"Careful!" Bak ducked away from the body dangling between Nebwa and Ptahmose, in the skiff above him. "We've no wish to fish him out again."
"We sped to your rescue fast enough," Nebwa said, winking at his sergeant. "We can surely hang on to your catch."
Bak ignored the gibe. The less said, the sooner Nebwa would stop his infernal crowing.
"Let's pull him in." Ptahmose adjusted his grip on the man's upper arm. "Now!"
The pair gave a mighty heave. The vessel rocked, sending Bak and Imsiba, who were clinging to the hull, bobbing up and down in the water. The body dropped into the skiff with a sodden thump and an expulsion of air that reeked of decay. Nebwa, Bak noticed with a secret smile, swallowed hard. Evidently the taste of palm wine did not mix well with the stench of death.
Nebwa managed a lopsided grin. "The next time you overturn your boat, I pray you'll find, a trophy sweeter to the nostrils."
"Stop babbling and move him out of the way," Imsiba growled. "One more mouthful of water and the weight of the silt I've swallowed will sink me to the bottom."
Amid grunts and curses, Nebwa and Ptahmose manhandled the deadweight forward and seated the body high in the prow. While they stared at the swollen, terror-filled face, Bak scrambled on board. He clung to the mast, which stood naked, the faded red sail crudely wrapped around the yards. The stench made him queasy, and he felt waterlogged. Imsiba tumbled aboard to collapse on a beam. The effort of removing the sail from the capsized skiff and stuffing it in the hole so the boat could be towed had worn them out.
They had long since drifted past Buhen, but not until Bak looked back did he realize how far. The fortress was nothing more than an indistinct speck of white in the distance. "Commandant Thuty will not be pleased with us today," he said grimly.
Ptahmose, a veteran of many years who valued his lofty rank of senior sergeant, jerked his gaze from the body, hastily changed places with Bak, and began to shake out the sail. Imsiba scooted aft to the rudder.
Turning his thoughts to the more immediate problem, Bak knelt beside Nebwa. The slain man's face he could see with his eyes closed, but he had yet to get a good look at the swollen body. The skin was gray-white. Pale blotches and ragged tears marked flesh scraped by rocks or other obstacles. A foot with three toes and a missing finger marked the passage of hungry fish or some other carnivorous creature, perhaps a crocodile too young and small to hold on to its feast. Bak had seen worse, for the river was a cruel burial place, but the sight never failed to bring a prayer to his lips that he would die far away from its waters.
He aimed a questioning glance at Nebwa, who had served in Wawat for years and knew many of the men in the garrisons strung along the river. "Do you recognize him?"
"Never saw him before." "Ptahmose?"
The sergeant, who was raising the upper yard, glanced again at the body. "No, sir," he said and turned away to adjust the braces.
Imsiba swung the skiff against the current. The sail rippled in the breeze, caught a stronger gust, and ballooned. The prow sliced through tiny wavelets, holding a course that would carry them to the quay.
Bak studied the lifeless man, picturing him as he had looked when alive and unhurt. The face had been well formed, as flawless as a statue of Maatkare Hatshepsut idealized by the sculptor to make her youthful. Dark eyes, dark regular brows, short red-brown hair curling as it dried in the sun. The body had been of the same perfection, with shoulders and waist and hips, even the height, so well proportioned they would fit a pattern drawn by a master artist. The thigh-length kilt was made of the finest linen and the belt was fastened at the navel by a bronze clasp tangled in the fabric. A ring of gold encircled one finger, its bezel broken and the stone, a scarab most likely, missing.
"A man of quality, from the look of him," Bak said. "A highborn officer?"
Nebwa reached for the hem of the kilt and rubbed the fabric between his fingers. "Maybe a merchant. Some of them, those who have ships above the Belly of Stones and trade with the tribesmen far to the south, have become men of wealth."
Bak rocked forward to take a closer look at the belt clasp. He could see a portion of an embossed design, the profile of a bearded man, a god. "He's no merchant, that I can promise you, but he might be an envoy of our sovereign." "Wouldn't that make Thuty gnaw his fingernails!"
