by Wilbur Smith
contents. This left seven armed men free to provide an escort. Then the
heavily burdened procession moved out through the ruined doorway of the
Holy of Holies into the crowded central qiddist, As soon as the
assembled monks realized what they were carrying away with them, a
shocked babble Of voices, of lamentations and exhortations, rose from
the squatting ranks of holy men.
"Quied' Nogo roared. "Silence! Keep these fools quiet."
The guards waded forward into the mass of humanity, clearing a passage
for the treasures they were plundering, laying about them with boot and
rifle butt, shouting at the monks to give way and to let the staggering
porters through.
The hubbub rose louder, the monks encouraging each other with their
howls of protest, whipping themselves into a frenzy of religious
outrage. Some of them leaped to their feet, defying the commands
bellowed at them to remain seated. They crowded closer and closer to the
armed troopers, clutching at their uniforms, chanting and whirling about
them in a challenging display of mounting hostility.
In the midst of this uproar, suddenly the spectral figure of Jali Hora
reappeared. His beard and robes were stained with blood, his eyes were
crazy, bloodshot and staring.
>From his battered lips and ruined mouth issued a long, sustained
shriek. The ranks of dancing monks opened to let him through, and he
rushed like an animated scarecrow with his skirts flapping around his
thin legs straight at Colonel Nogo.
"Get back, you old maniac!" Nogo warned him, and lifted the muzzle of
his assault rifle to fend him away.
Jali Hora was far past any earthly restraint. He did not even check, but
ran straight on to the point of the bayonet that Nogo was aiming at his
belly.
The needle'pointed steel stabbed through his gaudy robes and ran into
the flesh beneath them as easily as a gaff into the body of a struggling
fish. The point of the bayonet emerged from the middle of his back,
pricking through the velvet cloak, all pinkly smeared with the old man's
blood.
Spitted upon the steel, Jali Hora wriggled and contorted, a dreadful
squeal bursting from his bloody lips.
Nogo tried to pull the bayonet free, but the wet clinging suction of the
abbot's guts held the steel fast, and when Nogo jerked harder, Jah Hora
was tossed about like a puppet, his arms flapping and his legs kicking
and. dancing comically.
There was only one way to free the blade of a bayonet that was trapped
like this., Nogo slipped the rate-of-fire selector on the AK-47 to
"Single Shot'. He fired once.
The detonation of the shot was muffled by Jali Hora's body, but was yet
so thunderous that for a moment it stilled the outcry of the monks. The
high-velocity bullet tore down the entry track of the blade. It was
moving at three times the speed of sound, creating a wave of hydrostatic
shock behind it that turned the old man's bowels to jelly and liquidized
his flesh. The suction that had held the bayonet was broken, and the
blast of shot hurled Jah Hora's carcass off the point of the blade,
flinging it into the arms of the monks who were crowding close behind
him."
For a moment longer the strained, unnatural silence persisted, and then
it was shattered by a higher, more angry chorus of horror from the
monks. It was as though they were compelled by a single mind, a single
instinct. Like a flock of white birds they flew at the band of armed men
in their midst and descended upon them, intent on retribution for
murder. They counted no cost to themselves, but with their bare hands
they tore at them, hooked fingers clawing for their eyes, seizing the
barrels of the levelled rifles. Some of them even grasped the blades of
the bayonets with their naked hands, and the razor steel sliced through
-flesh and tendons.
For a short while it seemed that the soldiers would be overwhelmed and
smothered by the sheer weight of numbers, but then those troopers
carrying the stele and the coffin dropped their loads and unslung their
weapons, The monks crowded them too closely for them to swing the
rifles, and they were forced to hack and stab with the bayonets to clear
a space around them in which to do their work. They did not need much
room, for the AK47 has a short barrel and compact action. Their first
burst of fully automatic fire, aimed into the monks at belly height and
point-blank range, scythed a windrow- through them.
Every bullet told, and the full metal jacket ball whipped through one
man's torso with almost no check, going on to kill the man behind him.
By now all the troopers were firing from the hip, traversing back and
forth, spraying the packed ranks of monks like gardeners hosing a bed of
white pansies. As one magazine of twenty-eight rounds emptied they
snapped it off and replaced it with another, fully loaded.
Nahoot cowered behind the fallen pillar, using it as a shield. The roar
of gunfire deafened and confused him. He stared around him and could not
credit the'carnage he was witnessing. At such close range the 7.62 round
is a terrible missile, which can blow off an arm or a leg as efficiently
as an axe-stroke, but more messily. Taken in the belly, it can gut a man
like a fish.
Nahoot saw one of the monks hit in the forehead. His skull'erupted in a
cloud of blood and brain tissue, and the gunman who had shot him laughed
as he fired. They were all caught up in the madness of the moment. Like
a pack of wild dogs that had run down their prey, they kept on firing
and reloading and firing again.
