They disembarked at the docks of Hut-herib in the middle of the following morning. With the favourable current the return trip had taken less time even though the river was at its lowest level. Ker’s litter-bearers were already waiting, and while Ker gave instructions to the helmsman, Huy said goodbye to the sailors, grabbed up his bags, and left the barge, clambering onto the litter with a sigh of both regret and anticipation. The docks were quiet at this time of the year. With the river so low, vessels from the Great Green were few and the town had a weary, rather shabby feel. Ker joined Huy, and soon they were being carried away from the tributary. The mounds on which Hut-herib was built were no longer isolated by the water that would soon surround them. Some of the deeper ditches remained muddy and were full of straggling flags of marsh growth, but most of them lay grey and cracked, waiting to be filled. Huy wrinkled his nose; they smelled rank. The fields to the east were bare, the black earth baking in the sun, the lines of palms that delineated them dusty and drooping. Huy was glad to see the horizon fill with the familiar cluster of his uncle’s orchard and the row of sycamores marking the entrance to his own home.
The bearers set the litter down outside the house and at once there was a flurry of activity within. Huy barely had time to scramble off the cushions before his mother rushed out and, swinging him off his feet, crushed him to her. The sweet aroma of lilies enfolded him. “Darling darling Huy! You’re so thin! Have you grown? Yes, I think so! Hapzefa has cooked your favourite food and your room is all ready for you. Has this year been so awful for you? Welcome home!”
Huy suffered himself to be soundly kissed before struggling against her. “Put me down, Mother! I’m fine! I love you very much and I am so happy to see you.” He looked up at the brown eyes alight with joy, the well-remembered curve of her smiling mouth, and suddenly he meant what he had said. He grasped her hand. “Home is wonderful!” he almost shouted.
His father had emerged and was waiting. Huy flung himself at the broad chest and Hapu’s arms closed around him. “I have not been altogether a good boy, but I have studied hard,” he said, his face against his father’s neck. “I think you can be proud of me.”
Hapu set him on his feet. “I would have liked to visit your school with Ker,” he said gravely, “but the season has been a busy one. Perhaps when you return I will accompany you. Welcome, my son. Your aunt will be arriving soon and then we will celebrate. Go and unpack your bags.”
His room was unchanged, just as he had left it. As he stood in the doorway, his eyes travelled the well-known cracks in the ceiling, the lamp beside the couch. He inhaled, taking in the scent of the freshly washed linen, a hint of Hapzefa’s sweat, and surely the faintest whiff of his own body. There was no sign of the monkey. Huy let out his breath in relief and wondered where his mother had hidden it. He hoped that his aunt Heruben would not ask about it. And where was Ishat? He began to empty his bags, lifting the lid of his very own chest and placing the kilts and loincloths inside, lining up the spare pair of sandals under the couch, setting the sennet game and the scarab’s box and his statue of Khenti-kheti on the table. He could hear the murmur of adult conversation drifting in from the garden as he searched for his paints. He was eager to show his family everything he had learned, and the walls of the house would be perfect for a demonstration, but perhaps he ought to wait a day or two; otherwise he would seem to be boasting. Huy sat on his cot and closed his eyes. It was indeed wonderful to be home.
No one asked him about the monkey, but there were many questions about the school. Huy talked eagerly with his family’s eyes upon him, his mother’s shining with pride, his father’s with approval. Even Hapzefa smiled at him and did not seem to care that he had spilled a little garlic sauce on his kilt. Ker and Heruben listened smugly. This was their doing, and their love for him was mingled with a different kind of approval than that of his mother. Hapzefa had made honey cakes in his honour. He thanked her politely after devouring most of them himself. It was blissful to once again be the adored centre of attention, but now Huy was careful to inquire of both his uncle and his father how good the crop yield had been, of his mother and Hapzefa how the juice and beer making had gone, of his uncle if he was pleased with this year’s perfume distilling. They were clearly amused, though they answered him soberly. Huy thought he might quote from the maxims of Ptahhotep regarding the correct behaviour of children to those in authority over them, but decided against it. He knew, and they were discovering, that he had changed. Very soon he would be five years old, and well on his way to becoming a responsible person.
