The second riddle of the Sphinx resounded in my thoughts: I am seen by all who pass, but no one sees me. I posed a riddle that everyone knows, but no one knows me. I look toward the Nile, but I turn my back upon the pyramids.
I found myself thinking of the rows of sphinxes we had seen on the approach to the Temple of Serapis, some of them nearly buried by wind-blown sand. As if I were a bird with wings, I seemed to rise in the air and look down upon the young Roman and his old Greek tutor as they talked about Oedipus and the riddle he had solved, and then I flew northward, following the course of the Nile until I came to the plateau and landed atop the Great Pyramid, and looked down on the temples and roadways and the large, incongruous sand dune among them.
This vision faded and I sat upright in the sarcophagus. There were no longer any walls around me. I was surrounded by a sort of membrane, smooth and featureless and faintly glowing, rather as I imagine the inside of an egg might look to an unborn chick, if an egg could be made of twilight.
Suddenly I sensed I was no longer alone, and turned my head to see a dog-headed figure that stood upright on two legs. Slowly he walked toward me. His face was black on one side, golden on the other. In one hand he carried a herald's wand, and in the other, a green palm branch.
“Anubis?” I whispered.
“You know me better as Mercury.” His long snout never moved, yet somehow he spoke.
“You've come!” I said, hardly able to believe it. “The priest said such a thing would happen, and here you are! Will you help me solve the riddle?”
“You do not need my help, Gordianus. You already know the answer.”
He was right. I did know the answer. “You have no message for me, then?”
“I visit you not as a messenger, but as a herald, to announce her coming.”
“Who? Who is coming?”
Anubis fell silent, and then began to fade, as thoughts fade. Traces of his presence lingered on my eyes, even when I shut them. When I opened my eyes again, Isis stood before me.
I knew it was Isis by the crown she wore, with its curving horns and the golden disk between them, and by the Isis Knot between her breasts. Her linen gown was the color of blood. Her skin was golden brown, the color of honey. Her eyes glittered like sparks of sunlight on the Nile. She was unspeakably beautiful.
I had seen many images of gods and goddesses in the nineteen years I had been on earth, but never had I beheld a goddess face-to-face. I felt many things at once. I was fearful yet calm, awestruck yet strangely sure of myself. The unearthly allure of the goddess inspired in me a passion that was equally unearthly, unlike anything I had felt before.
The cold granite sarcophagus melted away. In its place I rested upon an infinite expanse of something soft and warm and pliant, almost like the pelt of a living, breathing animal, if such a pelt could cover the whole earth. Isis removed her crown and hitched it to a star in the twilight sky above her. Her red gown rippled as it fell to her ankles. She reclined beside me.
No words could describe the bliss of that coupling; nor shall I attempt to do so. There is a phrase used by Herodotus when he skirts a sacred matter about which his informants require his silence: I know a thing, but it would not be seemly for me to tell.
I shall say this much and no more: In a place and a moment outside of time and space, Isis and I became one. Perhaps it never happened. Perhaps it is happening still.
Little by little, I returned to this earthly realm, until at last I felt again the hard granite beneath me and its coldness around me. I heard the beating of my heart. I blinked and opened my eyes and saw darkness—not the darkness of dreams or the netherworld, but a common, earthly darkness, the mere absence of light, which was nothing to fear.
I sat up. If I had left my body at some point, there was no doubt that I had returned to it. My legs were sore from climbing, my shoulders and neck were stiff from lying on hard stone, and my backside ached from riding a camel.
How much time had passed? An hour, a day, a month? I had no way of knowing. For all I knew, I had died and come back to life.
Blindly, I navigated the chamber, feeling my way along the walls until I found the opening of the shaft. Steadying myself by the rope, proceeding cautiously so as not to bump my head, I slowly made my way up.
When I pushed open the stone panel, I was puzzled, for it seemed to me that the soft light was just the same as when I descended. Had I been inside the pyramid for mere minutes?
But then, from the soft glow that lit the Libyan mountains, I realized that the hour was dawn, not dusk. Far below I saw the camels sitting with their limbs hidden under them, their heads nodding in sleep. Huddled under blankets, also fast asleep, were Antipater and the others, including the priest of Isis, whose shaved head shone by the first ruddy light of the rising sun.
I made no sound to wake them. Instead I turned around and ascended as quickly as I could to the top of the pyramid. How many men can say they have witnessed a sunrise from the summit of the Great Pyramid? That moment, experienced alone—although in some way I felt that Isis was still present with me—I will remember all my life.
But I had another, more practical reason for the climb. I wanted to look down again at the large sand dune among the temples, to be sure that the shape was as I remembered it. It was. I could almost see the thing hidden inside it, as if the breath of a god had blown away the masses of sand. Its back was turned to the pyramids and it faced the Nile, just as the riddle said. It was seen by all who passed—who could fail to notice a sand dune big enough to block one's view of the pyramid? And yet it was unseen—for no one realized what was hidden under the sand. Its riddle was known to all, for everyone knows the riddle of the sphinx. And yet this sphinx was known to no one.
