River god - Smith Wilbur (чтение книг .TXT) 📗

  It took longer to finish our business than I deemed wise, but at last I embraced Tanus in farewell and urged the donkey out into the sunlight that was filtered by the fine yellow dust that still filled the air. My mistress lingered, and I waited for her in the valley below.

  Looking back, I saw them emerge from the cave at last. They stood gazing at each other for a long moment without touching, and then Tanus turned and strode away. My mistress watched until he was gone from her sight, then she came down to where I waited. She walked like a woman in a dream.

  I helped her to mount, and while I adjusted the saddle girth, she reached down and took my hand. 'Thank you,' she said simply.

  'I do not deserve your gratitude,' I demurred.

  'I am the happiest creature in all the world. Everything that you told me of love is true. Please rejoice for me, even though?' she did not finish, and suddenly I realized that she had read my innermost feelings. Even in her own great joy, she grieved that she had caused me pain. I think I loved her more in that moment than I had ever done before.

  I turned away and took up the reins, and led her back towards the Nile.

  ONE OF THE ROYAL HUNTSMEN SPIED US from a far hilltop, and hailed us heartily.

  'We have been searching for you at the king's command,' he told us, as he hurried down to join us.

  'Was the king saved?' I asked. 'He is safe in the palace on Elephantine Island, and he has commanded that the Lady Lostris be brought to him directly she is found.'

  As we set foot on the palace jetty, Aton was there, puffing out his painted cheeks with relief and fussing over my mistress. 'They have found the bodies of twenty-three unfortunates who perished in the storm,' he told us with ghoulish relish. 'All were certain that you would be found dead also. However, I prayed at the temple of Hapi for your safe return.' He looked pleased with himself, and I was annoyed that he tried to claim the credit for her survival for himself. He allowed us only time enough to wash hastily and anoint our dry skin with perfumed oil, before he whisked us away to the audience with the king.

  Pharaoh was truly moved to have my mistress returned to him. I am sure he had come to love her as much as any of the others, and not merely for the promise of immortality that he saw in her. A tear tangled in his eyelash and smeared the paint on his cheek as she knelt before him.

  'I thought you were lost,' he told her, and would have embraced her, had etiquette permitted it. 'Instead I find you prettier and livelier than ever.' Which was true, for love had gilded her with its special magic.

  'Taita saved me,' she told Pharaoh. 'He guided me to a shelter and protected me through all those terrible days. Without him I would have perished, like those other poor souls.'

  'Is this true, Taita?' Pharaoh demanded of me directly, and I assumed my modest expression, and murmured, 'I am but a humble instrument of the gods.'

  He smiled at me, for I knew he had become fond of me also. 'You have rendered us many services, oh humble instrument. But this is the most valuable of them all. Approach!' he commanded, and I knelt before him.

  Aton stood beside him, holding a small cedar-wood box. He lifted the lid and proffered it to the king. From the case Pharaoh lifted out a gold chain. It was of the purest unalloyed gold, and bore the marks of the royal jewellers to attest its weight of twenty deben.

  The king held the chain over my head and intoned, 'I bestow upon you the Gold of Praise.' He lowered it on to my shoulders, and the oppressive weight was a delight to me. This decoration was the highest mark of royal favour, usually reserved for generals and ambassadors, or for high officials such as Lord IntefV I doubted that ever in the history of this very Egypt had the gold chain been placed around the neck of a lowly slave.

  That was not the end of the gifts and awards that were to be bestowed upon me, for my mistress was not to be outdone. That evening while I was attending her bath, she suddenly dismissed her slaves and, standing naked before me, she told me, 'You may help me to dress, Taita.' She allowed me this privilege when she was especially well pleased with me. She knew just how much I enjoyed having her to myself in these intimate circumstances.

  Her loveliness was covered only by the glossy tresses of her sable hair. It seemed that those days she had spent with Tanus had filled her with a new quality of beauty. It emanated from deep within her. A lamp placed inside an alabaster jar will shine through the translucent sides; in the same way, the Lady Lostris seemed to glow.

  'I never dreamed that such a poor vessel as this body of mine could contain such joy.' She stroked her own flanks as she said it and looked down at herself, inviting me to do the same. 'All that you promised me came to pass while I was with Tanus. Pharaoh has bestowed the Gold of Praise upon you, it is fitting that I also show my appreciation to you. I want you to share my happiness in some way.'

  'Serving you is all the reward I could wish for.' 'Help me to dress,' she ordered, and lifted her hands above her head. Her breasts changed shape as she moved. Over the year I had watched them grow from tiny immature figs into these round, creamy pomegranates, more beautiful than jewels or marble sculptures. I held the diaphanous nightdress over her, and then let it float down over her body. It covered her, but did not obscure her loveliness, in the same way that the morning mist decks the waters of the Nile in the dawn.

  'I have commanded a banquet, and sent invitations to the royal ladies.'

  'Very well, my lady. I shall see to it.' 'No, no, Taita. The banquet is in your honour. You will sit beside me as my guest.'

  This was as shocking as any of the wild schemes she had thought up recently. 'It is not fitting, mistress. You will offend against custom.'

  'I am the wife of Pharaoh. I set the customs. During the banquet I will have a gift for you, and I will present it to you in the sight of all.'

  'Will you tell me what this gift is?' I asked, with some trepidation. I was never sure of what mischief she would dream up next.

  'Certainly I will tell you what it is.' She smiled mysteriously. 'It is a secret, that's what it is.'

  EVEN THOUGH I WAS THE GUEST OF HONOUR, I could not leave the arrangements for the banquet to cooks and giggling slave girls. After all, the reputation of my mistress as a hostess was at stake. I was at the market before dawn to procure the finest, freshest produce from the fields and the river. I promised Aton that he would be invited, and he opened the king's wine cellar and let me make my selection. I hired and rehearsed the best musicians and acrobats in the city. I sent out the slaves to gather hyacinth and lily and lotus from the banks of the river to augment the masses of blooms that already decorated our garden. I had the weavers plait tiny arks of reeds on which I floated coloured glass lamps and set them adrift on the ponds of our water-garden. I set out leather cushions and garlands of flowers for each guest, and jars of perfumed oil to cool them in the sultry night and drive away the mosquitoes.

  At nightfall the royal ladies began to arrive in all their frippery and high fashion. Some of them had even shaved their heads and replaced their natural hair with elaborate wigs woven from the hair which the wives of the poor were forced to sell, in order to feed their brats. This was a fashion I abhorred and I vowed to do all in my power to prevent my mistress from succumbing to such folly. Her lustrous tresses were amongst my chief delights, but when it comes to fashion, even the most sensible woman is not to be trusted.

  When, at the insistence of my mistress, I seated myself on the cushion beside her, rather than taking my usual position behind her, I could see that many of our guests were scandalized by such indecorous behaviour, and they whispered to each other behind their fans. I was just as uncomfortable as they were, and to cover my embarrassment, I signalled the slaves to keep the wine cups filled, the musicians to play, and the dancers to dance.