The Blood of Kings

by John Michael Curlovich

  “But he had another lover. That Persian boy.”

  “Bagoas. Beautiful boy. Quite slim, quite effeminate, quite alluring. No, that was never the same.”

  “What happened to him?”

  “It isn’t recorded.”

  We left the museum not long after that. Arm in arm. No one seemed to notice or care. I tried to imagine that happening in Pennsylvania, or even in New York. It wasn’t possible. Perhaps a trace of Alexander’s spirit lingered after all…?

  Next morning we traveled to Cairo. Danilo stopped back at that same café before we left and bought several large portions of the same casserole and a few bottles of wine. Then he said he wanted me to see the real Egypt.

  We rode on the top of a railway train. Around us were dozens of Egyptians. “One of the reforms Nasser introduced in the 1950s was this. Anyone can ride anywhere in the country for free—as long as he rides on the roof.” We had a bit of trouble getting our luggage up, and a young man helped us. Danilo gave him a tip. Baksheesh.

  It was a wonderful way to experience the country—to see it better than you could through a window, to smell its smells and hear its sounds. The sky had the most amazing transparency, a few wisps of clouds, and no more. And the people were wonderful. It seemed everyone had brought food and wine and we all shared. Our casserole was a big hit. People recognized me as an American and said so. I wondered how they could tell. Couldn’t I as easily have been a Canadian, or a Brit, or…? But every last one of them had me pegged. I had never thought being an American was such an obvious thing.

  Danilo chatted with a lot of them in Arabic, but most of them spoke English, and quite well. They talked about current events in the United States with a surprising level of knowledge and insight, even the youngest of them. They knew what the president was up to, and Congress, and even who the presidential candidates from the opposition party were and what they stood for. I have to say it was a bit disconcerting. Very few of my fellow students at West Penn were so well-informed.

  The men were beautifully dark with the largest black eyes and lean bodies. They wore robes called galabeas; when the breeze blew in off the Mediterranean it outlined their bodies perfectly. Pairs of them held hands or walked arm in arm. It was merely an expression of friendship, Danilo told me. But I wondered if it was always just that. I knew the atmosphere in Egypt wasn’t exactly friendly, but still…

  The Nile Delta was more lush and fertile than anyplace I had ever seen. Fruits, nuts, even wheat seemed to be growing everywhere. We could see little arms of the Nile branching off all around us, making the land marvelously fertile. Canals added to it. When, frequently, the train made stops, everyone would jump off and run to collect apples, limes, grapes… And it was all perfectly delicious. It didn’t taste like the food I was used to, and I commented to Danilo.

  “Of course not.” He grinned. “It’s natural.”

  For the first time in days he smiled a lot. An exiled king, returning to his homeland. But his people could hardly know or recognize him. Exile had been centuries too long. He must have been feeling the strangest complex of emotions. When he seemed to want to be alone, I’d go off and mix with the Egyptians. Several young men expressed an interest in me, I couldn’t have mistaken. I’m afraid I drank a bit too much wine.

  After a time, people slept. The sun was warm and brilliant. The train rocked gently from side to side. I fell asleep myself, without really wanting to.

  * * *

  Cairo. The first great capital of old Egypt, known then as Memphis. It had been the world’s greatest city a thousand years before Danilo was born. Of its ancient glories, very little remained.

  It was late afternoon when we got there. I knew it was the largest city in Africa, but I was hardly prepared for it. The crowds, the noise, the traffic… it made New York look prim and provincial. Danilo flagged a taxi and instructed the driver to take us to the Mena House, the famous hotel at the foot of the Giza Plateau, west of the city. Traffic was nightmarish. Cars weaved in and out, horns blared nonstop, pedestrians rushed for their lives. “Is this a typical Cairo rush hour?”

  Danilo ignored the question. He was watching everything and everyone, quite intently.

  Once our driver pulled up onto the sidewalk and drove for half a block, scattering people ahead of us.

  “For God’s sake, Danilo, tell him to be more careful!”

  He laughed. I was keenly aware of being an outsider.

