Complete Works of Talbot Mundy

by Talbot Mundy

  Baltis, sick of the heat and tired of standing, was on the floor, on her own folded cloak, with her back to the wall, close to where Jeff stood. The others, except copper-belly, were all leaning against the wall; he leaned against the cistern, with his elbows on it, rolling his great head sideways to watch first one, and then another. Chullunder Ghose had already squatted on the floor at the right hand of Baltis, close enough to her to whisper, although I doubt that he could have done that without Bertolini’s keen ears detecting it. Bertolini went straight to her, exactly as if he could see.

  “Are you Baltis? Why didn’t you come straight to me?”

  “I have Dorje’s orders.”

  “And a fine mess you’ve made of them!”

  I could see Chullunder Ghose touching her shoe with his fingers; she kicked his hand away irritably. It may be that the momentary irritation, added to the insolently domineering manner of Bertolini, prevented her from playing her own hand. Anyhow, she craftily protected Grim by admitting that she did not know who Bertolini was, and then intentionally blundering to bring an awkward climax to a head. She was quite capable of doing that. I believe she still cherished the thought of finally betraying Grim, for the sheer mischief of asserting her own genius, and it would not in the least have troubled her that she must die too, if she could only make her end dramatic and sensational. Perhaps she thought that opportunity not sensational enough.

  “One would think you were your sister,” Bertolini went on, snarling. “How many times have you told me what a treacherous fool she is, obeying her own inclinations instead of orders. And now you do the same thing! Why the devil didn’t you come to me?”

  That stung her. There had plainly been a more than common jealousy between those twins. It made her hate the man who spoke of her sister’s criticism. But she needed a clue as to how to answer him, so she still sparred for an opening, and I held my breath. I think we all did.

  “Do you wish me to tell you in front of all these people?”

  “Who are they?”

  “Ku-sho and his company.”

  “That fool! Useless idiot! Skin him alive! I asked you, why didn’t you come straight to me?”

  If she had thought for a week she could not have imagined a retort more suitable:

  “I was ordered to investigate you before trusting you. Dorje is far from pleased. Reports have reached him. The reports seem false. So I will come and see you now. But if you are wise you will make me a full report of all your doings.”’

  “Oh.” He turned livid. His tyrannous temper so changed his expression that I thought for a moment he would seize her throat and try to throttle her. However, he mastered his facial muscles, and in a moment there remained only a smile of malignant cunning that he probably supposed was pleasant.

  “Very well. Come now and see me. Come to my place. I will show you everything.”

  “Tomorrow,” she answered. “I am too tired now. I must sleep.

  “Where?”

  Chullunder Ghose spoke up for her. “The sahiba will go to Brown’s Hotel, Suite A.”

  Bertolini nodded, obviously memorizing the room number.

  “Who are you? Are you the fat fool who got in my way just now?”

  “Am fat wise man. Am expert who invented formula that, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one make forty-five; and one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine make also forty-five; and by subtracting one from the other we have self-same figures in another order, namely, eight, six, four, one, nine, seven, five, three, two — which once again is forty-five; and we have key to code which puzzles unintelligence departments of lots of governments. Therefore speak to me respectfully. Am Ph. D. of University of Guile. Am pundit plus.”

  “Are you the tinker who is to come to my place to advise me?”

  “No, the thinker! Am appropriately learned expert to do any emergency job whatever. If the boss says ‘Sizzle on a hot plate,’ this babu invents asbestos anti-sizzlum pad, like camouflage on top-side lid of Tophet, and squats as per invoice. Did the boss say, Do it?”

  “Yes. Get a move on. I came here on donkey-back. You’ll have to walk.”

  “Am good guesser. I guess I won’t walk — not all that distance! Hercules was penny-ante charlatan compared to this babu. Hercules was what U.S.A. Yankees call sucker. Self am reincarnation of Adam, who let Eve pick apple, ate same and did not give her any.”

