Ramses doubled over with a howl of pain. Cautiously the residents ventured out of hiding. A murmur—a very soft murmur—of sympathy and anger arose. Ramses could have done without the sympathy. At any moment someone would get a closer look at his face and wonder why a beggar would be so young and healthy-looking.
The curtains at the doorway of the house behind him were drawn aside and a woman’s voice said, “Come in, holy one. We have medicines and food.”
It wasn’t the sort of bolt-hole he would have chosen, but there really wasn’t any choice. Bent over, clutching his side and groaning, Ramses stumbled in.
He had seen a number of brothels in el Wasa, the red-blind district of Cairo. He had never been inside one, not only because fastidiousness had triumphed over curiosity but also because he knew his mother would skin him alive if she found out he had done so—and Nefret would have set fire to the remains. He was pretty sure this was a pathetic specimen of the type: a small grimy room lit by a few cheap brass lamps, its only furnishings a wooden table, a few chairs, and a long divan presently occupied by three underdressed, weary-looking girls. The woman who had invited him in was older, her wrinkled face coated with cosmetics and her fleshy body covered by a loose wrapper. Hands on hips, she studied him through narrowed eyes.
“Honored Sitt,” Ramses began.
Her hand shot out and caught hold of his chin, forcing his head up so that one of the lamps shone full on his face.
“You are no beggar,” she said. “Who are you? And why are you being hunted by the Turks?”
AS WE STARTED UP the hill Nefret asked, “Do you intend to leave here without discovering what has become of Mr. Plato?”
Her tone was critical and her look severe.
“I don’t give a curse what has become of him,” Emerson growled. “Stop worrying about him, Nefret. He has done this before and always manages to find his way back to board and lodging. Particularly board.”
However, when we reached the foot of the great wall and the gate called the Dung Gate, whom should we behold but the reverend himself, seated on a boulder and surveying the scene with his usual vague smile.
“There you are,” he said. “I thought you would come this way, so I waited for you.”
“What happened to you?” Nefret asked. “That is a nasty bruise. Did you fall?”
Plato raised his hand to his jaw. “I was met with resistance from the heathen when I preached to them.”
“Oh, for God’s sake,” Emerson exclaimed. “Who is he now, John the Baptist or one of the Apostles, or…Take him by the collar and drag him along.”
So we did, metaphorically speaking. Plato came without demur. In fact he seemed livelier than usual; every now and then a pleased little smile quirked his mouth. The rising bruise, which his beard did not wholly conceal, looked to my expert eye as if it had been caused by a fist striking his jaw.
In order to make ensuing events clear to the Reader, I should explain that the city is divided into quarters, Christian, Jewish, Moslem, and Armenian. There are no barriers between these sections, and people pass freely from one to another—not always in harmony but seldom in actual conflict. The famous Wailing Wall, where devout Jews gather to mourn the downfall of the Holy City, is on the eastern side of the Jewish Quarter; the huge stone blocks are, in fact, part of the enormous platform on which the Haram stands. The style of masonry and other archaeological evidence prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the entire platform was built in Herodian, i.e., Roman, times, to serve as the foundation for Herod’s temple. Nothing remains, alas, of the temple itself. The entire circumference of the walls is only about two and a half miles; devout pilgrims follow the entire route on foot or on donkeyback, taking in such sights as the supposed tomb of Saint John and the Pillar of Absalom. Even I was willing to abjure this pleasure. Access to the city is provided by seven gates that pierce the great walls. The route we followed led from Siloam to the nearest gate, whose unattractive name I have already reported, and into the Jewish Quarter.
There is not much difference in appearance between this area and the other quarters—narrow winding streets, dilapidated dwellings, feral dogs foraging for scraps of food. The city’s synagogues are in this section, as Christian churches tend to congregate in that part of the city. Two of the largest and most recent of the former were used respectively by the Sephardim and Ashkenazim sects. The latter’s conspicuous dome was visible from the upper floors of our hotel. I meant to pay a courtesy call there one day—without Emerson.
