Little Egypt

by Lesley Glaister

  ‘You need eyes in the back of your head.’ Isis heard Rhoda’s voice in her own. And she remembered the blind white eye of the pedlar in Luxor. They should have bought something from him, that little turquoise cat, or a scarab for luck. Luck is what they needed. From the corner of her eye she could see the pup and looked away, afraid he’d come trotting across to greet her and earn himself a kicking.

  There was the sound of an engine and a cloud of sand became visible in the distance.

  ‘Ah ha, here’s the transport. Punctual, eh? There you are, that’s Abdullah for you, not your average Arab,’ Arthur said.

  Isis darted a look at Haru and Selim, who were surely near enough to hear.

  The ball of dust came closer and out of it emerged a truck. The man who climbed out was fat, heavily stubbled and hatless. His hair was thick and grey and he wore European dress: dusty white trousers and a sweat-stained linen jacket. ‘This is our excellent Abdullah,’ Evelyn said. ‘And here’s Osiris, and this is Isis.’

  Abdullah nodded and greeted the children with handshakes. ‘I’ve heard so much,’ he said.

  ‘Really?’ Isis said stiffly. She wiped the sweat of his palm onto her dress.

  Osi began to bombard Abdullah with questions, and he held his hands up as if in defence and laughed. ‘Steady on!’

  ‘By the time he was twelve he’d mastered the three written forms of ancient Egyptian,’ Arthur boasted. ‘Something of a prodigy, aren’t you, son? Give him a few years and he’ll be out here himself.’ He clapped Osi, who seemed likely to burst with pride, on the back and Isis wandered away to watch Haru, who was angrily slinging food into the back of the truck. Selim lugged a sack of flour across and swung it high, but it hit the side and some of the pale powder spilled onto the sand. Haru shouted and clipped him on the ear. Selim flushed and slunk away.

  ‘That’s not fair,’ Isis said. ‘He didn’t mean to.’

  Haru made a noise in the back of his throat as if he’d like to spit.

  ‘Why did we have to stay here?’ Isis demanded of Evelyn who was tapping her foot and smoking a cigarette as she watched the scene through narrowed eyes. ‘What about your house in Luxor? I thought we were going to stay in a proper house.’

  ‘We no longer have a house,’ Evelyn said shortly.

  Isis stared as her mother sighed and sucked on her cigarette. She looked almost defeated and Isis felt a little stir of hope. ‘Things have gone rather … pear-shaped, you might say.’ And in a flat and uncharacteristic tone, Evelyn explained that there was a problem with money and that they seemed to have got themselves on the wrong side of the authorities, made some enemies, so to speak.

  ‘Enemies?’ Isis’ voice came out in a screech. ‘Why? What do you mean?’

  Evelyn lifted her chin and sent out a stream of smoke.

  ‘Why don’t you give up then?’ Isis said. ‘Just for a while. Why don’t you come home with us?

  ‘Impossible. Too much to sort out here.’

  ‘Why?’ Isis tried to catch her arm, but Evelyn flinched away and raised her eyes to heaven as if it was obvious.

  ‘Why is it impossible?’ Isis insisted.

  ‘Don’t be tedious, Isis. It’s getting more and more difficult to get a concession – a license to dig. They’ve got so many ridiculous rules and regulations now! They’re getting quite officious. Quite above themselves, if you ask me.’

  Isis noticed Abdullah glancing over as she said that.

  ‘But Abdullah’s our man.’ Evelyn continued in her loud embarrassing voice. ‘Abdullah will pull strings and wangle one if anyone can.’

  ‘But why should he?’ Isis whispered.

  Evelyn gave her a mystified look.

  ‘Why would he want to help you find the treasure? Why doesn’t he just get it for himself?’

  ‘That’s not how it works,’ Evelyn snapped.

  ‘After all, it is Egyptian treasure, not English.’

  Isis caught Abdullah’s smirk, before he turned his face away.

  The lines between Evelyn’s eyes were dark and gritty, grains were caught in her sparse eyebrows and her almost lashless eyes were rimmed with red; she looked as if she were going mad.

  ‘Who’ve you been talking to?’ she snapped.

  ‘Oh, loads of people,’ Isis said, gesturing towards the desert. ‘All my throng of friends.’

  ‘Sarcasm is the lowest form of wit.’ Evelyn took out her cigarette box and lit herself another.

