Desert God. Wilbur Smith

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СКАЧАТЬ I had selected two pieces of jewellery from the loot we collected from the Minoan officers whom we captured at Tamiat.

      ‘Is there something in there wrapped in red cloth?’ I asked and Bekatha squealed with excitement.

      ‘Yes, my best and most lovely Taita. Is it mine? Is the red one mine?’

      ‘Of course it is.’

      Her hands were shaking with excitement as she unwrapped the small parcel. As she held up the golden necklace her eyes filled with tears of delight. ‘It is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen!’ she whispered.

      Suspended from the chain were two golden figures. Although they were tiny they were complete in every exquisite detail. The largest was an image of a charging bull. Its head was lowered ready to butt with its viciously curved horns. Its eyes were tiny green stones that glittered angrily. Its humped shoulders epitomized brute strength and fury. It was attacking the other figure: the slender form of a beautiful girl. She seemed to dance just beyond the reach of those deadly horns. There was a garland of flowers around her head, and the nipples of her breasts were red rubies. Her head was thrown back as she laughed at the raging bull.

      ‘She is so quick that the bull will never catch her.’ Bekatha bounced the necklace between her hands to make the figures dance.

      ‘You are quite right, Bekatha. She is the charm against danger. While you wear it danger can never catch you. The bull dancer will keep you safe from all harm.’ I took the necklace from her hands and fastened the clasp behind her neck. She looked down at it and shook her shoulders to make the figurine dance against the lustrous skin of her boyish chest. She was lovely when she laughed.

      Tehuti had waited quietly for me to give her my attention, and I felt a little guilty as I turned to her. I don’t like to show favourites. ‘Your present is in the blue cloth, Your Royal Highness.’

      She unwrapped it carefully and gasped as the ring sparkled. ‘I have never seen anything shine so bright,’ Tehuti cried.

      ‘Place it on your middle finger,’ I told her.

      ‘It’s too big. It just slides around.’

      ‘That’s because it’s a very special stone. You must never show it to a man, except …’

      ‘Except what?’

      ‘Except if you want him to fall in love with you. Otherwise you must keep it concealed in the palm of your hand. Remember that the magic will only work once. So be very careful to whom you show the ring.’

      She wrapped her fingers tightly around it. ‘I don’t want any man to fall in love with me,’ she replied firmly.

      ‘Why not, my sweetling?’

      ‘Because if they do, then they try to put a baby inside you. When the baby is in, it does not want to come out again. I have heard the women in the harem scream, and I don’t want that.’

      ‘One day you may change your mind.’ I smiled. ‘But the stone has other qualities that make it special.’

      ‘Tell us. Why is it so special, Taita?’ Bekatha was not deterred by her sister’s silly scruples.

      ‘One reason is because it is the hardest thing in the entire world. Nothing can cut it, and nothing can scratch it, not even the sharpest bronze dagger. That’s why they call it diamond: “the Hard One”. Water cannot wet it. But it sticks to the skin of the woman who owns it like magic.’

      ‘I don’t believe you, Taita.’ Tehuti looked dubious. ‘It’s another of your made-up stories.’

      ‘You just wait and see if what I tell you is true. But remember …’ I wagged my finger at her sternly. ‘… don’t ever show it to a man unless you love him very much, and you want him to love you forever.’ I will never know why I told her that, except that the girls love my stories and I never like to disappoint them.

      I stood up from the tub and called for Rustie, my head slave, to bring a towel to dry me.

      ‘You are going away again, Taita,’ Tehuti accused me. She has a grown woman’s instincts. ‘You come back for just an hour, and then you are gone again. Perhaps this time it will be forever.’ She was close to tears.

      ‘No! No!’ I dropped the towel and embraced her. ‘That is not true. I am going only as far as your father’s empty tomb on the east bank.’

      ‘If you are telling the truth, then let us come with you,’ Bekatha suggested.

      ‘Oh, yes please! Let us come with you, dear Taita,’ Tehuti insisted.

      I paused to consider the suggestion, and I found that it appealed to me as much as it seemed to do to my girls.

      ‘There is just one problem with that idea.’ I feigned reluctance. ‘What we are going to do is a big secret and you will have to swear not to tell anyone else about what you see and what we do there.’

      ‘A secret!’ Bekatha cried and her eyes sparkled at the thought. ‘I swear, Taita. I swear by all the gods I shall never say a word to another living soul.’

      The three treasure ships were still moored alongside the wharf at the entrance to Pharaoh Mamose’s tomb when the princesses, Aton and I arrived there.

      Zaras and his men had worked well in my absence. Following my instructions they had rigged screens of reed matting around the tomb precincts to prevent us being overlooked from the surrounding hills. I was determined to work all night to get the triremes offloaded. However, Hyksos spies might creep in closer under cover of darkness, and of course we would have to work by torchlight. The screens would be vital in maintaining our secrecy.

      Using the experience I had garnered at Tamiat, I had worked out in detail how I should best proceed with the offloading. Now I supervised and instructed Dilbar and a gang of his men as they fashioned heavy pallets of dressed timber which they prised up from the deck of the first trireme. These were eight cubits square and would fit into the hatches of the holds. Then on the upper deck of each ship I rigged tripods and pulleys over the hatches. From these my men lowered the pallets into the hold, where other teams of workers packed the chests of bullion on to them.

      Then the chests were hoisted up to the deck in batches of twenty, swung outboard and lowered to the wharf.

      ‘What is in those chests, Taita?’ demanded Tehuti. I touched the side of my nose in a conspiratorial gesture.

      ‘That is the big secret. But very soon I will show you what it is. You will just have to be patient for a little longer.’

      ‘I never like having to be patient,’ Bekatha reminded me. ‘Even for a little longer.’

      A long line of men received the chests as they were unloaded from the pallets. The line stretched from the wharf through the entrance to the tomb, down four flights of stairs, and then along the painted and decorated tunnels, through the three vast antechambers until they reached the four treasuries. The treasuries were sited closely around Pharaoh’s burial chamber with its empty sarcophagus awaiting the embalmed corpse which never arrived. This vast complex had been hewn from the living rock, an endeavour which had taken me and two thousand labourers twenty years to accomplish, and of which I am still rightfully proud.

      ‘You СКАЧАТЬ