by Alex Archer
Smythe pointed to one of the dark ones. They had successfully cleaned the tarnish from half the coins. “Arabic. Dirhams, actually. Silver coins, which is why they’re so discolored—silver tarnishes quite easily. It even oxidizes in salt water, which is why salvaged treasure usually nets gold coins but not silver ones. The Arabic dinars were stamped in gold, but dirhams were silver. The tarnishing is a result of contact with hydrogen sulfide, a natural byproduct of simply handling them. Human skin, wool, eggs and onions, and even residual grease from a cut of meat during a meal, could cause this alteration. Simple chemistry, actually.”
Smythe moved on to one of the shiny dirhams. “The use of a good silver polish cleaned them right up, you see. And if you look at this writing, you’ll understand why I believe this chap might have been from Saudi Arabia.”
“You might, Professor, but I haven’t a clue.” Theresa laughed.
Looking on, Annja admired the younger woman’s easy affinity for the camera. She was a natural.
“Upon further examination of these coins, I was able to translate the language inscribed on them.” Smythe picked up one of the coins and held it out.
“Beg your pardon, Professor, but I need just a moment.” Theresa turned to Cory. “We’ll put an extreme close-up here.”
The cameraman nodded. “I’ll have to do that with one of the other lenses.”
“Of course.” Refocused on Smythe, Theresa smiled. “Sorry. Production necessitates a few interruptions.”
“Nonsense. Just let me know what you need from me. I’m in your hands.”
“Thank you. Now...back to that intriguing coin. Start with the translation, if you will.”
“Most Arabic coins of this period—the time of the Umayyad caliphate, the second of the four major governments that ruled the Muslim world—have the same legend stamped on them. ‘In the name of God, this dirham was struck in’—what is essentially Damascus these days—‘in the year 79 AH.’ Basically 698 CE by our conventional calendars.”
Theresa’s eyebrows rose. “So these coins are over thirteen hundred years old?”
“Correct.” Smythe smiled with childlike enthusiasm. “As I said, quite the find. Also of note, 79 AH was the first year these particular coins were struck. Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, the fifth Umayyad caliph, chose to make changes in the coinage at that time. So these are really special.”
“The British Museum is going to be quite taken with you, Professor.”
“I certainly hope so. They funded quite a lot of this particular foray, you see, and most of that on faith in me. I’m happy to provide a return on that investment.”
“What had you expected to find on this dig?”
Smythe put the coins back on the blanket beside the skeleton. “I wasn’t exactly certain. I’ve been intensely interested in the period of the caliphates in Muslim history. Particularly immediately following Muhammad’s passing and the struggle to agree upon a new leader.” He shrugged. “As you know, the Muslims continue to be divided over the true heir of Muhammad’s teachings and the path laid out for them by God.”
“Do you think the work you’re doing will help clear up any of that confusion?”
Annja almost smiled at the naïveté of the question. Theresa was a good journalist, but had no understanding of history and religious strife.
Still, Smythe treated the question with respect, which was probably the best course because some of the television audience would undoubtedly wonder the same thing.
“No. I’m afraid those particular combatants have long since chosen their own courses and declared their battles. What I hope to do here is preserve and bring to light some of the history of the caliphates.”
“Why aren’t you working a dig in Saudi Arabia?”
“Until a few months ago, I was. Then I chanced upon a lead that brought me here to Morocco.”
That clue—a few pages torn from a journal of a moderately successful historian who had completed a translation of an eighth-century treatise—was what had interested Annja, as well. The historian, Farouk Assad, had lived in al-Hejaz, near the Red Sea. Smythe had chanced upon the manuscript during research at the recently established National Museum of Saudi Arabia. In addition to support from the British Museum, Smythe had also secured support from the House of Saud, something that was rarely given to outsiders.
“The Muslim people were great thinkers and travelers.” Smythe warmed to the subject now. “In addition to their contributions to math and science and philosophy, they also traveled the world. They set up caravan routes that connected countries and markets.” He waved toward the Atlas Mountains. “According to the document I discovered, one of the lesser-known trade routes wound through Morocco to the Atlantic Ocean. And it passed through here.”
“This particular location was marked in the papers you found?”
“I believed so.” Smythe nodded. “Now, with the discovery of this body and these coins, I’d feel safe in saying that I have proven my case.”
When she’d seen Smythe’s documentation, Annja had also believed the translation was correct. She’d performed her own check on Smythe’s figures, and—at Smythe’s invitation—she had joined the dig. She hadn’t visited Morocco for any real length of time, and Smythe’s proposed excavation had fallen during some downtime from Chasing History’s Monsters.
Of course, that hadn’t kept Doug Morrell, Annja’s producer on the show, from trying to drum up additional business. Doug had been the one to point out that Smythe was capitalizing on Annja’s popularity to feather his own nest. Annja hadn’t argued the point, but she knew that wasn’t all there was to the arrangement. Smythe was a good archaeologist and Annja had gotten to be friends with him through email and a couple of small projects that had led to this.
“Can you tell us what you’ve found?” Theresa asked Smythe.
