Then she would prepare
the boxes by refilling them and wiping their outside frames clean of
dried-on clay dust and leaving them covered with moist cloth of flax
weave. She would also set her dampened wooden marking sticks neatly
laid out to one side to dry at day's end, and also saw to various other
details of her daily chores. Finally, exhausted, she would retire and
sleep soundly until the cock crew in the early predawn darkness to
signal the start of a new day.
Upon arising and finishing with her toilet, she would take with her a
set of dry sticks to sharpen with a small piece of honing stone, and
lift the dampened linen from her restored clay tablets to find them
looking fresh and soft with a dull smooth gleam when she took them up
to bring along with her for the day.
Mearch appeared one time in Ibi's shop, equipped with a wooden staff.
Advising her that he was still working on his assignment for her, the
Master Armorer made crude knife marks on the rod with a stubby but
wickedly sharp flaying knife as he measured her height, the length of
her limbs, and some other proportions, accomplishing all with a
swiftness and unconscious poise that betrayed long practice at this
sort of thing.
"I shall go, and do, and then I will return, and then you will see," he
finally said.
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