Ancient Evenings (12 page)

“Did He succeed?” asked Menenhetet. And replied, “Not at this time, not here. Horus still owned, we must remember, the old thumb of Set that Isis tied into the thick hair of His head. Now, head down, the bolt of Set riding on His sphincter, He knew that if He did not escape, the Land of the Dead might yet be carved out of His bowels. So, He reached up a hand, tore out a gout of hair to free the thumb, and waved it in the air. Set’s erection was lost. Abruptly Set’s penis was as small as His amputated thumb, and Horus, in a tempest (at last!) of godly fury at what almost had been done to Him, seized the testicles of Set with such force that the calm of the heavens was forever disturbed. The sudden noise of a squall is equal to the fury with which Set struck back at Horus’ brow, and the young man’s face was soon hideous, His eyes half uprooted. He looked like a hippopotamus.

“On this moment, they entered a new form of battle. While transformations are common in godly war, and the Gods seek to be artful in Their choice, still, They must also be ready to take up the form of any beast They come, willy-nilly, to resemble. So, when Set tore the eyes of Horus half out of His head and gave Him the expression of a hippopotamus, Horus was obliged to turn into that unfamiliar creature.

“They fought then in a bog, hippopotamus against hippopotamus, with grunts, hoarse slaverings, and atrocious roars, Their limbs so short and sturdy that when each got a leg of the other in His throat, the spectacle became as obscene as the sight of hogs suckling in a trough.

“Yet the judges were not disgusted. This part of the battle was expected to thrash in the mires, and gather up the repulsions of the atmosphere, drain the swamps, and flush the filth of the Nile. It would have been a great purification if it had gone on, but Set called a halt. The slime of Their bodies had begun to excite Him. He was losing ferocity too quickly. Set had assumed that Horus, being younger, would be rendered anxious by such slippery contact, but to Horus, this steaming intimacy was gloomy. He wanted His teeth in Set—none of this slithering of torsos—He strained for that luminous instant when the rage of your effort can taste the blood of the other. His lower teeth protruded, His nostrils drew together, His skin in repudiation of such oily struggle grew bristles. His lower teeth were like tusks. He had changed into a wild boar.

“Applause came to Him from the Gods Who watched. It was daring to choose the animal most like Set, and brilliant to select such a transformation now rather than to let Set choose it for the end. Horus could hardly have done better. Was there another hour of His life when He was more of a wild boar? He and Set came charging out of the marsh and ran up and down the field, slashing into each other’s flanks, biting ferociously, sobbing and shrieking, carving wounds into one another until a spray of blood flew off each time They came together with a crash.

“To the surprise of most, the advantage was turning to Horus. A God, like a man, is never stronger than in the hour He discovers His valor. Horus was delivered of oppression—He was no longer afraid to fight. What uproar in Himself! He even enjoyed the intoxication of the pain. Each time Set’s teeth tore His hide, He roared with new ferocity, His torn eyes pulled back into the knotty little sockets of the boar, while two gems of fire looked out. His broken nose was like a red and bleeding mouth, and the teeth that cut through His lips glistened in a collar of spikes. Set fled. To the jeers of the onlookers He retreated far enough to gain time for the last transformation. When He turned back to the field, it was as a black bear. Such a choice was difficult to comprehend since Horus had more of the natural build of such an animal, but the pain of Set’s wounds was great enough to look for the thickest hide, and He buried Himself in the meats and folds and near-to-impenetrable substance of a bear. There, He undertook His defense.

“This strife between the bears went on for a day, and then a night, and before They were done, it was three days and three nights. Horus held Set in a captive grip and made Him undergo a long and stubborn torment as He was bled of the great power of a bear. To sustain Himself in this pain, He had no more to call upon than the endless bitterness of His life, and it provided the fortitude not to surrender. It even enabled Him to withstand the exultation of Horus Who passed through all the intoxications of victory except victory itself, and so was exhausted finally of all enthusiasm, and merely lay with the bulk of His bear body upon the bear’s body of Set, and kept His teeth in the neck of Set until all the illumination He had tasted in His enemy’s blood was consumed and Horus lay at last with His caked face in the matted fur of the other.

