by N. L. Holmes
Soon an old man opened the peephole. “One moment, my lord.”
Hani heard the unbarring of the door from within, and soon it swung wide. Beside the doorkeeper stood Amen-em-hut’s twenty-one-year-old firstborn, Pen-amen. His eyes, red-rimmed with sorrow, widened at the sight of his aunt’s family. “Uncle Hani! Uncle Mery-ra! Neferet! Mother and Father aren’t here.”
“We know, son, and that’s why we’ve come. Your mother’s at our house and has told us about your father’s disappearance.” Hani clapped the youth on the shoulder, suddenly forced to swallow hard, unable to find adequate words of comfort. He said in a lower voice, “I told Anuia we’d come and interrogate the servants, ask around the neighborhood. Maybe we can find some clues to where he might be.”
The young priest’s drawn face lit up with hope. He was devastatingly handsome, taller than his father and just as good-looking, with beautifully modeled lips and great dark eyes set like jewels in a perfectly sculpted copper face. “We’re all so distraught—we don’t know what to do. Mother just woke up two weeks ago, and he was gone. We kept thinking he’d be back, but...” His lip rippled. “I’ve come back home to help Mother and the youngsters.”
“Good. She needs support.”
Hani’s nephew walked the men and girl back toward the house through the garden, a splendid place full of shrines and pools. It was a little formal for Hani’s simple taste but a delight nonetheless. Everything was neat and clipped to perfection, the paths raked, flowers deadheaded, the shrines whitewashed and decked with bouquets. The Hidden One and his family must still feel welcome here, at least, thought Hani affectionately, observing a bowl of grain set out on the step of one of the little buildings. Neferet pointed with a snicker at a pair of sparrows that had claimed it for their own and were gleefully throwing the husks around as they rooted for the best kernels. It made Hani feel especially kindly toward Amen-em-hut that he took his gardening so seriously.
As if he’d heard Hani’s thoughts, Pen-amen said, in a voice tight with tears, “Father loves his garden. It’s all he’s had to keep himself busy since they shut down the temple liturgy.”
“He’ll be back to enjoy it again, I’m sure,” Hani assured him.
“Will he, Uncle?” Pen-amen’s eyes were bright with desperation. “It’s been two weeks...”
“Have you asked the servants if they saw or heard anything that night?”
“I did. No one observed any unusual sight or sound. Father didn’t show up for breakfast—that was the first time they realized anything was amiss.”
Hani shook his head gravely. That didn’t sound good. “Tell me, my boy. Which of the neighboring houses are occupied? I want to talk to the gatekeepers, see if they heard anything the night he disappeared. When exactly was it, for that matter?”
“It was the eve of what should have been the Festival of Hut-haru. I remember that because we all talked about how few feast days the people have anymore that aren’t celebrated solely in the new capital. Father had come back from the office of the medjay all bruised and limping, and Mother had made him drink some water lily tea for the pain and suggested they go to bed early. She was nearly hysterical when she saw him, but he wouldn’t tell us what had happened, except to say the police were watching him and wanted to convince him to keep his mouth shut.”
“I have my medical basket with me,” Neferet informed her cousin earnestly. “If he needs more water lily, I can give him some.”
“Why, thanks, Neferet,” Pen-amen said, looking distracted.
“We have to find him first, little duckling,” Mery-ra reminded the girl, laying a grandfatherly hand on her shoulder.
“The nearest inhabited house is the one with the sycomore fig sticking up over the wall. Go north toward the center of town and you’ll see it. The owner’s name is Nemty-em-saf.”
“Thank you, Pen-amen. Let’s head out, troops.”
“Do you want me to go with you?” Pen-amen offered.
“Aren’t you here with the children?”
The young priest nodded reluctantly. “Maybe Neferet would like to play with Meryet-mut; then I could come along.”
Hani steered Neferet toward the door. “My dear, why don’t you keep your cousins company so Pen-amen can help us find his father?”
“But, Papa,” she protested, shooting him an afflicted look. “What if he’s hurt and needs medical attention?” Her dragging feet and piteous glance said, Please don’t make me play with Meryet-mut. I’m thirteen.
