Chapter 6

Prince Kilgot took very seriously his charge to train his brothers. Kilgot worked their asses off, but they did advance very rapidly. I didn't know how long it would take for them to be as skilled as Kilgot, but I had my doubts of it ever happening. The reason: Kilgot learned as he taught! That was one smart kid, and he worked just as hard as he worked his brothers. Hell, I was proud of him, and I told him so.

Meanwhile, there was actually an attempt on the pharaoh's life. This was a little different because it took place outside of the palace. The pharaoh was being carried in state on the royal palanquin which had 12 bearers. This many were actually needed because of all of the decoration on that damned sedan chair. I don't know what it weighed, but I do know that the pharaoh's weight added damned little to the gross weight that the men had to carry.

Incidentally, these bearers were actually soldiers selected for their strength, of course, but also for their loyalty to the pharaoh. There was no question that these men were going to drop the palanquin and run if trouble showed up. Everyone had a khopesh clipped to his belt, and he was entirely capable of using it if the situation ever arose.

Naturally, protocol demanded that the pharaoh's personal bodyguards marched along beside him, but I was ordered to march at Pharaoh Alquot's immediate right during the procession. His right side was the most dangerous side because that was the side most easily attacked by a right handed assassin with a knife or sword. All of the regular bodyguards knew me, so there was no problem from them, but the priests were somewhat disturbed because a foreigner was closer to the pharaoh than they were. Somebody, I never did know who it was, told them to shut up, and they did. Believe me, I was thankful for small favors.

I had a short very private audience with the pharaoh before the procession. I wanted him to do exactly what Prince Kilgot had done when he was attacked; namely, I wanted him to duck under his palanquin so it could be lowered on top of him for maximum protection. He was reluctant to do that because the pharaoh could never show the slightest trace of cowardice. I pointed our that no such accusation could be made because his guard had requested that he do that. Well, okay, then it was acceptable. I explained the plan to the bearers, and every one of them was immediately in favor of the tactic.

The procession started, and it wound through the streets of Thebes headed toward the temple complex. We had hardly gotten started when a gang of 20 men came bursting from the crowd brandishing khopeshes and shouting curses upon the head of the pharaoh and his family. Oh, shit, the rest of the royal family was back at the palace. I hoped that this did not mean that they were in trouble.

The moment the trouble started, I grabbed the pharaoh's arm and pulled him from the palanquin. He rolled under the rig and his bearers carefully lowered it over him. It was going to take a flock of men to move that thing before they could get to the pharaoh. I figured that the pharaoh was now safe, so it was time to look after myself and to kill as many of the attackers as possible. Thank God, the crowd ran away and left the field to the fighting men.

The regular bodyguards all had spears and knew how to use them. The bearers had khopeshes and knew how to use them. I had a mace and a khopesh and knew how to use them. The upshot was that the attackers did not have a chance, and I wondered who could have been so stupid as to think that they did.

The battle lasted only five minutes or so, and most of the would-be assassins escaped simply because they made a point to stay out of reach of the Army spears. In fact, I never had a chance to swing either of my weapons because of the superlative work done by the soldiers. I planned to make a point of that to the pharaoh.

The whole attack was a farce, and I could see no point to it. Maybe I would find out later. In any case, the palanquin was lifted, and I helped the pharaoh to his feet. Immediately, several retainers rushed up to brush him off. He suffered through that as only a pharaoh could and stepped back into his seat in the palanquin. The procession resumed with no further delay, and I filled Alquot in on what had happened while we marched to the temples.

The very boring ceremonies were finally completed and we reformed the procession to return to the palace. Somebody with good sense had put more soldiers into the streets to act as guards, but nothing else happened as we returned home. Personally, I was very happy with that outcome, but I wondered who it was who was disappointed.

We arrived back at the palace to great rejoicing. I was happy because there had been no attack on the palace or within it, so my wife was safe. Sally was only a few weeks from her scheduled delivery, and the midwives were predicting a safe delivery and that the child would be male. That was important to the Egyptians, but I could not have cared less whether it was a boy or a girl.

Among the nobility and their hangers on, it was important that the first child be a boy. The first child was so often a boy that I would not be surprised to learn that any girls born first were simply allowed to die so as not to embarrass the mother. After the firstborn, it was a crap shoot because nobody cared. Well, just to be on the safe side, I made it known that I wanted the baby to survive, even if it was a girl.

Our child was a boy, and I was roundly congratulated on my luck. It just continued to show that I had the favor of the gods. Sally made a beautiful mother, and I made a point of telling her so every time I saw her, which was several times each day. Sally insisted that the baby be named William Ackerman, Jr., and such a long name, Williamackermanjunior, was very impressive to the Egyptians, but some scribes complained that it was going to make the next pharaoh have an inconveniently large cartouche if he chose such a long name.

Okay, Sally and I now assumed that we would live in Egypt for at least 15-18 more years so that our son would be an adult making his own way if he did not choose to join us when we left. We both had strong feelings that we had to move on eventually and not stay in Egypt indefinitely. Neither one of us knew why we felt this way, but we both just knew that it would happen.

Right now, my intention was to train Will to be as accomplished with kung fu as I was. If he had no other trade, he could make a good living training future soldiers and aristocrats in the art. I was not worried about him since I expected him to be as big as me, and that went a long way toward making one a good fighter, all other things being equal.

The palace ran on with routine stuff for about 5 months, then somebody put a bug in Prince Amtilptah's ear. He was the oldest of the three princes I had to deal with, and he was nominally the first in line for the throne. Seemingly, out of the clear blue sky, he decided that it was time for him to go on a hippopotamus hunt. Again, for some dumb reason, Alquot agreed with him and wanted to go, too. Oh, dammit, this meant that I had to go on the damned hunt.

Well, the other two sons decided that they also wanted to join in this great adventure, so I now had to babysit four "great hunters." The problem with this was that there was no way I was going to be able to discourage the madness because hunting hippos was a classic sport handed down from antiquity that all pharaohs had to love for political reasons. But, on that score, everything in Egypt seemed to me to be done for political reasons.

The hunt is done with a spear from a boat usually holding no more than five men: the hunter, the guide, and two paddlers. If I had to go, I was going to refuse to paddle! I hoped that I could get away with that. There was room enough in the boat for a fifth man, so I figured that would be me. Well, Prince Kilgot might go on the hunt, but Prince Kilgot was NOT going after a hippo. I knew that order would stand because it was issued by his mother, Queen Hepsol.