Ancient Evenings (95 page)

I was thinking of Queen Nefertiri lying in the dark of a closed sedan chair. Her legs had been parted by a Pharaoh whose grandfather had been a soldier like me. Yet, Her blood was descended from Hat-shep-sut.

Why had Nefertiri never spoken of Ramses the First? Was my Queen ashamed? Now, in this moment, when I thought of Usermare, I did not dare to say it, but if the majesty of a Pharaoh was a virtue granted Him because He was crowned, then the Gods of Egypt, if They chose, could make any man a God. I told myself that I had been General-of-all-the-Armies, and therefore, could become a Pharaoh! Even as had Harmhab and Ramses the First before me.

Rama-Nefru said, “Here, take My hand. When I am lonely, I need a friend.”

Since I knew how the touch of one hand upon another could produce astonishing results in Her, I was uneasy. Yet such were the thoughts I had just had, that I also felt ready. I took Her hand. The surprise, I may say, was delightful. She had the softest palm I ever held. Then She gave a radiant smile, as if no bleak thought could live beneath the radiance of Her golden wig, and handed me a flower. It was a fresh pink rose. She said, “Its bloom has opened this morning.”

I held it to my nose, my other hand touching Her hand, and felt a sorrow lift from Her and come over to me through the petals of the flower. I did not know if I liked Her, yet out of that music in Her heart, so different from mine, one note must have been the same. For we felt the same sorrow.

We sat there holding hands, and memories of the Battle of Kadesh came back to me. She had been born after that day, but lived in the shadow of the battle. So, I knew, as I say, Her misery. I even heard Her silent lamentations as Usermare and Nefertiri came forth in one another.

Now, Her chamber may have had no window with a long view, but I was still so close to the thoughts of Usermare that I soon became aware He was on His way, and indeed was approaching across the Palace walks. In truth, I was ready for His visit so nicely and with such calm that I did not withdraw my hand from Rama-Nefru until I could hear His step in the next chamber. Then our fingers came apart with the lingering touch of two lovers separating from a kiss.

I waited in the anteroom. Now, Usermare was with Her and holding Her hand. I listened. I had never felt as gentle, nor as unlike a man before, not even when I had been treated like a little queen by Usermare. At such times, all of me had been in a terrible contraction. The more He had made me feel like a woman, the more I knew the anguish of a man. But now, as if the cries of pleasure uttered by Nefertiri left a wound in me whose bleeding would not be staunched, I felt as peaceful as the Nile in the abatement of its flood, and never more immersed in sorrow. The river might as well have contained the water of all who ever wept. That sorrow increased as Usermare began to hold Her palm. For with all Their sighs and heavy silences, I could feel the infidelity of Rama-Nefru’s hand as it lay in His.

The Hittites, I told myself, had four seasons, not three. So Her hand was like a fourth mouth, and Her heart more subtle than ours. Like the turns of the lobes of the liver She studied for so long, Her cruelty might be as subtle as Her heart. I do know that on this night She chose to speak of the Battle of Kadesh, and never uttered a word about Nefertiri. Yet I was certain that before She was done, He would suffer injury.

Here, Ptah-nem-hotep interrupted my great-grandfather, the sound of His voice bringing me back from the sweet indolence of my absorption. For my Father’s voice was harsh, as if He had recovered His strength but was in a rush to exercise it before losing such force again.

He began: “You have not said what was in My ancestor’s mind.”

“I have not,” agreed Menenhetet.

“Did you know His mind in this hour?”

My great-grandfather nodded. “Under the spell of Ma-Khrut, I can say that I knew His thoughts.”

My Father was pleased but agitated. “I, too, would claim,” He told my mother, speaking to her as much as to my great-grandfather, “that I am under your family spell. For I also know His thoughts. I, too, can see Him returning to the Columns of the White Goddess, and such a sight is rare, but …” Ptah-nem-hotep hesitated, as if daring much, “… He is, on this occasion, alone on the path.”

