One craftsman was working on cylinder seals, like the ones Nykara had traded for at Maadi ever since his first expedition. The craftsman was decorating one with an ostrich; one with a gazelle was lying to one side.
“The local gods you told me about?” Nykara inquired.
I nodded.
“Nekhen’s craftsmen carve ivory too, as you know from me bringing them to trade,” Nykara said. “These Farkha figures are at most four inches tall. The ones Ma–ee awards to our elites back home are up to sixteen inches in height. They don’t stand on bases, like yours, and none of our female figurines are portrayed wearing dresses.”
“I guess our two settlements have different iconographic rules,” I said.
Before we left the workshop Nykara exchanged a few pieces of lapis lazuli for a cylinder seal decorated with a boat and papyrus and reeds. He gave it to me. “Maybe it’ll bring you luck, help you find a man who likes to travel.”
I’ve already found him. I took hold of his arm. “Thank you,” I said.
“Ready for the surprise?” Itu asked me.
He led us through the rest of the settlement to the very end of the western turtleback. Half a dozen men were working on the foundation of a very large building. It was already outlined with several layers of mud–brick. In some sections the wall was nearly waist high.
“This belongs to us,” Papa announced. “Our family’s prospered, thanks to our trading with you, Nykara. We’ve been building new storage huts and adding workers all over Farkha these past years. But we’re going to centralize them all, make our operation more efficient.” He pointed. “See how the interior of the building is divided into rooms? Most are to store our goods or food supplies. The rest are where Itu and our workers’ families will live and work.”
“What are all these round holes for?” I asked.
“They’re bases for the tall thick posts that will support the roof,” Itu replied. “And those pits – hearths. Everything we need will be here, in one place.”
“Once the building is complete we’ll erect a mud–brick wall around it, for security,” Papa added.
“No one seeing this will doubt who Farkha’s leading trader is,” Nykara said. “I’ll bet anyone new coming from the North with something to trade will call on you first.”
“That’s the idea,” Itu acknowledged.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were building this?” I pouted.
“Because you talk too much,” Papa said. “You can’t keep a secret, Bakist. I didn’t want anyone in Maadi to know about it before it was done. Didn’t want them to get the same idea.”
You have no idea how well I keep secrets. I glanced at Nykara. Especially when they’re important.
At the end of the day the four of us strolled back to Itu’s. Nykara seemed to be barely aware of his surroundings, mulling something over.
“What are you thinking about?” I asked him as we approached the hut, linking my arm in his. He might have women he cared about in Nekhen, but they were half a world away and as long as he was here I might as well fantasize he was mine. He was so distracted he didn’t even notice.
“Ever since I first visited the North I’ve believed the way to eventually unify this valley is to tie Nekhen to Maadi,” Nykara said. “But you, Bakist, and Nabaru and Itu, really opened my eyes today. Maadi’s not the only important settlement in the North. It’s obvious to me now that Farkha also controls a considerable amount of trade with the lands along the seacoast, and the deserts.”
“We consider the delta and the deserts and the seacoast and Maadi to be integrated parts of the same vast region,” Nabaru interjected.
“Setau told me the same thing the first time I visited Maadi,” I replied. “I didn’t understand it then. But I do now. I’ve always pictured the valley like an arrow reaching straight from the cataract all the way to the Wadjet Wer. I realize now I should have pictured a flower instead – the valley the stem, your region the petals. Whoever unifies the valley must control Maadi, because Maadi’s positioned to control the trade that passes between North and South. But the unifier must also have a relationship with Farkha, because Farkha is the intersection through which all the products of the delta and the North and the deserts must pass. Maadi is control; Farkha is wealth. Unification requires both.”
“Not something we worry about at Maadi,” Papa said. “We don’t have dreams of grandeur. Anyway, tomorrow my caravan should arrive from the North. While you and Bakist trade the goods you brought with you, Itu and I will get everything transferred from the donkeys onto your boat. We should be ready to leave for Maadi the morning after.”