Curious, Bak untangled the fabric and tilted the clasp so they both could see. The twin-feathered crown of the lord Amon rose above the tiny profile. Framing either side were what looked like sheaves of grain but were actually clustered spears. The design represented the regiment of Amon, Bak's old regiment in the capital.
His eyes narrowed. "Impossible!"
"What is?" Nebwa demanded. "What's wrong?" "Not long before I left Waset, a few of the officers, men like me who joined the regiment of Amon soon after Menkheperre Tuthmose took command, began to wear this clasp as a symbol of pride in a military unit we helped rebuild. This man was not one of us."
"Are you sure? His face is so deformed his own brother might have trouble recognizing him."
"I left the regiment less than a year ago, Nebwa. I'm not likely to forget my fellow officers so soon." Bak's voice took on a hard edge. "Even if he joined after I left, he'd have no right to wear the clasp."
He eyed the misshapen face and his anger ebbed. However the man had gotten the clasp, whether by theft or wager or trade, he had surely been repaid a hundredfold for his deceit.
Without allowing himself to think, Bak reached toward the slain man. The task he had to perform was necessary, but one he always dreaded. He pushed his thumb and forefinger into the corners of the cold, clammy mouth, caught hold of the wooden object he had initially thought a tongue, and tugged. The thing resisted and he lost his grip. Swallowing the bile rising in his throat, he shoved his fingersdeeper, tugged harder. A wooden handle popped out and a bronze blade followed. The lifeless head dropped forward, chin on chest.
Bak's eyes darted from the gory weapon-a long, slim chisel-to the drooping head. As he realized what had happened, a chill crawled up his spine. The handle, a handsbreadth long and stained red, had filled the man's mouth. The narrow blade, half again as long as the handle, had been plunged deep into his throat. The flattened metal at the end, sharp and ragged from long use, had torn the flesh, making him bleed inside until he could no longer breathe.
Nebwa shuddered. "What kind of man could take another's life in so cruel a fashion?"
"One_ filled to overflowing with hate." Bak scooted closer to the body to examine the right wrist and the left. Neither showed the bruises or chafing of a rope. "Or so filled with anger he went mad." He ran his fingers through the damp, curling' hair, but could find no lump.
"We'll soon reach the quay," Imsiba said. "Do you wish Ptahmose and me to off-load the body and see it reaches the house of death while you report to the commandant?"
"Off-load it, yes," Nebwa said, "but find somebody else to carry it away. We vowed to return these skiffs to Meru before nightfall, and that you must do."
Across the prow, Bak saw the northern quay close ahead, glimpsed a sailor relieving himself over the stem of a cargo vessel nestled alongside. Farther upstream, a short distance above the southernmost quay and well out in the current, lay the place where the skiff had struck the tree. His thoughts followed the current up the river to where it flowed out of the Belly of Stones. The man had come from there, he felt sure, but from how far away? How long in those waters could a body remain intact?
Ptahmose groaned. "I'd rather face Commandant Thuty than that old devil Meru. When he sees we've holed his skiff, his cries of woe will be heard all the way to Ma'am."
"All men have to dance to the music of an untuned lyre once in a while," Nebwa said.
Bak glanced toward the lord Re, hanging low on the western horizon, then weighed the commandant's summons against the need for information. "Imsiba and I will return the skiffs. We'll drop you two off at the quay and we'll sail on-with this man's body-to the place where the fishermen beach their boats. I've questions that can be answered only by men who earn their bread on the river."
Imsiba voice$ the question in the other men's eyes. "Should you not first report to the commandant, my friend?"
"The days are very hot, Imsiba, and unkind to the dead. This body will soon lose its color and form unless it's dealt with in the house of death. I wish the fishermen to see it now, before any further change takes place."
"Well, Meru, what do you think?" Bak didn't know which was worse, the cloying scent of death, the reek of the grizzled fisherman hunkered on the opposite side of the body, or the rank odor of fish emanating from the half dozen skiffs beached along the shore.
Meru, his mouth puckered in thought, rocked back on his bony haunches and scratched the inside of his thigh. "He died at the hands of another, I'd say."