  ‘But what if he’s tricking you?’ Isis said quietly, looking across at the man who appeared to be absorbed now in securing the picnic equipment to the back of the lorry.

  ‘Why should he? We’re the ones with the …’ She frisked her fingers together to indicate money. ‘Now, surely we must be ready. Abdullah!’ she called imperiously as she stalked towards him.

  18

  EVELYN AND ARTHUR were travelling on their motorbike and sidecar. To Isis’ mortification, Evelyn, in pith helmet and monstrous goggles drove, while Arthur crammed himself into the sidecar, knees up round his ears as they roared away. Abdullah was to drive the lorry, with Victor and the children up front, which was a squash, with Haru, Akil and Selim balancing amongst the picnic equipment on the back.

  Jammed beside her in the hot, fly-ridden cab, Osi spent the whole drive yakking and yakking about the 19th dynasty until Isis’ jaw ached from the gritting of her teeth. Fortunately she had the window to her other side and was able to let her head hang out and ride along with the breeze in her hair and her eyes shut tight. Her head was heavy now and too big for her, like a melon lolling on its stalk. She felt bloated all over, but not with air as from a pump, it was more like a heavy fluid, weightier than water, like mercury, and she thought of the thin line of it in the thermometer at home and how once she’d broken one and Mary had let her keep the mercury in a matchbox, like a slippery, silver pet. The thought of Mary sent a jag of homesickness through her and she snapped open her eyes.

  A refreshing breeze overlaid the sour desert smell with a tinge of green, and loose sand blew in hazy patterns over the sunburnt earth. She tingled with the sensation of movement after being in one place for too long, and felt a small and unexpected spurt of gaiety. She was all right. Everything was, after all, all right. It had been an adventure getting here, but here they were, and on a family outing with a picnic promised, and perhaps she’d find the tomb interesting after all, if only Osi would shut his trap.

  The truck caught up with Evelyn and Arthur, in the one place within the barren wilderness where there was actually a scrap of shade under a cluster of sickly palms. This, it seemed, was the picnic site. Isis climbed out and helped unfold the canvas picnic furniture, and then Evelyn, like a proper mother, took her to a place behind a boulder where she could relieve herself.

  As they walked back to the others, Isis dared to take her hand, and Evelyn gave only the slightest flinch and did not pull away.

  ‘Tell me, how has Victor been?’ she asked, throwing a doubtful glance at her brother who was lolling against a rock, staring into the distance.

  ‘All right. He’s having nightmares though. Worse than ever.’

  Evelyn compressed her lips. ‘He did manage to get you here,’ she said. ‘I’m sure he’ll be all right.’ She let go of Isis’ hand and strode across to talk to him.

  Akil was making dough for the flat breads and Isis stole a piece and stowed it in her pocket. Selim was helping Akil by putting together the camping stove and Isis stood and watched, admiring the dexterity of his fingers. He did not look at her, of course, not with the others all around, but she thought she sensed a gathering of attention in his shoulders and neck and the back of his head.

  The breeze flickered feathery shadows through the palms, and a flock of bright little birds chittered, almost like English birds. The smell of frying fish and fresh bread was delicious, and both Evelyn and Arthur were in fairly good humour. Even Victor seemed to have pulled himself together, though he made it clear that he was disappointed
in the lack of anything but mint tea or water in the way of drinks.

  As they settled to eat, Arthur put his hand jokily over Osi’s mouth. ‘Let your sister get a word in! How is it at home then, Icy? Tell all.’

  ‘Nothing to tell,’ Isis said. ‘Oh, except the budgies have got out and set up home in the ballroom, on the chandelier.’

  Arthur laughed and slapped his forehead so hard he dislodged his helmet. ‘We must clear them out,’ he said.

  ‘What’s the matter with Cleo?’ Evelyn said. ‘Don’t we keep a cat to do for vermin and so on?’

  ‘Budgies aren’t vermin,’ Isis said. ‘And anyrate, how would a cat reach the chandelier?’

  ‘Anyrate,’ Evelyn said. ‘Listen to her!’

  ‘How about a dog?’ Isis dared.

  ‘That still wouldn’t reach. You could send in a hawk,’ Osi suggested.

  ‘We could look into it,’ Arthur said, through a squashed-down smile.

  ‘Mary says anyrate,’ Isis said, vexed. She looked to Victor for support, but he wasn’t listening.

  ‘Precisely,’ Evelyn retorted.

