“Jackal!” Neville said, so loudly that several of Reis Awad’s sailors looked nervously toward the shore.
Each of them felt a chill of horror as they recalled their nocturnal burglars.
“Got it,” Jenny said, keeping her voice down as she filled in the new letters. “ ‘The -ockin--ir- -is-laces the ro-ins e--,’ ” she continued. “There sure are a lot of sixes in that line.”
“A double letter,” Stephen said. “Not overly common in English, especially when you eliminate most of the letters we already have.”
“ ‘G’ ” stated Neville. “It has to be ‘G.’ That makes the final word ‘egg.’ I’ll bet my estate that the long word is ‘mockingbird.’ ”
“Another bird right after that,” Jenny said, already filling in. “Robin.”
“The mockingbird somethings the robin’s egg,” Stephen said. “ ‘Displaces’ would be my guess.”
“Looks good. We almost have it,” Jenny said, continuing to pencil in. “Could the next word be ‘love’?”
Neville noticed that she very carefully did not look at him as she said this, and didn’t know whether to be embarrassed or annoyed. He settled for reading the completed message aloud.
“ ‘The jackal trails the lion. The mockingbird displaces the robin’s egg. Love is more dangerous than either one.’ Why bother to encipher this at all? It doesn’t make any sense even translated.”
Jenny frowned at him. “You’re going to be angry with me, Uncle, but I’d say that it makes perfect sense—and fits in with the Sphinx’s other messages quite neatly.”
Stephen frowned. “I thought that cuckoos were the birds that pushed eggs out of other bird’s nests, not mockingbirds.”
Jenny scowled at him. “So the Sphinx made an ornithological error. The sense is the same. Jackals are scavengers. Mockingbirds—or cuckoos—push other birds’ eggs out of the nest and replace them with their own.”
“Mockingbirds,” Stephen added helpfully, “could be said to steal the songs of other birds. They’re fabulous mimics.”
“Right,” Jenny said. “In any case, we have animals that have a reputation for living off the labor of others. It sounds like a warning against someone who would try to benefit from our labors.”
“And this bit about love?” Neville said, daring her to say it.
Stephen interjected, obviously in the hope of keeping Jenny from being too blunt, “Love itself can be very dangerous. More evil has been done for love—whether for a country or a religion or another person—than we like to admit. We prefer to think of it as a tender emotion.”
Jenny wasn’t going to be dissuaded.
“Stephen’s right. Love makes a wonderful excuse for not seeing the truth about the motives of a country, a religion… or a woman. Uncle Neville, don’t you see…”
“Enough,” Neville interrupted sharply. “I assure you I have not betrayed our plans to… anyone. If you’re so clever, tell me this. Who do you think is sending these messages?”
“We had several candidates,” Stephen said cautiously, very aware of his position as Sir Neville’s subordinate, “but most don’t seem to apply once we left Cairo—if truly no-one knew our plans. Eddie Bryce now seems the best. Can he read hieroglyphs?”
“Not when I knew him,” Neville said. “However, that doesn’t mean he hasn’t learned since then.”
“We’ve shown him the other letters,” Jenny said. “I say that this time we confront him with our suspicions. It’s only fair.”
Neville agreed. He didn’t think Eddie was a likely candidate, but if the time had come for confrontations, he wasn’t going to let Stephen off the hook.
They placed the deciphered letter on the table, and when Eddie came up to inform them that the wind was so favorable that Reis Awad intended to leave immediately, they showed it to him.
“Another of these?” Eddie said. “Fellow seems to like romance and danger as subjects, don’t you think?”
“You should know,” Jenny said.
“What?” Eddie looked genuinely confused.
“I said, ‘You should know.’ Aren’t you the author of these fascinating letters?”
Eddie shook his head, laughing. “I am not. Hell, I’m not that clever. Almost all the education I got was in the army, plus what the mullahs drummed into my head after I converted. Ask Neville—I couldn’t even read when we met.”
His astonished pleasure that they could think him capable of such elaborate games was so genuine that they believed him.
