The Egyptologist

by Arthur Phillips

  Exhilarated, I retreated into the dining room to look for my lunch engagement amidst the tables drooping with mouldy consular staff. The vicious maître d’hôtel 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 recherché dairy inventions 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 neighbours,” 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 responsibility 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 mercilessly. 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.

  I’d call on Finneran, tell him I was keeping an eye on Margaret (never talking about our evenings at JP’s, of course, that’s why I never took a shilling from him to look after her, wouldn’t’ve been right). I’d try to get him to see the situation clearly without me having to spell it out, but he wasn’t going to see or set things straight on his own. Really I went to the house just hoping she’d be there. Sometimes she was, and the charming hostess offered me lemonades in the parlour and patted her dogs, and we sat quietly, and she’d mock me because I didn’t know what to say anymore without disclosing some secret—hers to her father, Trilipush’s to her, her father’s to her, or of course, mine, which was the most painful for me to hold tight. And she’d look at me in my afternoon anguish and say, “Harry, you’re getting quieter and quieter. Do try to be fun, can’t you? Didn’t you once promise not to bore me? I can’t bear men who break promises.” But still she’d turn up at my hotel (where she’d be sure to find me waiting and hoping) and lead me off to evenings at JP’s.

  Then one afternoon, Finneran called me at the hotel, invited me over for my “advice, as a fellow who understands complex situations.” He’d just had a cable from Trilipush: the brave explorer was moving from Cairo to the digging site in the southern desert, and he needed the investors’ money wired to the bank in Egypt immediately. It seems Finneran, while he considered the Oxford business, had delayed sending the money they’d agreed upon, but now I could see the shock of Oxford had worn off. No question: Finneran was softening. He plainly wanted me to tell him that Trilipush was trustworthy after all. He hadn’t wanted my advice, not a bit of it. No, he wanted me to lie, plain as day, and hold his hand while I did it. “Margaret really loves this fellow,” he said, as if that, even if it were true, argued for anything at all, other than adjusting her medication. “And the investors are counting on him. And on me.” One minute he’s chomping his cigar, and he’s all croc hide covering shark cartilage, proper captain of business issuing orders, the next minute he’s pathetically asking me (hardly a close mate or impartial player) what he should do. He rages one minute, looks confused the next, argues with himself: “A lot is riding on this investment,” he mutters. “Now’s not the best time for money to go the wrong way. But if you want the payoff, you can’t hesitate in the breach. If you commit, you can’t tie a man’s hands for want of a few dollars.” The thought crossed my mind: Trilipush had the entire Finneran family in his pocket. There didn’t even need to be a buried treasure!

  The madness of this family (no offence there, Macy) made me feel like an old clucking maid: I thought of his daughter out there in the parlour, her disgrace when Trilipush never came back, when all of Boston society would learn she’d been engaged to a confidence trickster and a murderer, and he had abandoned her. The longer Finneran paid Trilipush, the farther off that day of reckoning, until finally Trilipush would simply vanish without a word, probably having taken enough of Finneran’s cash to refurbish the Trilipush estates back in Kent, Finneran’s new money coupling with Trilipush’s old name nicely. And when that day came, who’d have Margaret after something like that? I would, I saw, clear as a bell. I would.

  I was gentle with Finneran. I said I thought Trilipush “might not be a wise investment, the evidence was certainly mixed.” He took that all right. So I tiptoed forward: perhaps, if Finneran was truly concerned about Margaret’s health and happiness, there were other men who could care for her better than this Englishman. There were too many risks attendant to a man already shown to be of dubious character, considering the Oxford news. I said my background investigation would take more time still, but perhaps better for him to find her a proven honest man, even if he weren’t an impoverished English toff. Finneran looked at me close, calmer now, seemed, I thought, to understand me. He nodded, thanked me for my time, said he would consider my words. But would she?

  Her use of opium was a bit worrisome, I could see that. I wasn’t as blinded by her as all that, and I’m writing to you, as I said I would, Macy, without apology or softening of the truth. I assume, by the time she wed your uncle, that she’d freed herself of these youthful indulgences. But in October and November ’22, she was indulging. I don’t know how she administered it, but she was procuring it from the shady J. P. O’Toole up there on the catwalk. And when she’d come back down to the couch where we sat side by side, her eyes wide and her pupils tiny, I knew she’d gone far away. “Harry, darling, how queer you look. Why don’t you ever come with me? Would you, darling?” I never did. “I live a million years while you live just this one night,” she told me once as she drifted away, something she read in a book, I think. “A million years, Harry. Don’t you want to be interesting, and join me for a million years? Can you imagine the two of us going into eternity together, man and woman, two bodies entwined for a million years?” I’m proud, Macy, of what I used to do for your aunt in this condition. I protected her, just as her father would’ve wanted. The record should show who the gentleman was, between the poor Aussie working man and the toff Englishman. We’d stay in O’Toole’s establishment as long as necessary, and I’d wait for your aunt to return from her million-year voyages, hold
her hand as she fell asleep, or stroke her hair and forehead. When she rejoined us mere mortals, I made sure she reached home safely and secretly. Yes, I repeat, I was worried about the opium, but to me it was only a part of her, and when she told me in her other, daytime, moods that it was just a toy she played with at her whim, certainly not worth mentioning to her overtaxed father, well, I had no strength to doubt her. And, looking back, obviously she was right. How else did she marry your uncle and live a happy life?

