'It looks so innocent, so mundane. An old papyrus scroll, a few photographs and notebooks, a computer print-out. It is difficult to believer how dangerous these might be in the wrong hands.' He sighed again. 'You might almost say that they are deadly dangerous.'
Then he laughed. 'I am being fanciful. Perhaps it is the late hour. Shall we get back to work? We can worry about these other matters once we have worked out all the conundrums set for us by this old rogue, Taita, and completed the translation.'
He picked up the top photograph from the pile in front of him. It was an extract from the central section of the scroll. 'It is the worst luck that the damaged piece of papyrus falls where it does.' He picked up his reading glasses and placed them on his nose before he read aloud.
'There are many steps to ascend on the staircase to the abode of Hapi. With much hardship and endeavour we reached the second step and proceeded no further, for it was here that the prince received a divine revelation. In a dream his father, the dead God Pharaoh visited him and commanded him, 'I have travelled far and I am grown weary. It is here that I will rest for all eternity.' '
Duraid removed his glasses and looked across at Royan. 'The second step. It is a very precise description for once. Taita is not being his usual devious self.'
'Let's go back to the satellite photographs,' Royan suggested, and drew the glossy sheets toward her. Duraid came around the table to stand behind her.
'To me it seems most logical that the natural feature that would obstruct them in the gorge would be something like a set of rapids or a waterfall. If it were the second waterfall that would put them here?' Royan placed her finger on a spot on the satellite photograph where the narrow snake of the river threaded itself through the dark massifs of the mountains on either hand.
At that moment she was distracted and she lifted her head. 'Listen!' Her voice changed, sharpening with alarm.
'What is it?' Duraid looked up also.
'The dog.' She answered.
'That damn mongrel.' He agreed. 'It's always making the night hideous with its yapping. I have promised myself to get rid of it.'
At that moment the lights went out.
They froze with surprise in the darkness. The soft thudding of the decrepit diesel generator in its shed at the back of the palm grove had ceased. It was so much a part of the oasis night that they noticed it only when it was silent.
Their eyes adjusted to the faint starlight that came in through the terrace doors. Duraid crossed the room and took the oil lamp down from the shelf beside the door where it waited for just such a contingency. He lit it, and looked across at Royan with an expression of comical resignation.
'I will have to go down?'
'Duraid.' She interrupted him. 'The dog!'
He listened for a moment, and his expression changed to mild concern. The dog was silent out there in the night.
'I am sure it is nothing to be alarmed about.' He went to the door, and for no good reason she suddenly called after him.
'Duraid, be careful!' He shrugged dismissively and stepped out onto the terrace.
She thought for an instant that it was the shadow of the vine over the trellis moving in the night breeze off the desert, but the night was still. Then she realized that it was a human figure crossing the flagstones silently and swiftly,coming in behind Duraid as he skirted the fish pond in the centre of the paved terrace.
'Duraid!' She screamed a warning, and he spun around, lifting the lamp high.
'Who are you?' he shouted. 'What do you want here?'
The intruder closed with him silently. The traditional full length dishdaasha robe swirled around his legs, and the white ghutrah head cloth covered his head. In the light of the lamp Duraid saw that he had drawn the corner of the head cloth over his face to mask his features.
The intruder's back was turned towards her so Royan did not see the knife in his right hand, but she could not mistake the upward stabbing motion that he aimed at Duraid's stomach. Duraid grunted with pain and doubled up at the blow, and his attacker drew the blade free and stabbed again, but this time Duraid dropped the lamp and seized the knife arm.
The flame of the fallen oil lamp was guttering and flaring. The two men struggled in the gloom, but Royan saw a dark stain spreading over her husband's white shirt front.
'Run!' He bellowed at her. 'Go! fetch help! I cannot hold him?' The Duraid she knew was a gentle person, a soft man of books and learning. She could see that he was outmatched by his assailant.
The pain roused Duraid. It had to be that intense to bring him back from that far place on the very edge of life to which he had drifted.
He groaned. The first thing he was aware of as he regained consciousness was the smell of his own flesh burning, and then the agony struck him with full force. A violent tremor shook his whole body and he opened his eyes and looked down at himself.
His clothing was blackening and smouldering, and the pain was as nothing he had ever experienced in his entire life. He realized in a vague way that the room was on fire all around him. Smoke and waves of heat washed over him so that he could barely make out the shape of the doorway through them.
The pain was so terrible that he wanted it to end. He wanted to die then and not to have to endure it further. Then he remembered Royan. He tried to say her name through his scorched and blackened lips but no sound came.
