“Never mind,” O’Connell said, as he drew up alongside her, where she sat up, stunned, spitting sand.
He climbed down and helped her dust off—she had sand in her hair, her eyes, she was really quite a mess—and soon Jonathan and the warden had arrived on the scene, followed by the Americans and their diggers, sitting astride their horses, eyes wide with the wonder of the Hamanaptra ruins.
O’Connell gestured about him, saying, “Welcome to the City of the Dead, boys—by the way, you owe the young lady five hundred bucks.”
9
What a Woman Knows
Within the ruins of the temple complex of Hamanaptra, uninhabited since the days of Seti the First, the rival expeditions set up neighboring towns of tents. Dozens of stray camels roamed the ruins, milling listlessly, buzzing with flies, dusty backpacks and old saddlebags slung over their humps. Evelyn had noticed O’Connell’s stricken expression as he watched the beasts wander aimlessly about.
“Where did those poor creatures come from?” she inquired of him. How dashing he looked in brown neckerchief, his white shirt crisscrossed with leather shoulder holsters, chinos, leather boots.
“My fellow legionnaires,” he said softly. His sky-blue eyes bore a haunted cast. “The vultures have taken their flesh, the sands their bones . . . but their camels are still waiting for their masters to return.”
The American expedition, with its two dozen native diggers and full gear, had a large-scale operation going, Dr. Chamberlin setting up worktables, overseeing the turbaned, gowned diggers, with their hoes and picks and rakes, in hauling the baskets of rock and dirt from an area around several massive columns with hieroglyphs the Egyptologist considered significant. The three American fortune hunters themselves weren’t doing any of the drudge work. They just sat in front of their tents, asking questions of their helpful guide, Beni, who sat smoking tobacco from a hookah.
O’Connell had dropped by to wish his competitors luck, and reported to Evelyn the following dispensation of advice by Beni: “If you get bit by a snake, just X the wound with a knife, suck out the venom and spit it away.”
Burns, the squinty man with the wire-rim bifocals, had asked, “What if you can’t reach the wound yourself?”
“That is what friends are for.”
“Jesus! What if I get bit in the ass?”
“Well, barat’m, if the friend you come to is Beni—you’re going to die.”
O’Connell found this story endlessly amusing, though Evelyn could only muster a polite smile at best.
The rival groups were keeping their distance, and the Americans did not seem to consider the smaller, rival dig to be much competition. Dr. Chamberlin had been overheard saying, “They’re led by a woman—what does a woman know?”
This Neanderthal attitude suited Evelyn just fine—it prevented interference and sabotage; and, anyway, she had her own ideas about where to dig.
Within the open shrine from which the upper portion of a massive, time-decayed statue of Anubis poked from the sands, a crevice in the rock had opened, tentatively revealing what appeared to be either a cavern, or a carved-out chamber, in the darkness below.
On her knees, wishing she had apparel other than the Bedouin gown, Evelyn examined the crevice and looked up at the three ignorant male faces hovering about her.
“This is an entrance,” she said.
“That’s a hole in the ground,” O’Connell said. “It’s not man-made . . . You don’t have to be an archaeologist or damn geologist to know that.”
“You’re right, it’s not man-made, but men made use of this as an entrance,” she said, brushing away sand from a shining surface that suddenly caught the sun and momentarily blinded her brother, Jonathan, who said, “Bloody hell! What is that?”
“A mirror,” O’Connell said, eyes tightening. “One really old mirror . . .”
The small round mirror in its ancient hieroglyph-embossed bronze frame was affixed to the rocky edge on the left side of an area where the crevice widened enough to accommodate a man—or woman.
Standing, Evelyn said, “This was a shrine, and this crevice was no doubt covered by a floor of stone or perhaps wood. Understand that the pharaohs took advantage of natural rock formations, caves, and what have you, but they then dug their burial vaults out of solid rock. I believe that below us is a subterranean city, of caverns, yes, but also of chambers cut from solid rock.”
She instructed her meager digging team, with its handful of tools purchased at the Bedouin trading post, to seek more of the mirrors along the lip of the crevice; within an hour, half a dozen of the ancient mirrors had been uncovered—on either side.
