The Phantom and the Fisherman Read online

  Ahmose called back, “Here! Here! Here! Watch who you’re calling “old”. I’m only sixty summers old – King Pepi lived to a hundred or more.”

  “You’re old enough to be my granny,” the phantom snarled.

  “No I’m not, you young monkey!” Ahmose said and his voice was perfect.

  “Look, you withered old baboon, if I can’t scare you out then I’ll have to throw you out,” he said and moved towards the couch.

  “Phantoms can’t hurt the living,” Ahmose told him.

  “No?”

  “No! You’re just a spirit. You can’t pick me up.”

  “Yes I can! I’m an extra-strong spirit.”

  “Prove it.”

  “How?”

  “Let me see … pick up that bowl of beer by the statue of Bes,” Ahmose said and waved a shaking finger towards the statue by the lamp.

  The phantom wandered across to the table and picked up the bowl of strong beer. “See? Told you!” he crowed.

  “But I’ll bet you can’t drink it,” Ahmose urged.

  “Watch me,” the phantom said and sipped the beer.

  “Ooooh! Nice drop of beer that,” he said smacking his lips. “I’ve had a few tonight but none as nice and strong as this.” He put it to his lips and swallowed it all.

  Then he stepped back. He seemed to catch his heel on the rush mat and sat down heavily. “Oooof!” he grunted then belched. He swayed. “Ooooh! Just have a little sit down, I think.”

  The big body swayed and the mask hung crookedly so he was looking out through one eye and the mouth-hole.

  “Just sit down? You didn’t come here to sit down. You came to rob me, you villain!” Ahmose cried.

  “Rob ’oo,” the phantom said. “Not rob ’oo. Just come to get what belongs to me.”

  Menes slowly raised the lid of the chest further. He put down the pen and picked up the net.

  The phantom didn’t seem to notice. He was too busy trying to talk to Ahmose on the old woman’s couch. And talking was hard because the words were getting muddled in his mouth.

  “What belongs to you, you villain?” Ahmose asked as Menes crept around behind him.

  “Me tresher … me trea-sure. I buried it here five summers ago before I was banished from Karnak. I hid it under the floor of me house. But when I came back I found you’d knocked down me house and built yours in its place.”

  Suddenly the large man began to sob. “Me tresher! Me lovely tresher. All I want’s me treeeesher! Waaaagggghhhh!”

  And to soak up the tears he pulled off the mask.

  Ahmose jumped from the bed as Menes jumped from the shadows to throw the net over the fat man. “Master Meshwesh!” the boys cried.

  “Wesh mesh?” the man bubbled. “Wish-wash, mess-mish!”

  As Menes tied the rope tightly the fat teacher rolled on to the floor and began to snore.

  Chapter 6

  The Terrible Teacher

  The governor’s guards came and took the terrible teacher away. That night they dug up the treasure and returned it to their master, Payneshi.

  The next day Meshwesh was dragged in front of the governor. “I should have you beaten to death, Meshwesh,” he said.

  “Yes, governor,” Meshwesh groaned.

  “And I should give the beating job to the young scribes.” The whole school was there to see the trial. “Would you like that boys?” Payneshi asked.

  “Yes!” the boys roared.

  “But really it is for Menes and Ahmose to decide. You are theirs to deal with as they please. If they want you chopped into fifty pieces and thrown to the crocodiles then that is what I will order.”

  The fat teacher looked at the boys, his red eyes puffed and pitiful. “It would hurt.”

  Menes looked at Ahmose then up at Payneshi the judge. “Spare him,” Menes said quietly. “He’s really taught us a lot – he’s a very good scribe but not a very good man – and he’s been punished. He’s lost his treasure.”

  Payneshi blinked. “It’s my treasure.”

  “Sorry,” Menes said quickly. “Spare him. Let him go back to teaching us … but take his beating sticks away.”

  Payneshi said, “A wise young man and a generous one.”

  “Very generous,” Meshwesh whined.

  “But I can be generous too,” Payneshi said. “I am giving you half of all the treasure that Meshwesh stole. It is your reward.”

  And so Menes walked from the palace a rich young man.

  “What will you buy?” his mother asked him when he reached home.

  “A boat for Dad,” he said.

  “I should think so too,” his father grumbled. “You owe it to me.”

  Mother threw her head back and laughed. “You stole his strong beer. He loves strong spirits. We got to the festival and he took a drink. All he tasted was weak beer. He nearly choked.”

  “Ah,” Menes said wisely. “Just like the phantom who drank it – he thought he was a strong spirit too!”

  Afterword

  Scribes had to be experts at Egyptian picture-writing – hieroglyphics. We have to learn twenty-six letters in our alphabet. Scribes had to learn seven hundred signs.

  So, school was hard and the teachers were strict. It seems schoolboys could be lazy and easily bored … just like today really. Teachers were told to beat boys because beating was the best way to make them work.

  Once a boy had learned how to be a scribe he could have the best jobs in Egypt – in the king’s palace or in the temples. While peasants sweated in the fields the scribes had a comfortable and rich life. School was tough and sometimes painful – but it was worth it in the end.

  The Egyptians believed in the spirit world. Evil forces were all around them. The best way to protect yourself from an evil spirit (or a ghost) was with a prayer. If that prayer was written down by a scribe then it was even more powerful. Of course a scribe would charge you for writing the spell.

  Thieves like Meshwesh were often banished from their homes and sent away to try and survive in another town where they had no friends to help them.