Pandion had now become a mere, an hereditary slave of Pharaoh, and was one of the eight thousand who served in gardens, canals and buildings of the palace domains.
Other captives from amongst those who had been through the royal inspection with Pandion were distributed amongst the higher officials as sahu — slaves who on the death of their masters would be transferred to the shehne of Pharaoh.
An oppressive silence filled the stifling atmosphere, broken only by occasional sighs and groans from the new slaves driven here together with Pandion. The brand burned like red-hot coals on Pandion’s back. The youth could find no place for himself. The open sea and shady groves on the wave-washed shores of his native land were replaced by a patch of dusty earth hemmed in by high walls. Instead of a free life together with his beloved — slavery in a foreign land infinitely far from all that was near and dear to him.
It was only the hope of liberation that kept the young Hellene from smashing his head against the wall that cut him off from the wide and beautiful world.
III. THE SLAVE OF PHARAOH
as in previous years the bushes burst into flower covering the hill slopes with a flaming carpet, when spring came again to the shores of Oeniadae. The bright constellation of the Archer (The early setting of the Archer constellation was regarded as heralding the end of the winter storms.)had begun to set early, the regular west wind heralded the beginning of the seafaring season. Five ships had returned to Calydon, having left for Crete in early spring, and then two Cretan ships had arrived. But Pandion was on none of them.
Agenor was frequently lost in silent meditation but he strove to keep his feelings of alarm hidden from his family.
The lone traveller had disappeared in Crete, had been lost somewhere in the mountains of that huge island amidst big communities of people whose languages he did not know.
The old artist had decided to go to Calydon and from there, if opportunity offered, to leave for Crete in order to find out what he could of Pandion’s fate.
Thessa had lately got into the habit of wandering off alone. Even the silent sympathy of her family lay heavy on her.
In profound grief the girl stood before the calm, eternally moving sea. Sometimes she ran down to the shore in the hope that Pandion would return to the place where they had parted.
But these days of hope had long since passed. Thessa was now certain that far beyond the line that divides the sky from the sea some misfortune had occurred. Only captivity or death could have prevented Pandion from returning to her.
And Thessa implored the waves that came rolling in from afar, perhaps from that place where her beloved P and km was now — implored them to tell her what had happened. And she was sure that she had to wait but a little while and the waves would give her a sign to tell her where Pandion was. But the waves the sea cast at her feet were all alike, and their rhythmic noise told her no more than silence would have done.
How could she discover what had become of her lover? How could she, a woman, whose lot in life is to be with her man, the mistress and protector of his home, his companion when travelling and the healer of his wounds-how could she overcome the distance that separated them? There was but one road for the woman who refused to obey a man, be it her father, husband or brother, and that was to become a hetaera in the city or the harbour. She was a woman — she could not set out for another country, she could not even make an attempt to search for Pandion.
There was nothing left for her to do but wander up and clown the shores of the mighty sea. There was nothing she could do! No way in which she could help!
Even if Pandion had perished she would never, never know where he had died.
A deluge of silver-blue moonlight inundated the entire valley. It was cut off by deep black shadows from crevices in the steep cliffs but it streamed along the river following its course from south to north.
Darkness filled the square well of the slave compound near Nut-Amon, or Waset, the great capital city of Aigyptos.
The wall was brightly illuminated and cast a dull reflection from its rough surface.
Pandicn lay on a bundle of coarse grass on the floor of his narrow cell. With great caution he thrust his head out of the low entrance that looked like a rat-hole. At the risk of attracting the sentries’ attention the young Hellene got up on his knees to admire the pale disc of the moon floating high in the heavens over the edge of the gloomy wall. It was painful to think that the same moon was shining over distant Oeniadae. Perhaps Thessa, his Thessa, was asking Hecate where he was, little suspecting that from his stinking hole his eyes, too, were fixed on that silver disc. Pandion drew his head back into the darkness that was filled with the dusty smell of heated clay and turned his face to the wall.
The raging despair of the first days, the fits of terrible grief, had long since passed. Pandion had changed very considerably. His thick, clean-cut brows were knit in a permanent frown, the golden eyes of the descendant of Hyperion were dark with the fires of wrath that secretly but stubbornly burned in them, his lips were now kept tightly pressed together.
His mighty body, however, was still filled with inexhaustible energy, his intellect was unimpaired. The youth had not lost heart; he still dreamed of liberty.
Pandion was gradually developing into a fighting man who was to be feared not only on account of his courage, strength and boundless determination but also because of the urge to maintain his spirits even in the hell that surrounded, him and to carry his dreams, desires and love through all trials and tribulations. That which had been impossible to a lonely man ignorant of the language and the country had become eminently possible — Pandion had a companion, a comrade. A comrade! Only he who has had to stand alone in the face of menacingly superior forces, only he who has been alone in a distant foreign land can appreciate to the full the meaning of that word. A comrade means friendly help, understanding, protection, common thoughts and dreams, wise counsel, timely reproach, support and comfort. During the seven months he had been employed on jobs in the vicinity of the capital Pandion had learned something of the strange language of Aigyptos and began to understand his fellow-slaves despite their many tongues.
