A Vile Justice (20 page)

The chief scribe raised an eyebrow at this fresh information and the added cynicism. He unrolled another segment of scroll, revealing a new and very short column. "Reassigned to the garrison at Mennufer." He glanced at Bak. "There the record ends."

"Mennufer." Bak scowled. "I, too, served there five years ago, but as a charioteer, not an infantryman. We seldom crossed paths. Usually only on the practice field, and in such great numbers we didn't know names or recognize individual faces."

Simut eyed the scroll, thinking back in time. "I vaguely remember a Sergeant Min. Not an especially admirable individual, I seem to recall, but no worse than some I've met." He rolled the document into a tight, neat cylinder and retied the string around it. "If you tell me what you wish to learn..."

"I've heard he and Hatnofer were close, and I'm trying to prove the rumor true or false."

"If he was the man I remember, he used to hang around this villa more than his duties in the garrison warranted. Not because of her, I'd've thought. There was another man, one who came often to see Djehuty, a Sergeant Senmut. . ." "The man who was slain."

Simut nodded. "The pair were close. Too close, if you ask me. I heard they often caroused together, played throwsticks and knucklebones, won more than they should in games supposedly honest. However, Senmut was a favorite of Djehuty-a sentiment well beyond my understandingso I said nothing." Deep in thought, he tapped the scroll on a leg of the tripod supporting the lamp. "If Min came also to see Hatnofer, I never noticed."

Bak let out a long, disappointed sigh. Another dead end. Who could he turn to next? He needed Nofery, a skilled collector of gossip. But she was ten days' journey to the south, too far away to summon. Who, of all the people he had talked with since coming to Abu, would be the most likely to have his ear to the wind, gathering whispers as a hearing ear gathered prayers?

Bak found the guard Kames seated in the shade on the uppermost step of the family shrine in front of Nebmose's villa, head and shoulders supported by a column, mouth open, snoring. The wiry guard had been there for some time. Birds chirped overhead, so accustomed to the raucous noise he made that they had grown indifferent. Frogs croaked in the small, shallow pool, trying to compete. His spear lay on the ground, and a mother duck and her young waddled back and forth across the shaft, tearing apart the remains of a loaf of bread he had dropped near his feet.

Bak walked close. Quacking a warning, the duck led her chicks to the far side of the pool. The frogs grew silent. He peered inside the small building. As before, a fresh offering of flowers lay at the base of the ancestor bust. Whoever tended the shrine was faithful indeed.

He tossed the remains of the bread to the ducks, picked up the spear, and frowned at the sleeping man. Kames continued to snore. With guards like this, he thought, any number of outsiders could slip within the walls and slay five people. This one needed a lesson he would not soon forget.

Bak turned the spear around, point backward, and placed the butt end of the shaft under Kames's chin. Abruptly he lifted it, jerking the guard's head up, waking him with a start.

"Wha ... ?" Kames's eyes focused on the shaft, widened in terror, darted to Bak's face. "Sir!" He pulled his legs close, meaning to scramble to his feet, but dared not rise.

Bak kept his head pinned against the column. "Five people have been slain and this is the way you stand guard? What kind of man are you? One who naps while others die?"

"Sir." Kames tried to swallow, moaned. "I never sleep on duty, sir. Never!"

"Has it not occurred to you that the slayer might find you with your eyes closed and you, too, might forfeit your life?" "Please, sir. This is the first time. I swear it!"

Bak did not believe him for a moment, but he had come for information, not to see him punished for idleness. He withdrew the shaft from beneath the guard's chin. "When first I met you, Kames, I thought you a man of good sense. I searched you out to talk, not to accuse you of neglecting your duty."

The guard's face paled as the implied threat struck home. He scooted forward, well away from the column. "I've already told you all I know, sir."

"Where's your partner, Nenu?"

"He went to Lieutenant Amonhotep, thinking to gain advantage for himself by complaining about me." Kames stared at his clasped hands, his expression aggrieved. "He told the aide that I amble around like a cow in a pasture, paying no heed to my surroundings, thinking only of food and rest. Now, while I patrol this empty villa, he comes and goes, running errands for those of lofty status who toil for the governor."