Yet all the time they ate and drank, gathered happily in the shade while the long afternoon began, Huy had been wondering where Ishat was. He did not want to spoil his parents’ pleasure by betraying his need to see her, a need greater than his own gladness at being with them, but he was disappointed that she was not there. Perhaps she doesn’t like me anymore, he thought, even while he was talking about Thothmes’ sisters. Perhaps she’s found someone else to play with.
“They must be very rich, to have such pretty things,” his mother was saying. “I’m happy to see you still wearing the Nefer amulet I gave you, Huy.” She suppressed a yawn. “All this excitement has made me sleepy. It’s time to rest anyway.”
Ker and Heruben got up. “Bring Huy for a visit next week,” Heruben said. “We all need some diversion. Waiting for Isis to cry can be nerve-racking.” She smiled at Huy. “I hope you still know how to throw an occasional temper tantrum, Huy,” she continued. “Otherwise we shall begin to believe that some demon has stolen our demanding little treasure and replaced him with the incredibly well-mannered child who has been entertaining us today.”
“Don’t say that, Heruben!” Huy’s mother cried out. “Not even in jest!”
Ker signalled the litter-bearers, who had been fed under the sycamores. “We have a gift for you, Huy, when you come. Heruben, the litter is ready. Thank you for your hospitality, Hapu.”
The family watched the litter sway out of sight.
Huy’s mother put an arm around his shoulders. “Will you sleep now? I expect it will be good to be on your own couch again.”
Huy shook his head. “I think I’ll lie by the pond and see what the frogs are doing.”
She laughed fondly. “Of course you’ll want to do that. Your father and I are going to our room. Don’t stay in the sun too long!”
It was not a lie, Huy told himself once he was alone. I will look for the frogs. But mostly I want Ishat to come out of the shrubbery.
As though his thought had conjured her, there was a stirring in the bushes by the gate to the orchard and she stepped into view, coming to him barefooted over the grass, her black hair neatly tied back with a leather thong, her kilt stiff and spotless. “I waited until they’d gone,” she said. “Your father invited me to eat with you, but I wanted you to myself. I hung about in the orchard for hours and now I’m starving. Is there any food left?”
“Hapzefa took it back to the kitchen. We can go and look if you like.”
They regarded one another cautiously for a while, then Ishat giggled. “Where’s all your hair? Is that squiggle above your ear supposed to be a nobleman’s youth lock?”
Huy was annoyed. “All of us pupils wear the youth lock,” he said pompously. “Mine was much longer. But then they cut it off,” he finished lamely.
She took hold of it and tugged it sharply. “Why? Wouldn’t it grow straight?”
He pulled out of her grip. “It was because I got caught in a place I shouldn’t have been,” he began, and to his inward amazement he found himself telling her all about the Ished Tree. She listened solemnly, and when he fell silent she too was quiet, her eyes on his face.
“So Atum planted this tree in Iunu,” she said at last, “and it is a magic tree with the secret of good and evil in it. Why did he do that?”
Huy blinked. “I don’t know.”
“Well, why put such a tree in Egypt and then not let anyone learn the secret so th
at everyone could know good and evil and stay away from evil and we would all be happy? It sounds silly to me.”
Huy’s mind filled with an image of the Tree, its atmosphere of otherness, its strange, compelling scent that was underpinned with something vaguely repugnant. “You would have to see it, Ishat,” he said slowly. “The reason for the act of the god and the presence of the Tree in Egypt is surely more complicated than we think.”
She shrugged. “I still can’t see why they punished you for just looking at it. Have you still got my scarab?” She was finished with the subject of the Tree.
At one time Huy would have answered her abrupt question with an equally sharp retort. Indeed it was on the tip of his tongue to say, “It’s not your scarab. You gave it to me and it’s mine now.” Instead, he looked indignant. “Of course! I kept it by my couch all year. Everyone wanted to see it, but I only let my special friend Thothmes hold it.”
