A Cloudy Day on the Western Shore

by Mohamed Mansi Qandil

  Aisha’s sadness did not recede, nor did the wolves’ fury abate. As she wept upon my chest, I said to her, “It is just the howling that has followed you all your life, without doing you any harm.”

  “It isn’t only the wolves,” she replied. “It’s him I’m most frightened of—he comes here every day. He keeps his distance from the house, but he stares in my direction, standing there holding his staff.”

  “Who?” I asked her.

  “The one called Abdel Rasul.”

  Exasperated, I exclaimed, “He’s nothing but a thief who steals artifacts. I shall bar his way here!”

  “You can’t,” Aisha replied with a shudder. “He is one of the spirits who occupy this valley. This place is dreadful—it is haunted!”

  Things went on in this tiresome fashion—by day I was exhausted by the raising of the stone, and at night the wolves’ furious howling kept me awake. I could see the men staggering with strain and exhaustion; meanwhile their expressions, the malevolent look in their eyes, made it clear they were getting fed up. They felt they were exerting themselves in a pointless cause. We were all of us in thrall to these stones. The men were ready to sacrifice those accursed five piasters just to have done with the stones and with me, but I could not stop. I was unsteady beneath the sun’s glare. My whole life had come to a standstill over the excavation of this little patch of earth.

  Aisha sat up—she had awoken feeling as if she were choking—the nightmares were unremitting, until she could no longer distinguish between waking and sleeping. She could find in herself no appetite for food or desire to go out. She knew that in the outer courtyard she would discover wolf tracks, together with Abdel Rasul’s footprints. On the table she found the bundle of old newspapers—he had put them into a sack and brought them back when they returned from the east bank all those days ago. On the first page was an image resembling her own face—puzzled, she studied it. Of course it was not a picture of her. It was a sketch of a stone statue, whose face bore all the same characteristics of her own: an Egyptian peasant woman, raising one hand as if to welcome the sun, while the other rested upon the head of a scaled-down figure of the Sphinx. Mukhtar had returned from his years away in France. His face looked tired, but the faded photograph could not conceal the sparkle that shone from his eyes. He was talking about his plan to erect an immense statue symbolizing the awakening, the new renaissance. It was a distant reminder of another world. Even now he had not forgotten what she looked like—the problem was that it was no longer her face, no longer her body. Her spirit had dissolved, everything was distorted, her path a fateful road taken, on which there could be no turning back.

  From outside she heard a moaning that was not the wind, but an actual wail, coming from the direction of the temple. She hesitated a moment, then walked slowly out of the house. She spied them by the stone wall, a long line of black-clad women, their heads likewise covered in black, beating their breasts and weeping without cease, leaning like a black sand dune disturbed by the wind. At first Aisha took them to be part of a funeral procession on its way to the tombs, but there were no men, nor was there a body. She really could not tell what had set them weeping so, but the incessant lamentation added to her own distress. All at once she felt that they must have come for her, to bewail her fate. She tried to retreat, to conceal herself inside the house, but one of the women turned toward her and fixed her with a hard look. Aisha drew in her breath sharply, for the woman had her mother’s face, as if she had risen once more from death and come to mourn the wretched pass to which her daughter had come. Aisha shut all the windows and locked all the doors. And still she was beset by the sound of wailing.

  Like a miracle came the magical moment in which the men succeeded in removing the last of the rocks. At last the surface of the ground appeared, dark and moist after being so long hidden from the sun. We all collapsed, overcome with weariness. The men prostrated themselves upon the earth, thanking their distant God. Yet there were still more days of toil ahead of us, for now we must prepare to excavate the hard soil, uncertain all the while of achieving any result.

  I tried to tell Aisha about what had happened, but she seemed to droop, her expression full of confusion and pain. All at once she said to me tearfully, “Why won’t you leave off digging? Why can’t we go away from this dreadful place?”

