The Cairo Codex

by Linda Lambert

  “He’s always wary at first, withholding a part of himself. But I can tell he likes you. I’ve known Amir for as many years as I’ve known Ibrahim. And since he’s some fifteen years my junior, I’ve watched him grow up. He is a man of pride and shame—a dangerous combination: deep pride in Egypt, its history, and its people, yet he’s ashamed that Egypt couldn’t make the revolution succeed.”

  “What do you mean, ‘dangerous’?”

  “Shame can make him lash out, respond to imagined offenses. And, of course, pride brings arrogance, a cover for his . . .”

  “. . . shame.” Justine finished Andrea’s thought.

  “Believe me, neither is the real Amir. When you get to know him, you’ll find he can be sensitive as well as sensible. And forgiving. But in many ways, he is France after World War II. Comprendez-vous? We are prickly, overly sensitive, quick to anger. Unfortunately, others feel the brunt of our confusion until we learn to trust, which doesn’t come quickly. And some people don’t stay around to find out.”

  “That’s helpful, and I think we may have moved pass the suspicious stage. He is being charming, and is terribly excited about the codex.”

  “That’s good to hear. Patience has its own rewards—not that I have any, you understand.” She laughed.

  “You seem to have escaped the French predicament yourself. How so?”

  “If you mean our prickliness? I think I’ve escaped it for the most part, although I require that you worship everything French.” She smiled again. “I was born after World War II, so I didn’t experience the Vichy shame directly. And I’ve tried to cultivate a sense of humor. Being a woman helps. Empathy is expected.”

  “So true. I have yet to fully realize that power. Of being a woman, I mean.”

  “You’re an accomplished and beautiful woman. Be patient and forgiving with yourself.” Andrea paused to finish her second cookie. “Speaking of exceptional women, I’ve always wondered why your parents separated. They’re both adventurous and seemed well suited for each other.”

  “I think it had less to do with my father, although he was overly protective, than with my mother. She passionately wanted to be free. She didn’t want to become a line dancer.”

  “A line dancer?”

  Justine grinned. “That’s the metaphor she uses for a woman who waits until her husband dies to do what she wants, then takes up line dancing and dances as fast as she can.”

  “A useful metaphor!” Andrea laughed, reaching for the last cookie. “Now, let’s go talk to Ibrahim about this codex of yours.”

  “This may be a significant find,” began Ibrahim, settling into the chair behind his cedar desk, a cane nearby. “Andrea and I think we’ll need to bring in team members with different areas of expertise. We don’t have the means here to do many of the dating processes. I will discuss our needs with Omar Mostafa, Director-General of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, but this is a delicate transaction, since Omar is a man of theatre; he fashions himself a star. That is not to say he isn’t fully competent and qualified, just that he also demands the limelight. And he may demand the codex, especially when he hears that an American is involved.”

  Justine raised a brow and opened her mouth to speak.

  “At any rate,” Andrea interrupted, “he’ll take the credit. But Ibrahim believes that if he and I offer to lead the team, Mostafa may welcome our participation and make available the full resources of the Council offices at the Egyptian Museum. We have a few other team members in mind, but we wanted to consult you first.”

  Is there anyone who doesn’t know Mostafa? And what is this about an American’s involvement? Justine decided to take a different tack. She was already beginning to understand the mixed feelings about her father here. “Are there disadvantages in bringing others in? My father often suggested that things can get bogged down with too many spoons in the stew.”

  “Good question. One critical issue is that the codex will sometimes be out of our hands—and we won’t be able to control the release of information,” Andrea replied, stretching her arms over her head and narrowing her eyes. “Things can get stretched out, but I think we can expedite things. At least, I would hope so, since I’m just at AUC for the spring and summer sessions.” She paused, then added, “Perhaps I could extend my leave if this gets really juicy.”

  Justine laughed. “I’m finding this really juicy already. How about you, sir?”

  “I’ll tell my good friend Mostafa I haven’t long for this world, so I need to proceed with all reasonable haste,” said Ibrahim, grinning and pulling at his beard.

  Andrea winked at Justine, and both women assured him that he would be around for a good long while. Ibrahim waved them off. “There is one other issue,” he added soberly, “that I’ve encountered before. If the findings are too provocative, there could be problems.”

  Justine frowned. “You both have warned me now. What kind of problems do you have in mind?”

  “Let me tell you a story,” said Ibrahim. “It was about twenty-five years ago, and I was in my full stride and fervor as an archaeologist. Dashing, I would say. At any rate, I was working with your father, Justine. He was still wet behind the ears, a little cocky. We uncovered a tablet near Darshur.”

  Her heart sped up. Here it comes, the story I’ve been waiting for. The one her father had refused to speak about.