  Wednesday, 25 October, 1922

  Journal: Today the bellboy delivers me a souvenir worthy of some paste in my journal, a little programme note from our depraved era’s bureaucratic farce, in which we must all accept our roles, though we are quite randomly cast.

  Mr. Trilipush,

  I wish to clarify that under the current circumstances, the entirety of the Deir el Bahari area, as outlined on the enclosed map, is to be considered as Professor Winlock and the Metropolitan Museum’s exclusive concession. Your application has been duly noted and reviewed. As soon as there is any change in the status of the Metropolitan’s concession, we will contact you. Should you move from the Hotel of the Sphinx, please inform us where in the United States you can be reached. Also, I regret to inform you that last week I cabled Professor ter Breuggen at Harvard University to confirm his position as a co-applicant for your request and he has—I am certain this is a misunderstanding—declined to attach his or Harvard’s name to your application, though he does ask that I send you his “good wish” [sic]. I am your humble correspondent, P. Lacau, Director-General, Antiquities Service

  As for Claes ter Breuggen, no surprise whatsoever from my dear Chair. This merits “Sup with the Devil, but Use a Long Spoon” on the Victrola XVII.

  Ter Breuggen. Claes ter Breuggen, the Walloon Buffoon, the Belgian Waffle, putting the phlegm in Flemish, catastrophically chairs (for the time being, just for a few more months) Harvard’s Department of Egyptology, curating the University’s teensy collection and miseducating the sons of the Boston wealthy, which poor boys stumble out of ter Breuggen’s bumbling and often inaudible lectures to stagger into my office for some much needed tutoring. “Say there, Pushy,” began one rosy-cheeked moron befuddled by a classic ter Breuggen lecture, all damp throat clearing and nasal clatter in which the first row can certainly count on having their faces moistened if not their curiosity whetted, “what’s all this about Pharaonic seal-bearers? Surely it was hot and sandy there, desert and everything, am I right? Not the right climate at all, you’d think.”

  Ter Breuggen’s last days as Harvard Egyptology’s high priest have a certain doomed, end-of-an-interlude, a-conquering-hero-is-coming-soon feel to them, as he schemes by written message to thwart his rivals in a period of instability. One will surely rise from within his court, win great victories abroad, return to the troubled kingdom to restore order.

  This greasepaint devil bared his rounded teeth at my most recent appeal before Harvard’s interdepartmental tenure review committee, in which ter Breuggen fired his latest soggy charges at me and manned his crumbling defences for the last time. Several of the committee members—shocked by ter Breuggen’s outrageous accusations and willingness to forsake any semblance of personal dignity in his fearful campaign against me—told me after the hearing that I had been the committee’s darling, but ter Breuggen had threatened, wheedled, and outright sobbed to keep me in my lowly place. Even Dean Warren, who chaired the raucous hearing, took me aside afterward to encourage me, wishing me luck on my expedition, practically guaranteeing me tenure should I make a find contributing to Harvard’s eternal glory.

  Ter Breuggen’s loathsome manner can be explained simply: his resentment that when I joined the faculty, I refused to hand over Fragment C to any collection under his curatorship, even as he goggled and drooled over my papyrus. No matter. Now, blackballed by the corrupt priest, I bide my time, I do battle for the kingdom abroad, win renown, and will return.

  Bank. Nothing.

  Post. Nothing.

  Bank. Nothing.

  Thursday, 26 October, 1922

  Journal: Noon, final day of Phase One. Expedition HQ moves south. A new start, and I can feel the strength and inspiration pour back into me. I was going quite mad waiting in this hotel, my enthusiasm curdled by the city and luxury. And now, a busy day, improvisations necessary. Letter to Lacau at Antiquities, thanking him for his correspondence, and giving my address at the villa where I will be vacationing and awaiting “any fortuitous change in Mr. Winlock’s status vis-à-vis Deir el Bahari.” Visit to bank to be under way at last in the matter of the first payment.

