Sphinx (32 page)

The moonlit night soon soothed his anger, leaving him merely restless and anxious for something to break the boredom of his watch. But the valley was quiet, and each of the tombs was sealed by its stout iron gate. Nassif would have loved to use his rifle against a thief, and his mind wandered into one of his fantasies in which he protected the valley against a band of brigands.

He stopped across from the entrance to Tutankhamen's tomb. He wished the tomb were being found now instead of a half-century before. He looked up at the concession stand, because that was where he'd have been on guard in Carter's day. He'd have hidden behind the parapet on the veranda, and no one would be able to approach the tomb without succumbing to his murderous rifle.

Looking up, Nassif noticed the door to the lavatories was ajar. He realized it had never been left open before, and he debated whether he wanted to walk up to the building. Then he looked up into the valley and decided he'd check the lavatory on the way back. While he walked, he pictured himself traveling to Cairo with a group of men he'd arrested.

 

Erica estimated that she should be very close to Tutankhamen's tomb. Progress had been slow because of the rounded, uneven floor of the tunnel. In front of her there was a sharp turn to the left, and she could not see ahead until she had rounded the corner. The floor of the passageway then slanted steeply down and entered a room. With her hands pressed against the rough, rock-hewn sides of the tunnel, she inched herself downward until her feet rested on a smooth floor. She had entered an underground chamber.

Now Erica guessed she was directly below the antechamber of Tutankhamen's tomb. She lifted the oil lamp
above her head, and the light spread out, illuminating smoothly finished but unadorned walls. The room was about twenty-five feet long and fifteen feet wide, with a ceiling made of a single gigantic limestone block. As Erica's eyes dropped to the floor, she saw an enormous tangle of skeletons, some with varying amounts of naturally mummified tissue. Holding the light a little closer, she could see that each one of the skulls had been fractured and penetrated by the blow of a heavy blunt instrument.

“My God,” whispered Erica. She knew what she was looking at. This was the remains of the massacre of the ancient workers who had dug the chamber in which she was standing.

Slowly she passed through the room with its gruesome reminder of ancient cruelty, and began to descend a long flight of steps that led to a masonry wall. Raman had opened a large hole, and Erica stepped into another, much larger room. When the light penetrated the darkness, Erica gasped for breath and steadied herself against the wall. Spread out in front of her was an archaeological fairyland. The room was supported by massive square columns. The walls were painted with exquisite images of the ancient Egyptian pantheon. In front of each deity was the image of Seti I. Erica had found the pharaoh's treasure. Nenephta had realized that the safest spot for one treasure was below another.

Gingerly Erica advanced, holding her oil lamp so that the flickering light could play upon the myriad objects carefully stored within the room. In contrast to Tutankhamen's small tomb, there was no disarray. Everything had its place. Entire gilded chariots were standing as if waiting to be harnessed to a horse. Huge coffers and upright chests fashioned from cedar and inlaid with ebony lined the right wall.

One small ivory chest was open, and its content—jewelry made with unparalleled elegance—had been carefully laid out on the floor. Obviously it had been a source of plunder for Raman.

Wandering around the central pillars, Erica discovered
there was another stairway. This led to a further room of the same dimensions, also filled with treasure. There were several passageways leading to still more rooms.

“My God,” said Erica again, only this time with astonishment, not horror. She realized that she was in a vast complex of chambers extending downward and outward in bewildering directions.

She knew she was gazing on a treasure beyond comprehension. As she wandered on, she thought of the famous Deir el-Bahri cache discovered in the late 1800's and carefully plundered by the Rasul family for ten years. Here the Raman family and then the Abdulal family were apparently doing the same.

Entering another room, Erica stopped. She was standing in a chamber that was relatively empty. There were four matching chests of ebony built in the form of Osiris. The decorations on the walls were from the Book of the Dead. The vaulted ceiling was painted black with gold stars. In front of Erica was a doorway carefully blocked with masonry and sealed with the ancient necropolis seals. On each side of the doorway were alabaster plinths with hieroglyphics carved in high relief along the front. Erica could read the phrase instantly. “Eternal life granted to Seti I, who rests under Tutankhamen.”

