The Hippopotamus Marsh

by Pauline Gedge

  “Yes, they should,” Si-Amun returned. Teti relinquished his hand. “It is nothing truly important, Teti,” Si-Amun went on. “But the scrolls seem so arbitrary in their demands, so senseless. Each time one arrives, Father becomes more tense and angry.” He looked up. Teti’s eyes were commiseratory and understanding. The man nodded.

  “And you are afraid that one day your father will grow tired of an unrewarded loyalty to the King and will take some reckless action that will bring disgrace on you all.” Si-Amun nodded miserably.

  “I think there is already rebellion in his heart. It is so unfair!” he burst out. “Our house has been loyal to Het-Uart for hentis! Why is the One pushing so?”

  “Calm yourself,” Teti said soothingly. “Have you eaten well? Good. A little more beer and then we will make our way home.” Si-Amun watched as the dark liquid spilled into his cup. “You are not a child, Si-Amun,” Teti reproved him gently. “You know the King’s fear. It will be laid to rest as long as your father strives to obey.” He drank, sighed, and wiped his mouth on a piece of linen a servant discreetly passed to him. “You and I must do our best to make sure that Seqenenra rides out this storm in peace. I say again, it will pass. I am your friend, young man, and your father’s too.” He bent a solemn gaze upon Si-Amun. “I would be desolate if anything happened to either of you. Let me help.” Si-Amun looked gratefully into the plump, painted face.

  “You are very kind, Teti,” he said huskily, “but I don’t know what you can do.”

  “I can speak for your father in Het-Uart. The One knows that my own loyalty is without question. I can be an intermediary, tactful, pouring oil on these troubled waters. I can also come and visit your father, talk to him of sense and preservation if his anxieties become too much to bear.”

  Suddenly Si-Amun knew what was coming. He cringed inside, wishing fervently that the whole subject had never arisen, and then wondering if it would have surfaced in any case. He was caught. He could not back away after having expressed his concern for his father. It would seem callous. He could not refuse Teti’s offer of assistance, for that in turn would appear to render the problem frivolous and his own words an exaggeration. But they were not my words even though they were present in my heart, he thought while Teti regarded him fondly. Teti spoke them aloud, not me.

  “But if I am to be of any help I must know how things stand with Seqenenra,” Teti went on. “Someone who cares must keep me informed so that I can come to Weset at a moment’s notice.” Seeing Si-Amun’s expression, he shook his head violently. “No no no, my loyal young man! Gods! Do you think I am asking you to spy on your father?” His thick black eyebrows rose. “Well, I suppose that in a sense I am, but my request comes from love, Si-Amun. Do not let Seqenenra go down under Apepa’s heel! Help me to help him!”

  It is a reasonable request, Si-Amun thought, indeed, it is a risky one. Teti himself might be seen by the One to be conspiring with my father if too much correspondence begins to flow from Khemennu to Weset and back again. How can such an expression of familial concern be wrong? Yet he hesitated. “Very well,” he said reluctantly, “but my father would be furious if he believed that I did not trust his judgement in this matter and was deferring to yours. You are right that he must be watched for his own sake, but …”

  Teti drew a ring from his finger and showed it to Si-Amun. “This is my family’s seal,” he said. “I shall imprint my letters to you with it. You in turn shall write under the seal of— what? What shall it be?”

  “A hippopotamus,” Si-Amun said slowly.

  “Very well.” Teti pushed the ring back onto his thick finger. “You know that Mersu, your grandmother’s steward, grew up in the same village as my steward? You may give any messages for me to Mersu to be sent north. You and Ramose have known each other since your youth. You can say they are for him. Or you can say nothing at all and let Mersu draw his own conclusions. But given his loyalty to your family, I’m sure he would understand.”

  He heaved himself to his feet, gestured, and the waiting servants sprang to roll up the mats. The litter bearers readied themselves. Si-Amun scrambled up. “But you will speak to the King?” he croaked. “You will assure Apepa of my father’s good faith?”