But Hani was adamant. “There’s my good grown-up girl.”
Reluctantly, she stomped into the house, and the three men returned to the gate and into the street.
As they made their way up the dusty lane, empty and silent except for the rhythmic buzz of cicadas, Pen-amen said, pointing, “It’s that place right up there. They’re the only ones who still live in the neighborhood full-time. All the bureaucrats have moved. Sometimes people come back on holidays, but no one would have had a gatekeeper on duty the night Father disappeared except Nemty-em-saf.”
“It’s a city of ghosts,” Mery-ra said sadly, staring around.
“Men-nefer is even worse,” Hani informed him with a grim lift of the eyebrows.
They stopped at the overgrown gate of Nemty-em-saf, and Hani pounded on the faded door. After what seemed a very long time, they heard footsteps approaching, and a stringy middle-aged woman in a scarf swung back the panel. “What is it?” she demanded brusquely. “Oh, Pen-amen! It’s you. Come in. Forgive my appearance, dear.” She tried to straighten herself up and twitched off her apron.
Hani could hardly believe that the wife of anyone who owned such a large house would have no servants to answer the gate. But without the offerings made to the Hidden One day and night, his priests were left virtually without income. Hani nodded respectfully to the woman, who, despite her apron and working-class scarf, seemed to be the mistress of the house herself. “My lady, I’m Amen-em-hut’s brother-in-law. I don’t know if you’re aware that he’s disappeared?”
She gasped in horror, clapping her hands over her mouth. “They’ve got him, then!” she cried. “Oh, I told my husband he wouldn’t last long, being so open about his protests. But may the Great Ones bless him for it. That’s what we all say, Pen-amen. We all admired him.”
Having noticed her past tense, Pen-amen said in a pained voice, “We hope he’s still alive.”
“I want to ask you, or whoever may have been guarding the gate the eve of the Hut-haru festival, whether you heard anything. He may have gone walking in the early hours of the morning.” Hani watched the woman’s face as she gnawed her lip in an effort at recollection.
“It’s been weeks,” she said apologetically. “There’s been a lot of noises at night these last few years. Gangs of ne’er-do-wells breaking into properties and such. I wouldn’t have known it was him even if I heard something. But I’ll ask my husband.”
“Thank you, my lady. Ask any of your friends who live in the area, too, if you would.” Hani shepherded the other two ahead of him back into the street. They stared at one another, fighting down discouragement. “Where to now, Pen-amen?”
The young man looked around him in desolation. “All the rest are empty. If we just knew which direction he was walking...”
“I don’t think this is going to tell us much, Hani,” Mery-ra said. “We’d have to cover the whole city unless we knew where he was going. Assuming he really did leave the house by night. Why don’t we try to find the neighborhood watchman?”
Pen-amen led the way to the watchman’s modest house. It occurred to Hani that the fellow’s job must have gotten a great deal easier since the exodus of most of his neighborhood. Other than patrolling the area to keep the peace, his duties consisted of announcing the news, but he was probably under no necessity to traverse uninhabited streets.
“Perhaps he can notify the neighbors of Amen-em-hut’s disappearance so if anyone has noticed anything, they can contact him,” Mery-ra suggest
ed.
A little suspicion in his gut made Hani leery of such a move. He shook his head uncertainly. “I almost hate to draw public attention to his absence, Father. Who knows who might hear a watchman’s announcement? Do we want strangers to know we’re looking for him? Maybe it’s better to let them think we think he’s dead.”
At that word, Pen-amen, at Hani’s side, emitted a broken sound. But he caught Hani’s eye and said with a resigned nod, “I see what you mean, Uncle. If the medjay are looking for him, too, the less they know, the better.”
Mery-ra shrugged. “You’re the investigator, son.”
The watchman’s house was a humble whitewashed cube with a second smaller cube on top for an upper floor, leaving the flat roof of the larger part as a terrace. When they knocked on the street door, a man looked down from the roof, hammer in his hand, and called, “What can I do for you?”
“We’re relatives of someone in your neighborhood who’s gone missing. We wondered if you might have seen him.”
