by Paul Sussman
If he was honest they had planted seeds in Khalifa's mind too, for much of what the imam said was true. There was evil and corruption in the world. What the Israelis were doing to the Palestinians was unforgivable. The poor and needy were ignored while the rich lined their pockets.
Khalifa, however, had never been able to make the connection between this and the use of violence. Ali, on the other hand, had slowly begun to build that bridge.
It had started innocently enough. With conversations, reading, occasional meetings. Ali had begun attending rallies, handing out leaflets, even speaking in public himself. He had spent less and less time with his history books, more and more with religious works. 'What is history without truth?' he had said to Khalifa once. 'And truth is to be found not in the deeds of men, but the word of God.'
Much of what he did had been good and it was this that had persuaded Khalifa there was no need to fear the changes that were being wrought within him. He had collected money for the poor, spent time teaching illiterate children, spoken out on behalf of those who would otherwise have had no voice.
All the while, however, there was a slow hardening of his rhetoric, a ratcheting up of the anger within him. He had become involved with fundamentalist organizations, joining first one, then another, each a little more extreme than the previous one, getting sucked deeper and deeper into the whirlpool, the line between faith and fury becoming increasingly blurred. Until eventually, inevitably, he had come to Sayf al-Tha'r.
Sayf al-Tha'r. The name was seared into Khalifa's mind like a brand on an ox's back. It was he who had corrupted Ali. He who had made him do the things he did. He, ultimately, who had sent him to his death that terrible day fourteen years ago.
And now with this case things had come full circle. Now he was no longer just investigating a death. Now he was seeking to avenge one too. Sayf al-Tha'r. He'd known it would be him. He'd known it. The past always catches up eventually, however fast you try to run.
An urgent hooting dragged him back to the present. He had strayed out onto the road and a tourist coach was bearing down on him, horn blaring. He hopped back to the side of the tarmac, looking for the two camel riders, but they had disappeared round a bend. He lit a cigarette, waited for the coach to pass, then continued on his way, the road ahead shimmering in the midday heat.
CAIRO
'I should never have left you,' said Daniel.
'This morning or six years ago?'
He looked at her.
'I was referring specifically to this morning.'
They were back in his hotel room, Tara on the couch, legs drawn up to her chin, Daniel standing beside the window. She'd had a whisky but was still trembling, the memory of her recent experiences fresh in her mind.
'I had to meet someone at the museum,' he continued. 'It took longer than I expected. I should have warned you about the backstreets around here. They can be dangerous for foreigners, especially women. There are thieves, pickpockets . . .'
'These weren't pickpockets,' said Tara, resting her forehead against her knees. 'I knew them.'
Daniel raised his eyebrows.
'One of them at least,' she said. 'I saw him at Saqqara the day I found Dad's body. And then later at the hotel. And he wasn't Egyptian.'
'You're saying someone's following you deliberately?'
'Yes.'
He was silent for a moment, and then, crossing to the sofa, sat and took her hand.
'Look, Tara, you've had a bad couple of days. First your father, now this. I think maybe you're reading too much into—'
She snatched her hand away. 'Don't patronize me, Daniel. This isn't some hysterical fantasy. This man is following me. I don't know why, but he's following me.'
She came to her feet and went over to the window, standing where Daniel had stood, looking out across the jumbled rooftops. The air was hot and she could feel trickles of perspiration running down her chest.
'He said something about a missing piece. He kept asking me where it was. He seems to think I've got something of his. God knows what, but he seems to think I've got it.' She turned. 'And he thought my father had it too. He was in the dig house. And possibly in my father's apartment. He left a smell of cigar smoke. There's something going on, Daniel. You have to believe me. Something bad.'
He said nothing, just sat on the couch staring at her intently, brown-black eyes sweeping across her face. He pulled a cheroot from his shirt pocket and lit it.
'There's something going on,' she repeated, turning away again. 'Please believe me.'
There was a brief silence and then she heard him stand and come over to her. He laid his hand on her shoulder. She shrugged it off, but he put it back and this time she let it rest. She could feel the strength of him burning through his palm.
'I do believe you, Tara,' he said gently.
He turned her and took her in his arms. For a moment she resisted, but only a moment. He felt so strong, so secure. She buried her face in his shoulder, tears welling in her eyes.
