Chapter 5: Cruises, Day Trips, and Guided Tours
Lissa is sick on the boat. Neil offers to take her below, and I expect her to say yes, but she shakes her head. “My ankle hurts,” she says, and sinks down in one of the deck chairs. Neil kneels by her feet and examines a bruise no bigger than a piaster.
“Is it swollen?” she asks anxiously. There is no sign of swelling, but Neil eases her sandal off and takes her foot tenderly, caressingly, in both hands. Lissa closes her eyes and leans back against the deck chair, sighing.
I toy with the idea that Lissa’s husband couldn’t take any more of this, either, and that he murdered us all and then killed himself.
“Here we are on a ship,” I say, “like the dead people in that movie.”
“It’s not a ship, it’s a steamboat,” Zoe says. “‘The Nile steamer is the most pleasant way to travel in Egypt and one of the least expensive. Costs range from $180 to $360 per person for a four-day cruise.’”
Or maybe it was Zoe’s husband, finally determined to shut Zoe up so he could finish a conversation, and then he had to murder the rest of us one after the other to keep from being caught.
“We’re all alone on the ship,” I say, “just like they were.”
“How far is it to the Valley of the Kings?” Lissa asks.
“‘Three and a half miles (5 km.) west of Luxor,’” Zoe says, reading. “‘Luxor is four hundred miles south of Cairo.’”
“If it’s that far, I might as well read my book,” Lissa says, pushing her sunglasses up on top of her head. “Neil, hand me my bag.”
He fishes Death on the Nile out of her bag and hands it to her, and she flips through it for a moment, like Zoe looking for exchange rates, and then begins to read.
“The wife did it,” I say. “She found out her husband was being unfaithful.”
Lissa glares at me. “I already knew that,” she says carelessly. “I saw the movie,” but after another half-page she lays the open book facedown on the empty deck chair next to her.
“I can’t read,” she says to Neil. “The sun’s too bright.” She squints up at the sky, which is still hidden by its gauzelike haze.
“‘The Valley of the Kings is the site of the tombs of sixty-four pharaohs,’” Zoe says. “‘Of these, the most famous is Tutankhamun’s.’”
I go over to the railing and watch the Pyramids recede, slipping slowly out of sight behind the rushes that line the shore. They look flat, like yellow triangles stuck up in the sand, and I remember how in Paris, Zoe’s husband wouldn’t believe the Mona Lisa was the real thing. “It’s a fake,” he insisted before Zoe interrupted. “The real one’s much larger.”
And the guidebook said, “Prepare to be disappointed,” and the Valley of the Kings is four hundred miles from the Pyramids like it’s supposed to be, and Middle Eastern airports are notorious for their lack of security. That’s how all those bombs get on planes in the first place, because they don’t make people go through customs. I shouldn’t watch so many movies.
“‘Among its treasures, Tutankhamun’s tomb contained a golden boat, by which the soul would travel to the world of the dead,’” Zoe says.
I lean over the railing and look into the water. It is not muddy, like I thought it would be, but a clear waveless blue, and in its depths the sun is shining brightly.
“‘The boat was carved with passages from The Book of the Dead,’” Zoe reads, “‘to protect the deceased from monsters and demigods who might try to destroy him before he reached the Hall of Judgment.’”
There is something in the water. Not a ripple, not even enough of a movement to shudder the image of the sun, but I know there is something there.
“‘Spells were also written on papyruses buried with the body,’” Zoe says.
It is long and dark, like a crocodile. I lean over farther, gripping the rail, trying to see into the transparent water, and catch a glint of scales. It is swimming straight toward the boat.
“‘These spells took the form of commands,’” Zoe reads. “‘Get back, you evil one! Stay away! I adjure you in the name of Anubis and Osiris.’”
The water glitters, hesitating.
“‘Do not come against me,’” Zoe says. “‘My spells protect me. I know the way.’”
The thing in the water turns and swims away. The boat follows it, nosing slowly in toward the shore.
“There it is,” Zoe says, pointing past the reeds at a distant row of cliffs. “The Valley of the Kings.”