  “Of course I will.” Teti stepped forward and embraced the young man. “It will be all right, Si-Amun, I swear. Perhaps we are being foolish, you and I.” He let Si-Amun go and they started for the litters. As they stepped from the shade, the sun smote them. “Perhaps all this will resolve itself and we will laugh at our own solemnity.” Si-Amun did not reply. I can always go home and do nothing, he thought, settling himself on his litter and twitching the curtains closed. I can ignore it all. But he knew he would not. His father’s secret rage at Apepa must somehow be diverted, rendered harmless, or it would destroy them all.

  They stayed in Khemennu for a month, eating, drinking and sleeping, talking with Teti’s visitors and going regularly to the temple of Thoth. Seqenenra went once into Set’s temple, carrying offerings of rare wine and three gold bands, knowing that the King would hear of it and be pleased and reassured. But he was not allowed into the sanctuary. Only the King himself and the senior priests of Set could greet the god face to face, though at home where Amun was totem of city and family and he himself was lord over all, he had the right to commune directly with his god. He was not sorry to be denied access to Set. He did not want to see the renegade brother of Osiris, the red-haired, red-eyed ruler of the desert, wild and unpredictable though he might be, represented as the Setiu saw him, melded with their own barbaric god Sutekh.

  He and Teti regained the easy familiarity of their relationship. Seqenenra, having decided not to apologize, pretended that the conversation in the passage had never taken place and Teti did not refer to it. Amid embraces and renewed invitations to visit more often, Seqenenra, the family and their retinue set off for Weset. The journey was slow. Seqenenra stopped at every town over which he was lord, talking to priests and mayors, overseers and his minor officials, and the family did not dock at the watersteps until the end of Phamenoth.

  All was well. Kamose had performed his duties quietly and efficiently. Tetisheri questioned Aahotep briefly about the health and well-being of her relatives but did not seem particularly interested in Aahotep’s replies.

  3

  SPRING ENDED AND WESET SANK into its summer somnolence. In the arbour the grapes formed and began to swell, green and hard. The crops began to lose their willowy brightness and stiffen to yellow. The crocodiles could often be seen basking immobile, with eyes closed on the sandbanks of the rapidly shrinking Nile, and over all that self-contained, placid domain the sultry timelessness of Shemu exhaled its burning breath.

  Seqenenra, lying on his couch in the stultifying afternoons with sweat pouring from his body or prowling the relative coolness of the old palace while family and servants alike waited languorously for the benison of sunset, knew that he would not wish to exchange this tranquil, satisfying life for the sophisticated bustle of Teti’s estate. There was contentment in the predictability of the coming harvest, and reassurance in the annual Beautiful Feast of the Valley when Amun was carried over the river to visit the mortuary temples and tombs of the ancestors and the citizens of Weset followed him with food to eat beside their dead. Aahmes-nefertari would add to the family. Tani would be betrothed to Ramose, and once a settlement was decided upon by himself and Teti, she would go to live at Khemennu. His mother would go to join his father before too many years were out, and he himself would grow old and fat, Aahotep beside him, and give the reins of governorship to Si-Amun. I ask for nothing more, he said to himself fervently, standing in the dusty shade of a palm tree to watch the peasants work the shadufs, tipping the sun-caught pure water into the now stagnant and empty canals. My land, my family, my life.

  Tani dictated many letters to Ramose and spent much time hanging about the watersteps, shading her eyes and waiting for a messenger’s skiff to appear round the northern bend, a bored Behek lyin
g at her feet. Sometimes Teti’s skiffs did bring scrolls from Ramose. Sometimes the young man gave his messages for Tani into the hands of a Royal Herald who delivered them at Weset on his way to Kush. Seqenenra had ceased to fear the sight of such a vessel tacking towards his watersteps, indeed, he welcomed them, for they made Tani bubble with joy.