  “Nonsense!” Bertolini answered. “I and my donkey are well known and can get by sentries unquestioned. You will get through, too, if you walk beside me.”

  “I don’t wonder you need an investigation!” said the babu. “Which of you manages Dorje’s business — you or the donkey? How do you suppose a big fat man like me, who can be seen from a mile away, would come to a place like this, on Dorje’s business, without as good credentials as the King would have if he were traveling incog.? I am supposed to be — in fact, I am — a trusted agent of the Indian Intelligence Department. Do you think Dorje employs only nit-wits? Do you think you could have escaped police investigation if there were not more than one important Egyptian on Dorje’s secret list? I envy you your naive vanity! You believe yourself a crafty king-pin, which must be very pleasant; but you are actually only a little piece of the machinery, under observation, and replaceable. I came here by motor-car. So did this lady. We go back by motor-car. And so do you. We drop her at the hotel. Then we go to your place. And if you think you are the only guiley conversation salesman who can get through a line of sentries, you are going to learn something. You are safer with me than I with you.”

  “My donkey — I can’t leave it here,” said Bertolini. “It would be recognized.”

  “Can it ride in motor-car? You need your brain investigated, not only your behavior! Your donkey shall be brought to you tomorrow — unless someone needs it for another purpose. Now let us go to your place. Come on!”

  Out-bullied, the blind bully smiled malignantly, stared all around him as if he could see, turned suddenly, and walked out, stooping under the low entrance without using his hands to feel his way. Baltis went next, hustled by Chullunder Ghose, who was in a hurry to get a word with Grim. But Grim was no longer in the antechamber.

  CHAPTER 19. “So I will bring on all of us a tragedy, unless—”

  As I have said more than once, that ramp is slippery. Baltis — small blame to her — collapsed from the heat and sheer weariness I had to carry her down the ramp, in no way aided by the irritating dance of the electric lantern that Chullunder Ghose held as he hurried to overtake Bertolini and to find Grim. Bertolini, of course, was unaffected by light or darkness; leaping and bewildering shadows made no difference to him. I believe that I, too, could have done better in absolute darkness, since I knew the way almost as well as he did. Jeff’s shout, from behind me, did not help matters.

  “Look out for yourself, Crosby!”

  Jeff, as I learned afterwards, had entered the antechamber, on his way to the step at the head of the ramp, where he hoped the air would be more breathable. He intended to remain there and to keep Dorje’s people inside until Grim should decide what to do with them. But as he ducked through the opening into the ante-chamber, both those bat-fouled Hindus doused the lights and rushed him. He collared one. The other scrambled out between his legs, but Jeff caught him by the foot and held on. Everything would have been all right if panic had not seized the crew that remained in the Great Chamber. They had been fooled and had betrayed their master; they may have hoped, in one mad rush, to undo the betrayal by destroying us. Or, they may have been suddenly seized by an animal impulse to fight their way out of a trap and abandon everything — escape — hide — vanish.

  At any rate, they rushed Jeff. It possibly occurred to them that the very last thing he would do would be to use the two revolvers he had taken from the Hindus. If so, they guessed rightly. Probably no man ever lived who was more dependable than Jeff in a matter of that kind. He was so utterly loyal to Grim that he would rather be kille
d than put a hitch in one of Grim’s plans. Grim needed time to send Bertolini away with Chullunder Ghose. Bertolini must not be alarmed. And God knows there was noise enough without revolver shots.

  But how to describe that fight in total darkness! It is impossible. I can’t even remember the order in which incidents occurred, any more than one can remember details of a nightmare. It was almost as quick as a nightmare — nearly as confusing; and the psychological effect of fighting in the very womb of Gizeh, overwhelmingly outnumbered by men whose organization and plans were still almost as mysterious as the origin and purpose of the pyramid itself, must be considered before I am blamed for a hazy account of what happened.

