Pharaoh

by Valerio Massimo Manfredi

‘Haven’t you thought of the consequences? Your discovery will dash to smithereens the hope of an afterlife for two-thirds of the people living on this earth. It will undermine Judaism, Islam and Christianity.’

  ‘Ra, Amon, Baal and Tanit, Zeus and Poseidon are all dead. Even Yahweh, the Lord of Israel, can fade away without God ceasing to exist.’

  ‘Look, I’ll help you place a charge inside the tomb. It’s the best thing, believe me.’

  ‘No, Sarah. If that tomb has come down to us still intact after more than three thousand years, we don’t have the right to destroy it.’

  ‘But your plan is impossible. We can’t leave the camp without anyone realizing—’

  ‘You’ve done so at will.’

  ‘We don’t have any explosives.’

  ‘They won’t be hard to get from the storehouse. The workmen have the keys. Find some excuse.’

  ‘But we don’t know what the hell is beyond the landslide opening. We could cause another cave-in. We could be trapped and suffocate to death.’

  ‘If you don’t help me I’ll do it by myself.’

  Sarah lowered her head.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I’ll help you. Otherwise you’ll just get yourself killed. But there’ll be some talking to do when all this is over.’

  ‘That’s OK by me.’

  ‘You do realize that we won’t be able to come back here. Have you thought of what we’ll do afterwards?’

  ‘There’s always water and gasoline in the ATV. We’ll take a couple of packs of survival rations and leave. I’d avoid the trail to Mitzpe Ramon. Better to head south down the Arava Valley to Yotvata and Eilat. There we’ll have to decide what to do. If that’s all fine with you, I’m going to the warehouse.’

  ‘You’d better not. You’ll only arouse suspicion. Let me do it. You get your things together. Fill up the water bottles and meet me at the parking lot in fifteen minutes. Don’t forget the suncream: we don’t want to end up getting burned.’

  Blake went into his trailer and began to pack his things. A feeling of excitement was sneaking over him; this place had become an unbearable prison and the thought of getting out of these people’s clutches seemed like a dream. He kept checking his watch, counting the minutes as he nervously smoked a last cigarette before going out.

  The moon hadn’t emerged from behind the hills yet but a pale light was spreading to the east, announcing its imminent appearance over the Paran desert. With just a few minutes to go, Blake stubbed out his cigarette. He went into the bathroom and jumped out of the back window after tossing his rucksack onto the ground.

  He stopped for a moment to look towards the camp and saw a dark shadow slowly approaching the parking lot: Sarah.

  He crept in the same direction until he was quite close to her.

  ‘I’m here,’ he whispered.

  ‘So am I,’ said Sarah. ‘Come on. We’ll be out of here in a minute.’

  She approached the vehicle and was leaning forward with her rucksack when they heard the generator start up and suddenly the whole area was lit up like day.

  ‘Freeze where you are,’ a voice said.

  ‘Maddox! Damn!’ swore Sarah. ‘Move it! Let’s go!’

  ‘Stop them!’ cried Maddox to a group of men running in their direction.

  Blake jumped into the open back of the vehicle as Sarah fired the engine and set off at high speed.

  Maddox’s men had reached the parking lot and were shooting and shouting at them to stop.

  What are they doing?’ yelled Sarah, without taking her eyes off the track.

  Blake looked back and what he saw made his blood freeze in his veins.

  ‘Oh, God,’ he said, grabbing Sarah by the arm. ‘Look Look down there!’

  Sarah turned for a second and saw searchlights criss-crossing the dark sky. Then she heard a steady beating of rotors and the screeching of engines pushed to their limits.

  ‘Assault helicopters!’ she yelled. ‘We’re getting out!’

  She rammed the accelerator down as hard as she could, while Maddox’s men jumped into Jeeps to spin them around and out of the parking lot.

  They didn’t get the chance. The darkness behind them was suddenly shattered by a series of blinding flashes and the deafening explosions of heavy guns hitting the trailers, machines and depots with murderous accuracy. The hammering of the guns was punctuated by the sharp chatter of automatic weapons spraying bullets. In the cone of light projected from the front of the choppers, the bullets raised spouts of sand along the ground and loosed off hundreds of glowing chips of stone that shot like meteorites up across the dark backdrop of the night.

