Ilario, the Stone Golem

by Mary Gentle

  interest in my daughter.

  The book-buyer, finding me holding her on the room’s balcony again

  one morning, bent over to study her more closely. Onorata was solidly

  asleep, one closed fist resting up under her fat chins, and I stroked with a

  forefinger at the dark hair slicked down on her scalp.

  Rekhmire’ straightened up. ‘When do they get interesting?’

  ‘They what?’

  ‘Infants. Will she talk soon? Or move around more?’

  I raised an eyebrow at him, as much in his own fashion as I could

  imitate. ‘You don’t know?’

  ‘I’m a book-buyer, not a nurse!’ Half affronted and half amused, he

  gazed down at me. ‘Aren’t you supposed to know these things?’

  ‘I was the youngest. I expect Sunilda or Matasuntha could tell you.

  And I’m a painter!’

  Tottola strolled in from the anterooms, evidently changing shift on

  guard duty, and gave the Egyptian a look that clearly inquired And the thing that’s so funny is—? , without needing a word. He stripped off his mail-shirt and garments, abandoning them for striped linen robes that

  reminded me painfully sharply of Iberia, nodded respectfully to me, and

  fell instantly asleep on his palliasse.

  Onorata began a grumble in her sleep. Rocking her in the crook of my

  arm, I discovered she found that motion no substitute for milk.

  Rekhmire’ offered her a blunt-nailed thumb, with no better success.

  I said, ‘I’ll get Carrasco to make her feed.’

  Rekhmire’ made himself scarce.

  Ty-ameny’s interest was the authentic tone of the Alexandrine

  philosopher. She visited, a day or two after, and leaned forward from

  among the cushions, studying my child who had fallen asleep on a

  blanket on the floor.

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  How I’ll ever convince anyone of the hellion she is, when she angelically sleeps in their presence—

  ‘Is she normal?’ Ty-ameny asked.

  Any other woman, I would have slapped. It was the Alexandrine

  curiosity in her tone that restrained me, more than her rank. Although

  that carried its weight.

  ‘It appears so, Aldro. Until she grows up, who can say?’

  The small woman nodded, and leaned back.

  Without requesting permission, I settled on the goats’-wool blankets

  beside Onorata.

  Rekhmire’ remained standing.

  Ty-ameny complained almost sulkily, ‘You’re making my neck ache.

  Sit down, in Ra’s name!’

  Rekhmire’ bowed as deeply as slaves do. With the help of his stick, he

  moved as if to seat himself on the stone ledge beyond her.

  Her hand closed over his wrist as he passed.

  Rekhmire’ let her arrest him. I saw in a heart’s beat all their history in

  the glance between them. I felt curiously shut out. Although the ruling of

  New Alexandria is no concern of mine.

  Ty-ameny’s cheeks darkened a little, as if the heat of the room flushed

  her face. She moved her hand to her chin, as if she would stroke the

  Pharaoh’s false beard that she was not wearing today. ‘It was a

  reasonable question!’

  ‘Yes, Great Queen,’ Rekhmire’ said mildly.

  The queen looked at him through narrowed eyes.

  Without turning, she said, ‘Ilario, I apologise for not asking that in a

  more tactful manner.’

  I bowed, catching how Rekhmire’’s face warmed as she spoke.

  ‘Too many people have thought it a reasonable question for me to like

  it, Great Queen,’ I said.

  ‘I believe that was the reason I was just slapped down.’ She spoke

  darkly, looking up at Rekhmire’. ‘Isn’t that right, cousin?’

  ‘The wisdom of the everlasting Gods is spoken through the mouth of

  the Pharaoh-Queen.’ Rekhmire’’s monumental face broke into a smile

  that made him look twenty. ‘Most of the time . . . ’

  ‘Stop towering over me, book-buyer. I can still shorten you by a head,

  any day of the week!’

