11    Thebes

At Last

AISHA STOOD IN THE SHADOW OF THE STONE GATES. She had walked a long time among the barley fields, hearing the stalks of grain whispering to her beneath the wind, as if warning her. She paid no heed to this; the valley seemed familiar and benign in the light of day. She wore the same khaki garments Howard had brought her, which made her feel more connected to this place. Today she was alone, Howard having left her early in the morning, taking Abdel Aal with him and crossing the river to the opposite bank. He had said that he might be gone all day, but that she could wander freely, without risk. She knew this—she saw the meekness in the eyes of the fellahin as they pulled up the noxious weeds, bending over stalks of barley and giving thanks for the ears of grain. She was one of them. They might have abused her body and broken her spirit, but still she was one of them. Her route brought her to the gate of Medinet Habu. Depicted on the front of the structure she saw the snake staring at her, and she hesitated a moment, then went on into the temple.

She was surrounded by walls of stone whose antiquity lent them a kind of dignity and solidity. Atop the walls she saw extensive platforms, which had been constructed for the soldiers who were positioned there to defend the city. She passed through a series of little rooms, to which sunlight penetrated through small apertures. The building resembled an old castle in which kings dwelt—perhaps the kings had used to come here seeking protection when their enemies swept the eastern shore. She entered a broad atrium, and suddenly the walls were full of brilliantly colored paintings: pictures of a great king—Howard had told her on his first visit here with her that this was Ramses II. He reclined lazily amidst his favorite concubines, who offered him flowers and perfumes and things to drink, and gazed rapturously at him, while he smiled in contentment. But contentment did not last long. As Aisha walked on she found that the drawings changed: the Pharaoh left his comfortable bed and mounted his war chariot. The concubines had vanished, and enemies had appeared before him, carrying swords and lances. All signs of felicity were gone from his face, replaced by a pitilessly cold expression.

The corridors and rows of columns intersected; she spied a statue of greenish basalt, and beside it another that had fallen to the ground: the same king, in a moment of intoxication, and the moment of his collapse. Aisha reached the interior courtyard. It was darker here, but the paintings were still vivid. At last the king appeared in the act of offering his sacrifices to the gods, his head bowed and his posture one of extreme humility. Was he giving thanks for a victory, or asking forgiveness for a defeat?

She heard a noise like the rustle of wings, and something that sounded like faint cries. She turned in alarm, but saw no one. The noises grew louder, and when she lifted her face and gazed upward she found that the ceiling was filled with bats, flitting about, colliding with the unyielding walls, and falling, broken-winged, like sightless ghosts. She drew back and tried to retrace her steps, but the bats descended and began to whirl around her. All at once the light failed; the place went startlingly dark, and she lost her way to the exit. She began to hurry—it seemed to her that she spied the shadows of other animals, animals that darted among the columns, as if the wolves, too, had awoken. She hastened her steps still more, and found that she was lost in a colonnaded maze, the bats still in pursuit. She stopped in consternation when she caught sight of someone at the end of the colonnades. He was seated beside a column, before him a built-up fire and a tin pot for making tea. He watched her approach with a penetrating stare, as if he had known that the bats would lead her to him.

He spoke in a voice made frightening by the silence of the temple. “Come forth, woman who has roused the creatures of the night!”

It was Abdel Rasul, the man she had seen on the day she first set foot upon the western shore: he wore the same clothing and the same turban, his large feet bare. She stopped where she was, rigid, afraid to move and cause the bats to attack her. The man did not get up, but spoke again. “These bats have not pursued you without cause,” he said. “They are the guardians of the temple, prohibiting all whom they perceive as a threat to this place from passing the gates or wandering the corridors.”

Shaking, she replied, “I am no threat. I came here before, and nothing happened . . .”

With unmistakable scorn, the man said, “You came with the foreigner—I know that. I also know that he brought you here after the gateways to the valley had been shut in his face—he wants you to open up its secrets to him.”

Aisha was frightened—this man knew a lot about her. “I haven’t told him anything,” she said. “Besides, I don’t know anything about this place to begin with.”

“It is not for nothing that the creatures of the night have awoken, woman. You stand now in the heart of the temple where the gods receive their sacrifices and reveal their secrets, and the wolves troubled you from the first moment you entered this valley until you arrived here.”

His voice resounded throughout the temple. He made no move from his place—he had no intention of hurting her, or so it seemed—but the knowledge that he had watched her every step so carefully made her fear him. Her throat dry, she said, “The wolves have always followed me—but that means nothing.”

“Our ancestors knew that wolves were capable of opening locked doors. Their luminous eyes can pierce the veils of darkness. Everyone in the valley knows that they are bringers of light. Anyone who reads the inscriptions on the temple walls knows that they watched over Horus when he was young. Perhaps you yourself were one of these creatures.”

He spoke in riddles—she couldn’t tell whether he was warning her or threatening her, but one thing for certain was that he could not have been more mistaken about her.

“Perhaps you have me confused with someone else,” she said. “I’d better go now.”

His voice rose in anger, startling her. “You shall see what you shall see,” he said, “and you know what you know, whatever you may say about it. What I fear is that you may pass along what you know to that pale-eyed foreigner. The valley is full of them, and if we give our secrets away to them they will pull the land out from under us and cast us into the river.”

Aisha shuddered. Somehow this man made her feel that she was guilty of something. He spoke more softly, and held out a glass of hot tea to her, but she shook her head. He took up his staff again and pointed at a block of stone. “Rest a little here on this stone,” he said. “I won’t hurt you. Have some tea if you like—only listen to me.”

She sat down facing him, but she dared not reach out and take the proffered tea. Now he spoke calmly. “Those foreigners,” he told her, “believe that they alone are able to read the inscriptions. But we also read them, and we understand their meaning better than those men do—because they are ours. But we don’t tell them that. We let them believe in our ignorance and lack of insight. I shall tell you a tale that is inscribed upon the wall of this temple. I don’t believe this foreigner you came with knows anything about it. When the war was waged between Horus and Set, god of darkness, Set managed to pluck out one of Horus’s eyes. It was a sacred eye, which saw what no human could see. To this day that eye is still lost. Many people have possessed it for a moment in time, and assumed the power to pierce through the veils, but they lost it for not understanding how to wield it properly.”

Aisha, unwilling to believe such fables, said, “I have nothing to do with any of this.”

“Who knows?” he replied. “All I wish to tell you is that you must be careful of this stranger—otherwise, you will be punished. That is all I have to say. And now you may go.”

She got up and turned away from him, amazed, despite his assurances, that he had not harmed her. It was odd that she found her way now easily, and that the bats no longer followed her. The air outside was still warm, the foliage brilliant in its greenness, the river pure blue, and she had woken at last from a murky nightmare. She hastened her steps until she reached the house and shut all the doors and windows behind her. She sat upon her bed and pulled the mosquito netting around herself, as if to conceal herself from the penetrating eyes of the old man—indeed, from the eyes of all who spied upon her.

The days of waiting and of madness will not end! That old man, Lord Carnarvon, has left his chilly lair in the north and is coming to Luxor, requesting a meeting with me in all haste. Up to this point, our relations have been excellent. I haven’t forgotten that he rescued me from that time of wandering and aimlessness, nor do I think he has forgotten that I added to his collection of artifacts pieces that were rare beyond what any museum dreams of owning. But the years are passing by, while my desperate search continues unabated. Ever since I discovered that empty tomb, I have labored in the valley like one possessed, a team of diggers behind me, baffled, not knowing what it is exactly that I want—I myself haven’t known. All the rocks and caves and empty trenches mocked me. I’ve had to calm down a little in order to meet Lord Carnarvon, who has come expressly for me.

We disembarked from the felucca on the eastern shore, Abdel Aal and I, and the new donkey I bought at the village market—he wasn’t a good one: he was dirt-stained and, try as we might to wash him, there was no restoring him to his original color. But he was what was available. It was an inauspicious thing to take him across the river, but I needed a conveyance for the sack in which we carry our provisions. The luxurious dahabeahs moored along the shore had multiplied, along with the variety of flags flown over them: English, Americans, French—even the Germans, defeated and bankrupted though they were in the last war, had a small dahabeah. Naturally, Davis’s dahabeah was in its place—perhaps he was even now lying at ease, his gray-haired chest bare beneath the winter sun, while I hurried off to the hellish scene that awaited me in the Winter Palace.

I left Abdel Aal and the donkey. The hotel’s terrace—whose design was modeled after English gardens—was full of activity, rosy-faced people sitting companionably drinking lemonade and cold beer and contemplating the white sails plying the river. They exchanged chitchat and showed off the fake artifacts they’d just bought. All of them appeared to be strangers—it was as if they wore skillfully crafted masks. Lord Carnarvon was not among them—perhaps he had swallowed a handful of his various medications and way lying in bed, gazing toward the sun from behind the blinds and imagining his cells warming up.

I crossed the crowded reception area, exchanging a few words of greeting with the hotel employees, and studied the pharaonic art that filled the walls, reaching all the way to the ceiling. Some of the frescoes were based upon my own paintings, but they’d been crudely executed. I climbed the stairs leading to the wing Carnarvon occupied, pausing briefly to catch my breath. I knocked at the door, which was opened by Lady Evelyn. A few months before, I had thought her the most beautiful woman alive—all I needed was one touch of her fingertips. But now she looked like an animate wax effigy, her movements calculated, her steps constrained. She gave me a half-handshake and the ghost of a smile, and offered me a martini garnished with a cherry—I had not known that she began drinking so early. Then, abruptly, she left me alone.

After a while I heard Lord Carnarvon coughing as he approached, wearing a dressing gown of English wool. He was looking pale. Permitting me to take his elbow and lead him to a chair, he sat down across from me and fixed his eyes on me, waiting for me to begin talking, stating my modest achievements until he should shake his head, vaguely derisive. I did not speak. He stared at me with weary eyes, then said suddenly, “I hear you discovered a tomb that was entirely empty.”

I hadn’t expected the conversation to begin this way, with a mocking, faintly pitying inquiry. The news had spread quickly, but such was always the case: diggers would pass the news along to smugglers, and from there it would travel to the buyers and other traders, until it reached the occupants of the dahabeahs, and the old gentleman himself, who would receive it along with his morning coffee.

“Not quite. Rather . . .”

He didn’t permit me to finish. Obviously bored, he said, “Perhaps others had got there before you. This valley is no longer of any use—every stone in it has been turned over by at least two or three people.”

He took a draft from a glass of water that sat beside him. I left my own glass untouched.

“There have been some disappointments, perhaps,” I said, “but this tomb has filled a gap in the historical record. I found there a broken tablet upon which the name of the king who succeeded Akhenaten is mentioned. It is surely a reference to Tutankhamun. No one had discovered this tomb, nor had anyone robbed it.”

He lifted his hand to silence me. He looked unconvinced by all I had said. I observed that his long fingers had grown skinny and wrinkled, so that they looked rather like bird claws. “That will do, sir,” he said. “It is time we concluded this business—we can’t keep dreaming forever.”

In despair, stricken all at once with defeat by his words, I replied, “We can keep digging a while longer. I’ll reduce the workers’ expenses—reduce my own wages if you wish.”

The old man shook his head stubbornly. He was more displeased than I had imagined. “The problem is not the expenses,” he said. “I know that prices went up after that dreadful war, so that a single day now costs us a full five pounds. The real difficulty, however, is that the years are passing by, and death hovers by my bedside. I have become convinced that I shall not live to see this discovery. Let us have done with this whole affair, Howard.”

“But,” I said hoarsely, “you did promise me a few more months—you promised that we might carry on with the work until the end of the season.”

“And can you guarantee me that death will wait?”

It enraged me that he was taking this self-pitying line of argument, this false surrender, this trumped-up expectation of personal annihilation. The bitter war years had passed him by and he had lived through them, even as millions in their prime had perished. I tossed him the latest document, in the hope that it might stir his interest. “In this tomb, which everyone thinks was empty, I discovered a number of intriguing things.”