“Anyhow,” Eddie added, “didn’t you get the first of these while you were still in England, and another one on the steamer you took over from England? I’d like to know how I would have worked that.”
“You could have mailed them in advance,” Stephen said. “You did know our travel plans, so you seemed the best candidate. And you and the Sphinx seem to think alike. Whenever the Sphinx hasn’t been warning us about romantic entanglements, he’s warning us off ‘the good king.’ Other than the Sphinx, you’ve been the least enthusiastic about this venture.”
Eddie smiled. “I don’t think I’m the least enthusiastic. Those fellows in the jackal-masks were pretty determined to stop us. I see your point, though. Is this the only such letter you’ve received since we left Cairo?”
Neville nodded. Nearby, the dahabeeyah’s sails were flapping, ready to catch the wind, and Reis Awad was shouting orders to his men, steering them as they rowed the craft out of the harbor.
“Want to turn around?” Eddie asked. “I could make some inquiries. Try to learn which post this came in, which boats just arrived, whether any of our associates are new to Cairo.”
He thinks I’ve told Lady Cheshire something, Neville thought. Have I been so obvious in my interest?
Neville shook his head.
“We’re finally away. Perhaps we’ll slip the Sphinx at last.” Then he remembered his own suspicions and turned on Stephen, “Or maybe not. Maybe I’ve been nursing a mockingbird cuckoo in my breast. I know someone far more likely than Eddie to pull such a trick.”
Stephen pointed to himself, “Me?”
“You,” Neville enumerated his suspicions on his fingers. “You write in hieroglyphs—and know enough to disguise your typical form beneath an assumed style. You love those mysteries of Poe and might want a hand at creating one yourself. You have had both privacy to create these, and opportunity to deliver them. You’ve also been almost indecently eager to decipher them—and have been available to provide little hints to Jenny and myself when we get stuck.”
Stephen’s mouth fell open.
“Me?” he repeated. “Why would I?”
“For a joke,” Neville said, firmly. “You like a good joke—or a bad one. A joke that would enable you to take digs at your employer without seeming ungracious would be ideal.”
Stephen colored, and he shook his head vigorously, as if the mere motion alone would be sufficient to prove his sincerity.
“I swear it wasn’t me,” he said, “on my honor. I appreciate your kindness more than I can say, and while I enjoy a joke as well as the next fellow, I would like to think I’m never mean about it. Anyhow, why would I want to dissuade you from a venture that’s letting me to fulfill one of my heart’s desires?”
Neville considered. Leaving out the Sphinx letters, Stephen’s humor was either clever or self-deprecating, but never cruel. He had to concede that the younger man’s defense was reasonable.
“You swear you aren’t the author of these?”
Stephen put his hand over his heart. “I do.”
Neville offered Stephen his hand. “Then I apologize for thinking you were playing a cruel joke, but I hope you’ll understand that I had to ask.”
Jenny had been listening to this without comment, but now she rose. “Since we’re indulging in confessions—and we’re safely on our way—I have one to make. I brought Mozelle with me. She’s asleep in my cabin. I think I’ll go get her so she can have some fresh air.”
Neville buried his face in his hands, suddenly laughing to split his sides. He should have known he couldn’t win. In the end, Jenny really was more like Alice—or Alice like Jenny—than he had ever admitted.
———
Although Neville longed to sail non-stop from morning until night, they had to play at touring and hunting lest they arouse the sailors’ interests in their destination. That would be unwise, Eddie warned him, since they did not wish tales of their urgency to be told once they had left the Mallard . Better that the crew gossip about Jenny’s skill with a rifle, or Stephen’s ineptitude with the same.
The sailors were all relatives, by blood or marriage, of Reis Awad. Knowing each other well, they found much of their amusement in speculating about their exotic passengers, talking about what they would do if they were rich (Neville knew this would not include cruising up the Nile), gambling, and making music. Lest they have too much time for speculation, Eddie had invested in a drum, a set of pipes, and a tambourine, presenting them to the sailors along with hints that his employers liked the local music.
