Journey

by Angela Hunt

  After adorning Yisrael with necklaces, rings and bracelets of gold and precious stones, the physicians carefully bound the body with long, narrow linen strips. With infinite patience they individually wrapped fingers, toes, arms and legs. With the care they might have shown Pharaoh himself, the embalmers inserted protective amulets—images of the lotus, the symbol of rebirth, and the ankh, a sign of life—between the layers of binding, then glued every few layers with resin.

  The process of wrapping required two weeks and over 445 square yards of fine linen. After twenty layers of binding, Efrayim was relieved to see that the shrunken body had resumed its normal size.

  A portrait mask covered the mummy’s bound head, a most decidedly un-Egyptian rendering of a bearded man with black, fathomless eyes. The physicians bound the mask in linen, then sealed the entire body with a final coat of resin. When the resin had dried, the embalmers stepped back, folded their hands and looked to Efrayim for approval. Yaakov’s mortal remains were ready for their final journey.

  Impressed with their reverent care, Efrayim bowed to the physicians and went into the house to report to his father.

  Chapter Five

  Menashe’s mouth tipped in annoyance when he learned that Pharaoh and Queen Tiy had requested the vizier’s presence at a banquet before the burial procession could depart Thebes. His annoyance flared to irritation when he heard that he and Efrayim would also be expected to attend the royal dinner. Though he was eager to join his kinsmen on the journey to Canaan, one thought assuaged his impatience as he shaved and dressed for his audience with the king and queen: the banquet would be held at Malkata. If all went well, he might be able to speak with Jendayi, the only girl who had ever made an impression on his heart.

  He had first met Jendayi ten years before. He had been a lad of fifteen, still ungainly and uncertain of himself, but his heart had melted when he saw Ani leading a new group of slaves through the vizier’s courtyard. This was a special group, Ani explained, escorting the newly acquired servants to the brick building where the slaves slept. They were musicians, and most talented ones. He had spent a hundred deben weight of silver to acquire them, but they were worth every ounce, for the vizier’s house should offer the finest music in the land. The slave broker had assured him that no orchestra in the entire world was more talented than the group he now led through the hot sun.

  Menashe’s eyes had swept over the other women and focused on her. On that day Jendayi had been a petite girl of seven or eight, with skin as pure as alabaster and hair as dark as kohl. The desert wind had whipped color into her cheeks, and even from a proper distance Menashe could see that thick lashes swept across her cheekbones. A bruised lotus blossom had been tucked into the fabric of her belt, an incongruous bit of adornment for a slave.

  Even then her gentle and overwhelming beauty sent his spirits soaring. Though she had to be frightened at her change of circumstances, she wore an expression of patient endurance while her posture spoke of strength and determination.

  Look at me, he had silently urged her, fascinated by the way she held the arm of a robust, bald slave whose heavy cheeks fell in worried folds over the collar at his neck. But she kept her eyes downcast, even when Ani stopped at the edge of the portico. The robust man halted, too, but the girl took two more steps, running headlong into the woman who walked in front of her.

  Then Menashe understood why she kept her eyes lowered. She was blind.

  He backed away, stunned by the realization. He had never seen a blind child. Blind babies were usually tossed to the crocodiles, for the Egyptians considered anyone with a physical imperfection accursed. She must have lost her sight at some point past birth, and she lived still because she possessed some talent or quality that atoned for her weakness and prevented her from being a burden.

  Over the next few days, Menashe learned the secret of Jendayi’s salvation. Jendayi was a prodigy, as skilled a harpist as he had ever heard, more inventively musical than even the harpists of Pharaoh’s court. The bald man, Akil, served as the orchestra’s chironomist, a singer who directed the musical ensemble with gestures. Menashe noticed that Akil gave particular, almost fatherly attention to the girl, urging her to play beyond her confusion, to give her full attention to the music.

  Apparently she heeded his counsel. The first time Menashe heard her play, he nearly forgot who and where he was. The occasion was a banquet his father had hosted for a group of Egyptian nobles. On a lark, Ani suggested that the master’s new musicians be invited to perform during the meal. Zaphenath-paneah agreed, and the small orchestra tucked themselves into a corner of the room to provide soothing music to spur the flow of the guests’ conversation.