  ‘Of course, cousin.’ Rekhmire’’s bow was so elegantly proper that, had

  I been Ty-ameny, I would have thrown something at him. I saw her

  small fingers tighten around one of the cushions as she grinned. The

  large Egyptian moved, seating himself on the bench beside her, and

  under cover of smoothing out the folds of his linen kilt, shot me a

  reassuring look.

  I envied them their closeness.

  ‘In fact,’ Ty-ameny added, with more gravitas than one might expect

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  from a woman with the stature of a twelve-year-old, ‘if it would set your

  mind at ease to have her examined, the best of my Royal Mathematicians

  and physicians will do so.’

  I could manage only ‘Thank you’, but it must have been clear what I

  meant.

  The next several days had all my attention on my child, who bawled

  dispiritingly whenever an Alexandrine picked her up, and looked at me

  as if I were the Frankish version of Judas.

  All of them pronounced her normal, but let me know that the extent of

  their knowledge – ‘Without dissection!’, Bakennefi Aa cheerily remarked

  – must be limited.

  Slaves continued to bring food to our quarters at regular intervals. I

  sunk myself into the enjoyment of palace living – since I did not know if I

  would ever live in a palace again – and on two days when it was too hot

  to go outside, or do more than lay down on the great bed on the dais in

  my chamber, I dozed beside Onorata’s cradle.

  I woke on the third day, bored.

  Zheng He, on land, would not have barbarians on his ship while he

  was not there.

  I had itchy fingers, and established myself under a striped awning on

  another of the palace balconies, with Onorata asleep in a hooded cradle,

  and a stack of old parchments and a stoppered flask of oak-gall ink.

  The striped awning reminded me of Taraco. I began a letter to

  Honorius, got as far as Honoured Father, and the ink dried on my quill while I tried to think of what I could say that would do no harm if

  someone opened the letter.

  ‘ Father’ is not harmless.

  Nor was anything else I could come up with.

  I turned the parchment over, shaping the quill with an evilly sharp pen

  knife that I hadn’t been able to resist in Alexandria’s main market square,

  both for its Damascus steel and its beautiful walnut haft, and set about

  sketching the lines of the aqueduct that came into the palace here. Arches

  of yellow brick cast shadows across a square. People came and went

  around the statue of a griffin-like creature on a plinth. A white mongrel

  dog paused long enough to cock its leg.

  The sun arriving overhead, I took Onorata back to our chambers and

  our own balcony, and set about drawing the great harbour, and the mass

  of streets going down from here to the massive walls.

  It turned into a study of Zheng He’s distant warship, but the size of it

  made the perspective look wrong.

  I checked it as mathematically as Masaccio and Leon Battista had ever

  instructed me, found it correct, and wondered, What do I do when reality itself seems incredible, even by an accurate description?

  Chin on fist, I stared down absently into the harbour, looking for

  an
other subject. I might draw Onorata, if Rekhmire’ wasn’t already

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  making smart remarks about how many drawings of the child he’s

  expected to make comment on . . .

  I began a listless study of another ship moored between Europa and

  Asia. Dwarfed by comparison with Zheng He’s it might be, but the lines

  interested me – not a war-ship, or a fat-bellied cargo-ship, or a dhow, but

  a fast light galley with canvas-shrouded arbalests on prow and stern for

  defence.

  My quill-point scritched at the treated surface of the parchment; I

  made a reasonable attempt at the sterncastle and rudder before I startled,

  and the pen blotted a great spurt of ink over all.

  I have drawn a ship like this before, and when I did – it was a Carthaginian bireme!

  ‘Agatha and Jude!’ It was safer to swear by Christian saints in this city,

  if you were a foreigner. I mopped at the ink with my sleeve, but the thin

  cotton only absorbed most of the liquid, leaving enough to shroud the

  carefully-drawn lines.

  ‘That will be the envoy,’ Rekhmire’ said, an arm’s length behind me.

  I started again, jerked my wrist, and sent a hooked line of ink through

  the harbour wall. ‘Caius Gaius Judas! Stop creeping up on me!’

