The Assassins of Isis

by P. C. Doherty

  ‘You’re just being arrogant,’ his wife had taunted. ‘You think you see everybody.’

  ‘No, no, listen. I patrol between the fifth mooring place and the eighth mooring place. I know who I saw that night. My eyes are sharp …’

  On and on the argument had run. Now Nadif got to his feet as he heard the sound of voices. He stepped from beneath the shade and stared back towards the Beautiful Gate. A funeral procession had left the city and was making its way down to one of the mooring places. The procession was led by a group of servants carrying cakes, flowers, jars of water, bottles of liquor and vials of perfume. Nadif forgot his own problem and stood fascinated as the procession passed him by. The servants were also carrying furniture, painted boxes, folding stools, armchairs and even a bed. He reckoned this must be an important funeral, because a second procession of servants brought weapons, masks, helmets and even pieces of armour. Next came the mourners, led by the Master of Ceremonies dressed in a panther skin. On either side of him servants sprinkled the ground with milk and scented water from golden spoons. Finally came the hearse, shaped like a boat, mounted upon a sledge drawn by a team of red and white oxen. On the boat statues of Isis and Nephthys stood next to the closed cabin which concealed the coffin casket.

  Nadif liked nothing better than a funeral. He watched it go, taking detailed notice of how many mourners there were, what treasures they carried, and the mournful songs they chanted. The procession passed in a cloud of dust. Nadif was about to continue his patrol when he noticed something glinting in the sparse grass on the far side of the trackway. Had someone in the funeral procession dropped a precious ornament? He hurried over and picked up a silver filigree chain holding a pendant, a golden hawk with its wings extended. He studied this carefully. He had seen it before, surely? He crouched down and racked his memory. Yes, that was right, on the night General Suten had died, his valet Heby had worn it round his neck. But Heby was a prisoner; what was his necklace doing out on the trackway?

  Nadif edged forward, pushing aside the coarse grass and bushes. He glimpsed a dagger encrusted with dried blood and plucked this up. The blade was of fine bronze, the handle of ivory. He placed it in his sack and, now alarmed, hurried along the pathway. He forgot about the heat and sun, the cries of the fowlers and fishermen. He must reach General Suten’s mansion! He sighed with relief as he glimpsed the guards at the gate, but instead of approaching them, he went down the narrow trackway which ran alongside the curtain wall and hurried along the dusty path, under the shade from the palm trees, the coarse grass sticking out to scratch his legs. He passed a guard resting in the shade; the man was busy with his water bottle and didn’t bother to get up but shouted that all was well. Nadif, cursing the laziness of these recruits, hurried on. He rounded the corner and another guard resting in the shade scrambled to his feet. Nadif waved him away. Everything seemed calm, but the policeman prided himself on having a nose for mischief. He hurried on around the next corner. There was no guard!

  ‘Hello!’ he shouted. No reply. Nadif paused. The sun was very high now, dazzling the trackway, with the wall of the mansion to his right and a line of date palms to his left. A hot, dusty place where flies buzzed and, in the branches above, a jay chattered. Nadif caught his breath; it was just like this out in the Red Lands, he thought, going up one of those lonely rocky gullies with the sun beating down like a hammer. He drew his dagger and walked on, his right shoulder brushing the wall. ‘Hello!’ he called again. Again no sound.

  He was halfway along the path when the buzzing of flies drew him to the dark red pool on the edge of the coarse grass. Nadif dropped his leather bag and water bottle; staff in one hand, dagger in the other, he moved into the shade of the trees. Squinting against the dazzling rays of sunlight he moved cautiously, but despite his care he almost stumbled over the sprawled corpse. A member of the guard, by the colour of his striped headdress, but he carried no weapons. Nadif turned the body over and stifled a moan at the bloody gash which tore the man’s throat from ear to ear. He stared around, rising to a half-crouch. The date palm trees clustered thick, the bushes and gorse pressing in like a fence, a grove which could conceal a small army. Nadif moved back to the trackway and looked for further signs, but they were impossible to detect. He studied the wall and noticed the dried blood stain on the uneven mortar. Someone had climbed down there, grazing an arm or a leg. Whoever it was, and Nadif had his own suspicions, had caught the guard unawares and slit his throat. Nadif hurried around and hammered on the side gate. It swung open, and a sleepy-eyed soldier looked out.

