“I would prefer to wash myself,” Huy protested. “As for clean loincloths and kilts, I brought all that I have, enough for three days.”
The man inclined his head. “In that case I shall see that your laundry is done every day. If by some chance you need more, you must let me know. I am at your service while you are here.”
“You mean if I get ink on myself or fall into mud.” Huy grinned, although he had never felt less like making a joke. He knew that he should be enjoying all the respectful attention being showered upon him. Indeed, he thought fleetingly, when I was a little boy I would have taken all this as my right and thrown a tantrum if it had been denied me, but now it only adds to the burden of expectation I see in everyone’s eyes.
The servant permitted himself a wintry smile. “As you say, Master Huy. Then when you are ready I will escort you to the High Priest’s office. At present he is performing the morning offerings to the god.”
Huy was relieved when the door closed behind him. He’s like an arrogant Pabast, he thought as he plunged his hands into the perfumed water and then reached for the natron. A sour Pabast with the added resentment of having to serve a boy as though he were a noble visitor to the temple. Well, I wish Mentuhotep had not bothered to accord me such esteem. I cannot live up to it.
Anhur’s unaffected greeting restored Huy’s equanimity, however, as later they both followed the servant’s stiff spine the short distance to the High Priest’s private quarters. Anhur took up his post outside the double doors. Mentuhotep rose from behind his desk to take Huy’s hand, bringing with him a strong whiff of myrrh and the sacred kyphi perfume used in temple worship that Huy’s uncle Ker had probably distilled from the choicest raisins himself. “You slept well, I trust?” he asked warmly. “Good. And Khanun tells me that you are quite taken with our holy patroness, Seshat. She will be pleased. Come and sit. The Book resides in a guarded alcove of the House of Life. Khanun has already brought it to me.” Huy took the indicated stool, eyeing the cedar casket with its figured brass corners as he did so and taking a deep, surreptitious breath.
Mentuhotep lifted the lid and withdrew a very thin hemp bag with a papyrus tag hanging from its drawstring. He glanced at it. “Yes, this is the second part,” he said, setting it on the desk before Huy. “The fourth is also in this box. I must not confuse them.” For some reason Huy suddenly wanted to laugh. He quelled the impulse as Mentuhotep’s hand descended on his naked shoulder. “Reading it will take no more than a few moments,” he commented. “Ramose tells me that you are able to memorize the words of the Book. In that case handle the scroll as little as possible and quickly return it to its protective bag. Do not leave it alone. Stay in here as long as you wish, then send for me when you are ready to leave.” The hand was withdrawn. Mentuhotep walked briskly to the door.
Huy swivelled after him on the stool. “Master, before you go, is there an accompanying scroll of explanation?” He could not keep the pleading out of his voice.
The High Priest paused. “Yes, there is, but Ramose wishes you to ponder what you will read for a day or two before I give you the commentary.” Huy’s sigh was involuntary and Mentuhotep chuckled. “I know, I know! But his reason is sensible. The direct will of Atum is that you come to an understanding of his works. Therefore your conclusions will be the truth. We do not know who wrote the commentary. Although it is full of wisdom, it is not necessarily the truth. What if your interpretation differs? You must not be influenced unduly. May Thoth give you courage.”
It is not courage that I need, Huy thought resignedly as he turned from the closing door and lifted the bag, and just when did my accursed decision to read the Book in the first place become “the direct will of Atum”? Already the facts of an event that belonged to me alone are being distorted to feed the secret hopes of those around me. It’s no wonder that more and more I feel as though some other Huy, someone the priests are creating for themselves, is inhabiting my skin.
In a mood of creeping depression he spread the drawstring and withdrew the scroll. He unrolled it carefully on the desk and held it open, marvelling as before at the pliant state of the ancient papyrus and the sheer beauty of the finely drawn characters. For a moment he closed his eyes, becoming aware of the strident cacophony of birds in the trees clustered against the office wall, the lingering odour of myrrh and kyphi, and another aroma, familiar and disturbing, rising from the thing pressed between his outstretched palms. The Ished Tree was many miles away, yet the scent of its leaves was deliciously fresh, immediately lifting the cloud of gloom that had threatened to engulf him. He swallowed, thinking that he could taste it as well as smell it, and, opening his eyes with the scribes’ quick prayer to Thoth, he looked down and began to read.