  The Jeeps jumped around like toys, then a boom shook the mountain and a gigantic globe of fire lit up the area for miles around when the explosives depot was hit.

  ‘What’s happening? What the hell’s happening?’ shouted Sarah, who couldn’t take her eyes off the track.

  ‘The helicopters have attacked the camp and they’re flattening it,’ yelled Blake. ‘It’s like an inferno. They’re firing for all they’re worth at everything they can see.’

  Sarah had turned off the headlights and was using the side lights so they wouldn’t be seen.

  ‘They’re landing now!’ shouted Blake, who was looking backwards. ‘The camp is hidden behind the hills, but I can see the helicopters circling as they’re going down.’

  The choppers had disappeared behind the outline of the hills, but the light coming from them and the tracers lit up the sky like the glow of a surreal dawn.

  For a while, only the beating of the rotor blades could be heard, then the crack of the automatic weapons started again.

  ‘They’ve landed. They must be combing the terrain inch by inch. Step on it! We’ve got to get away as fast as we can.’

  ‘We’ve done almost three miles,’ said Sarah. ‘We should be pretty safe by now.’

  Meanwhile, the moon had begun to rise in the sky, spreading a wide expanse of light over the pale desert, and Sarah was able to keep up a steady speed that she increased when they hit the flat plain of the hammada.

  The ATV streaked along like a shooting star, leaving a milky-white cloud of moonbeam-crossed dust in its trail.

  When they approached Ras Udash, Sarah switched the engine off, slid out of the seat and fell to the ground, completely exhausted.

  Blake went to her. ‘I’ve never driven a contraption like that, but I would have taken over from you if you had told me how.’

  ‘Forget it,’ said Sarah. ‘We got out by the skin of our teeth. One more minute and—’

  ‘But who were they?’

  ‘I don’t know. I couldn’t see anything because I had to look where we were going. Did you see any markings on the sides of the helicopters?’

  ‘All hell had broken loose. What with the explosions, tracer bullets and flashes, I couldn’t make out anything. You were driving so fast

  ‘Maddox must have stamped pretty hard on someone’s toes and they were out to get him,’ said Sarah. ‘God, we only just escaped in time.’

  ‘You can still see the light of the fires towards Mitzpe. Look’

  Sarah stood up and narrowed her eyes looking north to the horizon, where a confusion of lights flickered behind the low line of the hills.

  Yes,’ she said. ‘And now what are you going to do? It looks like your plan doesn’t make much sense any more.’

  ‘True,’ replied Blake. ‘But I still want to go down into the tomb to check out that side opening and close the sarcophagus. And after that, I’ll set the charges.’

  He took the shovel from the ATV and cleaned off the iron plate. Then he took the winch cable and hooked it to the lifting ring.

  ‘Listen,’ said Sarah, ‘let’s get out of here now. Someone might have noticed we’ve got away. We may not be safe even here.’

  ‘Help me, quick,’ said Blake as if she hadn’t spoken. ‘Start up the engine and drag off the cover plate. I just need to open it enough to get in. We’ll go d
own on a rope.’

  Sarah obeyed. She put the ATV into reverse and accelerated. It sank several times into the hammada and swung left and right until it got a grip and started to pull. The plate slid back slowly, uncovering part of the opening.

  Blake tied a rope round his waist, secured the other end to the lifting ring on the iron plate and slipped down inside.

  He lit a neon torch and looked around. Everything was in order and the sarcophagus lid was still resting on the crude raising mechanism he had used. He removed the plastic sheet that was wrapped round the sarcophagus and got up onto the stool from where he looked motionlessly at the mask which covered the face of the mummy.

  The startling realism of the likeness was austere yet majestic, highlighting the powerful, severe expression of a man whose mere look had held multitudes in sway.

  He came to suddenly, as if from a daze, when he felt Sarah’s hand touch his arm.