“How about it, Bakist? Up for some trading?” Nykara asked me.
“As always,” I replied. Another whole day to spend with you.
3440 BC
Amenia
Takhat, my third daughter, died barely a month after her birth in the fourth year after I became Uncle Sanakht’s woman. He didn’t even try to comfort me; he was disgusted I’d failed to give him a son once again. Nekauba, on the other hand, was delighted; his son Neby wouldn’t have a rival when it came time to inherit Sanakht’s pottery works.
I laid Takhat on my pallet and wrapped her tiny body in a length of my finest linen. Keminub, four years old now, placed an amulet around her sister’s neck – a pregnant pink limestone hippo. Perhaps it would protect her in the Afterlife, though it hadn’t in this world. Keminub didn’t really understand what was going on. Peksater, at two, had no idea at all. Takhat was too young to merit a grave in the cemetery where our family was buried so, as was custom, I pulled aside the reed mat atop the dirt in one corner of my house and began digging one. I used a sharpened pottery sherd; it cut through the packed earth surprisingly easily. About a foot below floor level I encountered a bit of leather. Puzzled, I set aside the sherd and dug the dirt and sand away with my fingers. In only a moment I’d cleared enough to uncover a leather pouch. The ground had been easy to dig because it had been excavated before and then refilled. I seized one end of the pouch and pulled it out. It was heavy, lumpy, full of hard objects. I lay the pouch on the ground next to the hole and untied the strip binding it closed. Carefully, I turned the pouch over and dozens of items cascaded from it – necklaces of carnelian and rock crystal and gold, bits of copper, flint figurines, loose beads, copper awls and fishhooks, arrowheads.
And then I noticed it twisted among the other amulets – a copper boat on a piece of twine. The amulet Nykara had given me so many years ago, the one I’d placed around Great–grandmother’s neck the day of her burial in place of the talisman I now wore. I sat back, sickened. My beast of a man was a grave robber.
I sifted through the items again, laid them out methodically. I was certain the copper necklace was the one Nykara had given Sanakht to lay on Great–grandmother’s neck during her burial. I recognized items from other funerals I’d attended in the cemetery where the elites and more prosperous Nekhenians were buried. The thefts clearly spanned a considerable length of time. When I was a very young girl I’d heard an old man tell my father about a grave robbery. Every grave in the workers’ and elites’ cemeteries, he said, was laid out the same way, with body and goods in the same position, making it a straightforward task for a thief to dig straight down to a dead person’s neck and cut through the linen wrappings and steal the necklace resting there, leaving the rest of the grave undisturbed. Now, two decades later, evidence of many robberies lay before me.
Hastily, before Sanakht could discover me, I stuffed everything back in the pouch and tied it with trembling fingers and reburied it and tamped down the ground and covered it with the reed mat. Then I dug a grave in the opposite corner of the hut. I purposely waited until Sanakht returned from the kiln that evening and then buried Takhat while he watched, though without any emotion on his part. I hoped that would keep him from suspecting I’d found him out.
I could hardly look at Sanakht for weeks afterwards. That he’d stolen from Great–grandmother gnawe
d at me. It was abhorrent, what he’d done. Had his theft affected her in the next life? Had she been wandering the night restlessly ever since she’d been disturbed? Had her spirit disappeared from among the stars? And what about the rest of the people he’d stolen from? What Sanakht had done was beyond wrong and I vowed I wouldn’t let him get away with it.
For the next several months I watched Sanakht closely, hoping to catch him in the act, confront him, convince him to stop. I attended every funeral I was aware of – I was usually called anyway, to represent the falcon god and give a final blessing. For weeks after each burial I regularly checked the grave to see if it had been disturbed. Any time Sanakht left our hut at night I followed him at a distance, careful not to be seen. The very first night I crept after him I discovered the reason he robbed. Sanakht’s destination turned out to be a hut in the lower settlement where several attractive unjoined young sisters lived with an older brother. I wasn’t the only woman who’d been curious for years about their seemingly endless supply of new jewelry and finery. They’d explained the luxury items away as family heirlooms. That night I figured out the truth. I was aware one of Sanakht’s distant cousins worked as a herdsman for Ma–ee and traveled regularly to the western oases on trade expeditions. I surmised he’d been trading stolen goods provided by Sanakht at the oases so Sanakht could give the sisters objects in exchange for their services that wouldn’t be recognized as stolen. I was disgusted and appalled by the revelation. Sanakht visited the lower settlement as many as three times each week.