  The tall Egyptian grinned, entirely unrepentant, and bent to stroke a

  fingertip over Onorata’s brow. She wriggled a little, and settled deeper

  into sleep. Rekhmire’ looked up and to the side.

  ‘Shadow will be off this balcony soon. You’ll need to take her in.’

  ‘ You take her in,’ I muttered. ‘This is the Carthaginian envoy? The one you expected? Why’s he here?’

  ‘As far as I know, nothing but a previously-arranged diplomatic visit.

  Ty-ameny’s ministers are running around like drunken piglets,’

  Rekhmire’ observed, in response to my querying look. ‘Now the jaws

  truly bite – Carthage’s envoy will expect to see their latest gift on display

  in the Pharaoh-Queen’s throne room. None of the Royal Mathemat-

  icians can yet promise it won’t do to her as it did to Masaccio. She has a

  choice of offending Carthage – which we can’t afford – or afford to have

  them find that out! – or else put herself in danger of murder by the golem.’

  The ink had dried on my nib. I scratched it against my thumb, wishing

  for treated wooden boards on which I could use encaustic wax, or

  Masaccio’s expensive pigments, and try out designs for Honorius’s altar-

  panels.

  ‘No.’ I looked up, blinking. ‘She doesn’t.’

  Rekhmire’’s brows, stark under his shaved head, dipped down, casting

  all his face into severe lines.

  ‘If we smash the golem’s limbs, or chain it, or immobilise it safely in

  some way, that would be no less offensive to Carthage—’

  I interrupted him before his rising tone could wake Onorata. It was

  difficult to keep my own voice sufficiently quiet.

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  ‘ No. They don’t have to break the damned thing to stop it hurting the

  Pharaoh-Queen. I know how we can do it. I know.’

  Rekhmire’’s sceptical look had hope badly suppressed under the

  surface. ‘You know?’

  I ignored his stress on the initial word.

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘Cheese glue.’

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  18

  ‘Cheese glue?’ the Pharaoh-Queen of Alexandria said.

  ‘Cheese glue.’

  ‘ Cheese glue?’

  One of the Royal Mathematicians muttered, ‘Cheese glue?’, in an

  equally bemused tone.

  Rekhmire’ smoothly intervened. ‘Hear Ilario out, Great Name of

  Sekhmet; I think you should.’

  Ty-ameny’s sloe-black eyes darted to his face. Whatever she found

  there was sufficient to have her not throw me straight out of the Royal

  apartments.

  ‘Explain,’ she demanded grimly.

  ‘Cheese glue’s made with limestone and . . . cheese.’

  I shuffled a little where I sat, hearing the words as they must sound to

  her.

  ‘Yes, it sounds foolish, but I know this part of my trade! The best kind

  is cheese that’s gone bad. Great Queen, when I was in Rome, Mastro

  Masaccio had me crumbling cheese and limestone and mixing the glue.

  You use it to size boards for painting, especially if your board has to be

  made up of several smaller pieces. When it sets . . . ’

  In memory I still hear Masaccio’s hammer.

  ‘I saw examples twice, in his workshop,’ I said, seeing the Alexandrines

  perk up at the sound of empirical evidence. ‘Once of a six-part panel put

  together before the plague came to Europa, that a man couldn’t break

  with all his strength. The other was more subtle, I think – an older board,

  that had a funeral portrait on it from Hannibal Barca’s time. The wax

  was gone, and the pigments too, and the wood broken in many places.’

  I held finger and thumb a half-inch apart.

  ‘But the glue that had held the wood together, that was still intact!

  Where the worms had eaten the wood all away, the cheese and lime glue

  stood up alone, rigid, like a framework.’

  I took a breath, realising the frown on the Royal Mathematician

  Bakennefi Aa’s face was calculation rather than scorn.

  ‘When it ages, it yellows, but initially it sets clear. Like glass. You

  would not ever know it was there.’ My mouth felt dry. I swallowed.

