Nefertiti (18 page)
She turned back to me. 'They have fights. Everyone does. It doesn't mean anything.'
'Have they had lots of fights?' I asked. Meretaten refused to reply.
Ankhesenpaaten, along the table, was playing with a mechanical toy of a wooden man and a big dog worked by strings and pulleys. As she turned the peg the wooden man raised his arms to defend himself as the dog leaped at him to attack. Over and over, the dog biting the man. The white fangs and the wide red eyes and the raised hair along his back. The little girl laughed and pointed at me. 'Look,' she said. 'It's you!'
I was disconcerted. Then I thought of something.
'I should also pass on a message to you all,' I said. 'It's from Senet. She wanted me to tell you she misses you all.'
Meretaten's face hardened. 'Tell her — '
Then the door opened behind me. The girls stood up and hurried to their beds. The governess trembled.
'Who permitted this
man
to enter the nursery and address the princesses without my presence?'
Her voice was like nails scraping on a board. There was a horrible silence. We all stood like statues, looking at the floor. I felt like I was back at school. I had to speak.
'Highness, I am to blame.'
By the shuffling noise they made I knew her feet were weak and old; her breath came short with anger. For all the finest perfumes of the land, she stank. It was the sickly-sweet stench of decaying flesh. Then she reached out and grabbed my face. I was shocked by the contact, and jumped. She gripped me with bony, resilient strength, and I had to make myself stand still while she drew her fingers, with their long, nasty nails, down across my face.
'So you are the fool who believes he will find her. Look at me.'
I did so. Time had withered her beauty into a wizened mask of rage. But for the crazy opulence of her dress - veils and robes draped around her bones - and the dyed lengths of her own hair, she would seem a madwoman, a wild nomad from the desert. Her mouth was like an old leather purse, her eyes milky, the colour of the moon. They drifted in their sockets as she spoke. Her laugh was accompanied by a gust of stagnant marsh gas. She grinned as if she could see my reaction, revealing an array of false gold teeth among rotting black stumps.
She shuffled around the girls like an ancient animal or a seer in her fantastic rags. The princesses instinctively backed away from her. Meketaten held her nose and made a face behind the back of the Queen Mother. Suddenly, with shocking accuracy, she slapped the child hard across the face. The girl forced down the tears that sprang to her eyes.
'Now that I have made the effort to come here, what do you wish to ask these girls? Hurry. It is late.'
I racked my brains.
You waste my time. Speak.'
'Highness, I have no further questions. We have already talked.'
She scowled at me. Then she turned to the girls. 'Sleep! Now. Any child who speaks will be punished.'
Nefernefrure began to sob again, great waves of unhappiness welling up inside her. The old monster shuffled over to the little girl and shouted into her distraught face. 'Stop blubbing! Tears are futile. They have no effect upon me whatsoever.' None of the other girls had the courage to defend their little sister.
She turned back to me. 'And you and your idiot slave, follow me. Governess, the room is a disaster. See that it is ordered.' And she shuffled out.
Khety blew out his cheeks, as if to say: I told you so. And he was right. Time was taking a slow and terrible revenge upon her, bone by bone. She was like a living corpse, except somewhere in that mind, probably over-complicated with the fears and terrible imaginings of a lifetime in power, was a keen intelligence and a refusal to submit to mortality without a struggle. But that did not account for her cruelty and viciousness. It was as if all human emotion had long since rotted down into a bile which ran black and vicious in her heart. Perhaps it was all that kept her in the land of the living.
We followed at a respectful distance. As she passed, everyone stepped back, lowering their heads respectfully, and then looked up frankly at Khety and me, with little more curiosity than if we
were din
ner for the crocodiles in the Sacred Pool. She seemed to know her way without help, and no-one offered to guide her. When she came to steps she showed no sign of hesitation but with quick, practised touches of her slippers quickly found her way onwards.