Once more he lifted his claw-like fingers and said in that same all too familiar tone of British world-weariness, “No more of these endless documents. You have one month from today to wrap up this whole operation.”

As he got to his feet, I protested, “I just need a bit of time.”

He did not reply, but only held me in his dull-eyed gaze. I could hear nothing but the sound of his breathing. “In that case,” I said defiantly, “I shall continue the work at my own expense.”

“For how long? A month? Two? A year? Believe me, Howard—it’s all used up, this valley.”

Where had I heard this sort of talk before? Who had been repeating it in the old man’s ear until he believed it? Lady Evelyn appeared at the door of the room and stared at me in cold silence, accusing me in her own way of being about to drain off the last dregs of her father’s strength. Why did she maintain such a cold demeanor toward me when for all these years she had not even noticed me? I had no alternative but to rise, nod my head at the two of them, and take my leave, without even having touched my drink—not that I’d been about to drink anything in any case. I descended the stairs, breathing hard, feeling that no one gave a damn about me. I sat on the terrace, thinking. Would there be any point in going back to him one more time, to make him see how great was the loss he was setting us both up for? Would it do any good to beg him? I was certain that I was very near to my discovery, so certain that I was not going to plead with anyone—I would keep digging at my own expense. I would not go back to those vagabond days again.

The felucca took us, casualties of a lost battle, back to the western shore. The donkey was the only happy one among us, for he had eaten a satisfying meal of fresh clover. Abdel Aal was miserable, for I had refused to purchase many of the things we needed—tea and sugar in particular—the very stuff of life, as far as he was concerned. I was wretched, and the tedious minutiae of shopping would have made me feel still worse. On the other side of the river I saw Abdel Rasul making his way along, leaning upon his staff and leaving the prints of his bare feet upon the sand. He didn’t turn in my direction, but I knew he saw me. He was watching for the moment when I would leave the valley. I walked beside the skinny donkey—perhaps walking would help me to relax. I saw the holes I had dug, the rocks I had turned over, and the valley that continued to withhold its secrets from me. They knew more of such secrets than I did—I might go on slaving over my excavations for years on end, while they would discover all the hidden sites with devastating ease. They could read the symbols and decipher the coded mysteries by some means we had not yet achieved. How could I possibly keep pace with them and evade Abdel Rasul’s control over this valley?

Aisha stood waiting for him on the balcony, looking pale. This was the last refuge for both of them alike. As Abdel Aal led the donkey to the annex at the back of the house, she found herself hurrying toward Howard. She embraced him and gave him a sisterly kiss, sprung from an access of fearfulness and need. Then she drew back quickly. Howard took off his hat and threw himself wearily into a chair. She sat before him on the floor and fixed her honey-colored eyes upon him. Her long lashes fluttered like a butterfly’s wings, and as he looked into her eyes he found that he felt quite passionate toward her—there was no one else left for him in all the wide world.

“What is it?” she said. “You look so sad.”

Feeling sorry for himself as he did, he was unable to conceal the furious anger he harbored. “It’s all over,” he said. “That old man, Lord Carnarvon, has given me only one month’s reprieve. After that, there will be no more funding.”

She drew a sharp breath, dismayed. “And what is to become of us?” she asked.

They knew their destinies were interdependent, and that the end of his work in the valley would mean the end of their relationship, the end of his connection to this strange country. In an effort to reassure her, he said, “I won’t give up, Aisha. I’ll keep digging at my own expense . . . I’ll find some other funding, I’ll . . .”

He didn’t know how he would accomplish any of this, but he sensed that she badly needed to hear these words and the false comfort they offered. He could have wept. Aisha got up from the floor and sat beside him. She cradled his face between her hands and wiped away a tear that had escaped his eye. They stayed like that, sitting close together, hands clasped.

This, in truth, was the first of the days of madness. Howard barely slept at night, waking at the first light of dawn and leading his group of diggers, with a load of baskets and waterskins, aimlessly over the rocky, hilly, debris-strewn terrain, penetrating the uncharted reaches of Dar Abu al-Naja, which had taken on a brittle, corrugated appearance. No sooner would they begin to dig than he would change his mind, dashing about over rocks and trenches, only to repeat the same routine at another site. He no longer attached any importance to completing diagrams of the trenches he had made, nor did he distinguish among any of the places where he had already dug. Where he saw a spot still untouched by the mattock, he shouted at the workers. They could not understand him, and did not carry out his instructions. They always went on digging in the wrong place, producing nothing for him but more lifeless rocks, when what he wanted was stones that spoke in glyphs, revealing their secrets. The workers stared stupidly at him, not knowing which of his contradictory orders to obey.

The search had become a nightmare that pursued him waking and sleeping. He scarcely touched any food, and for long hours, day and night, left Aisha not knowing where he had gone, always returning weary, listless, and begrimed with black dust. And all the while, Abdel Rasul traversed the valley, appearing before her leaning on his staff, a constant warning of she knew not what. She craved Howard’s help, but she had no idea how to get it, for she knew that if matters went on in this way he would collapse. He grew thinner and thinner, his moustache was bedraggled, and he no longer troubled to wash away the dirt that covered him. She wished then that this ghastly month would come to an end, and they could go away from here—perhaps they could have a new start in some other place.

One morning she awoke to find him already up. He was a new person, the aura of lunacy suddenly gone. He was calm, clean-shaven, washed, and animated. From the way he was dressed, it appeared that he did not intend to pursue the digging on this day. “We’ll go together to Luxor today,” was all he told her.

She didn’t know what to say. He gazed at her, making her understand how badly he needed her presence. She was afraid to face the ever-watchful eyes always fixed upon the eastern shore, but now he began urging her to put on those peculiar garments he’d had her wear before, and go out with him, her face uncovered. In some way or other, he wanted to acknowledge her publicly, wanted everyone to see her at his side. And she could not deny her pleasure at his having regained his ease and composure, or his taking her out in public, unveiled.

Abdel Aal was waiting for them with the odd-colored donkey. Aisha rode, and Howard walked beside her. At the riverside, a felucca came and collected all the passengers. Abdel Aal was carrying a sack carefully over his shoulder. Aisha observed that it was partially filled, and Howard looked insouciantly happy. She didn’t know precisely what he had in mind, but she noted the conspiratorial glances that passed between him and Abdel Aal. As soon as the boat reached the eastern shore, he asked Abdel Aal to take the donkey and go far from the curious eyes of the onlookers inside the hotel, and to settle the animal down with a large helping of clover. He led Aisha to the Winter Palace’s terrace, which was crowded with the morning’s customers. She looked fearfully about her, irresolute. The men were dressed with impeccable elegance, while the women were all in white and protected from the sun by wide-brimmed hats. A waiter set cold drinks before Howard and Aisha, and Howard asked him to bring all the available newspapers, English and Egyptian. The waiter placed a pile of them on the table.

“Wait for me here,” Howard said to Aisha. “I shan’t be gone long. You can amuse yourself by leafing through the papers and watching these fools—I shall return directly.”

He left her then and went out to the street. She watched him until he vanished from sight. She was ill at ease, looking anxiously at the waiters in expectation of being asked to leave, since Howard had departed. She dared not even browse through the pile of newspapers, although no one approached her.

I left Aisha and went to the road that extended along the riverbank, where Abdel Aal was still waiting for me beside the donkey, which was absorbed in its meal of clover. I gave him all my instructions, pointing out to him the dahabeah with the American flag raised above it. He was to take the sack with him, pretending to be a vegetable seller, and board the dahabeah. There he was to wait for me without speaking to anyone. After he’d gone, I stood rooted in place, peering all along the street, in case I should catch sight of any of Weigall’s men—I knew them all, for they had previously been my own men. Once I had made certain that the coast was clear, I set off myself. The Nubian servant lowered his head before me as he informed me that Mr. Davis was still asleep. No doubt he had staged one of his boisterous parties, which never ended before dawn, and had drunk a lot of bad American whiskey. I enjoined the servant in no uncertain terms to rouse his master, for I hadn’t time to wait. I took the sack from Abdel Aal and told him to return to the donkey.

It was some time before Davis appeared, rubbing his eyes, reeking of wine and cigarettes. He was surprised to see me at such an early hour, puzzled at my tense and rigid aspect. He gestured for me to sit down facing him, ordered the servant to bring cold beer, and bade me make myself comfortable until he had a chance to come more fully awake.

I spoke at once. “I’ve come to sell you something,” I said directly.

He raised his eyebrows quizzically. “Don’t tell me you’ve found something in that empty tomb,” he murmured.

“It was inevitable that I would find something—I can’t bear all the ridicule I’ve been getting from everyone on this subject.”

I didn’t mention that I had not been content to accept my initial defeat. I had been determined to go on my own to examine anew the empty tomb, feverishly intent upon challenging both my own disposition and the luck that had forsaken me. Davis sensed that I was onto something, that the earnestness I evinced was not without substance, and that it behooved him to refrain from further sarcasm. Suddenly amiable, he held out a bottle of beer and offered it to me. I declined, although I could have used it. I knew what a wealthy man Davis was—perhaps the very wealthiest of men—but he was aware that, despite the ill luck that had clung to me, I was always one step ahead of him.

“And what,” he said, “have you brought me now?”

“Are you sure you wish to make a purchase?” I asked him.

“I’ll buy anything you care to sell me,” he replied.

I emptied out the contents of the sack and spread them before him. I had to shake off the sand that still clung to them, but for all that the gold sandal had not lost its luster; there was a green cosmetics pot that still held the remains of fine powdered kohl; a scarab of bluish quartz that, although scratched and cracked, was nevertheless whole and magnificent; and a shining amber necklace missing only two of its beads. I saw the amazement plainly in Davis’s eyes—he would not have imagined that I could have happened upon this treasure and kept silent about it, without anyone’s finding out.

“What is all this?” he said. “In which tomb did you come across these objects?”

Confidently and without hesitation, I replied, “They belonged to an Asiatic wife of Ramses II.”

He didn’t bat an eye. He just kept staring, openmouthed, unable to contradict me. Then he asked uncertainly, “Have you told Lord Carnarvon about this?”

“It’s nothing to do with him. All you need to know is that I discovered these things in an area outside his jurisdiction, and by rights they are mine alone.”

In this I was sincere. I had put my life on the line for the sake of these objects, returning on my own to the empty tomb several times. I had thrust my hand into every crack, risking snakebite and the scorpion’s sting, and sat for long hours heedless of the wolves. What else could a desperate man such as I do? And at last I had happened upon this cache—it was in one of the deeper cracks, bundled in linen wrappings—maybe some priest, or perhaps thieves, had shoved it in there and forgotten where it was.

“Naturally, I shall take these things,” said Davis, “but you do understand . . . I’ll have to contact the Metropolitan Museum.”

“I’ll wait while you place the call.”

I knew that all means of overseas communication were available on this dahabeah. I wrote down my asking price. It wouldn’t take long, and it was not in his interest to delay matters. He left the room. I gave him the opportunity to look over the pieces and make certain they were genuine; the most important thing was that he would not be able to come up with anything corresponding to a tale of Asiatic wives. After this it was necessary that I get back to Aisha: she was the talisman bearing the luck I had at last encountered.

Howard came back, dashed up the stairs and made his way among the tables, then sat down across from her. He was in a good mood, although sadness lingered in his eyes. “I’ve made a little bargain,” he said, “and now I can carry on digging for a while.”

The waiter brought breakfast—white cheese, toast, butter, and eggs, with plenty of fruit juices and milk. Howard pushed aside the bundle of newspapers. “Tomorrow,” he said, “there will be talk of me in all of these papers.”

