Flowers of Evil, page 24
“Yahyah,” Neferet whispered. “So that’s how.”
Pen-buy cut open a second and third then a fourth and a fifth bouquet. Only two of them were solid. The others all contained a hidden surprise. The florist’s face had grown set as if he was struggling with the painful but inevitable conclusion.
“Look!” Bener-ib said. “The ones with poppies at the top have sepen inside. The ones with other flowers don’t.”
“That’s how they marked the ones to send south.” Pretty clever.
“Three out of five? So few of the day’s bouquets are real and destined for the Ipet-isut? That’s shocking,” Pen-buy stammered. “No wonder the books were confused.”
Neferet shrugged. “Maybe most of the contraband came at the very end of the night like this. Perhaps they thought you’d be less likely to examine the flowers closely after you’d seen thousands of them and time was running short.”
Pen-buy pinched the bridge of his nose as if he was overwhelmed. “No matter how closely I looked, I wouldn’t have seen anything. How can I thank you for bringing this all to light? Take this sepen, I beg you. You’re doctors. You can use it for something good.”
“We’ll take a few blocks, but it really belongs to the king. It’s contraband, after all. We’ll tell the soldiers to collect it.” Neferet picked a nice rock or two and pushed the rest away. “They may make you tear up your poppy fields.”
“That’s all right. Beautiful as the flowers are, I’d rather not remember this awful experience.”
They bade the man goodbye and wished him a blessed festival on the morrow. It was, when all was said and done, the commemoration of the family dead, and he had more than his share of them all at once.
As they trudged away toward home, readier than ever for a few hours of sleep, Bener-ib said, “I really would like to see Djed-har one more time. He must have lost much of his arrogance. I think most of it was defensive anyway. We must have posed a terrible threat to his profitable side business.”
“No point in tending to his health now, Ibet, my girl,” Neferet said dryly. “They’ll probably put him to death before he dies of natural causes.”
“Oh, I know,” she murmured, dropping her eyes. “I just...”
Neferet realized that this was something Ibet really wanted, although she would never push for it. She always formed an extremely close bond with her patients. “Well, why not? We can say hello to Pa-kiki while we’re at the garrison. Papa said he’s become chief scribe down there.”
Mut-tuy rolled her eyes and made a dramatic expression of martyrdom, but despite her, the three continued past their own neighborhood, where their beds awaited them, down to the vast walled enclosure of the garrison, with its grim towers at every corner. It had the look of a place where malefactors might be held, to emerge only as corpses.
“I’m the sister of the chief scribe, Pa-kiki,” Neferet announced at the gate. “May we speak to him?”
“I’m sorry, my lady,” said the soldier on guard. “He’s in consultation with General Har-em-heb’s adjutant and can’t be disturbed.”
“Ah! Pa-ra-messu is here in Waset? That’s all right. We’ll see him tomorrow. Please take us to see the prisoner Djed-har, then. We were part of the party that arrested him.”
The soldier looked conflicted. “I’m not sure I can.”
“Ask Commander Menna. We were with him.”
He dodged off to consult with Menna, and a moment later, that officer himself appeared, as cheerful and welcoming as always, despite the sleepless night of activity.
“Lady Neferet! Still up? What can I do for you?”
“We’d like to see the prisoner Djed-har, if you don’t mind. Professional courtesy, you might say.”
His toothy smile faded. “Oh, my lady, you weren’t aware, were you? When we went to arrest the healer, we found him dead. I seized his old servant, just in case he could answer any questions. If you want to talk to him...”
Neferet and Bener-ib exchanged looks of surprise and sorrow.
“All right. Let’s see him,” Neferet said.
In a somber mood, they trooped after the officer into the courtyard of one of the buildings. Tied up to rings in the wall were all of those arrested in the affair. Imi-seba and several sun-blackened workmen occupied a reluctant proximity. The two priests kept to themselves, away from the lower-caste men who surrounded them. Djed-har’s desiccated old servant crouched by himself, his face in his hands.
“Hello,” said Bener-ib, touching his shoulder.
