by Aaron Elkins
And the old bugger was in prime form, especially considering that he was drunk as a skunk, or pretty well on the way. Only the windup remained now, the part where he leaned forward keenly and said: "Now tell me, young man, just which type of authority do you lack?"
Haddon leaned keenly forward, eyeing the cringing Arlo. "Now suppose you tell me," he said with quivering beard, "just which kind of authority do you lack?"
For a man who prided himself on observing the vagaries of others with tolerance and detachment, on not letting people get under his skin, Jerry was ready to admit that he'd met his match in Clifford Haddon. Usually Haddon, who didn't even pretend to take any interest in Jerry's domain of library and collection administration, let him go his way in peace, but in the past few days he'd seen more of the director than in most months, and he was beginning to get a glimmer of why Tiffany, who had to deal with him every day, needed a neck massage about three nights a week and got that look on her face when his name came up. Still, if you looked at it right, you had to admit the guy was funny. Sometimes you just had to laugh out loud. Which, not intending to, he did.
Haddon turned to look sourly at him. "Something amuses you?"
Jerry raised his hands apologetically, one of them holding the pipe. "Sorry, Dr. Haddon, no offense. Something just struck me funny." He shrugged amiably, grinned at Haddon, and stuck the pipe back in his mouth.
Dr. Haddon's retort was interrupted by the appearance in the arched doorway of a wiry, dark-skinned man in turban and long, loose dirt-stained galabiya, who appeared to be in a state of mild, pleasurable excitement. This was in itself an extraordinary occurrence. It was one of Dr. Haddon's rules that outside workers were not to enter the living quarters.
"What the devil—" he began.
"Moomy," the man announced, and was silent.
"Moomy," Dr. Haddon echoed after a moment. "What the devil is moomy?"
"Moomy," the man said again. "In back."
Dr. Haddon had no choice but to ask for help from Tiffany, the only one among them who knew more Arabic than was required to issue an instruction or hold a rudimentary conversation. She asked a brief question. The man replied volubly.
"He says he found a mummy while he was cleaning up," Tiffany explained.
"A mummy?" Dr. Haddon exclaimed incredulously. "Here on the grounds? Impossible."
Tiffany asked several more questions and received lengthy answers. "Apparently what he's found is a skeleton, or at least some bones. He thinks they're human."
Dr. Haddon waved the idea away. "Absurd. Where?"
"In the old storage area behind the laundry."
"The—what in heavens was he doing in there?" Dr. Haddon glowered at the man. "You! What were you doing in there?"
The man grinned and nodded. "Moomy, yes. No problem."
"He said they were following your instructions, cleaning everything up for the moving pictures," Tiffany said.
"Yes, of course, but I didn't mean the old storage area, for God's sake. Does he think they want to—oh, what difference does it make?" Haddon rubbed wearily at his eyes. "Go and see what he's talking about, Tiffany. Nobody's been back there for ages. It's probably what's left of some dog that got in."
As Tiffany left with the Egyptian, Dr. Haddon turned to the others. "I'll keep you from your beds for only a few minutes more," he said, yawning. "Now, what was I saying—"
* * *
TJ escaped into the night with a sense of having made it just in time. Another thirty seconds of Clifford Haddon's arch and simpering posturing, his petty meanness and insincerity, and she would have burst. Tell me, just what kind of authority do you lack?... Believe me, my dear, I'm more distressed about this than you are... Aaaargh.
She realized she was overbreathing—Haddon did that to her— and made herself take a deep breath and slacken her stride. "Slow down, Ragheb," she said.
The Egyptian, who was leading the way over the dark, curving, hibiscus-scented paths with his powerful flashlight, obeyed.
