Daughter of Isis

by Belinda Grey

  Ellen’s only hope lay in hiding until Rami found her. Nephtari had assured her that he would come when he was needed, but the landscape with its rocks and bushes was empty of human reassurance, and she dare not look back to see if she was being followed.

  She had run so fast that her breath came in little, jerking pants and a stitch tormented her side. Ahead of her the high cliffs of the ancient temple reared up, and under her feet was the broken mosaic of the despoiled Outer Court.

  Perhaps it would be possible for her to hide in the cave. No doubt Henry Bligh would regard the cave as the logical place to seek her, but there might be some crevice in the rock, some ledge where she could remain undetected until help came.

  She began to run again, beneath the ancient pylon gate into the wide mouth of the moonlit cavern. The paintings were silver shadows on the wall, drained of colour, yet possessing a vibrant, mysterious life of their own.

  The shafts of moonlight were beaming down upon the shallow flight of crumbling steps. She turned towards them and began to grope her way down, her hands outstretched to brush against the rock face at each side. At the bottom the great slab of stone barred her way.

  The staircase was illuminated suddenly by a brighter light than the moon and she turned, her eyes widening, Henry Bligh, a flaring torch in his hand, stood at the top if the steps, looking down at her. ‘You run very fast, my dear Ellen,’ he mocked, ‘but there really isn’t anywhere to hide.’

  It was the nightmare she had dreamed at Tel-El-Aton, but now she was awake and the threat was real. Slowly, her mouth dry, she continued to descend the staircase.

  ‘Don’t be foolish,’ Henry Bligh rebuked. ‘You can’t walk through solid stone, my dear. And you’ve nothing to fear! Just let me know what message your father sent to you and you can sail safely back to England. I’ve no desire to hurt you at all!’

  She didn’t believe him, and even the paintings on the walls looked as if they didn’t believe him either, their animal heads averted in disdain. The light from the torch he held lit them into brilliance, the colours leaping into violent life.

  ‘Come back up here. You could turn your ankle on that stone,’ Henry warned cordially. ‘I wouldn’t want my ward to hurt herself.’

  It was useless! She was trapped between the stone and the light, and the echo of his voice mocked her. In a sudden gesture of angry frustration she beat with her fist against the rock, beat upon the painted figure of a naked babe sitting on a lotus with one plump finger to rosily pouting lips.

  There was a grinding, whirring noise and the rock swung inward, turning as if on a pivot to reveal a low vaulted chamber within.

  ‘The tomb! My God, but you’ve found the tomb!’ Henry’s voice had risen in excitement, and he was running down the steps towards her, pushing her through the gap into the room beyond. It was piled high with ornaments that glinted and sparkled as the light fell on them. ‘It’s a treasure trove,’ Henry said and the awe in his voice was almost religious. ‘Vessels of gold and silver. Jewels. Look at these emeralds! Like pigeon’s eggs!’

  ‘The tomb of Amentisis,’ Ellen whispered.

  ‘And cunningly hidden. Robbers would go straight to the stone down there and pass these pictures on the walls. And you found it, clever child! There’s the sarcophagus! The mummy will be in there.’

  ‘It’s beautiful.’ She had forgotten her terror of him in contemplation of the magnificence around.

  ‘It will bring a fortune,’ Henry said. ‘These things, broken up and sold separately, will fetch a King’s ransom. Such a pity you won’t be there to enjoy it.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’ She looked at him blankly. ‘These things ought to be declared to the Government.’ Henry said, setting the torch into a sconce and turning to look at her. ‘We would only have a fraction of the money as a reward if we did such a thing, and I cannot afford to let that happen. So you will have to stay here.’

  ‘Stay here?’ She echoed him stupidly.

  ‘The air is surprisingly fresh in here, but it won’t last for more than a day or two,’ Henry said, measuring the chamber with his eyes. ‘You will last about as long, my dear. If I return in a week’s time then it will be safe for me to take these objects one by one.’

  ‘You can’t do such a thing,’ she whispered, her eyes on his cold face. ‘No one could do such a thing.’