We were on David Street when it happened. The sky had clouded over and I felt as if I were walking at the bottom of a narrow passageway, walled in by buildings of several stories, and arched over, at intervals, by extensions of dwelling places on one side or another. It was impossible to stay together as a group in the jostling, hurrying throng. Emerson had taken me firmly by the arm and Daoud was looking after Nefret. Should we become separated, I felt sure everyone knew his or her way back to the hotel; we had come that same way earlier. I was not aware of trouble until a penetrating shriek rose over the polyglot babble and the importunities of merchants.
“Stop, Emerson,” I cried, attempting to free my arm. “Someone is in need of help.”
However, Daoud was the first to respond, since he and Nefret were closest to the cause of the disturbance. Plunging into a tangle of bodies, he lifted from its midst a familiar face framed in floating hair.
FROM MANUSCRIPT H
This was obviously a case in which physical coercion wouldn’t work, even supposing he could bring himself to throttle four women. Try to throttle, rather; the proprietress, for all her bulk, had a grip as strong as a man’s, and after a long night on the run Ramses was beginning to tire.
“What makes you think we—I—am being hunted?”
She caught the slip. A gleam of amusement brightened her eyes, but she did not refer to it at once. “They have spread out all over the city searching for you. The two fools you saw leave this house were among the searchers. They were—distracted. And too stupid to see through your clumsy disguise. Are you hungry?”
“I—I do not understand,” Ramses stammered.
A snap of her fingers dismissed the girls. They filed out through a curtained doorway behind the divan, without so much as a backward look.
“Sit down,” the woman said. “You are weary. I will bring your friend to you if you wish.”
Ramses had given up hope of directing the conversation. She was far ahead of him. “Yes,” he said. “Please. Where is he?”
She let out a high-pitched, girlish giggle. “Just outside. Trying to make himself invisible.” She raised her voice. “Come in, you there, or make way for others.”
David pushed through the curtains. His eyes went at once to Ramses. “Are you all right?”
In his relief he spoke English. Ramses replied in Arabic. “Aywa. Thanks to this noble lady.”
The florid compliment failed to move her. “So you are the Inglizi,” she breathed. “I would not have thought it. They said you attacked a lady who was a guest in the house, and that you fled when she cried out for help.”
“It is a lie,” David said vehemently.
“I believe you.” Her eyes narrowed with laughter. “I think neither of you would have to force himself on a woman. Now come with me, to a more private place.”
“Why are you doing this?” Ramses asked.
She answered with a familiar proverb. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Come.”
They followed her along a passageway lined with curtained doors, to a small closet next to the kitchen. Shelves along one wall held a supply of food stuffs—bags of flour and meal, lentils and dried fruit. There was barely room on the floor for both of them to stretch out, and no light, but it had the advantage of a solid wooden door. Their hostess handed in a jar of water and a bowl of cold mush, presumably the remains of last night’s supper.
“Rest while you can,” she said. “My name is Majida. No, I do not want to know yours. Make no sound.
I will return later.”
The door closed, leaving them in darkness except for a few thin rays of light from cracks in and around the door. “She’s locked us in,” David breathed, hearing the unmistakable drop of a bar into its socket. “Perhaps they’re offering a reward, and she wants to collect it.”
“If so, there’s not a damned thing we can do about it.” Ramses was suddenly so tired his knees bent of their own accord. He sank down to a sitting position.
The wretched food revived them, and they used the empty bowl for a drinking vessel.
“I think we can trust her,” Ramses said, after they had stretched out, heads close together. The floor was hard and dirty, but at that point he could have slept on a rock. “The Turks are hated everywhere in the territories, and for good reason.”
His only answer was a faint snore.