  ‘Where’s your captain?’ Nadif snarled.

  ‘Don’t you talk to me like that.’

  Nadif slapped him across the face. ‘I’m a standard-bearer in the Medjay; fetch me your officer.’

  The guard hurried away and Nadif followed, walking down the garden path. On any other occasion he would have stopped to admire the well-dug flowerbeds, the coloured garden pavilion and the pool of purity. He paused as the guard returned, his officer running behind trying to make himself look presentable.

  ‘What’s this?’ The officer was young and tried to bluster.

  Nadif gestured at the wall. ‘One of your men is dead.’

  ‘What!’ The officer would have hurried away, but Nadif grasped him by the arm.

  ‘How many guards do you have in the house?’

  ‘Two, one in the entranceway, one in the hall of audience.’

  Nadif pushed him along the path around to the front of the house, up the steps and through the porticoed entrance. The door of terebinth wood was off the latch. Nadif shoved it open with a crash. The guard sleeping on a cushioned bench where visitors would wait jumped to his feet.

  ‘What’s wrong, sir?’

  Nadif waved him away. The hall of audience lay silent; the dining area on the dais at the far end was deserted, its gauze curtains drawn back. Nadif noticed with distaste the empty wine jug resting against the plinth bearing a statue of Montu, the god of war. The guard there was also half awake, stripped to his loincloth and so much the worse for ale he could only mutter that there was nothing wrong.

  Nadif ran deeper into the house. He reached the general’s quarters, but a heavy-eyed maid said that her mistress, Lady Lupherna, was still asleep. Nadif withdrew.

  ‘Where was Heby held?’ he demanded.

  They hurried out of the general’s quarters, down a narrow corridor with chambers on either side.

  ‘Shouldn’t there be a guard here?’ Nadif demanded.

  ‘He was only placed under house arrest,’ the officer protested. ‘To leave he would have to—’

  Nadif ignored him and threw open the door. The chamber was empty, but he noticed robes had been taken off the clothes pegs and the lids of coffers and caskets were pulled up.

  ‘He could be in another room,’ the officer stuttered.

  ‘He better be,’ Nadif retorted.

  They searched the other chambers. As they reached the far one, Nadif heard a groan. The chamber was hot and rather stuffy; the windows had been completely shuttered, the drapes pulled across as if a sandstorm was expected. As he stood in the doorway, letting his eyes become accustomed to the gloom, he made out dark shapes. One seemed to move. The officer had found a lamp and brought it back in. Nadif snatched it from his hand and lifted it. He glimpsed staring eyes and a balding head, a gag across the mouth, and realised it was Chief Scribe Menna. He thrust the lamp back into the officer’s hand and hurried across to open the windows. As the light flooded in, the captain was already squatting on a stool, staring in disbelief at poor Menna. He had been securely lashed to a chair, a tight gag around his mouth. Nadif cut this away.

  ‘It was Heby,’ Menna gasped. ‘He came here just after dawn.’

  Nadif sliced the ropes. He noticed how well and securely the knots had been tied. Menna got to his feet. Like an old man on the verge of tears he hobbled across to his bed and sat on the edge rubbing his arms and legs.

  ‘You stupid ox!’ Me
nna shouted at the officer, tears brimming in his eyes. ‘Your men were half asleep.’

  ‘We were told to guard the house,’ the officer retorted. ‘Not every chamber. You know that. He was allowed to wander around.’

  ‘What happened?’ Nadif demanded.

  ‘Heby came in here not long ago, just after dawn. He wanted to see me, he was all agitated. He said he was finished. He wouldn’t be given a fair trial but would end his life on a stake. I tried to reason with him.’

  Menna turned his fat head and pointed to a bruise on his right temple. ‘Heby said he would flee, he would try his luck elsewhere. I tried to reason with him but he wouldn’t listen. He struck me here and I fell against the floor. I was dazed. Heby pulled me up, a dagger to my throat. He tied my hands and ankles with two leather belts. He acted like a man crazed with the sun, chattering to himself. He left my chamber and came back with a rope.’ Menna pointed to the belts lying at the foot of the statue of the household god Bes. ‘He took those off, bound me with the rope and raided my treasure casket.’ The Chief Scribe put his face in his hands. ‘Then he fled. Perhaps he did kill General Suten.’ He lifted a tear-streaked face. ‘I don’t know and I don’t care.’