“I suppose this’ll be closed, too,” Lissa says, letting Neil help her off the boat.
“Tombs are never closed,” I say, and look north, across the sand, at the distant Pyramids.
Chapter 6: Accommodations
The Valley of the Kings is not closed. The tombs stretch along a sandstone cliff, black openings in the yellow rock, and there are no chains across the stone steps that lead down to them. At the south end of the valley a Japanese tour group is going into the last one.
“Why aren’t the tombs marked?” Lissa asks. “Which one is King Tut’s?” and Zoe leads us to the north end of the valley, where the cliff dwindles into a low wall. Beyond it, across the sand, I can see the Pyramids, sharp against the sky.
Zoe stops at the very edge of a slanting hole dug into the base of the rocks. There are steps leading down into it. “Tutankhamun’s tomb was found when a workman accidentally uncovered the top step,” she says.
Lissa looks down into the stairwell. All but the top two steps are in shadow, and it is too dark to see the bottom. “Are there snakes?” she asks.
“No,” Zoe, who knows everything, says. “Tutankhamun’s tomb is the smallest of the pharaohs’ tombs in the valley.” She fumbles in her bag for her flashlight. “The tomb consists of three rooms—an antechamber, the burial chamber containing Tutankhamun’s coffin, and the Hall of Judgment.”
There is a slither of movement in the darkness below us, like a slow uncoiling, and Lissa steps back from the edge. “Which room is the stuff in?”
“Stuff?” Zoe says uncertainly, still fumbling for her flashlight. She opens her guidebook. “Stuff?” she says again, and flips to the back of it, as if she is going to look “stuff” up in the index.
“Stuff,” Lissa says, and there is an edge of fear in her voice. “All the furniture and vases and stuff they take with them. You said the Egyptians buried their belongings with them.”
“King Tut’s treasure,” Neil says helpfully.
“Oh, the treasure,” Zoe says, relieved. “The belongings buried with Tutankhamun for his journey into the afterworld. They’re not here. They’re in Cairo in the museum.”
“In Cairo?” Lissa says. “They’re in Cairo? Then what are we doing here?”
“We’re dead,” I say. “Arab terrorists blew up our plane and killed us all.”
“I came all the way out here because I wanted to see the treasure,” Lissa says.
“The coffin is here,” Zoe says placatingly, “and there are wall paintings in the antechamber,” but Lissa has already led Neil away from the steps, talking earnestly to him.
“The wall paintings depict the stages in the judgment of the soul, the weighing of the soul, the recital of the deceased’s confession,” Zoe says.
The deceased’s confession. I have not taken that which belongs to another. I have not caused any pain. I have not committed adultery.
Lissa and Neil come back, Lissa leaning heavily on Neil’s arm. “I think we’ll pass on this tomb thing,” Neil says apologetically. “We want to get to the museum before it closes. Lissa had her heart set on seeing the treasure.”
“‘The Egyptian Museum is open from nine A.M. to four P.M. daily, nine to eleven-fifteen A.M. and one-thirty to four P.M. Fridays,’” Zoe says, reading from the guidebook. “‘Admission is three Egyptian pounds.’”
“It’s already four o’clock,” I say, looking at my watch. “It will be closed before you get there.” I look up.
Neil and Lissa have al
ready started back, not toward the boat but across the sand in the direction of the Pyramids. The light behind the Pyramids is beginning to fade, the sky going from white to gray-blue.
“Wait,” I say, and run across the sand to catch up with them. “Why don’t you wait and we’ll all go back together? It won’t take us very long to see the tomb. You heard Zoe, there’s nothing inside.”
They both look at me.
“I think we should stay together,” I finish lamely.
Lissa looks up alertly, and I realize she thinks I am talking about divorce, that I have finally said what she has been waiting for.
“I think we should all keep together,” I say hastily. “This is Egypt. There are all sorts of dangers, crocodiles and snakes and . . . It won’t take us very long to see the tomb. You heard Zoe, there’s nothing inside.”
“We’d better not,” Neil says, looking at me. “Lissa’s ankle is starting to swell. I’d better get some ice on it.”