“On the morning of the fourth day, declared victor by the judges, He had ropes brought to Him, and in a creaking voice ordered His assistants to pinion Set’s limbs to stakes, and when they were finished, Set lay on His back, body lashed, looking at the sky. Slowly, like the change of light over the hours of the day, so did Set come back into the form of a wounded man lying near death on the field, but Horus was taken up on the shoulders of His friends and carried away to the river where They washed His wounds and cleaned the ravages of His face. Slowly, He, too, gave up the body of the bear. Then Horus slept for a day and a night in the joy of knowing that Set would not escape since guards trusted by Isis were in watch over Him.”

And as if his words could be my words, my great-grandfather now became silent. His story, however, did not cease. Indeed, I do not think it lost one thought.

FIVE

Horus slept well. It was a night for celebration, and the Gods cheered every appearance of Isis and Osiris. For the first time in years, the Lord of the Dead offered the touch of two fingers to His wife’s elbow (an old gesture to tell of carnal desire in the midst of formal ceremony) but Isis felt a foreboding that had little to do with pleasure. “Do You know,” said Osiris, “the boy was better than I expected,” and decided one virtue of this victory was that it enabled Him to feel love for His son.

“I am worried Set will escape,” Isis answered, and later, when They tried to sleep, She was restless and went off to walk in the night, while Osiris tried to meditate on the source of Her uneasiness. He saw the face of His first son, Anubis, and sighed as quietly as a leaf listening to the approach of a light wind. In that sigh was the recognition by Osiris that His mind might be as pure as silver, and luminous as the moon, but His talents for divination could never be applied to any matter concerning Set. He had lost that power on the night He made love to Nephthys. One did not torture the feelings of a brother without disturbing every composure of the deep.

Now, when Isis reached the field where Set was pinioned in His bonds, She dismissed the guard and sat in the moonlight. Set made no sign at Her appearance. Exhaustion hung in tatters on His presence. So it was not easy to tell Him of His crimes nor the grim years He had caused. Instead, Isis found Herself brooding over the young and naked body of Her sister Nephthys next to the body of Osiris and felt Herself shaking with surprising rage. “I suffer,” Isis said to Herself, “for all those who are deadened by evil copulations,” and She could feel no wrath at Her brother, only the strength of the silence between Them. Now, She heard Set say, “Sister, cut My bonds.”

She nodded. She felt meek. Beneath the light of the moon, Isis cut the ropes from Set, and He rose slowly from the ground, and, looking at Her, made the curious and childlike move of putting His thumb into His mouth. Sparks flew from His fingers and She saw His strength return. Then Set saluted and walked away.

Now, Isis knew a little of what She had done. By this unforeseen generosity to Set, She had begun to pay for ignoring the sacrifice suggested by Maat. So, She could not return to Osiris, but wandered through the night, and did not care what happened to Her. And in the morning, awakening with bad thoughts of His mother, Horus crossed the field to find that His uncle was gone.

Poor Horus. Until this battle, His emotions had tasted no better than the food of peasants who toil in caves: roots, grubs, and smoked beetles were the nourishment of His heart. Now, He had been to the feast of His own triumph. He was a man whose temper blazes for the first time in righteousness. “Where is My mother?” He roared in a voice to recall the worst voice of Set, and who did not hear? Nor did He have any trouble in finding Her. The eyes of those who had seen Isis pass, looked away. He could determine the direction She had taken by observing the back of everyone’s head, and in the woods, He soon found Her.

“Who has released My enemy?” He asked.

Then Isis was afraid, yet She answered, “Do not speak in such a tone to Your mother.”

He heard the fear She hoped to conceal, and, on the instant, raised His sword, and cut off Her head. “Now that I am victorious, I will never hesitate again,” He started to say, but burst into tears instead, and wept with more grief than He had ever known. Picking up the head of His mother, Horus ran into the wilderness.

