"Soldier of Sidon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Wolfe Gene)

3

WE ARE WARM, although not unpleasantly so. Myt-ser'eu fans me with a palm-frond fan. It cools her as well, or so she says, and waves away insects. Here I write, as Muslak has explained I must. He says a healer gave me this scroll and my cake of ink. My pen is a frayed reed. I dip it in the river and find it difficult to write as small as I wish.

Myt-ser'eu laughs at my letters and offers to show how her people write. Neht-nefret says she writes better. She will show me, not Myt-ser'eu. I will not let either have my pen, although this scroll is so long. I will write on both sides. Who can say where I can find another?

Muslak has sold all the hides in our hold. It took most of the morning. As soon as the money had been paid, we put out. This river is the Pre. Myt-ser'eu says there are three big rivers through this land, and many smaller ones. The Pre is the largest. She shows three fingers. This River Pre is the first. They come together farther south to make the Great River. After that, there is but one. She and Neht-nefret do not name it. It is the river. Muslak calls it the Great River, and says that Hellenes say Neilos or Aegyptos.

The fields to left and right are marvelously fertile. I do not believe I can ever have seen such fertile land. If I had, it would not surprise me as it does. Everything is green, dark and full of life. The crop this year will be bountiful. All these fields are as flat as my hand. Here and there, there are small hills. These have a house or two on them, or a village when they are larger, I suppose because they are less fertile than the fields. People who till the land cannot be rich, but these look well fed and seem busy and content. When we wave, they smile and wave in return.

The river is sea-blue or blue-green. It looks like good water, but Muslak says those who drink of it fall ill. Everyone drinks well water, wine, or something else in this land. I am going to ask the women about this. THEY SAY WE must not drink from the river at any season, and that it changes color to mark the changes of the year, now blue, now red, now green. We can wash ourselves in river water, but not mingle it with wine to drink. It will be bluer at Mennufer, Neht-nefret says. She has been there, though Myt-ser'eu has not.

Myt-ser'eu wished to know what I had been writing; I read it to her. The houses and villages are built on the hills so they will not be drowned when the river rises. Sometimes it rises very high, and then they are swept away and must be rebuilt. Neht-nefret says it is better to build on red land, but there is no red land here. I said I would make a raft of logs and live on that. She said wood was costly. NOW I HAVE seen a raft such as the people here build. It was of reeds. These would rot soon, or so I think. Being on this ship made me think of rowing. I believe I have done that-my hands know the loom of a sweep. I asked Muslak whether we would row when the wind died.

"It won't. The Great River is the best for shipping in the whole world, Lewqys. A north wind blows you up it for most of the year. When you want to go back down, you can furl your sail and let the current do the work."

That is marvelous indeed if it is true. Since we spoke I have seen a big boat rowed. The white oars rose and fell with the chant, so that it seemed to fly. It was gay with paint, the property of a rich man who lounged in the stern, and flew very fast, like a warship. Who could object? Such things fill the bellies of the poor.

Our ship is not like it, though it is painted too. Ours is wider and has a tall mast and a big sail. There are ropes to brace the mast, and others to hold the corners of the sail, which is sewn of many strips. There can be no loom wide enough to weave such a wide sail. When I spoke of this ship to Myt-ser'eu, she explained that the satrap wants it, and us.

"Don't your people build good ships?"

"The best in the world." Myt-ser'eu looked proud. "Our ships are the best, and our sailors the best."

I glanced at Muslak and saw that he smiled. He does not agree, and it seems to me that he must be right. Little skill can be needed to navigate this river, if it is as he says.

"Then why doesn't the satrap use your ships and your sailors?" I asked Myt-ser'eu.

"He doesn't trust us. The Great King treated us terribly in my mother's time. Now he is not here and things are better, but he fears we will rebel against him. Our soldiers are very brave."

I asked Muslak what he thought of them.

"They are," he told me. "Many fought for the Great King, and they're tough fighters-better than my own people are. We're sailors and traders. When we need soldiers, we hire mercenaries."

