The Totems of Abydos (2 page)

Who, Horemheb wondered, are the brethren? And, too, Horemheb wondered upon himself, for he did not know who he was, but only that he, too, was of the brethren. He had never denied that, and never would. He was of the brethren. Without the brethren, outside of the brethren, he was nothing. But, too, he was different. He wanted to know who they were, and who he was, who was one of them. That was not too much, surely. And so it was in search of knowledge, called by the journey, summoned by it, enticed by it, driven, tormented, and lashed by it, eager to seek and fearing what might be found, that Horemheb had once again left the village at sunset, that he had once again sought the string which would take him to the platform.

Horemheb drew shut the strings on his small sack of meal and, with difficulty, aided by the staff, rose to his feet. He looked up into the moonless sky. On his ancient visage was reflected the dim, yellowish light of the lantern fruit, retaining its recollection of the day’s sun, but Horemheb did not see it, of course, as he was blind. He had not always been blind. Once he had been as sharp-sighted, as quick, as any of the brethren. But long ago, so long ago that there were none amongst the brethren alive now who could remember it, he had sought the platform, the first time that he had done so after sunset. At such a time, of course, not even the string had been tied between the trees. Long before that first nocturnal journey Horemheb, of course, had undertaken his travels, sat at the feet of elders, read his parchments, sought others, conducted his researches, and pondered on the puzzles which had, even from his early youth, intrigued him, and then, as his wisdom increased, begun to frighten him. He was already old, and shivering in his hut, when the images, like furtive presences in the night, like rodents in the darkness, had begun to haunt him, had begun, so to speak, to prowl about his ears, and scamper over his old body at night, as though scornful of any longer concealing their presence from one so weak, from one from whom they had nothing to fear. It was difficult to catch these images in the darkness, for they were quick and elusive, but Horemheb thought they were the shadows of truths, not some blazing, triumphant truth that would vindicate the brethren and himself, that would dispel darkness with light and trumpets, with sunlight and processions, but small truths, not really important in the vastness of the universe, truths more like shadows, more like rodents in the darkness. And these truths, if such they were, for he did not care to welcome them as such, hinted at the greater thing behind them, at the darker thing behind them, the thing which was more vast and terrible than they, at the forces in the heart, at the memory. One night Horemheb had awakened and thought that he had screamed a scream, though it must have been a silent scream for it aroused none of the brethren. Something had come to him in his sleep which had terrified him. This was not, he knew, one of the small truths, which spoke of the diminutiveness of the brethren and himself, so tiny in the framework of things, but a truth which was not of the brethren, but was in its way the brethren, much as one might have a truth which was not about the pebble or the branch, but which was, in some mysterious cognitive alchemy, the being of the pebble or the branch, or its explanation, or its code or key, what told what it was and why it was so.

That very night, still shuddering from the dream, drenched with sweat, shivering in his blanket, Horemheb rose up and, heedless of the stealthy ones, hastened to the platform. He had realized that the secret he sought lay not in the bright court of the village, to be found in the light of day, within the fence, but outside the village, beyond those frail palings, through the forest, away from the village, in the darkness. That was the first time he had gone to the platform at night. He had come back alone in the morning from the platform. He had been noticeably different then from what he been the day before. He sat alone in his hut for three days, seeing no one and not eating. On the third day he taken his scarp and gouged out his own eyes. This, as I have indicated, occurred long ago. Indeed, as I have indicated, there are none alive today who remember it, other than Horemheb himself. He did not explain why he had done what he did, nor was he asked. The brethren are a tactful folk and the endemic courtesy which is custom, if not law, with them mitigates against the impropriety of inquiring too deeply into matters which might prove sensitive. They assumed, doubtless, that Horemheb had had his reasons for his act, reasons which must be, in his own mind at least, sufficient for its accomplishment, reasons it might not be wise to inquire into. They did determine that he had gone to the platform at night, however, which is not customary, though it is not unlawful, for the brethren. Perhaps he should not have done that. Who knew what he had seen there? It was conjectured it must have been unpleasant. The brethren were content to let Horemheb bear the weight of this secret, if it were one. Better he than they. Now, of course, all accepted the fact that Horemheb was blind, and old, and foolish. Still he had seen something that they had not seen. But perhaps it was better that it not have been seen.

