flashlight was malfunctioning-it didn’t seem to provide any illumination. And then he realized: the entire chamber was clad in what appeared to be onyx, walls and floor and ceiling, black and unreflective. The stone seemed to soak up their flashlight beams, pulling the light from them and leaving the small chamber so dim that its contents could barely be made out.
“Jesus,” Tina said, shivering. “How creepy.”
“Is that your professional opinion, Tina?” Stone asked.
“Kowinsky,” Valentino called out through the gap in the third gate. “Bring up one of those sodium vapor lamps.”
For a moment, everyone fell quiet, examining the chamber. To Logan, it did seem remarkably bare, compared to the opulent rooms that had come before. There was a single ornamental table placed along the left wall, enameled in gold, containing a dozen papyri, each carefully rolled and set in a line. In the rear of the chamber was what looked like a small bed, quite narrow, that had once been covered by some kind of linen coverlet and a pillow, both now sadly decomposed. Across from the table, placed along the floor by the opposing wall, were three small boxes-apparently of solid gold-along with a single urn.
But everyone’s attention quickly turned to the artifact sitting in the center of the room. It was a large chest, about four feet square, fashioned of some black stone-perhaps onyx again-and set upon a fantastically carved plinth of dark, dense wood. Its edges were lined in strips of gold. On its sides were reproductions of several of the designs they had already seen in chamber one-the box-shaped artifact topped by an iron rod; the bowl-like object trailing wisps of gold from its edges. But this time, the images were fashioned out of a multitude of brilliantly colored gemstones, set into the surface of the chest. Across its top was an elaborately fashioned serekh.
“Tina?” Stone said, pointing at the serekh, his voice almost a whisper. “That’s the rebus for Narmer’s name. Right?”
Tina nodded slowly. “Yes. I think so.”
Stone turned to her. “You think so?”
She had set down her video camera, the room being too dark to film, and was peering more closely at the chest. “The glyphs match, all right. But these scratches, here, through the head of the catfish… I don’t know. It’s most unusual. But it’s all unusual. That cotlike structure in the rear, the shrines in chamber two, the strange emptiness of this room…” She paused again. “It’s like I said once before. It’s almost as if this entire tomb was used as a rehearsal for Narmer’s death, for his passage to the next world, the Field of Offerings.”
“Have you come across anything like this before?” Stone asked.
“No.” She looked around the dim space for a minute, brow furrowed in confusion. “It’s almost as if… but, no, it couldn’t be.” She peered again at the chest. “If only I could get a better look at this.”
“Kowinsky!” Valentino bawled. “What’s up with those lights?”
“Not enough room to get them through this opening, sir,” came the disembodied voice of Kowinsky.
“You might want to take a look at those papyri,” Stone said to Tina. “Maybe they can shed some light on things.”
She nodded, moved away with her light.
Now Stone, followed by Dr. Rush, moved over to the series of small golden boxes set along the right-hand wall. Stone crouched down and began to carefully remove the top of the first with latex-gloved hands.
Logan watched, hugging himself against the chill and a feeling of growing dismay. Ever since entering the chamber, he had been aware of the malignant presence. It sensed them-he was sure of that-but the overpowering evil he had felt several times before was being held in check for the time being. It was almost as if it was watching, waiting… and biding its time. He reached into his duffel, pulled out the air ion counter, and swept it slowly around. The air in here was significantly more ionized than normal-in fact, the air had grown increasingly ionized as they’d penetrated deeper into the tomb. What this meant he wasn’t certain.
Stone had removed the top of the box. Reaching in, he gingerly pulled something out: a curl of metal, beaten very thin. “It appears to be native copper,” he said. “There are at least half a dozen small sheets of it in here.” Moving on to the next box, he removed its lid, peered inside, then pulled out something that in the faint light looked almost like a small bayonet, brownish and badly corroded. “Looks like iron,” he said.
“If so, it’s probably meteoric iron,” Tina said, drawn back from the papypri. “And it would be the earliest known use of iron among the Egyptians by at least a few hundred years.”
But Stone had already moved on to the third box. He opened it, placed a hand inside, then removed it again. In his cupped palm he held dozens of thin filaments of beaten gold, tangled together like Christmas tinsel.
“What the hell?” he muttered.
Tina Romero stepped over to the black-edged urn. She carefully lifted it, shone her flashlight inside. “Empty,” she said. Then she raised it to her nose, took a gingerly sniff. “Odd. It smells sour, like-like vinegar.”
Stone came over, took it from her, smelled it also. “You’re right.” He handed it back.
“Bands of copper, iron spikes, filaments of gold,” Logan said. “What could this all mean?”
“I don’t know,” Stone said. “But that will answer all your questions-and more.” He pointed at the onyx- colored chest that stood in the center of the chamber. “That will be what makes all our careers-and puts me in the history books as the greatest archaeologist of all time.”
“You think…” Rush paused. “You think the crowns of Egypt are in that chest?”
“I know they are. It’s the only answer. It’s the final secret of the final chamber of Narmer’s tomb.” Stone turned to Valentino. “Frank? Have your men give me a hand with this.”
Slowly-as if possessed by a single thought-the group drew together, forming a silent ring around the ebony chest.
47
Amanda Richards walked into the forensic archaeology lab and turned on the overhead lights with a flick of her fingers. She stood in the doorway a moment, taking in the racks of instrumentation, the carefully scrubbed lab desks and work surfaces. Then she stepped over to a table in one corner. The room smelled faintly of formaldehyde and other chemical preservatives-and, more chillingly, of sulfur.
Taking a seat at the table, she plucked a folder from beneath her arm and opened it. For several minutes, she examined the sheets within: X-ray fluorescence reports, the all-important CT scans, radiographies, and a brief summary analysis by Christina Romero, all pertaining to the same subject: the mummy of King Narmer.
Closing the folder, Richards sat still a moment, going through a mental checklist. Then she stood up and began assembling the tools she would need: scalpels, archival-quality linen thread, forceps, Teflon needles, fiberglass trays, scraps of ancient flaxen bandages taken from mummified remains too badly decayed or damaged to merit forensic intervention. With her tools assembled, she walked over to the corpse locker in the adjoining wall, grasped its handle, and-gingerly-drew out the mummified remains of King Narmer.
The corpse locker was similar to the ones in the storage area, where Fenwick March had been killed during his attempt to loot Narmer’s mummy, with a single difference: this locker was equipped with an atmosphere of inert gas, nitrogen. Since March had violated the mummy so roughly, tearing the bandages and disturbing its internal microclimate, every attempt had to be made to prevent further decay or decomposition. That, in fact, was the reason Richards was here-to repair, as best she could, the damage March had caused and prepare the mummy for shipment, until a more careful and extensive restoration could be done at Porter Stone’s lab complex outside London.
She swung down the stabilizing leg from beneath the locker, fixing its end to the floor. Then, pulling on latex gloves and a surgical mask, she carefully examined the mummy. Earlier in the day, technicians had removed the compounds in the mummy’s windings that formed the ancient booby trap by exposing the mummy to a negative airflow chamber. Nevertheless, Richards handled the corpse with the utmost caution.
She continued examining the mummy, taking note of the damage to the bandaged hands, head, and-most extensively-the chest. She found herself still struggling with the idea that Fenwick March-one of the most revered archaeologists in the world-could have done something like this: not only robbing a mummy, but in such a crude, unprofessional manner. It was amazing, the deadly lure of ancient treasure. March had been studying it, handling it, all his life. Perhaps this find-the Pharaoh Narmer-had finally been too much for him. It was the straw, the golden