Aisha smiled at him. She was growing accustomed to her surroundings. As they ate, the dining area filled up with people. A number of them clapped Howard on the shoulder and congratulated him. An elderly rebaba player sat on the steps outside and began to sing a dreadful song about a brother who killed his sister for the sake of honor—the waiter hurried over and drove him off, but he kept coming back. A cool breeze wafted in off the river, and Howard took a deep breath, expanding his chest as if he wanted to contain the breeze inside it.

“Why are you so attached to this place?” Aisha asked him, puzzled. “I long to get away from it.”

“I feel,” Howard replied, “as if my arteries had filled up with this country’s sand. When I go to Swaffham, and the fog there surrounds me, the air is so saturated with the smell of rain that it nearly strangles me. The only way for me to go on with life is to stay here.”

An elderly man and a pale-faced woman passed by their table. The man stopped, overcome with astonishment, but the woman shot them a venomous look and proceeded on her way. Howard rose and extended his hand to the old man, unhurriedly and with no show of eagerness, as if he had been expecting this moment.

“Good morning, my lord,” he said. “Lovely to see you enjoying this warm weather.”

Aisha observed that the woman, who had stopped a short distance away, was still glowering hatefully at them. The “lord” gestured toward Aisha and said, “Lovely to see you enjoying yourself as well, Howard. Won’t you introduce me to your pretty friend?”

“She is a pharaonic princess,” said Howard. “I discovered her on the western shore.”

The man laughed, then said succinctly, “Then all these years haven’t been in vain. This is perhaps the most splendid of your discoveries.”

With that he nodded and went on to join the angry-looking lady. Aisha needed no explanation—she knew that these were Lord Carnarvon and his daughter. A bitter taste rose in her throat. “Was it so that those two would see me with you that you brought me here?” she asked.

“Of course,” Howard replied bluntly. “I wanted to show them that I have a stake in this place I won’t easily forgo.”

She looked at him in consternation. Had he really brought her here to defend his presence in the country, or had it been to provoke the jealousy of that pallid woman? “His daughter . . .” she said. “Were you hoping to make her jealous?”

“I doubt she sees anything but her own face in the mirror, anyhow.”

Aisha realized that it was she who felt jealous, and the feeling had spilled over, trespassing on the neutral zone she had set up in self-defense, which she had forbidden herself to approach.

“Well,” she said, “you succeeded conveying your message to them: you’re not alone.”

They walked together through the city, conversing with the Saïdis they met in the streets. They drank fruit juices—sugarcane and pomegranate. He bought her a red velvet shawl, and she put it over her shoulders, fingering its soft fringe. Howard saw her face, how it had bloomed, and insisted upon buying her a gold necklace that looked exactly like the one worn by Hatshepsut. He placed it around her neck, and she laughed, feeling actually happy. No one had ever indulged her this way, and she felt like a true queen. They sat in a little restaurant, where they ate hot kebabs and lentil soup made with marrowbones and sipped strong tea. They walked between two rows of statues depicting rams, until they entered the maze of columns at the Temple of Karnak. They proceeded among the columns, which towered loftily above them, numbering 122 in all, then on through the rest of the temple—the altars, the Holy of Holies. He read the inscriptions to her and interpreted the kings’ cartouches. She had begun to learn from him how to read the vocabulary of this strange language. They sat by the edge of the sacred lake. On the other side of the river, the façade of the Temple of Deir al-Bahri could be seen, surrounded by an aura that made him melancholy. With a hand on her shoulder, he drew her a little closer. She shivered, but gave herself over to his touch. She felt possessed by a rare moment of heart’s ease, of freedom from fear. Her spirit, long since broken, craved healing. She wanted to unburden herself of all the weary secrets she harbored.

In a tremulous voice, she talked to him, revealing for the first time all the sufferings she had endured for so long, omitting no hidden detail. She remembered the night on which she had told Mukhtar the beginning of the tale, how he had kissed her eyes and clasped her to him. But that had been an innocent time, when she had not felt such bodily shame. She drew back her sleeve and showed him the mark of the cross. She explained that her mother had tried to ensure that she would elude the trap set by her uncle, but she had fallen into it anyway—had her own volition taken any part in this? It was mortifying to admit the desires that dwelt deep within. But her uncle had raped her and broken her spirit, robbed her of her original body and left her the one Howard now saw before him. Her cells had quickened in spite of her, carrying the residue of that violation. She felt utterly defiled, and this in the end had led her to the house in the red-light district.

Howard held onto her hand, as she wept and trembled. He felt himself the unluckiest person in the world, and yet here was this pharaonic princess, who had emerged from her painting to tell him her horrifying tale. He drew her into his arms, stroked her back, and said, “We all pay a price, one way or another. This has been a cruel passage for us both.”

She walked by his side, leaning against him, the earth still soft and the horizon pale. She wiped away her tears, to hide them from Abdel Aal, who was waiting for them by the riverbank, the donkey beside him. As the felucca bore them upon the surface of the river, a rough song could be heard coming from one of the fishing boats—a lone fisherman seemed to be serenading Aisha and Howard. The opposite bank loomed nearer, desolate and familiar. She leapt ashore, and the silence enveloped her from every side. She declined to ride the skinny donkey, but walked with Howard along a sandy path, Abdel Aal following behind them at some distance, and with him the donkey. She saw the fellahin coming from their fields, together with their livestock, ghost-like, engulfed by a haze of dust stirred up by their feet, heading for al-Qurna. Then the valley was empty, and the clouds changed from purple to gray.

Howard began to speak, pointing out the rocks and the deep trenches amidst the undulations of the hills: stories and anecdotes about each spot—she had already heard them, but he talked on cheerfully. His voice lost its gaiety, however, as they approached Dar Abu al-Naja, the area on which he had expended so much effort, searching and delving, all to no avail. The rocks were grim and sharp-edged, as if they had emerged only reluctantly from the earth, the holes so deep that it seemed they must penetrate to the other side of the world. And all of it in vain.

With a shudder he exclaimed, “I have dug here . . . and here . . . and here . . . until there was no place left to dig but under my own skin!”

She reached out and brushed his face, hoping to soothe him as he had done for her. They were about to lose the last place left to them under the sun. The brief day’s happiness dissipated; a great heap of rocks was blocking their way, and there was nothing for it but to go around it and make their way to the house. In amazement, Aisha pointed to the rocks and asked, “Was it you who made this pile?”

“I and everyone who came before me—all those who tried to dig, and came up empty-handed.”

“Why did you not move it aside and dig beneath it?”

“I could not—it was beyond my capacity.” He gestured toward a place obscured by shadows. “Here is the entrance to the tomb of Ramses II, which is visited daily by dozens of people. If I were to begin dropping rocks upon them, Weigall’s men would whet their talons and drive me from the valley.”

“You should have driven them out first.”

“It is a small, worthless triangle of ground, particularly as it lies close to a tomb that has in fact already been explored.”

The words were hardly out of his mouth when Aisha startled him by setting off, up the pile of rocks. Darkness had fallen upon them, and she wanted to look at the lights on the other side of the river. Before he knew it, Howard found himself following her. Abdel Aal sighed in exasperation, having no choice but to sit down and wait beside the donkey. Aisha kept climbing until she reached a level expanse composed of dust, pebbles, and little rocks, which covered the roof of the ancient tomb. The lights could be seen reflecting off the surface of the river: a tiny glimmer of hope amid the gathering darkness. Stepping up beside her, Howard put his arm about her waist, and they stood together as the evening chill descended.

She slipped the velvet shawl off her shoulders and laid it upon the ground, and they sat down side by side. It looked like a clear night, now that the clouds had dispersed. The sky seemed more rich with stars than she had ever seen it.

“I was hoping,” he whispered, “for a discovery that would ensure we could root ourselves here together . . . but I promise you, I won’t part from you wherever we are.”

“Lord Carnarvon’s reprieve is not up yet,” she said, smiling. “And no one can tell what this land may hold in store for you.”

Everything receded into the distance, leaving behind only the quiet of this moment. Painful memories, too, grew less acute, the sense of shame at having been raped. The night breathed upon them, combining heat from the sand and cold from the river. He reached out to cup her face in his palms, and she shivered, but tried not to pull away. His lips gently brushed hers, and there was no alarm or repugnance, but a warmth that pervaded her. His moustache was bristly against her nose; all fear had dissipated, replaced by a hungry passion. She could feel the pebbles pressing against her back through the fabric of the shawl, and it was painful at first, but the pain melted away when she felt herself enclosed within his embrace. His fingers found their way beneath her clothing, and she thought to herself, amazed, “My God—my body does not refuse him.” She wound her arms about his neck and drew his head down until she could feel the heat of his breath between her breasts. Warm through and through, she turned her head and sought his lips, pressing her own between them. She could feel the night breeze slip between her legs, and now she tried to restrain him, to prevent him from reaching the center of pain in her body, but to her astonishment there was no pain. She felt herself grow light as he moved rhythmically within her, and with an effort to fix her position on the ground she sank her nails into his back, holding back her cries, lest the wind carry them to the foot of the hill. Behind the horn of the mountain she spied a hesitant yellow moon looking down upon them. She had no need of it—a light had been born within her, as if the stars had found their way into her, driven out the darkness, and extinguished her thirst.

From the base of the hill came Abdel Aal’s voice, shouting, “Hey, Englishman! Wolves!”

Aisha started and extricated herself from his body’s warmth, gathering her clothing together and wrapping it around herself. They heard no howling, but the scrawny donkey had begun to bray in alarm. Once more Abdel Aal shouted, in mounting terror.

“They’ve caught our scent—it’s too dangerous to stay here!”

Howard gave her his hand and helped her to her feet, but her knees were too weak to support her. Breathlessly, they made their way down the hill. The moon spread its light across the sand to the edge of the river, but Abdel Aal pointed toward the dense shadows at the temple gates. “There they are,” he said, “keeping watch. They could attack us at any moment.”

Aisha felt the warmth drain from her limbs. “They are behaving strangely,” said Howard. “They are not howling or making any movement—there is something out of the ordinary here.”

“Be that as it may,” said Abdel Aal, “they could set upon us at any time.” He began to loosen the large cloth that was wrapped around his head, a long, odd-looking piece of fabric. From his pocket he drew a box of matches with which he began trying to set the edge of the cloth alight. His attempts were unsuccessful at first, but he went on striking matches until a flame ignited the hem of the fabric.

Abdel Aal took the lead, waving the cloth in a circular motion, while the burning edge of the cloth began to blaze, and to scatter bits of itself, still alight, like luminous butterflies. “Follow me,” he cried, and they followed, clinging to each other. Still Abdel Aal waved the cloth in circles. “It is in case of situations like this one,” he told them, “that we wear these enormous turbans.” From afar, the wolves’ eyes glowed brightly, piercing the veils of darkness, guarding the gates of the dead.

Howard and Aisha found it unbelievable that they had reached the house before the turban was entirely consumed. Abdel Aal refrained from looking them in the eye. He merely tossed what was left of the fabric onto the ground and quickly led the donkey toward the annex, without pausing to hear a word of thanks. The wolves took up a frenzied howling, which went on all through the night, until morning.

I awoke early. I heard the voice of the muezzin coming from the direction of the temple. There was a cold wind, and the river birds circled ceaselessly, seeking their livelihood. Aisha was asleep, the door to her room locked. It did not suit her that I should share her bed this night, despite all that had happened between us. She preferred to be alone, even though she was shivering, and the howling of the wolves would not let up. I saw Abdel Aal standing upright, facing the direction of the sunrise as he prayed upon the dew-moistened sand. The light was spreading slowly from behind the horn of the mountain—everything came from this direction, so why could my dream not be fulfilled in this place?

I waited until Abdel Aal had finished praying—I could tell he was done when he turned his face first right, then left. I approached him and said, “Go and gather the men. We shall start our work early today.”

“We haven’t had breakfast yet,” he replied in his gruff fashion, so familiar to me.

