The Double Crown: Secret Writings of the Female Pharaoh (27 page)

Inet rose from her seat on the portico and limped forward. She reached out with her walking-stick and hooked the box back within reach. She opened it and took out the doll. “But Isis saved him,” she reminded Neferure. “His sister-wife saved him, remember?”

Neferure sniffed.

“There,” said Inet. “We’ll set him down in the sun and let his box dry out. Come on, we’ll go and find you a tiger nut sweet.”

Meryetre, ignored by all, remained behind. My eyes fell shut.

When Neferure and Inet returned, I awoke to consternation once again. Meryetre had continued the saga of Osiris by sawing the doll into bits with a sharp knife and burying them around the fish pond.

“My doll!” wept Neferure. “You’ve broken my doll!”

“Well, Seth sawed Osiris up and buried fourteen pieces along the Nile,” said Meryetre. There were indeed fourteen little heaps of dirt around the pond. “That is what happened.” She stuck her lower lip out.

Neferure sobbed.

“But Isis searched and searched,” said Inet, desperately, “and she found all the bits and put them together with her magic. He even gave her a son, Horus, who triumphed over Seth. You know this, Neferure darling. That is why every Pharaoh is the Living Horus. I will dig up the bits and mend the doll, I promise, sweetheart.” She glared at Meryetre.

“It will not be the same,” said Neferure forlornly. “You keep the doll, now that you’ve ruined it,” she said to her sister. “And keep the sarcophagus too, I don’t like it.”

“She was afraid of being closed up,” I said now to Senenmut.

“But her Ka and her Ba and her Akh will roam free,” he reminded me. “You know that the body in the chest is in imitation of Osiris, who was so imprisoned yet is arisen and reigns in the Afterlife. You know it must be done. You cannot prevent it, Majesty.”

“No,” I agreed desolately. “I cannot prevent it.”

“Majesty, you must leave her now. You must come with me, and you must eat.”

My head did not seem to be attached to my neck. “Yes,” I said. I stepped away from him. Oh, how I hungered still to be held, to be comforted by his strong arms. But I stepped away from him and I straightened my back. I said: “I am still Egypt.” And I left the room.

Meryetre was twelve years old when her sister died. She tried her best to comfort me. She would come to my rooms bearing little gifts: a posy of flowers, a bunch of grapes, a cake. Her manner was gentle and she spoke kindly to me, as if I had been the child and she the parent. She has a motherly side that is the best of her. But I would not be comforted.

One day she noticed that the posy she had brought the previous time had lain just where she left it and was withered and colourless. She looked at it and then she looked at me. “Mother,” she said. “I am still here. Do you not even see me?”

I looked at the funny little face with the prominent teeth and pleading brown eyes. “Yes, dear,” I said, suppressing a sigh. “I do see you.”

Three times I had carried a babe, I thought. Three times I had suffered the sickness and the discomfort and the lack of sleep. Three times I had squatted upon the bricks. And one child only remained to show for it. Just like my mother, I thought. Had she too looked at me and felt bereft?

It was from that time, I think, that I began to feel – well, not old perhaps, by any means, but not young any more. Somehow a lustre had gone from the world that it has never regained. Yet life goes on; whether one will or no, life bears one along like a boat of reeds upon the river. One is not given a choice.

Here endeth the fourteenth scroll.                      

THE FIFTEENTH SCROLL

The reign of Hatshepsut year 9

With Neferure gone to the Fields of the Blessed, Thutmose lost a chance to strengthen his claim to reign. Yet still he harboured aspirations that would have seen him supreme upon the Double Throne had he achieved his desires. It is somewhat ironic that he is my son-in-law now, considering what happened eleven risings of the Nile ago, when I had twenty-eight summers and he was a man of twenty.

The summer was particularly hot that year. I remember that I wore a diaphanous linen robe and a light crown for the private audience that Thutmose had requested. I received him in a small chamber at the residential palace in Thebes. Of course he lived mainly at Memphis – as he does still – where the army has its headquarters, but he came often to the capital. I heard his deep voice greeting the guards by name as he arrived. He makes a point of remembering the names of all his soldiers – one of the ways in which he enlists their loyalty. Also he demands nothing of them that he does not do himself; he is harsh but he is just; he is an able and courageous soldier and by repute a master strategist and tactician on the battle field. One must grant him all of that. His fault is that he does not know his place.

He strode boldly into the room. “Greetings, Majesty,” he said. Short though he is, he makes his presence felt.

“Greetings, nephew,” I said coolly. We measured each other for a space of time. At twenty, I noted, he was no longer a boy. His shoulders were broad and his bare chest hairy, as were the sturdy legs beneath his brief linen tunic. His shaven head shone with oil and his dark brown eyes stared intently from beneath thick brows. The bulging muscles on his upper arms attested to the strength that enabled him to draw his legendary bow with ease.

For the first time in our lives I saw a man when I looked at him. I do not know for sure how he saw me. Since the death of my darling Neferure the previous year, may she live for ever, I had not had a good appetite, so I do know that I was slim. My women kept my skin smooth and supple with unguents, and because of the heat my head under the crown was shaven, but in any case I had not yet seen any grey hairs. I looked, I felt assured, at least presentable.

“No slaves,” he said, glancing at the two young girls who were waving large feathered fans. “Let them bring some cooled wine, and go.”

I was immediately angered by his presumption in giving orders as if it were his palace, not mine, but I bit my tongue. I was determined not to let him see that he could annoy me. I believe it to be one of his tactics, to make me lose my self-control and so feel foolish.

“Go and fetch some wine and some things to eat, and then leave us,” I ordered the slaves. “Nephew, will you not sit?” I gestured towards a low day-bed.