"Who told you this?" Bak demanded. "Not Amonhotep, surely!" _.

"Nenu. He had to brag." Kames looked up at Bak, worry clouding his face. "Do you think I'll be punished on his sayso alone?"

Bak had Been for himself how indolent Kames was, but the truth was not always useful. "I see you as a man who's very much aware, one who watches and listens but keeps to himself all he sees and hears."

The guard's chest swelled at the praise. "Oh, I don't know about that, sir," he said, feigning modesty.

Bak sat down on the step beside him, a friendly companion, not a police officer. "Kames, I'm in need of information about a Sergeant Min. Have you ever heard the name?" "Not that I recall, sir."

"He was one who survived the storm we spoke of the other day. He saved Governor Djehuty's life."

"Oh, him!" Karnes clapped a hand to his forehead, grinned. "Now I know who you mean. Sergeant Min!" Bak had a feeling he should have brought along a couple jars of beer, one to jog Karnes's memory and the other to foster patience within himself. "He's been gone nearly five years, but his memory must live on. What've you heard about him?"

"I never knew him. I toiled in Nubt, guarding the governor's estate, until a year or so after he left. Not until I came to Abu did I hear him mentioned, and then not often. Few men dared speak of anyone connected to the storm when Sergeant Senmut was alive."

"They were friends, I've been told."

"They drank and wagered together, not always to the benefit of those who shared their good time. And I once overheard someone say..." The guard glanced around, assuring himself he and Bak were alone. ". . . they shared a secret about the governor."

Bak had trouble keeping his voice casual, his body relaxed. "What kind of secret, Kames?"

"Will you talk to Lieutenant Amonhotep for me, telling him Nenu lied?" The guard stared at his clasped hands, pretending nonchalance.

Bak wanted t take him by the neck and shake him. This was blackmail, plain and simple. "I have a feeling the lieutenant's already suspicious of the tale. Why else has he said nothing to you? If that's the case, it's best I remain apart and you go on with your task in as diligent a manner as you know how."

"But sir!"

Bak raised a hand, demanding silence. "If you find yourself in trouble, send for me. I'll do what I can-but only if you help me here and now."

Trying to look suitably chastened, but with a smirk slipping through, Kames leaned close and lowered his voice to a murmur. "The man who spoke, one I'd never seen before and have never seen since, said he knew for a fact that the governor panicked during the storm and Min saved him from himself. I heard later, from men whispering in the barracks, that they came back from the desert far ahead of the other survivors: Min, the governor, and a donkey carrying food and water. They were burned by the sun and tired, but neither man was hungry or thirsty."

"I wonder how great an effort they made to find others who might've survived?" Bak spoke more to himself than to the guard.

Kames gave him a knowing look, a nod of agreement. "They say Min was sent away so he couldn't make trouble in the garrison, but as a man of questionable character, would he not demand wealth or a lofty position in exchange for silence?"

Bak thought of Hatnofer, a woman reputed to be close to Min. Did he leave her behind as unwanted baggage and travel to Mennufer alone? Or did someone slay him to keep him quiet, leaving her to await a summons he could never give?

The wiry guard leaned so close their shoulders touched, and Bak could feel his warm breath on his ear. "Some say Min sailed north to a lofty position in a garrison far away. Others say he never set foot on board that ship. He was slain here, pushed down the water gauge, where the level of the floodwaters is measured."

Bak stared at the barred gate in front of the garden, trying to fit this new information into the old. As he had already concluded, Djehuty held within his heart a secret related to the sandstorm, one so shameful he would rather die than admit to it. Assuming Karnes's tale was true, he had behaved in a craven manner. If he would die rather than confess to

cowardice, would he not also kill to protect his secret? He might well have taken Min's life or, more likely, have had someone else commit the foul deed for him.