  On the sidewalks, pairs of men walked hand in hand, a great many of them. I asked Danilo how they could be so open.

  “You’re in a different culture now, Jamie. What Americans would view as shameful and scandalous, Muslims see as an expression of friendship.”

  I looked again. Men holding hands. I could see the affection. “You’re telling me they’re just friends?”

  He nodded, then added wryly, “Most of them, anyway.”

  It took half an hour to reach Giza, on the outskirts of the city. Our driver helped us get our bags into the hotel and apologized for not being able to go faster than he had. I gave him his fee and his baksheesh and he left. In the lobby was a huge picture window with a perfect view of the plateau outside.

  And there they were: the pyramids, solid and monumental, the oldest stone buildings in the world. Before them sat the Sphinx, gazing into eternity as tourists sat drinking mint tea and smoking, as if this might have been any hotel lobby anywhere. Danilo checked us in and told the desk clerk we had to have a suite facing the monuments. There was a bit of a controversy, but after more baksheesh he found us one.

  When the bellhop, a boy of 16 or so, opened the door to our rooms there they were again: huge, ancient, magnificent. More distant in time from Julius Caesar than he was from us. The sun had just set, so the pyramids were bathed in golden light, quite artificial, quite striking. I stopped in my tracks and gaped. The pyramids. There, and so very much real. It was like being in a myth, like walking a woodland path and finding a gravestone that said “Here Lies King Arthur.”

  I left Danilo to tip the bellhop and went to the window. After the boy left, Danilo came and put an arm around me. “Welcome to my home.” He kissed me.

  They were larger than I’d imagined. Larger than anything. But there was something wrong. “You haven’t smiled since we got here, Danilo.”

  He ignored it. “Let’s get some dinner, Jamie. Then I want to introduce you to my realm.”

  The steaks in the hotel restaurant were wonderful, filets mignons cooked with spices I couldn’t quite identify. We got sweaters—Danilo warned me the evenings could be cool—and went out.

  It was a short walk up to the plateau. Tourists milled everywhere, busloads of them. Vendors swarmed, selling souvenirs, offering camel rides, haggling over prices. Boys begged. Antiquities Service security men kept a careful eye on it all. It was a little chaos. But above it all loomed the monuments.

  The pyramids rose, step after step, seeming to reach the sky. The Sphinx towered over us. Danilo told me their history and their legends. He approached each of them in turn and pressed his head flat against the stones, as if he had to convince himself they were real. Odd gesture, I thought.

  “I wish you could have seen them when they were still new. Encased in polished alabaster, gleaming brilliant white in the sunshine. Their tops were plated with gold.”

  He showed me the swarms of tombs around the pyramids, for queens, for court officials, even some for the workmen who built their pharaohs’ monuments. There was a stela between the legs of the Sphinx, promising the benevolence of the gods to whomever would keep it in good repair. There was a building to house an ancient boat that had been found in a pit behind the Great Pyramid. It looked like Noah’s Ark to me.

  Danilo made a sour face. “That was quite deliberate, so the Christian tourists might feel there was something familiar. You’d think they’d be content with their own myths in their own lands, but they have to import them here, too.”

  A full moon broke the horizon, larg
e and beautiful. Floodlights came on, illuminating the monuments. But despite all the wonderful things I found myself yawning; the train ride had taken a lot out of me. Danilo suggested I go back to the hotel and get some sleep.

  “Aren’t you coming?” I wanted him beside me.

  “Later. I’ll be down in a while. Go and get some rest.”

  “But—”

  “Please, Jamie. I think I need to be alone here for a while.”

  I looked around. There must have been a thousand people just on the same side of the Great Pyramid as us; and thousands more all around the rest of it.

  “They’ll go soon enough. Everything turns quite silent here after dark. The Antiquities Service turns off the floodlights, and people leave.”

  The hotel lobby wasn’t so crowded now. I stopped in the bar and had a glass of wine. Then I headed up to our room. The bed was soft and comfortable. I fell asleep quickly.

  When I woke the room was bathed in moonlight. For a moment I was disoriented. Then I remembered where I was. The full moon washed the pyramids in its ghostly light. I was alone.

