"It is not so simple as that."
"Do you want to make trouble, Renisenb?"
"No. And anyway, what do you mean by trouble?"
"Everything that was said that day in the big hall had best be forgotten."
Renisenb laughed.
"You are stupid, Kait. The servants, the slaves, my grandmother - everyone must have overheard! Why pretend that things did not happen that did happen?"
"We were angry," said Satipy in a dull voice. "We did not mean what we said."
She added with a feverish irritability:
"Stop talking about it, Kait. If Renisenb wants to make trouble, let her."
"I don't want to make trouble," said Renisenb indignantly. "But it is stupid to pretend."
"No," said Kait. "It is wisdom. You have Teti to consider."
"Teti is all right."
"Everything is all right - now that Nofret is dead." Kait smiled.
It was a serene, quiet, satisfied smile - and again Renisenb felt a tide of revolt rise in her.
Yet what Kait said was quite true. Now that Nofret was dead everything was all right.
Satipy, Kait, herself, the children - all secure - all at peace - with no apprehensions for the future. The intruder, the disturbing, menacing stranger, had departed - for ever.
Then why this stirring of an emotion that she did not understand on Nofret's behalf? Why this feeling of championship for the dead girl whom she had not liked? Nofret was wicked and Nofret was dead. Could she not leave it at that? Why this sudden stab of pity - of something more than pity - something that was almost comprehension?
Renisenb shook her head perplexedly. She sat on there by the water after the others had gone in, trying vainly to understand the confusion in her mind.
The sun was low when Hori, crossing the courtyard, saw her and came to sit beside her.
"It is late, Renisenb. The sun is setting. You should go in," His grave, quiet voice soothed her, as always. She turned to him with a question.
"Must the women of a household stick together?"
"Who has been saying that to you, Renisenb?"
"Kait. She and Satipy -"
Renisenb broke off.
"And you - want to think for yourself?"
"Oh, think! I do not know how to think, Hori. Everything is confused in my head. People are confused. Everybody is different from what I thought they were. Satipy I always thought was bold, resolute, domineering. But now she is weak, vacillating, even timid. Then which is the real Satipy? People cannot change like that in a day."
"Not in a day - no."
"And Kait - she who was always meek and submissive and let everybody bully her. Now she dominates us all! Even Sobek seems afraid of her. And even Yahmose is different - he gives orders and expects them to be obeyed!"
"And all this confuses you, Renisenb?"
"Yes. Because I do not understand. I feel sometimes that even zhaiyuedu.com may be quite different from what she appears to be!"
Renisenb laughed as though at an absurdity, but Hori did nor join her. His face remained grave and thoughtful.
"You have never thought very much about people, have you, Renisenb? If you had you would realize -" He paused and then went on. "You know that in all tombs there is always a false door?"
Renisenb stared. "Yes, of course."
"Well, people are like that too. They create a false door - to deceive. If they are conscious of weakness, of inefficiency, they make an imposing door of self-assertion, of bluster, of overwhelming authority - and, after a time, they get to believe in it themselves. They think, and everybody thinks, that they are like that. But behind that door, Renisenb, is bare rock... And so when reality comes and touches them with the feather of truth - their true self reasserts itself. For Kait gentleness and submission brought her all she desired - a husband and children. Stupidity made life easier for her. But when reality in the form of danger threatened, her true nature appeared. She did not change, Renisenb - that strength and that ruthlessness were always there."
Renisenb said childishly: "But I do not like it, Hori. It makes me afraid. Everyone being different from what I thought them. And what about myself? I am always the same."
"Are you?" He smiled at her. "Then why have you sat here all these hours, your forehead puckered, brooding and thinking? Did the old Renisenb - the Renisenb who went away with Khay - ever do that?"
"Oh, no. There was no need -" Renisenb stopped.
"You see? You have said it yourself. That is the word of reality - need! You are not the happy, unthinking child you have always appeared to be, accepting everything at its face value. You are not just one of the women of the household. You are Renisenb who wants to think for herself, who wonders about other people..."
Renisenb said slowly: "I have been wondering about Nofret..."
"What have you been wondering?"
"I have been wondering why I cannot forget about her... She was bad and cruel and tried to do us harm and she is dead. Why can I not leave it at that?"
"Can you not leave it at that?"
"No. I try to - but -" Renisenb paused. She passed her hand across her eyes perplexedly. "Sometimes I feel I know about Nofret, Hori."
"Know? What do you mean?"
"I can't explain. But it comes to me every now and then - almost as though she were here beside me. I feel - almost - as though I were her. I seem to know what she felt. She was very unhappy, Hori, I know that now, though I didn't at the time. She wanted to hurt us all because she was so unhappy."
"You cannot know that, Renisenb."
"No, of course I cannot know it, but it is what I feel. That misery, that bitterness, that black hate - I saw it in her face once, and I did not understand! She must have loved someone and then something went wrong - perhaps he died... or went away - but it left her like that - wanting to hurt - to wound. Oh! You may say what you like. I know I am right! She became a concubine to that old man, my father - and she came here, and we disliked her - and she thought she would make us all as unhappy as she was - Yes, that was how it was!"
Hori looked at her curiously.
"How sure you sound, Renisenb. And yet you did not know Nofret well."
"But I feel it is true, Hori. I feel her - Nofret. Sometimes I feel her quite close beside me..."