  As chironomist, Akil presided over the orchestra. He sat before them, his back to the room, his eyes toward his musicians. With one hand on his bent knee, Akil tapped the rhythm, with his other hand he indicated the notes to be played. The inclination of his arm specified the pitch, the position of his fingers told the musicians whether their sounds should be abrupt, smooth, loud or nearly silent. Since she could not see the director, Jendayi stood in the midst of the others, feeling their movements, listening to their breaths, seeming to anticipate the movement of Akil’s arm even before the others could respond to him.

  Along with Jendayi and her harp, Akil’s all-female orchestra consisted of women who played the lute, a double oboe, a lyre and a tambourine. For the most part they performed gentle, unremarkable music that did little but support Zaphenath-paneah’s dinner until a lull in conversation gave Akil the opportunity to lower his arms and hoarsely whisper Jendayi’s name.

  Even through the veil of memory, Menashe could recall the sparkling clarity of the notes she played. The harp broke through the heavy silence of sated banqueters like the shattering of crystal, then trilled in a melodic passage that brought the dinner to a standstill. The nobles seated around Zaphenath-paneah stopped eating; the servants paused in their circuitous routes to the kitchens and stared as the wellspring of sound swept through the hall and over the assembled diners. No one had ever heard such magic from either a harp or a human throat, and the effect astounded every soul at the vizier’s dinner.

  Sudden tears burned Menashe’s eyes as the music spilled through the room. One minute heavy and boisterous, then sweet and light, the poignant sounds touched places in Menashe’s heart no human had ever been able to reach. The melody grew bittersweet, brightening the faded memory of Menashe’s dead mother, then rushed on to lift his soul to the hope of sunrise and the joy of warbling birdsong. Finally the music softened to echo the sibilant whispers of the spirits of the Nile and the whirring insects in the tall river grasses. Menashe covered his mouth with his hand, afraid lest some inadvertent sound slip out and spoil the effect she’d created, then the girl pressed her hand across the vibrating strings and the sounds ceased.

  The silence that followed was like the hush after a whirlwind when the palm branches hang limp and the earth seems to catch her breath. As worn out as if he’d been running, Menashe clung to the edge of his chair and stared at the girl who sat as silent as the Sphinx. A strange and tangible whispering moved through the air, like the trembling breaths of a hundred simultaneous astonishments. “Who is she? Where did she come from? Has a god inhabited her fingers—or her harp?”

  Akil, as master of the orchestra, stood and took a bow, then placed one hand across his breast and gestured to Jendayi. Menashe burst out in spontaneous applause, echoed by his father and the other guests. The girl, apparently aware that the attention of every eye in the room had focused on her, stiffened as twin stains of scarlet appeared on her cheeks.

  On that day Menashe fell completely in love. He would bide his time, he decided, and wait until she was of a marriageable age, then he would approach his father and ask if she could be his bride. But within three years of her arrival at the vizier’s house, news of the child prodigy reached even Pharaoh’s ears. As a gesture of loyalty and love, Zaphenath-paneah offered his harpist and chirono
mist to Pharaoh’s service, and shortly thereafter Akil’s little orchestra left the vizier’s villa for Pharaoh’s pink palace.

  Though the turn of events left Menashe feeling bereft, God had not been entirely unmerciful. Over the years Menashe had relished his occasional visits to Malkata, not because he rejoiced at Pharaoh’s invitation, but because he adored sitting in the same room with Jendayi. A mere ripple of her fingers across the harp had the power to draw tears, and the sight of her diminutive form moving through the halls set his blood to pounding in his temples. He did not know how he would make her his wife, but one day he would. He would never marry unless he married Jendayi.

  His determination had only grown stronger through the years. On the afternoon of Pharaoh’s banquet before the departure to Canaan, Menashe dressed with special care before joining his father and brother at the gate of the villa. After they crossed the Nile on a barge, a litter bore the three men to Pharaoh’s gleaming palace.