He looked at it and then at me with a small smile. “Rather a chair, Majesty, if I may?” he said, swinging one closer and sitting down without waiting for permission. We were now eye to eye, or almost, for I am taller than he. “Soft seats do not suit a soldier.” His smile broadened mockingly. Of course he knew that seating men uncomfortably at a level below my eyes is an old trick of mine. He set a small wooden chest that he had brought with him down on the tiled floor at his feet. I wondered what it was, but I would not ask. While we waited for the slaves to bring refreshments we spoke of unimportant things. At last we were alone.

“Well, nephew?” I said, leaning back with a glass of cooled wine in my hand. “What matter do you wish to raise with me that must needs be so private? Do you have another grand scheme to march to the Euphrates?”

He looked nettled. “The time will come …” he began, but then he bit his lip. “No, Majesty, let us not bandy words on military matters. Those are issues that should be discussed with the military advisers and counsellors. No, I … well …”

I was not accustomed to seeing him look embarrassed, but he actually seemed ill at ease. “Perhaps the question on your mind has something to do with the mysterious box that you have brought with you,” I suggested. “Does it perhaps contain a new game? I must confess that I tire a little of senet.” I am extremely good at that traditional game, as well he knew.

“No, it is not a game,” he said, rising suddenly and picking up the box. He placed it on a low table that stood at my side. “Please, Majesty, open it.”

I inspected the little chest more closely. It was beautifully constructed from cedarwood, standing on four finely carved claws, with bands of polished copper across the domed lid and a clasp shaped like a lotus bud. “It is most elegant,” I said. I undid the clasp and folded back the lid. Inside, soft cotton cloths hid some kind of round object.

“Go on,” he said, “take it out.”

I did so carefully. The wrappings fell open to display a superb vase fashioned from alabaster, with a wide, flaring lip. Carvings on its sides depicted small and delicate birds. “Oh!” I exclaimed. “It’s beautiful!”

“A small thing, merely,” he murmured.

I rose, taking it over to a table that stood beneath a window. “If I set it here,” I said, “the light falls on it and makes it seem to glow. Oh, it is most exceptional. Where did you find it?”

He too had risen and stood regarding the lovely thing that almost seemed to shine with its own light. “Oh, I – well, I … didn’t find it, exactly. Only the – well, the marble. It is of a particularly good quality. As one can see.”

“You found the marble? You mean you made it? You made this yourself?”

“Yes,” he admitted. “Yes, I did. I like to work with my hands.”

I was astounded. I had heard that he had some skill with design, but I had not dreamed he could be capable of such artistry. “It is beautiful,” I said, sincerely. “I thank you. It is a beautiful gift. The chest, too, that it came in, is very handsome. Did you make that as well?”

“Yes,” he said. “It has a secret mechanism. Let me show you.” He brought the chest over to the table where I stood, closed the lid and pressed twice on the lotus bud. “See? Now it is firmly closed. Nobody can lift the lid.”

“But how can it be opened again?”

“Ah. You must know the secret. You must twist it once to the left, and twice to the right.” He did so deftly, and the lid clicked open again. “More effective than ropes and seals,” he said, smiling.

“It is most intriguing,” I said, pressing on the bud to close it. “And now … twice to the left …”

“No, once to the left. Like this.” He stretched out his hand and guided my fingers. “Then, twice to the right.” Click, went the lid.

The King in me stiffened, rejecting the forbidden touch. The woman in me responded to the warmth of skin on skin. And he knew it. His hand took possession of mine, he folded both of his strong, warm hands around my hesitant fingers. He turned his head to look into my eyes, so close now that I could see tiny freckles on his olive skin. His dark eyes were too intense for me to face. His gaze seemed to unlock feelings that I had kept under rigid control for so long that I had forgotten their existence. I closed my eyes in an attempt to hide them again.

I felt him draw nearer yet, lean towards me, touch his lips to mine. The King was furious, but in that moment the woman reigned, and she wanted his kiss. So delicately, like a bird alighting on a bough for the space of a breath, then taking flight again, he touched his lips to mine. Ah, his lips were warm. A second kiss, firmer and longer now. The taste of salt. The scent of unguent laced with myrrh and beneath that the perspiration of a man. I inhaled his warmth, his strength, his powerful intensity.

“Hatshepsut,” he said, his deep voice lingering over the syllables. His arms had slid around me, one hand in the small of my back, pressing me against him, his desire hard between us.

Yes, yes, the woman groaned, this is good, I want this, oh, yes, I do, it has been so long … I want this, I do, I do …

But the King was aghast at the sense of losing control. “Oh no,” said the voice of the Pharaoh, breathlessly. “No! This may not be!”

“Do not deny it,” murmured Thutmose. “Do not deny us. You want it too. You know you do.” His kisses were becoming more urgent. He thrust a hand into the top of my thin robe, caressing my breast, gripping it, moving his hard thumb across the nipple, erect and sensitive, sending a thrill of delight coursing through the woman’s loins like a stream of water through a dry wadi.

I want this, moaned the woman.

“This must stop,” ordered the King.

Thutmose was ignoring the King’s husky command.

I began to struggle. “Stop! Stop! Stop it!” Suddenly terrified, I felt like one who was drowning and could no longer breathe. I beat my hands against his shoulders fruitlessly. He picked me up and carried me over to the day-bed. He threw me down on the piled cushions, pulling at my robe. Wildly, I rolled aside as he cast himself down too. He caught my left arm, dragging me closer, pinning me down. In desperation I lunged across, grabbed a copper lamp that stood nearby, and brought it down on his head with a tremendous swing. It was a large and heavy one and it struck him on the forehead, making a nasty gash that streamed blood. He roared with pain, increasing his grip on my other arm until I thought he would snap it like a stick. Frantic now, I hit him again. The lamp caught him on the temple and he dropped back onto the cushions with a grunt.