She was obviously pleased, but after the grin his words produced, she scowled. “I am your special friend, Huy, not some spoiled little boy you only just met. Did he give you anything as nice as the scarab?”
“No, he didn’t,” Huy answered truthfully, and decided not to tell her about Thothmes’ sisters or the wealth and generosity of his parents.
“All right, then.” She was mollified. “Have you learned anything useful at your school? Can you write my name? Show me!”
“Come over to the pond.” She followed him to where the earth around the verge lay brown and bare, waiting for Itu to plant more vegetables. Leaning over, he sprinkled a few handfuls of water onto the soil and smoothed it out with his palm. Carefully he drew the hieroglyphs that spelled Ishat.
She stared down at the word doubtfully. “That is my name? That says ‘Ishat’?”
“Yes. Now you do it.”
But she drew away. “I’ll get my best kilt dirty if I touch the mud. Mother starched it and made me wear it in your honour. Besides, Huy, what use is it? If I can say ‘Ishat’ and everyone else can say ‘Ishat,’ why bother to write it?”
He was unable to define her attitude as defensiveness. He interpreted it as a peasant’s inability to understand anything beyond the immediately practical. Ishat was clever. She could tie any number of complicated knots. She could blow out an egg without destroying the shell, lure a pigeon into a net, make a desert dog follow her, she knew what flowers could be sucked for their sweet nectar and which were poisonous. But she saw no point in something as seemingly abstract as writing. Huy did not try to explain it to her. It would be no use, and that knowledge made him suddenly sad.
She was standing above him as he knelt by the pool, her eyes narrowed against the harsh sunlight of the afternoon, one sturdy foot over the other and an expression of defiance on her face.
“I love you, Ishat,” he blurted.
“Don’t be silly.” Her features cleared. “Well, Huy, what shall we do? You don’t have to go back to Iunu for five whole months. All of Akhet! Let’s go into the orchard and see what fruit has been left on the trees. I’d rather eat fruit than my mother’s cooking. The wasps are bad this year, so watch out. My father couldn’t find all their nests. You know, a goose bit me this spring when I was in the fields trying to keep them away from the new seed your father was strewing. I hit it with my stick and it ran at me and attacked my leg. Your father went to the market and got me sweetmeats.”
She is not really interested in what my life has been like at Iunu, Huy thought as he followed her through the gate. All she cares about is that I’m home and we can play together again. I feel hentis older than her now. Oh, I don’t want anything to change between us, Ishat! Why do things have to be different!
Before too many weeks had passed, Huy found himself settling into his old routines both with Ishat and with the household. Hapzefa took to scolding him absently again. He became careless about keeping his room tidy. He and Ishat spent endless hours in the garden and the fields until the Inundation began and the land slowly filled. For a while only the irrigation canals held water. The two children often stripped on a hot afternoon and ran in and out of the murky water. They were far from the river’s tributary, which was just as well, Huy decided. He did not want to tell Ishat that he had learned to swim. It was a skill she would appreciate, being a swimmer herself, but Huy could already sense a time ahead when his pursuits and hers would diverge and they would have nothing left to share. For the present he was increasingly content to slip back into their old, easy relationship, and the moments of dislocation became fewer and weaker.
His uncle and aunt had given him not only a new set of paints but a roll of papyrus and a scribe’s palette complete with brushes, containers for ink, and an ivory paper burnisher. “The paints are for now,” Heruben explained, “but the scribe’s utensils you must put away until you graduate to papyrus at school. We are just so proud of you, Huy!”
Huy had thanked them profusely, handling the objects curiously and holding the papyrus to his nose. It did not smell at all like a plant, indeed it had hardly any odour at all. The beaten weave of it fascinated him and he asked Ker how it was made. “I will take you to the papermaker in town,” Ker said. “You can see it all being done. The papyrus is truly a useful and magical plant. It is sacred to Hathor, and was not Horus himself born in the papyrus marsh at Chemmis, here in the Delta? A papyrus thicket marks the frontier between life and death. Always treat it with respect, plant and paper both.”