What of the five recent deaths? The patterns of the slayings pointed to Djehuty as the ultimate victim, not the slayerunless he had become so afraid his secret would be divulged that his wits were addled. Unlikely, but a possibility nonetheless.

Thinking of Kames's nap and the sleeping guard he had surprised at the gatehouse a few days earlier, Bak made a quick tour of the governor's compound. He was forced to conclude that security was irresponsibly lax. One would have expected the violent death of'the sergeant of the guard, Senmut, to bring about a strict adherence to good practices, but the reverse had happened. Or, more likely, Senmut had been as negligent as they, demanding nothing more than their present behavior. The problem now lay with Amonhotep, but he was too preoccupied by Djehuty's demands to come down with a firm hand, or even to notice.

Though convinced the slayer had come from within the compound rather than outside the grounds, Bak decided he would be equally lax if he failed to make a quick and, hopefully, intimidating inspection. After warning Amonhotep of his intent, he summoned Psuro and Kasaya. For the remainder of the day, the trio went from one guard to another, demanding cleanliness of individuals and weapons, improving stance, instilling proper procedures. Planting fear in their hearts, not only of the slayer but of the hard-nosed policemen from Buhen.

Finished witl~.the inspection, Bak sent Psuro and Kasaya into Abu to pick up their evening meal from the old woman who cooked for them. They had found the food in Pahared's wife's house of pleasure filling but singularly lacking in taste and appeal, so they had retained her services. While awaiting the pair's return, he would look at the water gauge, the place where Sergeant Min was rumored to have been slain.

After observing the gatehouse from a discreet distance, he strode out the front gate of the governor's compound, confident the guard-wide awake and vigilant-would have spotted anyone occupying the nearby walls or rooftops. If the archer still lived, he would not be lying in ambush close by. He hurried along the terrace overlooking the river. The sun hung low over the western escarpment, sending shafts of gold into a pallid sky, reflected on the smooth surface of the water.

Beyond the willows, whose graceful limbs waved gently in the breeze, he reached the entrance to the thigh-high mudbrick wall built close around the rectangular mouth of the - water gauge. An ancient grapevine, its trunk thick and knobby, its vines laden with clusters of ripening grapes shaded by a profusion of leaves, draped over the left-hand wall, covering much of its inner and outer surface. A stately sycamore towered overhead. Its rustling leaves sheltered a tiny black monkey that swung from limb to limb, squeaking.

Bak stepped through the open gateway and knelt at the top of an enclosed, steeply graded, rock-hewn staircase that plunged to the river. The steps served as the gauge by which priests from the nearby mansion of the lady Satet measured annual flood levels. In the gloom below, he could see the last of the year's deluge washing the lower stairs. A pale glimmer shone through the water, either a trick of the light shining from above or the opening to the river through which floodwaters entered and retreated. The hole through which a man would be pulled by the current should he fall, or be thrown, down the steps.

He eyed the well-like structure, trying to imagine a man pushed headlong down the steep stairway, tumbling out of control; head, shoulders, back, arms, and legs pounded by the hard stone steps; broken body swallowed by the waters below. After so long a time, with at least four floods to wash away any sign of violence, he did not expect to find confirmation of Min's death. But his first glance told him how easily a man could be slain here.

He rose to his feet. With his eyes on the water gauge, his thoughts on Min, he stepped back to the opening in the wall. The monkey's chattering increased in volume and rapidity; leaves rained down as it scrambled higher into the sycamore. Bak glanced up, wondering what had frightened it.

Just as he glimpsed the creature, something struck him hard on the back, forcing the air from his lungs, making him stumble forward. His foot hit the edge of the uppermost step and he lost his balance. He reached out, trying to save himself. His right hand slid over the rim of the open shaft and down the rough stone wall, scraping away a layer of skin. Leaves rushed through the fingers of his left hand, something hard scratched his wrist, the grapevine, and he grabbed. The vine dipped beneath his, weight. A long section tore away from the mudbrick wall above and flung him out over the depths of the water gauge. The far end held tight to the bricks, pulling him up short. He slammed face-forward into the rough-cut stone wall.