Ancient Evenings (74 page)

Later that night, he felt strong enough to return to his home but when alone was miserable and decided to go back, yet, on the path, felt so weak that he could hardly climb the tree to her gardens, and once inside, found her morose and puffed up as if she had been weeping since his departure.

“My purposes have been twisted,” she said. “I knew it on the night when the Ka of Seti passed over to you.”

When Menenhetet spoke of his remorse at disobeying her instructions, she replied, “No, it is not your fault but mine. I forgot about the creature.”

He had never spoken of the pig, although he always supposed it came from her. “Did you send it,” he asked, “so that I would come to you?”

She nodded. She sighed. “He does not belong entirely to me. He was also fashioned from the evil thoughts of Sesusi. Now the creature may upset every one of our ceremonies.”

Having spoken this aloud, he knew she must perform the service quickly.

Taking a small square of clean linen from one of her ebony boxes, she carefully wrapped the piece of bone that had lodged in his throat, and laid it in the hollow belly of a carved ebony statue no larger than her hand, but it had the face of Ptah, the crown of Seker, and the body of Osiris. Quickly, she placed this on her broken altar, and built a fire of dried khesau grass. Then she took from the bodice of her gown a small mound of wax, and made of it a figure of Aapep.

She said: “Fire be upon you, Serpent. A flame from the Eye of Horus eats into the heart of Aapep.” The blaze on the altar leaped to the mouth of the ceiling, and the heat in the room was great. Menenhetet sat cross-legged in the pool of water that flowed from his skin, while Ma-Khrut uncovered her bodice to show her great breasts. By this light, they looked as red as the fire. “Taste of your death, Aapep,” she said. “Back to the flames. An end to you. Back, fiend, and never rise again.” Now she lay the wax figure of Aapep in the fold of a papyrus on which she had just drawn a serpent daubed with the excrement of her cats. Then she laid the offering into the fire of the altar, and spat upon it and said, “The great fire will try You, Aapep, the flame will devour You. You shall have no Ka. For Your soul is shriveled. Your name is buried. Silence is upon You.”

Menenhetet’s own throat was still swollen from the bone, his eyes ached, his lungs were choked. In his head, he knew the wrath of many Gods, but he did not complain. He did not dare. Legions of Gods collided on fields he could not see. He could even smell some of the dead and wounded in the smoke of the cat dung on the khesau grass. The battle was joined, and he was an ignorant soldier, but he would never desert Honey-Ball in such an hour. “O Eye of Horus,” she cried, “Son of Isis, make the name of Aapep to stink.” And Menenhetet smelled the dead and wounded Gods in the foul breath of the smoke. When Honey-Ball embraced him her lips were slippery like snakes, and her breath was as foul as the smoke. His sore and injured throat began again to retch.

She stepped forward to the altar, and said, “Arise, Pig of the Forbidden Meat. Enter the Circle. Reek of the Seven Winds.” Then she sang in seven voices, each voice uttering one sound, each voice lower than the one before, as if she descended a ladder into a pit where the Pig was kept. “I,” she sang, until her lyre, hanging from a cord on the wall, began to quiver, and “ee” she sang until he could hear her bowls of alabaster rattle, “ay” and his teeth ached, “oh,” and his belly moved, “oo,” went into his groin, and on “you” the ground stirred beneath his feet. In the lowest voice of all, in a sound of much contentment, lower than the throats of the beasts who lived in the swamps, she sang “uhhh,” and at the end he heard one clear grunt, and felt the stiff hairs of the Pig’s snout nuzzle him between the cheeks in the way it did those nights when Menenhetet walked alone through the Gardens.

Now, standing before the altar, she raised her knife, point on high, and said, “I invoke You, God of destruction. I invoke You Whose name is Set. I call You by all the names that others do not know.” She said names stranger than any he had ever heard. “You Whose name is Set I call by Iopakerbeth and Iobolkhoreth, by Iopathanax and Aktiophi, by Ereskhigal and Neboposoaleth, by Lerthexanax and Ethrelnoth. You will come to me as I kill all that is evil in the Pig,” and she turned in a circle, knife out, and Menenhetet felt the Pig’s tongue grow rigid like the end of a cut branch, then push upward for an instant between his cheeks and fall away. Menenhetet could feel blood beneath his feet, but when he looked down, the floor was dry. He saw the face of the Pig, however.

