But Carter was far less than dismayed.
“Well done, Lucas!” he applauded as they laid down their load, positioning it securely on the trestles. “You were right. I promise never to question your judgement again.”
“Fat chance, Howard.” Lucas held no illusions.
A season almost as exciting, certainly more grand than the first, was over. Carter was glad. It had been emotionally taxing, particularly the earliest stages, and the work itself had been almost overpowering at times. Oftentimes he had fallen into bed in complete exhaustion, barely able to take his clothes off, let alone wash, overwhelmed by the responsibility, the problem solving, the immensity of the physical labour, the painstaking discipline of sequenced clearance, the long hours of restoration, the ever-present visitors of importance, the endemic politics. He should have been well used and equal to it all by this time but he wasn’t. His innate inability to deal with the whole picture with equanimity had been his problem all along, particularly in the absence of his sophisticated patron. That and the confined, subterranean labour, the very atmosphere of the tomb, had combined to make him feel positively ill at times.
And then there had been the dreams. So many of them. So real. But now, happily, it seemed that he was free of them, for the time being at least. Rising that morning, he had slept a good long night’s sleep and recalled nothing. For once he felt fully rested.
And so it was, following a brief period of highly visual and horrifyingly credible nightmares, that Lacau himself returned to the real world. He was a good deal more humbled than before; a good deal more watchful, besides. On its journey to Cairo not a single packing case had been lost. In the subsequent storage, unpacking, further conservation and display, not a single artefact had been damaged.
He accepted the experience as a warning. He would reinforce his efforts and see to it that the security of the treasures was without equal.
Chapter Twenty Seven
Osiris
Mo sat on his haunches in his toilet cradling the blackened, desiccated, shrunken phallus in his hands. He’d had the thing three years now and still had not been able to get his wife, or any of his other liaisons for that matter, pregnant. The cursed thing didn’t work. How he had wanted a boy all these years. How he had prayed. Now he had by his own good fortune, not to mention the craftiness of his deceit, obtained what should have proved to have been the most potent fertility symbol of all. Nor had it done anything for his libido it had been one huge disappointment.
Unlike him, however, his wife was considerably less disappointed. Nine girls were a sufficiency, even though four, as it had been written, died in infancy. Since the latest, she had not become pregnant these last five years. The thought of producing another child after all this, whatever the gender, was unthinkable. She calmed his ravings with words of affection, and occasionally, when he appeared pretty bad, manipulated him with her hands and her mouth. Only then, it seemed, would he forget his most personal of failures.
A bead curtain was all that protected the toilet and her husband from the outside world.
“Mohammed el Hashash! Stop playing with it!” she shouted from the other side. “It’s not going to get any better. You and I, we are past it. Accept it. You should never have taken the godforsaken thing in the first place. God knows what curse has been laid upon you for the deed. Your impotency may be the least of your worries. And should your master find out he still returns from time to time, remember I could lose a husband to the rat ridden cells of the Luxor prison.” She paused to reflect a moment and her expression lightened to a wry grin.
Mo drew the curtain aside. “What are you smiling at, woman?”
“Me?... Oh, nothing.” She became serious again. “Give up your worries and count yourself lucky to be walking free after such an obscene crime.”
‘One final prayer?’ thought Mo, gazing down at the pathetic object. He thought again. ‘No, pointless.’
He got up from his toilet, went out into the street, and tossed the talisman irreverently into the open drain that ran beneath the front wall of his house. Almost immediately, and literally out of nowhere, a black jackal scrambled from the shadows, closed its jaws over the discarded artefact and ran off.
The dog disappeared into a pall of dust thrown up by a passing donkey cart. Unnoticed by Mo or any passerby, the stray never emerged from the other side.
Carter sat on the veranda of the Winter Palace Hotel, rocking gently in his wicker armchair. He contemplated his whisky. The manager of the hotel, a good friend for some years now, saw he was alone and went out to join him. Carter’s face lit up when he saw the man approach.
“Anton, you old rogue! What brings you to idle your time away commiserating with a temporary guest? Surely there is work to be done?”
“It has been a while since I have seen you, Mr Carter, and I would like to have the pleasure of your company for a moment or two so that I may catch up on your activities these past months.” He dragged up a chair and sat down. “So. What is it these days that you have been doing with yourself?”
This was an unfortunate question, since the answer that Carter felt almost compelled to give was ‘nothing much’. But he resisted this conversation stopper with another response. “Busying myself with...” He stopped in midstream. “Oh, do forgive me. Will y’ join me in a drink?”
“Thank you, no, Mr Carter. Too early for me. Besides, on duty, you appreciate.”
“As y’ wish. Don’t much like drinking on my own, however.” Carter swallowed a draught and continued where he had left off. “Busy with tours. Everyone seems to want ‘Doctor’ Howard Carter to give them a personal guide to the antiquities. Y’ know how I love tourists!”
Both men smiled.
“It is good to see you smile,” the manager confided. “For a moment there, seeing you by yourself, I thought you might be moping.”
“Moping? About what, may I ask?” Carter had no intention of indicating his real mood.