I, Thoth of the Twenty-two Epithets, Who Makes Splendid his Creator, set down these words of Atum. Let him who reads them understand and marvel at the profundity within their simplicity.
I am One that transforms into Two,
I am Two that transforms into Four,
I am Four that transforms into Eight,
After this I am One.
Huy read the lines again. They were indeed simple, straightforward—and utterly nonsensical. He scanned them once more, this time speaking them, as if hearing them carried aloud into the warming air of the room could give them meaning. Raising his hands in a gesture of both puzzlement and release, he let the scroll roll up, then slid it gently back into its bag. The words were already firmly fixed in his mind. “I am One that transforms into Two …”
Getting up, he folded his arms and stood facing the window that gave out onto the High Priest’s small private garden. Through the dense foliage of the trees he could see bright sunlight and the deep blue of a mid-morning sky. The office will be flooded with direct heat as the sun westers, he thought idly. Perhaps I should lower the window hanging now. I’m thirsty for water. There must be a jug of it in here somewhere. “I am Two that transforms into Four …” He found water on a table by the door, poured himself a cup, and drank deeply. Now what? he wondered, and began to pace. “I am Four that …” That. That. Atum does not say “who,” he says “that.” “I am One that …” Not “I am One who …” Does it mean that the god transforms something else from one to two to four to eight, not himself? But at the end he says “After this,” after the transformings he has performed, he is One. Not “I have turned myself back into One” or “I am still One.” “After this I am One.” Is it a part of himself that he transforms for some unspecified purpose and then changes back into One again?
But “transform” means something deeper and more permanent than “change.” To transform is to alter irretrievably, to become something different for always. Atum took something and transformed it by dividing it. Atum took something of himself and transformed it by being able to divide it and yet remain whole. Something beside himself yet a part of himself?
Huy came to a halt. Vague whispers came to him, memories of things half heard and disregarded during his school lessons. Something about frogs. Frogs? He let out a peal of laughter and went to the door. “Please summon the High Priest,” he said to the supercilious face that confronted him, then closed the door again. The frog was the symbol of resurrection, but what could the renewal of life possibly have to do with the precise divisions stated in the scroll? Frogs represented life after the receding of the annual flood, the springing up of the new crops, new eggs in the nests along the canals, new hope for a bountiful harvest—not transformation. Not that! Yet all through the noon meal with the priests, the afternoon rest, the evening spent wandering the precinct, and finally lying sleepless on his couch, Huy could not rid himself of the conviction that frogs somehow held an explanation for the words being repeated over and over in his head.
The following morning he declined the servant’s offer to guide him to the High Priest’s quarters. He and Anhur found their way without difficulty. Mentuhotep was waiting for them, and after affably greeting the soldier he ushered Huy into the office
where once again the casket sat waiting on his desk. “Well, Huy,” Mentuhotep said, “are you ready to read the words a second time?”
“Really, Master, I don’t need to,” Huy answered hesitantly. “I am able to recite the contents of the first three scrolls perfectly. This one was easy.”
“Easy to memorize perhaps.” The man’s glance was keen. “But have you already an understanding of the Book so far? Is the meaning of the first sayings clear to you?”
“Mostly. I believe that a full grasp of the sense of it will not be possible until the whole has been read.” He had been going to say “until I’ve read the whole” but did not want to sound boastful.
Mentuhotep nodded. “Will you recite to me what you have read so far?” It was a command, not a request.
Huy resisted the urge to put his hands behind his back like a pupil called upon in the schoolroom, and began: “‘The universe is nothing but consciousness, and in all its appearances reveals nothing but an evolution of consciousness, from its origin to its end, which is a return to its cause …’”
The High Priest’s eyes did not leave Huy’s face. When he had fallen silent, Mentuhotep nodded. “Do you know what ‘evolution’ means, Huy?”