All at once it was clear to Erica that the verb was “rest,” not “rule,” and the preposition was “under,” not “after.” She also realized she was looking at the original location of the two Seti statues. They had been standing across from each other in front of the masonry wall for three thousand years.

Suddenly Erica realized that she was standing at the unopened entrance to the burial chamber of the mighty Seti I. What she had found was not just a treasure trove, but an entire pharaonic tomb. The statue of Seti she had seen had been one of the guards of the burial chamber, like the bituminized statues found in Tutankhamen's tomb. Seti I had not been buried in the tomb constructed in a pattern of the other New Kingdom pharaohs. It had been Nenephta's final ruse. A substitute body had been buried in the tomb publicly proclaimed to be Seti's, when
in actuality Seti had been buried in a secret tomb below Tutankhamen. Nenephta had pleased both sides. He gave the professional thieves a tomb to rob, and his sovereign protection that no other pharaoh had been given Nenephta probably also believed that even if someone stumbled into Tutankhamen's tomb, they would never imagine that it would serve as a shield for the mighty treasure below. He had understood “the ways of the greedy and unjust.”

Shaking the lamp to check the oil, Erica decided that she'd better begin the journey back. Reluctantly she turned and retraced her footsteps, continuing to marvel at Nenephta's scheme. He had indeed been clever, but he'd also been arrogant. Leaving the papyrus in Tutankhamen's tomb had been the weakest link in his elaborate plan. It had provided the clue for the equally clever Raman to solve the mystery. Erica wondered if the Arab had gone to the Great Pyramid as she had, and if he noticed that the chambers had been built one on top of the other, or if on visiting one of the tombs of the nobles he had found a tomb below it.

Walking up the narrow passage, Erica thought of the enormity of the discovery, and the huge stakes involved. No wonder there had been a murder. The thought brought Erica to a stop. She wondered just how many murders there had been. For more than fifty years the secret had to have been kept. The young man from Yale . . . All at once Erica began to question the association of the so-called Curse of the Pharaohs. Perhaps the people had been killed to protect the secret. What about Lord Carnarvon himself? . . .

Reaching the uppermost chamber, Erica paused to glance at the jewelry taken from the ivory chest. Although she had been scrupulously careful not to touch anything for fear of disturbing the archaeological aspects of the tomb, she felt comfortable touching something already disturbed. She picked up a pendant with a cartouche of Seti I rendered in solid gold. She wanted to have something in case Yvon and Ahmed refused to believe her story. So she took the pendant with her as she
mounted the steps to the room filled with skeletons of the luckless ancient workers.

Climbing up into the tunnel was much easier than the descent. At the end she placed the oil lamp on the dirt and pulled herself into the crawl space under the concession stand. She had to decide the best way to return to Luxor. It was just past midnight, so the chances of running into Muhammad or the Nubian were much less. Her biggest worry was the government guard who worked under Muhammad. On the asphalt road into the valley she remembered seeing a gatehouse. Consequently she could not leave via the road, but would have to take the trail back to Qurna.

Manipulating the piece of sheet metal was difficult in the confined space. Erica had to slide it over the dirt and allow it to drop into its bed. Then, with the sardine can she'd seen earlier she began to scoop the loose dirt over the metal cover.

Nassif was several hundred feet away from the concession stand when he heard the clank of metal against stone. Immediately he pulled the rifle from his shoulder and dashed toward the partially open doorway to the lavatories. With the butt of the rifle he pushed the door completely open. Moonlight filtered into the small entryway.

Erica heard the door opening and smothered the oil lamp with her hand. She was about ten feet from the edge of the men's room. Her eyes quickly adjusted to the dark, and she could see the doorway to the vestibule. Her heart began to pound as it had when Richard entered her hotel room.

