The Murder of King Tut Read online

  She had tended to her husband’s every fantasy, and when she couldn’t, Nefertiti directed his affections toward the harem girls, for it was common knowledge that no pharaoh, not even one as outlandish as Akhenaten, would marry a common whore.

  So it was that Nefertiti began to raise Tutankhamen as her own.

  The boy never knew his real mother, and though he had been told of her life and tragic death, he was still too young to fully comprehend being conceived in the womb of one woman and reared by the loving hands of another.

  “Did you want to see me, Mother?” He was so innocent-and yet so full of life. Nefertiti was overcome with warmth as she gazed upon the boy. She did love him, deeply, but not everyone in the court did. For some, he was already a hated rival.

  “Yes, Tut. Come. Sit next to me. Sit close to your mother.”

  Tut walked across the tile floor in his bare feet and plopped onto the divan next to Nefertiti.

  “I heard about the pharaoh,” he said softly. “I’m sorry.”

  She placed a hand underneath his chin and lifted it until his eyes met hers. “Your father hadn’t been feeling well for a long time,” she told him.

  “How did he die?” Tut asked next. Always the questions with him.

  She could never tell him the truth, but a lie didn’t feel right either. “He died in a burst of happiness. His heart was so filled with joy that it exploded.”

  There. Not so bad.

  “Tut, there’s something else we need to talk about. I need you to pay attention to what I have to tell you now.”

  “Yes, Mother?”

  “You are just a boy and have not yet been trained in the ways of the pharaoh. But you must know that this is your destiny.”

  The boy stopped her. “I don’t understand.”

  “You will be pharaoh one day, Tut.”

  “I don’t want to be pharaoh. I don’t! Why can’t you be pharaoh, Mother?”

  “It is not considered best for a woman to rule Egypt, Tut. But because I am of royal blood, I will find a way to rule for as long as it takes you to learn to be a great pharaoh.”

  “How long will that be, Mother?”

  “A dozen years, maybe less. Because you’re so bright, Tut. There is no hurry. The important thing is that you learn to be wise and strong and full of compassion for the people of Egypt, as your father was. He was a good man, always a good man.”

  “Smenkare would have made a good pharaoh,” said Tut. “And he was your son. This day must make you sad.”

  The boy was smart, which was probably why she loved him as she did.

  “Smenkare is dead, Tut.” She neglected to add that she had never loved her own son as much as she loved Tut. She had tried, but there was no light in Smenkare’s eyes, and she felt no connection between them. Someone like that should never rule Egypt, and it was almost fitting that the job would now go to this precocious boy at her side.

  “No, Tut. It must be you.”

  Tut simply nodded. “So what do I do next? Help me, Mother.”

  “See how we’re sitting here? You and me, right next to each other?”

  “Yes. Of course I do.”

  “This is how we will rule Egypt at first. Side by side, the two of us. For now I will make the decisions, because you are too young. But as you become a man, you will fill a bigger space and have the knowledge to make good decisions.”

  “Then I will rule as pharaoh?”

  “Yes, Tut. And I know that you will do great things. You will be a pharaoh people always remember.”

  Chapter 33

  Amarna

  1334 BC

  THAT WAS THE PLAN for the boy who would be king, though it didn’t turn out that way. Not even close. Once again death would intrude-perhaps even murder.

  “You live in a house full of women,” the military instructor informed Tut. “To be pharaoh, you must become a man. Someday, you will be as big and strong as I. Once you are through with your training, no man will stand in your way.”

  Studying the instructor’s bulging biceps and massive chest, Tut had a hard time believing that could ever be true, but he listened closely to every word.

  They stood in a great green field on the west side of the Nile. It was February, and the mild sun kissed the earth.

  Tut was a skinny child whose slightly cleft palate gave him a mild lisp but who otherwise bore the flawless beauty of his mother. His arms were thin, and his sandal-clad feet supported legs that weren’t much bigger around. At the time of his death, Tut would be approximately five foot six, and his build would still be slight.