The monks in the front rows turned to flee and ran into those behind.
They struggled together, howling with agony and terror, until the storm
of bullets swept over them, killing and maiming, and they fell upon the
heaps of dead and dying. The floor of the chamber was carpeted with the
dead and the wounded. Trying to escape the hail of bullets the monks
blocked the doorway, plugging it tight with their struggling white-clad
bodies, and now the troopers standing clear in the centre of the qiddist
turned their guns upon this trapped mass of humanity. The bullets socked
into them and they heaved and tossed like the trees of the forest in a
gale of wind. Now there was very little screaming; the guns were the
only voices that still clamoured.
It was some minutes before the guns stuttered into silence, and then the
only sound was the groans and the weeping of the wounded. The chamber
was filled with a blue mist of gunsmoke and the stink of burned powder.
Even the laughter of the soldiers was silenced as they stared around
them, and realized the enormity of the slaughter.
The entire floor was carpeted with bodies, their shammas splashed
and-speckled with gouts of scarlet, and the stone paving beneath them
was awash with sheets of fresh blood in which the empty brass cartridge
cases sparkled like jewels.
"Cease firing!" Nogo gave the belated order. "Shoulder arms! Pick up the
load! Forward march!'
&nb
sp; His voice roused them, and they slung their weapons and stooped to lift
their heavy, tapestry-wrapped burdens.
Then they staggered forward, their boots squelching in the blood,
tripping over the corpses,. stepping on bodies that either convulsed or
lay inert. Gagging in the stench of gunsmoke and blood, of bowels and
guts ripped wide open by the bullets, they crossed the chamber.
When they reached the doorway and staggered down the steps into the
deserted outer chamber of the church, Nahoot saw the relief on the faces
of even these battle hardened veterans as they escaped from the reeking
charnel-house. For Nahoot it was too much. Never in his worst nightmares
had he seen sights such as these.
He tottered to the side wall of the chamber and clung to one of the
woollen hangings for support; then, heaving and retching, he brought up
a mouthful of bitter bile.
When he looked around him again, he was alone except for a wounded monk
who was dragging himself across the flags towards him, his spine shot
through and his paralysed legs slithering behind him, leaving a slimy
snail's trail of blood across the stone floor.
Nahoot screamed and backed away from the wounded monk, then whirled and
fled from the church, along the cloisters above the gorge of the Nile,
following the group of soldiers as they ffarried their burdens up the
stone staircase. He was so wild with horror that he did not even hear
the approach of the helicopter until it was hovering directly overhead
on the glistening silver disc of its spinning rotor.
otthold von Schiller stood outside the front door of the Quonset hut,
with Utte Kemper waiting a pace behind him. The pilot had radioed ahead
while the jet Ranger was in flight, so all was in readiness to receive
the precious cargo it was carrying.
The helicopter raised a cloud of pale dust from the landing circle as it
sank down to the earth. The long tapestry covered load it carried had
not been able to fit into the cabin, and was strapped across the landing
skids of the aircraft. The instant that the skids kissed the ground and
the pilot cut back the throttle, Jake Helm led out a team of a dozen men
to loosen the nylon retaining straps and lift the heavy bundle down.
Between them the gang of overallclad workers carried the stele to the
hut and eased it through the door. Helm hovered close at hand, issuing
terse orders.
A space had been cleared in the centre of the conference room, the long
table pushed back against the wall.
With extreme care the stele was laid there, and minutes later the coffin
of Tanus, the Great Lion of Egypt, was laid beside it.
Brusquely Helm dismissed the gang and closed and bolted the door behind
them as they left. Only the four of them remained in the room. Nahoot'
and Helm crouched beside the stele, ready to unwrap the woollen
tapestry. Von Schiller stood at the head of it, with Utte at his side.
"Shall we begin?" Helm asked softly, watching von Schiller's face the
way a faithful dog watches its master.
"Carefully," von Schiller warned him in strangled tones.
"Do not damage anything." He was sweating in a sheen across his
forehead, and his face was very pale. Utte edged rotectively closer to
him,, but he did not glance in her direction. He was staring fixedly at
the treasure that lay at his feet.
Helm opened his clasp-knife and cut away the tasselled cords that
secured the covering. As he watched, von Schiller's breathing became
louder. It rasped in his throat like a man in the terminal stages of
emphysema.
"Yes," he whispered hoarsely, tthat's the way to do it." Utte Kemper
watched his face. He was always like this when he made another
significant addition to his collection of antiquities. He seemed on the
verge of a seizure, of a massive heart attack, but she knew he had the
heart of an OX.