“That is the same,” said my great-grandfather, “as the way I see it.”

“Tell Me then if what I possess of His thoughts is exact. I believe He is trying, even as I, to recollect the noble exploits of great Pharaohs before Him. He is telling Himself that Amenhotep the Second killed more than a hundred lions. He also thinks of Thutmose the Third and the ships of Hat-shep-sut. Now, He is so unfortunate as to pass by the place in the reflecting pool where His head crashed to the marble. On this recollection, He feels a terrible pain in His groin. Is this exact?”

“It is true measure,” said my great-grandfather.

“His stomach,” my Father said with more confidence, “is full of pain. He knows a fear of Thutmose the Great. The stones of Thutmose grind in His bowel. Then Usermare stumbles and nearly falls from the force of the kolobi He has been drinking since the hour with Nefertiri. Many Gods pitch about in His thoughts. All the same, He begins to sing:

“An Egyptian Princess has deep and bottomless eyes,

“I will spend the night with Her under the stars.

“How sweet is the taste of honey in Her mouth.”

Menenhetet rose to his feet.

“Did He sing that song?” asked my Father.

Again, my great-grandfather nodded.

“But the song,” said Ptah-nem-hotep, “does not take away His fear. As soon as He enters the halls of the White Goddess to see Rama-Nefru, His chest thumps like the heart of a stallion. All the while He repeats to Himself the name of Kadesh. The battle reverberates in His heart until He can feel Himself a Pharaoh like none before. Indeed He loves the names of the Hittite Gods because they remind Him of Kadesh. He says them to Himself: Kattish-Khapish. Valizalish. Is that true?”

“It is exact. You have heard it with exactitude of measurement,” said Menenhetet, and to show how moved he was, he crossed the patio, knelt, and kissed the ground before the Pharaoh’s feet. My Father, with a smile of happiness on His face, knelt in turn, and with His hand grasped the big toe of Menenhetet.

I had learned the word to describe all that was most exquisite to these two, great lords. It was
exactitude
.

TEN

This time, my Father’s strength was not consumed by entering the thoughts of Usermare, and He came to sit with my mother and me. Indeed, if not for His heavy breathing, I believe He was left most content with the achievement. The wind in His chest ceased to sound like a storm, and with a small gesture of His hand, He requested that Menenhetet resume what He had been telling. I, at the moment, happy my Father had returned, if only from across the patio, was soon listening again (in the manner I enjoyed so much) at the very entrance to sleep, and every voice soon became a murmur.

I can tell you, my great-grandfather related, that Ramses may have entered Her room with Kadesh on His tongue, but when Rama-Nefru did not upbraid Him, and gave instead the gift of Her hand, He was relieved to sit in silence and restore His calm. Then, to His surprise, Rama-Nefru began to speak of the battle, and told Him what She had heard of it in Her childhood. Listening in the next room, I soon decided that no story could be better chosen to suit the air of Thebes on this night when fires were burning at every crossroad. Indeed, one’s breath was nearer to the smoke of Kadesh than on any evening I had known by the Nile.

“In the year before You came with Your mighty armies against us,” She said, “our Hittites went to war with the Medes, and we won a great victory. As a child, I often heard of the splendor of that celebration. From the town wall, our people hung draperies of the most brilliant colors, purple, red, and blues richer than the sky of the day, and all these cloths were much embroidered until the walls looked like the interior of a palace.

“Then My uncle Metella and his officers had a great party where they drank from gold and silver cups he had taken out of the temples of conquered nations, and My uncle found much pleasure in using these sacred vessels of the vanquished. Having asked for a trellis to be built in his garden, he hung the head of the King of the Medes there. While he drank, he liked to look at this head hanging from a branch, and it gave him strength. Although My uncle did not need such strength. He was near to a giant in size.”

“I did not know that,” said Usermare. He waited in much doubt, but finally asked, “Was he taller than Me?”

“I have never seen a taller man than You,” She said.

