“Any chance you can take a two-three days or so off your job?” he asked as Thomas was giving him back his change. “Good money. Interesting job.”
Good job. Interesting money. Think about it, not-Markus. Ah, the dreams, the dreams . . . Lessons to be learned.
Thomas was about to shake his head, when the woman’s voice resumed.
All expeditions fail. You know that first-hand, no, not-Mathias? Why not? Adventure? You were always looking for adventure. Things happen in no particular order. Tricky, tricky. But adventure, not-Markus . . . Adventure . . .
“You speak Perso-Mongol, right?”
Richard was looking intensely at him now, eyes shining, as if he was secretly begging.
“Some.”
“Enough to get by, I see. You work here. It’s not particularly a tourist place . . . We only found it because our hotel is nearby . . . Cheap as dirt, and just as clean . . .”
They quietly sneered in unison.
Your name will always remain a secret. But I know it. I have always known it.
“I don’t know if I can,” Thomas said. “When would it be?”
“We’re leaving in three days,” Richard said. “Good money. And maybe a little bit of fame, even.”
They always say that. Even you. That’s what you told your friends, remember?
Thomas nodded and walked back towards the bar, where Tsentsen and Garesh were still playing their game. Garesh had more pieces on the board and Tsentsen looked upset, chewing his lower lip and shaking his head.
A little adventure couldn’t hurt, could it? A change of scenery for a few days? What’s more, he hadn’t seen Saran again. She hadn’t come by and he was feeling disappointed. Cheated. Sad? Sad. So leaving for a few days could help, maybe. Synth dressed him up in French Foreign Legion uniform and he couldn’t suppress a smile. Adventure . . .
Ah.
Yes, that invisible woman was right, whoever she was. Adventure.
He asked Tsentsen if it was okay if he took three or four days off, with no pay. Tsentsen nodded without looking at him and moved a tower.
Remember?
Thirty Five.
Routine. How Inspector-General Ali Shakr Bassam used to love that word, and how much he hated it now. He grabbed the pack of Navis without filter from his desk and gently tapped it on the wooden surface to extract a cigarette. Half a dozen files were spread in front of him, all completely uninteresting. Drug dealers, failed gangsters, small time criminals . . . Routine, routine, routine.
The small-time trafficking hoodlums he had talked to near Tazar’s widow’s place hadn’t called back. He wondered if he should find some pretext to have them brought to the station where he could interrogate them one by one. They could be accessories to the murder, in spite of their avowed respect for Tazar. Who knew? Since when could a cop trust a punk? He was getting soft. Sighing, he picked up a file. Drug smuggling. Opium. Of course. No new exotic drug or whatever. Opium. Routine. He shrugged.
Mongolian Throat Chant
Thirty Six.
Thomas got out of the Land Rover and stretched. He ached all over, but that wasn’t the worst thing. His ears still rang from Richard’s non-stop flow of amusing anecdotes. A seven hour trip. He had switched Synth on and off a couple of times, pretending to sleep, but it hadn’t been enough.
He looked around. The small village was located in a breathtaking landscape, surrounded by pale yellow and ochre mountains, covered with patches of dried grass that were home to a few tiny blue and yellow flowers. The sun was setting, turning the impossibly large sky a strange blue, like ink mixed with water.
The other two Land Rovers parked behind them, in the empty main square. A small troupe of children materialized, running towards them.
The expedition could begin.
Adventure.
Thirty Seven.
Thomas exchanged a few words with the mayor of the village, a middle-aged Perso-Mongol with a proud, drooping, salt-and-pepper mustache. He had obviously been waiting for the expedition, as he had put his best suit on—a Chinese-cut, brownish three-piece that smelled of mothballs—and he was escorted by the local cop, a young man with a closed face who looked like a soldier from Genghis Khan’s army. His cap was nonchalantly set on the back of his head, and his large leather holster hung across his thigh like a threatening S&M device. He asked to see the official papers and looked at them for a very long time, before finally nodding silently and handing them back to Richard without a smile.