THEY LEFT THE HOUSE at dawn the following morning, wearing homespun robes over cotton shirts and loose trousers, and the caps wound round with cloth that were the local headgear of choice. David’s valise had been exchanged for a pair of bags with long straps that could be slung over the shoulders. Majida gave them a last inspection as they stood by the door that led out into a narrow rubbish-strewn back street.
“Keep the scarves over your faces,” she instructed. “Your beards shame you.”
“True,” Ramses agreed. He offered her two gold sovereigns. “We cannot repay your kindness, but for the clothing—”
“Kindness deserves repayment too,” said Majida, taking the money. “Go with God.”
“One more thing,” Ramses said, as she turned away. “Er—where are we?”
She must have been very beautiful once, he thought, seeing her face break into a broad, uninhibited smile and dimples pop out on either cheek. “You need someone to take you by the hand and lead you like a child. How can it be that you are ignorant of that?”
“It is a long and tedious tale,” Ramses said with a sheepish grin.
“Then you must not tell it.” She reached out and patted his cheek. “This is Nablus, and you are on the east side. The road to Jerusalem is that way, an hour’s walk.”
She pushed them out into the alleyway and closed the door.
They followed the route she had suggested earlier, one which would take them out into the countryside most quickly.
“Nablus,” Ramses said. “We’re only ten miles from Samaria, where I started out! They must have been driving in circles all that time.”
“Same for me,” David agreed. “I was just outside Nablus when they picked me up. What’s the plan now? Back to Samaria? Jaffa?”
“No, the parents will be in Jerusalem by now. If we don’t turn up soon they’ll come looking for us. Anyhow, I’m ready to admit my inferiority and ask for a council of war. This business is more complicated than I realized. I’ll be damned if I can figure out what’s going on.”
“What do you mean?”
They squeezed past a donkey loaded with fodder. The houses were thinning out. Ramses waited until there was no one within earshot before he answered.
“David, we’ve been told three different stories by two people whom we can’t believe, and a third, poor Macomber, who may have been deliberately misled. I don’t even know who’s on whose side now. Did you happen to notice the tattoo on Majida’s arm when she reached out to touch my face? It was the same as that peculiar mark on Mansur’s forearm.”
Chapter Seven
Once again Plato Panagopolous had wreaked havoc with my schedule. By the time we had taken him back to the hotel and wrung the truth out of him, it was too late to return to our new house and begin a thorough cleaning.
I examined Mr. Plato, despite his insistence that he was unharmed. A bump on his cranium and a few more bruises were the only damage I could see. Daoud had a shallow cut on one arm. As Nefret cleaned and bandaged it, he explained that his arm “got in the way of a knife one man was holding.”
We were in our sitting room at the time. When Plato referred to the subject of luncheon, I was in complete sympathy with Emerson when he seized the reverend by the collar and addressed him in the ominous growl that is feared by every man in Egypt.
“I have reached the end of my patience. Not a morsel of food shall touch your lips until you have answered all my questions fully and truthfully. Where did you go this morning? Why is a man with a knife after your blood? Who sent him? I would like,” said Emerson, his voice rising, “to write the fellow a letter of thanks!”
Plato’s eyes were bulging and his pale countenance had darkened. I said, “Loosen your grip, Emerson, and let me conduct the interrogation, if you please. You must ask more direct questions. Mr. Plato, was it Mr. Morley you went to see this morning? There is no sense in lying, for I am fairly certain of the answer. Yes or no?”
Plato inserted a shaking finger into his collar. “Yes,” he stuttered. “Yes. Why should I not? I went on your behalf, to persuade him to ask your advice before proceeding with—”
“And he punched you on the jaw?”
Plato hung his head. “At first he took my suggestion badly. The role of the peacemaker—”
“Did not succeed in this instance,” I said. “Was it Morley who sent the assassin after you?”
“I cannot believe—”
“Have you other enemies in Jerusalem?”
