Agatha Christie - Death Comes as the End

Nofret shook her head.

"No one can harm me," she said with a superb confidence. "If they did, it would be reported to your father - and he would exact vengeance. They will know that when they pause to think." She laughed. "What fools they have been - with their petty insults and persecutions! It was my game they played all the time."

Renisenb said slowly:

"So you have planned for this all along? And I was sorry for you - I thought we were unkind! I am not sorry any longer... I think, Nofret, that you are wicked. When you come to deny the forty-two sins at the hour of judgment you will not be able to say, 'I have done no evil.' Nor will you be able to say, 'I have not been covetous.' And your heart that is being weighed in the scales against the feather of truth will sink in the balance."

Nofret said sullenly:

"You are very pious all of a sudden. But I have not harmed you, Renisenb. I said nothing against you. Ask Kameni if that is not so."

Then she walked across the courtyard and up the steps to the porch. Henet came out to meet her and the two women went into the house.

Renisenb turned slowly to Kameni.

"So it was you, Kameni, who helped her to do this to us?"

Kameni said eagerly:

"Are you very angry with me, Renisenb? But what could I do? Before Imhotep left he charged me solemnly that I was to write at Nofret's bidding at any time she might ask me to do so. Say you do not blame me, Renisenb. What else could I do!"

"I cannot blame you," said Renisenb slowly. "You had, I suppose, to carry out my father's orders."

"I did not like doing it - and it is true, Renisenb, there was not one word said against you."

"As if I cared about that!"

"But I do. Whatever Nofret had told me, I would not have written one word that might harm you. Renisenb - please believe me."

Renisenb shook her head perplexedly. The point Kameni was laboring to make seemed of little importance to her. She felt hurt and angry, as though Kameni, in some way, had failed her. Yet he was, after all, a stranger. Though allied by blood, he was nevertheless a stranger whom her father had brought from a distant part of the country. He was a junior scribe who had been given a task by his employer, and who had obediently carried it out.

"I wrote no more than truth," Kameni persisted. "There were no lies set down; that I swear to you."

"No," said Renisenb. "There would be no lies. Nofret is too clever for that."

Old Esa had, after all, been right. That persecution over which Satipy and Kait had gloated had been just exactly what Nofret had wanted. No wonder she had gone about smiling her catlike smile.

"She is bad," said Renisenb, following out her thoughts. "Yes!"

Kameni assented. "Yes," he said. "She is an evil creature."

Renisenb turned and looked at him curiously.

"You knew her before she came here, did you nor? You knew her in Memphis?"

Kameni flushed and looked uncomfortable.

"I did not know her well... I had heard of her. A proud girl, they said, ambitious and hard - and one who did not forgive."

Renisenb flung back her head in sudden impatience.

"I do not believe it," she said. "My father will not do what he threatens. He is angry at present - but he could not be so unjust. When he comes he will forgive."

"When he comes," said Kameni, "Nofret will see to it that he does not change his mind. You do not know Nofret, Renisenb. She is very clever and very determined - and she is, remember, very beautiful."

"Yes" admitted Renisenb. "She is beautiful -"

She got up. For some reason the thought of Nofret's beauty hurt her...

II

Renisenb spent the afternoon playing with the children. As she took part in their game, the vague ache in her heart lessened. It was not until just before sunset that she stood upright, smoothing back her hair and the pleats of her dress which had got crumpled and disarranged, and wondered vaguely why neither Satipy nor Kait had been out as usual.

Kameni had long gone from the courtyard. Renisenb went slowly across into the house. There was no one in the living room and she passed through to the back of the house and the women's quarters. Esa was nodding in the corner of her room and her little slave girl was marking piles of linen sheets. They were baking batches of triangular loaves in the kitchen.

There was no one else about.

A curious emptiness pressed on Renisenb's spirits. Where was everyone?

Hori had probably gone up to the Tomb. Yahmose might be with him or out in the fields. Sobek and Ipy would be with the cattle or possibly seeing to the cornbins. But where were Satipy and Kait, and where, yes, where was Nofret?

The strong perfume of Nofret's unguent filled her empty room. Renisenb stood in the doorway staring at the little wood pillow, at a jewel box, at a heap of bead bracelets and a ring set with a blue glazed scarab. Perfumes, unguents, clothes, linens, sandals - all speaking of their owner, of Nofret who lived in their midst and who was a stranger and an enemy.

Where, Renisenb wondered, could Nofret herself be?

She went slowly towards the back entrance of the house and met Henet coming in.

"Where is everybody, Henet? The house is empty except for my grandmother."

"How should I know, Renisenb? I have been working - helping with the weaving, seeing to a thousand and one things. I have no time for going for walks."

That meant, thought Renisenb, that somebody had gone for a walk. Perhaps Satipy had followed Yahmose up to the Tomb to harangue him further? But where was Kait? Unlike Kait to be away from her children for so long.

And again, a strange disturbing undercurrent, there ran the thought:

"Where is Nofret?"

As though Henet had read the thought in her mind, she supplied the answer.

"As for Nofret, she went off a long time ago up to the Tomb. Oh, well, Hori is a match for her." Henet laughed spitefully. "Hori has brains too." She sidled a little closer to Renisenb. "I wish you knew, Renisenb, how unhappy I've been over all this. She came to me, you know, that day - with the mark of Kait's fingers on her cheek and the blood streaming down. And she got Kameni to write and me to say what I'd seen - and of course I couldn't say I hadn't seen it! Oh, she's a clever one. And I, thinking all the time of your dear mother -"

Renisenb pushed past her and went out into the golden glow of the evening sun. Deep shadows were on the cliffs - the whole world looked fantastic at this hour of sunset.

Renisenb's steps quickened as she took the way to the cliff path. She would go up to the Tomb - find Hori. Yes, find Hori. It was what she had done as a child when her toys had been broken - when she had been uncertain or afraid. Hori was like the cliffs themselves - steadfast, immovable, unchanging.

Renisenb thought confusedly: "Everything will be all right when I get to Hori..."

Her steps quickened - she was almost running.

Then suddenly she saw Satipy coming towards her. Satipy too must have been up to the Tomb.

What a very odd way Satipy was walking, swaying from side to side, stumbling as though she could not see...

When Satipy saw Renisenb she stopped short, her hand went to her breast. Renisenb, drawing close, was startled at the sight of Satipy's face.

"What's the matter, Satipy, are you ill?"

Satipy's voice in answer was a croak, her eyes were shifting from side to side.

"No, no, of course not."

"You look ill. You look frightened. What has happened?"

"What should have happened? Nothing, of course."

"Where have you been?"

"I went up to the Tomb - to find Yahmose. He was not there. No one was there."

Renisenb still stared. This was a new Satipy - a Satipy with all the spirit and resolution drained out of her.

"Come, Renisenb - come back to the house."