“Should I give them backsheesh?” Richard whispered in Thomas’s ear as he folded the papers back into place.
Thomas shrugged.
“I don’t know. It might be insulting. Give them some cigarettes. As a friendly gesture, not as corruption.”
Richard motioned to Mark, who opened the hatch of the second Land Rover and took a few cigarette cartons out. The officials accepted them with smiles and little bows. Thomas wondered what Alexander had brought them, if he had ever passed this way.
Dreams, the invisible woman’s voice said. Dreams they have never forgotten, even if it seems so. Dreams are invisible, but you can touch them. Oh, of course, you would know that. Not-Markus! You would know that.
The mayor pointed out a large house on the other side of the square. The local inn. Thomas suddenly felt terribly thirsty. Like Alexander’s horse.
Thirty Eight.
In his bed, Inspector-General Ali Shakr Bassam contemplated the ceiling and tried to find sleep. He imagined a starless sky hanging over him, a sky without poetry. Thoughts whirled in his head, disconnected, but they always came back to Tazar, one way or another, like black poison.
To his surprise, Amir and a few friends were organizing a tribute evening to Tazar over the weekend, and he had been invited. He still wondered if he should go—the inspector-general in the midst of all these subversive students, but he had been disappointed with the official tributes—an old interview shown on the national TV channel, a poor interpretation of one of his plays and a one minute silence at the National Assembly this morning. Bassam sighed and rolled onto his side, his back to Rezida, who moaned slightly. Although Tazar had been deemed a National Living Monument just two years ago, the renewed tension with the Western Alliance had made him less popular with the authorities. That, and the fact he advocated absolute democracy, whatever that meant. But to Bassam, all this was politics. Tazar’s poetry concerned life, and life only. Yes. His life.
Thirty Nine.
Thomas had slept remarkably well, considering the narrow bed he was given, but at least, he had a tiny room of his own—right under the flat roof. The other guys had to share one big room and he was sure Richard snored like a bear. Sylvia also had a room of her own, but that was because she was a woman. He knew why he’d had the privilege—he spoke some Perso-Mongol and didn’t look too thrilled at the prospect of visiting the caves.
At dinner the cop asked him what he thought of his companions. He’d answered dumb tourists and they laughed together, raising their half-empty bottles of Khan.
Thomas knew the cop would not cause them trouble, as long as the political situation demanded politeness towards the Western Alliance. There was some irony in this that didn’t escape him. If he understood correctly what Richard told him in the Land-Rover, they were here to try to prove that Alexander had been re-buried here, and that would make Samarqand—symbolically at least—a historical part of the Western Alliance. Ancient kingdoms, ancient civilizations. Origins, the obsession with origins.
Cultural war of the worst kind.
Thomas sighed and stood to open the window. The village was already flattened by the sun, all yellows and grays.
Origins were dangerous, Thomas thought. He was happy to have got rid of his along the way.
Forty.
“Here we are!”
Richard made a sweeping gesture with his arm as Todd filmed him. When he saw the camera, Thomas had panicked. Pretending he had a phobia of cameras, he had insisted on no
t being filmed and had Richard sign a hand-written paper promising that they would not film him. Attorneys always scared the shit out of these people, even in the middle of nowhere. Thomas didn’t want Sørensen, watching a documentary on his B&O TV in his Viborg City apartment, suddenly recognizing him and setting Interpol on his tracks . . .
“The legendary mountains of Samarqand, that made Alexander dream!”
Thomas cautiously walked away and stopped a few seconds later, watching Mark and Sylvia unload crates of electronic material from one of the Land-Rovers.
The cop escorting them joined him and offered Thomas a Galaz.
“What are they babbling about?” the cop asked, putting the pack back in the breast pocket of his dusty uniform and producing a lighter.
“Alexander the Great,” Thomas answered. “They think he’s buried around here, somewhere.”
