Three Novels of Ancient Egypt

More and more wracked with discomfort and fear, Zaya kept tossing and turning on her bed, first right, then left, as grimacing ghosts pursued her. Begging for sleep to rescue her, she tossed and turned ever more before slumber finally lifted her from the hellfire of damnation.

She awoke to the baby's crying. The sun's rays broke through the room's tiny window, carpeting the floor — with light. She took pity on the child, rocking him gently and kissing him. Sleep had alleviated her sickness and calmed her soul, though it had not rid her of worry, or her mind of torment. Yet the infant was able to divert her feelings toward him, saving her from the agony and afflictions of the night. She tried caressing him, but he sobbed even more as she confronted the problem of feeding him — which utterly perplexed her. Then she hit upon the only solution: she went to the room's door and knocked on it with her hand. An old woman came, inquiring what she wanted. Zaya asked the woman to bring her half a rod of goat's milk.

Carrying Djedef in her arms, she walked with him back and forth across the room, putting her breast into his mouth to soothe and amuse him. She gazed at his beautiful face and sighed with a sudden thrill that seemed to have slipped unnoticed into her heart: “Smile, Djedef— smile, and be happy — you will see your father soon.”

But no sooner had she sighed in relief than she said to herself fearfully, “Do you see how I won him despite everything? The issue of his true mother is finished — and of his true father, as well!”

As for his mother, the Bedouin had taken her prisoner, and she — Zaya — could do nothing to rescue her. If she had lingered another moment before fleeing, she too would have found herself but cold plunder in the hands of the barbarous nomads. There was no justice in taking the blame for a crime that she did not commit, so she felt no embarrassment. As regards Djedef's father, no doubt Pharaoh's soldiers killed him in revenge for helping his wife and son escape.

Thinking about these things reassured her. She went back over all of them again to appease her conscience, to put paid to the ghosts of dread and the harbingers of pain.

She told herself incessantly that she had done the most virtuous thing by kidnapping the child and running away, for if she had stayed at her mistress's side, she would not have been able to protect her against the assault — and would have perished with her, as well. After all, it was not within her ability to carry her or to give her shelter. Nor would there have been any mercy in leaving the child in Ruddjedet's arms until the men of Sinai killed him. She felt it was more of a good deed to flee, and to take Djedef — with her!

However torturous these thoughts, how lovely it was to wind up with Djedef by herself, not having to share him with anyone! She was his mother without any rival, and Karda was his father. As if she wanted to be confident of this fact she kept cooing to him, saying: “Djedefra son of Karda… Djedefra son of Zaya.”

The old woman came with the goat's milk. The make-believe mother began to nurse the infant in an unnatural manner until she thought that he had had his fill. Then there was nothing left for her but to get ready to go out to see Karda. She bathed herself, combed her hair, and put her veil over her shoulders, before leaving the inn with Djedef in her arms.

The streets of Memphis were crowded, as they usually were, with people both walking and riding — men and women, citizens, settlers, and foreigners. Zaya did not know the road to the Sacred Plateau, so she asked a constable which way to go. The plateau, he said, was “northwest of the Wall of Memphis — it would take two hours or more to get there on foot — a half hour on horseback.” In her hand she clutched the pieces of gold, so she hired a wagon with two horses, seating herself in it with serenity and bliss.