It was dying, but the light did not leave its eyes as in a common death when water seems to sink slowly into sand. The light from the eyes of the Pig went away in a flash of lights and sudden shadows, like a stream falling over rocks, and Menenhetet saw many expressions pass. He saw fear in the face of Usermare from the day at Kadesh when the Hittite broke His nose, and a great pride, wild as a glint in the eyes of a boar, reflected back from the moist nostrils of the beast. Then the animal died and its face was like the round features of Honey-Ball when her eyes were asleep in the circle of her face. He could see the Pig no longer.

This ceremony had been different from others. For now he felt no desire for Honey-Ball. That was done. The Pig was dead, and with it had gone the fury of his member and the pleasure of his heart. Menenhetet was sad.

“I did not mean to kill the Pig,” said Honey-Ball, “only the part I did not make myself.”

“Who can know what will come?” he said slowly.

She smiled, but did not answer, and Menenhetet was moved by her next thought. “It is over with us,” she told herself, and gave him the measure of her love by the sorrow that overflowed in her. It was then he knew that his Secret Name was lost as well. He-who-will-help-to-turn-the-neck-of-Usermare belonged to Menenhetet no more, and now he had nothing with which to resist his Pharaoh.

EIGHT

Now, on the next night, Menenhetet was obliged to hold the hand of Usermare in the House of Heqat, the Pharaoh of the Two-Lands lying on His back, flat as the valley before the rising of the river, while the little queens made love to Him. Heruit and Hatibi were at His toes and Amait and Tait at His chest. The river was beginning to rise and so His nipples must be caressed until they swelled like Hapi, the God of the Nile Who had the breasts of a woman. An-Her, the spirit of harmony, gave long slow windings of her tongue to the folds of His belly, and Menenhetet, holding Him by the hand, could feel His navel trembling like an ear, and Heqat gave licks of her tongue to His sword, her lips like the tents of the Blessed Fields that are made from the petals of roses, inasmuch as the beauty of her mouth was equal to the ugliness of her face. By His head, Djeseret, the Sublime One, and Tantanuit would kiss Him as He inclined His face to one, then the other, all of these eight little queens as devoted to His body as if they prayed by His side in the temple, and their tongues were comfortable with one another. By the light of the burning wick in the saucer of oil, their eyes were as full of gold as the eyes of a lion, and their limbs gleamed.

Yet Menenhetet also felt His woe. Black as the mud at the bottom of the Nile was the gloom that lay beneath, and it shifted in the depths of His body like monsters in the unseen fields of the river mud. Old trapped odors of the most terrible fear drifted into Menenhetet’s nostrils from the stones that had been moved to face the wall. Mixed with His lust, rich as the beating of a stallion’s heart, Usermare was most uneasy in His belly from the shift of these stones, and a thought came to His mind across many years. Clear as a voice that Menenhetet could hear, Usermare said to Himself: “In the old days when I made love to Nefertiri, I could feel My Kingdom turn within.”

From Menenhetet’s fingers, along the length of Usermare’s arm, and through His body to His sword, Menenhetet felt Usermare enter Nefertiri as in the days when she was as young as Rama-Nefru, and Usermare knew Nefertiri in that way now by the mouth of Heqat on His sword. So, Menenhetet could live in the belly of young Nefertiri and that was as tender and royal a sensation as evening in the last rose-light of the sun. Menenhetet could not help himself, and his loins spurted, and he was wet in all the weakness of a field slave caught pilfering by his Overseer.

Usermare threw off the kisses of His little queens, and inquired, “What splendor brought you forth?”

“I do not know, my Lord.”

Like a woman giving birth, the stones of the ancestors of Usermare were grinding in His bowels, but Menenhetet had come forth, and so he could no longer feel his Monarch’s pains. Instead he was left in all the loneliness of his own poor wet thighs. Yet, even as he closed his eyes, he saw the great stone doors of the Temple of Seti knocked down that week, he heard the clinking in his ears of inscriptions being chipped away.