“There isn’t time,” I told him. “Go, before they leave for the fields, or cross to the other side of the river.”

I stood there until I saw him take the donkey out of its pen, straddle the beast, and head toward the village. I didn’t wait—I went on ahead of the rest and proceeded to the site where the rock pile was. It didn’t seem as grim as I had always been accustomed to finding it. It was taking on colors, absorbing all the tones of the light, as if new life were seeping into it. At that moment I realized that I had not waited in vain, that this king who had eluded me for so long was about to reveal himself. I climbed the rocks, as I had done the day before when following Aisha. The red shawl was still spread out upon the gravel. I picked it up in both hands and buried my nose in it—it bore her scent, and that of the lovemaking we had experienced together: a clear and unmistakable sign to me that I should begin in this spot.

When I descended once more, the men had gathered at the bottom of the rocky slope, and were looking curiously at me. It was strange that we should gather in this place we had so long avoided. It was a massive heap of rocks, and it would be difficult to get through it, but it was our last chance.

“We shall remove this pile and dig beneath it,” I said. They regarded me. I saw their eyes gleaming, their faces upon which the skin always appeared to be stretched taut, with no flesh to spare. They were accustomed to obeying orders, no matter how bizarre they might seem, knowing that our ways were often tortuous, even as the earth yielded up its riches to them as easily as if the treasures themselves had called out to them. They exchanged uncertain glances—it was a hard task—the rocks were heavy, their edges cuttingly sharp; their shoulders would crumple, their backs break.

“What is the matter with you?” I shouted at them. “Why are you just standing there?”

Al-Raïs Gregor stepped forward. Not daring to look me in the eye, he said, “We want a daily wage of five piasters for each of the men, and two for each of the boys.”

“That is too much!” I exclaimed, surprised and incredulous. The war had driven prices up, to be sure, but not to this extent. “You are trying to take advantage of my position.”

“Look at what you are asking of us, Englishman. These rocks will be the ruin of us. They’ve lain here so long they’ve fused together. It will be difficult, if not impossible, to dislodge them.”

He was right. But I didn’t want to look like a soft touch, especially since I didn’t know how many days the operation would take. “I’ll pay four piasters,” I said.

He turned to his men, who looked stonily back at him. Clearly they had entrusted him with speaking for them, and were reluctant to interfere.

“That is too little, Englishman,” he said. “This could be the last work we ever do, and only a fool would risk his life for nothing!”

He backed up until he stood with the men, as if he drew from them the strength to confront me. I was speechless with amazement at the stance they were taking. All these years I had counted upon the familiar bond I shared with them, but it seemed I had been mistaken—or perhaps I was closer to my goal than I knew, and all that stood between me and this king I sought was a few piasters. I could see the gleam in their eyes as they watched me—they were afraid, too, that I might refuse. In a matter of just a few minutes we had reached the point of no return. The men picked up their pickaxes, and the youngest among them took up the baskets, while the youths took the waterskins; I carried only my desperate dream, and an unexpected moment of love. I had to find a way to save face.

“Very well,” I said. “Five piasters it is, then, but we’ll work without stopping until the call to evening prayer.”

They breathed a sigh of relief, the crisis averted, and began to distribute themselves about the site according to their manner, so well-known to me—a method deeply ingrained in them, which they followed whether they were sowing seed, gathering the harvest, digging irrigation ditches, or building a house. It was the same process by which they had constructed these massive temples and forbidding pyramids, for the same trifling wages. The strongest among them began shaking the rocks loose, using only their hands, while the weaker availed themselves of the pickaxes’ blades. The shortest men carried baskets woven of palm leaves, and the boys filled the waterskins. They erected a tent for me beside the rocky hill, and some of their female relatives from the village came, set up a hearth, and began preparing bread. They brought tall earthenware jars filled with hunks of aged cheese and pickled turnips. The site came fully to life, and I knew that the rock pile would be removed, that nothing now would prevent this.

The morning hours were passed in work without surcease. The antiquities inspectors came, glanced at us in passing, and went away again, feeling some malicious satisfaction, no doubt, that I had taken upon myself the removal of this pile. The way to the tomb of Ramses II would be cleared, and they would take all the credit for themselves, while I myself would succeed only in running up against the walls of an old gravesite.

When the sun reached its apex, the men stopped work and took their first meal—perhaps the last as well, for this day. They broke the light, freshly baked loaves, laughing, slapping onion bulbs against their huge palms and devouring them with pleasure. They had aged cheese and pickled vegetables. They were experts in compensating for the salt they lost through sweating by consuming mineral salt. I could not share the food with them; I did not touch even the light meal Abdel Aal had brought for me.

After eating, they went back to hauling rocks and digging in the dirt, and kept it up for the rest of the day. The hill did not look as if it had been diminished in the slightest, or that it would be possible to remove it.

I returned to her at the end of the day, exhausted. She allowed me to kiss and caress her, but did not respond in kind. Did she regret having made love with me the night before, or was it the wretched Eastern taboo against forbidden things that had awoken in her? Would she feel less guilty if it had been rape, rather than a matter of mutual desire? I pointed out the pile of rocks lying in the forecourt of the house—I had tasked Abdel Aal with bringing the first of the rocks to be brought down by the men from the top of the hill, and these they had piled up in the shape of a small pyramid. I gave her the red shawl she had forgotten to pick up, and she smiled—a sad, distracted smile. I kissed her neck and her lips—she was unresisting, but not warm. At last she said, as if in apology, that the angry howling of the wolves had disturbed her all through the night, rousing terror in her heart. I sensed that the barriers between us had not yet fallen.

The stack of newspapers we had brought from the eastern shore had not been touched. Some of my old paintings were spread out upon the table—had she spent her time in contemplation of them? Amidst the papers I spied a picture of a pharaonic cartouche, on which I had written in hieroglyphics the name of cold Lady Evelyn—could it be that Aisha had recognized the name? It did not matter. I tried to draw her toward my room for more lovemaking—I was certain that if we made love at leisure, in an intimate moment behind a locked door, much of this tension would dissipate. But she could not do it—her eyes filled with tears, and I was afraid she might turn away from me once more. I went to my room, frustrated—although thoroughly weary, I could not sleep. The howling of the wolves was still at an angry pitch, coming from the direction of the temple. It was as if all the valley’s wolves had converged upon this spot near our house. What could have roused them so? After a few minutes, as I hovered between sleep and waking, I became aware that the door to my room was opening. Aisha entered and flung herself down beside me in the bed. I took her in my arms—she was in a state, her limbs trembling violently and her teeth chattering.

“They’re watching me!” she whispered.

“Who?” I asked, bewildered.

“The wolves! For a moment it seemed to me that they would attack us . . . then they began fighting with one another, and they are still at it.”

Was she imagining things? And yet their noise could still be heard. They did not sleep, and they upset my sleep as well.

The days passed, long and wearisome: dry sand, burning sun, and endless layers of heaped-up rocks, ranks of workers who toiled without respite. The stones were transported from that stubborn hill to out-of-the-way places, so as not to impede the passage of visitors and inspectors. We filled up the holes we had dug before, and still the original surface of the ground was reluctant to show itself.

Aisha’s sadness did not recede, nor did the wolves’ fury abate. As she wept upon my chest, I said to her, “It is just the howling that has followed you all your life, without doing you any harm.”

“It isn’t only the wolves,” she replied. “It’s him I’m most frightened of—he comes here every day. He keeps his distance from the house, but he stares in my direction, standing there holding his staff.”

“Who?” I asked her.

“The one called Abdel Rasul.”

Exasperated, I exclaimed, “He’s nothing but a thief who steals artifacts. I shall bar his way here!”

“You can’t,” Aisha replied with a shudder. “He is one of the spirits who occupy this valley. This place is dreadful—it is haunted!”

Things went on in this tiresome fashion—by day I was exhausted by the raising of the stone, and at night the wolves’ furious howling kept me awake. I could see the men staggering with strain and exhaustion; meanwhile their expressions, the malevolent look in their eyes, made it clear they were getting fed up. They felt they were exerting themselves in a pointless cause. We were all of us in thrall to these stones. The men were ready to sacrifice those accursed five piasters just to have done with the stones and with me, but I could not stop. I was unsteady beneath the sun’s glare. My whole life had come to a standstill over the excavation of this little patch of earth.

Aisha sat up—she had awoken feeling as if she were choking—the nightmares were unremitting, until she could no longer distinguish between waking and sleeping. She could find in herself no appetite for food or desire to go out. She knew that in the outer courtyard she would discover wolf tracks, together with Abdel Rasul’s footprints. On the table she found the bundle of old newspapers—he had put them into a sack and brought them back when they returned from the east bank all those days ago. On the first page was an image resembling her own face—puzzled, she studied it. Of course it was not a picture of her. It was a sketch of a stone statue, whose face bore all the same characteristics of her own: an Egyptian peasant woman, raising one hand as if to welcome the sun, while the other rested upon the head of a scaled-down figure of the Sphinx. Mukhtar had returned from his years away in France. His face looked tired, but the faded photograph could not conceal the sparkle that shone from his eyes. He was talking about his plan to erect an immense statue symbolizing the awakening, the new renaissance. It was a distant reminder of another world. Even now he had not forgotten what she looked like—the problem was that it was no longer her face, no longer her body. Her spirit had dissolved, everything was distorted, her path a fateful road taken, on which there could be no turning back.

From outside she heard a moaning that was not the wind, but an actual wail, coming from the direction of the temple. She hesitated a moment, then walked slowly out of the house. She spied them by the stone wall, a long line of black-clad women, their heads likewise covered in black, beating their breasts and weeping without cease, leaning like a black sand dune disturbed by the wind. At first Aisha took them to be part of a funeral procession on its way to the tombs, but there were no men, nor was there a body. She really could not tell what had set them weeping so, but the incessant lamentation added to her own distress. All at once she felt that they must have come for her, to bewail her fate. She tried to retreat, to conceal herself inside the house, but one of the women turned toward her and fixed her with a hard look. Aisha drew in her breath sharply, for the woman had her mother’s face, as if she had risen once more from death and come to mourn the wretched pass to which her daughter had come. Aisha shut all the windows and locked all the doors. And still she was beset by the sound of wailing.

Like a miracle came the magical moment in which the men succeeded in removing the last of the rocks. At last the surface of the ground appeared, dark and moist after being so long hidden from the sun. We all collapsed, overcome with weariness. The men prostrated themselves upon the earth, thanking their distant God. Yet there were still more days of toil ahead of us, for now we must prepare to excavate the hard soil, uncertain all the while of achieving any result.

I tried to tell Aisha about what had happened, but she seemed to droop, her expression full of confusion and pain. All at once she said to me tearfully, “Why won’t you leave off digging? Why can’t we go away from this dreadful place?”

I looked at her, taken aback. I had never imagined she might try to stop my endeavor, after I had expended so much effort and got this close. It was she who had designated the place for me, laying out her red shawl as a sign no one could mistake. Voices had been calling to me, and the king awaited me in the hollow ground. How could I now break my appointment with him after waiting so long? But she would not be silent.

“This place will destroy us both,” she said. “I’ve seen a terrible vision. Those wolves—they are not angry without reason!”

Enraged, I shouted at her, “And where do you wish us to go? Shall we go back to the house in the red-light district?”

She stared at me, stunned. I had wounded her cruelly.

I rose at dawn, so as to slip away without having to face her, but I found her awake, sitting on the front balcony, gazing at the fog-shrouded temple. The courtyard was full of wolf tracks, as if they had spent the night there. The rock pile I had fashioned into a small pyramid now lay scattered all about. I studied her face. Her eyes were hooded, and ringed by dark circles. Her lips moved, but her words were inaudible; perhaps she was praying to some unknown god to prevent me from pursuing my goal. I had no time for such foolishness—if she wanted to go away, let her go alone. I was not about to sacrifice the dream of a lifetime on account of a woman’s superstitions.

