could spell out a message to any other within sight, across a valley, from peak to peak, or from city wall to plain and river. With the flags Tanus was able to warn Remrem to be ready for us that night. Then, under cover of darkness, twenty of our galleys raced into the beach below the city walls. At the same moment, Remrem threw open the side-gates, and, at the head of his regiment, fought his way through the Hyksos pickets. Before the enemy were able to harness their horses, Remrem and all his men were safely embarked.
Immediately, Tanus signalled the rest of the flotilla to weigh anchor. He abandoned the city of Asyut to sack and plunder, and we bore on upstream under oars. For the rest of that night, whenever we looked back over the stern, we saw the flames of the burning city lighting the northern horizon.
'Let those poor bastards forgive me,' Tanus muttered to me. 'I had no choice but to sacrifice them. My duty lies south of here in Thebes.'
He was soldier enough to make the hard choice without flinching, but man enough to grieve bitterly over it. I admired him then as much as I loved him.
REMREM TOLD US THAT OUR SIGNAL frigates had sailed past Asyut the previous day, and that by now the despatches that I had drawn up on Tanus' behalf must be in Lord Nembet's hands.
Remrem was also able to give us some intelligence and news of the Hyksos, and his sweep to the south. Remrem had captured two Egyptian deserters and traitors who had gone over to the enemy and who had entered Asyut to spy on the defenders. Under torture they had howled like the jackals they were, and before they died, had told Remrem much about the Hyksos that was of value and interest to us.
The Hyksos king, whom we had so disastrously encountered on the plain of Abnub, was named Salitis. His tribe was of Semitic blood and originally a nomadic and pastoral people who had lived in the Zagros mountains near Lake Van. In this my first impression of these terrible Asians was confirmed. I had guessed at their Semitic origins from their features, but I wondered how a pastoral people had evolved such an extraordinary vehicle as a wheeled chariot, and where they had found that marvellous animal that we Egyptians now spoke of as a horse, and feared as though it were a creature from the underworld.
In other areas it seemed that the Hyksos were a backward people. They were unable to read or write, and their government was a harsh tyranny by their single king and ruler, this bearded Salitis. We Egyptians hated him and feared him even more than we did those wild creatures that drew his chariot.
The chief god of the Hyksos was named Sutekh, the god of storms. It needed no deep religious instruction to recognize in him our own dreaded Seth. Their choice of god was fitting, and their behaviour did the god honour.
No civilized people would burn and plunder and murder as they did. The fact that we torture traitors cannot be weighed in the same scale as the atrocities committed by these barbarians.
It is a truth that I have often observed, that a nation chooses its gods to suit its own nature. The Philistines worship Baal, and cast live infants into the fiery furnace that is his mouth. The black Cushite tribes worship monsters and creatures from the underworld with the most bizarre rituals. We Egyptians worship just and decent gods who are benevolent towards mankind and make no demands for human sacrifice. Then the Hyksos have Sutekh.
It seemed that Remrem's captives were not the only Egyptian traitors travelling with the enemy host. With a hot coal in his anus, one of Remrem's captives had told of some great Egyptian lord from the Upper Kingdom who sat upon King Salitis' war council. When I heard this, I remembered how I had wondered at the knowledge that the Hyksos had displayed of our order of battle upon the plain of Abnub. I had guessed then at the presence of a spy among them who knew our secrets.
If any of this was true, then we must expect that the enemy knew all our strengths and weaknesses. They must know the plans and defences of all our cities. Especially they would know of that rich treasure that Pharaoh had accumulated in his funerary temple.
'Perhaps this explains the haste with which King Salitis is driving on towards Thebes,' I suggested to Tanus. 'We can expect them to attempt a crossing of the Nile at the first opportunity that presents itself to them.' And Tanus cursed bitterly.
'If Horus is kind, he will deliver this traitorous Egyptian lord into my hands.' He punched his fist into the palm of his other hand. 'We must prevent Salitis from crossing the river, our ships are the only advantage that we hold over him. I must exploit them to full advantage.'
He stamped about the deck, and looked up at the sky. 'When will this foul wind swing back into the north? Every hour the enemy's chariots draw farther ahead of us. Where is Nembet's fleet? We must join our forces and hold the river-line.'
THAT AFTERNOON ON THE POOP-DECK OF the royal barge the state council of Upper Egypt convened before the throne. The high priest of Osiris represented the spiritual body, Lord Merseket: the chancellor stood for the temporal body of the: state, and Tanus, Lord Harrab stood for the military authority.
Between them the three lords lifted Queen Lostris to the throne of this very Egypt, and placed her son upon her lap. While every man and woman on board the barge raised their voices in a loyal salute, the other ships of the fleet sailed past, and even the wounded soldiers dragged themselves to the rail to cheer the new regent and the young heir to the great throne of Egypt.
The high priest of Osiris strapped the false beard of the kingship upon my mistress's chain, and it did nothing to detract from her beauty and manifest womanhood. Lord Merseket bound the lion's tail around her waist and settled the tall red and white crown upon her brow. Finally, Tanus mounted the throne to place the crook and golden flail to her hands. Now Memnon saw the shining toys that Tanus carried towards him, and reached out to snatch them from him.
'A king indeed! He knows the crook is his by right,' Tanus applauded proudly, and the court roared their approval of this precocious behaviour.
I think this was the first time that any of us had laughed since that dreadful day on the field of Abnub. It seemed to me that the laughter was a catharsis, and that it marked a new beginning for all of us. Up until that moment we had been overwhelmed by the shock of defeat and the loss of Pharaoh. But now, as the great lords of Egypt went forward one at a time to kneel before the throne on which sat this lovely young woman and her royal child, a fresh spirit sprang up in all of us. We were rescued from the apathy of despair, and our will to fight and to endure was resuscitated. Tanus was last of all of them to kneel before the throne and swear his allegiance. As she looked down upon him, Queen Lostris' adoration for him was so evident that it suffused her lovely face and shone like the sunrise from those dark green eyes. I was amazed that no other in all that throng seemed aware of it.
That evening after the sun had set, my mistress sent me to the bridge of the state barge with a message for the commander of her armies. She summoned him to a council of war in the main cabin. This time Tanus dared not