  ‘I need money,’ he responded calmly.

  ‘But you manage the estate,’ she protested.

  ‘My ambition rises higher than an oasis in the middle of nowhere,’ Henry said. ‘This tomb will provide much of what I require. And I will persuade Farida to marry me. I always did have excellent powers of persuasion.’

  ‘You can’t mean what you’re saying,’ Ellen said, dry-mouthed. Her legs were shaking so much she could scarcely stand. ‘People will ask questions and look for me.’

  ‘No doubt they will,’ he agreed, ‘But in these troubled times a girl might easily vanish, poor soul. After all, you were attacked by Berber tribesmen on your way to Silver Moon. We will all be very sorry and help with any enquiries that are set afoot.’

  Pride forbade her begging him, even if she had not realised that it was quite useless to appeal to his better nature. In paralysed terror she watched him as he backed to the opening and swung the stone close again, leaving her in the rocky cavern piled with its glittering treasures and only the jewelled and painted sarcophagus for company.

  CHAPTER

  TWELVE

  What had happened had about it the unreality of a nightmare. It was simply not possible that she was locked, living, into her own tomb. In a moment she would wake up and find herself in bed at Cwm Bedd, with Aunt Kate Evans calling up the stairs for her to get up and not waste the morning hours. But the reality stayed. The rock walls, painted with tiny, exquisite figures of children at play, would muffle her cries and repel her fists. She was trapped, and it would be quite useless to hope that the great rock opened from the inside. She who had been laid here had no need of exit.

  The air was fresher than Ellen had expected and the flame of the torch burned steadily, but within two or three hours the torch would be consumed and she would be plunged into darkness. In a week’s time when Henry Bligh returned alone. It was folly to dwell on such matters. She could feel hysteria rising up in her.

  To quiet her mind she began to move slowly about the great vault, pausing to examine the objects piled up about the painted walls. There were chests inlaid with patterns of ivory and silver, their lids open to reveal long strings of amber and jade beads, piles of glazed dishes and bowls patterned with fish and birds. One small chest contained ivory combs and enamel flowers on long silver pins. Another held jars of alabaster which, when she unscrewed one, gave off a faint, sweet scent like the ghost of a perfume. The statues were of painted wood, their eyes shining, their garments carved in formal pleats. She recognised some from the books she had seen at Silver Moon. There was the cat-headed Bast, and Osiris with his crook and flail, and the Ibis headed Thoth. In one corner a model boat, fashioned in silver, bore the ruby eye of Horus on its prow, and in another were ivory dice marked with turquoise spots and a half moon slung between painted wooden poles.

  The black dog, carved from ebony, guarded the arch leading to the inner chamber where the sarcophagus was raised on an ivory plinth, each corner flanked by a goddess made of gold.

  Ellen took the torch from its sconce and moved within the arch, bending closer to the painted cover with its fretwork of pearls. Somewhere in her head a voice mocked, ‘On the verge of extinction you waste your time in sightseeing’.

  The likeness of the one laid below was carved in relief on the lid, the whole figure being painted in colours as bright and delicate as on the day three thousand years before when they had been applied. At its head the statue of a woman stood, her arms outstretched, a horned headdress surmounted by a crescent moon set upon her broad, tranquil brow. Her painted gown was a sheath of silver and about her neck amethysts and rubi
es glowed on a collar of gold.

  Ellen stared from the figure of the goddess, Isis, to the carved likeness on the lid of the sarcophagus and thence to the black hound. The meaning of the festival was clear to her now, and with that flash of understanding the fear that had descended upon her began to lift.

  There was no logical reason for it but, in this place, where so many beautiful things had been lovingly collected, there was no room for terror. Sooner or later someone would find her, and no efforts of hers would make any difference to the outcome. Slowly she crossed the chamber to set the torch back into its place and then sat down, leaning her back against the comforting black side of the great, guarding hound.