For how many generations had this monument, surely larger than any other sphinx in Egypt, been buried beneath the sand? Long enough that no one living even knew that it existed. The people of Egypt had forgotten that among the temples and shrines on the plateau, set there like a sentinel to guard the pyramids, crouched a giant sphinx, now entirely covered by sand. And yet some memory of this marvel had persisted in the form of a riddle that no one could answer.
Now that I had solved the riddle, the shape of the sphinx within the dune was unmistakable, and surely would be so to anyone gazing down on it from the Great Pyramid. There I could see the outline of the haunches, and there the protruding forepaws, and there, at the highest point, the proud head, which no doubt was covered by a nemes headdress. As Antipater had remarked, the solution to a riddle invariably seems obvious once you know the answer.
From far below, I heard a faint cry. I looked down to see that my companions were stirring. Djal had risen to his feet and was staring up at me. Even from such a great distance, I could see the plaintive expression on his face.
I took in the view one final time, then made my way down to give him the good news.
* * * *
Later that day, while the plateau was still deserted due to the festival in Memphis, the priest of Isis summoned a team of laborers to excavate the highest point of the sand dune concealing the sphinx.
All day they dug. At last their wooden shovels struck something made of stone. They kept digging until very late in the afternoon, by which time the very top of the sphinx's head had been uncovered. The gigantic nemes headdress appeared to have once been surmounted by some ceremonial object, long since broken off or worn away by time; to the priest of Isis, the stone remnant suggested a rearing cobra, such as is often seen on the headdresses of lesser sphinxes.
As the sun began to graze the jagged crest of the Libyan mountains, the priest ordered the workers to begin covering what they had uncovered. “Work all night if you must,” he told them, “but don't stop until not a trace of your day's labor remains.”
“But surely these men should keep digging!” I protested. “Why must they undo their work? Don't you want to see the whole thing? Granted, a full excavation will require many, many days—”
“But surely the will of Isis is already known in this matter,” I said. “Was it not by her guidance that I found the solution? She even—” I bit my tongue and said no more. They had pressed me for details of my experience inside the pyramid, and I had revealed all I could put into words—except any mention of the intimacy I had shared with the goddess. That experience was too special to share, and beyond words—and it seemed to me that any mortal who dallies with a deity had best be discreet.
The priest would not be swayed. He invited us all to spend the night in comfort at his quarters in the Temple of Isis, and we left the workers to their labor. For now, the sphinx among the pyramids would remain a secret.
“Tomorrow I shall go to Memphis,” said the priest. “I will convince Mhotep that the riddle was solved and command him to return the mummy.”
“How will you persuade him?”
“Leave that to me. Your satisfaction in this matter, Gordianus, must be the role you played in the salvation of Djal.”
“I have already received my satisfaction,” I said, thinking of my wondrous experience with the goddess.
“How so?” asked the priest. The others pricked up their ears.
“That must be a riddle to which none of you will ever know the answer.”
* * * *
“An upstairs room! Why were we given an upstairs room?” wailed Antipater, clutching the railing and descending one step at a time. For days after our trip to see the pyramids he had been so stiff and sore he could hardly move, and had languished in his bed at the inn. On this day he had at last consented to stir, for we had received a very special invitation.
As we crossed the city, the exercise seemed to do him good, despite his moaning and groaning. The exotic sights and sounds of the city stimulated us both. Our route took us past the roadway to the Temple of Serapis, and we paused to look at the long rows of sphinxes.
“Teacher,” I said, “can you imagine such a sphinx expanded to the enormous scale of the monument that remains hidden on the plateau? If it were uncovered, men would call it the Great Sphinx, and would come from all over the world to marvel at the size of it. And if it were as beautiful as these smaller sphinxes, it would surely deserve a place among the Seven Wonders of the World. Why is it not on the list already?”
“Because, even very long ago, when the list of Seven Wonders was made, no one knew it existed. It must have been covered by that sand since at least the time of Herodotus, who makes no mention of it, and surely would have, had he seen it. But I suspect, Gordianus, that within your lifetime the Great Sphinx, as you call it, will be rediscovered. That priest of Isis will do his best to keep word from getting out, but one of those workers will talk, the news will spread, and sooner or later curiosity will get the better of even the most reactionary priests. Perhaps King Ptolemy himself will order the Great Sphinx to be excavated.”
“More likely it will be some ambitious Roman governor, after we've conquered Egypt,” I muttered.
“What's that?”
“Never mind.”
With the happy thought that someday I might return to Egypt and behold the Great Sphinx, we resumed our journey to the house of Djal.
The dwelling itself was modest, but it had a marvelous location, built on a bit of high ground beside the Nile. A little girl—the daughter of Djal—greeted us at the door and led us to a terraced garden with a view of fishing boats on the river and farmlands on the far side. Djal sat watching the river. When he saw us he jumped up and hugged us both. Antipater groaned at being squeezed so hard.
“What is that wonderful smell?” I said.
“The meal of thanksgiving that my wife has cooked for us.”
“Your wife? I thought—”
“She was ill, yes, but now she is much better. We are all better, since the return of the mummy. Come and see!”
He led us to the room where the meal would be served. At the head of the table, leaning upright against a wall, was a tall wooden case with a mummy inside.