  I glanced at my watch. Three A.M. Danilo had not come back. Or had come back and then left again. I wanted him.

  A beautiful young Egyptian man dozed at the front desk. When I asked if he had seen Professor Semenkaru he smiled, shook his head and closed his eyes again. I thought I knew where Danilo must be.

  He had been right. The plateau was quite deserted. So silent I could hear the desert sand crunch under my feet. The moonlight was more than bright enough to see everything by. At four distant places there were small guard houses; lights burned in them; there was no sign of the guards. A slight breeze blew, and I was glad I had worn my sweater.

  From the lip of the plateau I looked out over the city. Lights glistened; there was still traffic in the distant streets. All of it sufficiently far away that no sound came to me.

  The Nile had flowed at the base of the plateau in ancient times. Its course had shifted over the centuries; now it was off in the middle distance. Its water gleamed under the moon. Keeping an eye out for the guards and moving as quietly as I could, I walked to the Sphinx. Imperious, impassive; no wonder the ancients had thought it possessed a secret. Like Danilo, I pressed a hand to it. The stone was cool. Sandstone; it left my palm feeling gritty.

  Then I went to the great Pyramid. The size was mountainous, overwhelming. St. Peter’s Rome could fit inside with room to spare. I knew it was forbidden to climb it, but I had to. There were no guards in sight.

  Each step was six feet tall, taller than me. I struggled up three levels, six, ten. The moon seemed to smile on me. To the old Egyptians it had been Thoth, the scribe of the gods. Not at all seriously, I whispered a little prayer to him, thanking him for the light.

  I walked along the course of stones and turned the corner. At the far end, 100 yards ahead of me, just at the next corner, I saw someone else standing in the moon’s light, seemingly to stare directly into it. Or rather something.

  It was not human. It was a man with the head of a falcon. Eight feet tall, maybe nine, muscles rippling, a beak that could tear a man in half. I froze. I could not be seeing right. It must be a trick of the moon.

  It spread its arms, or what should have been arms. They were wings, large feathered wings. It flapped them. I thought it would lift into the air and fly off.

  This was not possible. This was Horus, the son of Osiris, the god who embodied the soul of the pharaoh. A myth. There in front of me.

  The breeze picked up. A dark cloud crossed the moon. The world was plunged into shadow. It took my eyes what seemed forever to adjust. I moved carefully back around the corner, out of its sight, and stood quite still. I even held my breath. It could not be real.

  The cloud uncovered the face of the moon, and the light returned. I looked around the corner cautiously. In the place where the falcon-thing had been there was a man. And though he was a hundred yards off, I knew it was Danilo.

  I had no idea what to do. This was private; he was alone by choice. If he knew I had seen him… But I could not simply go back to the hotel, not after the thing I had seen.

  Slowly—sadly, I thought—he sat down on the pyramid’s harsh stone and buried his face in his hands. I thought he must be crying. Slowly and cautiously, I took a few steps toward him.

  There were guards somewhere close by, and it was quite illegal to be there, but I had to let him know I was there with him. “Danilo?” I hoped my voice would carry to him but no further. He didn’t seem to hear; he kept his face buried. I moved closer, and again he seemed not to hear me.

  Finally, I was ten yards away. And yes, he was crying. I could hear him sobbing, muttering to himself, or perhaps to his gods, in a language not English. I spoke loudly. “Danilo, I’m here.”

  He looked up, quite slowly. His face was streaked with tears that caught the moonlight and glistened. For a moment he seemed not to recognize me. “Jamie?”

  “I’m here, Danilo.” He held up a hand. I walked beside him and took it in mine. “I’m here.”

  “I don’t know what’s wrong.” He looked away. “I was walking here. I waited till everyone else was gone. I needed to be alone with the past. And then suddenly the most awful wave of melancholy overtook me.”

  I sat down beside him and let my feet hang over the step.

  “This isn’t at all like me, Jamie. I’ve been home dozens of times in the past, hundreds. But I’ve never felt anything like this before.”