“Oh, you know... I guess nothing much, just finding and clearing the greatest and richest archaeological discovery of all time. It is a hard act to follow. Surely things must feel a trifle anticlimactic at present?”
Carter had not expected his friend to be quite so direct. He brushed it off quickly. “Alexander.”
“Alexander?”
“Alexander. His tomb. Know where it is.”
“No!”
“I do. At least, I’ve got a pretty good idea. I’m planning the excavation as we speak.”
This was a most unexpected turn of events. The hotel manager immediately pursued him for more information. “How ‘pretty’?”
“About as ‘pretty’ as the idea I had going into my search for Tutankhamen.”
“Down in the delta somewhere?”
“Exactly. ‘Down in the delta somewhere’. But don’t press me any further on this. Has to be hush-hush, you understand. Don’t want the damn tourists, or the French, following me everywhere I go in expectation of being on the spot when I make my next great discovery or trying to pre-empt me when I get close.”
“I understand fully, Mr Carter. You can rest assured I shall keep our conversation confidential.” “I always had the greatest respect for your integrity, Anton. Now...” Carter looked down at his empty glass.
The manager clapped his hands to get the attention of the waiter. “I’ll join you with one after all. Since you have faith in my integrity, have you got anything more to say on the subject?” He stared at Carter expectantly.
“I’m sorry, Anton. It wouldn’t be fair to give you any more details. Too much of a responsibility. You understand, of course.”
His friend nodded seriously. It was clear to him that Carter was uncomfortable. Anton felt happy enough with what he thought to be a unique confidence. Tonight he would have something different to tell his wife. With a little embellishment the story might take on some of the trappings of an adventure the unknown, the excitement, in any case something a world apart from the gene
ral humdrum, day-to-day business of the hotel.
Six in the morning found Carter sitting in the porch outside his bedroom in Castle Carter. He had been wakeful all through the night. Thinking this perhaps would be his last Luxor sunrise, he wanted to miss not one moment of it drink in the atmosphere, memorise the very odour of the place, listen to the waking waterfowl stirring in the marshes below him, hear the fishermen beating the Nile waters, and watch the sun bathe the Theban hills one more time.
He kept his eyes on the river. The broad indigo artery threaded its way soundlessly across his field of view. With no wind this morning, the river appeared flat as a mirror. Its stillness belied the power of the currents at work beneath. Within a few moments, the sun’s amber disc embarked from the east bank and began its daily crossing to the opposite side.
Carter kept his eyes fixed on the water until the sun’s reflection began to break up and sparkle in amongst the reeds and crops rimming the west bank. He breathed in deeply and stretched. He smelt the smoke from the kitchen. Abdel was already about the business of breakfast. Carter smiled. This would be a special breakfast. He would have enough chairs placed around the table to accommodate the spirits of Carnarvon, Evelyn and Pecky Callender. They would discuss, together, privately, intimately, that infamous night’s excitement one more time.
Abdel noticed the extra chairs but thought nothing of it. He placed the plate of mixed grill at his master’s place and returned to the kitchen.
Carter sat himself down at the head of the table and began his fried eggs.
After consuming a few mouthfuls, he laid his knife and fork on the plate and reached into a leather satchel which he had previously placed under his seat.
“Take a look at this,” he whispered. “Any of you recognise it?”
It was the large, blue glass headrest that Burton and Lucas had come across at the time they were closing their work in The Valley. He put it on the table in front of the place where Carnarvon used to sit.
“Well?... Sir, I find you speechless. Why ever is that? Is it because this is the piece you surreptitiously removed from the tomb and told none of us? Or is it because this is the piece that Evelyn took from the tomb and, to protect her from suspicion of guilt, you took it from her and hid it? With which of these explanations do you concur?”
The earl remained silent.
“Lucas found it jammed into the wall around the tomb entrance. We built the wall so it had to have been hidden recently. I am curious to know not who did it, but why they hid it. Why, once successful in removing a piece that had not previously been recorded, did you not run off with it? I do not understand why it came to be so purposefully hidden.”
The earl turned his head to look at his daughter. Evelyn turned her head to stare at Callender. Callender turned to Carter.
“Why is everyone looking at you, Pecky?”
He shook his head.
“This is most aggravating. This is an unrecorded piece. For my own professional reasons I need to know who found it, where they found it, precisely, and why they secreted it in such a, I must say, stupid place.”
All three stared back at Carter in silence.
“All right. Let me start again....”
At this point Abdel walked back onto the porch with the coffee. Carter assumed his usual position. Abdel poured him some more coffee and left. “Abdel! Come back here, man! Leave the pot and go about your business. Go feed the animals. I’ll call for you if I need you.”
Alone once more, Carter renewed his conversation with the empty chairs.
“You assume much responsibility, your lordship. I think in this case too much too weighty. Me too, for that matter. To tell you the truth, Lucas found this, Burton and I wagered for it, and Burton won. Two years later, on my sixtieth birthday, Burton presents it to me as a gift. No better gift, yes?”
He observed nods of agreement from all at the table.
“Now. All I want to know is, where did it come from?”
After a moment or two, Carnarvon’s mouth moved but Carter couldn’t make out the faintest word.