The old man’s head jerked up. He gaped at the three women expressionlessly. “My master is dead.”
“That’s what they tell us. Was it his liver after all?” Bener-ib squatted at his side.
“No, mistress. He... He ended his life. He said he didn’t want to be tortured and put to death by the soldiers. I’m sure the gods will forgive him.”
“They may forgive him that, but I don’t know about making sepen to smuggle to the men of Ta-nehesy. That would go against his oath to heal,” said Neferet severely.
“He meant no harm,” said the old man, all his hauteur drained out. “He always said the gods liked to see people happy and relaxed. It was sacred, like drunkenness.”
“But he had to know that without a doctor to set a precise dose, that stuff is really dangerous. It’s not like water lily. I’m afraid he was lying to himself, just like he lied to everybody else about us and about his qualifications. I suppose he wrecked our dispensary too.”
“N-Not personally. He sent me to do it. He said it wouldn’t hurt anybody. You could afford to replace everything.”
Neferet made a noise of disgust. “As if that makes any difference. There are people who had to go untreated because we didn’t have supplies. I’m afraid your master was just making excuses for himself. He was a baaad man.”
Bener-ib got to her feet. “I’m sure they’ll let you go,” she said kindly. “None of this was your doing.”
From across the court, a peremptory voice that couldn’t pronounce its Rs said loudly, “You, over there! Have you come to set us free?”
Neferet shot an impatient glance at Pu-im-ra. She’d had about enough of men who thought they could do anything they wanted. “Wait your turn,” she said in an equally loud voice.
With deliberate slowness, she strolled over to the two priests. They were in the full morning sun and had to squint to look up at her. A trickle of sweat already dribbled from beneath Tetiky’s wig.
“Good morning,” she said cheerily. “I have just one question. How did you meet Djed-har? He seems a little below your circle of tony friends.”
“Through a servant of mine. He lived in the old man’s neighborhood and knew he had flexible morals.” Pu-im-ra seemed pleased with his ingenuity. Perhaps he’d misinterpreted Neferet’s dangerous good humor.
“He’s dead, you know. He preferred to die rather than face what you’re going to suffer. Say goodbye to your nose and ears, friends.”
Pu-im-ra froze for a moment. “Hasn’t the First Prophet intervened? He’ll get us released.”
“I don’t know anything about that,” she said with a careless shrug. “If he has any honor, he’ll surrender you to the worst sort of capital punishment. You’ve stolen from the god and from the king.”
“But we’re priests. We’re hemu-netjer. You can’t do that to us!”
“I’m not doing it. The king is. Or he could just turn you over to a large and ferocious dog, like your fellow conspirator.”
The two men exchanged wide-eyed looks of horror.
“Or impalement,” said Muy-tuy with gusto.
“Who’s that bloodthirsty child?” demanded Pu-im-ra in an unsteady tone.
“The voice of the people, Rabbit, my friend.” With a smug smile, Neferet and her companions turned and moved away.
Behind her, she could hear Pu-im-ra murmur, “‘Rabbit’? What does she mean by that?”
And Tetiky, in a voice that suggested he enjoyed breaking the news to his superior now that he had nothing to fear from him, said, “That’s what those common criminals called you, my lord. We all did.”
⸎
The next day was the festival in which the king and the Hidden One and his family mounted their golden barques and journeyed across the River to pay their respects to the late kings of the Theban dynasty. Of course, the last few rulers had been buried in the hellhole known as the Horizon of the Aten, so mostly, that meant the late, lamented Neb-ma’at-ra and his ancestors. And with the gods, the inhabitants of Waset flocked to the west bank to feast with their own dead. It was one of those holidays that was a little somber and mostly joyous—a celebration of family, living and dead.
Just as she had done when she was a child, Neferet’s nieces and nephews had made little boats of papyrus to set loose on the River and leave at the family tomb. Bener-ib and Mut-tuy had tried to show the orphans how to make some for their own father, but most of the children were too small, and all of them were too unruly, so Hu-may and his elder sister had done it themselves. Soon would come the best part of the day—the uninhibited family banquet with their deceased relatives, right there in the courtyard of the tomb. Plenty of beer and picnic dishes. And meat roasted at the edge of the desert over fires that twinkled into the twilit sky until late in the endless summer evening.