  “Are you ready, sire?” asked the instructor.

  Tut tried to speak, but in his nervousness only a sigh escaped his lips.

  The instructor concealed a smile. “Let’s talk about the types of bows we will be using in our archery practice, then.”

  The list was too long and too dazzling for Tut to remember right away-though the instructor made it very clear that the pharaoh would be proficient in each of them, along with shield and mace, sword fighting, spear throwing, chariot riding, horseback riding, hand-to-hand combat, daggers, throw sticks, boomerangs, clubs, and battle-axes. For today’s lesson there was a double-composite angular bow, composite angular “bow of honor,” bow staves, and short self bows. That was all he had to master.

  The bows were made of birch that was then wrapped in sinew and bark for durability. Gold leaf and ivory decorations adorned their curved shafts. The instructor’s great bow was taller than Tut, while Tut’s bow was only big enough to reach just above his knee when he stood it on the ground.

  The instructor placed the bow in Tut’s little hands: “Now listen to me. You will want these with you in the afterworld. On the day you are buried, all your bows will be buried with you. So learn to use them well, Highness. The rules of combat you are about to learn will stand you in good stead… forever.”

  Tut notched an arrow in the bow and pulled back the string. His shot hit the target cleanly on the first try, though it wasn’t far from the boy.

  “Very good, sire. You are a natural.”

  Chapter 34

  Amarna

  1333 BC

  “YOU’RE LATE. I won’t tolerate this, Tutankhamen. There’s no excuse for such conduct.”

  Tut raced into the royal classroom at the prince’s school with mud from the Nile still coating the soles of his feet, his favorite hunting bow in hand. He had been out in the reeds again, shooting ducks, and realized too late that it was time for class.

  He had no chance to clean up, and now, pharaoh- in-training or not, he would face the instructor’s wrath.

  “Instructor, I-”

  “Quiet. Not a word from you. Sit down and practice your hieroglyphics.”

  The teacher was a thin, dyspeptic young man who didn’t walk about the room so much as he flitted like a nervous bird. Tut liked to mimic him for the amusement of his sister, but now she was too busy giggling at Tut’s misfortune for him to attempt a joke.

  The standard punishment for tardiness was to repeatedly write hieroglyphic characters on a piece of papyrus. The task often took hours, which the instructor knew was absolute torture for Tut.

  He was eight now, and his latest passion was chariot lessons. Two hours spent writing meant two less hours spent at the reins, speeding across the open desert.

  Much as his father would have hated it, Tut longed for the day when he would lead the warriors of Egypt into battle. He pictured himself in a chariot, two mighty steeds galloping before him, an army of thousands responding to his every command. But this was no daydream-it would actually come to be-and sooner rather than later.

  “Well done, Pharaoh,” whispered his sister Ankhesenpaaten. She was a few years older than him, but mature in the way of deeply practical children. And she was a beautiful girl, even better-looking than Tut.

  “Someday,” the teacher announced, “when you reign over Egypt as the one true pharaoh, you can have me killed for my insolence, but
until then this is my classroom and you will do as you are told-and that includes arriving on time. Am I understood, Tutankhamen?”

  A furious, red-faced Tut nodded his head and placed a fresh reed in his mouth, making sure not to make eye contact with his sister, who now snickered at his misfortune. Tut chewed the end of the reed, feeling the fibers break apart until they formed a loose and supple paintbrush.

  Then he dipped his new writing implement into a bowl of water and touched it to a block of solid ink. He began to draw on a piece of papyrus, his hand effortlessly forming the falcons, owls, feet, and myriad other images that made up the hieroglyphic alphabet.

  But soon the afternoon heat and the quiet of the classroom had his mind wandering. He loved the outdoors, and to be stuck inside on such a beautiful day wounded his spirit.