“I think so, Master. It means a slow change towards something better.”
“Your schoolmasters have taught you well. And if Atum wills a form of becoming for himself, which is—what?”
“The First Duat. The place of metamorphosis.”
The High Priest’s half smile was one of satisfaction. “Good. Then are the becomings mentioned in the scroll you read yesterday metamorphoses, or evolutions, or something else?”
“I don’t know. They are called transformations. Are they different from both metamorphoses and evolutions?”
“That is for you to decide.” Mentuhotep came around the desk. “I know that you want the commentary, but not today. Obviously you do not need to read the scroll again, unless having it under your eyes and hands would help you deliberate? No? Then I shall take it away and leave you to think. You need not stay in here to do so, but choose quiet places in the precinct for your meditations.”
Huy put out a hand. “Master, since my reading yesterday I’ve been unable to purge the thought of … of frogs from my mind.” He could feel himself flush. “It sounds insane, but will you tell me if some demon of ignorance has found a way into my heart and is leading me astray?” Mortified, Huy could see that Mentuhotep was repressing a laugh.
“You are the Chosen One, Huy,” he said unexpectedly. “Your heart is pure. Enjoy your day, and if by tomorrow you are still hopping about on the bank of comprehension, we will talk together. No, I am not laughing at you,” he finished gravely. “I am simply delighted that all those who have taken your measure have spoken the truth. It is a good thing that your parents are such pagans. No erroneous conception of these holy things has corrupted you.”
He bowed and withdrew, leaving Huy still red-faced with shame for both his own ignorance, pure though it might be, and that of his father. Well, he thought bitterly, I will lie here on the High Priest’s reed mat and think about frogs, and when my spine begins to ache I will go to the sacred lake with Anhur and think about them some more, and when I become hungry I will eat with the priests and think about grilled goose and radishes. In spite of Mentuhotep’s words he felt like a fool.
He thought about frogs until his head began to throb—their colours, their sheen, their black, bulbous eyes, the way they moved, their throaty call, how cool and dry they felt in an upturned palm—and when he realized that nothing could be added and he had merely built a wall of frustration in his mind, he got up with an exclamation of sheer irritation, woke Anhur, who was dozing outside the door, and set off to find the school’s training ground.
It lay to the north of the temple, and unlike its counterpart at Iunu it was surrounded on all sides by tall, thick hedges of acacia. Anhur nodded his approval as they started across the churned expanse of earth towards the mud-brick cell beside the stables. “Being on the north, it gets only a little of the morning sun,” he commented, “and the acacia keeps a lot of the ground in shade. Mind you, Huy, most battles aren’t fought under such ideal conditions.” How would you know? Huy wanted to snap, but he held his peace.
Hearing the guard’s voice, a man had emerged from the cell and stood peering suspiciously at them as they approached, his gaze flicking from Huy to Anhur’s broad shoulders and ready weapons. He inclined his head slightly once, an invitation to speak, and Huy realized gladly that at least there was one person here who did not know who he was. He bowed politely. “I believe that I am addressing the Overseer of the Training Ground,” he said formally. “I am Huy son of Hapu of Ra’s temple school at Iunu, sent here by my teachers to study for a while. This is my guard Anhur.”
The man’s attention travelled to Huy’s palms and belt, seeking any trace of the henna with which the nobles painted their hands and the throwing sticks with which they hunted. Seeing neither, and obviously puzzled by the presence of a personal guard, he grunted. “I am the Overseer. What is your business with me, Huy son of Hapu?”
“I would like the use of a bow and arrows to keep up my target practice while I am here. If you need permission from the Overseer of the School, I can send a servant to procure it.”
“That won’t be necessary for the equipment,” the man replied shortly with another swift glance at the stolid Anhur. “But if you intend to hitch a chariot I’ll need the Overseer’s seal, and I can’t provide you with a wrestling partner.”