The women were preparing to make bread, while the men arranged baskets and repaired shovels, and the boys filled waterskins with river water. It was another day, and it would be strenuous, but it was different now—or such at least was my dream. First I must put Aisha’s sorrowful face out of my mind. I drank a glass of strong tea with the men, invoking with them the name of God before they applied themselves to the earth with their pickaxes, turning over the black soil. Looking as though until this moment it had never been touched, it was redolent of the air of ancient times, of death without resurrection. The men hefted their shovels and filled the baskets, squaring the sides of the trench so that they would not fall inward. They worked on, delving into layers of earth without stopping, the air seeming to pulsate in a curious way—we were all waiting for something extraordinary to turn up. I saw an ancient clay cat, a marble vessel, a broken bottle, and fragmentary bits of inscription—rich soil such as any excavator might dream of, but it wasn’t what I was after—I was waiting for the king on whose existence my fate depended.

At noon the fragrance of fresh bread filled the air, mingling with that of the earth’s depths, but I didn’t permit anyone to stop working; I pressed them to keep digging. The sun, however, was brutal, and exhaustion had overtaken us all, with the king still well out of reach. At last I signaled to them to stop, to take their rest and their lunch. One of the youths, though—the ones who carried the waterskins—shouted suddenly. “I see the edge of a staircase!” he cried. “There are stairs!”

We all rushed over, leaping into the chamber, our bodies tumbling over one another. Dust rose up in a cloud, and we could no longer see anything. We turned about, scrabbling in the dirt, shouting when a part of the sand wall collapsed. But there was the top of a staircase. With our hands we moved aside the dirt and the pebbles, unearthing the first step, the second, and the third, all leading down into the bowels of the earth. We forgot about food, forgot the burning sun and our weariness. Dust rained down on us, but we uncovered more steps. I wept, but no one took any notice of my tears. Our faces were all coated with dust. The men cried out in the name of God as each step was revealed, and with them I plunged into a different era. As darkness, like destiny, crept upon us, we lit the torches and kept digging, reaching all the way to the twenty-fifth step. I took up a torch and approached the wall that rose before the final step. There was a stone in the way, chipped and sharp-edged, beneath which was a door, or the entrance to a vault, and there were inscriptions on it. Raising the torch, I was able to read the hieroglyphics easily. There was one cartouche, bearing one name: Tutankhamun. “Oh, king, you who eluded me so long! I’ve found your resting place at last!”

They wanted him back at Thebes. But he knew it only as a terrifying city. They wanted to marry him to a girl he hated, who regarded him as a wild animal; they wanted to set a heavy crown upon his head and give him a scepter to clutch against his chest; they wanted to weigh his body down with gilded clothing, leaving his spirit no opportunity to roam the wilderness he so loved. They had even taken his old name from him and given him a different one, along with a new god. No one paid any heed to the question of what he himself wanted. How could he express himself in the face of their antagonism, or address himself to Horemheb’s unyielding determination?

Tut was hiding within the palace, hoping they would not find him and force him to do all these things. He only wanted to postpone the affair so that he might mourn his late father, but they would not permit him even this final chance to say farewell.

Akhetaten had changed since Horemheb’s soldiers had assumed control of the city, virtually without opposition. The minister Ai had been the first victim, even though he, too, had surrendered. The warriors of the south had raised on high the banners of the god Amun as they overran the streets of the unresisting city. In the vanguard was a rank of priests, with their shaven heads and those implacable looks they cast upon the crowd. The city’s sentinels threw down their weapons and went out to greet the warriors, but these looked on them with contempt. Horemheb brought to the palace the news of the Pharaoh’s death, entering for the first time Queen Nefertiti’s private wing. He breathed her fragrance; he saw her bed. She surprised him by receiving the news unflinchingly. She was grief-stricken, but not shocked, for she knew intuitively that her husband had left seeking death. Horemheb wished that at such a moment as this he could shed the soldier’s stern aspect and fall to his knees at her feet, confess to her the intensity of his desire to warm her bed, now grown cold. But the daughters were weeping inconsolably. Tut, meanwhile, attempted tried to slip away into a corner, but Horemheb spoke to him severely.

“When the days of mourning are over,” he said, “the marriage rites shall be held. You are to marry the eldest daughter, Ankhesen, and become Pharaoh of Egypt. Such was the decree of the late Pharaoh, which I promised to carry out.”

Couldn’t they have chosen another of the girls? Why must the throne come at such a cost? And yet who would dare oppose Horemheb? His soldiers had secured their grasp on every part of the city, while his priests had shut the temples of Atun and arrested the priests of the fallen god. No one dared ask what had become of the Pharaoh Akhenaten. How had he died? Where was he buried? What ceremonies had been undertaken to ensure that his spirit should proceed safely to the afterlife? None dared: not the vanquished city—the very sun hid its face—nor the nobles who came in droves to declare their allegiance to Horemheb and their deference to the god restored, Amun. They feared for their lives, trembling at the thought of the priests’ vengeance. Who would pay any heed to a heretic Pharaoh, when no one even knew to what end the paths of eternity had led him?

Horemheb’s orders were abrupt and peremptory: “You have one week to leave this city, Akhetaten. Thereafter, it stands no more.”

The city’s end came swiftly, but inevitably. It had been a passing fancy, in a land that lived and breathed only nightmarish visions. The soldiers spread out, and the smell of pitch wafted from everywhere. The residents came to the fearful realization that Horemheb’s threat was to be carried out: he would burn the city as soon as the grace period ended. The tradesmen began emptying their shops and storehouses of goods. Ships and smaller vessels drew near to the beach and stood ready, while their crews prepared for unremitting days of labor. The houses began to expel their contents: heaps of furniture; of clothing; of pots and pans; a few memories, some regrets. Objects from the houses filled the bowels of the sailing vessels. Hundreds of people without means descended upon the streets, seeking a way to escape.

Meanwhile, the priests began working savagely to efface all images of the sun with extended arms. Tut stood alone on the balcony of the palace watching the city in its death throes. Atun rose weakly from behind the horizon, hastening each day to hide himself once more. The Pharaoh’s daughters were afraid of being snatched or raped, but the soldiers surrounded the outside of the palace, guarding it from the common rabble, and from the priests, and no one dared approach the palace walks. The royal ship stood in the river, awaiting the departure of the Pharaoh’s family. Nefertiti, though, did not stir from her room—it was as if she was insensible to what was going on around her, did not smell the odor of pitch that permeated the atmosphere.

Soon the final day was upon them. Horemheb himself came to the palace to help them make their way to Thebes, that frightful city, but the Pharaoh’s daughters greeted him with terror in their eyes. Their old friend was no longer a friend, but a cruel man determined that none should defy him or stand in his way. “Our mother,” said Ankhesen, the eldest, “does not wish to leave the city. None of us wishes to return to Thebes.”

He had no time for such maneuvers, the ploys of women. He went to Nefertiti’s quarters, the slave girls retreating before him. He found the queen seated before the window, impassively surveying the horizon. Hearing his footsteps, she turned to him as if unseeing.

“My lady,” he said, “this is the last day. We must all leave.”

“It is you and your soldiers,” she replied, “who designated this day. I shall not leave my city. I will not go to that hostile city my husband deplored, the city that hated him.”

He found himself at a loss. He dared not force her to leave. He dared not even approach her, or touch her with so much as the tips of his fingers. “The city will burn,” he said.

“I shall burn with it then,” she said. “Here my husband died, and here I shall die.”

Just so had Queen Tiye acted, and all the foolish queens before her. He stood there a while before her, hoping she might yield. It seemed to him that she saw him, and saw how afraid for her he was. But her face remained set, her staring eyes weary: gone from them was that captivating gleam, ephemeral enchantment, conveying vague promises. They had become two dull metal orbs. Did she despise him? Had she despised him all along?

There would be no point in speaking further. He turned and left her. The exodus from the palace had begun—ranks of slave girls, male slaves, and servants who had never imagined that the queen would sit on alone in a city about to be put to the torch. Once more he faced the girls with their frightened eyes.

“We will not leave this city,” said Ankhesen, “so long as our mother does not leave.”

“You in particular, little princess,” he said between clenched teeth, “must come with me. I shall carry you to the ship against your will if you put up any resistance. Your sisters may stay behind if they wish.”

“And you will burn them all?”

“The city will not burn,” he said. “For Queen Nefertiti’s sake, I grant it life. But ruin lies beyond the walls. None shall remain here but the vipers, the crows, and the wolves. All shall follow me, willingly or not.”

Ankhesen fought them vigorously when they picked her up and carried her to the ship. She struck the guards with her fists and clawed at their faces. She looked at Tut with hatred as he walked beside her, head bowed. Horemheb led the throng as if the spirit of Amun—that evil god—had taken possession of him. The ships and other craft—small rowing boats, too—crept along the surface of the river, while onshore another creeping procession kept pace with them, of horses, mules, donkeys, water buffaloes, and cattle, heavily laden with goods, all heading south. The city walls appeared, pale and silent. The light within them had died, and with them would die the most beautiful woman on earth. Horemheb thought of her, sitting submerged in terminal silence. She had not given him a chance, nor herself the chance to awaken from her sorrows and begin to move toward a rapprochement. How could she not have sensed his desire for her all these years?

The river bore everyone, willing or not, to Thebes. It was the priests who received them all with baleful glances—but this was no time for reprisals. The new god was dead, along with the alternate city and the heretic Pharaoh, and there was nothing for the priests of Thebes to do but celebrate their dominion over all the valley’s cities, without exception.

The old pharaonic palace was reopened. Ankhesen sat in one corner of it, while Tut crouched in another part. They did not meet or exchange any conversation whatsoever. All the same, preparations for the wedding continued. Thebes was lavishly decorated. It was announced that the new Pharaoh had changed his name to accord with the god Amun, and that the first of his deeds would be the construction of a new temple in the center of Karnak, by which means he would establish his obedience and reverence for the venerable deity. Tut, afraid and isolated, knew nothing of what was happening around him. He didn’t know who had changed his name, or who had ordered a temple for this unfamiliar god. The whole city was blazing with activity, celebrating its easy victory. Tut alone felt vanquished, and missed Akhenaten, the man who had given him his new life—and now here was Tut, taking Akhenaten’s throne, marrying his daughter, and repudiating his god. He was a traitor—he knew it in his heart—but he wasn’t strong enough to do anything about it.

On the day of the wedding, the palace filled up with people: priests and chiefs, the luminaries of Thebes, those who had never left it and those who had gone away and come back, the penitent and the servile. Horemheb directed them all with stern exactitude. This wedding was the inauguration he must complete before undertaking to change everything.

Ankhesen appeared wearing a black robe—she had not yet relinquished her mourning clothes. Tut was seated on the throne, his head bare and his hand empty; he had acquired none of the splendor of a king—he looked like a terrified boy, searching for a means of escape. He was afraid to go near Ankhesen. She sat next to him, disdainful as ever. She was remembering her mother and sisters, from whose midst she had been plucked for the sake of this dismal marriage. She looked at the priests, who were seeing to the completion of the wedding rites—she was ready to explode. The high priest of Amun was offering the two of them a beaker full of milk mixed with honey.

“This honey,” he said, “is the nectar of the sun, the milk that of the moon. They are combined just like your sacred conjoined lives. Each of you completes the other: you are the goddess Isis, who offers the throne to her husband, and he it is who shall be born anew by your grace, to be as Osiris, and you shall remain together until time completes its circuit, until Sirius the Dog Star appears, the seasons of the flood succeed one another, and Amun grants you both power and dominion over all creatures in this land beloved of the gods. I bless your marriage and proclaim you the new Pharaoh, Tutankhamun.”

