Nicholas would not let him go so easily. 'Let's make sure of you, dear
boy,' he grated through his swollen, bleeding mouth. He spat out a
mouthful of blood and saliva as he stretched out and grabbed the back of
Helm's collar, holding him face down in the water under the log. They
icked up speed rapidly down the last stretch of the canyon, but
Nicholas held on doggedly, drowning any last spark of life from Helm's
carcass, until at last it was torn. from his grip by the current and he
watched it sink away into the grey, roiling waters.
'I'll give your love to Tessay,' Nicholas called after him as he
disappeared. Then he gave all his concentration to balancing the log and
staying aboard for the ride through the tumbling, racing current. At
last he was spewed out -AL
through the pink rock portals into the bottom reach of the DandeTa
river. As he was swept beneath the rope suspension bridge he slid off
the log and struck out for the western bank, very much aware of the
terrible drop into the Nile that lay half a mile downstream.
Sitting on the bank, he tore a strip from the tail of his shirt. Then he
bound up his wounded chin as best he could, strapping it around the back
of his head. The blood soaked through the thin wet cotton, but he
knotted it tighter and it began to staunch the flow.
He stood up unsteadily and pushed his way through the strip of thick
river in bush which bounded the river, until at last he struck the trail
that led down to the monastery and hobbled down it on his bare feet. He
only stopped once, and that was when he heard the sound of the
helicopter taking off from the top of the cliff above the chasm far
behind him.
He looked back. 'Sounds as though Tuma Nogo made it out of there, more's
the pity. I wonder what happened to von Schiller and the Egyptian,' he
muttered grimly, fingering his injured face. 'At least none of them are
going to get into the tomb, not unless they dam the river again.'
Suddenly a thought occurred to him.
'My God, what if von Schiller was already in there when the river hit!'
He began to chuckle, and then shook his head. 'Too much to hope for.
justice is never that neat.' He shook his head again, but the movement
started his wound aching brutally. He clutched his bandaged jaw with one
hand and started down the trail again, breaking into a trot as he
reached the paved causeway that led down to the monastery.
ahoot Guddabi ran full into von Schiller around a corner of the maze,
and in a peculiar way the old man's presence, even thoug he was of no
conceivable value in this crisis, steadied him and kept at bay the panic
that threatened at any moment to boil over and overwhelm him. Without
Hansith the maze was a weird and lonely place. Any human company was a
blessing. For a moment the two of them clung together like children lost
in the forest.
Von Schiller still carried part of the treasure that they had been
examining when Hansith had panicked and run.
He had Pharaoh's golden crook in one hand and the ceremonial flail in
the other.
'Where is the monk?' he screamed at Guddabi. 'Why did you run off and
leave me? We have to find the way out of these tunnels, you idiot. Don't