The watchman told them to wait, and in a few minutes, they heard his footsteps approaching the door. Soon thereafter, it opened in their faces, and a semi-toothless little man, who didn’t seem to be terribly old for all that, bade them enter.
The house was small but self-respecting, boasting a miniature vestibule with a packed-earth floor and a tiny salon beyond. A single column, crudely painted in bright colors, centered it. On the floor beside the column, a woman and a pair of small children who looked like twins stared up, blinded, at the light that streamed in through the open door. Otherwise, the room was dim and stuffy, lit only by a few high, small windows.
“Sure your fellow didn’t just move to Akhet-aten?” the watchman asked. “More’n half the neighborhood’s gone downriver in the last few years.”
“No, no,” said Pen-amen. “My father went to bed at Mother’s side two weeks ago, and when she awoke, he was gone. He apparently used to walk around the neighborhood in the dark.”
“Ah! Lord Amen-em-hut. I shoulda recognized you as his son. Mighty handsome family.” The man made an obsequious little bobbing motion. “Always the perfect gentleman, your father, even in the middle of the night.”
“You’ve seen him, then?” cried Hani, cautious hope awakening in him.
“Many times. Don’t know which was the one you’re talking about, though. He told me once he had trouble sleeping and he liked to walk around a bit. I warned him it weren’t safe these days, but he figured he was a priest. If the gods didn’t protect him, they wouldn’t protect nobody.”
The man had an open, honest face. It was good to know such a one was walking the streets of the city at night with a big stick. Although he’s not very big, Hani thought with a silent chuckle. I guess he sounds his clapper for the medjay if some large malefactor happens along.
“This would’ve been the eve of the Feast of Hut-haru,” Hani specified.
“I couldn’t say, my lord. It’s been a while. The last time I seen him, he was limping, though, ’n had a bruised face. Musta been more or less around the same time.”
Hani exchanged a triumphant look with Pen-amen. “That was probably the very night. Did he say anything that might have suggested he wasn’t just out strolling as usual?”
The man sucked his sunken cheeks. “Can’t think of anything. I passed him not far from his house and greeted him as usual—’cause I’ve got to know him lately—and he asked somethin’ about the wind bein’ up. There was a nearly full moon, I remember, and I could see a big bruise on his face. I asked him was he all right, and he said sure. Just had a little accident.”
Pen-amen’s expression had grown twisted with emotion, but he held his peace.
“Why do you think he asked about the wind?” Hani pursued, an idea forming in his mind.
“The wind on the River, he said. Don’t know why.”
“Thanks, my man. You’ve been very helpful.” Hani pulled off his faience ring and pressed it into the watchman’s hand. The fellow made a pro forma protest but, in the end, received it gratefully. The three kinsmen took their leave.
Once again in the street, Hani said, looking from his father to his nephew, “I think he’s somewhere upriver. Did your father sail, Pen-amen?”
“Not a lot, Uncle. But he grew up in Waset, and like all of us, he knew his way around a boat.”
“Sounds to me like he wanted to sail upriver and needed to know if there was enough wind. He probably wouldn’t have been in shape to row after the medjay’s little reception.”
“But Mother searched our country place, and all the estates of the god are occupied by the king’s soldiers now.”
Mery-ra made a dubious moue. “Did he even have a boat?” he asked, and Pen-amen shrugged. “I don’t picture Amen-em-hut prowling the marshes the way you do, Hani. Or do you think he stole one from the bank somewhere?”
“I’m sure I can’t answer that, Father,” Hani said. Still, he felt he had a clue. His brother-in-law probably hadn’t been taken by the police from his bed and killed.
After a moment of reflection, Hani said to his father, “We need to pick up Neferet and get home. I don’t want the women to be worried about us too.”