“Father, this is Gordianus of Rome, the man who saved you. Gordianus, this is my father.”
I had never seen a mummy before. Nor had I ever been formally introduced to a dead man. In the world's oldest land, I was having many new experiences.
I stepped closer to the mummy and made a small bow. As far as I could tell, the old fellow looked none the worse for his time in captivity. His linen wrappings were unsoiled, and his face was quite remarkably well preserved—so much so that I half expected him to blink and open his eyes. Anything seemed possible in Egypt.
Djal's daughter came running into the room. “Father! Father! Come and see!”
We followed her back to the garden. The face of the Nile had changed. Where before it had been as still and flat as a mirror, now a series of ripples extended across the whole width. Out on the boats, which bobbed slightly in the tide, fishermen waved their arms and cheered. Across the water, the fields were suddenly filled with farmers hurrying this way and that. Various contraptions with wheels and paddles were set in motion. The irrigation channels that crisscrossed the fields, which before had been dry, now glistened with moisture.
“The inundation has begun,” whispered Djal. “And my father is home!” He dropped to his knees, covered his face, and wept with joy.
“Come see!” cried the little girl. She took my hand and led me down a path toward the river. Antipater followed, groaning. On the muddy bank we took off our shoes and stepped into the Nile. Looking down, I saw the green water turn brown as it steadily rose, covering first my feet and then my ankles.
From all up and down the river I heard cries of thanksgiving. Again and again the name of Isis was invoked. I stared at the sun-dappled water. For just an instant, amid the ripples and sparkles of light, I caught a glimpse of Isis smiling back at me.
Copyright © 2012 by Steven Saylor
[Back to Table of Contents]
* * *
Novelette: ONE ANGRY JULIUS KATZ AND ELEVEN BEFUDDLED JURORS
by Dave Zeltserman
* * * *
Art by Allen Davis
* * * *
Many readers have been waiting for this: another story in the series to which the 2010 Readers Award winning “Archie's Been Framed” belongs. The series’ characters can be found in a novel-length case too: see Julius Katz and Archie, available on Kindle. Archie's creator, Dave Zeltserman, writes many different types of fiction. His 2011 serial-killer novel, A Killer's Essence, already has film interest, and the earlier Outsourced remains under option. In August of 2012 watch for a new Zeltserman novel: Monster: A Novel of Frankenstein.
“I tried, I really did, and the guy I've been talking to sounds genuinely apologetic about not being able to reschedule this shindig, but with the guests’ traveling plans and the necessary preparations and Antoine Escopier's schedule, it couldn't be done. I wish I had better news for you, but I don't.”
If Julius gave any indication that he heard me, it was only by his lips pressing into an even grimmer and harsher line, which I didn't think possible. Otherwise no response; neither in words nor by hand signal, not that I expected any.
“This murder trial should've been over two days ago,” I continued with a what-are-you-gonna-do type of sigh for Julius's benefit. “But both the prosecutor and the defense attorney have been grandstanding over what should be an open-and-shut case. I mean, come on, his wife was cheating on him with the dead guy, right? The police find him in that alley standing over his victim's body while holding the murder weapon. He runs, they catch him three blocks away, and his gloves are found where he ditched t
hem and they test positive for gunpowder residue. So if this isn't an open-and-shut case, what is? But with all the media attention, they're going to play it up for all it's worth. The jackals.”
I could just as well have been talking to a marble sculpture. No reaction from Julius. Not even to ask me who I was referring to as jackals, the media or the attorneys in the courtroom. Even if it killed him, Julius was determined to hold on to his churlish grudge just as he had for the past three days. Let him, for all I cared.
Julius is mostly known as Boston's most brilliant and eccentric private detective; this past week, though, he was known simply as juror number seven in one of Boston's high-profile murder trials, even if it was open and shut. Without his grudge, he still wouldn't have said anything, at least not while he was sitting as a juror with his attention supposedly focused on the trial at hand, but he would've given me a hand signal of some sort. Even if only an impolite one.
I guess I did care, because I felt an excess heat building up, and before I knew it I added, “Eh, so you miss a once-in-a-lifetime meal. On the bright side, they're going to be serving macaroni and cheese tonight and I was able to swing it so they'll throw some pancetta into yours.”
This time I got a visible reaction from Julius. It was slight, but I definitely picked up a flash of anger in his eyes, and I had to admit it felt good seeing it after these last three days.
Of course, the disruption jury duty caused to Julius's daily routine was enough to put him in a rotten mood, and it got exponentially worse once the judge decided to sequester the jury. By itself, that would've made Julius a miserable person to be around, but the timing couldn't have been worse. Tonight was the night of the gourmet extravaganza Julius had been looking forward to for over a year. Probably the most famous chef in Paris—one Antoine Escopier—had flown in to cook an eleven-course dinner at the Boston Plaza, complete with a separate vintage for each course, with invitations going out to a select group of gourmets and wine enthusiasts. Julius had six of the wine labels in his cellar, and he had been on the hunt for three of the other vintages for years. It must have been torturous for him since he found out the jury was to be sequestered.
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