by Marié Heese
Truly, whether one be a fishwife or a queen, there is no dignity at such a time. Anyone may peer and prod at one’s most private parts and make pronouncements on the state of them. One’s body becomes nothing more than a portal, stretched and wrenched open for the new being to pass through, and one is wrung without mercy, squeezed together and torn apart alternately with no quarter given.
Fortunately I had spent only a few hours squatting on the bricks when, after one huge despairing push, she slid into the midwives’ hands, and soon she cried lustily, so that one could be sure she breathed. Never, even at my coronation, have I felt as powerful and as proud of myself as I did when I held my first-born in my arms. I knew that the god Khnum had fashioned her body and her Ka upon his potter’s wheel. But I had carried her and I had brought her into the world through my loins and I was proud. Not for a moment did I think it a pity that she was not male. She was herself, and she was perfect.
When I had been washed and dressed in a fresh robe and installed on a day-bed with the new little princess in my arms, Inet came in. She looked at her doubtfully. “Better it had been a boy, seeing that the Pharaoh is not strong,” she remarked.
“There will be time for boys,” I said furiously. “She is beautiful. She is a gift from Khnum.”
The milk rushed plentifully into my tender breasts and I insisted on feeding her myself for the first few weeks, although Inet disapproved. In the core of my body something clenched like a fist when the baby suckled and I sensed that it was good, that it was right.
But I could not keep on for long. I had to agree to a wet nurse taking over. Since I was already shouldering a portion of my husband’s many tasks even then, only one year into his reign, inevitably my child was taken to the palace nursery to be brought up with the other palace children. Soon Inet had come to adore the child and cared for her devotedly.
I began to conduct interviews in the small audience chamber. One morning the young Nubian whose life I had begged from the Pharaoh arrived to see me.
He strode in confidently and made a deep obeisance. He had now been a pupil of the palace school for about six months and he had already, I thought, grown taller and filled out.
“Majesty,” he said.
“Arise,” I said. “I know who you are, but I do not know your name.”
“Khani,” he told me, rising and standing very straight, with something wrapped in linen in his hands. “I came to thank Your Majesty. I know that I owe the Great Queen my life. It is yours to command, and will always be.”
I smiled a little at his earnestness, yet I was touched. “If you live to serve Egypt, I shall be well content,” I said.
“I serve Your Majesty above all,” he insisted. “I always will.”
“I thank you,” I said, although I could not think what he might do for me. He would surely become a soldier, I imagined. “Will you go to Memphis, to be trained?” I asked.
“After I have had more schooling,” he assented. “Then, yes, I must go to Memphis. I would like to become a standard bearer.”
“A noble ambition.”
He stood, silent and slightly awkward for a few moments. Then he went down on one knee and held out the object in his hands. “I have brought a gift, for the new princess,” he said. “I made it for her. I wish it could have been gold, but it is only wood.”
I took the gift from his outstretched hands and folded the linen wrappings back. It was a small bowl, beautifully carved and polished, with handles in the shape of birds sitting on the rim. The wood was a dull golden colour with dark brown whorls in it. “Oh, it’s lovely!” I exclaimed. “You have the hand of an artist. I am sure that she will use it one day, and she will love it.”
He looked gratified.
After that he came every few months until he left for Memphis, always with something for Neferure: sometimes a basket of fruit, or flowers, or another small item carved from wood or marble. It was almost as if he sensed that she had played a role in his escape from death. We began to have longer conversations as he mastered our tongue, and I valued his comments. It was interesting to hear the views of someone looking at our land as an outsider. He had a keen and most perceptive understanding. I would miss him, I thought, when he went away.
Neferure bloomed. I insisted that she be given precedence as the first-born of the Great Royal Wife. This did not sit well with Isis, my husband’s concubine, who had given him a son some six years previously when he was still the Crown Prince. That son, of course, was Thutmose, that one who would be King. But I was adamant and I got my way.
I saw Neferure often; Inet would bring her to play in my rooms, and when she was old enough she loved to be told stories. She was a good child and a loving one, a true child of the sun.
When Neferure was one, something happened to Inet that made her left leg lazy and her left hand weak. She was in bed for some weeks, but recovered and learned to walk with a stick. It was clear that Neferure would need someone with more strength to look after her. It was then that my husband suggested that we should appoint Senenmut as her nurse and tutor. He had been my steward for some time, and he had acquitted himself well. He already loved the little princess; he explained to me that he was the eldest of a large brood of children and had been accustomed to helping his mother cope with the little ones. Neferure adored him from the start. So the appointment was made, and it suited everyone.
Here endeth the seventh scroll.
Yesterday when Pharaoh gave the latest scroll into my keeping and I left the palace, I had that feeling of chill on the nape of my neck that accompanies the presence of inimical eyes. I felt that I was being watched and followed. The scroll was tucked under my tunic top into a little inner pocket I had my slave sew for me. I would not be so foolish as to carry it in plain sight. I did however carry a couple of ordinary scrolls together with the implements of my trade in a linen bag, and I had taken the trouble to write down a list of instructions to be delivered to the clerks of the Royal Granary, as if that had been the purpose of my visit to the King.
