The Egyptologist (26 page)

His ironic question was a welcome "how-d'ye-do" from a peer who
knew all too well what sort of envy and stupidity we sometimes meet in
this treacherous world.

"Ah, yes, quite so! And a fellow slave to wicked Intestinus the
Large, if I may be so bold. Local food doesn't agree with you, old boy?
Or are you a chronic victim, diet aside? This is no continent for the in•
continent."

As the towel-boy dried my hands, I noted with interest that Carter
chose to take his towel himself. As if he knew that an explorer, accus•
tomed to the rough ways of the site, cannot allow himself to grow used
to the city's soft luxuries.

We sat and smoked in the D-G's waiting room (even the great
Carter has to wait his turn for the attentions of the desk-wallahs), and
he accepted and placed in his portfolio my gift to him,
Desire and Deceit
in Ancient Egypt,
which I inscribed, "To my dear friend, a fellow suf•
ferer of both imbeciles and irritable innards, and a great archaeologist,
truly the passing generation's greatest Egypt-man. With fondness on
21 October, 1922, in the waiting annex of the D-G's office at the An•
tiquities Service, Cairo. Ralph M. Trilipush."

Carter's renowned quietness, combined with—let us just imagine —
some exhaustion at the prospect of pursuing his minor but elusive prey
for another season, having burdened himself with the concession for
the obviously drained Valley of the Kings, was remarkably stylish. His
manner was of the insightful monosyllable, the expressive eyebrow, the
breath that could be tuned to the most precise gradations of meaning,
practically the sculpting of exhaled cigarette smoke into hieroglyphs
which, translated into English, would fill pages. His repose (especially
after those internal barrages that would have reduced lesser men than
us to outright sobbing) spoke volumes.

We conversed for several minutes about explorer's gut, my discov•
ery of Fragment C, my prospects for finding Atum-hadu's tomb, his
own prospects for success in the Valley. We discussed Oxford, my
childhood in Kent, my military career, Atum-hadu. "Gardiner had some
rather choice words about your rhyming translations," Carter teased.

shaking his head at the dishonest and dim-witted philologist who had
reviewed
Dedire and Deceit
in
Chronicled of Egyptology
as "embarrassing for
laymen and painful for scholars."

"Amusing, wasn't it? That reminds me: I must ask you, Howard,
what you make of those who even at this late date still harbour doubts
that Atum-hadu — "

"Oh! Meestair Cartair! We are apologising for your waiting with all
of our most sincere hearts!" And out of the D-G's office rolls the little
secretary, burbling over with admiration and excuses. "You are back
from your villa in Gurna? You were not expected, but what complete
happiness to be seeing you!" And similar sycophancy, at which Carter
and I rolled our eyes at each other.

"What! Is Carter out there, too? Send him right in!" booms a voice
from the D-G's office, neatly illustrating the bureaucrat's typical prefer•
ence for dealing with the unthreatening embers of past success rather
than the burning fire of present-day promise. Carter's bearing, even in
the few steps from his chair to the D-G's door, was highly impressive.
Were I still young and malleable, I would have sought to emulate him:
his unspoken but unmistakable conviction that everything important
was somehow more complicated than the layman could understand, but
that the only necessity was a clear intention, and that a relaxed simplic•
ity would always yield results. Although perhaps even
results
are not

the point (sixth season, after all) and to conduct oneself as if results
were
the point is to strive for something illegitimate or grubby. Rather,
his bearing implies that one should conduct oneself as if acknowledging
that success is often out of one's control, and — I seem to be having
trouble pinpointing the exact effect Carter has—he made one feel
smallish, I have heard others say, as if he knew more than you but felt
neither superior nor apologetic for that, only wanted, as long as you
were in his presence, that you would feel neither inferior nor sorry, but
strive, as he did, not for petty things, but only for some unnameable
greatness, and to do that with precisely his same sort of unexcitable but
stylish calm. And never to mention any of this aloud.

Nodding to me to acknowledge the unfairness of his welcome over
my own, Carter took his leave. Before he entered the D-G's office we
made plans to dine often, later, upriver at Thebes during the digging
season, and he complimented
Desire and Deceit
again.

DuBois informed me that the D-G was busy for the rest of the day
and to make my "retour in other weather."

Sunday, 22 October, 1922

Journal. Logistical planning:
Visit bank, which is open, but Sun•
day, of course, is a bank holiday in America. So, tomorrow, as soon as
credit is established, first task will be to settle rental of villa in the
south, ideally near Gurna. Make appointment for lunch tomorrow with
agent. Prepare schedules, begin packing. Hard to know which gramo•
phones to bring south for the villa, and for on-site at the excavation.

On the one hand, the Victrola XVII is an excellent salon unit and fills a
room well. The Edison Audiogram 3 is very small, fine in a bedroom to
help one sleep. Depending on the ease of transport between the villa
and Atum-hadu's tomb, I could bring the Columbia Favorite. But the
XVIIs power and volume would be ideal for inspirational music for the
men and myself. Popular songs. Old Army favourites.

But, as Carter reminded me yesterday, the great delight on excava•
tion is hearing the men's work songs, the simple melodies these simple
people chant to keep their minds occupied as they burrow away, unin•
terested in the search itself, and the sweetest sound of all is the sudden
silence that falls magically everywhere and all at once when one of
them unearths something. Carter spoke of that silence with nostalgic
rapture in his eyes.