  Tut longed to be swimming in the Nile, ever mindful of the crocodiles that lurked there. Or maybe taking Ankhesenpaaten for a chariot ride-he adored her. Or perhaps simply standing on a mountaintop, gazing out at the purplish rocks of a distant butte, reveling in the fantastic notion that all of this land, as far as the eye could see, would one day be his.

  This was not merely a boy’s daydream either-it was for real.

  Chapter 35

  Amarna

  1333 BC

  AS HE DREW HIS CHARACTERS, Tut kept an eye on his strict instructor, the bane of his youth. The last thing he needed was another unjust punishment on top of the others he’d accrued. Nefertiti had been very clear in her warnings about Tut’s studies. If he failed a subject or even fell behind, he would lose the right to go out beyond the palace walls. Tut could think of no more horrendous penalty.

  Then, to Tut’s amazement and joy, the same warm afternoon sunlight that had sent his mind wandering now cast a spell over the instructor. Tut watched eagerly as the man rested in his chair and his eyelids began to close.

  The instructor’s head then lolled back and his mouth opened slightly, until, ever so softly, he began to snore.

  Ankhesenpaaten put one hand over her mouth to keep from giggling. Tut gently placed his brush on an ivory palette and tapped her on the shoulder while jerking a thumb toward the door.

  “No,” Ankhesenpaaten mouthed. “We can’t do that, Tut. We mustn’t.”

  Tut insisted, standing quietly and taking hold of her arm. With a quick glance at the instructor, whose soft snore was deepening into something louder, she stood, too.

  Together, the boy and girl royal tiptoed toward the door and the freedom of the river world. To be safe, Tut grabbed his hunting bow on the way out.

  Suddenly, Aye’s hulking torso blocked their path. “Where do you think you’re going?” the royal scribe boomed, making Ankhesenpaaten jump in fear.

  The instructor jerked awake and leaped to his feet.

  Aye gripped Tut and Ankhesenpaaten tightly by the arms and dragged them back into the room, digging his fingernails into Tut’s bicep. “Let go of me,” Tut cried, but Aye only squeezed harder. “I will be pharaoh one day, and you will be gone from the palace. I promise it, Scribe. You too, Teacher!”

  Then Tut wrenched his arm free and ran, and he didn’t stop running until he stood on the banks of the Nile. What was even better was that Ankhesenpaaten had run with him-every step of the way.

  Chapter 36

  Amarna

  1333 BC

  “WHAT DO YOU THINK they’ll do to us if they ever catch us?” asked a smiling Tut, crouching down below the reeds so they wouldn’t be seen by Aye or their other nemesis, the teacher.

  Ankhesenpaaten was usually the practical one. Her impulsive decision to escape along with Tut had perhaps been the greatest surprise he had known since the day their father died.

  But it was a nice sort of surprise, the kind that made him feel less alone in the world. It felt really good to have a comrade in arms-a friend-if only to share the inevitable punishment that would follow this outrageous adventure.

  Tut looked into his sister’s eyes and smiled. Technically, she was his half sister, thanks to his father’s consort with the ill-fated Kiya, and though she and Tut were the fruit of the same father, it more often felt like they were best friends than brother and sister.

  She was like him, and she wasn’t. It was hard to explain. Except that he loved her dearly. He so dearly loved his Ankhe.

  “They’re not going to beat us,” Tut announced, answering his own question.

  “Why do you say ‘they’?” she asked. “It’s Mother who will determine our punishment.”

  “That’s not exactly the way it works,” Tut said patiently. “Aye and the instructor are men. They think they have power over Mother.”

  As part of the process of learning to become pharaoh, Nefertiti had taken great pains to include Tut in important meetings with her advisers. Even a boy could see that Aye coveted the great power that Nefertiti possessed. The royal vizier often cast angry glares at Tut, as if the boy had somehow offended him by just being there.

  Aye frightened Tut, and as Tut remained in the reeds thinking about him, he gently rubbed the marks Aye’s thick nails had left on his upper arm.

  “You need to watch out for Aye,” Tut told his sister. “I don’t trust him. Neither should you. I think he wants to marry Mother and become pharaoh.”