Ankhesen was about to refuse, but at a sharp glance from Horemheb she took a sip, just enough to wet her lips. Then Tut, nauseated, drank as well. The high priest drew near and set the crown in place, a huge thing compared to Tut’s small head. It consisted of two colors: red for Upper Egypt and white for Lower Egypt; it was bisected by the guardian serpent, from which rose two feathers, representing truth and justice. The eye of Horus, with its distinctive tapered corners, looked out from the middle of the crown. Tut’s aspect changed once he was wearing the crown: he grew taller and more striking, seated there upon the throne. But Ankhesen grew still more furious with him. She would have liked to get up and leave him sitting there alone, this vagrant who had stolen her father’s throne and bound his destiny to her against her wishes. But the ceremonies had not been concluded yet. The priest was handing him the scepter—the scepter of Amun, who was responsible for repelling enemies. It was made of sycamore wood, and had the head of a wolf. It was covered with a layer of gold, to give light to the world of the hereafter.

Slaves entered, bearing large wooden platters, on which were fresh loaves of bread, the steam still rising off of them. The slaves approached the throne and halted before it. The Pharaoh rose, took the loaves, and handed them out to everyone. The first loaf went to Horemheb, the second to the high priest, and the rest of the nobles and luminaries followed. Then Tut turned to Ankhesen. She glared at him, and he shrank back. Only Horemheb observed this, for at this time the ceremonies were over. As the sound of drumbeats rose and grew louder, dozens of dancers made their way into the center of the hall, where they began swaying to the rhythm. Outside, the assembled masses, in their thousands, cheered as platters of bread and jugs of beer were brought down from the palace, and servants began dispensing them at no charge. The city was suffused with an atmosphere of gaiety it had not known for some time, the men bedding the women indiscriminately, as if the energy ignited in the wanton city streets might engender strength in the loins of the new Pharaoh.

The Pharaoh himself, however, stood helpless before his bride as the night ended. Everyone had left, and Ankhesen stood there quite naked, challenging him with her body, resplendent in its budding womanhood. She had inherited her mother’s coloring, as well as her willowy frame and bewitching eyes.

“You’ll not touch me,” she said to him. “I won’t let a wolf child into my bed.”

Her voice rose high and shrill; the palace had ears, all attentively pricked. Tut had no choice but to go away and leave her. He went looking for a room in a faraway corner in which to retreat, the moans of the lecherous and unbridled crowd ringing in his ears.

In the morning he attempted to salvage some sort of victory in the alien streets. The attendants dressed him in his gilded robe and placed the crown upon his head. He ascended his war chariot, drawn by eight horses, and his lavish entourage made a thorough tour of the city. Horemheb followed him in another carriage, a little way behind. When he reached the Temple of Karnak, the priests gathered around them, holding fragrant censers, and the temple virgins emerged, scattering flowers at their feet. None of this alleviated Tut’s feeling of estrangement: not the chanting of the crowds, the façades of the houses, the emblems of the gods, or the droning of the priests. He was alone, with no remedy for his loneliness.

Afterward, he sat upon the throne for hours on end, people coming and going before him. They knelt to convey their reverence, told him their names and their many soubriquets, although he was incapable of remembering anything. They laid gifts at his feet: golden vessels, jeweled necklaces, and costly robes, in constantly replenished piles of goods brought in by his followers. He had no idea what he was supposed to do with all of it. At last Horemheb clapped his hands, and everyone filed out. Tut was exhausted and trembling, but Horemheb stood at attention before him, unyielding and grim as ever.

“Beginning tomorrow,” he said, “you shall give the order for the peasants to leave their fields and the workers their tasks. We must assemble the greatest army this land has ever known. The enemy has overrun the Valley of Turquoise, and will soon reach the fertile lands. We must not merely drive them back—we must pursue them to their own lands and lay waste their cities.”

It was always war, one begetting another. Tut, though, was frightened. All those who were providing him with protection would now leave him and go far away. Horemheb seemed to know what he was thinking.

“I shall leave guards with you, chosen from the most faithful of my men. They will carry out orders at your command. They will kill without hesitation anyone you wish done away with—you have only to say the word.”

“Say the word . . . ?” Tut echoed in a hoarse whisper.

“Be resolute in issuing all your orders, and do not repeat yourself. Even the queen—expect from her nothing less than total submission. In truth she gave up the throne to you, but it has become yours now. You must fill her womb quickly—this is what I have found when it comes to women. Use any method you wish, and think nothing of resistance or pain or cruelty—be as cruel as you like as often as you like. The Pharaoh must be harsh, always.”

Horemheb began preparing the country for war once more. The peasants took off their blue overgarments, and harvested reeds from the riverbanks, which would be transformed into shafts for spears. Iron and bronze were combined to be forged into swords and spearheads; grain silos, jugs of oil, and linen thread were requisitioned; women gathered in the temples to weave soldiers’ uniforms. Peace and quiet had withdrawn from the valley, and tomorrow the warriors would call out their entreaties to the gods for help, before they turned and made their way northward.

The army left the city—thousands of peasants, transformed into soldiers. They had taken up their spears and their armor; the professional soldiers had mounted their war chariots. They all passed before him as he stood upon the balcony of the palace, Queen Ankhesen beside him.

He was frightened of her, and of everything else in this city. He thought he would die if he so much as raised his voice just a little. How could he assert his authority over those priests, who had their way in everything? How could he be safe, lost in the dim corridors of this palace, laid end-to-end with traps to ensnare him? Lurking in every passageway was a hidden enemy, but the greatest foe of them all was in the bedroom—the room in which he had found no place until now, and here he must make a beginning.

She sat upon her bed, surrounded by slave girls, who anointed her body with oils, perfumes, and honey—the same recipe Queen Tiye had used. She’d paid no attention when he entered and stood in the middle of the room, so she was startled when he spoke up and ordered the slave girls to leave. They hurried out.

He approached her and took her by the arm, but she clawed at his face with her nails like an angry cat. When he pushed her roughly back to the bed she struck his chest with her fists. He forced open her legs, and she pulled his hair, so he yanked off the fabric that covered her chest. She tried to repel him, but he pressed himself between her thighs. They struggled in silence, their agitated breathing the only sound. She looked him straight in the eye, then gave up the fight. Her exposed chest heaved, and her pale belly rose and fell. She let him do as he wished. He gasped and perspired, groping aimlessly with his hand. Her scowl vanished, replaced by a sneer. She neither resisted nor assisted him. He struggled on, clutching at her legs and pressing himself to her torso. His breath became the snorting of a beast. All the while she fixed him with the same mocking stare and faint smile.

When at last his efforts ceased, she said, “Now get up off of me, valiant Pharaoh.”

He was choking—the corridors of the palace were stifling and endless. He increased his haste, seeking the river, a fresh breeze to dry his sweat, but he stumbled on, through the side passages, until the face of the river appeared, black and silent, without a breath of air. He sat upon the steps leading down to the water. The opposite shore seemed far away, dark and desolate—if only he could escape to it. There he might give way to his tears with no one to see him. He heard footfalls, and turned to find a detachment of four guards standing behind him, protecting his back. They left him only when he went to the queen’s quarters, but no sooner did he reappear in the open than he came once more under their direct scrutiny, precisely in accordance with Horemheb’s orders.

“I want to cross to the other shore,” he cried.

“We’ll fetch the royal bark at once,” one of them replied.

The oars beat upon the surface of the river, slicing the dark waves. His heart was heavy and the opposite bank seemed unwilling to come any closer. Behind him were the lights of the palace, refusing to disappear. All he wanted was darkness to hide the emotions that showed on his face. The boat kept rocking, rocking on the face of the water until it made contact with the mud of the riverbank. The oarsman stood up quickly, got out of the boat, and bent over before him, so that the Pharaoh might step upon his back and thus reach the sand. Tut was trembling, but the earth here was solid, perhaps more than in any other place. Here was more silence, more darkness than anywhere else. He motioned to the guards, who stayed by the riverbank, watching for any movement on the water. Only the elderly oarsman stayed with him, following, at a certain distance.

“What is this place?” said Tut.

“It is the Valley of the Kings, my lord,” the old oarsman replied, surprised. “Here lie all the great kings who make their way to the afterlife.”

In the distance rose the howling of wolves; the sound pierced him to the marrow. He remembered the taste from long ago, of milk running into his mouth. The memory woke within him hunger, desire, the need for warmth, driving out the torpor of palaces and lazy familial comforts. The voices rose as if the wolves had caught his scent.

“Let us go, my lord,” the oarsman said fearfully. “There are a great many of them.”

He made no move. He saw their eyes gleaming in the darkness and their nimble shadows flitting among the rocks of the mountain that loomed over them like a great beast’s horn. He laid hold of his garments and removed all the finery and jewelry that weighed him down, at the same time releasing a great cry—he had returned once more to their world—he must surrender his body to their fangs and claws. He moved toward them, trying to make contact with their bodies, but the oarsman began to weep, and called for the guards. No one dared touch him, so the four guards moved quickly to form a line between him and the rocks. One of them held up his hand and said, pleading, “My lord . . .”

Tut drew breath with difficulty, also nearly weeping. There they stood, forming a barrier between him and the freedom he sought, keeping him on a throne he did not like, with a wife he could only detest. There was nothing to do but turn and stumble back through the sand, ready to collapse with every step, the rest of them behind him not daring to place a hand on him, until he heaved himself at last into the boat.

Later he went back again to the western shore, but in daylight it appeared less forbidding, despite the scowling rocks, heavy with the sarcophagi of the dead. The guards accompanied him, along with the priests of Amun, walking behind him as he cast about in the sand, in an effort to recall the place in which he had stood during the night. He tried to familiarize himself with the features of the rocky terrain, to discover the imprint of claws upon the ground, to sniff out the scent of urine always left behind in places where the wolves had been. At last he pointed out the spot, addressing himself to the high priest.

“Here I wish to build my tomb,” he said.

The priest stared. “Your tomb!” he exclaimed. “Is this not rather premature?”

“Work begins tomorrow,” Tut replied sharply.

Work indeed commenced the following day. There were few men—most of the houses had been emptied of adult males, leaving the women alone, their beds cold. Yet workers must be found, in deference to the Pharaoh’s orders. The first tunnel penetrating the depths of the earth was begun. He stood and watched the laborers as they scooped out soil and cut through stone. This supplied a pretext for him to spend as much of his time as possible on the other shore. The work proceeded all through the day, and at night by torchlight.

News came regularly of the war being waged in the north. Every fifteen days a messenger came, sand-coated and blood-soiled. The battles raged on—they might flare up and subside, but the casualties never abated, nor did the ships cease their plying of the waters, bearing matériel northward, where they sailed laden with wheat, barley, salt, honey, onions, and with them northbound passengers. While the messages kept coming, the northern tribes had retreated to their own side of Egypt’s borders and the struggle had moved into Canaan, but it would not stop unless and until the Hittite enemy was driven back behind the northern river, which as far as Egypt was concerned was the line of safety.

One way or another, matters of state were carried out. Ranks of clerks and other employees skilled in many languages took on all assignments. The young Pharaoh knew virtually nothing of what went on, and if he asked the answers he received were at once vague and incomprehensibly detailed. The tomb, though, kept expanding beneath the surface of the earth, a black hole with walls of jutting rock. When he peered into its murky depths, he felt them calling to him. He got into the habit of keeping a solitary vigil, in order to listen to the howling of the wolves, while the torches stayed lit all night long.

He would steal back to the dark palace and go to bed alone, where he would lie with his eyes open, hoping to keep the nightmares at bay. Meanwhile, the keening of the wolves never stopped resounding in his head. He imagined his skin covered in fur, his canines grown into fangs, his nails sharpened into claws. One night he opened his eyes in alarm to find the light of dawn peeping through the curtains. He could see clearly Ankhesen’s face regarding him. She was not angry or poised for a fight. Her hair hung loose, its locks wreathing her face, and she wore a thin gown through which her breasts were plainly visible—she took no trouble to hide them. He heard her whisper very softly, sounding the way she had in her long-ago childhood.