  I had a flashlight in my pocket. To reach it I had to set the Princess down and before I could use it the whole scrambling avalanche of hysterical humans was on top of me, with Jeff on his back in the midst of it. Two men’s teeth were in his right arm (but I did not know that until afterwards). His left fist, though men were hanging on it, was going like a piston. So were his legs, though men were clinging to those too. As a matter of fact, before he reached me, there were three men out of action, one dead, with his skull crushed on the edge of the granite step at the top of the ramp. That dead man was Ku-sho — copper-belly — but none of us knew it. Jeff was giving them plenty to keep them occupied, and he was using head as well as muscles. He had thought of the revolvers.

  Naturally, every single one of those scrimmaging madmen had thought of them too. That was one reason why they were all on top of Jeff together. But he had thrown the revolvers away; one slithered past me, down the ramp. One man, who had a wave-edged dagger, was so eager to grab the revolver that he forgot his own weapon until about the moment when the scrimmage reached me. When he did remember it he drew and plunged it to the hilt between the shoulder-blades of the Hindu who wore spectacles, where it stuck tight. But that was another thing learned later on.

  Instinct governed me. I picked up Baltis to protect her. Down I went — down under them, as the weight of all those scrambling humans struck my legs, and I clung to my burden as we used to hug the ball on the football field, wishing to God some unexpected referee would blow his whistle. Fighting never did amuse me, anyhow. I believe Jeff likes it. Someone smashed me in the mouth, and I declare it was Jeff, although he says it wasn’t, because if it had been I would have no teeth left and it only loosened two. It felt like an eternity before we brought up, all in a pulsating heap together, at the wall at the foot of the ramp.

  Then Jeff’s prodigious strength had something firm to use for leverage. He was like an earthquake. I suppose I helped him, although I imagine not much; I was almost half out from the shock of that blow in the teeth. He hove that mass of humans off him something in the way that blasting powder heaves off debris. And he had his wind left, which was more than I had.

  “Where’s your flashlight?” he asked.

  The flashlight answered him. I had dropped it when I went down under. I suppose it slid down with us. One of the Mongolians had picked it up and now he used it, directing the light straight at us, to his own undoing; Jeff’s fist struck him like a hammer on the jaw and he crumpled, but the flashlight crumpled with him — smashed to smithereens as it struck the stone floor.

  However, that brief flash of light was actually all we needed and we were safer in total darkness once we had the lay of things. Baltis was as limp as a corpse and I supposed she had suffered internal injuries in spite of my efforts to protect her. Jeff was bleeding. I knew I was, although nothing to matter. But the enemy were in a bad way. That one glimpse of them was as encouraging to us as reinforcements would have been. Jeff’s fists and feet had done terrific punishment, and they were not the sort of men who thrive on that stuff; whereas the more you hurt Jeff, the more deliberately gamely he fights and the keener his sense of strategy, which sometimes does not fully wake up until he is rather hard pressed.

  “Into the passage!”

  He shoved me with his elbow. He admitted afterwards he would have knocked me into the passage if I had as much as hesitated; and it is a fact that he once saved Grim’s life by a punch in the jaw that knocked his head out of the way of an Afghan’s tulwar. If there’s fighting, you either jump when Jeff says jump, or you get moved on in spite of yourself, your self-esteem and your opinions. He takes full charge of operations. And he grins immensely afterwards, if you should waste words on remonstrance.

  There was nothing whatever for me to do but to back away into the darkness, carrying Baltis who was not particularly heavy and who was beginning to show symptoms of recovering consciousness. Jeff backed down the passage after me and we retreated step by step until we had passed the entrance to the so-called Queen’s Chamber. There Jeff halted and I heard his fist swat someone like a pole-axe; whoever he hit crawled into the passage toward the Queen’s Chamber and lay there calling to his friends; I think two, or perhaps three, of them followed him, and Jeff let them go by because they were as good as out of action in that low, narrow tunnel.

  And then Grim came. “Are you fellows hurt? You’ve saved our bacon! I was afraid Bertolini would hear the rumpus, but Chullunder Ghose clowned a panic and made enough din to drown yours. He almost carried Bertolini to McGowan’s car. They’re waiting for Baltis. Is she all right?”