  As he had done to me scores of times, I reached out and stroked his hair.

  “I began to cry, Jamie, and I couldn’t stop. I’m crying for everything I’ve lost. And for everything I’ve found.” He put his arm around me and held me tightly. “I’m mourning for what I once was. And for what I have become.”

  It all made sense to me in a way; in another way it made no sense at all. For a man to be so complicated and to let it be seen… it was a new thing to me. I had no idea what to say to him, or that even if saying anything was the right thing to do. And so I simply held him. He buried himself in my arms and cried for a long, long time under that bright Egyptian moon. In time he was still, and I knew that he was sleeping.

  I think I must have fallen asleep myself. The next thing I remember is looking up to realize that the sky was beginning to lighten. I shook him gently. “Danilo, it’s time for us to go.”

  He looked at my face, groggily.

  “Come on. The guards will be out and about, and the morning’s first tourists will be arriving.”

  He stood and stretched. So did I, and then glanced upward. The last bright stars were still shining. He took my hand. “Do you feel up for a good, hard climb?”

  I realized what he meant. “But security…”

  “They will leave us alone. Come on. We’ll both be sore tomorrow, but it will be worth it.”

  Then we climbed the Great Pyramid, step by difficult step. At times we kept apart, at other times we push-pulled one another up the face of the monument. The eastern sky went from grey to purple. As I had expected, a tourist bus drove up the plateau and parked a few hundred feet away from us. People spilled out of it. Danilo took no notice of them; he seemed determined to get to the top before the sun rose.

  Panting, nearly exhausted, we finally reached the top and stood with our arms around each other’s waists.

  The sun rose, as swiftly and majestically as if it had actually been a god. There might almost have been fanfares. First the top of it notched the horizon. Its rays reached us and bathed us in brilliant golden light. Then it climbed slowly over the rim of the world and ascended stately into the sky, its proper element. The age-old city stretched out beneath us, the blinding light of the sun above… It was as thrilling a sight as I’d ever seen.

  “Is this what it feels like to be a god, Danilo?”

  “A king, at least. And it is ours.”

  I couldn’t resist. “When do we take possession?”

  “Possession is long overdue.
We owned it all once, my family did. My father bestrode this land with all the wisdom and majesty the world could want in a monarch. And insight. He understood so many things. I’ve always thought that was why they hated him so much. The viciousness of the dull toward the intelligent.” He looked into my eyes, then held me even tighter. “And then came myself, and then my poor brother’s short imperium, and then… night.” He squeezed me tightly to himself. “But as the Bible reminds us, the sun also rises. Next comes you.”

  “Papa.”

  “You do not have the right demeanor for a prince, Jamie. No true prince could ever permit himself to be so rude. It’s a lucky thing for you that I love you.”

  I knew he was right. Standing there at the top of the world with a future brighter than the sun—or so it seemed to me—I couldn’t imagine a more fortunate existence. But, of course, nothing lasts.

  We spent another day in Cairo, at the Egyptian Museum on Liberation Square. I knew the building at once. There’s footage of it in Karloff’s The Mummy.

  Gallery after gallery of the most exciting objects, all preserved carefully in glass cases with fine wood frames. I had seen photographs of the more famous ones; seeing them in person was quite marvelous. There was a colossal statue of Akhenaten, not as fine as the ones in the Louvre. The colonial powers had been only too efficient.

  On the upper floor were the treasures of Tutankhamen. Rare things, beautiful things. Danilo stood before the famous golden death mask and looked into his brother’s face. And so did I. He had indeed been a beautiful boy. His eyes seemed to be fixed on something distant and unreachable, perhaps on eternity, perhaps on the face of Set himself.

  Danilo seemed transfixed. He slowly raised a hand and pressed it against the glass. A guard took a step toward us. Danilo shot him a glaring glance, and he stopped.

  “He was the sweetest boy. He had a bit of a limp, you know. But he was as athletic as his body would permit. He loved to swim. His limp didn’t matter then.” The tone of his voice was unmistakable. It was love. I didn’t ask whether they had ever actually… No, that I didn’t want to know.