on the table, with the broken chain coiled around it like a tiny golden snake.
IV
I’d forgotten to leave a wake-up call, but Schmidt remembered. A good thing, too; I am not used to sleeping pills and I’d have snored on until mid-morning if he hadn’t telephoned to say he was on his way down.
‘Give me half an hour,’ I mumbled pathetically.
‘Fifteen minutes.’
Motivated by that promise or threat, I managed to get in and out of the shower and into my clothes before he arrived. I do not have transparent garments in my wardrobe – not for day wear, at any rate – so I had no trouble finding a shirt that covered the bruises, which were darkening as expected. Studying myself in the mirror I was pleased to find that the excesses – physical and emotional – of the previous night hadn’t left visible marks, and when Schmidt insisted we go down to breakfast I agreed. I wanted John to see me smiling and calm, cool, collected, and contemptuous.
He wasn’t in the dining room. Neither was Mary. The place was only half full, so I concluded the others were breakfasting in their rooms. Alice was sitting with Feisal; they waved and I waved, and joined Schmidt at a table as far from Alice as I could get. The less we were seen together, the safer for her.
She’d be looking for her contact when we went ashore. I wondered what disguise he’d assume – another tourist, a seller of souvenirs, a beggar? The set-up was perfect for a seemingly casual encounter, the sites were swarming with people. He’d be there, I felt sure. The change in schedule must be known to the authorities, and after Ali’s death it was imperative that they reestablish contact.
Schmidt stuffed himself with eggs and cornflakes and fruit and bread, and then proceeded to fill his pockets with titbits. For the cats? ‘Yes,’ said Schmidt, when I asked. ‘And the poor dogs. Ach, Vicky, it is sad to see – ’
Feisal interrupted the speech, stopping by our table on his way out to warn us we’d better hurry. ‘Don’t forget a hat, Vicky. We are farther south, and the sun is hot.’
I hoped that was a hint; but after I had dashed upstairs and opened the safe, nothing was there that hadn’t been there the night before. Maybe it was a hint of another kind? And maybe it wasn’t a hint of any kind. After deliberating for a few seconds I put the gun into my bag.
Most of the passengers had assembled. After all that time cruising, even the lazy ones were ready to go ashore. Schmidt had cornered Larry; ignoring his winks and nods, I joined Anna Blessington. She looked cute as a button, eyes bright in her wrinkled face, a broad-brimmed straw hat tied under her chin with a jaunty bow. The hands resting on her stick were mottled with age spots and twisted with arthritis. If she was a crook or a secret agent I’d turn in my Sherlock Holmes badge.
‘Did you enjoy the party last night?’ I asked.
‘Yes, it was splendid, wasn’t it?’ She grinned, producing an even more astonishing set of wrinkles. ‘Especially Feisal’s dancing. To think I am the only female whom he has held in his arms!’
‘I’m thinking of spraining my ankle,’ I admitted.
‘You don’t have to resort to such painful expedients, my dear.’ She hoisted herself to her feet and reached, unselfconsciously, for my arm. ‘Just till we get down the gangplank, if you don’t mind; it’s a bit steep.’
The ancient cemeteries and the temples that served them are in the desert; we had a long ride, through the cultivated fields and the town of Hammadi. The children were on their way to school; I was pleased to see girls among them, modestly clad in long-sleeved dark robes, their heads covered with white kerchiefs. Older women all wore black. Stalls along the street sold a variety of goods, from fruit and vegetables to cheap plastic dishes. After we left the town we drove through fields of cabbages and sugarcane. The road, paved but narrow, bordered a canal. We roared past donkeys loaded with reeds and rusty trucks loaded with pots and turbaned men riding bicycles, and another tourist bus.
The area outside the entrance to the archaeological enclosure was a modern disaster – rows of stalls selling film and souvenirs, a couple of coffee shops with rows of rusting tables and chairs outside. Feisal raced around like a Border collie, shepherding us into a compact group and assuring Suzi, who kept trying to break away and head for the souvenirs, that she would have a chance to spend her money after we had seen the temple. He lost Schmidt when we started up the ramp to the entrance. looking back, I saw my boss surrounded by lean dogs and peremptory cats. Handing Anna over to Feisal, I went back to him.
‘For heaven’s sake, Schmidt, come on. Feisal has the tickets.’
Schmidt had emptied his pockets of food. His stricken face was turned towards a child who sat on a low wall nearby. The kid’s hand was out and he was whining for baksheesh. He had only one leg.
‘Ach, Vicky – ’
‘I know, Schmidt. I know. Come on.’
‘One moment only . . .’ He trotted towards the boy and filled the outstretched hand with crumpled bills. That wasn’t as generous as it sounds, since Egyptian currency consists mainly of paper money, the smallest being worth approximately ten cents. But I don’t think Schmidt looked at the numbers on the bills.
He’s a volatile old guy, though, and he cheered up after we got inside. There are those who consider the Abydos temples the most beautiful in Egypt, and I wouldn’t argue with them. Some of the other tourist favourites – Dendera, El Kab, Philae – are better preserved, but they date from the Greek or Ptolemaic period, a thousand years later. Abydos is Nineteenth Dynasty, one of the high points of Egyptian art.
Schmidt hauled out his camera and took pictures of everything. Then he forced it on me and made me take pictures of him in front of everything. Then he forced it on Bright, who happened to be nearby, and made Bright take pictures of both of us in front of . . . well, practically everything. By the time we reached the inner courtyard he’d used up the first roll of film and retired behind a pillar to reload.
I took advantage of his absence to escape, not only from Schmidt’s obsession with snapshots, but from the others. Feisal was lecturing. I didn’t want to hear a lecture, I just wanted to look.
Some of the others had wandered off too. I saw Alice going up the steps that led into the Hypostyle Hall and John and Mary, hand in hand, following her. Bright and Sweet were nowhere around.
Perched on a low foundation wall of cut stone, I sat soaking it all in and trying not to think about what Alice might be doing. I sincerely hoped she was doing it, but I didn’t want to think about it. After a while Feisal led the group into the pillared hall. I went on sitting. It was hot, but not unbearably so. The square pillars of the vestibule opposite were decorated with the mighty form of pharaoh being greeted by various gods. Exposed as these were, they had lost most of the paint that had once covered them. I tipped my hat so it shaded my eyes and relaxed. Gradually the voices of guides lecturing in six different languages faded into an agreeable background hum, and somehow I wasn’t at all surprised to see that the reliefs were now bright with fresh paint, the king’s body and limbs red-brown, his crown a soft blue, his collar and bracelets picked out with turquoise and gold.
One of the painted figures stepped out of the pillar. He wasn’t wearing a crown, and his hair was pale gold, not black. Raising one eyebrow at me in distant acknowledgment, he turned and began removing objects from the wall. They solidified and took on dimension in his hands: jewelled and beaded collars, heavy bracelets, golden cups, bowls and containers . . .
‘There you are.’
I shook the sleep from my eyes and looked up. The figure standing over me wasn’t wearing a white kilt and beaded collar but dust-coloured pants and shirt. Larry gave me a tentative smile. ‘Sorry to disturb you.’
‘It’s a good thing you did. I was about to fall over.’
‘Some of us are going to have a look at the Old Kingdom tombs,’ Larry explained. ‘Anton thought you might want to come along.’
‘The First Dynasty royal tombs? I thought nothing remained of them.’
‘Nothing worth visiting, no. But there are tombs of all periods here; this was one of the holiest places in Egypt, the legendary site of the tomb of Osiris. Last year an expedition from Boston located a new cemetery of Fourth Dynasty burials. Normally tourists aren’t allowed, but I happen to know the chap in charge and . . . He broke off, eyeing me doubtfully. ‘But perhaps only an enthusiast like myself would be interested.’
He looked like a little boy whose mum has rejected his offering of a toad or a garter snake. Close your eyes and think of the National Museum, I told myself. The tombs must be mastabas, like the ones at Sakkara. The superstructures were all above ground. If anybody invited me to visit the sunken burial chamber I would politely decline.
‘I’d love to,’ I said.