The archaeologist grinned. “You mean other than this skeleton and these coins?”
“Please.”
“When Miss Creed and I began this dig, we contacted some of the locals who worked around here, seeking any knowledge they might have about the area and the history. You’d be surprised how many people don’t really know the background of their locale. We were fortunate because these men—the khettara builders we employed for the dig—knew some legends about the trade route, and they had discovered some of the potsherds and other artifacts left by the previous travelers a thousand years ago or more. They had already been turning those artifacts over to the museums here in Morocco.”
Seated nearby at a flickering campfire, Nadim translated Smythe’s words for those who didn’t speak English. Several of the men smiled and nodded. Pots hung over several cook fires and Annja’s belly growled in anticipation of a hot meal. With the coming of the night, the temperature plummeted and she looked forward to her tent and sleeping bag.
A flicker of movement caught Annja’s attention and she focused on the ridgeline of the hill not far away. Even as she made out a man’s head and shoulders in the darkness, two more joined him.
Annja started to step back, but froze as hooves beat against the ground and a rider on a white horse exploded out of the shadows behind her. Three other riders followed him. They rode into the campsite as other men in long flowing burnooses rose from nearby hiding places.
The leader guided his horse into the camp, scattering the locals and aiming for Smythe, Theresa and Cody. He reined in his horse quickly, causing the big animal to rear, then pointed a Russian-made pistol at Smythe. “Do not make any sudden moves.”
Chapter 3
Confronted by the robed men on horseback with untold others moving in from the darkness, Annja stood her ground. She thought of reaching for her sword, knowing it would only take a moment to free the weapon from the mysterious place it resided, the otherwhere, as she thought of it. Adrenaline surged through her and she recognized t
hat call to action from so many other confrontations.
For the moment, though, she left the sword where it was. She didn’t like the idea of being robbed or losing their find, but that was better than causing anyone’s death.
Souad stared at the man in amazement. The teen stood beside his father, who had quickly dropped to his knees. Annja heard Souad’s awestruck voice even over the horses’ restless hooves against the earth.
“Mustafa.”
The mounted man turned his attention to Souad and spoke in Berber. Annja spoke just enough of the language to pick up the gist. “You know me, boy?”
Nadim caught his son by the arm and yanked Souad down to his knees. Souad’s frightened eyes never left Mustafa’s.
The mounted man grinned at the boy, and in the flickering campfire light, he looked evil. Mustafa wore a forked black beard. Exposure to the sun and the elements had turned his skin nut-brown. A ragged scar that looked like an upside-down V puckered his left cheek and added a squint to the eye above.
“Yes, you know me.” Mustafa laughed, but his pistol never left Smythe. “I could take you away from this life, from all this digging in the ground like a worm, and make a proper bandit of you.”
Souad ducked his head and Nadim threw a protective arm around his son. His other hand dropped to the knife at his belt, but he didn’t draw the weapon.
The white horse shifted and turned in a half circle. Mustafa twisted in the saddle and kept the pistol trained on Smythe. His dark eyes swept over Annja, as well.
“You are a pretty one,” Mustafa said in broken English.
Annja made no reply.
Turning his attention back to Smythe, Mustafa glared at the BBC crew. Theresa had closed ranks with Smythe, and Cody had stopped filming and looked around uneasily.
“I had heard you were here.” Mustafa said it almost like an accusation.
“We have the proper permissions,” Smythe said in a neutral tone.
“You do not have permission from me.”
Smythe didn’t reply.
Mustafa guided his horse toward the skeleton on the blanket. Firelight flickered dully over the ivory. “Whose bones are these?”
Smythe shook his head. “I don’t know.”
Peering more closely at the blanket, Mustafa called to one of his men, pointed and spoke rapidly. The man, younger and smaller, dismounted and trotted over to the blanket while keeping his grip on the bolt-action Russian rifle he carried.
The bandit knelt beside the blanket and picked up the silver coins. He held them up to Mustafa, talking excitedly.
The bandit leader pointed his chin toward the coins in his man’s hand. “Where are the rest?”
Smythe shook his head. “We haven’t found any more.”
“Where did you find these?”
“In the well.”
Mustafa’s expression hardened. “Then there are more. You have not found them all.” He stood up in his stirrups and called out in his native tongue.
Four of his men quickly separated from the others and walked over to the khettara opening, which was high and banked to look like the entrance to an anthill. The bandits picked up a collection of oil lanterns from the tools sitting next to the opening and began lighting them.
“You can’t just go down there.” Smythe took a half step forward, then froze as Mustafa aimed his pistol with more deliberation.
“Do not think you can tell me what to do.”
Smythe held his hands up higher. “It’s not safe.”
“You do not want us to find the fortune hidden there.” Mustafa spat. “That is how it is with you foreign dogs. You come into our country, pilfer our heritage, take our treasures and leave.”
“That’s not true. Everything we find here is going to Moroccan museums. We’re only here to seek greater understanding of history.”
“The Koran tells us all we need to know of history.” Mustafa waved the pistol at the skeleton. “Those old bones have their own story, and it is nothing we need to know now.” He turned to his men. “Find my treasure.”