Eventually we came to a private chamber. Guards were set on either side of the door. As she passed, she flourished her hand and the doors were closed silently behind us. The room was devoid of personal touches: nothing more than a meeting room furnished with a throne on a raised dais which she ascended. She did not sit down in it but remained standing above us.
'I will grant you a few moments of my time, which is short in every sense. But only because the King, my son, requests it. I have no wish, whatsoever, to discuss affairs of s
tate with some ambitious and un
imaginative little Medjay meddler. Speak.'
Here was a woman who had seen and engaged in the operations of power for decades. A woman who had presided over the most powerful reign of the dynasty and still influenced the present King. She waited, her blurred eyes open. It was a strange and disconcerting sensation to address them directly.
'Highness, kindly describe your relationship with the Queen
Nefertiti.'
'She's the wife of my son and the m
other of six of my grandchil
dren. My female grandchildren.' You have others?'
'Of course. There is a harem; there are other wives.'
'And other grandchildren?'
'Yes.'
Stones speak more candidly than this. But the stoniness perhaps defended information that was delicate. Other children. Other claims to power.
As I hesitated, uncertain how to proceed, her blind eyes glittered with a kind of bitter amusement. But I would not let myself be distracted. I tried a different approach.
Your Majesty has ruled at the heart of the kingdom for many years, by the grace of Ra.'
'Your point?'
'Your Highness knows better than any the . . .
challenges
which Queens must transcend. Men are born with advantages; women must create their own. It is, as in your own example, if I may say so, a noble achievement.'
'Don't you dare to praise me. Who do you think you are?' Once more she was breathless with anger. 'I was born into a family of great power. My gender was
always
to my advantage. I made it so. It gave me a useful cover for my intelligence. And it has enabled me to do all the things I have achieved. Most men fear powerful women. But there are a few who enjoy them. My husband was one. Without me, this city and its god would not exist.'
Khety and I exchanged glances. Even though she was blind I still felt she could see everything.
'And the Queen?' I asked.
'What about her?'
She stared at me, hard. There would be no yielding here. 'Would this city not exist without her?' 'It seems to be surviving so far.' Silence.
'You are lost already,' she continued, decisively. 'You know nothing. You have nothing to ask me because you have discovered nothing and understood nothing.'
It was somewhat true, and all the more infuriating for being so.
I said, 'I find a young woman, to all purposes identical to the Queen, murdered, her face removed. I find no evidence that the Queen's disappearance was either violent or against her will. I do, however, find reasons why she might have decided to disappear of her own accord.'
She grinned, baring her gold teeth, in reply. And then she was caught out by a racking cough. She spat out a little phlegm, careless of where it landed. Khety and I just stared at it.
'Can you hold dreams in your hand?' she continued. 'Can you say why people need gods, and why power's legs must needs be crooked on the straight road? Can you say why men cannot be honest? Can you say why time is more powerful than love? Can you say why hate is more powerful than time? There are many questions your method cannot accommodate.'
I could not say why any of these things should be so. I played my last card: 'She is not dead.'
Her face did not change. 'I'm delighted to hear your optimism in the face of so much evidence to the contrary.'
'Why do you think she disappeared?'
'Why do you think she
has
disappeared?'
'I think she had to make a choice. Between fight and flight. She chose flight. Perhaps it was the only way for her to survive.'
Her face puckered with rage. 'If that is the case, then she is a despicable little coward,' she spat. 'Did she think it would be so easy, to just disappear when things got difficult? Pack up her tender feelings, abandon her children and her husband and disappear, crying her futile tears? Damn her for her selfishness, for her vanity, for her weakness.'
