The Egyptian by Mika Waltari

Posted by admin_akashic on Mar 4th, 2022 in Stories

handsome and ugly, and also men wore golden jewellery, and their collars were heavy from jewels and gold. There was much shouting and laughter; overturned wine jars and crushed flowers lay about the floor, and the Syrian musicians handled their instruments with such purpose that no conversation could be heard. It was evident that there had been a great deal of drinking, for one woman vomited. A servant handed her a bowl too late so that her dress was befouled and everyone laughed at her.

Kefta the Cretan embraced me, also, smearing salve all over my face as he did so and calling me his friend. But Nefernefernefer looked at me and said, “Sinuhe! I once knew a Sinuhe. He also was to be a physician.”

“I am that Sinuhe,” I said, looking her in the eye and trembling.

“No, you are not the same Sinuhe,” she said and made a gesture of denial. “The Sinuhe I knew was a young boy with eyes as clear as a gazelle’s. But you are a man with the ways of a man. There are two furrows between your eyebrows, and your face is not smooth like his.”

I showed her the ring with the green stone that I wore on my finger, but she shook her head, pretending to be puzzled, and said, “I must be entertaining a robber in my house, who has killed that Sinuhe who made my heart rejoice. Certainly you must have killed him and stolen the ring I once gave him in token of our friendship. His name also you have stolen, and the Sinuhe who pleased me no longer lives.” She raised her hands in the gesture of grief. Then I became bitter and sorrow entered my heart. I took the ring from my finger and handed it to her, saying, “Take back your ring then, and I will go and vex you no longer.” But she said, “Do not go!” And again, laying her hand lightly on my arm as she had done once before, she said softly, “Do not go!” While she did this I knew that her embrace would burn me worse than fire and that never again could I be happy without her. Servants poured out wine for us, and wine was never more delectable in my mouth than at that moment.

The woman who had been ill, rinsed her mouth and drank more wine. Then she drew off her soiled gown and threw it down and removed also her wig so that she was quite naked. She pressed her breasts together with her hands, telling the servants to pour wine between them, and she let any one drink from there who wanted. She reeled down the room laughing loudly. She was young, beautiful and reckless. Pausing before Horemheb, she offered him the wine between her breasts. Horemheb bent his head and drank, and when he raised it again, his face was dark, and he looked the woman in the eyes, seized her bare head in his hands and kissed her. Everyone laughed, and the woman laughed with them. Then becoming shy all at once, she demanded a fresh gown. Servants clad her, and she put on her wig again. She sat close to Horemheb and drank no more. The Syrian musicians played on, and I felt the fever of Thebes in my blood and knew that I was born to live in the sunset of the world and that nothing mattered any more as long as I might sit beside the sister of my heart and gaze at the greenness of her eyes and the redness of her lips.

Thus it was through Horemheb that I came to meet Nefernefernefer, my beloved once again, but it would have been better for me if I had never met her.

“Is this your house?” I asked her as she sat beside me, surveying me with her hard green eyes.

“This is my house,” she said. “also the guests are my guests, and I have guests every evening, for I do not care to be alone.”

“You must be very wealthy,” I said and depressed as I was afraid I was not worthy of her. But she laughed at me like I was a child, and said mischievously in the words of a fairy tale, “I am a priestess and not a contemptible woman. What do you want from me?” But I did not understand what she meant by that.

“And Metufer?” I asked, for I wished to know all, despite the pain it might cause me. She inspected me and her painted eyebrows frowned a little. “Did you not know that Metufer is dead? He died because he misused money Pharaoh had given his father for the building of a temple. Metufer died, and his father is no longer the royal master builder. Did you not know that?”

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