As far as robbery, my vigilance finally paid off on the first moonless night after a particularly rich burial. I caught Sanakht slipping out of our hut when he thought I was asleep. I rose and followed him all the way to the elite cemetery, where the woman of a prominent elite son had recently been buried. Sanakht met someone there – it was too dark for me to tell who. I got close enough to hear whispers, followed by quiet digging. That my man had an accomplice complicated matters – I could have had a discussion with Sanakht, but who knew what the second man might do if I suddenly appeared out of the darkness? Reluctantly, I slipped away from them and hurried home. A few days later, when Sanakht went down to the lower settlement on some kind of business, I dug up the leather pouch under my floor and found a new necklace I recognized as the woman’s. I noted other objects were missing; not surprisingly, one of Ma–ee’s expeditions had departed for the desert less than two weeks earlier. Now I had proof Sanakht was a grave robber and what he did with the stolen items, but no idea what to do about it. But I had to do something.
***
For weeks I mulled over and rejected plan after plan. I was just a woman. How was I supposed to capture two men in the act of robbing a grave and deliver them to Ma–ee for justice? I had to catch them – I couldn’t simply accuse them of their crime. Sanakht could claim someone else had buried the pouch in my house. Plus, I didn’t know who Sanakht’s accomplice was. He might be a neighbor; he might be a stranger. I had no idea if there were others in the upper settlement also involved in robbery. Surely there were more thieves than just my man; such theft would be an easy way to get rich. Revealing what I knew to the wrong person could put me in danger, and then what would happen to my daughters? Sanakht didn’t love them. But I couldn’t let him get away with thievery. I owed Great–grandmother that much. Finally, one day, in desperation, I turned to the only man in Nekhen I could trust. Under cover of making mats beside the river I headed for the boatyard with both my daughters in tow. I asked after Nykara and a boatman directed me to him. He was on the riverbank, alone, inspecting a newly–constructed wood boat tied bow–first to the trunk of a dom palm.
I stood in the shade of a tree not far away and watched him for the longest time, my heart in my throat, tears welling in my eyes. I hadn’t seen him in the four years since Ma–ee’s confirmation. I hadn’t spoken to him since I’d become Sanakht’s woman a year before that.
Sometimes, late at night, I still pictured what my life would have been like with Nykara – turning a reed hut on the heights overlooking the valley into a home, making pottery every day at my kiln, raising our children – he wouldn’t care I produced only daughters – even traveling on expeditions with him up and down the valley. I’d heard of his appointment to run the fleet after Ma–ee became ruler. No doubt he’d designed and built the boat he was inspecting, the largest and most graceful I’d ever seen. That he was once again able to pursue his heart’s desire made me happy, and sad I couldn’t share it with him.
I wondered if he’d taken a woman. Probably, now that he was an elite and had a thriving enterprise to pass on someday. He’d never lacked admirers. I didn’t begrudge him. One of us should at least be satisfied in that way. As for me, I was mostly miserable. Only raising my daughters and making the pottery Sanakht supplied Nykara with gave me any joy. Sanakht watched me closely, and Nekauba too. He still desired me, despite his joining with Kapes. I made certain never to let him catch me alone, for fear of what he’d do. It was obvious to everyone except Sanakht how he felt; Kapes blamed me, as if I encouraged Nekauba’s attention. My cousin and I rarely spoke anymore because of him, even though we shared the same house.
