Lauren Haney: Cruel Deceit

“We all had a hand in it, yes.” One of the guards, an older man, pointed at the young priest. “Meryamon called for help and we came running. Thanks to the lord Amon, it hadn’t yet gotten out of control and was confined to the one small room. On the floor mostly, burning some scrolls and…”

The words tailed off and he licked his lips, uneasy with the memory. “We dared not let it reach the roof for fear it would spread to the adjoining storage magazines. We keep aro matic oils in this block and if they were to catch fire…” He had no need to explain further. A major conflagration might have resulted, sweeping through, at the very least, this sector of the sacred precinct.

“You did well,” Amonked said, letting his gaze touch every man among them. “You’re to be commended for such swift action.”

Bak peered through the door. A small room had been walled off from the rest of the storehouse. Illuminated only by the natural light falling through the door, it was too dark to see well. The body lay in shadow, the floor around it clut tered with charred papyrus scrolls and the reddish shards of broken pottery storage jars. The dead man’s clothing was wet, as were the documents lying in the puddle around him.

The smell was stronger here.

“We need light,” he said, “a torch.”

The boy sped down the lane and vanished. In no time at all, he hurried back with a short-handled torch, its flame ir regular but free of smoke.

Bak took the light and stepped into the room. He tried not to breathe, but the stench of blood, fire, body waste, burned oil, and charred flesh caught in his throat. As accustomed as he was to death, he felt ill. Swallowing bile, hardening his heart, he walked deeper inside. Careful not to disturb any thing on the floor, he knelt beside the dead man. Amonked entered the room, gasped.

The body was that of a sharp-faced man of about thirty five years, small and wiry. The fire, which had burned many of the scrolls lying around him, had consumed one side of his kilt and had darkened and blistered the right side of his body. A blackened oil lamp, a possible source of the fire, lay broken at his feet. His throat had been cut, the gaping wound dark and ugly. The pool of blood around his head and shoul ders had been diluted by water, making it difficult to tell ex 32

Lauren Haney actly how much the man had lost, but quite a lot. Bak guessed he had been lifeless when the fire started. He prayed such had been the case.

“Do you know him?” he asked Amonked.

“Woserhet.” Amonked cleared his throat, swallowed. “He was a ranking scribe, but was to serve throughout the Opet festival as a priest. He’d been given the responsibility for this year’s reversion of offerings.”

The daily ceremony was one in which food offerings were distributed as extra rations to personnel who toiled in the god’s mansion and to others who petitioned for a share. Why would a man who held such an important but transitory and innocuous task be slain?

“I’d guess the slayer stood behind him, reached around him knife in hand, and slashed his throat with a single deep and firm stroke.” With an absentminded smile, Bak accepted a jar of beer from the boy who had brought them from the barque sanctuary over an hour earlier. “He was slain in much the same way as the Hittite merchant we found dead last week.”

The boy, wide-eyed with curiosity and thrilled at being al lowed to help, handed a jar to Amonked and another to

Meryamon. Taking the remaining jar for himself, he plopped down on the hard-packed earthen floor of the portico that shaded three sides of the open courtyard. After the dead man had been carried off to the house of death, he had brought them to this peaceful haven in one of several buildings that housed the offices of the priests and scribes responsible for the storehouses.

“You believe Maruwa and Woserhet were slain by the same man?” Frowning his disbelief, Amonked pushed a low stool into the shade and dropped onto it. “What would they have in common?”

“Both men’s lives were taken in a similar manner, that’s all I’m saying.” Bak gave the Storekeeper of Amon a fleeting smile. “To tie the two together would be stretching credibil ity. Unless there was a link between them that we know nothing about.”

“One man was burned and the other wasn’t,” Amonked pointed out. “Would not that suggest two different slayers?”

“Probably.” Bak rested a shoulder against a wooden col umn carved to resemble a tied bundle of papyri. “What task do you have, Meryamon, that delayed you in leaving the sa cred precinct?”

The young priest sat on the ground near Amonked. His eyes darted frequently toward the portal and the men hurry ing along the lane outside on their way to the gate, eager to watch the procession. Whether intentional or not, his desire to follow was apparent. “I distribute to the officiating priests items used in the sacred rituals: censers, lustration vessels, aromatic oils and incense, and whatever else they need.”

Pride blossomed on his face. “I perform the task throughout the Beautiful Feast of Opet, yes, but also for the regular daily rituals and the various other festivals.”

“A position of responsibility,” Amonked said.

Meryamon flashed a smile. “I daily thank the lord Thoth that I was diligent in my studies and learned to read and write with ease and at a young age.” Thoth was the patron god of scribes.

The leaves rustled in the tall sycamore tree in the center of the court, and Bak spotted a small gray monkey swinging through the upper branches. “So you’re not a man who serves the lord Amon periodically. You earn your bread within the sacred precinct.”

“Yes, sir. And I dwell here as well. I share quarters with several other priests who, like me, have yet to take a spouse.”

Bak glanced at Amonked, thinking to defer to him, but the

Storekeeper of Amon urged him to continue with a nod of the head. “Tell me of the men who helped put out the fire.

Why did they remain behind?”

“Most were passersby, heading out to watch the pro 34

Lauren Haney cession. The three guards, I assume, were ordered to stay, to keep an eye on the gates and patrol this sector of the sacred precinct.” Meryamon smiled ruefully. “Bad luck for them, having to stay while their mates were given leave to play.”

Bak felt as if he were fishing in a muddy backwater, pok ing his harpoon at random in a place he couldn’t see. “The room where Woserhet was found. What was its purpose?”

“It’s a records storage room, sir, a place where we keep scrolls on which are recorded activities conducted in that particular block of storage magazines. Each object is tracked from delivery to disposal. Like other men with similar tasks,

I make a note of each and every object I remove and return, and many of my own transactions are stored there.” A shadow passed across the priest’s face. “Or were.”

“The room received a moderate amount of damage, but a considerable number of scrolls lay on the floor. Do you have any idea how many records might’ve been lost?”

“I noticed a number of empty spaces-fifteen or twenty,

I’d guess-on the shelves along the walls and quite a few broken storage pots on the floor. So many jars would’ve con tained a significant number of scrolls, but the vast majority, I thank the lord Amon, were saved.”

Amonked broke his silence. “How well did you know

Woserhet, Meryamon?”

“Not at all, sir. I’ve seen him now and again and I knew his name, but I didn’t know he was responsible for the rever sion of offerings.”

Amonked looked skeptical. “Are you not the man who’ll supply ritual implements and incense to that ceremony?”