The Egyptian by Mika Waltari

Posted by admin_akashic on Mar 4th, 2022 in Stories

soft, heel-less slippers for I do not like heels on slippers for they leave bruises and bumps on my head. I mean to serve you as faithfully as I serve my master since for some strange reason my heart has become strongly attached to you, although you are thin and your breasts are small and I do not understand what my lord sees in you. But I hope these matters improve after you give birth to your first child. Also I intend to steal as conscientiously from you as from him, regarding your advantage rather than my own.” In saying this, he became so moved that he cried again and uttered loud lamentations. Minea stroked his back and touched his fat cheeks with her hand and consoled him until he grew more composed, whereupon I made him sweep up the fragments of the jar and drove him out of the room.

That night we lay as we had before, Minea and I, and she slept in my arms, her breath upon my neck and the caress of her hair at my cheek. But I did not possess her, for what was no joy to her was none to me either. I think however that holding her in my arms, my joy was sweeter and more profound than if she had been mine. Of this I cannot be sure, for I do not know what my joy would have been had I possessed her, but one thing I know: that night I felt charity toward all men, and there was not one evil thought left in my heart, and every man was my brother, every woman my mother and every girl my sister both in the Black Land and in the Red Lands under the same moonlit sky.

On the following day, Minea danced once more before the bulls, and my heart quaked for her, though she came to no harm. But a young man amongst her companions slipped from the forehead of his beast and fell to the ground, where the bull slit open his body and trampled him beneath its hoofs so that the spectators round the arena rose up and shrieked with fear and delight. When the bull had been driven off and the dancer’s body borne out to the stables, the women ran to look at him. They touched his bleeding limbs, their breath came quickly, and they said to each other, “What a sight!” But the men said, “It is long since we beheld such excellent contests as those of today.” They settled their wagers with one another without regret, weighing out gold and

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silver, and they drank wine together and made merry in their houses so that the lights shone in the city brightly until very late; and wives went astray from their husbands and forgot themselves into strange beds for the night, but no one frowned at this for it was their custom.

I lay alone on my mat, for that night Minea could not come to me any more, and early in the morning I hired a chair in the harbour and set forth to follow her to the god’s house. She was borne there in a golden carriage drawn by plumed horses, and her friends attended her in chairs or on foot with much noise and laughter, throwing flowers over her and halting by the wayside to drink wine. The way was long but all were well provisioned, and they broke off branches from olive trees and fanned each other and stampeded the peasants’ sheep and indulged in many other tricks. The house of god lay in a deserted place at the foot of a mountain near the seashore, and when the procession drew near, they lowered their voices and spoke in whispers, and the laughter ceased.

It is difficult to describe the god’s house, for it was like a low hill upon which grew grass and flowers, and it ran directly into the mountain. The entrance was barred by gates of copper high as a mountain, and before them was a small temple where dedication took place and where the watchmen of the god’s house were quartered. It was dusk when the procession arrived here, and Minea’s friends stepped from their chairs and threw themselves down on the grass and began eating and drinking and playing tricks on one another, having forgotten their recent solemnity when approaching the god’s house, for Cretans have short memories. As darkness fell, they lit torches and chased each other through the thickets until the cries of women and men’s laughter rang out in the darkness, but Minea sat alone in the temple where none might approach her.

I watched her as she sat in the temple. She was arrayed in gold like a divine image, and on her head she wore an immense gilded headdress, and she tried to smile at me from afar, but there was no joy in her smile. Yet when the moon rose, they took from her the gold and jewellery, dressed her in a thin robe and bound her hair in a silver net. Then the guards drew back the bolts of the copper gates and opened them. The gates opened with a deep, rumbling noise, and ten men were needed to move each gate, and beyond the gates all was yawning darkness, and

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