Neferet and Bener-ib had herded the children to Neferet’s parents’ house early in the morning so they could get into position in the floating procession. Now they waited on the deck of Papa’s cheery red-and-green yacht, while Sati and Maya and their brood and Pa-kiki and Mut-nodjmet and their little ones clambered on board, laughing and screeching, papyrus boats clutched in their hands. Aha would join his wife’s family until later, when he’d make a visit to his own ancestors.
Neferet leaned on the gunwales with her forearms, gazing out across the sparkling waters at the magnificent divine barges gathering at the temple quay. Everything was as bright and full of color as a tomb painting—or the flower fields. She took a deep sniff of the rich, overripe River.
“Could things get any better?” she dreamily asked Bener-ib at her side. “Ma’at has been done, and all’s right with the good gods’ creation. Here we are with our family, and everybody’s healthy, and it’s a beautiful day.”
Bener-ib leaned against her with her shoulder. “It’s wonderful, all right. I just wish my parents weren’t buried so far away.”
Neferet turned to her with her mouth open. She’d never actually thought about that. “Oh, that’s right. They’re buried at Sau. Some year, we need to go up there for the Beautiful Festival of the Valley so you can feast with them.”
“But nobody celebrates it up there.”
“No?”
“There are no kings buried there. And no Ipet-isut.”
Neferet gave a pondering hmmm. So many things she had never considered. “Well, you’re part of our family now, anyway, my Sweet Heart.”
From farther down the boat, Uncle Pipi’s voice, excited as a child’s, rose. “The User-het-amen is raising its anchors. They’re getting ready to move, everybody!”
The whole family crowded to the same side of the yacht, squeezing together for the best view of the divine barque as it glided majestically into the stream in the wake of its tugboat. Neferet lifted Tiry in her arms, while Qen and Shu-roy and the older orphans glued themselves to the gunwales.
“How many boats are there, Tiry?” Neferet asked the toddler.
“Hamtau,” Tiry answered promptly with her favorite number. As if to confirm, she held up four stubby fingers.
Mut-tuy snorted and shook her head in disgust. “Stupid. You said three, but you held up four fingers. Neither one of which is right.”
Neferet was on the verge of correcting the adolescent for spoiling the day’s joyous atmosphere with her bad temper, but it occurred to her that it probably wasn’t very happy for Mut-tuy. On this feast of family closeness, she had to be highly conscious that she herself had no family except for her siblings—her father and grandfather were dead, and her mother had abandoned them all. Neferet would have slipped an arm around the girl, but such a gesture probably wouldn’t have been well received.
The little girl in Neferet’s arms began to chew on something she was holding.
“Wait, what’s this, Tiry?” Neferet said, extracting a crumpled papyrus boat from the child’s fist. “You were supposed to put this in the water—and I don’t mean the water inside your mouth.” She straightened it out and noticed that there was writing on it, which wasn’t unusual—Lord Ptah-mes had given them a sheaf of used papyrus to cut up. But the content caught her eye. And the date.
“Why, this just came yesterday—and it’s addressed to me!” Neferet caught Bener-ib’s eye, puzzled. “Who wrote to me? I never saw any letter.” She deciphered the lines that remained and burst out laughing. “A servant must have mixed it up with the old pieces. It’s from some exorcist priest. He says he lifted the curse and sent it back on the one who cast the spell. I thought our luck had turned!”
And so, sadly for him, had Djed-har’s. Curses were powerful things and cut two ways.
Another reason to be happy. “Here, Mut-tuy—one more boat to put at your father’s tomb.” She passed the chewed and spindled thing to the girl with a wink. “Tiry knew what she was doing.”
And Mut-tuy, who had been under the curse, too, grinned with relief in spite of herself.
Neferet threw an arm around her and gave her a sisterly squeeze. “Thanks for all your help, my girl.”