  No word there, however, which is professionally and personally disappointing, but clearly there is a problem with the system, and these are the rough obstacles that will bruise us on any travel. Confirm they have the address and wiring information for my corresponding bank in the south. Deliver also a sharp word to the little clerk who has made me so uneasy these past weeks. There were, unfortunately, black-painted iron bars between my flexing fist and his smug little face (no doubt for this very reason, middle-class English bankers being not entirely insensible to the effect they have on other people).

  Go to collect my new suits of clothes, but find that, the international money transfer system being the shambles it is, I can, after a damned difficult selection, approve only two of them—an Egyptian twill and a light gabardine. I reassured the poor tailor he would be paid for the remainder when I send for them.

  The portrait artist is not yet done with his work. In its current condition, I am in full colour from the top of my head to my upper lip, at which point I fade into sketched brown lines. He has me looking directly outward, but with my head turned slightly to one side. Handsomely done. However, he has imagined a certain sagging under my right eye that no mirror can confirm and no gallery tolerate. So I instruct him that the painting is to be delivered upon repair and completion to the Explorers’ Club, from whom he may collect payment.

  And back to the hotel, where the morning manager—an Egyptian—wants to know how much longer they should expect the pleasure of my stay, as I have extended my original reservation. The international system of money wiring is infuriating: these native fellows are doing their best, running a not-at-all-bad hotel to the best of their ability, and it is quite disheartening that they should be so much at the mercy of a bank. But I shall need a base of operations in Cairo, of course, even when I am working down south—mail forwarding, my suite on short notice, a place to store some items, a pied-à-terre for my fiancée or my business partners as they come through town, a central facility for certain Government celebrations projected for early December. And so, excellent news for the manager: his most expensive suite of rooms will be occupied well into the winter. I hold it until January 1, for now, and perhaps longer, I will wire from Luxor with final dates. I pay a small portion of my balance to hold the suite until then. I distribute copies of Desire and Deceit in Ancient Egypt to the concierge, the bellboys, the African chambermaids, et cetera. Supplies to be left in the suite: the Victrola XVII, largest of my gramophones. Supplies to take for the trip south: more letterhead for the journal, convenient towels and bedding sets: the hotel’s absurd emblem and motto should be highly amusing to everyone at the site. Have my bags taken to the dock, and enjoy one last drink on my veranda while I update this log. I shall miss the padded bed. I shall miss the Sekhmet Bar in the lobby, decorated with paintings of that ancient lion-headed goddess who would, were she ever allowed to sober up, destroy humanity. I shall miss the service. I am older now than when I was in the Army, you know, and cannot say these creature comforts mean nothing. Oh, make no mistake, I shall be delighted to lie again on a camp bed under the stars, guarding my find, coping with heat and cold in rapid alternation, singing and chatting with the native men who treat me both as one of their own and as their natural leader. But I am not as devotedly rugged as all that, not anymore. Sixteen nights in the splendour of the Hotel of the Sphinx, on my smooth bedsheets print
ed with the vulture, sphinx, cobra, and HORUS CONSUMES THE HEARTS OF THE WICKED—well, I shall warm myself with them (and the memories they carry) on cold desert nights.

  One last visit to the bank: nothing.

  And at last, at last, my great voyage has begun: I write now from the deck of the steamer Cheops. Ahead of me, a journey 500 miles to the south, 500 miles up the Nile to where my king awaits me, to where Marlowe and I found Fragment C, and where he later lost his life.

  My departure and the setting of the sun coincide, and from the white deck under the purpling sky and over the boiling, blackening Nile, I see Cairo recede, the crowd on the dock, the lights of the square, the smoke rising from the houses and the ahwas and shops, mingling with the smoke from the boat. One can almost see from this distance the smiling faces of the luggage porters as they sit down on the dock to begin without delay their study of Desire and Deceit in Ancient Egypt (Collins Amorous Literature, 1920). One wears one’s twill suit, tailored by one of Egypt’s greatest men of the needle. One leans on the polished wooden parapet on the port side of a fine vessel. One watches in anticipation and relaxation as one chugs past narcissistic palms and nearly naked peasants, virtually unchanged from their portraits on ancient papyri. One admires the ladies onboard—almost all American, one notes—and one thinks of home (so far) and of destiny (so near), and one remarks with frustration the premonition of thundering stomach pain to come. Descend to my cabin.

  Later, calmer, below. I was soon able to rise to the saloon level, the god of belly disorder granting a respite after only an hour or so of enforced worship. Soothing drinks above and belowdecks. And a jazz trio in the saloon, Egyptians, in fact, tootling competently enough. While I danced with tourist ladies rapt by tales of exploration, the native bandleader, in red smoking jacket and fez, slapped a banjo while another honked a dented cornet and a third crooned, with a wonderful accent, songs such as “You’re a Lucky Fellah” and “I Love That Man and I’ll Keep Him, Just Aziz” and: