got together with Interpol to hunt down the crooked dealers. But Claudel was far too clever to let that happen. He’d made a fine art of creating buffers and paper trails to protect himself, and in any case most of his trade was with private owners. Unscrupulous connoisseurs were always keen to expand their collections, and blush-making sums of money would change hands-even if the artefacts could never be openly displayed.
So, Pierre Claudel was a man with just about everything in life. But it was in his nature to want more, as it had always been. He would stand at his balcony in the mornings, sipping espresso, and gaze out towards the desert far away. The sands still held many secrets. There were still undreamed-of fortunes to be made out there. He yearned for one really big find, something he could retire on. Some of the legendary treasures of ancient Egypt were still undiscovered-like the fabled tomb of Imhotep, one of the nation’s earliest and most influential rulers, a man long thought not even to have existed. Armies of archaeologists and historians were out there and had been for years, scouring the sands for that elusive prize. If only he could snatch something of that magnitude out from under their noses-what a coup that would be. Something like that would set him up for life and for twenty lives afterwards.
He would lie awake at night, just imagining it.
Then, one day in late September, seven months ago now, Claudel had had a call that changed his life.
The minute he’d heard the man’s voice on the other end, he’d known this was serious, heavy shit. Normally he’d have slammed the phone down or demanded to know where they’d got his private number. But instinct had told him otherwise, and he’d listened to what the man had to say.
As a result of the call, a meeting had been set up. Not in the city, but in the desert. The man had been insistent on that point. Claudel had been uncomfortable with the idea, but his gut feeling again directed him to go with it. So he’d driven out there, alone as instructed. It had been a long, hot, dusty drive. The meeting place was a spot he knew from years ago, one that had never been worth visiting again. Whatever scraps the lonely ruined temple had to offer had been pilfered centuries ago. Now it just stood there, neglected and half buried in the sand, in the shade of a towering escarpment miles from anywhere.
As he’d pulled up and stepped out into the searing sun, Claudel had sensed he was being watched from the escarpment high above. Time had passed. He’d paced up and down, checked his watch impatiently. The heat of the sun was giving him a headache. He wasn’t used to roughing it any more. He’d been just on the point of leaving when four off-road vehicles had appeared out of the shimmering heat haze and bounced across the dunes towards him.
He’d shielded his eyes from the sun and watched them approach. The ten men who climbed out of the dusty vehicles weren’t the kind he normally did business with. Most of them looked like ex-soldiers, or mercenaries. Nobody was smiling. Several of them were carrying stubby automatic weapons on slings over their shoulders. Claudel didn’t generally come into contact with guns in the course of his work, and he didn’t much like them. These had evil-looking, curved magazines, folding stocks, a brutal military appearance to them. They looked scuffed and worn with use, and he could only wonder how many people had been shot with them.
But it was too late to run now. He was committed-to what, he didn’t yet know.
Claudel had been shoved against his car and frisked for weapons and wires. ‘Watch the suit,’ he protested.
‘He’s clean,’ the tall bearded one had muttered. They released him and he dusted his clothes off indignantly. The men signalled across to one of the jeeps, and only then had Claudel noticed the eleventh man, the one who’d hung back, sitting smoking in the rear seat, quietly watching from a distance.
The man had stepped down from the vehicle and walked across the sand. His face was long and lean, the dark curls receding across his high forehead. He was wearing khaki trousers and a loose-fitting shirt that billowed in the warm breeze, the black rubber butt of a pistol protruding from a Cordura holster on his hip. He carried a slim briefcase in his left hand. He was slightly built, not tall, not physically striking or intimidating in any way. But he exuded an air of menace that seemed to come from somewhere behind those deep, dark eyes.
Claudel had looked into them and he couldn’t tell what the man was thinking. That scared him most of all. Something told him those eyes had seen things he couldn’t imagine. This was a man without any trace of kindness or humour or compassion. Even the rest of the group had almost visibly shrunk away from him as he moved past them.
The man had strode up to Claudel. Stood with his boots planted apart in the sand and gazed at him impassively. ‘My name is Kamal,’ he said. His voice was soft, almost gentle.
Claudel could sense the rest of the men watching him. The burly one with the baseball cap, the least mean- looking of the bunch, glanced nervously at Kamal. Another one, a ferret-like little guy with a shaven head and an ammunition belt wrapped around his torso, was fingering his gun.
Then Kamal had beckoned to Claudel and walked towards the shade of the rocks. The Frenchman had followed, feeling the sweat run down his temples, not just from the heat. His neck and shoulders ached with tension, expecting a bullet. He racked his brain as he walked. What had he done? Had he offended someone? Stepped on the wrong toes?
But then Kamal had done something unexpected. He sat down in a shady hollow in the rocks and motioned to Claudel to join him. ‘I know who you are, and what you do. You can help me.’
Claudel eased himself down on a rock. ‘I don’t know what you want,’ he replied hesitantly.
‘I want to show you something.’
Then Kamal had opened the case. Inside it was a large manila envelope. He handed it over. Claudel frowned at it, looked inside and saw that it contained a series of glossy colour prints.
Kamal was watching him expectantly. Claudel shot him a baffled look, then started leafing through the photos. They showed a stone slab, ancient and pitted, covered in sand-dusted hieroglyphs.
‘You can read them?’ Kamal asked quietly.
Claudel nodded distractedly. He was already deep into them. He could feel an icy tingle running down his neck, down his spine as his eye traced the lines of symbols, converting them into words. He suddenly broke away from them and looked up. ‘Where did you-’
‘Read,’ Kamal said, interrupting.
Claudel’s fear was gone now. He read on.
‘What does it say?’ Kamal asked.
Claudel studied the glyphs again for a moment, struggling to condense their meaning. ‘Amun is content,’ he read slowly out loud. ‘The Heretic of Amarna shall be denied, the treasures restored to their rightful place.’
Kamal smiled. ‘An educated man. I had to have it translated.’
But Claudel wasn’t listening. The icy tingle was intensifying into a mounting excitement that made him breathless.
The Heretic of Amarna shall be denied.
The Frenchman couldn’t hide the tremble that made the glossy photo in his hands flutter.
It couldn’t be. Amarna, the city in the sands. The heretic pharaoh. The ancient story of the three High Priests who’d defied him. Claudel knew what this was about. Treasure. Big time.
But it was just a legend. A myth. Dismissed by every Egyptology scholar in the world as fantasy and nonsense.
Could it be true after all? Surely not.
But what if it was?
He suddenly felt as giddy as a schoolboy. This could be it. This could be the big one. The thing he’d been waiting for. The biggest discovery of his career. Maybe the biggest haul in history. If even half the discredited legends were true, it would be like finding Tutankhamun’s tomb all over again. And then some.
He looked up, meeting Kamal’s eye. ‘It’s incredible.’
Kamal smiled in satisfaction. ‘That’s what the other guy said, too.’
Claudel frowned. ‘The other guy?’
‘You’re my second opinion. Don’t take it personally.’
Claudel was suddenly tense with fear. ‘Who else have you told about this?’
A curator at the Egyptian Museum,’ Kamal said. ‘We paid him a visit at his home last night.’
‘What?’ Claudel gaped in horror. ‘Who?’
‘Beng.’
‘You told Beng about this?’