CHAPTER 2
Thirty days had passed since Hani had learned of the devastating disappearance of Amen-em-hut. Hani had tried not to go to the capital any more often than necessary so he wouldn’t have to leave Nub-nefer alone with her anxieties. She was a valiant woman—she made an effort not to let her suffering show before the children—but Hani could see from her dark-ringed eyes and hollowed cheeks how afflicted she was. Nub-nefer and her brother were their parents’ only two children who had lived. Two years apart in age, they were so much alike even in appearance that Mery-ra irreverently referred to them as Shu and Tefnut, the divine twins. Poor Neferet could hardly get her mother’s attention to tell her excitedly what spells and potions she had learned that day, and Hani and Mery-ra found themselves grimly distracted during her and Pa-kiki’s lessons. The priest’s mysterious fate was an open sore, draining the tranquil energy of the family.
When Hani met with Lord Ptah-mes, he told him about the mysterious disappearance of the priest. “We’ve looked in the obvious places, but there seems to be no trace of him. It’s been a month or more.”
Ptah-mes let a heavy sigh escape him. “Listen, Hani. I advise you not to be too openly seen to be searching for him. Amen-em-hut’s name is not in good odor at court, and you’ve made sufficient waves of dissatisfaction. You need to be seen toeing the line.” Ptah-mes had witnessed Hani nearly provoking the vizier of the Upper Kingdom to strike him a year or so before. “Dissociate yourself from all the man stands for.”
“You’re right, of course, my lord,” Hani said, but he felt a little rebellious inside. “As you might expect, this is a source of anguish for my wife, though.”
“I can’t compel you, my friend. But please think about what I’m saying. Things are very tense here, and reprisals will probably be coming. Don’t get caught in this.” Ptah-mes’s thin, handsome face was unsmiling. Something dangerous was clearly underway, and Hani appreciated the warning.
Hani had juggled all this in his mind endlessly on the trip home from Akhet-aten—his wife’s grief on one side and the possible safety of the whole family on the other. A terrible Weighing of the Heart through which he couldn’t seem to find the perfect course of moral right. Man does not have a single path; the Lord of Life confounds him, he reminded himself gloomily.
He was preoccupied as he made his way through the garden to the entrance of his house. The panel was open, the door protected only by the reed mat. Hani put out his hand to draw it aside, only to jump back as his father thrust his head around the edge of the opening.
The rest of Mery-ra was as concealed as his broad physique permitted. “Hani, son. You’re home?”
There’s something cagey about his manner. What’s the old rascal up to now? “As I so frequently am these days,” Hani said with a grin. “What ar
e you hiding, Father?”
“Nothing, son, nothing. It’s just that there’s a little surprise here for you.”
“Ah? What’s the occasion?” Hani pushed his father gently aside and made his way through the door.
Out of the semidarkness, a familiar yet completely unexpected face appeared in front of him, beaming. “It’s me, Hani, old man!”
“Pipi!” Hani cried.
His younger brother, Pa-ra-em-heb, obdurately remained in Men-nefer, former capital of the Lower Land, even though almost the entire government had abandoned it for the new capital. Pipi spread his arms and blocked the doorway. Hani threw himself into his embrace, laughing and protesting his total surprise. They almost never saw one another since Pipi had gone off to the northern capital. Pipi, like all the men of their family, was broad and thick. Never as athletic as his elder brother, he had put on weight since Hani had last seen him, and it spilled generously over his kilt. But his cheerful square-jowled face was unchanged, untouched by the years, as Hani could only hope his own was. With the familial gap between his front teeth, he looked like nothing so much as a mischievous pudgy boy.
“It’s good to see you, little brother. What brings you back after so long?” They walked into the salon, arms affectionately over one another’s shoulders, with Mery-ra bringing up the rear, cackling his delight—a parade of squat foursquare men who looked remarkably alike.
“Oh, I’ve been back a few times, haven’t I, Father?”
“He has,” Mery-ra said.
“But rarely when I’ve been here,” Hani chided affectionately. “I’d concluded you no longer loved me and were trying to avoid me.”
“Not so. Purely a matter of coincidence. You’re away more often than you’re home, from what I understand.”
“Or used to be,” Hani said. “I’m not missioned overseas so often at the moment.”
“Ah ha ha! I told you you’d get tired of traveling!” Pipi tried to goose his brother in the side, and they began to roughhouse, making threatening noises and hooting with laughter like a pair of badly disciplined schoolboys.
