Three Novels of Ancient Egypt

What a gorgeous sight they make! If only she could, just once, taste motherhood, she would gladly give her life for it! O God! The Lord shows no compassion, nor does pleading help, nor will Karda forgive her failure. Perhaps before long she will become a mere divorcee, expelled from her home, wracked by solitude and the misfortunes of being unmarried.

Zaya shifted her gaze from the happy mother to the two oxen. “If only I had a son like that!” she said to herself. “What if I take this child and pretend that he is my own, after yearning that the gods would favor me with one by natural means?”

Her intention was not evil, rather, she was being wishful — as the soul wishes for the impossible — and as it wishes for what it would not do — from fear, or compassion.

Zaya wished away, while the heavens created happiness for her under the wings of dreams. In them she saw herself walking with the exquisite child up to Karda, saying, “I have borne you this gorgeous boy.” She saw her husband grin and jump for joy, kissing and hugging her and little Djedef together. Drunk from this imaginary ecstasy, she lay down on her right side, holding the two oxen's reins with one hand, while cradling her head with the other. She let her mind wander until she abandoned herself to the world of dreams, her eyes quickly numbed by the delicate fingers of sleep, veiled from the light of wakefulness, as the western horizon veils the light of the sun from the world.

When Zaya returned to the sensate world, she thought that she was greeting the morning in her bed in the palace of her benefactor, the priest of Ra. She stretched out her hand to pull the blanket around her, because she suddenly felt a cold breeze. Her hand dug into something that resembled sand. Amazed, she opened her eyes to see the cosmos blackened and the sky studded with stars. Her body felt a strange shaking — and she remembered the wagon, her mistress Ruddjedet with her little, fugitive child, and all the memories that the conquering power of sleep had snatched away from her.

But where was she? What time of night was it?

She looked around to see an ocean of darkness on three sides. On the fourth, she saw a feeble light coming from very far away, which undoubtedly emanated from the villages spread out along the bank of the Nile. Beyond that, there was no sign of life in the direction toward which the oxen were plodding.

The desolation of the world penetrated her soul, its gloom piercing her heart. A terrifying tremor made her teeth chatter with fear, — while she kept peering into the darkness — with eyes that expected horrors in unsettling forms.

On the dark horizon Zaya imagined that she could make out the ghostly shapes of a Bedouin caravan. She recalled what people said about the tribes of Sinai — their assaults on villages, their kidnapping of people who had wandered off the road or taken the wrong course, their interception of other caravans. No doubt the wagon that she piloted so aimlessly would be precious booty to them — with all the wheat it carried, and the oxen that hauled it. Not to mention the two women — over whom the chief of the tribe would have every right to drool. Her fear rose to the point of madness, so she stepped down onto the desert sands. As she did so, she looked at the sleeping woman and child, regarding their faces by the light of the pulsing stars. Without thought or plan, she reached out her hand and, lifting the boy up delicately, expertly wrapped the quilt around him, and set off in the direction of the city's lights. As she walked on, she thought that she heard a voice calling out to her in terror, and she believed that the Bedouin had surrounded her mistress. Her fear grew even stronger and she doubled her pace. Nothing would hinder her progress: not the heaping dunes of sand, nor the dear burden she carried, nor her enormous tiredness. She was like someone falling into an abyss, pulled down by their own weight, unable to stop their descent. Perhaps she had not gone too far into the desert, or perhaps she had covered more distance toward her goal than she could tell, because, beneath her feet, she felt hard-packed ground like the surface of the great Desert Road. Looking behind her, Zaya saw only blackness. By this time she had used up her hysterical strength: her speed slowed and her steps grew heavier. Then she fell down onto her knees, panting fearsomely. She was still insanely afraid, but couldn't move, like the victim pursued by a specter in a nightmare, but who cannot flee. She continued swiveling to her right and to her left, not knowing in which direction could come escape — or ruin.