Neville didn’t, particularly, but he felt some nostalgia for the sound. Jenny seemed to enjoy it, but doubtless she heard it as strange and exotic. Stephen evidently disliked it, but seemed to have an infinite capacity for tuning it out—certainly a useful skill for a scholar residing with both mother and sisters.
Reis Awad proved to be an admirable captain, skilled at getting the most out of both the wind and his crew. This did not mean he had absolute control of the situation. Once a sandstorm forced them to tie up along the bank for an entire afternoon. Another time a local sheik tried to charge an unreasonably large sum for viewing a small ruin. When Reis Awad and Eddie refused, the sheik hinted that there were those in his village who would take what they wanted. They spent a tense night anchored in mid-stream, but no assault came.
Watching Jenny and Stephen’s delight in every element of the passing scenery—from birds and flowers to hippopotami and crocodiles—Neville felt the years slipping away from him, until he too was once again seeing the Nile for the first time, without goals or dreams to distract him from its beauty. His impatience left him for hours at a time, and he realized with a start that he was closer to being happy than he had been for many years. Like Jenny, he began to wish the voyage would go on longer.
It can, you know, he told himself one night. Eddie wouldn’t mind, and I could convince the other two, especially with the incentive of sailing further up the Nile. We could go up the cataract, into Nubia even.
But even as he considered this, he knew he was only toying with a fancy. The peace he felt was due in part to knowing he was almost there—almost to the point where the Hawk Rock was just visible from the banks of the Nile. From the upper deck, he kept watch along the west bank and, finally, in a quiet stretch between Edfu and Kom Ombo, they found the landmarks he had set down so many years before.
Seen from the river, there was little enough to attract attention, just a small farming village without even a minor ruin to distinguish it. Beyond this village, deep in the desert, was a rock formation that to the expectant eye bore a distinct resemblance to a watchful hawk. Had it not been for the clear, dry air, and the utter absence of trees, the formation might well have been invisible, or at least too blurred to be seen clearly. As it was, the setting sun feathered the hawk in the colors of blood.
“There it is,” Neville said softly. Quoting from memory, he said, “ ‘Worn and near mad, I stumbled from the desert wastes into a village by the Nile. Joyfully, I went and plunged my head into the silty waters. The natives looked at me as if I were insane, and I fear I did not help myself to gain their regard, for as soon as I was recovered enough to stand, I stood and saluted the Hawk Rock that had been my guide away from the strange Oasis of Statues back to the Nile’.”
Eddie had also seen the Hawk Rock, and returned from speaking to Reis Awad.
“We’ll sail on up for a few more miles. Tomorrow I’ll go ashore, and see if the arrangements I made for camels and such have been carried out. Tonight, do your packing, since I want to be ready to leave at a moment’s notice. As much as I like most Egyptians, some of the residents in these outlying villages think a deal only holds until they have your money.”
“Isn’t it unwise for us to leave the river this close to an obvious landmark?” Jenny asked. “If those jackal-headed men really do protect Neferankhotep’s tomb, aren’t they even more likely to have agents here than in Thebes?”
“It is likely,” Eddie said with the air of one who has resigned himself to a course of action that could not be avoided. “However, we cannot make the journey without camels, and we couldn’t very well carry camels on the dahabeeyah. That means we had to set a rendezvous point.”
Neville added, “Chad Spice’s journal doesn’t give very clear directions. If we don’t start from where we can see the Hawk Rock, we’re lost before we begin. We aren’t landing at the same village from which Alphonse started us, and people do go out into the desert. I’ve had Eddie give it out that our destination is the Khargeh Oasis—a place as unknown to most of these river fellahin as the Tower of London.”
Stephen grinned, “London Bridge is falling down, but Khargeh Oasis is just across town.”
Jenny tried to smile at his joke, but Neville saw her shiver, her gaze fixed on the distant landmark.
“It seems to be watching us, doesn’t it?” she whispered.