I would not go home, I thought. Let me first see if I can flush out the mangy dog sniffing at my heels. I forced myself to stroll as if I had no cares and betook myself to a tavern near the waterfront where I ordered beer. A slave brought water for me to cleanse my hands and then provided a small bowl of salty roasted lotus seeds designed to increase one’s thirst. It was a popular watering-hole and there was much chatter and laughter.
Within minutes a stranger had slipped into the chair facing mine on the opposite side of the small table. At least, I took him for a stranger, and one with too little acquaintance with bathing at that. He had lost an eye and an ugly gash across his cheek on the same side drew his mouth up in a permanent grimace. His head was shaven, his tunic scruffy and stained. But when he spoke, I realised that I knew him. It was one Ahmose, who had been in the same class as I was at the temple school for scribes.
“Good day, my brother,” he said. “I see it goes well with you, since you have the King’s ear. Better with you than with me, I fear.”
“Good day to you, Ahmose,” I said, to show that I had recognised him. “Will you have a beer?”
He accepted with alacrity. I bade a slave bring some bread and dates also, and the manner in which Ahmose devoured the food when it came proved that I had been correct in my surmise that he was hungry.
“Have you been following me? How do you know I have the King’s ear?”
He nodded, flushing slightly. “I caught sight of you outside the palace,” he explained through a mouthful of bread. “I thought I would presume on our old acquaintance.” Although he looked like a ruffian, he spoke like the educated man I knew him to be. His single eye, brown and somewhat bloodshot, looked at me pleadingly. “I seek work,” he said. “You know that I am capable. But nobody wants to employ a scribe who looks like me.”
“What happened to you?” I enquired, calling for more beer and bread.
His sorry tale was soon told. Like myself h
e had done some of his training as a scribe in a stone quarry. There a fight had broken out among the workers, a tough and violent lot as I well knew. He had attempted to calm the men and they had attacked him with their sharp implements. He had been close to death and could not work for months. Now he presented a fearsome face to the world.
“The problem is, the upper classes who have need of the services of a full-time scribe are disgusted by my looks,” he explained.
“Ah,” I said, “I see, I see.”
“I get single commissions,” he told me. “Mostly from the poor. But as you know, they very seldom use the services of a scribe and they pay little. I need permanent employment, Mahu. Is there not a job somewhere in a royal warehouse where it matters not how a man looks, but only that his work is accurate? You know that I am competent.”
I nodded. “Yes, I know you are.” I called for more beer while I thought. There was indeed a position for which Hapuseneb, Grand Vizier of the South, who also held numerous other posts in the service of the Pharaoh, including Chief Prophet of Amen and Overseer of the Royal Granaries, had asked me to help find an incumbent. It was a job as clerk in the Royal Granaries, but not one that would require the person to go out to the farms, rather an office job keeping track of stores and dispersals. Not highly paid nor of much consequence. But no doubt Ahmose would jump at it, and I knew he would acquit himself well.
It could prove useful, I thought, to have someone I knew, loyal to me and under an obligation to boot, working closely with the Vizier. Priest and Chief Prophet of the God though he is, I do not trust Hapuseneb, and a pair of eyes and ears keeping track of what he does and says may be just what we need. I could spare a few debens of silver to augment my old friend’s income if he would report to me.
“I do believe I have something for you,” I said. “We’ll have to get you cleaned up and looking more presentable. What say you …”
By the time we staggered out, somewhat the worse for wear, we had a deal.
It is as well that I have been given a fright by Ahmose; I realise anew that I must needs be very careful, very careful indeed, with the secret documents given into my care. As soon as I have enough to fill a sealed jar, I shall travel to my cousin’s farm near the mountains, where he keeps goats and grows olives. I can take two jars on a donkey, one with wine and the other filled with scrolls. There is a cave there with a fissure at the back; I shall place the jar inside and cover it with sand and loose stones. Yes, I think that will do. My cousin will be glad to receive wine from me from time to time. Yes, yes, much the best plan.
THE EIGHTH SCROLL
The reign of Hatshepsut Year 20:
The fourth month of Peret day 14
I have been heartsore ever since the attack upon Bek; it was a dreadful shock to me. I know he is an adult man and not a child, but he is so small, and yet has always been so sweet-natured and fun-loving, that I feel about him as I have only felt about one other and that was Neferure, may she live. I live with guilt because I sent him into danger; I should have known that one day he would be set upon for my sake. I am convinced that those who did this to him knew him for one of mine – perhaps he was in fact caught spying, which neither he nor Mahu will admit to me. But I know wherefore a man’s ears are chopped off. It is not the random cruelty of drunken sailors that does this.
Of course the Pharaoh sends men into battle and they are killed or they are wounded. I know there is a cost to pay and I do not flinch from it, although I always try to avert war if I can. Yet if war must be waged, it must and men will die. Men will be mutilated. But not my little Bek. Not him.