  But they were all smiling now and the smile spread to Isis. Even Osi was acting like a normal happy boy, well almost. He was managing to resist the mention of Tutankhamen, which was unusually sensitive for him, enough to give Isis a flicker of hope that he might grow up to be normal after all. And there was a proper family feeling, and this was a proper family occasion, a picnic like other, normal, people had.

  ‘Victor met a floozie on the boat,’ she said, and got the desired effect from her parents: hoots of laughter, though Victor gave her a dented look and she felt a stir of disloyalty.

  Abdullah, who had been standing and shading his eyes, turned and lifted his finger. ‘Ah ha!’ said Arthur. ‘Now, for our surprise. Shut your eyes, until I say so.’

  Isis almost shut her eyes, but could still see through her lashes if she tilted her head back, and with sinking heart she watched the arrival of a pair of camels, led by two tall men with utterly black skins and red turbans.

  ‘You can look now,’ Evelyn said.

  The camels towered ridiculously, blinking down at Isis as they chewed the cud with their vast brown teeth. Their hair was full of grit and their eyes with spite, and she didn’t want to go anywhere near them. Arthur’s plan had had been that she would ride with Evelyn and he with Osi, but she did not want to be up there, so high, her own height today was questionable.

  ‘These fellows are Nubians,’ Evelyn said in her loud, confident voice. ‘Rather handsome in their way, don’t you think?’

  ‘They can hear you,’ Isis muttered, edging away from the camels.

  ‘She’s scared,’ Osi said. ‘Isis is scared!’ Usually that taunt alone would have been enough to make her do anything, just to show them.

  ‘So what?’ she said. ‘I can walk.’

  ‘Where does she get it from?’ Evelyn complained.

  Isis felt Selim’s eyes on her and the blood rose to her cheeks.

  ‘It’s supposed to be a treat, Icy,’ said Arthur.

  ‘Spoilsport.’

  ‘If she doesn’t want to, she doesn’t want to,’ put in Victor.

  ‘I don’t feel quite myself,’ Isis said.

  Though their face held no particular expression, she sensed that the Nubians were jeering too, but it didn’t matter, the more they jeered the more she’d dig her heels in – no, don’t think that – she lurched at the thought of sinking heels. The nearest man stared down at her from his elegant height until she looked away, and then he spoke rapidly to Haru.

  ‘Will you ride the donkey?’ Haru asked.

  ‘He doesn’t like me,’ she said.

  Haru hacked out a laugh and, in Arabic, repeated what she’d said to Akil and the camel men who all looked from Isis to the donkey and hooted and slapped their sides.

  ‘Come on, Missy,’ coaxed Abdullah.

  Selim was stroking one of the camels. Isis met his eyes and read encouragement there. She must seem really pathetic to him, to be so afraid of what to him would be a normal, everyday event.

  ‘Oh, very well then, if I must,’ she said. ‘But I don’t see why I shouldn’t walk.’

  ‘It’s easy once you’re up,’ Arthur told her. ‘And the camel will kneel, see.’ He barked something at one of the men and he made the smaller creature, the paler of the two, get awkwardly down on its knobbled knees and prostrate its long neck on the ground.

  ‘There, see how friendly.’ Abdullah smiled and as she stared at his face, the bland and insincere shine of it, she knew with a pang of clarity that he would never lead Evelyn and Arthur to the tomb. That he had taken them for fools. That he was fleecing them and they were like children in their eagerness to believe in him. Unable to bear it, she looked away.

  She managed to clamber onto the camel, and Evelyn sat behind her and at a word from the camel man, the creature unfolded itself like an ironing board and they rose upwards. Isis and Evelyn set off first, Osi and Arthur behind them, and Victor was roared away in the truck with Abdullah, Selim and Haru.

  The gait of the creature was uneven and swaying and at first she felt the need to cling to the ridge of her saddle. But soon her body grew used to the rhythm, and although she was sore and chafed with sand and sweat, pressing down on the saddle gave her an oddly exhilarating sensation, a kind of pleasant ache, and though her head felt huge and full of wadding, she enjoyed the rocking movement and wished they could go faster and faster and gallop between the high sandy cliffs.

  Osi and Arthur’s camel came up beside theirs and the two creatures twisted their snaky necks to hiss and spit at one another and she found herself laughing, they were so preposterous with their giant liquid eyes and glamorous lashes and she enjoyed the sun-baked tang and rough, dull texture of camel hair.