  Nadif walked carefully around the room. He could see signs of disturbance and noticed how the small ebony-lined caskets and coffers had been thrown open and emptied.

  ‘What has happened?’ Menna asked.

  Nadif was about to reply when he heard voices in the corridor, and Lady Lupherna, hair billowing down like a black cloud, clothed in a night shift, an embroidered shawl around her shoulders, hurried into the chamber.

  ‘Heby!’ she whispered. ‘One of the guards told me! Chief Scribe Menna, are you well?’

  Menna waved her away. She sat down in a high-backed chair, stared at the cut ropes, the open caskets, and turned heavy-eyed to Nadif.

  ‘He did do it, didn’t he? He murdered my husband, and now he’s fled. We were working so hard to prove it was a lie.’

  ‘My lady.’ Nadif smiled at her. ‘Did you hear anything untoward?’

  ‘Ask my maids.’ Her fingers fluttered. ‘I couldn’t rest. I mixed a sleeping draught in my wine. I slept until I was woken; my maid said you had tried to enter our quarters.’

  Nadif apologised and explained what had happened, how he had found Heby’s necklace, the blood-stained dagger and the guard with his throat cut. Menna took up the tale and pointed accusingly at the captain of the guard.

  ‘Your men could have been more vigilant. Well?’ he shouted. ‘Shouldn’t you be pursuing Heby? You, sir,’ he pointed to Nadif, ‘I thank you for your vigilance. I would be grateful if you went down and informed the Lord Valu; proclamations have to be issued.’ He put his fingers to his face. ‘Such woes,’ he moaned. ‘Such troubles.’

  The officer of the guard was only too pleased to leave.

  ‘I can’t go immediately sir,’ Nadif explained. ‘I must question your servants and yourselves. Lady Lupherna, did you see anything suspicious?’

  ‘I’ve told you,’ she retorted. ‘Ask my maid.’

  ‘Chief Scribe Menna?’

  ‘Ask the servants.’ Menna waved his hand. ‘They will tell you that yesterday, morning evening and night, I stayed here.’ He pointed to the writing table strewn with papyri and blunted styli. ‘I was trying to defend Heby, I wanted to question that snake man. I thought he was telling a lie.’ Nadif nodded understandingly. ‘I slept for a while and rose just before dawn. Heby came in, the rest you know.’

  Nadif thanked them and went back into the hall of audience, where he asked the steward to assemble the servants: the maids, the kitchen boys, even the gardeners. They all told the same story: how Lady Lupherna and Chief Scribe Menna had kept to the house. No one had seen Heby go. Nadif thanked them. He walked out and sat on the steps and recalled what he had been thinking earlier and the argument he had had with his wife. He closed his eyes. That young guard, his flesh so cold, lying in the undergrowth! Nadif reflected carefully. He was tired, he would have to go away and think very prudently before drawing up his report.

  AMAM: ancient Egyptian, ‘the eater of the dead’

  CHAPTER 10

  Amerotke decided to leave the Temple of Isis. He and Shufoy returned to the guest house to pack their few belongings. Their guards gathered, quite delighted to be assigned this light duty of trailing the solemn-faced judge across fragrant temple gardens, or lounging in the cool orchards around Amerotke’s house. The judge thought they were too relaxed, so he decided to keep them busy and sent them to search for Paser, as well as offer his farewells to Lord Impuki. Paser came hurrying across to the guest house. He still seemed anxious and wary-eyed, clearly relieved that this inquisitive judge was leaving.

  ‘I meant to tell you,’ Paser declared hastily, ‘that although General Suten came to consult our manuscripts, he was thinking of leaving his family archives to our House of Life. I thought,’ he glanced away, ‘perhaps, you might find such records more interesting than ours.’ He bowed, then strode out of the chamber and down the stairs.