“Yet You were still a child when Metella died. So You cannot know.”

“I cannot know,” She agreed, “but where is the King who can lift his head nearer to the sky than You?”

He grunted. “Do You feel well?” He asked. I could feel His desire to offer His tongue to Her blond hairs.

“I feel weak at this hour,” She replied, “but ready to tell You more.”

“I wish to hear it.”

The people behind the walls of Kadesh knew, She told Him, that the Egyptians were coming. They had had word of the departure from Gaza. Spies with fast horses had come to the city each day bringing news of the advance of the Egyptians. Great was the uneasiness. Even as the Armies of Usermare marched forward, so did the full moon draw near. But the morning after a full moon was called the Day of Sappattu and on that day, strenuous activity was forbidden. The Hittites could not fight on such a day. It was the hope of Kadesh that the Egyptians would arrive on the morning before the Day of Sappattu so that the city would not be lost. To induce the Egyptians to march into battle a day early, they even conducted a ceremony. Within the walls, many fires were lit, and priests spoke prayers into the flame. Metella, however, did not attend. It was reckless to expose the King. The person of the King was never to be attached to the flame. “Magic,” said Rama-Nefru, “when it does not burn one’s foe, can eat oneself.”

“Well, where was he while the fires were going?”

“In his Palace preparing to sleep. He was looking for a sleep of truthful dreams.”

“How would he do this?”

“I have told You how. Many times. By fasting all day. The question to which one desires an answer will also be hungry.”

Metella did not know whether the Egyptians would advance on Kadesh by the left or the right bank of the river. He hoped to be able to address the question to Marduk Himself, although the God was not easy to reach. It was equal in difficulty to walking across a chasm on one of the giant hairs that grew out of the God’s head. So it was necessary to have the purest sleep in order to know the best balance.

“What if Marduk had told him of disasters to come?”

“Then,” said Rama-Nefru, “one could prepare for one’s doom. That is better than to wait blindly.”

“I never want to hear bad omens,” said Usermare.

“We believe it is better,” She said, “to know, than to hope.”

He snorted. “What happened while he slept?”

“In the middle of the night, he awoke with a headache.”

That was no good sign. If the Gods did not speak, then a vow would have to be taken. The priests shaved Metella of his beard and the hairs of his body. The heavy black curls, when collected, overflowed a bowl.

The High Priest stuffed this hair into a vase, and sealed it, and the vow was taken to carry this vase all the way to Gaza and bury it there. While the battle would certainly take place before any messenger could reach such a distant place, the vow would be secure if he was on his way before the armies met. So, in the middle of the night, they sent off a man.

Yet once the messenger was gone, the King’s headache remained. All who were near Metella thought an earthquake was close. The stones beneath their feet felt as slippery as the back of a snake. This must be a sign that the enemy would overthrow the walls. In an earthquake, the land loses its reason and many trees fall.

The High Priest of Kadesh engaged the King, therefore, in a rare ceremony. He asked Metella to put down his sceptre, take off his ring, remove his crown, and unbuckle sword and scabbard. Then, beside a statue of Marduk, the Monarch bowed before the High Priest. Since Metella was without any of the kingly appointments, his person was not inviolate, and he could be treated as a man. The High Priest thereupon struck him in the face many times, and did not stop until tears came to Metella’s eyes. His headache, however, was lessened. Now the people of Kadesh could have hope that the trees would not be uprooted. Still, the omens were poor. Outside the Palace, people were wailing in the middle of the night. It had become known that the King, trying to find a true dream, had wakened with much oppression.

When Metella’s headache still did not pass, the priests declared that more daring spells must be cast before the battle. This, however, would leave the King wholly unprotected. Metella had, therefore, to be removed from the battle. A substitute would be sent out in his place.

The King’s wrath, Rama-Nefru said, was great. Yet, having accepted the ceremony, he was bound to the word of the High Priest. All wept at the pain of Metella that he would have to remain behind, and he battered his head against the walls of his Palace.