The cop nodded, shielding the flame from the wind as he lit Thomas’s cigarette, then his own.
“Ah, still dreaming about Iskander,” the cop said. “Many poems were written about him. My name is Mikhail.”
“Mathias Sandorf,” Thomas said. “Like in the TV series!”
Mikail smiled.
“So many heroes for such a deserted place,” he said, blowing a long plume of smoke.
Forty One.
Inspector-General Ali Shakr Bassam never dreamed. But tonight he was dreaming—and he couldn’t deny it. He was in Olgeÿ Tazar’s apartment again, sitting in the same armchair, but this time it wasn’t the poet’s widow in front of him on the sofa, it was the great poet himself, smiling and pouring some chai into two small glasses.
“I am dreaming,” Shakr Bassam said, astonished at seeing Olgeÿ so close, so alive.
“It’s about time,” the Poet replied, handing him the glass.
A Moment of Near Silence
Forty Two.
The cave was like the fifteen or so others they had visited in the last few days. A natural hole that men had enlarged and decorated through the centuries. The sides had been carved during the Hellenistic period, with Greek columns and the characteristic acanthus flowers. Inside, centuries had passed and left their mark. Remnants of Greek, Buddhist, Islamic and Shamanic practices lay in a colorful rubble on the ground. The walls were covered in ancient graffiti and time-worn frescoes.
“Look!” Richard suddenly said. “Todd, you gotta film this!”
Todd did as he was told, turning on the camera’s flashlight. Richard walked dramatically towards the end of the cave, where a gigantic painting of a Buddha with Greek features was smiling at them.
“I think we might have found it,” Richard said again.
He sounded moved, and Thomas wasn’t sure he was pretending.
“Here! See?”
Todd walked closer, and so did Thomas, followed by Mark, Sylvia and the cop.
“A door!”
Thomas squinted in the half-light, focusing on the trembling white circle of Todd’s video camera. All he could see was a rectangular red stain between the Buddha’s crossed legs. For all he knew it could be an erect penis later defaced by Muslim or Christian pilgrims.
Richard gestured to Mark, who handed him a crowbar. Thomas glanced at the cop, thinking he might disapprove of the impending vandalism, but Mikhail stood motionless, like a wax sentinel. Delicately, Richard banged on the red rectangle, listening. Thomas only heard some dull clangs! but Richard seemed excited.
“Beautiful, beautiful” he whispered. “Mark, Sylvia, get the probing equipment!”
Thomas followed them outside, accompanied by Mikhail. They watched the others haul some heavy metallic suitcases out of the Land-Rover.
“Why are they so excited?” Mikhail asked him, looking for his cigarettes.
“They think they might have found Alexan . . . Iskander’s tomb.”
“Ah.”
He smiled.
“Grown men chasing ghosts. And they say we’re primitive.”
He shook his head and Thomas smiled in his turn, accepting a cigarette.
Forty Three.
There were a lot of people gathered at the university’s auditorium. Hataman was scheduled to sing a few of his interpretations of Tazar’s poems at the end of the evening, and Inspector-General Ali Shakr Bassam thought it probably was the reason for such a crowd. Although he was dressed as a civilian and had nothing to do with the notorious Bureau 23, he felt nervous in his suit. He chose a seat next to a fire exit, just in case, and tried to spot his son among the people who were busy on the stage.
He finally saw him, holding a couple of microphones which he distributed on the oversize coffee-table, surrounded by ten uncomfortable looking white chairs, that occupied the center of the stage.
Amir’s eyes floated over the crowd and Bassam shyly waved at him, not wanting to embarrass his son. Amir saw him and waved enthusiastically back. Bassam felt his cheeks blush. So much innocence in that boy, it was almost a crime.
Forty Four.
“I see something,” Richard whispered excitedly, as Todd’s camera recorded everything. “Look—there, in the center of the screen . . . It looks like a sarcophagus!”