  “At first I was greatly excited. It could have been another Rosetta Stone—about a hundred years too late. It appeared to have inscriptions in more than one language. As you can imagine, we were thrilled, and we sat up at night debating our options.” Ibrahim pulled his tea toward him and contemplated a small glass paperweight on his desk for several moments before continuing. “Our first take on the tablet—it was maybe three hands high—was that it was in hieroglyphics, Greek, and Coptic.” He carefully placed his gnarled hands one above the other, measuring the tablet in the air. “It turned out that the Greek and Coptic were interwoven and there was a fourth language: ancient Hebrew. We decided to keep it hidden in our work area near Darshur, and we worked on it in the evenings. But the languages weren’t the issue.”

  “Why not?” pressed Andrea.

  “Yes! Why not?” echoed Justine, almost holding her breath.

  “The true find may have been in the message, my dear young women. The message was the jewel. At least, the message as we thought we understood it. It told about the promise of the Pharaoh to Moses and his wife Zipporah. The Pharaoh offered to let Moses lead the Children of Israel out of Egypt if he would leave Zipporah behind. She agreed, but Moses resisted. ‘Better to leave me behind than to cause firstborn Egyptian sons to perish,’ argued Zipporah. The story on the tablet claimed that Moses had finally agreed. We even inferred that the Passover never happened. That is, the part of the story of the Exodus where God kills the firstborn sons of Egyptians but ‘passes over’ the houses of the Children of Israel. The central story confirming that the Hebrews are God’s chosen people.” He paused, permitting the weightiness of his last statement sink in. “But we never got that far. The tablet disappeared.”

  “Didn’t you have enough information to bring the inscription to light?” urged Justine. “Couldn’t you have done something?”

  “We’d made a few sketchings, but had no photos. We had no tablet. No hard evidence. But there was something else that haunted us: Did we want this information to come to light? Is all knowledge superior to faith?” Ibrahim’s eyes suggested that he had slipped back in time, reliving those moments.

  “But surely you’ve answered that question for yourself, Ibrahim,” said a startled Andrea. “You’re a scholar and archaeologist. Your profession demands that evidence supersedes faith.”

  “Absolutely,” said another voice. They turned to find Amir leaning against the doorframe. “Are you three plotting without me?” He grinned, but his eyes were steely.

  “Hi, my boy,” said Ibrahim. “I was just explaining that it hasn’t always been so clear to me that knowledge trum
ps faith. Living one’s life in the Middle East has its consequences,” he said defensively, staring downward as though he were ashamed to have his grandson hear his doubts.

  Amir’s full eyebrows drew together. He appeared momentarily stunned. Then he strode across the room and pulled up a chair. “Surely you’re speaking theoretically,” he said.

  Ibrahim nodded gratefully, his Adam’s apple pulsing only slightly.

  Justine glanced at Amir, then Ibrahim, amazed that there was a time when the elder El Shabry had been tempted to suppress evidence. And what does this say about my father? “Truth trumps tradition every time,” she said decisively, sounding more confident that she felt. Her stomach tightened, a signal that something was wrong, something was missing. “There are rumors, Dr. Ibrahim. Rumors that have darkened my father’s credibility.” Her voice tight, she drew a deep breath.

  “What kind of rumors, my dear?” asked Ibrahim.

  I have trouble believing he hasn’t heard them too. “That the evidence was withheld to protect Judaism. I can see how such a rumor would spread in an Arab country. But are the rumors true?” she asked, although she wasn’t sure she wanted to hear the answer.

  “I know the rumors . . . and they are just that,” insisted Ibrahim. “I’m not sure even your father and I know what might have happened. When the tablet was stolen and never recovered—and as far as I know, it didn’t show up in the antiquities market—we moved on. ‘Best to let sleeping dogs lie,’ your father said.”

  Justine’s face flushed as she heard one of her father’s familiar homilies. Was he as conservative in his work as at home? Not apt to challenge tradition or overturn prevailing “truths”? That possibility had never entered her mind before, and she couldn’t accept it now. He’s a scholar, a scientist above all. She glanced at Amir, who met her eyes with remarkable tenderness.

  “Trust your father,” was all he said.

  She swallowed and regained her focus. “Let me ask you, Andrea, and you, Ibrahim”—she turned from one to the other—“why do you think this find is significant? What do you know that I don’t know?”

  “Andrea,” said Ibrahim, nodding in her direction, his head bobbing up and down.

  Andrea stalled by taking a long sip of her tea. “Perhaps for three reasons,” she began. “First, it was found in the cave thought to have once been inhabited by the Holy Family. Of course, this story is most likely myth, and there is no telling how many people have lived in that cave over the generations. We need the carbon-14 dating to situate the possible author or authors. However, the language is very familiar to me, not only as Aramaic, but as similar in phrasing, pacing, to certain renowned documents—I’m still examining that premise. From the small phrases I’m able to translate now, I can say it is written in first person.”

  First person?