Looking at this green land, where barley shoots up wherever a seed is thrown, I can see that what Muslak said must be true. Only good fighters could hold it. If the people of Kemet did not make fine soldiers, it would be taken from them. OUR SHIP PASSES white temples as massive as mountains-mountains white as snow beneath this blinding sun, and sharp and pointed as any sword. Who would have thought human hands could make such things? Neht-nefret says the ancient kings are laid there. The people of Kemet built many temples, Muslak says, and very large ones, of which the mountain-temples are largest of all. If gods wished temples, would they not build them? They build mountains and plant forests instead, and that is what I would do were I a god. IT IS MUCH later. I am on the roof of our inn, where I write by lamplight. Myt-ser'eu is asleep, but I think I will wake her soon. I have read this scroll, and see that I must write. I will do this first, though I must hold the papyrus very near the lamp to see the letters.

We are staying here for the night, though most of the sailors will sleep on the ship. Muslak and Neht-nefret have a room on the floor below, but my river-wife and I sleep in this roof-bed. We are in a tent of nets, which seems very strange to me. The mosquitoes are evil here, she says, and her people sleep as high up as they can to escape them. The wind that blew us up the Great River blows the mosquitoes away, if they fly too high.

There was music and dancing tonight, which Neht-nefret and Myt-ser'eu wished to join. Muslak agreed to pay, and all four of us had a fine time. Everyone who was not dancing or playing the flute sang and clapped. I did not know the songs, but I clapped with the rest, and quickly picked up the choruses. The young women danced and danced, which was very pretty. Myt-ser'eu was the loveliest, and Neht-nefret had the most jewelry. All eyes were on them, which they greatly enjoyed as anyone could see. Three men played double-flutes while two beat drums. The young women swayed, stepped this way and that, shook rattles, snapped their fingers, and kicked higher than their own heads while we sang and cheered.

We did not drink wine, but "beer." It is a wine made from barley. I cannot imagine how a juice can be pressed from barley, but that is what Myt-ser'eu says and Muslak confirms. Chaff floats upon it, there is a taint of leaven. It is warm with cardamom and too heavy and sweet for my taste, but I drank two bowls because everyone else drank. Sucking up the beer through a tube of thin clay leaves the chaff on the bottom when the bowl is empty. When the evening was over, we played a game in which we broke our clay tubes. He who holds the longest piece wins.

At last the young women tired and the young men danced. It was an easy dance, so I joined it. I was not the best dancer and the rest laughed at my errors, laughter without malice that even a child could bear. I will dance better next time. The flute-players and drummers did not join our dance. All the women sang, most clapped, and Myt-ser'eu played her lute. When everyone was tired we drank more beer and washed in the river. She wears an amulet that protects her from crocodiles.

In what I read today I wondered about the sails I saw on roofs. This inn has such sails, and Myt-ser'eu explained them. There are holes in the roof below for both. One is open on the north-facing side and catches the north wind, directing it into the inn. The other lets the wind stream out again. The first is like the mouthpiece of a flute, the other like the little holes a player fingers. Our inn is the flute. When the wind blows well, as it does tonight, the rooms inside are cool and there are few mosquitoes because the doors and windows are shut. Myt-ser'eu says her people are the wisest in the world. I do not know that, but they are surely very clever.

I was a soldier in a city called Sidon. That is plain from what I read. I wish to go there and speak with those who may remember me. Muslak says that when we leave Kemet we will sail to his own city of Byblos, and that it is near Sidon. It will be easy, he says, for me to reach Sidon from there.

Now I will blow out the lamp and wake my river-wife. There are others sleeping on the roof. I do not think they could watch us even now. When the lamp is out, they will surely be unable to watch us through the nets, which are fine nets for small fish. These a man might see through in sunlight, but the other sleepers will not be able to watch even if they wake. I must remember to be quiet, and to hush Myt-ser'eu, who moans and trembles.