That night Renisenb had a dream.
She was with Khay, sailing with him in the Barque of the Dead in the Underworld.
Khay was standing in the bows of the boat - she could only see the back of his head.
Then, as they drew near to sunrise, Khay turned his head and Renisenb saw that it was not Khay but Kameni.
And at the same time the prow of the barque, the serpent's head, began to writhe.
It was a live serpent, a cobra, and Renisenb thought: "It is the serpent that comes out in the Tombs to eat the souls of the dead."
She was paralyzed with fear.
And then she saw that the serpent's face was the face of Nofret and she woke up screaming:
"Nofret - Nofret..."
She had not really screamed - it was all in the dream.
She lay still, her heart beating, telling herself that none of all this was real.
And then she thought suddenly:
"That is what Sobek said when he was killing the snake yesterday. He said: 'Nofret'..."
Chapter 7 FIRST MONTH OF WINTER, 5TH DAY
Renisenb's dream had left her wakeful. She slept after it only in snatches, and towards morning she did not sleep at all.
She was obsessed by an obscure feeling of impending evil.
She rose early and went out of the house.
Her steps led her, as they did so often, to the Nile.
There were fishermen out already and a big barge rowing with powerful strokes towards Thebes.
There were other boats with sails flapping in the faint puffs of wind.
Something turned over in Renisenb's heart - the stirring of a desire for something she could not name.
She thought,
"I feel - I feel -" But she did not know what it was that she felt!
That is to say, she knew no words to fit the sensation.
She thought,
"I want - but what do I want?"
Was it Khay she wanted?
Khay was dead - he would not come back.
She said to herself,
"I shall not think of Khay any more.
What is the use?
It is over, all that."
Then she noticed another figure standing looking after the barge that was making for Thebes - and something forlorn about that figure - some emotion it expressed by its very motionlessness struck Renisenb, even as she recognised Nofret.
Nofret staring out at the Nile.
Nofret - alone.
Nofret thinking of - what?
With a little shock Renisenb suddenly realized how little they all knew about Nofret.
They had accepted her as an enemy - a stranger - without interest or curiosity in her life or the surroundings from which she had come.
It must, Renisenb thought suddenly, be sad for Nofret alone here, without friends, surrounded only by people who disliked her.
Slowly Renisenb went forward until she was standing by Nofret's side.
Nofret turned her head for a moment, then moved it back again and resumed her study of the Nile.
Her face was expressionless.
Renisenb said timidly: "There are a lot of boats on the River."
"Yes."
Renisenb went on, obeying some obscure impulse towards friendliness:
"Is it like this, at all, where you come from?"
Nofret laughed, a short, rather bitter laugh.
"No, indeed.
My father is a merchant in Memphis.
It is gay and amusing in Memphis.