And I answered, “May all the gods of Egypt save me from a woman who wishes me well. Pharaoh also wishes only well, and the river is full of bobbing corpses because of his well wishing.”
I drank wine, and I wept, saying, “Merit, your cheeks are smooth as glass and your hands are warm. Let me touch your cheeks with my hps this night and put my cold hands into your warm ones so that I may sleep without dreaming, and I will give you whatever you desire.”
She smiled sadly and said, “The crocodile’s tail speaks through your mouth, but I am accustomed to that and I take no offense. Know therefore, Sinuhe, that I require nothing of you and never in my life have required anything of a man; from none have I taken a gift of any value. What I give I give from my heart, and to you also I give what you ask, for I am as lonely as you.”
She took the wine cup from my trembling hand, and having spread her mat for me, she lay down beside me, warming my hands in hers. I brushed her smooth cheeks with my lips and breathed in the fragrance of cedar from her skin, and I took pleasure with her. She was to me as my father and my mother-she was as a brazier on a winter’s night and a beacon on the shore that guides the seaman home through a night of tempest. When I fell asleep, she was to me Minea-Minea whom I had lost forever-and I lay against her as if on the floor of the sea with Minea. I saw no evil dreams but slept soundly, while she whispered in my ear such words as mothers whisper whose children fear the dark. From that night she was my friend, for in her arms I could believe once more that there was something greater than myself beyond my understanding, for which it was worth while to live.
Next morning I said to her, “Merit, I have broken a jar with a woman who is now dead, and I still have the silver ribbon with which I bound her long hair. Yet for the sake of our friendship, Merit, I am ready to break the jar with you if you wish it.”
Yawning she held the back of her hand across her mouth and said, “You must drink no more crocodiles’ tails, Sinuhe, since they make you talk so foolishly next day. Remember that I grew up in a tavern and am no longer an innocent girl who might take you at your word-and be sorely disappointed!”
“When I look into your eyes, Merit, I can believe that there are good women in the world,” I said, and I brushed her smooth cheeks with my mouth. “That was why I said it, that you might know how much you are to me.”
She smiled.
“You note that I forbade you to drink crocodiles’ tails, for a woman first shows her fondness for a man by forbidding him something, to feel her own power. Let us not talk of jars, Sinuhe. You know that my mat is yours whenever you are thus lonely and sorrowful. But be not offended if you find that there are others lonely and sorrowful besides yourself, for as a human being I too am free to choose my company, and I hold you in no way bound. And so, in spite of all, I will give you a crocodile’s tail with my own hand.”
So strange is the mind of man and so little does he know his own heart that my soul at this moment was as free and light as a bird, and I recalled nothing of the evil which had come to pass during those days. I was content and tasted no more crocodiles’ tails that day.
4
Next morning I came to fetch Merit to watch Pharaoh’s festival procession. Despite her tavern upbringing she looked very lovely in the summer dress that was made in the new fashion, and I was not at all ashamed to stand beside her in places reserved for the favored of Pharaoh.
The Avenue of Rams was brilliant with banners and lined with the vast crowds who had come to see Pharaoh. Boys had climbed the trees in the gardens on either side, and Pepitaton had ordered countless baskets of flowers to be set out along the road so that, according to custom, the spectators could strew them in Pharaoh’s path. My mood was hopeful for I seemed to glimpse freedom and light for the land of Egypt. I had received a golden bowl from Pharaoh’s house and had been nominated skull surgeon to his household. Beside me stood a mature and lovely woman who was my friend, and around us in the reserved places we saw only happy, smiling people. Yet profound silence reigned; the squawking of crows could be heard from the temple roof-for crows and vultures had taken up their abode in Thebes and were so gorged that they could not rise and fly back to their hills.
It was a mistake for Pharaoh to allow painted Negroes to walk behind his chair. The mere sight of them aroused the fury of the people. There were few who had not suffered some injury during the preceding days. Many had lost their homes by fire, the tears of wives had not yet dried, men’s wounds still smarted beneath the bandages, and their bruised and broken mouths could not smile. But Pharaoh Akh- naton appeared, swaying high in his chair above the heads of the people and visible to them all. Upon his head he wore the double crown of the Two Kingdoms-lily and papyrus. His arms were crossed on his breast, and his hands were hard clenched about the crook and whip of royalty. He sat motionless as an image, as the Pharaohs of all ages have sat in the sight of the people, and there was a dread silence as he came, as if the sight of him had struck men dumb. The soldiers guarding the route raised their spears with a shout of greeting, and the more eminent of the onlookers also began to shout and throw flowers in front of the royal chair. But against the menacing hush of the crowd, their cries sounded thin and pitiful, like the buzz of a solitary midge on a winter’s night, so that they soon fell silent and looked at one another in amazement.
Now, against all tradition, Pharaoh moved. He raised the crook and whip in ecstatic greeting. The crowd surged back and suddenly from its manifold throat broke a cry as terrible as the thunder of bursting seas among the rocks.
“Ammon! Ammon! Give us back Ammon, the king of all gods!”
As the mob billowed and swayed and the cry rolled out ever louder, the crows and vultures winged upward from the temple roof and flapped their black pinions above the chair of Pharaoh. And the people cried, “Away with you, false Pharaoh! Begone!”
The shout alarmed the bearers so that the chair halted in its course. When they again moved forward, goaded by the nervous officers of the guard, the people poured in an irresistible flood across the Avenue of Rams, swept away the chain of soldiers, and threw themselves pellmell before the chair to block its advance.
It was no longer possible to follow exactly what was happening. The soldiers began to belabor the people with their cudgels to clear the way, but soon they had recourse to spears and daggers in their own defense. Sticks and stones sang through the air, blood flowed across the street, and above the roar rose the screams of the dying. But not one stone was cast at Pharaoh, for he was born of the sun like all other Pharaohs before him. His person was sacred, and no one in the crowd would have dared even in his dreams to lift a hand against him, though in their hearts all hated him. I do not believe that even the priests would have done so unheard of a thing. Pharaoh looked on unmolested. Then he arose, forgetting his dignity, and called out to halt the soldiers, but no one heard his cry in all the din.
The mob stoned the guards, and the guards defended themselves and slew many of the people, who cried out unceasingly, “Ammon! Ammon! Give us back Ammon!” and also, “Away with you, false Pharaoh! Begone! Thebes will have none of you!” Stones were cast on those of high rank, and the people surged threateningly about the reserved enclosures, so that women threw away their flowers, dropped their phials of perfume, and fled.
At Horemheb’s command the horns were sounded. From courts and sidestreets came the chariots that he had disposed there out of sight lest the people be provoked. Many were crushed beneath the hoofs and wheels, but Horemheb had ordered the removal of the scythes from the sides of the chariots to prevent unnecessary bloodshed. They drove slowly and in a prearranged order, encircling Pharaoh’s chair and also protecting the royal family and others in the procession, and so escorting them away. But the crowds would not disperse until the royal barges were seen rowing back across the river. Then they broke out in jubilation, and their rejoicing was yet more terrible than their anger. The ruffians among the crowd besieged the houses of the rich until the soldiers restored order and the people dispersed to their homes. Evening drew on and the crows circled down to tear at the bodies that remained lying in the Avenue of Rams.