“If any man here does not agree, if he thinks he knows a better way, if he thinks he would make a better leader and make better rules, then let him step forward now and challenge me.” Artemon strode from one end of the group to the other, looking from face to face. No one moved.
“Very well. I remind you of another rule. When a storm strikes at sea, some men aboard ship prepare for their fate by tying to their persons whatever valuables they possess. They do this as a signal to whoever should find their bodies: take these worldly goods in return for the favor of disposing of these remains in a decent fashion. This is a sacred bond between the dead and the living, between the victim of the storm and the scavenger. We honor and observe that bond. Using whatever dry wood we can collect from the beach and from the ship, we shall build a pyre. Any body we find, upon which the dead man’s wealth has been attached as an offering, will be stripped of valuables and then laid upon the pyre and burned, so that neither fish nor vultures can devour it. Does every man here understand? Does every man agree?”
“Yes,” I said, along with the others.
Artemon stared at us for a long moment. By the crinkling of his eyes, I could see that he smiled. “Then let’s begin!”
Following Artemon’s instructions, the men fell to various tasks. Some fetched the booty already collected by the scavengers and began loading it into the boats. Some ventured into the wrecked ship, carrying long axes to break through any obstacles; later they emerged carrying trunks and bundles of fabric and even a few amphorae of wine that had survived the wreck intact. Some began collecting wood and building the funeral pyre.
Others headed up and down the beach to comb through the debris and search the dead bodies. Among this last group I saw Hairy Shoulders, who apparently had left both his tunic and his loincloth in the boat, for he was going about the task completely naked. I had never seen a man with so much hair on his body.
I looked up and saw vultures circling overhead. Their wheeling flights converged above the little dune where the scavengers had been slain. While I watched, one vulture after another dared to land and pick at the corpses.
“Menkhep!” said Artemon, walking toward us. “You and Pecunius go and tend to those bodies.”
“You don’t expect us to drag them to the funeral pyre, do you?” said Menkhep.
“Of course not.” Artemon drew closer and lowered his voice. “But someone needs to scare off those vultures and search the bodies, to retrieve any valuables. I can trust you to do that without defiling the remains. Some of the men-they’re hardly better than animals, as you well know.”
“Come on, Pecunius.” Menkhep was clearly not pleased with our assignment.
The skittish vultures were easily dispersed. First we looked through the trappings of the camels, but found little of value. They had been hitched in a circle, their reins tied to a scrubby bush. Menkhep set about untying them, and indicated that I should do likewise.
“Are you sure we should let them go?” I said.
“We can hardly take them with us. Would you have them stand here in the hot sun and starve?”
Finally we turned to the task of searching the corpses.
I had as yet seen few dead men in my life, and touched even fewer with my own hands. The bodies were still warm and the wounds still wet with blood. From the similarity of their features and the range of ages-the eldest had a white beard, and the youngest was hardly bigger than Djet-I realized that the scavengers might all be members of a single family. If that were the case, the lone survivor would be returning to a household of women soon to be wracked with grief.
Some of the men wore rings and necklaces, none of any great value. Between them we retrieved only a handful of coins. Upon several of these the serene profile of King Ptolemy had been smeared with blood. Menkhep wiped the coins clean before dropping them in the bag tied at his waist.
Menkhep paused and tilted one ear upward. “Do you hear that?”
I listened. Above the quiet surf, the creaking of the wrecked ship, and the sound of the men shouting back and forth, I heard a noise like the whimper of an animal, very faint but from somewhere nearby. The noise faded, then I heard it again, louder and more plaintive than before.
“That’s a woman,” said Menkhep, lowering his voice.
“Are you sure?”
“Come!” He gestured for me to be silent and follow.
We trudged through the sand to the top of the dune. In the shallow depression below us, atop a bed of succulents, glistening with beads of sweat under the hot sun, I saw the heaving, hirsute backside of Hairy Shoulders. What he was doing was obvious, but the body beneath his was so much smaller that I could hardly see her. At last Hairy Shoulders pulled back, and I saw the bloodless face of a young girl framed by a nimbus of curly chestnut hair. Her eyes were shut and her mouth was frozen in a grimace. It was hard to tell whether she was conscious or not, but she was clearly in pain.
Beside me, Menkhep put two fingers in his mouth and produced a shrieking whistle.
A moment later, Artemon came running up the little hill, followed by several others. Interrupted by the whistle, Hairy Shoulders had withdrawn from his victim and rolled to one side. He looked up at us dumbly. His hairy chest was matted with blood, and for a moment I thought he must be wounded. Then I realized the blood had come from a deep gash across the girl’s breasts. The tattered remains of her clothing were pasted with sweat and blood to her motionless body.
“It wasn’t me who stabbed her!” shouted Hairy Shoulders. “It must have been the scavengers. They must have had their way with her before they started ransacking the boat, then they left her here to die.” There was a note of panic in his voice. When I saw the look on Artemon’s face, I understood the man’s fear. Artemon’s gaze was like that of a basilisk: furious, implacable, without mercy.
“Did you not hear what I said, before we began, Osor?” Artemon’s low, chilling tone was more frightening than if he had shouted.
“Of course I heard. But it’s not like I harmed the girl myself. I told you, this is how I found her. I ask you, what man wouldn’t take advantage of such a situation, eh?” He managed a crooked grin. While he talked, his manhood, which appeared to be just as prodigious as he claimed, had withered until it almost vanished amid the forest of hair between his legs.
“You must see that you leave me no choice,” said Artemon.
“What? Why do you say that?” Hairy Shoulders’s voice broke. “It’s not what you think, I tell you! She was enjoying it. Don’t you see?” He turned to the girl, but when he touched her, he pulled back his hand and gave a stifled cry.
The girl was dead.
“Bring him to the beach, where everyone can see,” said Artemon. The others descended on Hairy Shoulders and carried him, twisting and shouting, up and over the crest of the dune and toward the beach.
Artemon looked at Menkhep. “You and Pecunius, carry the girl to the funeral pyre.”
It was a strange and loathsome duty, having to touch a body so recently alive. As we moved her, a warm breath issued from the girl’s mouth so that she seemed almost to sigh, but the reedy, hollow sound was not like anything I had ever heard from the lips of a living mortal. Her body was limp and weighed very little. I could easily have carried her by myself, had I cared to pick her up in my arms, as occasionally I had picked up Bethesda for the simple joy of holding her and carrying her about. Instead, Menkhep and I shared the burden, carrying her like a sack or some other object, and our progress across the sand was slow and painfully awkward. Menkhep, who had searched the slain scavengers with no sign of squeamishness, appeared quite unnerved by this task. We both sighed with relief when at last, slowly and gently, we laid the girl’s body atop the makeshift pyre of debris and driftwood.
In the meantime, Hairy Shoulders’s ankles had been bound and his wrists tied behind his back. He had been lain over a crate taken from the wreckage, so that his head hung over the edge. He was quietly weeping.