“What is troubling you?” she said to him. “Why do you seek death so eagerly?”

He stared at her in astonishment. She spoke with a gentle kindness to which he was in no way accustomed—nor would he ever have imagined her leaning over him in this intimate way—she was all but clinging to him, fearless and unguarded. She spoke again. “Am I the cause of all this?”

In a strained voice he said, “I used to think so . . .”

“What is it, then?”

“The man they have defamed, the god we have abandoned . . . this is the cause I did not perceive before. This is the curse that has befallen both me and you.”

“But the throne is ours!” She was staring at him, mystified.

“For the sake of that throne,” he replied, “we have forsaken everything. And so we have been ashamed of things that should not have shamed us.”

He spoke sadly, painfully, but his words were true. Perhaps she had been averse not to him, but in some way to herself—both of them had recoiled from themselves.

Now for the first time she attached herself to him, trembling. “Be all that as it may,” she said, “don’t leave me alone. This city frightens me!”

He caressed her, and she flung her arms around him. They were too close to permit either the clawing of each other’s faces, as in their first encounter, or even an exchange of words. They were both trembling, and her hair hung down around his face.

“Make love to me now,” she whispered in his ear. “Do as you will with me—I am content.”

The following morning the rising sun found them warmly asleep in each other’s arms—the cold that had beset them since their arrival in the city had dissipated. Although she was hungry for more, she contented herself with this measure of warmth and affection, for there was no preventing him from crossing the river every day to follow the progress of work on the tomb. It extended well into the earth, with rooms and corridors, a hidden cavern designed for the resurrection of the dead. The dreary walls of sand disappeared behind a layer of white plaster: a smooth and gleaming surface that mitigated the gloom of the lightless burial chamber. Next would come the artists to paint the walls of the tomb.

But the army stayed away longer and longer, while households made up of only women grew more and more oppressed. The flood season drew near, but there was no one to sow seed in the earth, so when the waters engulfed it and then receded, nothing grew but grass and weeds. The army would have had to return earlier, before the floods, to ward off the specter of famine, but the soldiers stayed away, beyond the horizon, while the number of messengers reporting from the north dwindled, and such news as they brought was contradictory. The army had advanced considerably upon the barbarian tribes—but had it reached the river that was its goal?

At last the army returned, Horemheb raging like a cyclone, begrimed with sand and bearing many wounds, some of them still bleeding. His army was exhausted, its numbers reduced nearly by half. They looked around, their eyes wandering in their heads, reeling with hunger and fatigue. Horemheb, though, when he stood before the Pharaoh, appeared strong and confident, as was always his way. Tut sat upon the throne, the queen at his side. They trembled when they heard Horemheb’s booming voice—all these months they had fancied they were true monarchs, but here came Horemheb to put them in their place, like the two little children they were.

“I come,” he said, “to announce our victory, my lord.”

This was not evident from his appearance, and if such a victory had indeed been achieved, then it had been very costly. Tut dared not say a word, or ask for details. He simply stared fixedly at Horemheb.

“We destroyed their settlements,” Horemheb continued. “We evicted them from Canaan and drove them back beyond the river. The Hittite king has pledged not to attempt to antagonize us further, and he sent his son as hostage, to ensure that he keeps his promise.” Horemheb gestured and said, “Come forward, Tayfour.”

A slender youth advanced, bare-chested and tousle-headed. He stood trembling before them. Tut looked him over uneasily. His hair was dark blond, his eyes disquietingly pale. He was trying to disguise his primitive ill nature with a mask of servility, and he kept his mouth closed to conceal his fangs. His nails were long and filthy, his bare feet broad, ill-suited to his wiry frame, as if he had walked a journey of many miles. Ankhesen studied him as well, equally ill at ease: those strange eyes, blue as if they contained a miniature sea; his disheveled locks straggling upon his wide shoulders. His legs were strong, like those of a wrestler—he could have lifted her up onto his shoulders if he had wished, and carried her off. There was a protracted silence, while Tut tried to find his voice.

“I congratulate you, brave warrior,” he told Horemheb at last, “but what are we to do with this hostage? Are we to kill him or imprison him?”

“My lord,” Horemheb said, “he is our hostage. Should any harm come to him, it would mean a renewal of war. We must play host to him, and guard his life.”

“Very well,” Tut replied casually. “Let him be housed in one of the lodgings adjacent to the palace, then. We have no wish to provoke the barbarians’ wrath.”

The servants led the youth away. Ankhesen followed him with her eyes until he disappeared from view. Then Horemheb began to tell them of his deeds and offer up the spoils. It was plain enough that he really had been victorious. From the enemy’s temples he had seized statues of Set, the god of darkness, whom they worshipped. He had got hold of their flags, fashioned from dyed animal hide, and made off with their leaders’ iron coats of mail. He had appropriated gold from their treasuries. Not only that, but he had ordered the rape of all the women, so that they would bear children of Egyptian blood, who would declare no more wars upon the land in which their fathers dwelt.

With Horemheb back, there was virtually no need for the Pharaoh who sat upon the throne. The ranks of those seeking favors, the beggars, and the sycophants, dwindled. The country seemed enervated, as if it were trying to recover its breath. To begin with, Horemheb dissolved the army and paid off the soldiers. They were required to surrender their lances and swords, and to return once more to their starving villages. Axes were raised and brought down upon the earth, tilling it and clearing it of dead matter. The waterwheels turned, lifting water from the river’s edge and depositing it into the irrigation canals, which had become clogged with weeds. The fields drew breath once more, the dust shivered as it received the new plantings. But the war that had grown distant still raged within the palace, whose chief inhabitant seemed to be laboring under a curse. Tut had been seized by a sudden weakness, and one night he found himself unable to rise. Ankhesen’s moans and her efforts to rouse him were of no avail—he was simply too feeble to accommodate her. Horemheb’s footfalls resounded through the palace corridors at all times, without cause. Tut made no further attempt to return to her bed, while his longing to cross to the opposite shore increased.

The tomb continued to grow, the way a viper creeps along below the earth. Ankhesen sat alone all day long, and for many hours of the night as well, amid the slave girls’ silly chatter and the toadying of Thebes’s upper-class women. Her friends from the city in which she had grown up no longer came; abashed, they kept to their own homes. Ankhesen felt desperately lonely.

On hearing her slave girl, Amnet, remark, “What a gorgeous creature he is!” she rose and went to the girl’s side. It was then that she saw him pacing about the palace garden, like a captive animal. He was lean, but muscular. His skin shone with perspiration, for he had not yet adjusted to Thebes’s hot weather. With a gasp, he lifted his hand as if groping for a breath of fresh air. Quivering, she gazed at him, feeling herself at one with him—just like him, she had been snatched away from her family, her people, leaving behind her mother and sisters, as well as her father’s grave, whose whereabouts she did not even know. She had become a prisoner within this stifling palace. She wished she could go down to him and touch him, offer him some sort of kindness, let him know he was not alone in this strange land. Standing beside her, Amnet gave off her own distinct fragrance. She was a pretty girl, from one of the noble houses of Thebes, and her scent was that of Ankhesen’s grandmother Tiye. All the women of Thebes had insisted upon wearing it after the queen’s passing.

“He is not a ‘creature,’” said Ankhesen.

“He is wild and dangerous. My mother always warned me about men with pale eyes—everyone fears them.”

“Perhaps it is he who fears everyone else,” Ankhesen replied. “If Horemheb should become angry with him, he might kill him in an instant.”

Ankhesen felt her heart fill with pity for the young man, a despairing hostage in a strange country whose language he did not know, threatened with death at any moment. In Amnet’s voice she could sense her hunger; the girl could not suppress a tremor of desire. Unwittingly, she had drawn attention to the youth, and now Ankhesen saw an escape from the tedium of the vacant days her husband spent on the other side of the river.

She made sure she was alone. She took to dismissing Amnet before the hour at which he made his daily appearance in the garden. She stood behind the curtains, so the she could watch him intently. She did not know whether he had sensed her presence or not; while in the garden he was never still—it was as if he were keeping up a regimen of military exercises, battling imaginary adversaries and hurling spears at nonexistent targets. He kept up his savage routines, so as not to grow soft, to give way to a life of ease. For long hours she watched him, unable to take her eyes off him, her body tensed as if she had reached the summit of a mountain that had no other side.

She had been observing him for more days than she could count, when one day he startled her by approaching her window. She was expecting him to turn around and walk away again, but he didn’t. He stopped below her window and lifted his head to confront her. She felt her breath coming faster—it was no use trying to hide behind the curtains—he knew she was there—no doubt he had caught sight of her some time ago. She opened the curtains and stood facing him, feeling her chest expand and contract. She could smell his sweat, distinctly a scent of the wild, and all the while he stood regarding her with his strange eyes, an arresting, indeterminate blue color. She did not speak—but then he addressed her in broken Egyptian.

“You are the queen, yes? I still remember your face.”

With a start of surprise she said, “You’re speaking Egyptian!”

“Yes. I learned it from the slave girls and attendants.”

As astonished as before, she said, naïvely, “The slave girls? When did this happen?”

“All the time. They sneak into my room every night.”

She gasped, staring at his body, his pale skin. He had taken some color from the sun, but it had not dispelled his whiteness. He looked powerful, overflowing with the potent juices of his youth. Those whoring slave girls—they had learned the way to his bed and not one of them had told her. Had they conspired together, or had each sought her own pleasure in her own particular way?

“Why are you always watching me?” he said now. “Why don’t you come talk to me? I, too, am royalty—a prince, and my father is a king . . .”

Three guards began making their way toward him, coming from the other end of the garden. She saw them walking in his direction, their weapons unsheathed. “They’ll kill you,” she said, frightened.

He turned and looked behind him. Seeing them, he showed no fear, nor did he move from his place in front of her window. “They wouldn’t dare,” he said. “I am a hostage.” The soldiers, looking no less menacing, were getting closer.

“They will kill you,” she said in alarm, “because you dared to speak to me.” The guards moved in, circled him, and pointed their spears at his neck. It appeared to Ankhesen as though their pointed tips had actually pierced his skin. “Stop!” she shrieked. “Get away from him!”

The guards lowered their spears and bowed their heads. She was trembling, and still he gazed at her, looking her in the eye, indifferent to the guards and their spears. “Go!” she shouted at him, but still he stood there, defiantly. This pleased her, but she glared at him and he began to move off, without turning his back to her. She stood watching him, following every step with her eyes, afraid that the guards would go after him and do him some harm. She turned to them—their heads were still bowed—and she said with undisguised fury, “Do not provoke him again. Now go!”

For the rest of the day she was unable to regain her composure—she felt as though she was burning up inside. The Pharaoh, meanwhile, stayed away all day and all night. When Amnet came, Ankhesen turned on her wrathfully. “That hostage,” she cried, “the prince. Do you know where his room is?”

Amnet gave her a frightened look and colored deeply. Taking a step backward, she said, “My lady, I . . .”

But Ankhesen was apoplectic. “Wretched girl!” she shrieked. “Don’t try to tell me that you don’t go to him!”

The girl could not understand why Ankhesen was so angry with her.

On the other side of the river, work on the tomb proceeded, and Horemheb could only admire its workmanship and the way in which it continued to expand beneath the earth. He had gone in person to see it, going down with the Pharaoh as he descended the passageway leading underground. They entered the anteroom, the largest of all, in which everything belonging to the Pharaoh would be placed, all the things that would be useful to him in the afterlife. Then they passed through the doorway leading to the burial chamber, which was a little smaller. Here was where the coffin would go, along with the rest of the king’s treasures. Horemheb followed him into each section, including the small annex in which the king’s weapons would be placed.

His face expressionless, he said, “This shall be a tomb surpassing all those of the great Pharaohs.”