Damn Haddon, he had gotten to her again. She was still fuming. It wasn't simply because of the schedule change—although that would have been enough—but because of his uncanny ability to set her off just by being himself. She was not an emotional person. She hated emotional people, and she hated herself when she blew up, the way she had back there. What had been the point? How many times had they been over the same ground, and where was it ever going to get them? But Clifford Haddon, like no other person she had ever known, could turn her into a ranting screamer just by opening his mouth. It was amazing, really. Sometimes, especially when he'd been at his Scotch, he could set her teeth on edge just by walking into a room. Those smarmy, prissy speeches, that horrible little pharaoh's tuft of beard, that narrow-minded, self-righteous...
And why was it only her? That was what was so frustrating, that nobody else ever blew their stack. Haddon hadn't aced only her out of the picture, after all; he had cut the time that Jerry would have to show the library as well, and what had Jerry's reaction been?
Duh, sure, chief, what else?
No, that wasn't fair. Jerry wasn't dumb, she knew that, he honestly didn't give a damn. He was probably glad of the change. Leaving him out of it altogether probably would have made him happiest of all. It was too bad she couldn't be more like her easygoing, take-things-in-his-stride husband when it came to dealing with their despicable boss, she thought, not quite meaning it. But thank God he was always there to provide TLC and propping-up after one of her sessions with Haddon. She'd probably need some tonight.
A few steps ahead of her, Ragheb stopped at the warped and leaning metal gate of an unroofed, stucco-walled enclosure jutting out from the rear of the laundry building. Her eyes had gotten used to the darkness now. Even without the flashlight she could see the welter of junk through the open gate: corroded bed frames, a toilet bowl broken in two, knotted tangles of filthy, moldering clothing, some rust-cankered, mysterious engine parts reputed to be from a 1925 motorcycle.
Ragheb waited for her to precede him. He spoke English. "Moomy in here, madam," he said politely.
Unexpectedly, she caught herself hesitating. Out here, at the furthest perimeter of the Horizon compound and of the city itself, shielded by the bulk of the buildings, the familiar traffic sounds from the Corniche were muted and distant. The civilized aroma of bougainvillea and hibiscus from the well-planted grounds was faint, the ashy, primeval smell of the vast, unseen Eastern Desert strong and mysterious. Even the familiar, friendly Ragheb was suddenly exotic and inscrutable. A rare, chill breeze from the desert eddied about her, raising the tiny hairs on the back of her neck.
"Well, then," she said, and her own too-loud voice made her start. "Let's just see what we have." Firmly, she led the way into the enclosure.
Thirty seconds later, grim-faced, she told Ragheb to go back and get Haddon.
Chapter Four
They came scurrying in a line behind the director, who had commandeered Ragheb's flashlight and made for the storage area double-time, his bearded chin well out ahead of his feet, a man who intended to set things straight, by God.
But when he reached the enclosure, he lost impetus. Standing at the entrance, swaying a little, he flashed the light from mound to mound of junk. "Well then, where is it? Don't keep us in suspense."
TJ used her own penlight to direct his larger beam to the sandy ground near a rough, oil-stained workbench built into one of the corners. There, next to two rusted five-gallon cans of congealed roofing tar, one of them on its side, a stained, dun-colored, unevenly globular object gleamed dully in the artificial light.
Jerry was the first to speak. "A skull. I guess there isn't much doubt about its being human."
"There's more than the skull," TJ said. She bounced her thin line of light to other objects scattered in an eight- or nine-foot radius over the junk-littered ground: a snarled, grisly clump consisting of a scapula and humerus held together by a few tattered shreds of ligament, the entire mess caught up in
a twisted, filthy galabiya; a thigh bone with the ends gnawed away; a sacrum and an innominate bone, also held together by a few threads of fiber. A few feet from the skull was what appeared to be a turban, collapsed and filthy. Near the sacrum was a cracked, curled sandal.
"An Arab," Jerry said. "The jackals must have been at him. There's still some dried flesh left, but not much."
Arlo shivered. "I wonder how long he's... it's been here."
"Who knows?" Jerry said. He leaned over, peering at the femur, hands on his knees. "Ten years, twenty years ..."
"Impossible," Haddon said curtly. "This area was in regular use until—when was it?"