Neville turned involuntarily to look. Across the reddened sands the massive clump of rock returned his gaze with one that had watched since long before the time of the pharaohs. Its perspective seemed older than Egypt, older even than the gods.
14
Riskali
Early the next morning, Eddie and Neville took the Mallard’s lighter to shore. Eddie had wanted Neville to remain behind, but Neville insisted on going.
“We’re going to have to go ashore sooner or later,” he said. “I promise not to cause you any trouble. I’ll speak only English, and act dumb as a post.”
Eddie hesitated.
“Despite what I told Jenny, I’m not comfortable drawing too much attention to ourselves, even here.”
“The camels,” Neville insisted, “will have drawn attention.”
Eddie surrendered. “Very well.”
As they drew closer to the village, it became evident that it was unremarkable, even for an Egyptian peasant village. The houses were roughly rectangular structures built from mud brick, brightened here and there with a bit of painted woodwork or a curtain. Goats and semi-feral dogs roamed the twisting alleyways that passed as streets, and the mosque was distinguished only by being slightly taller than the other structures.
The fields surrounding the village were adequately tended, but did not show any great ambition in their planting. The irrigation ditches were minimal. Only a few shaduf were spaced along the banks; apparently, the villagers were willing to settle mostly for what the Nile gave them. This morning, even the shaduf were idle; the men who should have been tending them stood along the riverbank, gaping at the dahabeeyah.
Almost as soon as the lighter bumped against the bank, an elderly man in surprisingly spotless white robes came striding out of one of the largest houses. His aura of confidence and the retinue that trailed him marked him as the village headman. In an isolated place like this, he was probably the religious as well as the civil leader. He might pay token heed to the national government and the regional governors, but doubtless the fact that he knew that, from a practical standpoint, his rule was absolute, accounted for his haughty demeanor.
Eddie and Neville stepped ashore, warning the sailors to be ready to depart at a moment’s notice. Then they turned to face the headman.
He greeted them in formal Arabic, and Eddie replied with the same, his own words flawlessly mimicking the dialect of the region. The old man raised a bushy white eyebrow in surprise, but otherwise did not comment.
“I am Riskali ben Ali,” he said, “headman here.�
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“I am Ibrahim Alhadj ben Josef,” replied Eddie, stressing the ‘alhadj’ just slightly.
Riskali was appropriately impressed. Although all good Mohammedans were enjoined to make the pilgrimage to Mecca, in such an isolated place as this, few would have actually achieved that goal.
“You are with the dahabeeyah?”
“The dahabeeyah is with me,” Eddie replied. “I am seeking my friend Daud who was to meet me here.”
Riskali’s expression became guarded. “Daud? Let me think.”
Eddie did not move. Neville knew that the natives had become conditioned to expect an extensive series of gifts—bribes, really—from any Europeans. Eddie was doing his best to convince the headman to accept him as another son of Islam. This would not make him immune from the need to offer gifts, but it would mean that the villagers would need to honor any agreements they made with him.
Fleetingly, Neville regretted forcing himself on Eddie. Then he dismissed the thought. The presence of Europeans aboard the Mallard could not have been concealed, and his deferring to Eddie, no matter how subtly, would give weight to the other man’s claim to be the master of the expedition.
After several moments during which the flies buzzed counterpoint to the silence, Riskali sighed gustily.
“I cannot think of anyone by that name,” he said.
This was an invitation to jog the headman’s memory with a coin. Judging from the excited shuffling of some of the younger members of the retinue, they knew this as well. What had begun as a simple exchange of information was now revealed as a contest of wills.
Eddie did not look as if he would be the one to give way, but the deadlock was broken by the emergence from one of the huts of a lanky Arab with a short beard. He wore expensive robes of elegant cut that made the snowy whiteness of the headman’s robes seem merely over-bleached.
“Oh, that Daud,” the headman said dismissively. “I thought you were seeking someone important.”
Daud waved cheerfully and made his way to the riverbank. Feigning indifference, the headman led his contingent toward a cluster of palms near the center of the village.
The Buried Pyramid Page 26