  I looked at her, taken aback. I had never imagined she might try to stop my endeavor, after I had expended so much effort and got this close. It was she who had designated the place for me, laying out her red shawl as a sign no one could mistake. Voices had been calling to me, and the king awaited me in the hollow ground. How could I now break my appointment with him after waiting so long? But she would not be silent.

  “This place will destroy us both,” she said. “I’ve seen a terrible vision. Those wolves—they are not angry without reason!”

  Enraged, I shouted at her, “And where do you wish us to go? Shall we go back to the house in the red-light district?”

  She stared at me, stunned. I had wounded her cruelly.

  I rose at dawn, so as to slip away without having to face her, but I found her awake, sitting on the front balcony, gazing at the fog-shrouded temple. The courtyard was full of wolf tracks, as if they had spent the night there. The rock pile I had fashioned into a small pyramid now lay scattered all about. I studied her face. Her eyes were hooded, and ringed by dark circles. Her lips moved, but her words were inaudible; perhaps she was praying to some unknown god to prevent me from pursuing my goal. I had no time for such foolishness—if she wanted to go away, let her go alone. I was not about to sacrifice the dream of a lifetime on account of a woman’s superstitions.

  The women were preparing to make bread, while the men arranged baskets and repaired shovels, and the boys filled waterskins with river water. It was another day, and it would be strenuous, but it was different now—or such at least was my dream. First I must put Aisha’s sorrowful face out of my mind. I drank a glass of strong tea with the men, invoking with them the name of God before they applied themselves to the earth with their pickaxes, turning over the black soil. Looking as though until this moment it had never been touched, it was redolent of the air of ancient times, of death without resurrection. The men hefted their shovels and filled the baskets, squaring the sides of the trench so that they would not fall inward. They worked on, delving into layers of earth without stopping, the air seeming to pulsate in a curious way—we were all waiting for something extraordinary to turn up. I saw an ancient clay cat, a marble vessel, a broken bottle, and fragmentary bits of inscription—rich soil such as any excavator might dream of, but it wasn’t what I was after—I was waiting for the king on whose existence my fate depended.

  At noon the fragrance of fresh bread filled the air, mingling with that of the earth’s depths, but I didn’t permit anyone to stop working; I pressed them to keep digging. The sun, however, was brutal, and exhaustion had overtaken us all, with the king still well out of reach. At last I signaled to them to stop, to take their rest and their lunch. One of the youths, though—the ones who carried the waterskins—shouted suddenly. “I see the edge of a staircase!” he cried. “There are stairs!”

  We all rushed over, leaping into the chamber, our bodies tumbling over one another. Dust rose up in a cloud, and we could no longer see anything. We turned about, scrabbling in the dirt, shouting when a part of the sand wall collapsed. But there was the top of a staircase. With our hands we moved aside the dirt and the pebbles, unearthing the first step, the second, and the third, all leading down into the bowels of the earth. We forgot about food, forgot the burning sun and our weariness. Dust rained down on us, but we uncovered more steps. I wept, but no one took any notice of my tears. Our faces were all coated with dust. The men cried out in the name of God as each step was revealed, and with them I plunged into a different era. As darkness, like destiny, crept upon us, we lit the torches and kept digging, reaching all the way to the twenty-fifth step. I took up a torch and approached
the wall that rose before the final step. There was a stone in the way, chipped and sharp-edged, beneath which was a door, or the entrance to a vault, and there were inscriptions on it. Raising the torch, I was able to read the hieroglyphics easily. There was one cartouche, bearing one name: Tutankhamun. “Oh, king, you who eluded me so long! I’ve found your resting place at last!”

  They wanted him back at Thebes. But he knew it only as a terrifying city. They wanted to marry him to a girl he hated, who regarded him as a wild animal; they wanted to set a heavy crown upon his head and give him a scepter to clutch against his chest; they wanted to weigh his body down with gilded clothing, leaving his spirit no opportunity to roam the wilderness he so loved. They had even taken his old name from him and given him a different one, along with a new god. No one paid any heed to the question of what he himself wanted. How could he express himself in the face of their antagonism, or address himself to Horemheb’s unyielding determination?