  Amerotke collected their belongings and put them in a leather sack. Shufoy was chattering like a monkey, so his master, more to distract him than anything else, told him to go to the House of Twilight.

  ‘What do you want there?’ Shufoy gripped his parasol as if it was a staff, standing on one leg as he had seen a holy travelling man do outside the Temple of Min. The fellow had managed to stay like that for three days without moving. Shufoy often wondered whether he could pass himself off as a holy man; after all, he did serve in the Temple of Ma’at.

  ‘That old man Imer,’ Amerotke paused, ‘the one I met last time I was there, they said he was close to death. I would like to know.’

  Shufoy hopped to the door. Amerotke heard him laughing with the guards outside. He picked up his cloak and the sack and went down and made himself comfortable in the shade of an acacia tree. A short while later Shufoy, his scarred face lugubrious, came striding back with all the sombre majesty of a chief mourner.

  ‘Master,’ he intoned, ‘Imer has died, shortly after you visited him. He has gone into the Far West. He now rests in the cool green fields of Osiris.’

  ‘Ah, well.’ Amerotke rose to his feet and walked across the lawns to the precincts near the great temple. He went down the steps, across another courtyard and down into the wabet, which he had visited when he had first come to view the corpses of Mafdet and Sese. He skirted the priests and acolytes, busy over their funeral rites, walking quickly round the death slabs with the corpses sprawled there, and across to the scribe at the far door who kept the tally of the dead.

  The scribe lifted his head. ‘My lord?’

  ‘Do you have the body of Imer? He died a short while ago in the House of Twilight. I would like to pay my respects and hire a chapel priest to sing some prayers and hymns for him.’

  The scribe lifted a hand and methodically went back through his records. Then he looked up and shook his head. ‘I’m sorry, my lord, there is no entry. You must be mistaken, perhaps you were given the wrong name?’

  Amerotke was about to protest when he recalled the Lady Nethba. He thanked the scribe and went outside to where his guard was waiting. He sat on a bench and tried to resolve the problem. Shufoy, fascinated by the funeral priests, their faces covered by hawk and jackal masks, drifted back towards the wabet. He stood in the doorway oblivious to the pungent odours of perfume and natron, studying the various inscriptions carved into the lintel of the door, particularly the one about snakes, which he read out to entertain the guards.

  ‘Go back, dusk crawler, go back into the dark.’

  ‘Shufoy!’ The little man groaned and went back to his master. ‘Shufoy … no, never mind.’

  Instead Amerotke beckoned over one of the guards and whispered an order to him; the man pulled a face but nodded and went into the wabet. He returned a short while later shaking his head.

  ‘I’m sorry, my lord.’ He spread his hands. ‘There was n
o record of her.’

  Shufoy was now fascinated at what was going on. Amerotke waved away the guard.

  ‘I can’t believe it!’ the Judge whispered. ‘The lady Nethba talked of Kliya, an old washerwoman who came to the Temple of Isis to die. Lady Nethba later made enquiries about her only to be told they had no record. Now …’

  ‘Is that why Lady Nethba was upset about her own father?’ Shufoy asked.

  ‘Precisely,’ Amerotke agreed. ‘She became all anxious. So what do we have here, eh, Shufoy? Two old people who come to the Temple of Isis, one of whom I met, I saw with my own eyes, yet now they have no record of them. I wonder if they were buried?’

  ‘My lord judge!’

  Amerotke glanced up. A white-garbed temple acolyte, dressed in a sheath-like linen robe, stood on the edge of the lawn. Behind him, some distance away, was a woman, apparently in mourning by the dirty, dishevelled robes she wore and the dust covering her head and face.

  ‘My lord?’ The acolyte waggled his finger fastidiously towards the woman. ‘This, er, this lady presented herself into the Chapel of the Ear. She has come to see you. She says the chief steward of your house told her you were here. She claims to have information for you.’

  Amerotke waved the woman over. The temple acolyte almost jumped aside, as if she was infected with the plague. She was quite young and kept her head down. Amerotke could glimpse the blood-scarred cheeks where she had scratched herself with her nails; her skin was now the colour of dust. At first he suspected some form of attack and his hand went to his dagger while he beckoned a guard over. The woman, however, fell to her knees and began to keen, rocking backwards and forwards.