Imsiba shook his head as if unable to cope with so ridiculous a statement. Three younger fishermen, stark naked, smirked at each other over the nets they were spreading out to dry on rickety driftwood frames.
Bak, well acquainted with the games the villagers played, implored the lord Amon to give him patience. "Your years have given you wisdom, old man, but even I, in my youth, can see how he lost his life."
"Could've been…" Meru eyed the body; his torn fingernails worked their way toward his dirty, tattered loincloth. "Could've been thrown from a ship up by the Belly of Stones."
"Don't be an ass, Meru!" Imsiba nudged the old man's shoulder with a knee, not hard enough to tip him over but with enough force to remind him that he could end up sprawled facedown on the ground. "No ships have sailed beyond Buhen all week."
"Look at this man, Meru." Bak pointed to the blotches and tears on the waxen skin. "Read these marks on his body and tell me of his travels upriver."
The old man leaned over his spread knees, scratched a buttock, and studied the injuries. "Came through the Belly of Stones, as I see you've guessed."
"Surely not all the way," Bak objected. "Semna, the southernmost fortress, is several days' march from here. I've heard many crocodiles inhabit the waters between here and there."
"Crocodiles. Boulders to block his path. Trees and brush to snag him. Quiet pools and backwaters he could float into with no way out." Meru shook his head. "Couldn't have been in the water long. A day and a night at most." "Where did he come from, do you think?"
"Never gone far into the Belly of Stones, you understand, but from what I've heard from men who have…" The old man pursed his lips and drew his brows together, making a great pretense of reaching a conclusion. "Suppose he could've come from as far away as Iken. Water may be high enough now to carry him that far." His skeptical tone negated the words even as he spoke them. "Don't know. The river up there spits out what it swallows as often as not. And what it holds in its mouth, it gives as an offering to the lord Sobek." The crocodile god.
Bak stood up, satisfied Meru had told him all he could. The fortress-city of Iken, he had heard, was as large as Buhen, a trading center where men from all walks of life came together. A good place for a man pretending to be more than he was, or for one who took as his own what belonged to another.
"Do you have anything more to say for yourselves?" Commandant Thuty demanded.
"No, sir," Bak and Nebwa said together.
Thuty rested his elbows on the arms of his chair and scowled at them over pyramided fingers. He was a short man, and broad, with powerful muscles accented by the light and shadow playing on his body from a torch mounted in a wall bracket next to a closed door. His brows were heavy, his chill firm, and the hard set of his mouth had been known to make strong men quake in their sandals.
"You're men who should set an example for those who look to you for guidance. A good example." Thuty looked pointedly at Nebwa: "Neither excessive drunkenness…" His eyes swiveled toward Bak, standing beside his friend. "… nor foolhardy behavior that leads to the destruction of another's property will lead them along a path of right and order."
"No, sir," his victims chorused.
The commandant frowned at each man in turn, letting the time stretch. To prevent himself from fidgeting, Bak concentrated on the items in the sparsely furnished, but cluttered reception room. Around the commandant's chair stood a half dozen three-legged stools and two low tables. A spear, bow and quiver, and shield lay against- one wall; baskets overflowing with papyrus scrolls surrounded the chair; and toys, a few of them broken, were strewn across the floor. Each time Bak entered the room, he was dismayed by its disreputable appearance-and saddened by memories of the previous commandant's widow, who had made the room a haven of quiet elegance for her husband while still he lived.
At last Thuty spoke. "I see no need to say more. You're men of mature years, old enough to recognize the error of your ways. Now sit down and tell me of the man you found."
Relieved at getting off so lightly, Bak drew a stool close to a second door, which stood ajar to allow a breath of tepid air now and again to drift down a dark stairwell from the roof. Nebwa shoved the door fully open and rested a shoulder on the jamb. Bak described the way he had found the body and how it looked.
"A man of quality or a scoundrel." Thuty expelled a long, unhappy sigh, stood up, and crossed the littered floor to open the main door. Children's laughter and merry squeals sounded in the courtyard outside. A welcome breeze carrying the odors of onions and fish wafted through the room and up the stairwell. "We must assume the former, I fear."
