Mara, Daughter of the Nile Read Online Free PDF Page B

enough of pharaohs. Serve yours if you will—I will stay comfortably at home. And when young Thutmose tosses you aside like a worn sandal, come to me. Perhaps I can comfort you.”
    There was a pause. Then Sheftu said gravely, “You do not understand,
Haut Khofra
.”
    “Understand?” The old man frowned in surprise. “Certainly I understand. You wish me to come to Thebes as head of Hatshepsut’s troops, especially the two thousand of the bodyguard, who are sadly in need of training. You wish me to train them, inspire them, discipline them to blind obedience to me personally, so that at my word of command they will rise against the queen herself. I understand all this perfectly. What you do not understand, my boy, is that I have finished with pharaohs.”
    “But I do not ask it for pharaoh. I ask it for Egypt.”
    Khofra’s fingers stopped drumming upon the table. “Egypt?” he echoed.
    “Aye, my general! Have you never known that it was Egypt you served?” Sheftu left his chair to stand over the old man. “That empire you conquered—was that pharaoh’s? No, pharaoh is dead. It is Egypt’s! But by all the gods, how long can we keep it, with this pampered woman on the throne? All Syria is growing restive. The Kadesh, the Keftyew, they have not felt the point of an Egyptian spear since their graybeards were young, and they need to be taughtrespect. You think Hatshepsut will do it? Pah! She cares for nothing except building more temples—at whatever cost!”
    Sheftu broke off, breathing hard. Khofra’s still profile told him nothing, and he had a sudden terrible vision of returning to Thutmose empty handed. He leaned closer, gripping Khofra’s chair. “But Egypt cares! Egypt groans under taxes, while the empire slips away, bit by bit! With you in control of the Army, Hatshepsut can be overthrown, and Thutmose, who is a man and a warrior, can set things to rights.
Hai
, think, Khofra! Pharaohs come and go—what matter if one used you and tossed you aside and loved you not? Egypt loved you, and she needs you worse than ever before. She is sick! Will you let her die?”
    Still the old man sat motionless. Sheftu had done all he could, and he knew it. He straightened slowly, in a silence only intensified by the humming of bees in the acacia blossoms outside, and the shrill, far-off scream of an eagle. Khofra was looking at his hands, where they lay palm-down on the polished table. They were powerful hands still—blunt fingered and scarred and sinewy—and once they had gripped the mightiest sword in all Egypt.
    The general rose suddenly and walked to the open door, where he stood looking out at the sunny courtyard.
    “You are a remarkable young man, Lord Sheftu,” he murmured at last. “Remarkable and wise, for you have shown me a thing I never knew. So Egypt loved me!” He paused, and for a moment longer remained motionless, leaning against the doorframe. Then he turned back into the room. “Egypt needs me? So be it I will come.”
    “Blessed of Amon!” breathed Sheftu. He crossed the room and bowed low. “In pharaoh’s name, in Egypt’s name, I thank you,
Haut meryt
.”
    “I want no thanks. Up, my lord. It is I who thank you. You’ve cured an ache of twenty years’ standing—and at last made my life seem a reasonable thing.”
    “Reasonable? By all the gods, it’s glorious! Now, more than ever. This news—” Sheftu stopped, then suddenly laughed. “This news will cheer my prince so that he may even smile upon the Canaanite princess!”
    “Thutmose has sent for a Canaanite princess?” exclaimed Khofra.
    “Can you think so, my general? Nay, it is Hatshepsut who has sent for her. Thutmose wants no barbarian for a wife! He rages like the leopard of Upper Egypt at the very idea. It is just one more arrogant insult from that most arrogant of women, his sister. She holds him fast in a snare of politics and spies, and when he struggles, offers him this princess as one offers a toy to a fretful