  He had a flashlight but did not use it. I heard her murmur, “Jeemgreem!” and I think she threw an arm around him.

  “Jeff and I will do the rest of this,” he said. “Get her to the car and on your way back tell McGowan what has happened.”

  So I don’t know just exactly how Grim discovered that copper-belly was dead. I only know that between them they drove all the rest of that gang into the Queen’s Chamber and that Grim got a clip on the forehead that made the blood run into his eyes.

  My head was a bit woozy, but by the time I reached the entrance and the fresh air I felt almost fit to carry Baltis back to Cairo. I believe I would not have minded trying! I defy anyone to hold that woman in his arms and not like her, to put it mildly. In attempting to tell this story as it happened, I have probably not done her justice. Idiot and malignant little traitress though she was in some ways, she was wonderful in others. I laid her on one of the pyramid courses and wondered whether it would be safe to strike a light in order to look through my pocket kit of first-aid remedies.

  There was no sign of McGowan. I could hear what sounded like a motor- truck, but it was impossible to judge its direction or how far away it might be. Baltis, as most normally healthy people do, had begun to recover the moment that decently breathable air reached her lungs, and it is one of my heretical theories that nature, once stirring, is best left to her own devices, so I put back the kit, proposing to give her about two minutes before carrying her further. However, I overestimated her need. She sat up without help and spoke low but audibly, which was a very certain symptom of returning strength.

  “Where is Jeemgreem?” (I answered her.) “Do you think he will trust me now? I could have betrayed him. I could have caused you all to be killed. I could have escaped with those men; and I could have done much work for Dorje elsewhere. Now — do you think — will Jeemgreem trust me?”

  I answered, I was sure he trusted her. But I did not say he trusted her to get the breaks for him by trying to betray him. However, I believe she understood me. I was probably not in such good shape myself that I could talk without giving my meaning away.

  “What do you do with me now?” she demanded.

  I told her: “To the hotel.”

  “You tell Jeemgreem I am not so simple as he imagines. I love him. You say that. And because I love him I will help him as no one else can.”

  I said: “He counts on you to do that.”

  “Yes? But does Jeemgreem count on me to help him for philosophic reasons? I am as pragmatical as he is! Furthermore, I am as ruthless! If you have true affection for him you will tell him what I say.”

  I promised.

  “Very well. Then, say this: he is winning — just
this little skirmish, and that makes me love him more than ever. But the big fight comes, which he shall not win unless he loves me also.”

  It was a strange time and place to discuss the strategy of love, in which some idiot has said that all is fair. But she seemed on the verge of revelation, and although Chullunder Ghose was waiting and probably half frantic with impatience, I cast about in my mind for an answer that might tempt her to indiscretion. However, there was no need. She continued:

  “He may think that he can leave me here in Egypt. He may think that he can silence me by shutting me in prison. And he is ruthless enough. But I also, I am ruthless. I enjoy to die dramatically, as I always did do, in every life that I have lived — and there are plenty of future lives in which to love each other. It would be too tame if there were no tragedy once in a while. So I will bring on both of us a tragedy unless he—”

  Interesting, but not important, as I saw it at the moment. Threats nine time out of ten amount to nothing. So I picked her up and carried her as fast as I could toward where we had left the car. However, when I told Grim afterwards about that conversation he took it seriously and said he would not dream of leaving her behind, and always after that he treated her with a shade more show of confidence than formerly. I say, show of confidence. From first to last he never once confided in her; and he never once accepted as a fact one single scrap of information from her except such as she revealed in her efforts to win the whip hand over him. So far, she seemed the only really capable agent Dorje had. The others, the moment danger showed itself, seemed to run around like ducks with their heads cut off. But all conspiracies are like that; there are never more than half a dozen, if as many, dependable desperadoes — all the others merely follow those if they succeed — desert them if they fail.