  Tut was hiding within the palace, hoping they would not find him and force him to do all these things. He only wanted to postpone the affair so that he might mourn his late father, but they would not permit him even this final chance to say farewell.

  Akhetaten had changed since Horemheb’s soldiers had assumed control of the city, virtually without opposition. The minister Ai had been the first victim, even though he, too, had surrendered. The warriors of the south had raised on high the banners of the god Amun as they overran the streets of the unresisting city. In the vanguard was a rank of priests, with their shaven heads and those implacable looks they cast upon the crowd. The city’s sentinels threw down their weapons and went out to greet the warriors, but these looked on them with contempt. Horemheb brought to the palace the news of the Pharaoh’s death, entering for the first time Queen Nefertiti’s private wing. He breathed her fragrance; he saw her bed. She surprised him by receiving the news unflinchingly. She was grief-stricken, but not shocked, for she knew intuitively that her husband had left seeking death. Horemheb wished that at such a moment as this he could shed the soldier’s stern aspect and fall to his knees at her feet, confess to her the intensity of his desire to warm her bed, now grown cold. But the daughters were weeping inconsolably. Tut, meanwhile, attempted tried to slip away into a corner, but Horemheb spoke to him severely.

  “When the days of mourning are over,” he said, “the marriage rites shall be held. You are to marry the eldest daughter, Ankhesen, and become Pharaoh of Egypt. Such was the decree of the late Pharaoh, which I promised to carry out.”

  Couldn’t they have chosen another of the girls? Why must the throne come at such a cost? And yet who would dare oppose Horemheb? His soldiers had secured their grasp on every part of the city, while his priests had shut the temples of Atun and arrested the priests of the fallen god. No one dared ask what had become of the Pharaoh Akhenaten. How had he died? Where was he buried? What ceremonies had been undertaken to ensure that his spirit should proceed safely to the afterlife? None dared: not the vanquished city—the very sun hid its face—nor the nobles who came in droves to declare their allegiance to Horemheb and their deference to the god restored, Amun. They feared for their lives, trembling at the thought of the priests’ vengeance. Who would pay any heed to a heretic Pharaoh, when no one even knew to what end the paths of eternity had led him?

  Horemheb’s orders were abrupt and peremptory: “You have one week to leave this city, Akhetaten. Thereafter, it stands no more.”

  The city’s end came swiftly, but inevitably. It had been a passing fancy, in a land that lived and breathed only nightmarish visions. The soldiers spread out, and the smell of pitch wafted from everywhere. The residents came to the fearful realization that Horemheb’s threat was to be carried out: he would burn the city as soon as the grace period ended. The tradesmen began emptying their shops and storehouses of goods. Ships and smaller vessels drew near to the beach and stood ready, while their crews prepared for unremitting days of labor. The houses began to expel their contents: heaps of furniture; of clothing; of pots and pans; a few memories, some regrets. Objects from the houses filled the bowels of the sailing vessels. Hundreds of people without means descended upon the streets, seeking a way to escape.

  Meanwhile, the priests began working savagely to efface all images of the sun with extended arms. Tut stood alone on the balcony of the palace watching the city in its death throes. Atun rose weakly from behind the horizon, hastening each day to hide himself once more. The Pharaoh’s daughters were afraid of being snatched or raped, but the soldiers surrounded the outside of the palace, guarding it from the common rabble, and from the priests, and no one dared approach the palace walks. The royal ship stood in the river, awaiting the departure of the Pharaoh’s family. Nefertiti, though, did not stir from her room—it was as if she was insensible to what was going on around her, did not smell the odor of pitch that permeated the atmosphere.

  Soon the final day was upon them. Horemheb himself came to the palace to help them make their way to Thebes, that frightful city, but the Pharaoh’s daughters greeted him with terror in their eyes. Their old friend was no longer a friend, but a cruel man determined that none should defy him or stand in his way. “Our mother,” said Ankhesen, the eldest, “does not wish to leave the city. None of us wishes to return to Thebes.”

