had even unwrapped his mummy to reach the amulets and scarabs beneath
the linen bandages, so that his body was almost naked. When these
remains had been discovered in 1881 in the cache of royal mummies in the
cliff cave at Deir El Bahari, only a scrap of papyrus parchment attached
to his breast had proclaimed his lineage.
There was a moral in that, she supposed, but as she stood before these
pathetic remains she wondered again, as she and Duraid had done so often
before, whether Taita the scribe had told the truth, whether somewhere
in the far-off, savage mountains of Africa another great pharaoh slept
on undisturbed with all his treasures intact about him.
The very thought of it made her shiver with excitement, and goose
pimples prickled her skin and raised the fine dark hair at the nape of
her neck.
'I have given you my promise, my husband,' she whispered in Arabic.
'This will be for you and your memory, for it was you who led the way.'
She glanced at her 'Wrist-watch as she went down the main staircase. She
had fifteen minutes before she must leave for her appointment with the
minister, and she knew, exactly how she would spend that time. What she
was going to visit was in one of the less-frequented side halls.
The tour guides very seldom led their charges this way, except as a
short-cut to see the statue of Amenhotep.
Royan stopped in front of the glass-fronted display case that reached
from floor to ceiling of the narrow room. It was packed with small
artefacts, tools and weapons, amulets and vessels and utensils, the
latest of them dating from the twentieth dynasty of the New Kingdom,
1100 BC, whilst the oldest survived from the dim ages of the Old Kingdom
almost five thousand years ago. The cataloguing of this accumulation was
only rudimentary. Many of the items were not described.
At the furthest end, on the bottom shelf, was a display of jewellery and
finger rings and seals. Beside each of the seals was a wax impression
made from it.
Royan went down on her knees to examine one of these artefacts more
closely. The tiny blue seal of lapis lazuli in the centre of the display
was beautifully carved.
Lapis was a rare and precious material for the ancients, as it had not
occurred naturally in the Egyptian Empire. The wax imprint cut from it
depicted a hawk with a broken wing, and the simple legend beneath it was
clear for Royan to read: 'TAITA, THE SCRIBE OF THE GREAT QUEEN'.
She knew it was the same man, for he had used the maimed hawk as his
autograph in the scrolls. She wondered who had found this trifle and
where. Perhaps some peasant had plundered it from the lost tomb of the
old slave and scribe, but she would never know.
'Are you teasing me, Taita? Is it all some elaborate hoax? Are you
laughing at me even now from your tomb, wherever it may be?' She leaned
even closer, until her forehead touched the cool glass. 'Are you my
friend, Taita, or are you my implacable adversary?' She stood up and
dusted off the front of her skirt. 'We shall see. I will-play the game
with you, and we shall see who outwits whom,' she promised.
The minister kept her waiting only a few minutes before his male
secretary ushered her into his presence. Atalan Abou Sin wore a dark,