It has been some weeks since I had time to write and he has recovered fairly well. The young physician, Minhotep, has been to see him often and has pulled him through. He has even had a pair of false ears made for Bek by the workers in the House of the Dead; they fashioned them from linen and resin and painted them to look like skin. They are attached to a wig, so when he puts it on he looks very normal and he hears well enough. But the spark of fun has gone from him and he sits in a low chair with his short legs in their splints sticking out in front of him and he never jokes or laughs.
Yunit, the gods be praised, has not lost the babe. She has been indefatigable in caring for Bek and I have seen that her ankles have become thick, but she will not allow anyone else to look after him. Truth to tell, she presents a very odd little figure at present. With her swollen belly and short legs she puts me in mind of the goddess of fertility, Taueret, the pregnant hippopotamus. May that be a good portent for her. I hope that there may be no problems with the birth. She reminds me of myself.
The third year of my husband’s reign began well for both of us. The recurrent illnesses that so sapped his strength seemed to be in abeyance; we hoped that he had overcome them completely. He was better able to shoulder his duties as Pharaoh and began the comprehensive restoration of temples that the Hyksos invaders had allowed to crumble into ruin. At this time also he called me often to the marriage bed, and soon I was pregnant again – this time, I was certain, with the son that he so much desired, a son with the full blood royal and an indisputable claim to the Double Throne.
And I was right. In truth I had a son. I carried him for seven moons and he stirred often under my heart. The day of his birth lives in my memory.
It was extremely hot, I remember that well. So hot that it was hard to breathe. It was the time when the waters of the Nile run red. Red as the blood that flowed from my loins after my little son was expelled from my body in a rush. I had been beset by sudden pains for only a short while when the birth took place – despite the bitter potions prescribed by the royal physicians and despite the incantations and prayers and burning of incense by the priests who beseeched the gods not to allow the babe to come forth, for it was too soon; two months too soon, and that was dangerous. The physicians were useless, the priests were powerless and the gods were deaf.
The babe was born and he was perfect. A perfect little man child, whole in every way. All of the miraculous miniature fingers and toes were there, all of the limbs, the tiny sac and the small member that should have matured to plant the seeds of Pharaohs yet to come, all there. The Chief Physician held him by the heels and everyone rejoiced.
But alas! The gods did not cause his heart to breathe. Khnum, who creates the animals by the breath of his mouth, who breathes forth the flowers of the field, who breathes air into the noses of men, did not infuse my son’s perfect small body with the spirit of life. And I, divine though I am, I could not endow my son with the life force. I could not kindle the divine spark. I failed him.
The women took him away and cleaned him and wrapped him in linen swaddling clothes. They washed me too, and then they brought my small son and placed him in my arms. I held him but for a little while. The milk had started into my breasts, which tingled with it; thin as yet but plentiful. I took some on my palm and anointed the silent little face, the forehead, the tiny perfect nose, the exquisitely formed lips that could not suckle. The unbelievably smooth cheeks. The delicate rosy lids over the closed eyes. He did not seem to sleep; oh, no. The living cannot sleep so still.
They took him away and I was utterly bereft. I could not rise from my bed; I could not eat, I could not sleep. I just lay and let the tears roll down my cheeks. My husband was distraught at the loss of our son, but when he saw me despairing, he became even more concerned about me. “Hatshepsut, my love, you must eat,” he urged me. “You are so thin. Please, eat! We cannot lose you too!”
But I could not. Finally he sent Inet to me. She had not been well since her leg and hand became lame, but she struggled into my room with her walking stick and sat down on a small stool next to my bed, saying nothing, simply taking my hand in her two hard little paws and stroking it gently.
“Oh, Inet,” I sobbed. “It is so hard. So hard.”
“I know,” she said.
“He should have had a name,” I said, voicing my deepest concern. Because he never breathed, he was
not named. “How can he be taken to the gods if he had no name? How would they know to call him?”
“It is written, ‘The god knows every name’,” said Inet. “Even those that we do not.”
“Even the name of a baby who did not breathe?”
“Oh, yes. And because he never breathed, his heart would have been light and Ammit would not have gobbled it up,” said Inet.
She always knew how to comfort me. My son would evade the clutches of the hound of hell, I thought. He would not have been sent to perdition in the ghastly Netherworld with those whose hearts are heavy with evil when weighed against the feather of Ma’at. He would have reached the celestial realm; the doors of the sky would have been thrown open to him; he would have joined the never-dying circumpolar stars.
My greatest comfort at that time was Neferure. Small though she was, already she was a person of considerable charm. She was an intelligent and biddable and indeed a most delightful child. Her nature was sunny and she never cried, except perhaps when she fell and bumped her head or when the teeth were coming into her mouth. She had the loveliest chuckle, a happy sound that everybody wanted to hear.
I was young and strong and I recovered as well as one ever does from such a loss. My husband was travelling often at this time, inspecting the sites of temples that he wanted to be restored, conferring with Ineni, who had been my father’s architect and who was, despite advancing age, still the best man in the kingdom to consult and to oversee these projects. So I stood in the Pharaoh’s place in Thebes and handled many matters, large and small. It helped me to be busy. One morning when I was carrying out my duties at the administrative palace, Khani arrived.