He began to distinguish those who had clear-cut, well-defined individuality from amongst the five hundred slaves confined in the shehne and daily driven out to work.
On their part the other slaves gradually learned to trust one another and some of them became friendly with Pandion.
The terrible privations which they shared, the common longing for liberty united them in a common struggle to win their emancipation, strike a blow at the blind, oppressive forces of the rulers of the Black Land and return to their long-lost native lands. “
Home — that was a word they could all understand although to some it meant a land that lay beyond the mysterious swamps in the south, to others somewhere beyond the sands to the east or west and to the third, like Pandion, a land beyond the seas in the north.
There were but few in the shehne, however, who had strength enough to prepare for the combat. The others, exhausted by their heavy drudgery and perpetual undernourishment, were slowly fading away without a murmur. These were mostly people of advanced age, who had no interest in what was going on around them; there was not a spark of resolution in their dull eyes; they showed no desire to communicate with their companions; they worked, ate slowly and sank into a heavy sleep and next morning shuddered at the cries of the warders who awakened them to trudge along in the column of slaves, sluggish and indifferent.
Pandion soon realized why there were so many separate cells in the slave compound: they kept people apart. After supper it was forbidden to hold communication with one another; the sentries on the wall watched for infringements of this rule and next morning an arrow or a stick fell to the’ lot of the disobedient. Not every slave possessed either the strength or the courage to take advantage of the darkness and crawl to the cells of his companions, but some of Pandion’s comrades did.
Three men became
Pandion’s closest companions. The first of them was Kidogo, a huge Negro almost four cubits in height who came from a very distant part of Africa to the south-west of Aigyptos. Kindly, jolly and exuberant Kidogo was also a skilled artist and sculptor. His expressive face with its broad nose and thick lips immediately attracted Pandion’s attention by its intellect and energy. Pandion was used to well-built Negroes, but this giant immediately drew the attention of the sculptor by the beauty of his well-proportioned body. Muscles seemingly forged from iron suited Kidogo’s light and lithe figure. His huge eyes seemed all attention and were astounding in their animation against the background of a black face.
At first Pandion and Kidogo communicated with each other by means of drawings made with a pointed stick on the earth or on walls. Later the young Hellene began to talk to the Negro in a mixture of the language of Quemt and the simple, easily remembered language of Kidogo’s people.
In the pitch darkness of moonless nights Pandion and Kidogo crawled to each other’s cells, and talking in whispers, gained fresh strength and courage in the discussion of plans for escape.
One evening after Pandion had been there for a month a group of new slaves was driven into the shehne.
The newcomers sat or lay near the door gazing hopelessly around them, their tormented faces bearing the seal of grief and despair so well known to every one of the captives. On returning from work in the evening Pandion was going to the big water vessels to get a drink when suddenly he almost let fall his bowl. Two of the newcomers were talking softly in Etruscan, a language with which Pandion was familiar. The Etruscans were a strange, rough and ancient people who frequently visited the shores of Oeniadae where they enjoyed the reputation of sorcerers knowing the secrets of nature.
So great was the power of memories of his home that had been evoked that Pandion’s whole body trembled; he spoke to the Etruscans and they understood him. When he asked them how they fell captive to the Egyptians both of them sat silent as though they were not at all pleased with the meeting.
The two Etruscans were of medium height, very muscular and with broad shoulders. Their dark hair was matted with dirt and hung in uneven strands on both sides of their faces. The elder of the two was apparently about forty years old and the younger was approximately the same age as Pandion.
The likeness between them was immediately apparent — their sunken cheeks stressed the protruding cheekbones and their stern hazel eyes flashed with a stubbornness that nothing could break.
Pandion was both puzzled and annoyed by the indifference of the Etruscans and hurried back to his own cell. For several days after this Pandion deliberately paid no attention to them although he knew they were watching him.
Some ten days after the arrival of the Etruscans Pandion and Kidogo were sitting side by side over a supper of papyrus stalks. The two friends ate their food quickly and then lingered a while to talk while the others were finishing their meal. Pandion’s neighbour on the other side was the elder Etruscan. Unexpectedly he laid his heavy hand on the youth’s shoulder and looked mockingly into Pandion’s eyes when he turned towards him.
“A poor comrade will never gain his liberty,” said the Etruscan slowly with a note of challenge in his words; he did not fear that the warders would understand him for the inhabitants of Tha-Quem did not understand the languages of their captives and despised all foreigners.
Pandion jerked his shoulder impatiently, not having understood the import of the Etruscan’s words, but the latter squeezed hard with his fingers that dug into Pandion’s muscles like bronze talons.