Horemheb, of course, never told anyone what he had seen. From this one might have supposed that perhaps he had learned the secret, or that he had apprehended the truth, or that he had discovered the memory, or the thing like a memory, which lay like a stone and a fountain within the brethren. But this was not so. If he had learned these things, or recollected them, or whatever, he would not have returned later to the platform. You see, to the contrary, at the platform that night, he had not really learned the secret; he had not there, before the platform, understood the memory, the half-suspected memory, which might not even exist; no, he had not there, at the platform, perceived the truth at last, something which might have redeemed himself and the brethren, which might have made it all worthwhile, or, if not that, at least intelligible; no, no coin was obtained there of inestimable worth, or even one of paltry value, nor even a truth which might in its glory or hideousness have blasted him. Rather it was something else he saw there, something which he had not expected and which frightened him. It was only after he had returned home and thought and thought, and twice dreamed, that he suspected the meaning of what he saw, not that he knew that meaning, or understood it, but only that he suspected it. What he had seen there, he became certain, although it was not in itself the secret, not in itself the truth, or the memory, was something which nonetheless appertained to the secret, something which was not the truth or the memory but which might not be entirely unrelated to the truth, or to the memory, something which had something to do with all three, or one, as the case might be, or else it was something which might, in some terrible way, itself know the secret, the truth, the memory. After Horemheb had inflicted such indignity and pain upon himself, he did not return for revolutions to the platform. Then, one evening, ten revolutions, and a hundred mournings and festivals, after he had inflicted his cruel injuries upon himself, that he might not again see what he saw, that his eyes should never show him such a thing again, he returned to the platform. We do not really know why he returned to that fateful place. Perhaps, in the beginning, he was curious to know if he had been mistaken on that distant night, if he had really seen what he thought he had seen, or if it were an illusion of the senses, or a dream. Perhaps, on the other hand, he was mad or labored in the grip of some monstrous compulsion. In any event he had had the string tied by the brethren during the brightness of the day and then, one evening, when the sun was sinking behind the trees and the shadows of the fence were long and jagged on the clearing, and the fruit of the lantern trees was becoming visible in the gloom, he returned to the platform. Since that time he had made the journey several times, many, many times, a great number of times, taking with him his staff and his small sack of meal. The string which was now again dried and thin, worn by the winter and the weather, pelted by the rain, sometimes sheathed with ice, chilled by snow, swaying beneath the trees, had been replaced a number of times. But it was, in a sense, you see, the same string; it was always the same string, as it always marked the same trail; it always traced the same journey. It is in that sense it was the same string. It always led to the platform. Why then did Horemheb return to the platform? We do not really know. I think it was because he suspected that in its vicinity was the secret, the memory, the truth. I think he came back to the platform because he wanted to know, because even in his age and pain, and his fear, and given the terror of what he suspected, he wanted to know, or perhaps because it was merely he had not yet been satisfied, or because he was insatiably restless, or because he was inveterately curious, that perhaps as a consequence of some ineradicable affliction inherited from some remote unknown ancestry, an ancestry he might in an earlier day have despised or found laughable had it suddenly, from a depth of bushes, peered out at him, or perhaps because he still hoped to unravel the riddles of his distant youth, that youth like an unfinished dream, so lost, yet so constantly present, so far away, yet so near. On the other hand, he may have come back to the platform because he had no choice really, because the journey called him. Perhaps the truth is as simple as that. Let those to whom journeys call speculate on the possibility of that. For myself I do not know, and I do not think others do either. Perhaps he was merely the sort who cannot refrain from digging with sticks into the sores on his own body. That is possible. The species are rare in the universe, but they exist, those which torture themselves.

Now Horemheb continued his journey. Then, after less than one of the twenty-five segments of a rotation, the divisions of a lightness from a lightness, he felt beneath his feet not the softness of the forest trail, the crushed leaves and the dust, that curious mixture of particles wounded to powder by long treading, but the flat stones. It was there that the string ended. With his staff Horemheb tapped ahead of himself, scratching now and then at the stones to determine their setting, and the directions of the cracks between them. It was still night. Had he been able to see them the stars were full and, behind, in the forest, the lantern fruits hung like lamps from the branches of the trees. He supposed the platform looked much the same as always. No one knew its age, but it was known that there had been an innumerable number of platforms before this one, built on this same spot. That was testified to by records as old as those the brethren possessed. No one, at least as far as Horemheb knew, knew why the first one had been built here, or what the point of the platform was.

In a little time, for the area of the flat stones was not really large, the tip of Horemheb’s staff, moving gently before him, inquisitive, like something alive, sniffing, groping, alert, an extension of his spirit, an emblem of his quest, touched the first stair. There were three of these, if one counts the level of the dais on which the platform had been erected. Horemheb climbed the steps and, because he conjectured he was early, he sat down, cross-legged, before the platform. The platform itself was not high, once one had ascended to the dais on which it was erected. Horemheb, who was not large, not even amongst the brethren, could have put out his hand, had he been standing, and placed his full palm upon it. But he did not stand before the platform, as he was surely early. Rather he sat there, cross-legged, before the platform, with the sack of meal and his staff beside him, took out the parchments, and, from the irregular surfaces, traced the sayings. He did not fear the stealthy ones in this place, for they did not come here.

After a division of a revolution Horemheb rolled the parchments and tied them shut.

He then rose slowly to his feet. He did not use his staff this time to help him rise. He did hold the sack of meal.

He had heard it ascend to the platform, with one movement, from the back. It had been quiet but Horemheb did not think that it had been concerned to conceal its presence. Rather that was the way it moved.

“Speak,” said Horemheb, after a time. “Speak!”

Horemheb knew it was close to him. He knew its presence, especially here, in this place. Sometimes it was so close to him he could have put out its his hand and touched it. Once he had done so, on a rainy night. The fur had been wet and matted. There had been a strong smell upon it.

“You know why I have come,” said Horemheb. “Speak.”

The thing moved about, twice, turning, on the platform, and bit at its fur, doubtless to rid itself of vermin.

“Speak,” said Horemheb.

But the thing did not speak.

Horemheb had read the parchments, but they had been silent. In his distant youth he had sat before the elders, but they had not told him, if they knew. He had made long journeys, even to the place of smoke and ships, but had not found what he sought. Now, again, he had come to the platform.

“Speak,” begged Horemheb.

But Horemheb heard only the wind, and the soft sounds from amongst the rocks.

“I have come through the forest,” said Horemheb. “I have braved the darkness. I have stood before the platform. A thousand times I have brought my body and my staff, and my question, to this place, and have not been heeded. A thousand times I have returned to the village empty-handed.”

“Speak!” said Horemheb.

But it did not speak.

Horemheb then put the sack of meal on the platform, as his small offering, small in value to many, but a gift of considerable price to Horemheb.

Horemheb then bent down and picked up his staff. He descended from the dais and found the string once more, which he would follow back to the village.

Behind him the beast looked down at the sack of meal between its paws. It was not such stuff that the beast ate.