Nebwa sneaked a wink at Bak. "We mustn't risk neglecting a man whose father may have powers far greater than our own."
"You're an admirable officer, Troop Captain," Thuty said in a wry voice, "but I fear for your future if you don't soon learn respect for the political necessities."
"I've ordered the mortuary priest to- do nothing for now," Bak said, cutting off any incautious reply Nebwa might make. "With luck, I'll learn the slain man's name before his condition is such that he must be buried."
"With luck," Nebwa said, "a courier will arrive in the night, bringing news from another fortress of a missing man."
Thuty strode to his chair and adjusted the thick pillow on the seat. As he sat down, a child's laughter turned to shrieks. The commandant's voice took on a sharp edge. "If I don't soon receive a message, his garrison commander will have much to account for."
"He was probably slain no more than a day ago." Bak had to raise his voice to be heard over the wailing child. "No competent officer would report him gone before making a thorough search."
"He may've been sent on a mission outside his garrison," Nebwa pointed out. "If so, he might not be missed for several days."
Bak shook his head. "Neither a desert tribesman nor a villager would leave a bronze chisel in his throat. Even if damaged beyond repair, they find ways to reuse the metal."
"Are you implying his life was taken by a man of Kemet inside the secure walls of a fortress?" Thuty leaned back in his chair, wove his fingers together atop his head, and eyed Bak with a slight smile. "You've not yet learned his name, Lieutenant. Don't you think it too soon to reach so unpleasant a conclusion?"
Bak gritted his teeth to keep himself silent. The guess was premature, he had to admit, but he could think of no other theory that made more sense. "I'll go to the scribal office building at first light tomorrow. If he came south from Kemet on board a ship, he'll have registered his purpose there on his way upstream. The scribes will surely remember him. His face and body were as well formed as those of a god."
"And if he failed to make his presence known?" Nebwa asked.
The wailing increased in pitch, betraying a temper tantrum. Thuty's mouth tightened. "We must assume he slipped around Buhen on one of the desert tracks."
Nebwa grimaced. The failure of the garrison patrols to prevent nomadic tribesmen from bypassing Buhen without paying the necessary tolls was a sore point with the commandant, one he brought up at every opportunity.
Bak, irritated as much by the child as by the verbal arrows, rose from his stool, crossed the room, and firmly closed the door, stifling the yowling to a whimper. "If so, he's the scoundrel I took him for when first I saw the belt clasp, and we must worry more about what he's been doing upstream than whether or not he's a man of importance."
Thuty eyed the door, or maybe Bak, with what might have been a smile of approval. "Report to me, Lieutenant, as soon as you learn his name. If he was the soldier he appears to be, I must send a courier south to his commanding officer." He added, with obvious regret, "If he was of noble birth, and his slayer remains unknown, I fear you must travel upriver to look into the matter."
"Me, sir?" Bak was surprised. Other than one journey to a distant gold mine, his duties had never taken him more than a couple hours' walk from Buhen.
Nebwa frowned. "That man's death isn't Bak's responsibility! It falls on the shoulders of his garrison commander."
Thuty laced his fingers across his stomach. "Late yesterday I received a message from the capital giving me additional authority over the garrisons along the Belly of Stones." His eyes shifted to Bak. "As this includes maintaining order, I've decided to entrust you with the resolution of all major offenses against the lady Maat that occur within my chain of command. Not four hours ago I sent word to that effect to the garrison commanders and the viceroy."
Bak smiled, delighted with the news and flattered. The commandant had never before shown any special regard for him as a policeman or an officer. "I appreciate your confidence, sir."
Thuty acknowledged his thanks with a nod.
Happiness gave way to caution and Bak's smile faded. "If I must go upriver, it should be soon. Searching for a man bent on escaping justice is like tracking a wild creature across the desert. The older the signs he's left behind, the fainter they become."
"Too many questions remain unanswered to make the decision now. And I've another matter to discuss, one equally important if not more so."
Bak felt deflated. Before he had entered the room, it had never occurred to him that he might be allowed to do more than learn the dead man's name and where he came from. Now that he knew he might have the responsibility of searching for the slayer, he longed to get on with it. What could be more important than balancing the scales of justice?