They both knew he did not merit such a tomb, but Horemheb ordered that the national treasuries be opened, and that the gold needed for the construction of his coffin, his death mask, and the royal chariot be taken out: as if he were offering compensation for his betrayal of the fallen god and the late Pharaoh.

Ankhesen, meanwhile, still stood in her room, oppressed by a sense of bitter cold and silence. She sat down upon the empty bed, but she could neither sit still nor sleep. She got up again and hurried down the stairs. She stepped out into the wet grass. The guards would see her, certainly, but they would not dare approach her. She entered a stone building hidden in a stand of trees and dashed along the corridor, out of breath, heedless of the slaves who prostrated themselves upon the ground when they saw her. Her body was in revolt, and nothing could have stopped it.

At last she came to the place where he slept. He was naked beneath the moonlight, deeply asleep. She wrapped herself around him. He had become accustomed to these nocturnal advances, the pressure of women’s bodies, trembling with desire, none of his visitors bothering to identify themselves. This time, though, he recognized the face in the moonlight and understood the enormity of the predicament in which he found himself. But she pulled him closer, growling like some famished creature. His bed was permeated with a multitude of aromas, those of other women—including even Amnet’s scent. This goaded her further, and she moaned, finding his body so different from what she had known: youthful, strong, and muscular, as it moved above hers, knowing and confident. He knew where to find the key to her pleasure—the most subtle and sensitive places. A cry of ecstasy escaped her as she was engulfed by a wave of intense feeling such as she had never known. Again and again, unceasingly, her body rose up responsively, not even allowing her a moment to stop and catch her breath.

A little later, Ankhesen sat beside the window, gasping for breath, the moonlight reflected in her face, which shone with perspiration. The boy, bewildered, exclaimed, “I never imagined you coming to me on your own two feet!”

She contemplated his body, gleaming in the light of the moon. No other body had given her this pleasure, rapture such as she had never before experienced—not with the wolves’ whelp, not with any of the dozens of slaves and guards. No one had given her, as he had, the sensation that her limbs were dissolving.

“If you had given me a sign,” he said, “I would have slipped past the guards and soldiers to kneel at your feet.”

She took his head in her hands, gazed into his pale eyes, and pressed his face to her breasts, into which, trembling, she felt him sink his teeth. She cried out in pain. “I don’t want you to kneel at my feet,” she said. “I want you to be king—my king.”

It was a crazy idea, and yet, from the first night on, she could not stop thinking about it. She felt more certain each time she crossed the patch of damp grass, ravenous for him; each time she lay bathed in sweat on his narrow wooden bed; each time she returned, drunk and sated with pleasure. She could no longer detect any scent but her own in his bed. She would envision the details of how it might be accomplished, each time Tut lay beside her, with his slight frame and dark complexion, starting up from time to time as if relentlessly beset by nightmares. But it was an idea so outlandish as to render Tayfour impotent with fear. He got up out of bed and covered the beautiful, naked body that was his glory.

“I am a foreigner here,” he said. “No one would accept me.”

“When I choose you, they will accept you. It was I who gave the throne to my husband, and I can still give it to you. I am the daughter of Isis. He who sits upon my lap shall be Pharaoh.”

She spoke with a keen resolve, a firmness of mind so different from the ungovernable appetites of her body. Truly she was a goddess, with her wide eyes and delicate lashes—no one could check her desires or break her will. Everyone knew of their relationship—her nightly forays were observed, her moans overheard. But his being the instrument of her pleasure was one thing; for him to attempt to ascend the throne would be quite another.

“What about the present Pharaoh?” he said. “The one who still lives—your husband?”

“This is what we must arrange between us. He is no good for this life. Every night he goes across the river—to the land of the dead. And it is there he must stay.”

That night with him she gave herself over to violent passion, and did not leave off even after he had grown shaky. She had found the bodily release she had sought for so long—she had come to this point in the same crazed and outlandish way in which her father had conceived his decision to destroy the old gods and follow a new one.

In her bid to achieve her ends before revealing to all the true state of affairs, time was her adversary; she must exploit her power as queen and make all arrangements out of everyone’s sight, well concealed from the Pharaoh and Horemheb—especially Horemheb. She would need enough gold to persuade the guards who watched Tayfour’s every move to look the other way, and to expedite the task of the river guards in crossing to the other shore, and of the ferrymen in finding anchorage that would not be discovered by the night watchmen. No one knew the truth of her scheme—or its intended outcome. Each participant was apprised only of that small part in the proceedings for which he would be paid.

She waited for a night when the moon would be full, when the ancient wolf spirits would awaken and they would call to one another, howling all through the night, in a communication between two worlds: that of the living, and that of the dead. Seeing Tut preparing to cross to the western shore of the river, she shrank for a moment in fear of the deed she was contemplating. She clung to his neck. He felt the quivering tension in her body as she pressed herself to him.

“Don’t leave me this night!” she cried desperately. “Lie here beside me and do with my body what you will—or do nothing. Only stay with me!”

But he too was gripped by a sense of urgency, every cell of his being straining toward the moment in which his senses, his former instincts, would reawaken. He saw the moon through the window, looking down upon him, pale and round, encircled by a nimbus composed of the spirits of his ancestors—they were calling on him to join them. He left her and hurried down to where the boat awaited him. The river was dark and cold.

The affair was proceeding like a destiny foretold. Had she been trying to prevent him from going, or to hasten him on his way? Then she heard footsteps approaching her room—had Tut suddenly changed his mind, and come back? But it was Horemheb who entered the room, not waiting for permission, before she could cover herself—who but he would dare to do such a thing? He stood before her, his face dark with anger, and she felt a cold apprehensiveness clutch at her heart. She shrank from his grimace, and said, “My lord Pharaoh is not here.”

“Indeed,” he said, his voice booming. “I am aware of that. It is you I’ve come to speak to, to learn what is going on between you and the hostage.”

She turned sharply toward him, shaking off her fear. “You wouldn’t dare touch him,” she said.

“I shall remove this man and send him far away,” he replied. “I shall imprison him . . . if necessary I shall kill him.”

Now she spoke her mind. “This man,” she said, “is the one I deserve. From the beginning that wild child has been of no use to me. He is too weak to be the king who rules my body!”

He stared at her in consternation—it seemed to him he was seeing, once again, Akhenaten announcing his rebellion against the whole establishment. “I do not understand what you mean, oh queen,” he said.

It was over, she knew. “It was I who gave Pharaoh the throne,” she said, “and I can give to this other man.”

Through gritted teeth, Horemheb muttered, “Such a thing shall never happen. I will not vanquish the barbarians in the north only to permit them to vanquish me at Thebes. It cannot be . . .”

He left her then. She saw him crossing the wet grass, heading for where Tayfour was lodged. Would he be able to stop him? Was it possible that any harm should come to him?

That morning, Howard appeared looking elegant, and happier than usual. He paid no attention to her grave expression or the effects of sleeplessness that showed in her face.

“Lord Carnarvon arrives today. He and his daughter will cross from the east side of the river, so that we may open up the tomb. I don’t suppose you can meet anyone, in the state you’re in.”

She did not look at him. She felt her heart was breaking. Ever since he had discovered that wretched stairway he had been ignoring her. All he cared about was telling the elderly Lord Carnarvon that he had found something that might turn out to be astonishing. He had gone no farther than the outer door and the vault beyond it—he did not yet know whether the tomb, hidden behind a wall of clay, was empty or whether a king awaited him within it. He resisted his own curiosity, setting a guard over the site day and night, and enjoining his men not to speak of the matter. Throughout those days he did not see her. So anxious was he that he saw none but himself.

Aisha refrained from questioning him; she could see that she had fallen into a trap. She had thrown him a life ring—to her cost, for now here he was, back to ingratiating himself with the elderly Lord Carnarvon and his sallow-faced daughter. Henceforth he would never see Aisha, nor would he perceive the danger besetting her, closed in as she was by this angry valley.

As she stared into space, all at once the sun went behind the clouds, and the river grew dark. Before her she saw the wolves, in their dusty pelts, mouths open and tongues lolling, eyes gleaming brighter than ever by the light of day. Lord Carnarvon and his pallid daughter must be alighting on the shore even now, making for the tomb, broadcasting the death of a king, the death of everything. The wolves moved toward her. Afraid of nothing, unstoppable, they surrounded the house on every side. She remembered the harsh expression upon her mother’s face, and knew it would be useless to scream. There was no escape.

Tut advanced, while the wolves howled—they were spreading out across the land, bounding over the hills, and now they were nearly upon him. He could see them clearly, and they could smell his scent. The four guards stood well away from him, close to the riverbank, trembling. The old Tut had awoken once more—there was no need for him to be in this city, or to worship this god. He must stand against Horemheb, put a stop to the inscriptions that were filling up the walls of his tomb against his will, efface the images of these gods he detested, not let them take over his destiny, his life in the other world. The howling of the wolves rose, pulsing, alive, endowing his body with extra energy. He must reclaim his rightful place, make it clear to everyone that he was not a traitor, no partisan of Amun, and not beholden to Horemheb. He would announce his repudiation of all of it, and so, perhaps, reclaim his lost manhood.

He spied the shadow of some phantom, stirring near the doorway to the tomb, then disappearing behind a rock. Was it one of the guards, or a tomb robber? He was no longer afraid—at this moment he could have faced them all—no one would dare to harm the Pharaoh of Egypt! But he felt the force of a great blow as it struck the back of his head. He heard the sound of something shattering, the rocks were spinning, the stars growing distant, and the pain was beyond endurance. Then, all at once, darkness fell.

I wouldn’t have believed Lord Carnarvon could manage all the steps leading to the mouth of the tomb. The lady held fast to his arm as they stepped over the rubble. Then they paused to look at me, breathing hard. They did not believe that I had anything worthwhile to offer them. I approached the old man, held out my hand, and took his arm to help him keep his balance as we descended along the passageway. The lady stood where she was, hesitating, and when I approached her she raised her eyes as if seeing me for the first time, and held her hand out to me. Incredulous, I took it, and slowly escorted her down the passage. Still she was altogether cold, casting openly doubtful glances at me. The men who had done the excavation were looking down at us from above, smelling of sweat, their faces coated with dust. But their part in the proceedings was finished. She held her delicate nose with one hand, but left the other hand in mine until she stood beside her father. She had relinquished some of her pallor, her face flushed with exertion.

I pointed out the cartouche bearing the name of the king, explaining to them the meaning of the hieroglyphic inscription. Then we proceeded on into the tomb. The air grew hot and stifling, and Lord Carnarvon paused several times to catch his breath. We came to a halt before the blocked-off wall that stood between us and another epoch, with all its secrets and illusions. The breathing of the men watching from above could be heard resounding in the passageway, but none of them dared come any closer. From a distance a faint sound reached us, like that of wolves howling, although we were in broad daylight. I took up a small pickaxe I had placed there specially, next to the wall, and struck the first blow . . . then the second. The wall was no more than a barrier of brittle clay, with space behind it: the as-yet-undiscovered tomb of a king. A small crack opened before us, emitting thickly musty air, laden with the odor of decay, and of pitch and camphor—ancient air, which had lain dormant for so many eons. Lord Carnarvon clutched his chest and began to cough violently. The lady seized his hand and patted it, glaring at me once again. At last the air grew still. Flying insects, grayish in color, swarmed about, but dispersed on encountering the outer air. Lord Carnarvon, recovering, stood up straight. I wanted him to take a look through the crack, but he indicated that he would not be able to manage it, and I dared not ask the lady. I lit the electric lamp, and directed the beam through the opening, into the interior chamber. What I glimpsed was like a dream: the shimmer of a golden mirage, glowing despite the darkness that had accumulated since the beginning of time. With an effort, Lord Carnarvon spoke to me.

“Can you see anything?” he said.

“Yes,” I replied. “Wonderful things.”