Thomas looked at the four Elenis bent over their machines. For the first time since his arrival in Samarqand, he felt close to Olgeÿ Tazar. So close, his eyes began to burn with both sadness and hatred.
Forty Five.
The evening had been wonderful, and Inspector-General Ali Shakr Bassam discreetly wiped away a tear with the base of his thumb as the ceiling lights were turned on again. He had a lump in his throat and his knees felt wobbly as he stood up among the parting crowd.
Hataman’s songs had pierced his heart, and all those readings, discussions and remembrances around the great poet had been fantastic. He was, for once—he had to admit—very, very proud of his son. And of his son’s friends too, of course. But especially of his son. His love for Tazar had acquired a superior form now, as it had suddenly become the cement that had been lacking between father and son.
Too moved to speak, he wanted to escape discreetly, to protect his son from the embarrassment of having to present his father the cop to his friends, but he heard Amir’s voice calling him. He turned and saw Amir on the stage, waving for Shakr to join him. There was a woman standing next to him and he immediately recognized Faiza Tazar, Olgeÿ’s widow.
“You can be proud of your son, dear Inspector-General,” she said, extending a warm hand, which he shook quickly.
“You know each other?” Amir asked, surprised.
Faiza smiled.
“Yes. We met at one of Olgeÿ’s readings, a long time ago.”
Bassam nodded, accepting the lie as a wonderful present. Amir threw an arm over his father’s shoulder. It was the first time he’d ever done that. The miracle of poetry.
Traffic Noise
Forty Six.
“Where have you been? I came here twice, but your boss didn’t know when you were going to come back. Or if you were going to come back . . . He also told me your name was Mathias, not Thomas. Sorry if I remembered it wrong . . .”
Thomas threw a glance at Tsentsen who winked back. That girl. She was here, right in front of him. Black eyes under a black fringe. Smiling. Saran.
“I was away on an expedition . . . Well, with some guys from New Babylon, trying to find Alexander the Great’s tomb . . . They think they might have found it . . . Whatever . . . I was their interpreter . . . Not much to do, as a matter of fact, but it paid well . . . And it was a nice change . . .”
She nodded enthusiastically.
“I could take a holiday myself. So much work! Phew!”
She wiped imaginary sweat from her brow. They laughed. Thomas was feeling lighter than air. Synth materialized the Hindenburg.
It was difficult to hear her, because she was sitting at the bar and surrounded by the usual Saturday night crowd. Richard and his clique were packing tonight, taking the first plane back early in the morning. They had been really excited by their discove
ry. Thomas hoped they were wrong, that it wasn’t Alexander’s tomb. Dreams should remain dreams.
Isn’t that so, not-Mathias, isn’t that so?
Saran was talking excitedly to him, but he didn’t hear her. He was back in the last cave he had visited, lying on a marble altar covered with silk cushions, listening to the most incredible music he had ever heard.
Your music, not-Markus. Soon.
“So?”
Saran was looking at him with obvious expectation.
“Sorry . . . I couldn’t hear you . . . So much noise here!” he apologized, taking her empty Khan and putting a new one in front of her.
“Do you want to come for dinner at my place tomorrow? I think it’s your free evening, right?”
Thomas nodded.
“With pleasure.”
Free, right?
Forty Seven.
Inspector-General Ali Shakr Bassam couldn’t believe it. A lead on the Tazar assassination, right under his eyes! He looked up from his desk at Konchev and Nobal, standing in front of him in their ill-fitting uniforms, like a pair of serious clowns.
“Where did you find this?”
It was a letter claiming the murder of Tazar, signed by a group calling themselves the Samsara Freedom Fighters—he had never heard of them before, but new groups of fanatics seemed to spring up almost every week. He mentally cursed the king and his absurd politics, then remembered the telepathy rumors and tried to erase his own thoughts immediately.
The letter in itself was an incredible piece of evidence, but what made it even more formidable was a partial thumb print in the upper left corner. It had been dusted and there it was, shining and perfectly visible in the early afternoon light.
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