Thuty bade him and Nebwa be seated, settled back in his chair, and reached for a stemmed drinking bowl standing on the table near his elbow. "About two months ago, a courier came through Buhen on his way to Kemet. He carried a message from Amon-Psaro, a powerful tribal king from the land of Kush. Perhaps you know of him."
Bak had heard the name but knew nothing of the man, whose sphere of influence lay far to the south, well beyond the Belly of Stones.
Nebwa grew thoughtful. "A man to be watched. One who has great influence over the other kings in that wretched land. I'd not like to face the army he could gather if ever he should find a reason to make war on the land of Kemet."
"Nor would I," Thuty agreed. "We, with the other garrisons on the Belly of Stones, would be the first to face him. I doubt we'd have the strength to hold him back long enough for reinforcements to come to our aid."
"Has a trader or someone else with business in the south committed an offense Amon-Psaro can't overlook?" Bak asked.
"Not at all." Thuty's smile came and went in an instant. "His firstborn son, a child of ten or eleven years and heir to the throne, suffers from an illness no physician has been able to cure. The courier carved a message to our sovereign, Maatkare Hatshepsut herself, asking that the lord Amon be sent to Kush to heal the boy."
"I can well imagine the physicians who live in that vile place," Nebwa scoffed. "Little more than daubers of tainted mud, would be my guess."
"Not a request lightly refused," Bak said.
Thuty nodded. "The lord Amon and the physicians traveling with him set sail as soon as they could. Almost a month ago."
No wonder the commandant hopes to avoid the problem of the slain man! Bak thought. The god would pass through Buhen and travel up the Belly of Stones, and the responsibility for his safety and well-being would rest on Thuty's shoulders.
Thuty stretched out his legs, crossed his ankles, and sipped from his bowl. "Even then, couriers came and went, one after another. Because the fortress of Semna lies at the head of the Belly of Stones on the border of Wawat and Kush, it was selected as the meeting place. Ceremonial etiquette was established, and the numbers and ranks of those who would accompany each party were decided." He took another sip and set the bowl on the table beside him. "I chose the two of you to stand among them."
A broad smile spread across Nebwa's face. "We're to travel to Semna with the god?"
All thought of the slain man fled. Bak's disappointment faded to a shadow, and he imagined himself joining the priestly retinue. Then memory of the body hanging over him in the water intruded. "When is the lord Amon expected, sir?"
"Two days, three at most."
Bak almost laughed aloud at the absurdity of the situation. The god and the dead man would most likely demand his attention at the same time. He could see no way of serving both.
Thuty settled deeper into his chair. "You, Nebwa, will provide the men who'll haul the god's barge out of the water and pull it upriver past the worst of the rapids in the Belly of Stones."
Nebwa's face fell at so menial a task.
"Your men will toil only as far as Iken," Thuty reassured him. "From there, each garrison commander will assign his own men to pull the vessel past his segment of rapids, while the river pilot at Iken will assume the responsibility for towing the barge up the navigable stretches of water." He paused for Nebwa's nod, then continued. "You've a second task of greater importance. You must select thirty of your best men. Your responsibility and theirs will be to guard the lord Amon with your lives. He's the greatest of the gods to us, but to the wild men of the desert he's a statue of gold and a temptation for those who seek easy wealth."
Balk was puzzled. "What am I to do if not provide guards?"
"You're to select ten of your Medjays. During the journey to Semna, they'll stand watch over the lord Amon with Nebwa's men. 'Once there, they'll serve as guards of honor to Amon-Psaro."
Bak's heart swelled with pride. To be given so exalted a task was an honor indeed.
"You'll stand at the head of your men…" Thuty's expression soured. "…provided you're not needed upriver to resolve that wretched man's death. If you must search for his slayer, your sergeant, Imsiba, will stand in your place."
Bak bowed his head in acknowledgment, so torn by his own contradictory wishes he could think of nothing to say. He longed to go to Iken, or whatever fortress the slain man had come from, to prove himself worthy of Thuty's confidence. But he also yearned to travel with the lord Amon, to share his men's joy and honor as they served the god and the Kushite king. Could he somehow manage to do both?