  Time passed in a slow procession of images flung up by her memory. Herself as a small child wondering what lay beyond the mountains and longing to travel there. Herself, landing at Alexandria, and meeting the intense dark gaze of the man on the white horse. Herself, flung over the saddle and jolted through the darkness. Herself pressed against Rami’s lean frame, heart beating, desire rippling along her nerves. Herself alone with the great figures of an ancient epoch ringing her round and a treasure she would never spend within the reach of her fingertips.

  Her eyelids were growing heavy, and when she opened her eyes all the colours of enamelled chests and sparkling jewels swam together in a rainbow blur. The thought came to her that perhaps, before they died, people became a little mad, and that the madness itself was a kind of mercy.

  She was jerked into full consciousness by a sound that she thought at first must be an imagined one, and then, slowly, as she watched, the great rock began to swing inwards. Rami stood on the threshold, a flaring torch in his hand, his eyes sweeping about the chamber as Ellen struggled to her feet.

  ‘You choose a strange resting place, my green dove,’ he said, and at the sound of his voice something broke inside her and she began to laugh weakly with tears pouring down her face.

  ‘Hush now!’ He handed the torch to someone behind him and came swiftly to her, pulling her tightly against him. ‘Hush now! Surely you knew that I would come for you?’

  ‘I knew nothing of the kind!’ She scrubbed her cheeks with a fold of his robe. ‘My guardian left me here to die! How did you find me so quickly? Did Nephtari show you the pendant and the card?’

  ‘I was with my sister when the boy. Ali, came. He had been following you, on my instructions and for your own protection, and saw Henry Bligh follow you too. Ali can move as fast as sand blown on the wind and disappear into the landscape as easily. He waited long enough to see what had happened and then came to me. The sketch of Harpocrates on the card was the real clue as to where the entrance to the tomb was situated. Now do stop crying. It is making your nose red, and you have a most charming nose.’

  ‘My father must have found the tomb by accident as I did,’ she gulped.

  ‘And it is not so easy to open,’ Rami said. ‘There is only one spot on that painting which, when pressed, works the mechanism. I have been outside for an age trying to find it.’

  ‘I understand about Amentisis now,’ Ellen said quaveringly. ‘I know why the song is sung and what the festival dance means. Come and see!’ She took his hand and urged him towards the sarcophagus. For a moment he gazed in silence at the carved and painted lid and then he nodded. ‘Amentisis was never a powerful priestess with magical powers,’ Ellen said, her voice hushed. ‘She was a tiny girl, no more than three or four years old when she died, if we are to go by the likeness of her on the lid.’

  ‘And all these things that were put here for her to enjoy in the afterlife are playthings for a child.’ Rami pointed out. ‘The toy boat and the moonswing, and here are dolls.’ He held up two jointed wooden figures with painted hair and faces.

  ‘And the strings of beads and the hair ornaments are all designed for a child,’ Ellen said. ‘The child was stolen away by the moon goddess. That was how the parents thought of it when she died. They had prayed to Isis for a daughter and very soon Isis took her back again.’

  ‘She rode on the black dog Anubis, guardian of the dead,’ Rami said.

  ‘Into this world, with everything here that could delight a little girl. Her parents must have loved her very much,’ Ellen said softly.

  ‘And they tried so hard to hide her resting place.’ Rami’s face was troubled.

  ‘All these treasures will be put into a museum, won’t they?’ she said.

  ‘And the mummy taken to Cairo and displayed under glass for tourists to gape at,’ he added.

  ‘If we tell.’ Her eyes met his in a long glance of understanding.

  ‘If we tell,’ he agreed slowly.

  ‘Your servant Ali?’

  ‘Sees what I see and forgets what I forget. Ali is completely loyal to me.’

  ‘And the cause you serve?’

  ‘An independent Egypt would never flourish if it were built on the profits of grave-robbing.’

  ‘Then we say nothing?’

  ‘We leave Amentisis in peace.’

  ‘To enjoy her afterlife without disturbance.’ Ellen drew a deep breath and said wistfully, ‘If only we could take something for the Fords so that they could have their clinic. My father must have taken the ivory heart from here, but that wouldn’t fetch sufficient.’