“What the hell are they for?” O’Connell said, brushing himself off.
“Ancient Egyptian lighting system.” She moved along the crevice, angling the mirrors to catch sunlight, just guessing about their positioning, but excited nonetheless. “If I’m right in my educated estimations, you should soon see for yourselves.”
“Ready to go down there?” O’Connell said.
“Please.”
He began to tie ropes around a nearby pillar.
“According to the Bembridge scholars,” she said, as her brother and the warden and the dashing adventurer listened with rapt attention, “somewhere within the statue of Anubis is a secret compartment . . . which may conceal The Book of Amun Ra.”
O’Connell, heavy hemp ropes affixed to the pillar, tossed its trailing coils down into the darkness of the crevice. He slung on his backpack; in his waistband were the wooden shafts of a pair of torches whose canvas nubs, though dry, were thoroughly soaked in kerosene.
“I’ll signal with the torch when it’s safe,” he said. “I don’t want to yell and alert the other team.”
“Keen thinking, old man,” Jonathan said.
Pausing at the edge of the crevice, O’Connell reached around into his backpack and withdrew something, which he tossed to Evelyn.
She caught it—a brown leather pouch about the size of a small book—and before she could ask, he said, “Little something I, uh . . . borrowed from my fellow Americans . . . when I dropped by to wish ’em luck.”
He grinned at her, and—holding on to the rope with leather-gloved hands—jumped into the crevice, rappelling down.
“What a lovely present,” she said softly, examining the gleaming archaeologist’s tools that filled every compartment of the pouch.
Soon the orange waving signal of the lighted torch below told them he’d found his footing, and—at Jonathan’s bidding, and after an endless after you, no, after you exchange—the sweat-beaded, wide-eyed warden went down the rope first.
Jonathan smiled at his sister, saying, “I guess if the pillar supported his weight, we’re safe enough,” and went on down.
Finally Evelyn, in her flowing gown, descended hand over hand into the spooky darkness, wishing more than ever she were in trousers. Her sandaled feet slipped when she touched down, and she flopped to her bottom, rather rudely.
As O’Connell crouched to help her up, his torch gave a quick tour of the chamber they were in, unveiling straight smooth walls, decorated with geometric designs, figures of gods and goddesses, carved in bas-relief out of solid rock.
The beauty of it all made her gasp.
“My friends,” she said in the sort of hushed tone generally reserved for church, “do you realize we are standing inside a room no human being has entered in over three thousand years?”
“Where’s the treasure?” the warden asked.
“Help yourself to my share of the spiderwebs,” O’Connell said, brushing some away.
He lighted the second torch and handed it to Jonathan, who said, “What is that awful smell?”
Evelyn sighed.
She was sharing this special moment, at the start of what might prove to be an archaeological find comparable to the tomb of King Tutankhamun, with a trio of utter barbarians.
Jonathan had some panic in his voice, his torch held high, wavering. “I te
ll you, it’s the stench of death!”
The warden, leaning in at her brother’s side, sniffed the air. “I don’t smell anything.”
Jonathan’s nose twitched in the direction of the sweat-soaked warden, then he pulled away, smiling awkwardly. “False alarm . . . I say, Warden Hassan, would you mind keeping your distance? I’m feeling a trifle crowded.”
Insulted, Hassan sneered and backed away.
Evelyn took O’Connell by the arm, saying, “Shine that torch over here,” and soon she had found what she was seeking, a metal disk affixed to the stone wall. She brushed away the cobwebs and repositioned the disc on its tiny pedestal, aiming it at a ray of light that had fingered down from above, shining in from those ancient outer mirrors she had discovered, and done her best to calibrate . . .
The ray of light hit the disk and bounced and every one of those outer mirrors pitched in, instantly illuminating the entire underground chamber.
“That is a neat trick,” O’Connell said.
“God in heaven,” Evelyn breathed, taking in the beautifully fashioned chamber—even its ceiling was carved! Her hand was raised as she followed the hieroglyphs, her mind translating a mile a minute. “It’s a Sah-Netjer!”