Through such a route did the Governor of the Secluded return to the dark thoughts of the Pharaoh, and Menenhetet felt once more by way of Heqat how Queen Nefertiri was near, yet within Her was Amon, and the sword of the Hidden One was like a rainbow of light in the small forest between Her thighs. The gloom that lay like mud on the heart of Usermare was the name of Amen-khep-shu-ef, for that Prince was the child of Amon. It was Amon who had taken the place of Usermare between the thighs of Nefertiri.

Usermare’s blood raced with the anguish of the hare when caught in the jaws of the lion. The member of Usermare grew soft in the mouth of Heqat, for the rainbow who was Amon whispered to the young Nefertiri, “You will give birth to a Prince Who will slay His Father.” Nefertiri groaned in great pain and much delight, while Amon came forth in great size and radiance, even as Usermare came forth with none into the mouth of Heqat. A woe from the blackest caves of Seker lay on the heart of Usermare. He saw a son who wished to kill Him.

“I will cut off the nose of anyone who conspires against Me,” Usermare now said to the eight little queens and glared at them so fiercely that no hope of joy was left for the evening. Once again, He lay on His back, deep in gloom, holding the hand of Menenhetet while the little queens attended Him, and Heqat now stood to the side, trying to summon the Gods He desired to be near.

“O Great Pharaoh,” said Heqat, “King of the Reed and the Bee, Lord of the Two-Lands, Host of Thoth, Most-Favored of Ptah, Son of Ra, we anoint Your body.” Heqat laid an oil blessed by the High Temple of Amon between His toes, and other little queens anointed His orifices and laid oil on the muscles of His chest which were like the waves of the Very Green. Yet the despair of Sesusi was profound.

“O Golden Falcon,” said Heqat, “You, Who are Horus, Son of Osiris, You unite heaven and earth with Your wings. You speak to Ra in the sky and to Geb in the fields. You are Horus Who Lives in the Body of Great Usermare.” Heqat lay her face upon the groin of Sesusi, but He did not stir. He lay as if in His tomb.

“O King of Upper and Lower Egypt,” said Heqat, “Lord of the Two Lords, Horus and Set, Your speech is like fire …”

“I know no fire,” said Usermare. “I am cold. Amon has hidden Himself.”

“Amon has hidden from the treachery of men. But none can destroy Him,” said Heqat. “For He has made heaven and earth and He scattered the darkness on the waters. Amon made the day with light, and has no fear. Amon made the breezes of life for Your nostrils.”

“For My nostrils,” said Usermare.

“Amon,” said Heqat, “made the fruit and herbs and the fowl and fish for Your subjects. He will slay His enemies, as He has destroyed all who dare to revile Him. Yet, when His children weep, He hears them. O You Whose speech is like fire, You are the Son of Amon.” Heqat took into her mouth all that was in the groin of Usermare and the King gave a great groan, but nothing stirred.

Then, Menenhetet, holding the fingers of Usermare, felt a new fear. For his Pharaoh heard the seven sounds as clearly as if He had been present last night at the Execution-of-the-Pig, and the seven sounds crashed together, while the soup fell again upon the chest of Usermare. His heart burned with wrath, and a mist rose in His bowels from such heat. “I must gather My powers,” He said aloud, “so that I may calm the flood.” Why did He lie on His back if not to guide His thoughts toward all thoughts in His Kingdom that would soothe the flood? The high waters of this year must not rise too high. Yet He could not calm His thoughts. He was in a rage, and weary. He sighed heavily. No caress could relieve the dread upon His chest. “Never poison a Pharaoh, but at the time of the flood,” He murmured, and fear of Amen-khep-shu-ef returned like a foul smoke. Usermare sat up to stare at each of the little queens before Him. He looked at Heruit and Hatibi, Amait and Tait, An-Her and Heqat, Djeseret and Tantanuit, and he thought of other little queens not there, of Mersegert and Merit of the North, of Ahuri who performed the swallowing of the sword so well, and of Ma-Khrut—equal to Heqat at such services. His fingers gripped the hand of Menenhetet fiercely so soon as His mind saw the face of Honey-Ball. But His thoughts moved on to think of Oasis and Tbuibui and Puanet, of Squirrel and Rabbit and Creamy and many others. Like flowers waving before Him at the edge of the pond where Kadima swam at twilight, so did Usermare think of each little queen and wonder which one had sent out evil words.