Huy wanted to shake the surliness out of him. “I wrestle with my guard. And if I wanted a chariot I would have no difficulty in quickly getting permission to use the best you have. Now show me the bows.”
The man’s eyes dropped. Without another word he led them into a large room beside his cell where the bows hung in rows, each one with its string wrapped in oiled hemp cloth. I did not need to be so rude, Huy thought regretfully as he entered the cool space. This is nothing but thwarted conceit on my part because I am the Chosen One, and shouldn’t the Chosen One be omniscient? It came to him also, as he walked the rows of weapons, that somewhere in the back of his mind he was hoping that physical exertion might shake loose the same sort of revelation that had come to him on the training ground at Iunu. “This one,” he said, pointing at one of the composite bows, “and I will take the barrel of arrows outside and try them all. I can set up the target myself.”
“As you wish.” The Overseer stalked away. Huy lifted down and unwrapped his bow, chose a set of leather gloves from the chest by the doorway, and Anhur heaved the barrel of arrows out into the dappled sunlight.
“I’ll be happy to wrestle with you, Huy,” he puffed, “but if I hurt you Ramose will have harsh words for me when we return home.”
Huy chuckled. “Probably for me too. Set up the target over there, Anhur, and find some shade. When I’m sufficiently sweaty we’ll wash and then eat.”
For an hour Huy drew and loosed, until the target began to blur, his arms ached, and his kilt became soaked in sweat. Finally he admitted defeat. The exercise had done him good, he knew, but the burst of inner knowledge he sought had been denied him. After cleaning the bow’s grip and rewrapping the string while Anhur saw to the target and the arrows, Huy tossed the gloves back in the box and together they re-entered the temple. In the priests’ bathhouse they stood side by side on the slabs, dousing each other with warm water and scrubbing the natron into skin and scalps. Huy, watching Anhur splash and grunt in appreciation, realized that a genuine affection for this blunt, phlegmatic man was growing in him and he would be sorry when the time came for them to part.
Anhur was not pleased when Huy decided to go into the school courtyards instead of taking to his couch. “You want to talk to that beefy young ox with the tongue of a shrewish woman?” he grumbled. “Trust me, Huy, that kind can carry a grudge right into the tomb. You’ll be wasting your breath. What is he to you, anyway?”
&
nbsp; “He killed me,” Huy replied. “If we ever keep company again, Anhur, I’ll tell you about it, but today I must try to come to an understanding with him. It’s the way of Ma’at.”
“‘Hail Uamtutef, I have not eaten my heart,’” Anhur said.
“What’s that?”
Anhur rolled his eyes. “It’s one of the negative confessions from the Book of Coming Forth by Day. You’re supposed to learn them all in order to get past the gods that wait to condemn the guilty soul after you die. Don’t you know that? And you thought I was just an ignorant soldier!”
“No I didn’t, and I assure you I don’t eat my heart over Sennefer. I’m not angry with him. I don’t want him to be angry with me anymore.”
Anhur snorted. “Well, good luck,” he said derisively. “At least I’ll be able to defend you on a full stomach.”
Huy’s assumption that the Overseer’s quarters would be near the entrance to the first courtyard proved correct. A passing priest gave him directions that took him along the south side of the temple itself to where the unroofed passage ended at a junction behind the sanctuary. One arm led in a few steps to a door in the outer wall. The other petered out in a large grassed quadrangle bounded by cells on three sides and, abutting the sanctuary itself, a modest apartment. Here Huy knocked. After a while a servant responded, blinking drowsily at Huy as full sunlight drenched his face. “Yes?” he said sharply. “If you have a problem, could it not wait until after the sleep?”
Huy inwardly cursed himself. He had chosen the time of day so as not to encounter any of the other boys, but he had not considered the Overseer’s rest. “If your master is asleep I will not disturb him,” he said. “But if he is still awake I would like to speak with him for a moment. Please tell him that Huy son of Hapu is here.”
The Twice Born Page 30