“I was just about to say that, actually,” Jonathan said, dryly.
“Which is what?” O’Connell asked her, as he brandished a torch made redundant in the mirror-lighted chamber.
“A preparation room,” she said, nodding toward an altar-like pedestal in the center of the room. “For entering the afterlife.”
“Good lord,” Jonathan said. “It’s a bloody mummy factory!”
Evelyn turned to O’Connell. “I’m afraid I’ve lost my bearings . . . Can you point me toward the statue of Anubis in the shrine?”
“Sure,” O’Connell said, pointing his torch, inadvertently revealing a passageway. He gave her half a smile. “Shall we?”
She nodded primly, as if accepting an offer to dance. “Please.”
The tunnel, one of a labyrinth of such passageways, was narrow, low-ceilinged, and infested with cobwebs. Crouching, clawing his way through, O’Connell led as they headed toward where the statue should be, until a chittering, scurrying sound from the walls froze them.
“Sounds like insects,” Jonathan offered. He was just behind Evelyn, with the warden bringing up the rear.
O’Connell drew one of his revolvers, then, lighted torch in hand, pressed onward, the light from the ancient mirrors dissipating, the passageway growing darker and darker as they went deeper and deeper.
Finally they emerged into a cavern, not a man-made area at all, into which—either over time, or perhaps as a result of some ancient earthquake—the statue of Anubis had partially dropped. At any rate, there it was: the lower half of the massive idol.
A sound of movement—Was it that same scurrying sound? Evelyn wasn’t sure—seemed to come from the other side of the statue.
O’Connell handed Evelyn his torch, whispered, “Stay close,” and withdrew his other revolver.
The sound of movement increased. The warden was backpedaling, but Jonathan seemed to have found a new resolve, standing firm and tall, drawing a derringer from his jacket pocket.
Whatever it was, whoever they were, it was almost upon them! O’Connell lunged around the base of the statue . . .
. . . around which three sweaty figures lunged toward him: the American adventurers—each of whom had his own revolver in hand.
And now the three Americans were thrusting their revolvers at O’Connell, whose two revolvers were pointed at them in what promised to be an all-around massacre.
“Stop!” Evelyn cried. “Don’t anyone do anything stupid!”
The two groups froze in a dangerous poised-for-action tableau around the base of the idol. Behind the three Americans were Beni, who also brandished a revolver, Dr. Chamberlin, and a wide-eyed group of turbaned native diggers.
“Jesus, O’Connell!” Henderson said, backing off. “You scared the heck out of us!”
“Watch your language,” O’Connell said. “There’s a lady present!”
A swagger in his shoulders, O’Connell stepped back, lowering his revolvers; the Americans backed away a step, too, also lowering—but not holstering—their weapons.
Burns, eyes narrowing behind his wire-rims, pointed toward Evelyn, saying, “Hey! That’s my tool kit!”
Evelyn hugged the leather pouch to her breast, saying, “Impossible—it was a gift from a dear friend, upon my graduation!”
“I tell you, it’s mine,” Burns said, and he stepped forward.
O’Connell moved between them, and raised his revolver, training it directly between Burns’s squinty eyes.
“You’re mistaken,” O’Connell said. “But if you’d like to borrow a bullet, just ask.”
Burns swallowed, smiled nervously, backing away, saying, “You know, I believe you’re right—my pouch was a darker brown. These eyes ain’t what they used to be.”
Evelyn moved up next to O’Connell, near the base of the statue, which she rested a hand against, in a gesture that pretended to be casual, but was actually proprietary.
“Well, gentlemen,” she said sweetly, “do run along, now, and have a lovely day. My companions and I have considerable work to do.”
Dr. Chamberlin, face tight with controlled rage, moved up between Henderson and Daniels, saying, “Young lady, this is our dig site. Would you kindly vacate these premises, at once?”
She glared at him, her arms folded. “I would think, Dr. Chamberlin, that I would not have to explain the protocol of such matters to so eminent an Egyptologist as yourself. To put it in terms your American confederates might understand—finders keepers!”