  Payni and Epophi came and went in a remorseless heat that shrivelled the leaves on the trees and sapped energy from beast and human alike. Mesore began, and all at once the lazy, halcyon days were over. The gardeners loaded vegetables into baskets. Servants began to strip the vines, and in the white dazzle of the big courtyard to the south of the house the men trod the grapes, singing and dancing.

  Si-Amun, Kamose and Seqenenra were seldom home. Day after day they strode the fields, watching the overseers direct the reapers. The sickles rose and fell. Of particular concern was the flax harvest, for much of the crop would go north to form fine linen for the King’s household, traded for the family’s needs, and the rest Isis and the other servants would weave for Aahotep and the girls. Barley was set aside for the season’s new beer. The harvest was plentiful, and master and peasant alike worked cheerfully.

  Towards the end of Mesore when Si-Amun, Kamose, Seqenenra and Uni were closeted together tallying the yield and trying to apportion the taxes and tribute that must go to Het-Uart, Aahmes-nefertari knocked and came towards the littered desk. Her pregnancy was now in its eighth month but being her first, her slim body was not much distorted. She was suffering more than usual from the heat and no longer spent so much time roving the grounds. Today she was barefoot but wore an ankle-length white sheath caught under her breasts by two thick linen straps that covered her nipples. The menat-amulet given to her by her mother was hanging from a leather cord around her neck. Her arms were bare of ornament but yellow ribbons trailed from her hair, sticking to the sweat on her shoulders, and as she approached she pushed back her wet tresses. Behind her, Raa, her childhood nurse and favoured companion, came padding, bearing a large starched fan.

  The men looked up from their work. Aahmes-nefertari sank gratefully onto the stool Seqenenra pushed forward. “Thank you, Father,” she said. “I am sorry to disturb you, but a royal skiff has just pushed off again from the water-steps. The herald could not stay to speak with you. He said he had urgent business with the Prince of Kush. He gave me a scroll for you. Tani is very disappointed!” Seqenenra laughed.

  “Tani is becoming spoiled. She imagines now that every craft plying the Nile is doing so for her benefit. I suppose the scroll is our tax assessment from Het-Uart. It will be heavy with the harvest so bountiful, and Men tells me that the cattle in the Delta have calved as never before. Well I suppose I must look at it.” Aahmes-nefertari produced the scroll and Seqenenra took it.

  “The Overseer of Lands has also come, with reports on the harvest from our nomes,” the girl went on. “Grandmother is giving him wine by the pool. She asks that you join them. The Tchaus Nome is complaining of a lessened yield due to rust on the grain.” Kamose smiled faintly.

  “The Tchaus Nome always complains about something,” he said.

  “Better a complaint than the silence that hides one,” his father answered, breaking the seal. “Aahmes-nefertari, please tell your grandmother we will join her shortly.” The girl rose and left, Raa behind her.

  Seqenenra unrolled the scroll. Si-Amun and Kamose waited expectantly. Then Seqenenra exclaimed softly, “No. No! This is not to be believed.” The hand holding the message dropped to the table. Kamose stepped up and touched his father’s shoulder. It was trembling.

  “May I read?” he asked tersely. Seqenenra nodded.

  “Read it aloud. I may have misinterpreted a portion of the script.” Kamose and Si-Amun exchanged a swift glance, then Kamose picked up the scroll. His eyes ran rapidly over it and he cleared his throat.

  “‘To my …’”

  “Not the salutation!” Seqenenra cut in harshly. “That hypocrite!” Uni started, then regained his composure beside the desk. Kamose continued.