  As a pair of Pharaoh’s elite Medjay warriors escorted them through the maze of palace passageways, Menashe reflected on the king who now held Jendayi’s fate in his hands. Amenhotep was not unreasonable; in fact, many considered him to be Egypt’s wisest pharaoh. He neither taxed his people unfairly nor spilled their blood on foreign fields. He had sired a host of royal children and married a woman who proved to be not only fruitful, but capable.

  Of course, Pharaoh did have—Menashe grinned, searching for the words his father would use to describe the king—quirks. In addition to his inordinate fondness for women, Amenhotep possessed an enthusiasm for building as strong as his predecessors’ passion for war. Along with the palace at Malkata, he had built a large addition to the temple to Amon-Re at Karnak and a larger temple, flanked by an avenue of Sphinxes, to Amon-Re at Opet. Though no one could say which project was the more daring, the most mysterious work had been accomplished at his mortuary complex. Through some magic of design and situation, Pharaoh’s builders had erected a pair of colossal stone statues engraved with Amenhotep’s image. Precisely at sunrise each morning, the two sixty-five-foot statues produced hauntingly musical sounds.

  Pharaoh’s chief chamberlain met them outside the gilded doors of the king’s throne room and prostrated himself before Zaphenath-paneah. “Pharaoh and the Mother of All Egypt are in the garden,” the chamberlain told them after Yosef gave him permission to rise. “You are to join them as they finish their game.”

  “What game are they playing?” Yosef asked as the chamberlain led them toward the garden.

  The chamberlain’s broad face cracked into a smile. “Hounds and Jackals.”

  Menashe cast Efrayim a puzzled glance. Hounds and Jackals was a trivial entertainment usually employed by wealthy Egyptians as a way to pass long, hot afternoons. He could not imagine the divine pharaoh and the Mother of All Egypt being bored enough to indulge in a board game. He and Efrayim had not played in years.

  His father must have guessed at his thoughts. “Pharaoh and Queen Tiy have erected a life-size board in the center of the garden,” Yosef explained, casting the words over his shoulder as they walked. “The fifty-eight golden circles on the game board have been represented by fifty-eight golden tiles along the garden pathway. And instead of a splotch of blue paint to represent an oasis on the game board, Pharaoh’s men have situated a real pool between the two garden paths.”

  Players of the game had a simple objective, Menashe recalled. One player managed a team of hounds, the other a team of jackals. To begin, each player rolled the knucklebones, and the first to roll either a one or a six could set out on the trail, moving from tile to tile. The first player to land exactly on the shenu, the royal insignia, won the game.

  The challenge of Hounds and Jackals lay in managing the two serpentine trails that connected opposite sections of each pathway. If a player landed one of his tokens at the junction of a tile and one of the serpentine paths, he had to follow the secret trail, either moving ahead by several tiles or falling back by the same distance. To further enliven the game, five special tiles were marked with the ankh, the symbol for eternal life. A player fortunate enough to land on the ankh could roll the knucklebones again and take another turn.

  As they neared the garden, Menashe could see that Pharaoh had made a great production of the game. Two winding paths had been cut into the garden on opposite sides of an enormous reflecting pool. A gigantic shenu, a tile engraved with the king’s divine name and decorated with gold, red carnelian and lapis lazuli, rested on the ground directly in front of the garden pavilion.

  At that moment an official yelled, “Three!” Pharaoh, who watched from the pavilion, pointed at a slave on the path reserved for “hounds.” The slave, dressed in a furred headdress and a silver collar, ran forward three tiles. At once a dozen slaves burst from behind a screen of greenery, a replica of the sacred bark of Amon-Re on their shoulders. The boat, a small model of the sacred bark on which the god sailed to his various temples, featured a curved prow and stern carved with the image of the ram-headed god. Long poles supported both the craft and fluttering banners painted with the god’s sacred insignia.

  The grinning “hound,” delighted at Pharaoh’s good fortune, climbed into the boat while the bark-bearers carried him over one of the hidden paths to a tile much closer to the shenu and the finish line.

