That was what death did to you.
"I felt this," you said.
"I felt that -" but you only said it, you did not now feel anything.
The dead were dead.
There was no such thing as remembrance...
Yes, but there was Teti.
There were life and the renewing of life, as the waters of the yearly inundation swept away the old and prepared the soil for the new crops.
What had Kait said:
"The women of the household must stand together"!
What was she, after all, but a woman of a household - whether Renisenb or another, what matter?...
Then she heard Kameni's voice - urgent, a little troubled.
"What are you thinking, Renisenb?
You go so far away sometimes... Will you come with me on the River?"
"Yes, Kameni, I will come with you."
"We will take Teti too."
II
It was like a dream, Renisenb thought - the boat and the sail and Kameni and herself and Teti.
They had escaped from death and the fear of death.
This was the beginning of new life.
Kameni spoke and she answered as though in a trance...
"This is my life," she thought, "there is no escape..."
Then, perplexed:
"But why do I say to myself 'escape'?
What place is there to which I could fly?"
And again there rose before her eyes the little rock chamber beside the Tomb and herself sitting there with one knee drawn up and her chin resting on her hand...
She thought: "But that was something outside life.
This is life - and there is no escape now until death..."
Kameni moored the boat and she stepped ashore.
He lifted Teti out.
The child clung to him and her hand at his neck broke the string of an amulet he wore.
It fell at Renisenb's feet. She picked it up.
It was an Ankh sign of electrum and gold.
She gave a little regretful cry. "It is bent. I am sorry.
Be careful -" as Kameni took it from her - "it may break."
But his strong fingers, bending it still further, snapped it deliberately in two.
"Oh, what have you done?"
"Take half, Renisenb, and I will take the other.
It shall be a sign between us - that we are halves of the same whole."
He held it out to her, and just as she stretched out her hand to take it, something clicked in her brain and she drew in her breath sharply.
"What is it, Renisenb?"
"Nofret."
"What do you mean - Nofret?"
Renisenb spoke with swift certainty.
"The broken amulet in Nofret's jewel box.
It was you who gave it to her... You and Nofret... I see everything now.
Why she was so unhappy.
And I know who put the jewel box in my room.
I know everything... Do not lie to me, Kameni.
I tell you, I know."
Kameni made no protest.