The Egyptian by Mika Waltari

Posted by admin_akashic on Mar 4th, 2022 in Stories

his tongue. Then we set him in the chair, binding his head to it and putting wedges in his mouth so that he could not close it. I held his hands and cheered him, the dentist audibly invoked all the gods of Babylon to aid him and, putting the forceps into the boy’s mouth, whipped out the tooth more deftly than I have ever seen it done. Despite the gags, the King yelled in a terrible manner, and the lion began roaring outside the door, hurling itself against it till it creaked and scratching at it with its claws.

It was a terrifying moment, for when we had unbound the King’s head and taken the wedges from his jaws, he spat blood into a dish, shrieking and yelling, with the tears pouring down his face. He roared that his bodyguard should put us all to death, and he called his lion and kicked over the holy fire and beat his physician with a stick, till I took it from him and bade him rinse his mouth. This he did whilst the physicians lay at his feet quaking from every limb, and the dentist thought that his last hour was nigh. But the King quieted down and drank some wine, though with a wry mouth, and asked me to divert him as I had promised.

We went into King’s great banqueting hall, for the room in which the tooth had been drawn was no longer pleasing to him — but he intended to close it forever and call it the Accursed Room. In the banqueting hall, I poured water into a vessel and let the King taste it, and I also let the doctors taste the water, so that they could all see it was ordinary water. Next I poured the water slowly into another vessel, and as the water ran into the other vessel, it was transmuted into blood so that the King and his physicians cried aloud in dismay and were greatly frightened.

Then I let Kaptah bring in a box with a crocodile in it, for all the toys sold in Babylon were made of clay and elaborate, but recalling the wooden crocodile I had played with when I was a child, I had had a skilled artisan make me a similar crocodile according to my instructions. He had made it from cedar wood and silver and painted and decorated it so that it resembled a living crocodile. Now I took it from the box and while pulling it after me along the floor it followed me with its legs moving and champing its upper jaw against the lower one like crocodiles do when they reach for their prey. I gave the crocodile to the King and he was greatly pleased, for there were no crocodiles in his rivers. Pulling the crocodile after him along the floor the King forgot the pain he had suffered and the physicians were looking at each other and smiled of joy.

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After this, the King rewarded his physicians richly and made the dentist a wealthy man and sent them away from him. But he bade me stay, and I taught him how to change water into blood, giving him some of the substance that must be mixed with the water to bring the miracle about. This skill is a simple matter as everyone familiar with it knows. But every great art is simple, and the King marvelled greatly and was full of my praises. And he was not content until he had summoned to the garden all the distinguished men of the court and also common people by the palace walls. In the sight of all he transmuted the water of the pool into blood so that both mighty and humble cried out in fear, prostrating themselves before him, to his very great satisfaction.

He had all but forgotten his tooth, and he said to me, “Sinuhe, the Egyptian! You have cured me of a great evil and delighted my liver in many ways. Therefore, you may ask of me what you will. Name the gift you desire, and I will give it you, whatever it may be, for I would rejoice your liver also.”

Then I said to him, “King Burnaburiash, lord of the four quarters of the world, as your physician I have held your head under my arm and grasped your hands when you uttered wrathful cries, and it is not fitting that I, a stranger, should preserve such a memory of the King of Babylon when I return to my own country to tell of what I have seen here. Impress me, therefore, with a glimpse of your might, and hang a beard upon your chin, gird a tail about you, and command your warriors to parade before your face that I may behold your majesty and power and prostrate myself humbly before you and wipe the dirt in front of you with my mouth. I ask no more than this.”

My request pleased him, for he said, “Truly no one has ever spoken as you do, Sinuhe. I will grant your request though for me it is most wearisome, for I must sit throughout a whole day on a golden throne till my eyes are tired and I am overcome with yawning. Nevertheless, it shall be as you wish.” He sent word to all provinces of the country summoning his forces and fixed a day when they had to parade before him.

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