  Ankhesenpaaten smiled at this.

  “He can’t do that, Tut. You’re the pharaoh.”

  “Not if he marries the queen. Marriage into royal blood would allow Aye to take the throne.”

  Tut paused to let that sink in, tilting his head to watch a duck extend its wings and lift them slightly upward as it glided in for a landing.

  “I don’t like that,” Ankhesenpaaten said softly, “and I don’t like Aye. Not a bit. He’s angry, and he’s rude to Mother.”

  “We also need to watch out for Meri-Re, the high priest,” warned Tut.

  “Why him?”

  “He’s afraid that when I become pharaoh I will no longer worship Aten.”

  “He would lose all his power and wealth if that happened.”

  “Right. You’re a smart girl. Almost too smart somehow.”

  “And General Horemheb is a sneaky one. Keep an eye on him also.”

  “I will be wary of them all,” said Tut. Then he did something he really hadn’t expected to do. He leaned in close and kissed Ankhe. And perhaps even more surprising, she didn’t protest.

  Then, confident that they had avoided capture, the two children rose from their hiding place and sprinted toward the river, laughing. They were less afraid of the crocodiles lurking there than of the powerful men crawling about the palace.

  Chapter 37

  Thebes

  1908

  HOWARD CARTER had been summoned.

  His old friend and Antiquities Service boss, Gaston Maspero, wanted to meet and discuss Carter’s “future.” In the four years since Carter had left his post, there hadn’t been much talk like that-more a hand-to-mouth existence that barely kept Carter’s dreams alive and often made him look foolish for having them.

  So Gaston Maspero’s request for a meeting was more than welcome. It could be a lifesaver.

  The distance from the Winter Palace Hotel to the Valley of the Kings was roughly five miles. If one stood on the great marble steps leading up to the hotel’s main lobby, it was possible to gaze across the Nile toward the distant cliffs that formed the backside of the valley. When there was no wind and the desert dust was not clouding the air, those cliffs seemed almost close enough to touch.

  That’s the way Howard Carter felt every day of his exile. A man less passionate about Egyptology would never have debased himself the way Carter had, standing out on the streets to hawk his wares to tourists, no different from the hordes of carriage drivers, ferryboat captains, and beggars who lined the dirt road at the river’s edge.

  Like them, he existed on the most meager of handouts. His serviceable watercolors would probably have been completely overlooked and ignored were he Egyptian rather than European. />
  To say that Howard Carter’s life had fallen into disarray would be an understatement. He’d become a shadowy version of himself: at once haughty and penniless.

  To supplement his modest living as a watercolorist, he also sold antiquities on the black market, thus sinking to the level of the men he’d once prosecuted for tomb robbery.

  Carter dressed well enough, even though his clothes were worn, and still had a taste for fine food and expensive hotels, but he’d become dependent on wealthy patrons to make his way. Adding insult to injury, his most beloved patrons of all, Lord and Lady Amherst, had fallen on difficult times. They’d been forced to sell Didlington Hall in 1907, and Lord Amherst was in poor health. At the age of thirty-four, Howard Carter had become little more than a self-educated sycophant.

  Enter, thanks to Maspero, the inimitable Lord Carnarvon.

  George Edward Stanhope Molyneux Herbert, better known as the Fifth Earl of Carnarvon-or, more simply, His Lordship-was a pale, thin man with a hound’s face pitted by smallpox. He smoked incessantly, despite damaged lungs; raced cars; owned horses; and otherwise reveled in living the life of a wealthy, self-absorbed bon vivant. Even the 1901 car crash that had almost killed him didn’t stop Carnarvon from spending his money recklessly and living a life of entitled leisure that no one deserved-at least not in Carter’s opinion.

  His Lordship had first come to Egypt in December 1905, thinking that the warm weather and dry air might help him recuperate. That visit and subsequent other “tours” whet his appetite for all things Egyptian.