After that, the User-het-amen slid the smaller barques of Mother Mut and Khonsu, son of the Hidden One, and finally the king’s own gilded boat. The royal lad sat under the golden sunshade, as still and solemn as a god in his cabinet.
“That’s Har-em-heb beside him and the queen, isn’t it?” asked Papa. He and Mama stood arm in arm like the king and queen of their own familial nation.
Only then did the other vessels slide into the current, their backwash churning the white dots of the children’s paper boats that floated like flower petals on the swirling water. Among them glided Papa’s little red-and-green boat with its Bes-head prow and cargo of excited children.
“Look, there’s Lord Ptah-mes’s yacht. His children will all be there to visit Lady Apeny’s tomb.” Neferet pointed against the sun at the long, sleek black-and-green craft.
“Are you going to visit his family tomb, my love?” asked Mama. “That would be a nice gesture after everything he’s done for all of us.” She stooped to stroke back the hair of Beket-iset, who lay on her couch at her side, smiling with joy.
“Later,” Neferet said. “It’s much more fun with you people.”
Grandfather chuckled. “They don’t seem like a particularly jolly bunch, it’s true. Whereas we...” He linked arms with his two sons. “We’re one of the jollier bunches. Right, boys?”
“Right!” everyone cried in unison, and their warm laughter echoed over the water.
Neferet wished she could preserve this moment forever—all these family members in good health and in love, the woman of her heart at her side, this gold-and-blue day washed in sunshine. But we’re heading west. Isn’t that what all of life is—sailing to the West in the company of those you love?
As so often happened, Ibet seemed to have read her thoughts. She said quietly, “I guess the families of all those men who were condemned for smuggling aren’t so happy today.”
“But they chose to side with Chaos,” Neferet said, a little miffed that her joy should be tarnished.
Bener-ib nodded, looking philosophical.
On the other side of Neferet, seemingly too far away to have heard their conversation, Baket-iset said, apropos of nothing, “Only the god knows a man’s heart. Not everybody who does evil is evil.”
Neferet had to admit that Sen-em-iah seemed to have been a well-loved person, and people were rarely well loved without deserving it. She hoped that Pen-buy’s prayers would get his father through the Weighing of Hearts. But she wasn’t so sure about Pu-im-ra and the others. She had a feeling Ammit the Devourer was going to feast.
“Did we get any of the blessed flowers?” Sati asked.
“Of course.” Mama smiled. “I saw to it we got some of the ones that had been closest to the god, right in the sanctuary. They’re all piled in the kiosk, out of the sun.”
“From flowers to wives—only the finest for our family,” Papa said fondly, pressing Mama to his side.
Exchanging a look with Bener-ib and Mut-tuy, Neferet snickered. “Better check inside those bouquets, though!”
THE END
HAVE YOU ENJOYED THIS book? Here is a sample from the next Hani’s Daughter Mystery, Web of Evil:
CHAPTER 1
It was late in the season of Akhet, Harvest, and the precocious heat of spring had only intensified. Neferet and Bener-ib hadn’t been sorry to deliver the children to the farm to spend a few weeks in the relative cool of the open countryside. They themselves came nearly every weekend holiday, when Mama and Baket-iset, Sati and her children, and Mut-nodjmet and her brood were also likely to be around.
“This is perfect for the orphans,” Neferet said, staring after the little ones, who had just gone running off amidst a pack of over-stimulated cousins. Even the baby crawled after them, crying, until the nurse scooped him up. “If this gang can’t wear them out, nobody can.”
“And maybe they’ll learn some manners by example,” grumbled Mut-tuy. She was the oldest of the orphans, although at thirteen, she no longer considered herself a “little one.” Her Horus-lock of childhood had fallen to a rebellious chop of the knife a few months ago, but the hair that would become her maiden braids still only stuck out about a thumb’s length from her scalp.
It wasn’t a good look, Neferet had to admit, eying the girl from the corner of her eye. Mut-tuy was tall, skinny and flat-chested. Her face promised beauty later in life, but now, everything was awkward elbows and big feet. The ruthlessly cropped hair didn’t help.
