Death Comes as End - Agatha Christie [73]
‘You have eaten too many green dates–or perhaps the fish had turned.’
‘No, no, it is nothing I have eaten. It is the terrible thing we are living through.’
‘Oh, that.’
Kait’s disclaimer was so nonchalant that Renisenb stared at her.
‘But, Kait, are you not afraid?’
‘No, I do not think so.’ Kait considered. ‘If anything happens to Imhotep, the children will be protected by Hori. Hori is honest. He will guard their inheritance for them.’
‘Yahmose will do that.’
‘Yahmose will die, too.’
‘Kait, you say that so calmly. Do you not mind at all? I mean, that my father and Yahmose should die?’
Kait considered for a moment or two. Then she shrugged her shoulders.
‘We are two women together–let us be honest. Imhotep I have always considered tyrannical and unfair. He behaved outrageously in the matter of his concubine–letting himself be persuaded by her to disinherit his own flesh and blood. I have never liked Imhotep. As to Yahmose, he is nothing. Satipy ruled him in every way. Lately, since she is gone, he takes authority on himself, gives orders. He would always prefer his children before mine–that is natural. So, if he is to die, it is as well for my children that it should be so–that is how I see it. Hori has no children and he is just. All these happenings have been upsetting–but I have been thinking lately that very likely they are all for the best.’
‘You can talk like that, Kait–so calmly, so coldly? When your own husband, whom you loved, was the first to be killed?’
A faint expression of some indefinable nature passed over Kait’s face. She gave Renisenb a glance which seemed to contain a certain scornful irony.
‘You are very like Teti sometimes, Renisenb. Really, one would swear, no older!’
‘You do not mourn for Sobek.’ Renisenb spoke the words slowly. ‘No, I have noticed that.’
‘Come, Renisenb, I fulfilled all the conventions. I know how a newly made widow should behave.’
‘Yes–that was all there was to it…So–it means–that you did not love Sobek?’
Kait shrugged her shoulders.
‘Why should I?’
‘Kait! He was your husband–he gave you children.’
Kait’s expression softened. She looked down at the two small boys engrossed with the clay and then to where Ankh was rolling about chanting to herself and waving her little legs.
‘Yes, he gave me my children. For that I thank him. But what was he, after all? A handsome braggart–a man who was always going to other women. He did not take a sister, decently, into the household, some modest person who would have been useful to us all. No, he went to ill-famed houses, spending much copper and gold there, drinking too and asking for all the most expensive dancing girls. It was fortunate that Imhotep kept him as short as he did and that he had to account so closely for the sales he made on the estate. What love and respect should I have for a man like that? And what are men anyway? They are necessary to breed children, that is all. But the strength of the race is in the women. It is we, Renisenb, who hand down to our children all that is ours. As for men, let them breed and die early…’
The scorn and contempt in Kait’s voice rose in a note like some musical instrument. Her strong, ugly face was transfigured.
Renisenb thought with dismay:
‘Kait is strong. If she is stupid, it is with a stupidity that is satisfied with itself. She hates and despises men. I should have known. Once before I caught a glimpse of this–this menacing quality. Yes, Kait is strong–’
Unthinkingly, Renisenb’s gaze fell to Kait’s hands. They were squeezing and kneading clay–strong, muscular hands, and as Renisenb watched them pushing down the clay, she thought of Ipy and of strong hands pushing his head down into the water and holding it there inexorably. Yes, Kait’s hands could have done that…
The little girl, Ankh, rolled over on to a thorny spine and set up a wail. Kait rushed to her. She picked her up, holding her to her breast, crooning over her. Her face now was all love and tenderness. Henet came running