Helplessly, Annja watched. She and Smythe had agreed to hold off further exploration of their find till morning when the light would be better. Nadim had promised mirrors that would bring natural light down into the well so they wouldn’t have to use lanterns. They would have been fresh in the morning.
Now potentially everything down there was about to be lost. The losses wouldn’t just be the material things the Bedouin raiders took, but also the placement of those things. Archaeologists could tell almost as much from the placement of artifacts as from the artifacts themselves. She clenched her fists, knowing there was nothing she could do to preserve the integrity of the dig. Mind you, the cave-in had possibly made determining placement impossible, anyway.
At the khettara opening, the bandits grabbed the ropes that had been left there and cautiously scrambled over the side. They wore their weapons—rifles and curved swords—strapped over their backs. In short order, they disappeared into the yawning mouth and dropped into the earth.
Mustafa leaned forward in his saddle and surveyed Theresa. “You are a pretty one, as well.” He smiled, and the puckered scar on his face turned the expression into a cold leer. “Maybe I will take you with me when I go.”
Theresa drew back slightly, and didn’t meet the bandit chief’s gaze. That reaction had no doubt been learned on the tube, Britain’s underground train system. Eye contact made predators more aggressive.
While the rest of his men stood around, Mustafa walked over to one of the cooking pots. He sniffed the contents, then took a bowl from a stack beside the campfire. Snaking the bowl into the pot, he dipped up a portion, blew on it, then drank. Evidently enjoying his repast, he dipped the bowl again.
Several minutes passed before they heard a cry of surprise from the khettara. Mustafa threw down his borrowed bowl and trudged over to the opening.
“What have you found?”
One of the bandits climbed up from the well with a small golden chest that had once been bound with iron. Over the years, the metal had oxidized and nearly flaked away, leaving only orange grains worked into the softer metal. The box was about eighteen inches long by four inches high by four inches wide.
Involuntarily, Annja took a step forward. One of the guards standing next to her caught her by the arm. The rough grip stopped her, and she had to refrain from grappling with the man and throwing him to the desert floor. She took a quick breath and let it out.
Smythe also stepped forward, but the Bedouin watching him thrust the butt of his rifle into the archaeologist’s stomach. Racked by pain, Smythe dropped to his knees.
“Quickly. Quickly.” Mustafa turned the box over in his hands, examining the catches. Then finally he gave up and took out a curved knife. He prized the lid open.
Campfire light gleamed from smooth yellowed-ivory surfaces. Annja strained to see what the Bedouin leader held, and thought she could make out a scroll of some kind. The parchment was wrapped tightly around the ivory bars.
Irritably, Mustafa removed the scroll and cast it aside as he searched the box. He smiled a little as he pulled up a few gold coins.
Annja remained focused on the scroll, trying desperately to fathom the script barely revealed on the section that had unrolled. No matter how hard she tried, though, she couldn’t make out any of the writing.
Drawn by her fascination, as well as that of Smythe, Mustafa reached down for the scroll. He squatted and unrolled it. If the Bedouin leader understood any of what was written there, he gave no indication.
He looked over at Smythe and Annja, then pushed the scroll at them. “Can you read this?”
At her guard’s urging, Annja leaned toward Mustafa.
Smythe studied the page. “Can I get a torch, please? This is very hard to
see.”
Mustafa waved to one of the warriors, who immediately tossed him a flashlight. He caught the flashlight and turned it on, shining the beam on the scroll.
The writing was beautiful, swoops and flourishes that showed a steady, artistic hand. Looking at it, Annja decided the writing looked familiar, but couldn’t immediately fathom why.
“This is old.” Smythe spoke in a low voice, entranced by the scroll before him. “The writing is very hard to make out.” He sighed. “If you give me time, I’m certain I can translate it.”
“Later, then.” Mustafa started to place the scroll back inside the box. He waved his pistol at the dig crew, then barked orders to his men. “Bring them all. They will fetch good prices.”
Immediately, the Bedouin raiders grabbed hold of Annja, Theresa and the three archaeology students who had followed Smythe out into the desert.
“Wait. You can’t take them.” Smythe surged up, still holding his stomach. “These are my students. I’m responsible for their well-being.”
The guard with the rifle hammered the buttstock against Smythe’s head, catching the professor unaware. Unconscious, Smythe fell face-first. Blood gushed from a wound along his temple.
Annja started to go to him, but the raider next to her tightened his grip on her arm. This time she caught his wrist in her other hand, set herself and yanked him over her hip, throwing him hard. He lost his rifle and she thought briefly of going after it, but she knew she’d never reach it in time.
Instead, she knocked Mustafa backward, causing him to trip. The box hit the ground and opened, spilling the scroll. Hoping to seize a negotiating point, Annja grabbed for it. Before Annja could do anything, Mustafa had the other end of it and it ripped in two. Her heart was in her throat when she saw the damage, but she knew she didn’t have time to regret her actions.
She seized one of the nearby climbing ropes equipped with a grappling hook, then turned and ran across the flat, moonlit ground. As she ran, she slid her end of the scroll into her shirt for safekeeping.