  She broke off, her eyes widening, as the wide jewelled collar about the neck of the carved Isis fell clinkingly on to the sarcophagus and lay there, its jewels blazing.

  ‘Your movements must have weakened the clasp,’ Rami muttered. He had backed a step and there was the awe of the unknown in his face.

  ‘Are we to leave it?’ Already her hands were reaching for the shimmering gold. ‘If this could be broken up and sold it would fetch sufficient for a clinic, wouldn’t it? The money could be sent as an anonymous gift to Dr. Ford, couldn’t it?’

  ‘Take the necklace,’ Rami said abruptly. He had turned aside and was staring at the wall paintings.

  ‘You seem very certain,’ she faltered.

  ‘Look around you,’ he said. ‘Don’t you see that these paintings are all scenes from the life of Amentisis? Here are her parents praying to Isis for a child, and here is the babe with the goddess Hathor protecting her, and here she is with her doll and her ball. And look at this one!’

  ‘A little girl with her hands to her eyes,’ Ellen said slowly.

  ‘And in this one her eyes are being bathed by a priest,’ Rami said. ‘I think Amentisis had the eye disease that is still endemic here. I think she would be the last person to grudge the necklace being taken in order to found a clinic.’

  ‘A gift from the goddess,’ Ellen said, and wanted to weep again.

  ‘I know a man in Cairo who’ll pay highly for this and ask no questions.’ He took the necklace from her opened her bag and dropped it within.

  ‘Henry Bligh knows about this tomb.’ she remembered, shivering.

  ‘And Henry Bligh will be dealt with, I promise you.’ Rami’s voice was grim. ‘I have not forgotten that in his greed he left you here to die! Come, we have spent sufficient time among the dead. It is near dawn and time for us to face the living!’

  He took her hand and led her through to the outer chamber again, pausing to lift the dwindling torch from its sconce and holding it aloft for an instant to cast its flickering light on the treasures piled within and the sarcophagus below the shielding goddess. Then they went into the rocky tunnel of crumbling steps and the rock ground slowly into place again, leaving only the little god of Silence perched on his lotus flower.

  ‘We’ll bypass the village and ride straight to Silver Moon,’ Rami said. ‘I’ve a score to settle with that fine gentleman.’

  ‘He will be out pretending to search for me,’ she objected.

  ‘Not yet. They’ll have gone back to Silver Moon to wait until it’s light enough to organise a proper search party. Come!’

  He lifted her to the saddle of his horse and sprang up behind her muffling his nose and mouth with the folds of his headdress. He h
alf-turned to call some unintelligible instructions to the wide-eyed Ali, and then, with a scattering of sand, they were off, riding hard into the glowing sunrise.

  The fields were deserted, the fellahin apparently still sleeping off the excesses of the festival. The shock of the previous night’s events was receding and a new energy was filling Ellen.

  They were within sight of the walls and the gates stood open. As they drew near Ellen’s heart lurched in panic for several figures were running down the avenue towards them. Even Farida was with them, her plump face unusually flushed.

  ‘Come, my green dove!’ Rami leapt to the ground and lifted her down beside him.

  ‘Ellen, where have you been?’ Farida was demanding. ‘We looked for you everywhere, and then Henry said it would be wiser to come home and begin a proper search in the morning!’

  ‘Ellen, stand aside!’ Henry’s voice was sharp and cold. ‘The man you’re with is a rebel and a supporter of Arabi Pasha. I’ve no doubt he’s already dishonoured you.’

  Even in that moment she was forced to admire her guardian’s cool nerve. He must have known that he tottered on the brink of exposure, but he still hoped to carry off the situation with a high hand. In a moment he would be trying to convince them that her brain had been turned by her recent seduction at the hands of an uncivilised fanatic.

  ‘We will speak privately,’ Rami said, putting her aside and advancing towards the other. His hand was on the hilt of his scimitar and the white line about his mouth betokened anger held in check.