“There is no point in taking it with you to Iunu this spring,” Hapu had said firmly when they returned home. “It will be several years before you leave the pottery shards behind. Give it to your mother to store away safely. You don’t want it stolen, do you?”
So, reluctantly, after several evenings spent handling and dreaming over his new acquisitions, he took the palette and papyrus roll to Itu. She was in the room she shared with her husband, changing the linen on his couch, when Huy peered round the door. “Come in, Huy,” she said. “Have you finished gloating over your presents?”
“I did not gloat. I was trying to imagine what it will be like to set them across my knees like the scribes and actually begin to take the dictation of my employer.”
Itu dropped the armful of sheets on the floor and sank onto her own couch. “How humid it is today!” she complained. “Before long the mosquitoes will begin to fly out of the canals. Put your things in my chest, Huy. They won’t be disturbed.”
She watched him cross to the wall and lift the lid of the chest. Then he paused. “You still have it,” he said. “I can see one paw sticking out under your sheaths.”
“You really hate it, don’t you, my darling? It is rather sinister, I admit. Perhaps you will appreciate its value when you are older.”
Huy had drawn away from the chest, the palette still in his hands. “I don’t think so, Mother,” he said steadily, though he could feel his hands grow cold. “Would you please put my things away? I don’t want the monkey to know I’m here.”
Itu slid off the couch. “You and your funny fancies!” she said kindly. “You’re still just a little boy, aren’t you, Huy, in spite of your grown-up language and the new gravity you came home with. Very well. Give it to me.” Huy did not relax until the lid of the chest banged closed. “Hapzefa has been slicing watermelon,” Itu went on. “Let’s go and have some.”
Huy made sure that he was not the last one out of the room.
On the first day of the month of Thoth, New Year’s Day, the whole country celebrated the rising of the Sothis star, which always heralded the beginning of the Inundation, with a sacrifice to Amun. Every month held its feast days, but those of this month, the first of winter, were observed with a fervency born of relief. Isis had begun to cry. Once again there would be silt for the crops and plenty of water to fill the canals. The ceremony of the Opening of the Dikes took place, the King performing the first ritual and every farmer with dams across his canals following suit. The Chief Royal Scribe noted, as always, the exact day, month, and year
of the King when “the water returned.” People everywhere held parties, throwing gifts, flowers, and often themselves into the river. It was a time for fishing and fowling, and on Ker’s arouras the grapes hung heavy and lusciously red, waiting to be harvested. On the nineteenth day of the month Thoth himself was honoured, and on the twenty-second the Feast of the Great Manifestation of Osiris was held. Hapu and the gardeners were too busy filling their baskets with grapes to do more than say a few perfunctory prayers during a morning’s holiday from work, but Huy, mouth and fingers temporarily stained purple with grape juice, stood in the privacy of his room and thought for the first time about the god who had given the civilizing gift of the written word to Egypt. Although the statue of Hut-herib’s totem graced his bedside table, it was to mighty Thoth that he prayed, thanking the god for his wisdom and begging that his remaining years at school would result in skills that would make his father proud of him. “And please keep me away from any more mischief,” he finished before rushing out to join Ishat by the grapevines. He still had four more months in which to enjoy himself before his uncle’s barge bore him away again.
4
THE YEARS THAT FOLLOWED were largely uneventful for Huy, but not for his mother, who gave birth to another boy four months after Huy’s eleventh birthday. Surprised and perhaps a little embarrassed, Hapu went into the market and hired a scribe, dictating the news to Huy, who received it at school with mixed feelings. He had known that his mother was pregnant and had watched the tumult of rejoicing and congratulations with a somewhat jaundiced eye. All his life he had been the family favourite, the only son of adoring parents and the darling of a childless aunt and uncle who had spoiled him outrageously. Now he would have to share the attention. He had returned to school before the actual birth and for that he was grateful. Fleetingly he wondered, in a flash of jealousy, whether his new brother would usurp his place in the affections of the family, seeing that for seven months of each year he was not at home to remind everyone of how much they loved him.
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