On the instant, what was left of Isis turned into a statue of flint. In such a headless state would She remain.

It is possible Osiris never knew a greater test of His understanding. While He could perceive His wife’s act as a godly response to some warp in the order of things, it could not be said He felt forgiveness toward Horus. I was right, thought Osiris, not to trust My Son. What savage temper! Conceived out of the chill of My corpse, He is wild as a weed. “The future Lord of the Living is wild as a weed,” repeated Osiris, and He was not given to repetition. But He did not know what to do. Hideous was the prospect of being wed forever to a headless statue. Indeed, how could one avenge such a wife? Yet, He could not leave Horus unpunished. That would invite chaos. So, Osiris gave word that His Son must be pursued.

Set was the first to take up the chase. He went out as a middle-aged warrior hardly healed from His wounds. He had, however, regained confidence. For when Isis cut His bonds, He felt as if a great power was released from Her and given to Him, and He prayed for noble and exalted strength. To the Hidden One, He said: “Monarch of the Invisible, allow Me a magnification of this great power that Isis releases (by betraying Her Son). Let lightning be as five hands where once it was five fingers.” The heavens answered in a quiet voice, “Put the thumb that still belongs to You in Your mouth,” and Set did as He was told, and felt balm come into His wounds, and His eight free fingers gave off sparks. So He was confident when He went out to look for Horus.

There was no battle, however. Set came upon a youth who sat in the stupor of grief. Set did not waste the opportunity. Immediately, He plucked out Horus’ eyes (and indeed they were still weak from the wounds of the war). As Horus ran about in a circle (for blindness came upon Him in a whirlpool of pain) a stroke of lightning more deranging than the fall of a great stone shivered the earth, and the blood-red sockets of Horus’ face showed as green as the brilliance of grass. Set felt a fear of the force given to Him by His prayer, and gave up all attempt to kill Horus. Instead, He grasped the head of Isis and ran away. Horus, seeking to pursue, stumbled off a cliff at the edge of the wood, and wandered in blindness through the desert.

By then, Set was far off. Having been granted this success, Set was not free of the awe He felt before these new powers. So, He took the eyes of Horus from the pouch in which He kept them, and planted those eyes in the ground, and even as He watched, they grew and became the lotus, which plant had never been seen before (and this lotus was soon to proliferate and become the royal plant of the Pharaohs). Watching, Set was tempted, however, to desecrate the head of His sister. The voice that had told Him to suck His thumb was now mocking Him. “You are too kind to Your enemies,” said that voice. “Do not weaken what lives in the roots of Your temper. Befoul Her. Pollute Her flesh.” From His anus to His navel, Set was one godly churn. The head of His phallus was a plum ready to burst. Lust was the purest impulse He knew—to paint semen on another. But in fear, He forced Himself away, and in a convulsion, masturbated over a field of lettuce. “Oh,” murmured the voice, “You have made a mistake.”

Set did not listen. What masturbator does? Chilled, subdued, He quit those silent bespattered vegetables, and came back to Memphi, but on every day that followed, His hunger to gorge on lettuce had become as great as His taste for meat.

So soon as He returned, Set presented the head of His sister to Her statue. Isis did not trust the gift. Mute, and incarcerated in stone, still She could feel that the head was contaminated. Thoth, Who had been serving as Her doctor, while other Gods were off in search of Horus, was also dubious. Thoth, with His thin arms and baboon face, might be the least virile of the Gods—He was married to Maat!—but He was also the Chief of Scribes and the Lord of Words. Of course, He would be the one to know how to speak to a statue. Having been alone with Isis for many hours, He began to put His hands on the flint with subtle strokes. So Isis began to converse. When it came to such matters, Thoth had the finest ears. After He laid a finger on the stone, He knew how to receive the reply. (It was in the quality of the silence. But how many have ears to distinguish between one silence and another?)