  Silently, he got down and connected the levers on each of the pairs of jacks with a rod so they could be operated simultaneously by a single person. With Sarah’s help, he raised them until the weight of the lid was off the blocks. Gradually, by placing smaller and smaller blocks, he lowered the jacks, two centimetres at a time, until the lid was completely closed.

  ‘It’s taken us sixty-five minutes,’ he said, wiping his brow as he looked at his watch. ‘Longer than I expected.’

  ‘Things always take longer than planned,’ said Sarah. ‘Now, please, Will, let’s get away while it’s still dark.’

  Blake turned towards the side opening, where he had cleared away the debris.

  ‘I want to see what’s in there,’ he said, grabbing a small pick.

  ‘Come on. Let’s get out of here,’ Sarah insisted. ‘I don’t like this place. And you never finished telling me that story about the curse.’

  ‘There wasn’t enough time for explanations.’

  ‘I know. But anyway, it’s time to get away. Let’s close up this hole on top, set off the charges and head out for Yotvata. If that hunk of tin out there stays in one piece, we can probably expect to reach Eilat before the weather changes. The ATV’s top speed is seventy, which means an average of forty or fifty. Have you thought about that? Christ, you can always come back here when all this has blown over and dig down right to the centre of the earth if you want. But for now let’s go.’

  ‘Just half an hour,’ said Blake. ‘Just give me one half-hour and then we’ll go. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to come back here. I want to see what’s behind there. Shine the light here, please.’

  Sarah pointed the neon light towards the opening and Blake started to work at the compacted mound as if he were demolishing a wall. After a while, the pick broke through.

  ‘I knew it!’ he said, his excitement rising. ‘There’s a cavity on the other side.’

  He widened the opening and had Sarah pass the neon through to light up the space beyond the mound of debris.

  ‘What’s there?’ asked Sarah.

  ‘The rest of the slide, which is partly blocking a tunnel that goes up like a ramp.’

  ‘You only have a quarter of an hour,’ said Sarah. ‘You promised.’

  Blake continued digging with the pick, throwing the rubble behind him until he had finally opened up a gap big enough for a person to get through.

  ‘Come on,’ he said, and started to go through to the other side.

  Sarah followed him uncertainly, lighting the way with the neon. They had gone about twenty metres along the narrow passage when she stopped suddenly to listen.

  ‘What is it?’ asked Blake.

  ‘The helicopters . . . damn! They waited until it was light enough, then they followed the tracks of the ATV.’

  ‘Sarah, you can’t be sure of that. We’ve seen helicopters passing this way at other times.’

  But the noise was getting louder and nearer. And soon they could hear the crackle of machine guns.

  Sarah yelled, ‘Let’s get out of here, quick!’ She started to run back, but, at that very moment, an explosion shook the earth under their feet. A flash filled the tomb and the corridor with light, and immediately afterwards there was a dull crash as they were plunged into darkness.

  ‘They’ve hit the ATV and the explosives. We’re buried in here!’

  ‘Not yet,’ said Blake. ‘Quick! This way. Shine the light!’

  They heard another explosion.

  ‘The gasoline tanks,’ said Sarah, crawling up the ramp. At that moment, they heard a sinister noise behind them, a sort of crunching and then sliding rocks.

  ‘Oh, God! The vibrations are making the tunnel cave in!’ shouted Sarah. ‘Hurry! Run! Run!’

  The tunnel had got narrower and began to slope upwards slightly. Sarah and Blake scrambled up desperately, pouring with sweat, their hearts beating wildly as a growing sense of oppressive claustrophobia assailed them.

  In the midst of their dash, clambering over the fall of rocks and sand and through a suffocating dust that the light barely penetrated, all of a sudden Blake came to a dead halt. He stared as if made of stone towards the left of the tunnel, where a kind of niche had unexpectedly appeared.

  ‘Come away!’ shouted Sarah. ‘What are you waiting for? Come on!’

  But Blake seemed to be paralysed by what he was seeing, or what he thought he was seeing. Within the cloud of white dust, there was a dazzling confusion of golden wings under a stone vault and a veiled shimmering of treasure.

  ‘Oh, my . . . God!’