Her anger echoed around the cold room. Then, suddenly, she staggered a little. Her hand flew up to her face while the other searched about for the arm of the throne, but in her panic she missed, her legs lost all power, and she slipped down to the stone platform. She made no sound. Her veils had fallen from her shoulders and lay about her like white and gold linen snakes. For a moment she was quite still. I moved to her aid, and as I did so her breath began to rattle and shake as she struggled, tangled as she was in the folds of her robes. As she moved the clothing came away from her chest. Its brown skin hung in shrivelled folds from the bones. She seemed more a shadow doll, all sticks and string, than a living thing. Then I saw, with horror, black and blue cankers, open sores, blossoming where her breast should have been.
Without thinking, I touched her shoulder. And she screamed. The noise seemed to pierce the stone of the walls. I heard feet running towards us outside in the corridors. Then she grasped my head and pulled it down towards her rotting face. Her grip was supernatural, and she whispered urgently, wetly, into my ear: 'Time himself is feasting on me. He is dining with care. He is powerful. But my hatred will survive me. Remember that, when you see beauty, for this is the end of beauty and power. That is my final answer to all your questions.' Her sightless, moony eyes were fixed with strange concentration in that doll's skull. Then she let me go, and all strength departed from her body.
I reached out to cover the horrible sight again, but she cried out a second time, and I realized that every touch caused her agony. It could not be long now. And there would be little work left for the embalmer to finish.
We drove to Meryra's villa. By now t
he population was clearly chang
ing and growing, as people arrived for the Festival. The atmosphere was changing too: it carried a new tension, partly from the fact of there being too many people cramped together in one place that was not yet ready to receive them. But there was something else, an undercurrent of fear that had not been there before. I noticed more armed Medjay on the streets, and not in pairs but in units, as if preparing for the great event. It seemed, suddenly, that these new buildings, temples and office complexes could shiver, quake and collapse into the dust of their making for no reason. The world no longer felt solid; it felt conditional. There were tremors of uncertainty under our feet.
We arrived at the villa just as Meryra's celebration procession was making its way along the street. The man himself was carried on a high throne, together with his wife in a long wig and a pleated linen gown. They both looked highly satisfied with themselves and their elevation above all others. He seemed the man of the moment. The late light
shone on his gold collars. The parade passed into the main house with shouts and cries, and Meryra was lifted down and, to calls of praise and congratulation, and the casting of flowers, accompanied inside his house, presumably to change his robes.
Suddenly Parennefer was at my side.
'How did it go?'
'Everything you said about her was true.'
He gazed about the crowd, taking note of who was and who was not there. 'No sign of Ramose of course. Apparently he was invited but sent a message of apology saying he had urgent affairs of state to resolve. But of course no-one's buying
that.'
He paused meaningfully.
'Let me guess,' I said, as we pushed past the guards and into the open courtyard of the villa. It was paved with alabaster, and lined with trees. A long pool glimmered by candlelight. 'He's jealous of Meryra's promotion.'
Parennefer clicked his tongue and flicked out his hands. 'Of course that. But not only that. It creates a dilemma. Meryra's politics are opposed to Ramose's. And now, since he's been publicly favoured by Akhenaten, he has the power to influence events and decision-making.'
'And what are his politics?' I asked.
'He's dedicated to domestic issues. He doesn't care about much else other than flattering the King. Ramose thinks the Great Estate is threatened by the barbarians that surround us. He thinks we're all ignoring the instabilities in our foreign territories. He thinks we need to turn our attention to solving them through military campaigns. Meryra thinks we can solve the
m and our domestic issues simul
taneously by inviting the various parties to the Festival. Bring them all here, give them a talking-to, show them a good time, demonstrate who's in charge, and so on. Ramose thinks that's like inviting a gang of tomb robbers to dinner, giving them your knives and offering them your wife.'
'I think Ramose has a point,' I said.
Parennefer sighed. 'I know. But Meryra has the ear of Akhenaten.
We must have Nefertiti restored. What would happen if, during the Festival, she's still not here, or, worse still, is revealed as having been murdered? It would hugely damage the prestige of the event in front of everyone. It would open up all sorts of flaws in the appearance of power, just at the moment when we most need to assert our supremacy.'