“I’m sorry, your lordship. Could you say that again, please?”
Carnarvon’s lips were forming words, but Carter couldn’t hear a single one of them.
“This is most frustrating, your lordship. I have not comprehended a word you have said.”
Carter stopped his questioning. Pictures began to form in his mind. He saw Carnarvon in the antechamber. He saw him watching Carter disappear into the cavity that provided access to the annex. He saw him look at one of the golden beds and turn as if to take something that was standing on it. Before Carter had extricated himself from the opening, the earl had placed the object carefully in a corner, in the darkness, on the other side of the partially dismantled doorway separating them from the entrance corridor. Carter gave the earl a knowing look. The grandee smiled in recognition.
Abdel returned unannounced and the entire suite of guests disappeared.
“Dammit, Abdel! I told you not to come back until I called you.”
“I am sorry, sir. You had been here for some time and I thought you might be in need of some more coffee. I am sorry.”
“Get out at once! I am busy.”
His confused servant departed.
Carter realised the stupidity of his statement. He shrugged his shoulders and turned back to address his guests. But the moment had passed. The seats lay vacant once more.
As he disembarked from his taxi at the front steps to the Winter Palace,
Anton was there to greet him. “Oh. I am honoured,” said Carter.
“No honour, sir. I’m just here to make sure you actually do leave.”
The two smiled together. Anton took his friend by the arm. “Particularly brilliant starlight tonight, Mr Carter. Looks like Osiris has come out in his best attire to wish you ‘bon voyage’. It seems all are pleased you are, finally, departing this place.”
Carter could take the sarcasm. They had quipped cruelly to each other on many occasions in front of company sometimes mercilessly so he ignored it. He looked up at the night sky. There was no moon. The backdrop was as deeply inert as patent leather. Across it the stars stood out like gemstones. The great constellation of Orion reached over him like a protective arch, the bright stars in its belt like the distant pyramids at Gizeh.
He became conscious of a presence the like of which he had only experienced once before, while he was in the tomb. He felt sure he was being watched. As the two of them made their way into the hotel, he looked around.
“What are you looking for, Mr Carter?” asked the manager.
“Mmm? Oh, nothing... Nothing, Anton. Just thought I recognised someone. These old eyes, wrong again.”
“I hope not the infamous Mrs AO!” quipped the manager.
“Ooh, no! Long forgotten and never repeated, thank God,” smiled Carter.
“I have reserved a special suite for you tonight, Mr Carter. I hope you approve. Special night. Special room. The suite Lord Carnarvon used to use. No extra charge!” The manager’s eyes gleamed, anticipating Carter’s reaction.
“I am truly honoured!” He really felt it. The gesture could not have been more appropriate.
Anton entered the room first, held the door open for Carter, and went over to the window to draw back the shutters. The evening breeze played with the curtains. Carter turned to Anton and smiled. It was enough.
Anton saw he was about to speak and interrupted, “Sir. Please. No thanks. It is not for you to thank us. It is our position to thank you. You cannot know how much you have done for us. Egypt of course, as well, but for this hotel... So much... So many visitors... So many generously rich clients... I cannot count the names. So much money!” He raised his arms with his palms outstretched, gesturing as if he were holding a giant sack.
“You have been a blessing to this place. All I ask of you is that you come back one day. Make a great new discovery. We will be waiting for you with the red carpet! There will be no
bill. Thank you. Thank you, that is, from all of us.”
So saying, Anton bowed and ceremoniously backed out through the door. As he grasped the handle he said, “See you for dinner at his lordship’s table... at eight?”
Carter nodded and the door was pulled shut.
Nothing less than black tie and tails were in order that night and, as he was shown to his table, Carter looked every bit the part he had come to play. Anton had prepared a special menu for the evening. Two of the creations had been his lordship’s favourites. As it happened, Carter had never been all that partial to either dish, but tonight he was not going to disappoint his host who had been to so much trouble to get things just as they were all those years ago. The very same claret was on the table, too, and Carter immersed himself in it with relish, turning down the offer of his usual Scotch.
Anton poured the drinks and sat down opposite him.
They took up their glasses, clinked the crystal over the centre of the table, and together said, “To absent friends.”
The Egyptologist drained his glass and his friend reached across the table with the bottle and replenished it.
“Anton. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. There could not have been a more appropriate ‘goodbye’. How can I ever repay your hospitality?”
“As I have said before... That you have done so many times already... over and over again. It is I who is, and will remain, in your debt.”
The two smiled. Carter took another long draught and smacked his lips.
“While my intent is not to get myself soused on such an occasion as this, I may yet find, as the evening wears on, that this admirable claret will overtake my senses and cause some loss of control.”
His host laughed out loud. “A moment to be enjoyed. A moment to be treasured. A moment to be remembered. Have another.”
By the time the main course had arrived, Carter had lost control. He was telling jokes and laughing at Anton’s long list of stories of funny incidents during his many years at the hotel. He had completely forgotten his earlier ‘last-night-in-Luxor’ melancholy. Free of his usual inhibitions, he was having a whale of a time; the hotel manager, too. The two of them became a considerable disturbance to the other guests in the dining room that night.
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