  “Very well, Father. ‘For a time I slept peacefully in my palace, disturbed by no more than the night cries of birds, but soon once more the coughing of your hippopotamuses intruded on my dreams so that my voice is weak and my eyes are dim from lack of rest. The muzzles of your leather-workers have not prevented the beasts from tormenting their King. Therefore I have consulted with the priests of Set the Mighty, whose children the hippopotamuses are, to enquire of them why the god’s charges are still calling to me.’” Kamose paused, even his customary control almost deserting him. Seqenenra sat rigid, his mouth grim, looking down at his tightly clasped hands. Si-Amun’s patience was a motionless, tense thing. Taking a deep breath, Kamose went on. “‘The children of the god are angry because their lord’s homes are far from Weset. They are sad because there are no priests to do them homage. Therefore I, Awoserra Apepa, Beloved of Set, recommend to you, Seqenenra, that a southern home be built for my lord the god Sutekh so that he may be worshipped in Weset and his children may be appeased. When word of this intention becomes known in the nomes of the governor of Weset, the people will rejoice, and will flock to the site of the god’s home to build it, and will make tribute to the god’s servants who will tend it. If the governor of the south does not answer my message, let him no longer serve any other god besides Sutekh, but if he makes answer and he does what I tell him to do, I will take nothing whatsoever from him and I will bow myself down never again before any other god in the whole earth besides Amun, the King of the gods.’” Kamose put the scroll on the desk with exaggerated care and folded his arms.

  “I am surprised that he had the intelligence to string so many coherent words together all at once,” Seqenenra grated. “Filthy aati!” The anger that had sprung upon him with such familiarity and had so shocked him during the intense and now almost forgotten exchange with Teti burst into immediate life. Its sudden force balled in his stomach and he winced. Si-Amun started forward.

  “Father, you are speaking blasphemy,” he said, his face pale. “Think whom you are calling a fever and a pestilence! It is true that Set has no temple south of Khemennu. It is possible that the god is displeased. That he spoke to the King through his children and his priests.” Si-Amun’s sweat was soaking the band of his short black wig and trickling down his neck, and the stifling heat in the room seemed to intensify. “If he wants a home here in Weset, you must comply.” Seqenenra looked up at him slowly.

  “A son who says ‘must’ to his father is in danger of discipline,” he snapped, but he was calmer. “Of course, it is possible that the god spoke to his priests, but I do not think so. Kamose?” The young man began to pace.

  “I do not think so either, Father. Apepa is tightening the vise. A temple for Set here will mean royal representatives in Weset at all times. Our every move will be watched. For us and for the nomes it means large numbers of conscripted farmers for construction and an even heavier tribute to pay architects, stonemasons, engineers.” He reached the step that led down between the small lotus pillars to the garden beyond, turned, began a measured walk back. “If we agree to the King’s veiled command, our lives will change forever. We will lose whatever freedom we may have. If we refuse, we give him an excuse to charge us with disobedience both to a divine directive and disrespect to Set.” He smiled coldly. “I do not think that you can dictate an ingenious letter to deflect the King’s intention this time.”

  “I think you are right,” Seqenenra agreed woodenly. “I would need the complexity of Thoth’s mind to do so.” He swivelled on the chair. “Uni, you are my right hand in this house. You order my staff. What is your opinion?” Uni bowed.

  “Set is not only the god of foreigners,” he replied. “He is also the sovereign of deserts. Are we not children of the desert as much as of the fertile land, O Prince? A temple to Set here in Weset would be most appropriate.” He was obviously very uneasy, swallowing often between his words, his glance moving rapidly between Seqenenra’s a
ttentive face and Kamose’s damp back.

  “Could the nomes support the labour and expense?” Kamose asked, reaching the door and turning. “Apepa wants you to refuse, you know that, Father. He wants to ruin you.” The words fell flat and sinister in the thick afternoon air.

  “His insecurity is a dangerous thing,” Seqenenra said in a low voice. “I have served him faithfully and honestly but my devotion has counted for nothing beside his secret fear.” He got up clumsily, and leaning both hands on the desk, tried to smile reassuringly at Uni. “Do not be ashamed that you are troubled,” he said kindly. “You are loyal to this family but also to our King, and any word spoken against him goes to your heart. I could not do without you, Uni. I know that if you were in the King’s presence when something was said against us, you would be equally distressed. Forgive me.” Uni’s features cleared.

  “I obey the One and you,” he answered. “And now Lord, will you join your Overseer who is surely overstuffed with fruit and sloshing with your wine by now?” Seqenenra managed a laugh.