I look down at her ankle. Where the bruise was there are two little puncture marks, close together, like a snakebite, and around them the ankle is starting to swell.
“I don’t think Lissa’s up to the Hall of Judgment,” he says, still looking at me.
“You could wait at the top of the steps,” I say. “You wouldn’t have to go in.”
Lissa takes hold of his arm, as if anxious to go, but he hesitates. “Those people on the ship,” he says to me. “What happened to them?”
“I was just trying to frighten you,” I say. “I’m sure there’s a logical explanation. It’s too bad Hercule Poirot isn’t here—he’d be able to explain everything. The Pyramids were probably closed for some Muslim holiday Zoe didn’t know about, and that’s why we didn’t have to go through customs, either, because it was a holiday.”
“What happened to the people on the ship?” Neil says again.
“They got judged,” I say, “but it wasn’t nearly as bad as they’d thought. They were all afraid of what was going to happen, even the clergyman, who hadn’t committed any sins, but the judge turned out to be somebody he knew. A bishop. He wore a white suit, and he was very kind, and most of them came out fine.”
“Most of them,” Neil says.
“Let’s go,” Lissa says, pulling on his arm.
“The people on the ship,” Neil says, ignoring her. “Had any of them committed some horrible sin?”
“My ankle hurts,” Lissa says. “Come on.”
“I have to go,” Neil says, almost reluctantly. “Why don’t you come with us?”
I glance at Lissa, expecting her to be looking daggers at Neil, but she is watching me with bright, lidless eyes.
“Yes. Come with us,” she says, and waits for my answer.
I lied to Lissa about the ending of Death on the Nile. It was the wife they killed. I toy with the idea that they have committed some horrible sin, that I am lying in my hotel room in Athens, my temple black with blood and powder burns. I would be the only one here, then, and Lissa and Neil would be demigods disguised to look like them. Or monsters.
“I’d better not,” I say, and back away from them.
“Let’s go, then,” Lissa says to Neil, and they start off across the sand. Lissa is limping badly, and before they have gone very far, Neil stops and takes off his shoes.
The sky behind the Pyramids is purple-blue, and the Pyramids stand out flat and black against it.
“Come on,” Zoe calls from the top of the steps. She is holding the flashlight and looking at the guidebook. “I want to see the weighing of the soul.”
Chapter 7: Off the Beaten Track
Zoe is already halfway down the steps when I get back, shining her flashlight on the door below her. “When the tomb was discovered, the door was plastered over and stamped with the seals bearing the cartouche of Tutankhamun,” she says.
“It’ll be dark soon,” I call down to her. “Maybe we should go back to the hotel with Lissa and Neil.” I look back across the desert, but they are already out of sight.
Zoe is gone, too. When I look back down the steps, there is nothing but darkness. “Zoe!” I shout and run down the sand-drifted steps after her. “Wait!”
The door to the tomb is open, and I can see the light from her flashlight bobbing on rock walls and ceiling far down a narrow corridor.
“Zoe!” I shout, and start after her. The floor is uneven, and I trip and put my hand on the wall to steady myself. “Come back! You have the book!”
The light flashes on a section of carved-out wall, far ahead, and then vanishes, as if she has turned a corner.
“Wait for me!” I shout and stop because I cannot see my hand in front of my face.
There is no answering light, no answering voice, no sound at all. I stand very still, one hand still on the wall, listening for footsteps, for quiet padding, for the sound of slithering, but I can’t hear anything, not even my own heart beating.
“Zoe,” I call out, “I’m going to wait for you outside,” and turn around, holding on to the wall so I don’t get disoriented in the dark, and go back the way I came.
The corridor seems longer than it did coming in, and I toy with the idea that it will go on forever in the dark, or that the door will be locked, the opening plastered over and the ancient seals affixed, but there is a line of light under the door, and it opens easily when I push on it.
I am at the top of a stone staircase leading down into a long wide hall. On either side the hall is lined with stone pillars, and between the pillars I can see that the walls are painted with scenes in sienna and yellow and bright blue.