  He had no time for such maneuvers, the ploys of women. He went to Nefertiti’s quarters, the slave girls retreating before him. He found the queen seated before the window, impassively surveying the horizon. Hearing his footsteps, she turned to him as if unseeing.

  “My lady,” he said, “this is the last day. We must all leave.”

  “It is you and your soldiers,” she replied, “who designated this day. I shall not leave my city. I will not go to that hostile city my husband deplored, the city that hated him.”

  He found himself at a loss. He dared not force her to leave. He dared not even approach her, or touch her with so much as the tips of his fingers. “The city will burn,” he said.

  “I shall burn with it then,” she said. “Here my husband died, and here I shall die.”

  Just so had Queen Tiye acted, and all the foolish queens before her. He stood there a while before her, hoping she might yield. It seemed to him that she saw him, and saw how afraid for her he was. But her face remained set, her staring eyes weary: gone from them was that captivating gleam, ephemeral enchantment, conveying vague promises. They had become two dull metal orbs. Did she despise him? Had she despised him all along?

  There would be no point in speaking further. He turned and left her. The exodus from the palace had begun—ranks of slave girls, male slaves, and servants who had never imagined that the queen would sit on alone in a city about to be put to the torch. Once more he faced the girls with their frightened eyes.

  “We will not leave this city,” said Ankhesen, “so long as our mother does not leave.”

  “You in particular, little princess,” he said between clenched teeth, “must come with me. I shall carry you to the ship against your will if you put up any resistance. Your sisters may stay behind if they wish.”

  “And you will burn them all?”

  “The city will not burn,” he said. “For Queen Nefertiti’s sake, I grant it life. But ruin lies beyond the walls. None shall remain here but the vipers, the crows, and the wolves. All shall follow me, willingly or not.”

  Ankhesen fought them vigorously when they picked her up and carried her to the ship. She struck the guards with her fists and clawed at their faces. She looked at Tut with hatred as he walked beside her, head bowed. Horemheb led the throng as if the spirit of Amun—that evil god—had taken possession of him. The ships and other craft—small rowing boats, too—crept along the surface of the river, while onshore another creeping procession kept pace with them, of horses, mules, donkeys, water buffaloes, and cattle, heavily laden with goods, all heading south. The city walls appeared, pale and silent. The light within them had died, and with them would die the most beautiful w
oman on earth. Horemheb thought of her, sitting submerged in terminal silence. She had not given him a chance, nor herself the chance to awaken from her sorrows and begin to move toward a rapprochement. How could she not have sensed his desire for her all these years?

  The river bore everyone, willing or not, to Thebes. It was the priests who received them all with baleful glances—but this was no time for reprisals. The new god was dead, along with the alternate city and the heretic Pharaoh, and there was nothing for the priests of Thebes to do but celebrate their dominion over all the valley’s cities, without exception.

  The old pharaonic palace was reopened. Ankhesen sat in one corner of it, while Tut crouched in another part. They did not meet or exchange any conversation whatsoever. All the same, preparations for the wedding continued. Thebes was lavishly decorated. It was announced that the new Pharaoh had changed his name to accord with the god Amun, and that the first of his deeds would be the construction of a new temple in the center of Karnak, by which means he would establish his obedience and reverence for the venerable deity. Tut, afraid and isolated, knew nothing of what was happening around him. He didn’t know who had changed his name, or who had ordered a temple for this unfamiliar god. The whole city was blazing with activity, celebrating its easy victory. Tut alone felt vanquished, and missed Akhenaten, the man who had given him his new life—and now here was Tut, taking Akhenaten’s throne, marrying his daughter, and repudiating his god. He was a traitor—he knew it in his heart—but he wasn’t strong enough to do anything about it.

  On the day of the wedding, the palace filled up with people: priests and chiefs, the luminaries of Thebes, those who had never left it and those who had gone away and come back, the penitent and the servile. Horemheb directed them all with stern exactitude. This wedding was the inauguration he must complete before undertaking to change everything.