Helm came to the top end of the pillar and carefully opened a small slit
in the cloth. He eased the point of the blade into this opening, and
then ran it slowly down towards the base, like a zip fastener. The blade
was razor sharp and the cloth fell away to reveal the inscribed stone
beneath it.
The sweat burst out like a heavy dew on von Schiller's skin. It dripped
from his chin on to the front of his khaki bush jacket. He made a small
moaning sound as he saw the carved hieroglyphics. Utte watched him, her
own excitement mounting. She knew what to expect of him, when he was
caught up in this paroxysm of emotion.
"See here, Herr von Schiller." Nahoot knelt beside the obelisk and
traced the outline of a broken'winged hawk with his finger. "This is the
signature of the slave, Taita."
"Is it genuine?" Von Schiller's voice was that of a very sick man,
wheezing and gusty.
"It is genuine. I will guarantee it with my life."
"It may come to that," von Schiller warned him. His eyes were glittering
with the hard brilliance of pate sapphires.
This column was carved nearly four thousand years ago," Nahoot repeated
stoutly. "This is the veritable seal of the scribe." He translated
glibly and easily from the blocks of figures, his face shining with an
almost religious rapture: "'Anubis, the jackal-headed, the god of the
cemeteries, holds in his paws the blood and the viscera, the bones and
the lungs and the heart that are my separate parts. He moves them like
the stones of the bao board, my limbs serve him as counters, my head is
the great bull of the long board'!--'
"Enough!" von Schiller commanded. There will be time for more later. Go
now. Leave me alone. Do not return until I send for you."
Nahoot looked startled and scrambled to his feet uncertainly. He had not
expected to be dismissed so abruptly in the moment of his triumph. Helm
beckoned him, and the two of them went quickly to the door of the hut.
"Helm," von Schiller called thickly after him, "make certain that nobody
disturbs me."
"Of course, Herr von Schiller." He glanced enquiringly at Utte Kemper.
"No," said von Schiller. "She stay The two men left the room, and Helm
shut the door carefully behind them, Utte crossed the room and turned
the key. Then she faced von Schiller with her hands behind her and her
back pressed to the door.
Her breasts were thrust forward firm and pointed The nipples showed
clearly through the thin cotton blouse, hard as marbles.
"The costume?" she asked. "Do you want the costume Her own voice was
tight and strained. She enjoyed this game almost as much as he did.
"Yes, the costume," he whispered.
She crossed the room and disappeared through the door into his private
quarters. As soon as she was gone von Schiller began to undress. When he
stood mother-naked in the centre of the room, he threw his clothing in a
heap into one corner and turned to face the door through which she would
return.
Suddenly she stood in the doorway, and he gasped at the transformation.
She wore the wig of tight Egyptian braids and over it the uraeus, the
golden circlet with the hooded
cobra standing erect above her forehead.
The crown was genuine, as old as the ages - von Schiller had paid five
million Deutschmarks for it.
"I am the reincarnation of the ancient Egyptian Queen Lostris," she
puffed. "My soul is immortal. My flesh is incorruptible." She wore
golden sandals from the tomb of a princess, and bracelets and finger
rings and earrings from the same tomb. All were authentic royal relics.
"Yes." His voice was choking, his face as pale as death.
"Nothing can destroy me. I will live for ever," she said.
Her skirt was diaphanous yellow silk, belted with gold and precious
stones.
"For ever," he repeated She was naked above the waist. Her breasts were
big and white as milk. She cupped them in her own hands.
"These have been young and smooth for four thousand years," she purred.
"I offer them to you."
She stepped out of the open golden sandals and her feet were slim and
neat. She parted the frontal split in the yellow skirts and held it so
that her lower body was exposed.
All her movements were slow and calculated. She was a clever actress.
"This- is the promise of eternal life." She placed her right hand on her
dense honey-coloured pubic bush. "I offer it to you.
He groaned softly and blinked the streaming sweat out of his eyes,
watching her avidly.
She undulated her hips, slowly and lewdly as an uncoiling cobra. She
moved her feet apart and opened her thighs. With her fingers she spread
the lips of her vulva.
"This is the gateway to eternity. I open it for you., Von Schiller
groaned aloud. No matter how often repeated, the ritual never failed.
Like a man in a trance he moved towards her. His body was thin, dried
out like a thousand-year-old mummy. His chest hair was a silver fuzz,
the skin of his sunken belly was folded and wrinkled, but his pubic hair
was dark and thick as the hair on his head.
His penis was huge, out of all proportion to the skinny old frame from
which it dangled. As she moved slowly to meet him it filled out and hung
at a different angle, and of its own accord the wizened foreskin peeled
back to reveal the massive purple head beneath it.
"On the stele," he grunted. "Quickly! On the stone."
She turned her back to him and knelt upon the stone, watching him over
her shoulder as he came up behind her.