'I don't know what to do, Daniel. I don't know what's going on. Someone's trying to kill me and I don't even know why. I tried to tell them at the embassy, but they didn't believe me. They thought I was imagining things, but I'm not. I'm not.'
'OK, OK,' he said. 'Everything's going to be fine.'
He tightened his arms around her and she allowed him to do it, knowing how dangerous it was to be so close to him, yet unable to help herself. There was a loud beeping from outside as a car nudged its way through the crowd.
They stayed like that for some time before he gently eased her away, brushing his finger beneath her eyes to wipe away the tear stains.
'There were three of them, you say.'
She nodded. 'Two Egyptians and one white guy,' she said. 'The white guy was huge and had a birthmark on his face. Like I said, I've seen him before. At Saqqara and outside my hotel.'
'And what exactly did he say to you again?'
'He asked me where it was. He kept saying, "Where is it? Where is the missing piece?" '
'That was it?'
'He said something about hieroglyphs.'
Daniel's eyes narrowed. 'Hieroglyphs?'
'Yes. He said, "Where are they? Where are the hieroglyphs?"'
'He definitely used that word? Hieroglyphs? You're sure?'
'I think so, yes. Everything was a blur.'
He drew slowly on the cheroot, ribbons of blue-grey smoke spiralling from the corner of his mouth.
'Hieroglyphs?' he said, more to himself than to her. 'Hieroglyphs? What hieroglyphs?' He took another pull on the cheroot and wandered across the room. 'You haven't bought anything since you came to Egypt? No antiquities or anything?'
'I haven't had time.'
'And you say this man was at your father's dig house?'
'Yes. I'm sure of it.'
He fell silent, rubbing his temples, thinking. A wasp flew in through the window and settled on the rim of Tara's whisky glass. Silence.
'Well, they obviously think you have something that belongs to them,' he said eventually. 'And presumably they think you have it because they think your father had it before you. So we have to answer two questions: first, what is this object? And second, why did they think your father had it in the first place?'
He went over to the couch and sat down, lost in thought. She remembered him like this from their time together, how he would sit in a sort of trance thinking through a problem, mind whirring like a machine, his expression half-grimace, half-smile, as though he was pained by the process, yet enjoying it too. He was silent for a whole minute before coming to his feet again.
'Come on.'
He picked up his cheroots and moved towards the door.
'Where? The police?'
He grunted. 'Not if you want any answers. They'll just take a statement and forget about it. I know what they're like.'
'So where, then?'
He reached the door and threw it open.
'Saqqara. Your father's dig ho
use. That's where we'll start. Coming?'
She looked into his eyes. There was so much she recognized there – the strength, the determination, the power. There was something else as well, however. Something she hadn't seen in him before. It was a moment before she was able to pin it down – guilt.
'Yes,' she said, picking up her knapsack and following him out into the corridor. 'I'm coming.'
LUXOR
On his way home from Deir el-Bahri, Khalifa stopped off to see Dr Masri al-Masri, Director of Antiquities for Western Thebes.
Al-Masri was a legend in the Antiquities Service. He had joined as a young man and, given that he was now almost seventy, should by rights have occupied a higher position than he did. He'd been offered more exalted posts, on numerous occasions, but had always turned them down. He was a native of this part of the world and felt a particular affinity with its monuments. He'd devoted his life to their preservation and protection, and although he held no formal academic qualifications, was universally referred to as the Doctor, both out of respect and, also, fear. Al-Masri's temper, it was said, was worse than that of Seth, the Egyptian god of thunder.
He was in a meeting when Khalifa arrived, so the detective sat down on a wall outside his office and lit a cigarette, gazing across the road at the scattered remains of the mortuary temple of Amenhotep III. From over his shoulder came the sound of bitter argument.
There had been a time when Khalifa himself had wanted to join the Antiquities Service. Would have joined it had Ali not been taken from them, leaving him with the sole responsibility of caring for their mother. He'd been at university at the time and for a while had tried to continue his studies, earning money on the side working as a tour guide. It hadn't been enough, however, especially after he'd married Zenab and she had become pregnant with their first child.
And so he had abandoned Egyptology and joined the police force instead. His mother and Zenab had both begged him not to, as had his tutor Professor al-Habibi, but he had seen no other way of providing a decent life for his family. The pay wasn't brilliant, but it was better than that of a junior antiquities inspector and at least the force offered some sort of security for the future.
