Lauren Haney: Cruel Deceit

In no time at all, she allowed him into the stall. He hated to blind her, but decided he couldn’t trust her outside the en closure and especially on the gangplank. He flung the tunic over her head. Talking all the while, he led the trembling mare out of the stall, across the deck, and onto the gang plank. She snorted and held back as she felt the slope be neath her hooves, but she obeyed.

Nebwa, who had spoken not a word throughout, followed them onto the shore, staying well clear lest he frighten the horse. A unit of harbor patrolmen awaited them at the bot tom of the gangplank. The officer who stood at their head or dered the men back, giving the mare plenty of room and no reason to fear. With solid ground beneath her feet and Bak’s soothing voice filling her ears, her trembling subsided. He tore the tunic from her head and handed her over to Nebwa who, talking to her as gently as Bak had, led her to the mouth of a narrow lane where Imsiba waited.

The patrol officer came forward and identified himself as

Lieutenant Karoya. He was a tall, slim young Medjay who had a tribal tattoo on his left upper arm. “Well done, sir.”

“I hope some of your men know horses, Lieutenant.

We’ve fifteen more to take off that ship.”

“I’ve three men who can help. All served as archers in the regiment of Amon and were assigned to chariotry compa nies.” Beckoning the trio, he studied the ship and its excited cargo. “Have you any idea what’s frightening them, sir?”

“A snake, we think. We’ll need three or four men with cudgels to keep watch.”

A half hour later, Bak led the last animal off the ship.

“Now,” he said to Karoya, “let’s see what made those horses so afraid.” He let his eyes travel over the empty stalls and the hay and grain at the bow. “The lord Amon alone knows what we’ll find.”

The young officer nodded. “I saw the ship arrive this morning, a couple of hours before you summoned me, but I paid no heed after that. With so many people coming early for the festival and the market so busy…” He smiled rue fully. “Well, you can imagine how it is, sir. Many vile crimi nals have come to prey upon the law-abiding.”

A harbor patrolman took the horse from Bak and led it to the mouth of the dead end lane. There several other mem bers of the harbor patrol were preparing to lead the calmed and willing animals to the garrison stables, where they would be cared for until their owner could be found. Nebwa, whose lofty rank would cut short any official resistance, would go with them.

Bak suggested that he, Karoya, Imsiba, and a half dozen harbor patrolmen conduct a sweeping search of the deck, be ginning at the bow. After the young officer sent the rest of his men off to keep an eye on the market, they crossed the gangplank and walked forward.

While his mates stood by, brandishing their cudgels, one of the harbor patrolmen took up the long pole used to probe the depths of the river so the vessel would not run aground and prodded the sheaves of fodder and hay in front of the forecastle. A low moan sounded from within the mound.

Bak and the others looked at each other, startled. The patrol man cautiously dug away the straw. In moments, he exposed two sailors bound tightly together. Both were senseless, but one had begun to come around.

Bak exchanged a worried glance with Imsiba and Karoya.

No snake had attacked these men. They had no doubt been left to guard the cargo. If the horses, as valuable as they were, had not been taken, what else of value had been on board?

Leaving Imsiba to bring the sailors to their senses and the patrolmen to continue their sweep of the deck, Bak hurried sternward. The smells of hay and manure dwindled as he walked alongside the deckhouse, a lightweight, portable structure built of slim poles walled and roofed with colorful reed mats woven in a chevron pattern. In air less pungent, he caught a whiff of an all-too-familiar metallic odor. Mutter ing an oath, he swept aside the mat that covered the doorway and looked inside. The interior was gloomy, heavily shad owed, but the man on the floor lay in the long slab of light that entered through the opening. Bak had no doubt he was dead. His throat had been cut, the wound deep and gaping.

His head and upper body lay in a pool of drying blood.

Smelling death, the horses had panicked.

“Karoya!” he called.

Taking care not to step in the reddish puddle, he knelt be side the body. The weapon was nowhere in sight, but it had to have been fairly long and very sharp and the man who wielded it strong.

Karoya pounded up the deck. He peeked inside, spat out a curse, and tore several mats off the wall to allow more light to fall on the scene. The body was that of a man of about forty years. His light brown hair was held back from his broad, clean-shaven face in a single thick braid that lay coiled in the blood. He wore a long-sleeved, knee-length tu nic fastened at the shoulders with ornamental bronze pins. A gold signet ring adorned the middle finger of his right hand; he wore several plain gold bangles on his left wrist and an amuletic pendant around his neck.

“A man of Hatti,” Bak said.

“Maruwa, he’s called.” Karoya swallowed hard, looked away from the body. He appeared close to being sick. “I should’ve guessed when I saw the horses that he’d come back to Kemet.”

Bak pretended not to notice the younger officer’s discom fort. “You know him?”

“I’ve seen him here at the harbor, but that’s all. He came regularly-every six months or so-to bring animals from the land of Hatti to revitalize the bloodline in the royal sta bles.”

The shadow of a man fell over the body. “What’s going on here?” he demanded. “That’s Maruwa! What’s happened?

Where are his horses? Where are the sailors I left on guard?”

Karoya caught the man’s arm and forced him back, away from the deckhouse. “This is Captain Antef, sir. Master of this ship.” He stared hard at the seaman. “Where have you been, sir? Where are all your men?”

The captain, a once-handsome man going to fat, stiffened his spine, pulled his head back, and stretched to his greatest height. “I did as I always do, as regulations require. I went to customs to report our arrival, to give them a copy of the manifest and arrange for an inspector to come aboard as quickly as possible.” He glared at Bak. “Who are you?

What’s happened here? Did someone steal Maruwa’s horses, slay him?”

By this time, the search party had realized something was wrong other than a snake and they, too, had come to the deckhouse.

“Where are the members of your crew?” Bak asked the captain.

“Why should I tell you? I don’t know you. As far as I know, you’ve no business here at all.”

“Answer the question!” Karoya snapped.

Antef flung a resentful glance at the Medjay officer. “I left two men on guard and permitted the rest to leave the ship. I saw no reason for them to remain. Maruwa said he’d stay behind to look after his horses, and the rest of the cargo was of no exceptional value.”

“When did you last see Maruwa?” Bak asked.

“I bade him good-bye as I left the ship. He was on deck, tending the animals.”

“How long ago was that?”

“Two hours at most. Probably less.”

“The men told us they were struck from behind and that’s the last they remember,” Bak said. “They had no idea how long ago, but sailors on a nearby ship last noticed them and Maruwa about a half hour before the horses began to fret.”

Mai, the harbormaster, paced the length of his second story office and back again to stand before the broad open ing in the wall that looked out upon the harbor. He stared at the ships and the people wandering through the market, but the grim expression on his face told the men who stood be fore him that his thoughts were with the dead man. “The reason for the slaying could not have been a theft gone wrong?”