"Until the big rains five years ago, so they've been here less than that," TJ said. "Five years at most. And I doubt if the jackals can get into the compound. Dogs, more likely, or those monster rats."
Arlo's face, pasty at the best of times, was distinctly greenish in the light from the flashlights. He looked away as Haddon shone his light directly onto the skull.
"Who is it?" the director demanded, sounding thoroughly aggrieved. "How did he get in? What the devil was he doing in here?"
No one answered. "Nobody'd better touch anything," Jerry said.
Haddon's lips turned down. "Perish the thought."
"And I think we'd better notify the police."
"The police?" Haddon turned on him. "Good God, Jerry, have you ever dealt with the Egyptian police? Why would we want to drag them into this? This—this person has been dead for years and no one's missed him yet, have they? I think it's clear enough what happened. The poor beggar got in here somehow, hoping to find something worth stealing in the collection and had the misfortune to die in flagrante delicto. Claimed by the Grim Reaper in the very act of plunder."
His light darted erratically through the jumble of discarded objects. "Ha, see that piece right there? He must have come in here—"
"Why here?" TJ said. She waved her own smaller beam over the mounds of debris. "What would he want in here?"
"Now how would I possibly know that? Who knows what was in the heart of a dead man? Perhaps he heard someone coming and ran in here to hide. Perhaps he was hiding until nightfall, when he could make his, er, getaway more easily. Whatever it was, he simply had the bad luck to die in the interim."
"Of what?" TJ persisted. "Old age? Gallstones? Guilt?"
"Whatever the reason," Haddon said sweetly, "we can rest secure in the knowledge that the unfortunate gentleman is in the arms of Osiris and beyond caring what we make of him. I hardly see the need to stir things up at this late date, and particularly not now, with the Gustafsons here, busily putting their noses into every corner, not to mention that accursed camera crew. And don't forget the anticipated arrival of the man known to one and all as the Skeleton Detective tomorrow evening. God in heaven! No, it seems to me it would save a great deal of commotion all around if we simply disposed of his remains without bothering anybody."
"You're kidding!" TJ exclaimed.
"With dignity, of course," Haddon added.
"We could bury him right in the compound," Arlo volunteered, earning a surprised glance from Haddon. It was not common for Arlo to address the director without having been spoken to first. "In the northeast corner, where Lambert used to bury his garbage. Nobody uses it anymore."
"Do I understand you to be volunteering for the assignment?" Haddon asked.
"I—I only meant that I agree with you."
"I can't begin to tell you," said Haddon, "what a source of comfort that is to me."
Jerry, who had been going quietly through his pipe-lighting ritual, exhaled a lungful of fragrant smoke and shook out the match. "Dr. Haddon, we've got a corpse right in our backyard. We don't know who he was, we don't know how he died, and we don't know what he was doing here. The police have to be called. There's no two ways about it."
Haddon wavered. Despite the coolness he dabbed at his forehead with a handkerchief. "I take your point, Jerry," he said with surprising mildness, "but I hardly see any hurry—"
"And don't forget, Ragheb knows all about it."
"And if Ragheb knows, everybody knows," TJ said.
Haddon opened his mouth to reply, closed it again, and arrived at a decision he didn't like. "Yes, all right, you're probably right," he said, wearily passing a hand over his eyes. The Scotches had finally caught up with him. "We'll call them from the house." He made a frustrated little gesture with the flashlight, pointing the way for their return. They went back the way they'd come, with Haddon in the lead and Arlo bringing up the rear.
"But what a time for this to happen!" Haddon muttered bitterly as they entered the main building.
"All the more reason to take care of it right now," Jerry said sensibly. "Maybe they can wrap the whole thing up by tomorrow. By the time Oliver gets here it'll be forgotten." He found the proper page in the tiny local telephone directory, picked up the telephone, and handed them both to Haddon.
Haddon took it without enthusiasm. His face was gray. "Wrap something up by tomorrow? The Luxor police? Don't make me laugh. We'll be lucky if they get here by tomorrow."