  Sarah grabbed him by the arm and pulled him away just a second before the whole vault collapsed onto where his head had been and she kept pulling him until she thought her heart would burst.

  They sank onto the floor of the gallery, exhausted.

  Not a sound could be heard now, except for the occasional pebble that continued to fall from the walls. Bit by bit, the dust settled and they could see that a gentle draught was coaxing it upwards. ‘There’s an opening there,’ said Sarah. ‘We might be able to get out.’

  Blake pulled himself to his feet first. His forehead was bleeding where the stones falling from the vault had grazed him. His hands were skinned and his face was grubby with a mixture of sweat and white dust. He was still brandishing the pick and seemed to be out of his mind.

  ‘I have to go back,’ he said, turning round. ’You don’t know what I saw there.’

  Sarah grabbed him by both arms and pushed him against the wall.

  ‘For the love of God, Will. We have to save ourselves. If we don’t get out of here, we’ll die. For the love of God, let’s get out of here. We have to go!’

  Blake seemed to come out of his dazed state and started walking upwards. He continued his backward glances until, finally, they both saw a stream of light. It was a thin sun ray filtering through a crack at what seemed to be the end of the tunnel.

  Blake approached it and lifted the pick to widen the crack, but, at that very moment, he saw some dust fall and heard the muffled sound of voices. He signalled to Sarah not to move or make any sound and put his ear up to the crack. Now he could hear the noise of steps moving away and, further still, there was the beating of a helicopter’s rotor blades turning slowly.

  ‘They’ve landed,’ he whispered. ‘They’re patrolling the area, probably looking for us.’

  ‘Can you hear what language they’re speaking?’ asked Sarah.

  ‘No. They’re too far away and I can’t hear them because of the helicopter. We could try to get out so we can see.’

  He opened the crack with the pick just enough to get his head and shoulders out and found himself in a small cave which was rank with the smell of urine. On the ground were fresh prints of military boots.

  When Blake had got out he helped Sarah do the same.

  ‘Jeez!’ said the girl. ‘What the hell is this stench?’

  ‘It’s only ibex urine. They use caves like these for shelter at night and the sand on the floor is completely impregnated with their excrement. I’ve seen tons
of these places in the Middle East. Let’s go and see what’s happening.’

  But even as he spoke, he heard the helicopter engine speed up and heard the whir of the blades as they spun through the air. They slipped across the cave floor to the entrance and found themselves on the side of the hill at Ras Udash, above the site where they had worked for so many days and from which a dense column of black smoke was now rising. The helicopter was already far away.

  ‘What a disaster,’ said Blake, his eyes filling up.

  The ATV had suffered a direct hit and bits of it were lying all over the place. The explosion had blasted a crater and the fallout had formed an enormous heap where the entrance to the tomb had been.

  ‘Two explosive charges and four tanks of gasoline. Quite a bang,’ said Sarah. Her eyes followed the helicopter, which was, by now, barely a speck in the grey sky. ‘Did you see any markings?’ she asked.

  Blake shook his head. ‘I didn’t see anything. Have you seen the boot tracks?’

  Sarah glanced at the footprints that had been left all around the entrance of the cave.

  ‘NATO combat boots. They’re the most common type of all and loads of armies use them. As far as I can tell, they could have been Egyptians, Americans, Saudis, Israelis . . . But the helicopter was Western-made. Not that that tells us very much.’

  She opened her rucksack.

  ‘We’ve only got the stuff we were carrying with us. What’ve you got?’

  Blake opened up his pack.

  ‘A water bottle, a few cereal bars, a couple of cans of meat, some crackers, a box of dates and one of dried figs.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Matches, string, needle and thread, Swiss Army knife, soap, suntan cream. The usual junk . . . and a topographical map and compass.’

  He started down towards the deserted plain. The sky was beginning to lighten and a cold wind had sprung up from the north. It forced the column of smoke down to the ground, where it meandered at length between the rocks and stones of the hammada.

  At a certain point, Sarah saw Blake turn towards something on his left and bend down to pick it up. She went over to him.

  ‘What is it?’

  Blake turned round. In his hands he was holding a Bible whose pages had been charred by the explosion.