Monday, 23 October, 1922

Journal:
Bank first thing, but there is a delay of some sort. Bank
manager asks me if I am "quite certain about the details of my financial

arrangements?" I am ready to strike him as he peers up at me from be•
hind his ludicrous spectacles, one of those Englishmen who in the heat
of the tropics does not bronze or blossom, does not sweat through with
passion, but instead shrivels, a sun-dried little fruit, desiccated and
clinging to his figures and protocols, the only things that can save him
from total disintegration.

No matter. The delays of the modern financial system are one of the
unavoidable obstacles thrown in our path. Were our task easy, anyone
could accomplish it, and immortality would be a cheap honour.

Lunched at the Explorers' Club in Cairo, and I must admit I found
it rather overwhelming to see the company I hope one day to keep. The
building was an officers' club in the War. I had heard of its transforma•
tion and I had vaguely expected some rather crass or amusing tribute
to the fathers of Egyptology and excavation, perhaps something to lure
American tourists, or more practically, a well-decorated house of assig•
nation wherein impoverished archaeologists could discreetly pair off
with cash-heavy would-be patrons, whether the representatives of
skimpily stocked but well-endowed American museums or bored and
daffy English lords, ideally shell-shocked and narcoleptic, fanning
themselves with signed cheques.

But no, I found something else entirely, a little vanity of the French
and British Consuls-General perhaps, but one which had quite an ef•
fect on me, as if a panorama of my future were laid out glistening
before me. In the pillared, sandstone building—a bank at first glance—
one entered a dark wood hall on bloodred carpets as gaslights cobra-
hissed behind globes of lapis and crystal. Floating fezzes unburdened
me of my things, and then I stood quite alone, straightening my cuffs
and tie in the dim light under the watchful eyes of a portrait gallery of
the men who came before me, each leaving his large, ineffaceable foot•
prints in the sand. To the left of the mirror where I examined my own
face hung old Henry Salt, whose memoirs I devoured as a boy. Next
was Salt's muscleman, Belzoni, the former circus strongman who
opened Abu Simbel's temple. Then, the half-mad, hypnotic gaze of
Fouéré who was reputed to have kept a harem with the full blessing of

the French Government, as it kept him more productive in the ac•
cepted Golden Age pursuit of unwrapping mummies for their golden
rings. Next in oils was Champollion , white-collared, stiff-necked, and a
bit cross-eyed, as if the effort of decoding the Rosetta stone had twisted
his eyesight and reason into a coiled snake. And a dozen others hung
there, too, nearly all of them retiring or dying with the warning to the
world that there was nothing left under the sands of Egypt; they had
found the very last of it themselves. And each being proven wrong by
the bold fellow who followed him, who in turn said he had been the
last, who in turn . . . and so on.

I stood amidst these pictures, my own mirrored face hanging equal
amongst them. I could see the reflection of Carter's face over my shoul•
der. "Hullo, Trilipush," said the painting, so audibly that if I had not
been alone I would have asked a companion if he had not heard it, too.
A foolish phantasm, but I understood at once the meaning of this mad
vision, this excess of imagination too long trapped in the city and the
corruptions of hotels and clubs: I could hear the pantheon welcoming
me into its ranks.

Exhilarated, I retreated into the dining room to look for my lunch
engagement amidst the tables drooping with mouldy consular staff. The
vicious
mattre d'hotel
would have dispatched me to the membership office
before seating me, but my companion arrived in the nick of time and we
were soon seated, examining his photographs of Nile-front villas.

A few moments later, the living Carter entered the restaurant and
passed close to my table, dressed, as in his portrait, in a light gabardine,
and peering strangely at me, nodding as he does. "Ah, feeling better,

are you, Trilipush?"

"So far, so good, old man. Avoiding the more
recherche
dairy inven•
tions and anything hailing from our friend the goat, but otherwise
nothing should keep me out of the sand, thanks." He looked at a few of
the estate agent's photographs on the table. "We shall be near neigh•
bours," I told my colleague, and he expressed his pleasure at the news.

In the end, confident in CCF and the Partnership, I settled on a
large house in a secluded suburb of Luxor on the eastern bank of the

Nile instead, close to the ferry crossing to the west bank and the path
to Deir el Bahari. I signed a five-week lease with an option to renew
month by month after that. By then, purchasing a place may be more
logical, but for now we are cautious as we approach our prey. I paid
the deposit from my own resources. Subsequent rental payments will
have to await the coming wire.

Nothing at bank, post.

Return to hotel. Considering the Explorers' Club, a long session
with the portraitist is an urgent necessity before my departure south on
Thursday.

Tuesday, 24 October, 1922

No news at bank. Why has M. not made sure that precisely this did
not happen? Surely it is not unreasonable to assume she would take re•
sponsibility for what she began, the wealth she waved at me like so
many veils.

Door still impenetrable at Antiquities.

Nothing at post. Cable CCF to express urgency.

I won't deny I was in some confusion, pain even. Your aunt teased me merci•
lessly. Some days (my wise ones, I'd say now) I decided the best thing to do was
just to leave Boston quick, but when I told her I'd booked my passage, she'd pout
and say, "No, how could you leave me alone with no one to have fun with?" I'd
change my plans to stay, and next time I saw her, a bouquet for her in my shaking
hands, she'd ask me with a sneer why on earth I hadn't left for Egypt yet. When I
couldn't find her, I'd find myself wandering about Boston (a city far, far from
home), unable to see how to move forward my stalled investigations or what to
write for Finneran, and I'd go book another New York-Alexandria ticket package,
which of course I wouldn't use. I convinced myself that my numerous clients and
the twists and turns of the case required my presence in Boston. And maybe she
didn't want Trilipush, she'd almost said, nearly. Are you laughing at me too,
Macy? Go right ahead and laugh.