He was quickly proved right. The receptionist at the police department regretted that no English-speaking official of sufficient rank to attend to this most serious matter was currently available. The morning shift would report at 8 a.m., however, and at that time a responsible investigator would be dispatched to Horizon House at once. Personnel at Horizon House were instructed to secure the grounds.
Haddon hung up with a slurred laugh. He seemed about to fall asleep. "At once. That means... that could mean anywhere from eight a.m. to eight p.m. Well, I don't see how it can be helped. I'm going to b-... to bed, and I suggest the rest of you do the same." He took a deep breath and headed for the door to the patio, off which the living quarters opened. Partway there he listed, managing to right himself with the help of the wall.
At the door he turned, steadied himself against the jamb, and fixed them with a quizzical and suspicious gaze. "I don't suppose... don't suppose any of you know anything ab-... about this?"
Tiffany shook her head.
Arlo shook his head.
"Who, me?" Jerry said.
Haddon nodded gravely. "Good night to all," he proclaimed, drawing himself up, "and to all a good night." A moment later they heard a clatter as he stumbled against one of the wicker chairs on the patio.
"The man's swacked again," TJ said.
"Swozzled," agreed Jerry. "One of these nights he's going to fall in the fountain and kill himself on his two a.m. rounds."
"He makes rounds?" Arlo asked. "At night? I knew he was an insomniac, but—"
"You don't see him," Jerry said. "Your window faces the other way. He prowls around till two or three in the morning, talking to himself and falling over stuff."
TJ was shaking her head. "You know, it's really not that he drinks that much. It's the interaction with the medications he's on that does it; that stuff for anxiety, or depression, or whatever he takes. I'm surprised he can see straight."
"Now what in the world does he have to be depressed about?" Arlo asked. "We're the ones who have to work for him."
Jerry laughed. "If you had to be Clifford Haddon, you wouldn't be depressed?"
"You certainly have a point there," Arlo said, pressing his eyes with his fingertips. "Well, I guess I'd better get to bed too."
"Not me," Jerry said, stretching. "I left Forrest and his crew over in the annex with some six-packs and pizza, and I bet they're still there. I know I could use a couple of beers."
"God knows, so could I," TJ said fervently.
"You can say that again," said Arlo after a moment's reflection.
Chapter Five
Whatever aura of mystery had hung over the storage enclosure the night before, it was not in evidence in the dusty, flat 9 a.m. sunlight of the next morning. The enclosure looked like what it was, a squalid, fifteen-square-foot pen crammed with the household and workplace castoffs of years. Most of it—th
e shabby, anonymous clothing, the moldy automobile cushions, the time-grayed newspapers—was peacefully disintegrating. Some—the broken toilet bowl, the warped plastic coat hangers—would be around for future generations of archaeologists to potter blissfully among.
Major Yussef Saleh and Sergeant Monir Gabra of the Qena Governate Police, Criminal Investigation Division, had been pottering for half an hour. They were not blissful. They had located, in addition to the bones found the night before, the other half of the pelvis, a few long bones and ribs they took to be human, and several irregular smaller pieces that they thought might be human hand or foot bones. They had found no signs of foul play and hoped they would not; sorting through the broken tools, discarded utensils, and rusty, unidentifiable pieces of metal in search of a probable blunt or pointed instrument of death was a task neither of them cared to think about.
Following proper police procedure, the bones had not been disturbed until they had been photographed and their positions sketched and described. Then, kneeling on a cracked rubber mat that they had found among the junk, they delicately turned over the skull.
After a moment, the two men looked at each other with puzzled expressions.
* * *
"Yes?" Clifford Haddon glanced up, not pleased to be interrupted. When he saw that it was Major Saleh, his tone became more cordial. "Ah, yes, Major, may I help you?"
"Will you come with us, please?"
Haddon stiffened. Spots of deeper color popped out on his pink throat. "Come with you—where?"
"To the storage enclosure," Saleh said. "I would like to ask you about something if you can spare a few minutes."