Despite all that had happened to Nykara and me, and the years that had separated us, I was still in love with him. I never saw a boat drift past on the river without thinking about him. How I wish I’d been able to run to him the day of my joining to Sanakht, to escape with him to the delta. My life would have been so different. But it was what it was. I wondered if he still remembered me, or ever thought about me. I moved from under the tree, stopped a few paces behind him. “Nykara,” I called in a low voice.
He turned. His eyes instantly lit up. That told me all I needed to know. Nykara still cared for me. I didn’t know if that was going to make my mission easier or harder.
“Amenia!” he exclaimed. His eyes took in my girls. “And your family.”
“Nykara, I don’t know where else to turn,” I blurted.
He clearly heard the desperation in my voice. “Let’s talk in private,” he said. He lifted both my daughters onto the deck of the boat. I climbed aboard unaided. He followed after me. He indicated the shade of the open–sided pavilion amidships and we sat down cross–legged on the deck, facing each other. My girls scrambled towards the stern, chattering excitedly, exploring. They’d never seen a boat up close before, much less been on one.
“They’re beautiful,” Nykara told me. “They look exactly like you.”
“Keminub and Peksater.” And Keminub is ours! I wanted to shout. You’re her father. She ties us together for eternity. She’s just like you – warm, outgoing, caring. Can’t you see her eyes are exactly the same as yours? I’d tell you, except I’m stuck with Sanakht, and that would make this more difficult for you. But I will tell you some day, when she’s older, so you can help her escape his clutches. “I had another daughter, Takhat. She died a month after she was born, half a year ago.”
“I’m so sorry, Amenia.” His sympathy was genuine.
My words poured out in a rush. “That’s why I’m here, Nykara. I was burying Takhat inside my house when I found a leather pouch under the floor crammed with grave goods. Sanakht stole them. I caught him stealing from another grave a week ago, but there was someone with him and I couldn’t do anything about it. I want to catch him in the act again and convince him to stop.”
“Men rob graves,” Nykara said gently. “They always have. A necklace here, a bit of copper there… it’s hard to prove and no one cares.”
“I care!” I said vehemently. “Sanakht stole from Great–grandmother – the boat amulet you gave me, Nykara! Who knows what’s happened to her in the next life?”
“I see.” He nodded his head. He was less enthusiastic than I’d hoped. “Why have you come to me?”
“Sanakht is a powerful man in the upper settlement now, mostly because of me, second only to Uncle Hemaka. No one will go against him. I know at least one person steals with him, though
I don’t know his name and haven’t seen his face. There may be more. So I can’t report Sanakht to anyone. Who’d believe me? I’m afraid what would happen to my daughters if I made an accusation and the authorities did something to me. But you can act. You’re Ma–ee’s friend…”
Nykara shook his head. “I’m not, Amenia.”
“But you run the fleet again. He gave it to you.”
“I forced him to, because he needed my help to become ruler. He resents me now, that he had to turn to me. I keep my distance from him.”
“But if someone was proven to be a grave robber, to be bringing chaos to the land, Ma–ee would want him dealt with?”
“I suppose he would,” Nykara admitted.
“Won’t you help me?”
“What exactly do you want me to do?”
“Help me catch Sanakht in the act. Talk to him. Convince him to stop.”
“And if he won’t?”
I met his gaze directly. “Take him to Ma–ee. I simply can’t tolerate Sanakht jeopardizing the Afterlife for anyone else. Though I don’t know how I’ll support my girls if Ma–ee executes him. I assume that’s how he’ll deal with him, as bloodthirsty as he is.”
“I think you’re right about that. Do you have a plan?”
Briefly, I outlined for Nykara what I’d discovered to be Sanakht’s pattern when he robbed a grave, how I thought we should deal with him. Nykara listened thoughtfully, non–committally.
“So, will you help me?” I asked at the end.
“Before I agree I have to know something,” Nykara said. “Tentopet passed a message from Abar to me about why you confirmed Ma–ee instead of her.” He gazed at Keminub. “Did Ma–ee really kidnap your daughter and threaten to kill her?”
The Women and the Boatman Page 62