“No. That is…”
I will spare the Reader the rest of his rambling discourse. In the end, between my pointed questions and Emerson’s threats, he admitted it had been Morley who robbed and attacked him at the inn in England. He had come to us after he discovered Morley intended to leave him behind when the expedition—based on his discoveries!—left England. Morley had used and then abandoned him, leaving him penniless. But he bore no hatred toward his betrayer, no indeed! He had accompanied us in the hope of bringing Morley to a better understanding. Had he not preached forgiveness?
“Oh, good Gad,” said Emerson. “Now he claims to have been Jesus. I don’t know how much more of this I can stand.”
“His explanation is consistent with what we already knew,” I pointed out. “We had assumed from the first that Mr. Morley was a conscienceless adventurer, concerned only with profit.”
“Oh, quite,” said Emerson glumly. “‘Consistent’ is the correct word. Either he is the most consistent liar I have ever met or he is a perfectly consistent fool. Now, then—er—since it is clear Morley has no intention of cooperating with us, we must take steps to control his activities. Here is paper and pen. You claim to recall the text of your famous scroll. Write it down.”
Plato complied readily, explaining that he was giving us only the part of the text that contained directions as to the location of the treasure. It was certainly a curious document. It read in part: “Now while the workmen were lifting up their picks there was a rift on the right hand, one hundred cubits from the entrance, leading to the place of the treasure, and one hundred cubits was the height of the rock over the heads of the workmen.”
“This is, of course, a translation,” said Emerson, studying the paper. “You read ancient Hebrew?”
“At one time I did. My memory—”
“Aha,” said Emerson. “If you are the scholar you claim to be, you ought to be able to reproduce at least part of the original.”
Plato blinked at him. “Do you understand—”
“Are you hungry?” Emerson replied with a wolfish smile.
Plato picked up the pen.
To my astonishment he proceeded to inscribe several lines of what certainly appeared to be a variety of Hebrew. Emerson’s smile vanished. He cannot read the ancient form of the language any more than I can, but he knew enough, as did I, to tell that the text was not a scribble of meaningless symbols.
Nefret spoke for the first time. “Touché, I believe,” she remarked.
BY THEN THE HOUR was late for luncheon and the dining salon was only half full. Emerson, still in a state of aggravation, directed Plato to a table clear across the room from the o
ne at which we gathered.
“I wish to discuss a number of matters that don’t concern him,” he said, in response to Nefret’s attempted objection. “I have yet to make up my mind about the creature.”
“I quite agree,” I said. Selim nodded emphatically.
“Very well, then,” said Nefret, frowning. “Let us begin with the matter of Ramses and David. You said we should wait a few days. We have waited. I propose one or all of us leave for Samaria tomorrow.”
“If we do that, it will mean postponing our activities here for several days,” I said. “There is a great deal to do. Setting up the house—a complex chore in itself—keeping watch over Morley, arranging for Emerson’s excavations.” Nefret’s lips parted, so I hurried on. “Would you care to explain to us, my dear Emerson, what intrigues you about that particular site?”
The waiter delivered the soup we had ordered, which gave Emerson time to consider his response. It took the form of a lecture.
“Egypt ruled this entire region during the fourteenth century B.C., including Jerusalem, which is mentioned in the Egyptian archives. Yet no artifacts of that period have been found here.”
He paused to have a sip of soup, and I took advantage.
“Don’t tell me you have found evidence of remains from that remote period? After a cursory examination of surface material? I understand, my dear, why you would be thrilled to discover Egyptian material here, but surely—”
“You would not sacrifice the safety of your son for such a discovery?” Nefret cut in. The verb is appropriate; her voice was as sharp as a knife blade.
“Certainly not,” Emerson exclaimed. “You wound me deeply by such a suggestion. However, we have no proof at this time that his or David’s safety is at risk.”
“Proof!” Nefret cried. “What are you waiting for, a ransom note, or…” She paused, biting her lip. The image in her mind was as clear to the rest of us as it was to her. There was no putting her off, and to be candid I had come round to share her concerns.
A River in the Sky Page 18