It must be the anteroom because Zoe said its walls were painted with scenes from the soul’s journey into death, and there is Anubis weighing the soul, and, beyond it, a baboon devouring something, and, opposite where I am standing on the stairs, a painting of a boat crossing the blue Nile. It is made of gold, and in it four souls squat in a line, their kohl-outlined eyes looking ahead at the shore. Beside them, in the transparent water, Sebek, the crocodile demigod, swims.
I start down the steps. There is a doorway at the far end of the hall, and if this is the anteroom, then the door must lead to the burial chamber.
Zoe said the tomb consists of only three rooms, and I saw the map myself on the plane, the steps and straight corridor and then the unimpressive rooms leading one into another, anteroom and burial chamber and Hall of Judgment, one after another.
So this is the anteroom, even if it is larger than it was on the map, and Zoe has obviously gone ahead to the burial chamber and is standing by Tutankhamun’s coffin, reading aloud from the travel guide. When I come in, she will look up and say, “The quartzite sarcophagus is carved with passages from The Book of the Dead.”
I have come halfway down the stairs, and from here I can see the painting of the weighing of the soul. Anubis, with his jackal’s head, standing on one side of the yellow scales, and the deceased on the other, reading his confession from a papyrus.
I go down two more steps, till I am even with the scales, and sit down.
Surely Zoe won’t be long—there’s nothing in the burial chamber except the coffin—and even if she has gone on ahead to the Hall of Judgment, she’ll have to come back this way. There’s only one entrance to the tomb. And she can’t get turned around because she has a flashlight. And the book. I clasp my hands around my knees and wait.
I think about the people on the ship, waiting for judgment. “It wasn’t as bad as they thought,” I told Neil, but now, sitting here on the steps, I remember that the bishop, smiling kindly in his white suit, gave them sentences appropriate to their sins. One of the women was sentenced to being alone forever.
The deceased in the painting looks frightened, standing by the scale, and I wonder what sentence Anubis will give him, what sins he has committed.
Maybe he has not committed any sins at all, like the clergyman, and is worried over nothing, or maybe he is merely frightened at finding himself in this strange place, alone. Was death wha
t he expected?
“Death is the same everywhere,” Zoe’s husband said. “Unexpected.” And nothing is the way you thought it would be. Look at the Mona Lisa. And Neil. The people on the ship had planned on something else altogether, pearly gates and angels and clouds, all the modern refinements. Prepare to be disappointed.
And what about the Egyptians, packing their clothes and wine and sandals for their trip? Was death, even on the Nile, what they expected? Or was it not the way it had been described in the travel guide at all? Did they keep thinking they were alive, in spite of all the clues?
The deceased clutches his papyrus and I wonder if he has committed some horrible sin. Adultery. Or murder. I wonder how he died.
The people on the ship were killed by a bomb, like we were. I try to remember the moment it went off—Zoe reading out loud and then the sudden shock of light and decompression, the travel guide blown out of Zoe’s hands and Lissa falling through the blue air, but I can’t. Maybe it didn’t happen on the plane. Maybe the terrorists blew us up in the airport in Athens, while we were checking our luggage.
I toy with the idea that it wasn’t a bomb at all, that I murdered Lissa and then killed myself, like in Death on the Nile. Maybe I reached into my bag, not for my paperback but for the gun I bought in Athens, and shot Lissa while she was looking out the window. And Neil bent over her, solicitous, concerned, and I raised the gun again, and Zoe’s husband tried to wrestle it out of my hand, and the shot went wide and hit the gas tank on the wing.
I am still frightening myself. If I’d murdered Lissa, I would remember it, and even Athens, notorious for its lack of security, wouldn’t have let me on board a plane with a gun. And you could hardly commit some horrible crime without remembering it, could you?
The people on the ship didn’t remember dying, even when someone told them, but that was because the ship was so much like a real one, the railings and the water and the deck. And because of the bomb. People never remember being blown up. It’s the concussion or something, it knocks the memory out of you. But I would surely have remembered murdering someone. Or being murdered.
Time is the Fire Page 8