While she watched, a dark silhouette slipped into the room. Even in the partial light Erica could recognize the rifle. A feeling of panic began to grip her as the man slowly moved directly toward her. He was hunched over, moving like a cat stalking its prey.

With no idea what the man could see, Erica hugged the ground. He appeared to be looking directly at her as he reached the wall of the urinal. Then he stopped, and for what seemed like hours he stood there intently
staring. Finally he reached out and grabbed a handful of loose dirt. Cocking his arm, he tossed the dirt into the recess. Erica closed her eyes as a portion of it hit her. The man repeated the action. Some of the pebbles clanked against the still-exposed sheet metal.

Nassif stood up. “
Harrah,
” he muttered. He was angry because he did not even get to shoot a rat.

Erica felt a small amount of relief, but noticed the man did not move away. He stood there looking at her in the darkness with his rifle back on his shoulder. Erica was perplexed until she heard the trickle of urine.

 

There was enough moonlight reflecting from the sail of the felucca for Erica to see the time. It was after one. The passage across the Nile was so smooth that she could have dozed. Crossing the river was the last hurdle, and she allowed her body to relax. She was sure Luxor was safe. The excitement of her discovery had superseded the harrowing experience in the tomb, and it was her anticipation of revealing her find that kept her awake.

Looking back toward the West Bank, Erica felt pleased. She'd climbed from the Valley of the Kings, passed the sleeping village of Qurna, and crossed the cultivated fields to the banks of the Nile without any problems. A confrontation with some dogs had been solved by merely bending down to pick up a stone. She stretched her tired legs.

The boat heeled against a puff of wind, and Erica looked up at the graceful curve of the sail across the star-strewn sky. She was not sure who she'd enjoy telling her discovery to the most: Yvon, Ahmed, or Richard. Yvon and Ahmed would be the most appreciative, Richard would be the most surprised. Even her mother would for once be genuinely pleased: she would never again have to make excuses at the country club for her daughter's career choice.

Back on the East Bank, she was pleased to find the lobby of the Winter Palace Hotel deserted. She had to call out at the desk to raise a clerk.

The sleepy Egyptian, although taken aback by her
appearance, gave her a key and an envelope without saying a word. Erica started up the broad carpeted stairway while the clerk looked after her, wondering what she could have been doing to get so dirty. Erica glanced at the envelope. It was Winter Palace stationery, addressed to her in a bold, heavy hand. When she reached the corridor, she put her finger into the corner of the envelope, tearing it open while she navigated around the remnants of the hotel construction. At her door, she was about to insert the key when she unfolded the letter. It was a meaningless scribble. Looking at the outside of the envelope, Erica wondered if it were some kind of joke. If so, she did not understand it or appreciate it. It was like getting a phone call and hearing the person hang up without speaking. It was somehow unnerving.

Erica looked at her door. If there was one thing she'd learned during the trip, it was that hotels were not safe places. She remembered finding Ahmed in her room, Richard's arrival, her room being searched. With a renewed sense of uncertainty she pushed her key into the door.

Suddenly she thought she heard a noise. In her present state of mind, that was all she needed. Leaving the key dangling in its slot, Erica fled down the corridor. In her haste, her tote bag hit against a stack of building blocks with a resounding crunch. Behind her she heard her door being rapidly unlocked from within.

When Evangelos had heard the sound of the key, he had jumped up and rushed to the door. “Kill her,” shouted Stephanos, awakened by the noise. Drawing his Beretta, Evangelos whipped open the door in time to see Erica disappear down the main stairway.

She had no idea who was in her room, but she had no illusions about being protected by the sleeping clerk. Besides, he wasn't even at the desk. She had to get to Yvon at the New Winter Palace. She ran out the back of the hotel into the garden.

In spite of his size, Evangelos could move like a hawk on the attack, especially when he concentrated. And
when given an order for violence, he was like a rabid dog.