“You despise them, and you shouldn’t.” The Etruscan nodded his head towards the other slaves who were busily eating. “The others are no worse than you and they also dream of liberty…”
“They are worse,” exclaimed Pandion arrogantly. “They’ve been here a long time and I haven’t heard of any attempts at escape!”
The Etruscan pressed his lips together contemptuously.
“If youth doesn’t possess sufficient intelligence, then youth must learn from age. You’re strong and healthy, there’s still strength left in your body after a day’s heavy toil, and lack of food hasn’t yet undermined your strength. They have lost their strength; that’s the only difference between you and them, and that’s your good luck. But remember that you can’t escape from here alone: you have to know the road and break through by force and the only force we have is all of us together. When you are a good comrade to all of them there’ll be a better chance of your dreams coming true…”
Amazed at the shrewdness of the Etruscan who had fathomed his most secret thoughts, Pandion could find no answer and only hung his head in silence.
“What’s he saying? What’s he saying?” Kidogo kept asking him.
Pandion wanted to explain but at that moment the overseer beat on the table; the slaves who had finished their meal had to make way for the next party and go to their cells for their night’s rest.
During the night Pandion and Kidogo discussed the Etruscan’s words for a long time. They had to admit that the newcomer understood the position of the slaves better than anybody else. Those who bore the brand of Pharaoh had to know the way out of the country if their escape was to be successful. This was not all: they had to fight their way through a country with a hostile population who believed that the “savages” had been created to work for the people chosen by the gods.
The two friends were despondent at this but they had a feeling of trust in the clever Etruscan.
A few more days passed and there were four friends in Pharaoh’s shehne. Gradually they acquired greater authority amongst the other slaves.
The elder Etruscan, who bore the awe-inspiring name of Cavius, the god of death, was regarded as their senior by many of the staves. The three others, the young Etruscan, whose name was Remdus, Kidogo and Pandion, three strong, hardy and bold men, became his most reliable assistants.
By degrees from amongst the five hundred slaves more and more fighters appeared who were willing to risk their lives in the faint hope of returning to their native lands. And just as slowly the remainder, the cowed, tormented and oppressed, regained confidence in their strength and the hope grew stronger that by uniting they could resist the organized might of a huge state.
But the days passed, empty and aimless, bitter days of captivity, days of heavy drudgery that they hated if only because it contributed towards the prosperity of the cruel taskmasters who had thousands of human lives at their disposal. At sunrise each day columns of worn-out men under armed escort left the shehne for work in different places.
The inhabitants of Aigyptos despised all foreigners and did not take the trouble to learn the languages of their captives. For this reason fresh slaves were at first employed on the simplest tasks; later, as they learned the Quemt language, they were given more complicated instructions and learned handicrafts. The overseers did not bother about the names of their slaves and called them by the names of the peoples to which they belonged.
Thus Pandion was called Ekwesha — Egyptian for all the peoples of the Aegean Sea; the Etruscans were Turu-sha, while Kidogo and all other black slaves were simply called Nehsu — Negro.
For the first two months in the shehne Pandion and forty other fresh slaves did repair work on the canals in the Gardens of Amon, (A temple at Karnak, near Luxor.)
rebuilt dykes washed away by the previous year’s floods, loosened the earth around fruit-trees, pumped water and carried it to the flower-beds.
The overseers took note of the hardiness, strength and ability of the newcomers and gradually selected a new detachment which was sent for building work. It happened that the four friends and thirty other strong slaves — the leaders of the mass of slaves in the shehne — were all in the same group. When they were transferred to building work, their regular contact with the others was interrupted since they remained away from the shehne for weeks on end.
The first work given to Pandion away from Pharaoh’s gardens
was the dismantling of an old temple and tomb on the west bank of the river some fifty stadia from the shehne. The slaves were loaded on a boat and ferried across the river under the supervision of an overseer and five soldiers. They were marched along a path northwards to a ridge of vertical cliffs that here formed a gigantic ledge. The path led them past tilled fields on to a metalled road; suddenly a picture was unfolded before Pandion’s eyes that for ever impressed itself on his memory. The slaves had been halted on a wide-open space sloping down to the river and the overseer had gone away, bidding them await his return.
This was the first opportunity Pandion had of studying his surroundings more or less leisurely.
Directly in front of him rose a vertical wall of copper-coloured rock, three hundred cubits high, dotted with patches of blue-black shadow. From the foot of the cliff the white colonnade of a temple spread out in three terraces. A path of smooth grey stone rose from the riverside plain; on either side were rows of strangely carved sphinxes — monsters in the form of recumbent lions with human heads. Further a broad, white staircase between walls on which were carved twining yellow snakes, one on either side, led to the second terraced building supported by low columns, twice the height of a man, of dazzlingly white limestone. In the central part of the temple he noticed a second row of similar columns. On each of them was the representation of a human figure in a royal crown with the hands folded on the breast.
The Land of Foam Page 8