O’Connell and Beni exchanged glances, and the three American fortune hunters did the same.
Then all of the men raised their guns again—and the opposing groups were right back where they started, tension mounting, violence waiting for its chance to explode.
Daniels, the stoic brawny one, shared one of his rare comments, directed at O’Connell: “That there is our statue . . . pal.”
“Funny,” O’Connell said, smiling (and Evelyn didn’t ever recall seeing such a terrible smile before), “I don’t see your names carved on it anyplace . . . chum.”
The skinny, mustached, fez-wearing guide of the Americans, Beni, was pointing his revolver at his former Foreign Legion comrade.
“Rick, Rick, Rick,” Beni was saying, with a quietly crazed expression that seemed to speak of wanting the worst to happen in these awful close quarters, “such bad odds you’re facing.”
“I’ve faced worse, you little bastard,” O’Connell said, “and you damn well know it.”
On either side of the standoff, thumbs cocked weapons, making clicks that echoed in the chamber—tiny, huge echoes . . .
Evelyn felt helpless, wanting to stop this, not knowing how, and her gaze dropped to her feet, where she noticed, for the first time, a wide crack in the floor. She lowered her torch, as inconspicuously as possible, toeing some pebbles into the crack . . . and faintly she heard them hit bottom.
There was a second chamber, below this one!
“Boys, boys, boys!” Evelyn said, in her most charming, chiding manner. “Behave yourselves—this is an enormous site, and you are such a large group, and we are so pitifully small . . . We’ll concede this statue to you, and press on. After all, there’s plenty here to go around.”
The tension eased, but suspicion still clenched the faces of the Americans, in particular Dr. Chamberlin’s.
Eveyln’s laughter was gentle, if brittle, as she latched on to O’Connell’s arm, guiding him away, back toward the passageway, giving him a pointed look that directed him to go along with this, as she said, “If we’re going to play together, we must learn to share.”
Moving backward, keeping their guns trained on Beni and the Americans, Jonathan and the warden followed after Evelyn and O’Connell.
Evelyn’s group did not see t
he Americans lowering their weapons, but heard their derisive laughter and stinging remarks about cowardice.
O’Connell was scowling, burning under that manhood-questioning onslaught, but Evelyn clutched his arm, halting him (and her brother and the warden) in the passageway. She lifted a finger to her lips, in a shush gesture, and they listened.
The voice of the Egyptologist, Dr. Chamberlin, echoed down the passageway to them: “The next step is for me to translate these hieroglyphs—they should lead us to the location of Seti’s treasure!”
These words made Evelyn smile, and she motioned for O’Connell and the others to follow her back to the embalming chamber, still illuminated by the mirror-ricocheting sun rays.
“Dr. Chamberlin apparently is ignorant of the secret compartment in that statue,” she told the little group. “They’re searching for Seti’s treasure, not The Book of Amun Ra.”
“That’s what we should be seeking!” the warden said, frustration seizing his sweaty face.
“The book she’s talking about,” O’Connell told Hassan, “is made of solid gold—get it?”
The warden considered that piece of information, as Evelyn informed the group of the chamber she’d discovered, below the statue.
“Let’s find our way down there,” she said, and they headed back into the labyrinth, with O’Connell, torch in hand, in the lead. Within minutes, he had found a tunnel heading downward, and—after another crouching, cobweb-clawing journey—they were in a vast, spare, low-ceilinged chamber, similar to the embalming room, less elaborate in its hieroglyphs.
“This is another preparation chamber,” Evelyn said, “probably for the mummification of figures less important than royalty.”
“Why?” O’Connell asked, guiding his torch around the room. “Don’t tell me they had different levels of mummy-making?”
“Three, actually—pharaohs and princesses got first-class treatment. I’d say this room prepared the dead to travel by, well . . . steerage, you might say. Bodies would be thoroughly cleaned and soaked in salt and stored in a chamber like this for seventy days. But it’s good for us—we can reach this ceiling without much effort. According to my calculations—which have been pretty precise so far, you must admit—we should be right beneath the statue.”
The Mummy Page 10