  Rekhmire’ remained silent where he sat beside me.

  Either he desires me to have all the credit for this – or all the blame!

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  Ty-ameny’s frown was now of a different kind, I saw. She asked, ‘How

  would this help us?’

  She’s willing to consider it!

  ‘The golem’s limbs are articulated.’ The memory of stone fingers was

  one I pushed aside almost by habit now. ‘Each of the arms, knees,

  fingers, feet – they’re all jointed, by metal gears. If you were to pour prepared glue into the joint mechanisms and let it set . . . ’

  Ty-ameny blinked as if dazed.

  ‘And no one could see this?’ Her black gaze snapped into focus. ‘At a

  distance, say, of – Ahhotep, over there, beside the window. If I am here,

  and he is there, will he see this has been done?’

  I considered it, heart racing, not wanting to seem too sure of myself.

  ‘No,’ I said at last. ‘Not even if he knew what he was looking for. The

  joints are brass, they shine. The extra coating will shine the same way.’

  The room of advisers was silent for the space of ten heartbeats;

  Tyameny put her chin in her hand. She gazed unseeing at Rekhmire’,

  silhouetted against the white afternoon heat.

  My voice creaked and dropped down into the lower male registers. ‘At

  the very worst, it would give you warning, when the joints move and the

  glue shatters. There would be time enough to move away. If the cheese

  glue’s allowed time to cure and set – the golem will pull itself to pieces before those joints will move.’

  ‘Bakennefi Aa.’ Ty-ameny gave the Royal Mathematician and his

  cohorts a look that indicated they should – as rapidly as possible – search

  out sources in the Library. As the three Bakennefi brothers bowed and

  left, she turned back to me.

  �
�You know how to mix this? The proportions of each; all the

  ingredients?’

  That amount of implied responsibility cut off my breath. My heart

  pounded in palpable thuds. I swallowed, I hoped imperceptibly, and

  nodded.

  ‘You mix a batch,’ the Pharaoh-Queen said. ‘My mathematicians will

  run tests. But, at the same time – the golem will be treated with your

  substance, too. Where it stands, beside the royal throne; undertake the

  treatment there.’

  She shot a glance at Rekhmire’.

  ‘Plausible ways can be found to delay the Carthaginian envoy’s formal

  audience for a few more days?’

  ‘He’s a diplomat, Great Queen, he’ll expect it.’

  The corner of her mouth tweaked up, although she nodded solemnly

  enough. Her gaze switched back to me.

  ‘ Cheese glue!’ she muttered.

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  19

  The envoy of the King-Caliph Ammianus of Carthage was received

  with the proper amount of ceremony, Pharaoh-Queen Ty-amenhotep

  giving the impression – as I note Alexandrines like to do – that she

  condescended to pay respect to a member of a younger and more

  barbaric civilisation.

  Rekhmire’, shielding me from the view of the envoy’s entourage,

  murmured, ‘If he does anything in public, he’s a fool.’

  The great audience hall had space enough to hide me, veiled and

  therefore female, among Ty-ameny’s advisers. I hoped that if the

  Carthaginian envoy had been briefed at all, he would be looking for

  Rekhmire’’s scribe, or at best the painter’s apprentice from Rome, and

  not the pregnant woman of Venice.

  Apprehension made my mouth dry.

  Onorata lay newly-fed and grumpy up in our apartments, with Ramiro

  Carrasco and the German brothers and a squad of Ty-ameny’s Royal

  Guard in attendance. I didn’t trust the Carthaginians not to attempt

  abduction of my baby. Nor, evidently, did the Pharaoh-Queen.

  Brass horns blared.

  The crowds at the doors shifted.

  I guessed the envoy’s party had begun their way up the Thousand

  Stairs to the Daughter of Ra’s palace. In the white heat of afternoon.

  Surely a calculated insult?

  ‘He may well think that,’ Rekhmire’ confirmed my suggestion. ‘But

  he’s from the Darkness. The sun in the middle of the day addles the