He had been sad at the time. Was still sad in a way. It would have been nice to work among the objects and monuments he so loved. He'd never regretted the decision to put his loved ones first, though. And anyway, archaeology and detective work weren't that dissimilar. They were both about following clues, analysing evidence, solving mysteries. The only real difference was that while the archaeologist tended to unearth wonderful things, it was the detective's lot, more often than not, to find terrible ones.
He drew on his cigarette. The argument behind him was getting louder. There was a hammering sound, as of someone banging his fist on a desk, and then suddenly the door of al-Masri's office flew open and a wiry man in a dirty djellaba emerged. He turned briefly to scream, 'I hope a dog shits on your grave!' before stomping angrily out of the building, gesticulating wildly with his arms.
'And I hope two dogs shit on yours!' bellowed al-Masri after him. 'And piss on it too!'
Khalifa smiled to himself and, flicking away his cigarette, stood. The office door was open and, approaching, he put his head inside.
'Ya Doktora?'
The old man was sitting behind a small plywood desk piled high with papers. He was tall and thin, with a long, dark-skinned face and curly, close-cropped hair – a typical Saidee, or native of upper Egypt. He looked up.
'Khalifa,' he grunted. 'Well, come in, come in.'
The detective entered, al-Masri pointing him to one of the armchairs that lined the wall.
'Damned peasant fool,' he snapped, nodding towards the door. 'We discover what looks like an extension of Seti I's mortuary temple in one of his fields and he wants to plough it up and plant molochia on it.'
'A man has to eat,' smiled Khalifa.
'Not if it involves destroying our history, he doesn't. Let him starve! Ignorant barbarian.' He banged his hand on the desk, sending a sheaf of papers tumbling to the floor. He bent down to retrieve them. 'Tea?' he asked, head hidden beneath the desk.
'Thanks.'
Al-Masri shouted and a young man entered.
'Get us a couple of glasses of tea, will you, Mahmoud?' He fiddled with the papers, placing them in one pile, then moving them to another, then dividing them in half and placing each half on a different pile, before finally opening a drawer and cramming them inside. 'To hell with it. I won't read the damned things anyway.'
He sat back and looked over at Khalifa, hands clasped behind his head. 'So what can I do for you? Come to ask me for a job, have you?'
The doctor knew of Khalifa's background and liked to tease him about it, albeit in a friendly way. Although he never said as much, he admired the detective. Khalifa was one of the few people al-Masri knew whose passion for the past came anywhere near to rivalling his own.
'Not exactly,' smiled Khalifa.
He leaned forward and tamped out his cigarette in an ashtray on the desk, then filled al-Masri in on the murder of Abu Nayar. The old man listened quietly, clicking his fingers behind his head.
'I presume you haven't heard anything?' asked Khalifa when he'd finished.
Al-Masri snorted. 'Of course I haven't heard anything. If there's ever a new discovery around here we're always the last to know about it. They're better informed on the moon.'
'But it's possible something could have been found?'
'Sure, it's possible. I'd say to date we've only uncovered about twenty per cent of what's left of ancient Egypt. Perhaps less. The Theban Hills are full of undiscovered tombs. They'll be finding them for another five hundred years.'
Mahmoud came back with the tea.
'I think this might be something big,' said Khalifa, taking a glass from the proffered tray and sipping it. 'Something people are prepared to kill for. Or to keep secret.'
'There are people around here who'd kill for a couple of shabtis.'
'No, it's more than that. People are scared. We've interviewed every antiquities dealer in Luxor and they're all shitting themselves. This is something important.'
The old man took his own tea and sipped it. He seemed relaxed, but Khalifa could tell he was interested. He sipped again and then, laying the glass aside, came to his feet and began wandering around the room.
'Intriguing,' he muttered to himself. 'Very intriguing.'
'Any idea what it might be?' asked Khalifa. 'A royal tomb?'
'Hmmm? No, not likely. Not likely at all. Most of the great royal burials are already known, except Tuthmosis II and Ramesses VIII. And possibly Smenkhkare, if you accept that the body in KV55 was Akhenaten, which personally I don't.'
'I thought Amenhotep I's tomb was still lost,' said Khalifa.
'Rubbish. He was buried in KV39, as any sensible archaeologist knows. Anyway, the point is that if it was a major royal burial it would almost certainly be in the Valley of the Kings, and you're not going to keep a new find there hushed up, however many people you kill. The place is so full of tourists you can hardly move.'