  ‘Fun, Beastie?’ said Evelyn from behind her, and Isis gave a nod and smiled.

  19

  AFTER AN HOUR or so they approached the cliffs and the men commanded the camels to kneel. Isis’ legs were rubbery as she clambered off and sparks flew in her eyes. It was the sun, only the sun, but it pressed down on her with heavy hands, and the ground was so gritty bright it made her squint. Sweat trickled from beneath her hat, stinging her eyes with sharp salt. The lorry had already arrived, and Victor and Haru were leaning back against it, smoking as they waited. Selim shot her a quick bright look and turned his head.

  Abdullah paid the camel men and they mounted and rode swiftly away, the soft splayed feet that had plodded so soggily, taking off into a hectic lollop, fast and thrilling, as if it was a race.

  Since the Great Place – the Valley of the Kings – was swarming with tourists and journalists, they were to visit a tomb belonging to one of the tomb-makers, Arthur explained, rather than to a pharaoh. Here was quieter, more suitable for a family visit and – though, of course, the mummy and all the grave goods were long gone – there were particularly fine and interesting decorations to be seen.

  Before they set out on their trudge, they ate slices of orange and drank warm, goaty-tasting water from a skin bag. First of all, Arthur and Evelyn took them part of the way up the cliff for a good view of Deir El Medina. This had been a village populated by the builders who made the tombs for the pharaohs. They would begin the work, Arthur told them, the moment a new pharaoh was crowned, so that the monarch was able to travel from Thebes and see the progress of his own resting place.

  ‘Imagine standing in your own tomb!’ Isis said, staring down at the pattern of sand-coloured ruins. You could clearly see the outline of houses and streets.

  ‘I wouldn’t mind,’ said Osi, and pointing: ‘Is that the Temple of Hathor?’

  ‘Quite right.’ Arthur patted his head. ‘The tomb-makers were an uppity lot, don’t you know,’ he said, ‘a lot of artistic temperaments and so on – and not above going on strike if they weren’t satisfied with their rations – and they ate like lords. And of course they made their own tombs beautifully. We’ve got some supe
rb examples of 19th an 20th dynasty – you wait and see …’ His voice skipped with supressed excitement.

  The entrance was nothing but a heap of rubble that you might pass without noticing, but at Abdullah’s instruction, Selim and Haru hauled stones out of the way to reveal a rough panel of planking. At the shifting of the wood, a mouth yawned open in the rock. Though she was hot, goose-pimples riffled over Isis’ skin, and her stomach clenched at the thought of being swallowed down there.

  Abdullah issued them all with torches and began to explain about entrances and antechambers while Osi interrupted and contradicted. Before her irritation could overtake her, Isis took the dough from her pocket, dampened it with the sweat from her palms and stuffed it in her ears. The warm dough swelled, blocking Osi’s voice, everyone’s voice, in lovely bready silence. It was a strange effect – the soundless wagging of everyone’s chin – and she became aware of a rushing sound coming from inside herself, that must have been the passage of her own blood, the secret sound of self.

  Osi went in first with Abdullah, Haru, Selim and Victor. Evelyn followed and then, reluctantly, shoved along by Arthur, Isis entered the cracked lips of rock and stumbled down the throat, floored roughly with splintery planks. Stuck on ledges in the lumpy rock were candles and beneath them complex gnarly veins of trickled wax. A dry, knowing kind of smell caught in her nostrils and she caught up with Evelyn and clung to her arm; it’ll only be a minute, it’ll only be a minute, she told herself. Evelyn frowned down at her, said something silent and pulled her arm away.

  Selim had grazed his knuckle on a rock or the rough wood; she saw him wipe away a trickle of blood and then suck at the wound. His eyes were deeply shadowed by his lashes but he looked up and met hers in a long, unsmiling gaze. She looked away. Abdullah was showing them the three chambers of the tomb, teeth flashing as he pointed out details in the decoration. She stood apart from the group, seeing them as fish in an aquarium with their silently opening and closing mouths.

  She turned to stare at the skin of pigment on the walls that in the wavering torchlight appeared so freshly painted as to be still wet. The air was stiff and stale, like the air trapped in a dead person’s lungs, and she felt a flutter of panic. The images made the blood beat harder, like birds trapped in her ears, and she lifted her hands to try and remove or loosen the dough, but it had cooked tight in her ear canals and her fingers were disconnected and clumsy as if she were trying to operate the vast, numb hands of a puppet.