  From the security of her elevated chair, Queen Tiy frowned. Stepping up to the rope that separated the playing field from the observers, Menashe noted the position of the players. If his good fortune held, the king would win.

  Tiy nodded toward her representative, who tossed the knucklebones into a gleaming bronze pan. “Two!” called the official. With a decided frown, the queen pointed toward one of her men (a jackal, Menashe decided, since he wore a black headdress painted with pointed ears), who promptly stepped forward two tiles. But his move placed him at the exit of one of the secret paths, and as soon as the servant settled on the tile, a pair of priests lifted the lid on a woven basket. As Menashe stared in mystified amazement, a cobra slithered out and “hissed” the queen’s player back to the beginning of the course.

  “Don’t worry,” the chamberlain whispered as the reptile wriggled away. “It is an old creature whose fangs have been removed.”

  Triumphant laughter echoed from the king’s chair. “Ah, Tiy, I shall beat you yet!”

  “We shall see, my king.” The queen laughed, too, but her laughter had a sharp and brittle edge.

  Pharaoh rolled the knucklebones again, and the spectators broke out in polite applause as he moved another “hound” forward six tiles.

  The queen shot her husband a twisted smile, then gestured to the official. “The bones,” she commanded, her spiderlike hand extended. “I will throw them myself.”

  The official bowed and gave her the knucklebones. Pharaoh leaned back and cupped his hand around his chin. Tiy rolled the bones in her hands as if to get the feel of them, then splayed her fingers. The bones spilled uselessly onto the ground.

  “Tiy!” Disappointment dripped from Amenhotep’s voice. “You dropped them! You have forfeited the game!”

  “Alas, apparently I have.” A smile crawled to Tiy’s lips and curved itself there like an undulating cobra. “But I would rather surrender to you, mighty Pharaoh, than be beaten by you. Besides, this is not an appropriate time for games. Our guests have arrived, and they are in mourning.”

  Pharaoh’s expressive face stiffened and became almost somber when he caught sight of his vizier. “Zaphenath-paneah,” he said, his voice dull and troubled. “I am glad you have come. I wanted to spend this day with you, to strengthen your heart as you once supported mine as I prepared to bury my father.”

  Now that the royal gaze had fallen on them, Menashe followed his father’s example and prostrated himself before the pavilion. “Rise and kiss the royal foot, most excellent vizier, my Zaphenath-paneah.” Pharaoh’s voice sounded thin and hollow in the open air. Yosef rose to his knees and crept forward to brush his lips across the tops
of Amenhotep’s red leather sandals. A great honor, this kissing of Pharaoh’s feet. Only a select few noblemen were allowed to touch the divine king.

  “You and your sons may stand,” Pharaoh called, and Menashe rose. Lifting his chin, he assumed all the dignity he could muster, but he always felt like a child in Amenhotep’s presence. Though Yosef was the king’s most trusted counselor, Menashe and Efrayim had not spent enough time in royal company to feel comfortable in the king’s presence. Perhaps no man ever could.

  At thirty-one, Amenhotep III stood before the world as a man in the prime of life. Even from this distance, Menashe felt the power that coiled within him, an energy that could not be disguised by the king’s air of studied relaxation. Like the other nobles, Pharaoh wore a linen kilt girdled at the waist by an elaborate beadwork belt, but there the resemblance to other noblemen ended. From Pharaoh’s belt hung a sporran of beaded strings, each topped by a gold cow’s head pendant, a symbol of the goddess Hat-Hor.

  Since he could never be seen with his head uncovered, Amenhotep wore the nemes headdress, a piece of stiffly folded cloth held in place by a gold band across his forehead. Two striped lappets fell forward over his smooth chest. A model of the serpent goddess Wadjet protruded from the front of the headdress, and under the nemes, the king’s profile was sharp and confident. His face, bronzed by the wind and sun, was pleasant enough, but his eyes smoldered with the intimidating and fiery pride of Egypt’s kings.

  “Your sons have grown into fine men.” Pharaoh nodded with a taut jerk of his head, then stole a slanted look at his wife. “What do you say, my dear Tiy? I believe the young sons are as pleasing in form as their father.”