Another unwanted gift, this representing the fourth death, that of Lieutenant Dedi trampled by a horse.
He hurried to Kasaya, squeezed his shoulder to calm him, and knelt beside the disgusting object. The foreleg was dry and bloodless, the creature from which it had come long dead. The meat inside the melon had begun to dry on the surface, but was glistening wet beneath. The ghastly thing had been left some time after midday, he guessed, after the archer had disappeared in the rapids. Even if the man had somehow managed to survive, he could not have left this awful gift.
Chapter Ten
"Will you see the governor today?" Psuro asked.
Bak knew what the Medjay really wanted to know: whether or not they were soon going home to Buhen. "I think it best we go on as before, making no reports until we've something substantial to say."
Psuro gave him a pained look. "But sir!"
Bak took the basket from the old woman and handed her a plastered wood token for the garrison quartermaster so she could collect the grain due her. As she shuffled away, he grabbed the uppermost of the two stools Psuro had stacked, one upside-down on top of the other, on which to place the food if by chance they had already gone when she delivered it. Swinging the seat upright, he sat down and lifted the lid from the basket. The aroma of fresh-baked bread wafted out, competing with the smell of braised fish, which she had wrapped in leaves and placed atop the bread.
A low moan drew his eyes to Kasaya, who was lying on his sleeping pallet, face to the wall, suffering from the previous evening's overindulgence.
"The instant I tell Djehuty about the archer, he'll send us packing. How will we account to the vizier if later, ten days from the day of Hatnofer's death, when we're well on our way to Buhen, a courier delivers a message that the governor's been slain?"
"He'd not be pleased," Psuro answered ruefully.
Bak spread open the leaves, took a flattish loaf still warm from the oven from beneath them, and laid a fish, equally warm, across the bread. Passing the basket to Psuro, he said, "We don't know for a fact that the archer's dead. I lived through worse rapids, thanks to the lord Amon. I know few men do, but…"
"Unless they know the waters well," Psuro cut in.
"If he knew the river, would he have allowed himself to be pressed so close to the island that he had nowhere to go but into the maelstrom?"
"No, sir."
Psuro took a loaf and a couple of fish from the basket. Winking at Bak, he knelt beside Kasaya and held the food close, giving the younger man 'a good, strong whiff. Kasaya moaned louder and shoved the offending hand away.
"Too much celebration," Psuro grinned. He walked to the stairs, sat down, and the smile faded. "And now you say we had no reason to make merry."
"The more I think about it, the more convinced I am that the gifts we've found here, the threat they imply, have nothing to do with the archer. The goal was probably the sameto get us out of Abu one way or another-but the means of reaching it was entirely different."
"Which of the two is the slayer?"
Bak took a bite of fish, thought over his answer while he chewed, swallowed. "I think the gift-giver the more likely. He has sufficient imagination to work out the patterns I spotted when first we came to Abu. I've seen no sign that the archer is that creative."
Psuro shivered. "I don't know which was worse: the rat or the melon."
"If the slayer still walks the halls of the governor's villa, as I believe, a dap or two more might bring forth the truth. If I err, and he died yesterday among the rapids, the worst we can do is to rouse some dormant tempers."
Psuto looked up from his meal, frowned. "I dread to think of what we'll find on our doorstep tonight."
"So far, the gift-giver has never thrown caution aside to enter the house in the full light of day. I think it safe to let you go about your business until an hour or so before darkness falls. Then I want you on the rooftop across the lane, your eyes locked on this house."
"You've only five more days, Lieutenant, and then-if your guess is correct-Djehuty will die." Amethu, seated on a low stool in the shade of a portico, glanced over the edge of the scroll open between his hands, giving Bak a quizzical look. "Are you closing on the slayer, or aren't you?"
"Perhaps." Bak stood before the steward, resting a shoulder against a slim wooden column. A yellow cat paced the floor around him, rubbing against his legs.
"Humph!" Amethu rolled the document tight and dropped it into one of three baskets lined up beside his stool. "You sound like a man who knows no more now than when these distressing events began."
"`Like the granite in the quarries south of Abu, sir, this problem I must solve is made of many tiny granules, some transparent, others opaque, all squeezed so tight together they're difficult to pry apart."
The steward gave him a sharp look, as if he suspected he was being made light of. "Have you thought to bend a knee before the lord Khnum? A plump goose or a tender young kid would make a worthy offering."
Bak vaguely recalled someone needling Amethu about religious fervor. "I fear he'll pay no heed without diligent effort on my part."
"Have you seen the shrine at the back of the god's mansion? The shrine of the hearing ear? I often go there. It's a quick way to seek the god's aid, convenient, providing solace in times of travail." Amethu's bright eyes darted toward Bak. "You, as a police officer, would find it of special comfort and worth. An image of the lady Maat is carved high on the wall, wings outspread to encompass all the world."
If the steward had not been such a staid individual, Bak would have suspected him of using talk of the gods to retaliate for his own comparison of granite with the problem of murder.
"Sir!" An earnest-faced young scribe hurried across the patch of bare earth outside the colonnade, ducked into the shaded portico, and presented a large chunk of broken pottery to the steward "Here's the inventory of linens, as you requested"
"So soon?" Amethu took the shard, glanced at the numbers, and scowled "Are you certain you counted all the uncut lengths, the sheets, the…"
"Our supply is very low, sir." The young man appeared untroubled by the implied criticism. "Over the past few weeks, we've sent a large quantity to the house of death. With so many people dying within these walls…"
"Yes, yes, yes." Amethu waved his hand, signaling silence. "The subject is one I prefer to forget. You've no need to remind me." He pursed his lips, thinking. "Go now to the men counting jars and dishes. They're certain to need your help. We've given no pottery away."
Puzzled, Bak watched the scribe hurry off. From the moment he had entered the compound, he had seen men scurrying hither and yon, writing pallets and water jars suspended by cords over their shoulders, carrying rolls of papyrus or baskets filled with limestone and pottery shards. Here, beneath the portico where Amethu sat, located at the end of three long, narrow warehouses, the activity was magnified tenfold.
"I've never before heard of anyone taking an inventory during the season of planting," he said. "Aren't your scribes needed elsewhere? Setting boundary lines, for example, or counting baskets of grain to send out to the fields as seed?"
Amethu's mouth tightened. "This was Djehuty's idea, not mine. All this work. All this interference in tasks for which he has no aptitude. The man should be taken into the fields and…" His mouth tightened, cutting off whatever punishment he longed to mete out.
Drowning in an irrigation ditch, Bak suspected. "From what I've seen and heard, he doesn't usually concern himself with the running of his household."