it. It was deserted and bare. A wooden cross hung on the wall with a
truckle bed below it. There were no other furnishings. They went on past
a dozen others which were almost identical.
At the next turning of the passage Nicholas paused.
He felt a tiny draught on his cheek, and the taste of fresh air on his
tongue. 'This way he whispered.
They hurried on, until suddenly Royan grabbed his shoulder from behind
and forced him to stop.
'What-' he began, but she squeezed his shoulder to silence him. He heard
it then, the sound of a human voice, echoing eerily through the
labyrinth of passageways.
Then came a weird haunting cry, that of a soul in agony, wailing and
sobbing. They crept forward, trying to make their escape before they
were discovered, but the sounds grew stronger as they went on.
'Dead ahead,' Nicholas warned her in a whisper. 'We are going to have to
sneak past.'
Now they saw soft yellow lamplight spilling from the doorway of one of
the cells into the passage. There came another heart-rending female cry
that echoed down the passage and froze them in their tracks.
'That's a woman's voice. What is happening?' Royan breathed, ut he
shook his head for silence and led her on.
They had to pass the open door of the lit cell. Nicholas edged towards
it with his back flattened to the opposite wall. She followed him,
keeping close and clinging to his arm for comfort.
As they looked into the cell the woman cried out again, but this time
her voice blended with that of a man.
It was a duet without words, but racked with all the feral agony of a
passion too fierce to be borne in silence.
In their full view a couple lay naked upon the truckle bed. The woman
lay spread-eagled, holding the man's hips between her uplifted knees.
Her arms wound hard around his back, upon which each separate muscle
stood out proudly and gleamed with sweat. He thrust down into her
savagely, his buttocks bunching and pounding with the force of a great
black battering ram.
She rolled her head from side to side as another incoherent cry was torn
from her straining throat. It seemed too much for the man above her to
bear, and he reared back like a flaring cobra, his pelvis still locked
to hers, but his back arched like a war bow. Spasm after spasm gripped
him. The sinews in the back of his legs were stretched to snapping
point, and the muscles in his back fluttered and jumped like separate
living creatures.
The woman opened her eyes and looked directly at them as they stood
transfixed in the doorway, but she was blinded with the strength of her
passion. Her eyes were sightless, as she cried aloud to the man above
her.
Nicholas drew Royan away, and they slipped down the passageway and out
on to the deserted terrace. They stopped at the foot of the staircase,
and breathed the sweet cool night air that was perfumed by the waters of
the Nile.