I decided not to mention the argument between Akhenaten and Ramose, and the few fragmentary words I had overheard, which now seemed to take their place, like shards of evidence, in a possible version of that conversation which ran along the lines: do you not see the danger to which you are committing us by bringing together these conflicting and mutually adversarial foreign powers at the worst possible time? But Akhenaten's dilemma was acute: preparations and negotiations had taken many months, if not years; all the visiting parties had to travel for several weeks at least to attend; most were on their way, arriving within a few days. If he abandoned the Festival now, the consequences could be catastrophic for his authority and his power-base. His enemies would say he was significantly weakened either way. No, cancellation was not an option. I wondered how he slept at night.
Suddenly I heard a scream. I looked up and saw a small sun of intense, crackling white fire, with arms and legs struggling below it, emerge from the main door of the house and run as if dancing crazily in small, agonized zig-zags, emitting high shrieks. Everyone hurried back, crying out in horror, as the burning figure ran blindly among the crowd.
I ran forward and cast a jug of water over the figure: but this only enraged the fire. So I pulled a decorated covering from a bench, and threw it over the man, pulling him to the ground to suffocate the flames that seemed to burn ever more fiercely. The heat was more intense than ordinary fire, and gave off a strongly noxious smell; quickly it was burning through the covering. Khety swiftly found a heavier cloth, and we finally extinguished the flames. We stood back, brushing the last burning tatters from our own clothes and hands.
The body itself twitched and trilled rapidly in its mortal agony, and then fell still. The stench of burned flesh and hair was disgusting. The courtyard was absolutely silent. I pulled away the burned and scorched materials from the upper gown, which was expensive and magnificent, and saw gold collars.
It was Meryra.
Then his wife emerged from the house. She stepped towards the body as if in a trance. When she saw all that remained of her husband, she let out a high, ululating scream, and then collapsed into the arms of her attendants. Instantly there was pandemonium among the guests, who fled in panic like a herd of desert antelope, the women kicking off their sandals the better to run.
Among the chaos, and surrounded by Priests in white linen gowns, I examined the corpse. I carefully peeled back the textiles that were now fused to the head's remains. Not much was left. The flesh was charred, and as I gently separated the burned material patches of white bone were exposed. It looked indeed as if the flesh had been eaten away, as well as burned. The eyes were milk-white, like a cooked fish. I noticed around the scalp, however, patches of something black and viscous like tar, still steaming. Bitumen. This would account in part for the noxious scent I had noticed. Adhering to this sticky pitch were tufts of burned, matted fibre. Hairs. The remains of a wig. It must have been painted with bitumen on the inside, and then suffused with some intensely distilled, highly volatile substance that, once alight, burned with a terrible incandescence. And in turn the greater the heat, the more liquid and flammable the bitumen would have become. The burning wig would very quickly have become fused to the victim's head. I tried again to understand the scent, but although I caught something - strange, pungent, acidic, almost with a hint of garlic in it perhaps - it was confused by the stench of the burned flesh.
Parennefer stood to one side in shock, his face glistening with perspiration, his eyes blinking. 'How could this happen?' he said, over and over. I felt like slapping him. It seemed very clear to me: this was another accurate blow aimed at th
e vulnerable heart of the Great
Estate. The High Priest of the Aten had been burned to death on the night of his glory by a fire of judgement.
Suddenly, the courtyard was stormed. Armed Medjay on chariots thundered through the gate, leaped down and surrounded us and the body. Others were swiftly directed to fan out and search and occupy the villa and its outbuildings. From the dark heart of this noisy operation appeared a tall, solid figure. Mahu. He stood over the body, ignoring my presence. He looked carefully at everything. Then, still without looking at me, he said, 'Take him away.'
I was tied up, trussed like a pig and thrown onto a wagon, which was driven away at speed through the
city. The shadows of the build
ings ran over me. I looked up at the roofs of houses and the high, still stars above them. I knew where we were going.