  Ibrahim swayed in his seat. Amir raised an eyebrow, glanced at Justine, and stepped alongside her, lightly brushing her shoulder.

  Justine blinked; her face flushed again, this time with excitement. She jumped up and paced the room, taking immense strides. “When can we get a team together?”

  CHAPTER 9

  LESS THAN A WEEK LATER, JUSTINE STEPPED out of a taxi and onto the high curb at number ten Aisha al-Taimuriyya, the address of her new sixthfloor apartment. A narrow but popular artery traversing Garden City, the street began near the Four Seasons Hotel on the Corniche, curved east past the Indonesian Embassy and police station, and emerged near the Blue Nile grocery on Qasr al-Ainy. The elderly Nubian boab, or doorman, his skin the glistening color of eggplant, hurried to take several of her bundles.

  Shortly, Nadia, Amir, and Mohammed would be there to help her move in. She’d had two messages from Nasser. It looked as though he wouldn’t make it this morning.

  Nestled entirely between the Corniche on the Nile and Qasr al-Ainy, Garden City, like Cairo itself, was the home of secret gardens. Hidden behind stone, brick, or wrought iron walls and gates, and shielded from the omnipresent swirling dust, lay recurring images of the Garden of Eden. Burgeoning flowers and palms, willows and sycamores, green lawns sprouting fountains, and perfumed air all held the secrets of this glorious city. Such beauty was more and more rare here; secrets, more precious still.

  At one time, these gardens had not been so secret. Flowing from palatial villas down to the Nile, colorful carpets of grass and flowers had hosted grand parties and welcomed Cairo’s elite. Sumptuous villas had been home to Egypt’s wealthy businessmen, foreign diplomats, and rich scoundrels. Such grandeur grew from the dark side of colonization—wealth at the expense of the many—yet Justine remembered her excitement whenever her family had received invitations to these splendid events.

  Carrying her buckskin suitcases and followed by the overloaded boab, she took the wrought iron elevator to the sixth floor and entered her new home. She motioned to the boab to set everything just inside the door beside her luggage. After thanking him for his assistance, she walked from room to room, elated to have a place she could finally call her own, even if it belonged to someone else. The furnished apartment was large and full of sunlight. Overgrown cabinets of Islamic design almost brushed the high ceilings. A large living-dining area, a small office, and two bedrooms led to a terrace running the length of the apartment. The European-style kitchen, while small, was fully equipped. Every window opened onto a view of buildings turned brown by smog and neglect, lines full of clothes, unkempt rooftops covered with TV satellite dishes and an occasional pigeon cage. What happened to the glory of Garden City? How was it that its residents had grown accustomed to such deterioration? She knew the answers to her own questions: servants could no longer be used like slave labor; thankfully, power had been more democratically dispersed in the fledging republic.

  Within the hour, her friends arrived with arms full of falafel, foul, and pita, towels, glasses, sheets, and lilies. By early afternoon, having unpacked Justine’s few personal belongings and dozens of books, the moving party was sitting down to pita sandwiches and tea.

  “One of your most important relationships here,” Nadia said between bites, “will be with the boab. You said his name was Kamala?”

  Justine nodded.

  “The boab can be your protector, your mother, your father, your eyes, and your ears. Little goes on in a Cairo apartment house without the notice of the boab.”

  “Never get on the wrong side of that man,” Amir said as he flopped into an armchair nearby to check his texts. “Kamala may sleep on a cot in the back of the garage, but his dignity demands respect.”

  “While I don’t need another parent, I can use extra eyes and ears,” grinned Justine. “Thanks for the advice.”

  Mohammed stood by the table methodically cutting into a falafel and placing both halves into a hummus-lined pita. “How did you survive the earthquake, Justine? A traumatic beginning to your life here. I was concerned when I left you at the hotel that it might be too much excitement too soon.”

  “Thanks to you, Mohammed, I survived it well—physically, at least. But I’ve found the deaths of the children in Birqash and the damage to the poorer areas of Cairo rather devastating,” she said, tucking both hands into her blue jeans and hunching her shoulders. “It made me feel rather helpless.” She looked at Nadia, whose eyes still welled up at the reminder of the children and their families.

  “People who suffer in Egypt don’t have any kind of insurance,” said Amir. Justine noticed the muscles on either side of his mouth tighten and then relax again. “It’s not like the U.S., where even the Hurricane Katrina victims expected substantial help.” The room was growing warmer as sunlight insistently seeped through the French doors.

  “Expected is the operative word there,” said Justine. “It wasn’t necessarily forthcoming.” She paused. “Amir, you’ll remember the story of the taxi driver and his daughter, the horribly scarred young woman I referred to our agency doctor . . .”

  “What happened to her?” asked Mohammed.

  “Dr. Bakry j
ust said, ‘Send her to me,’ and when he saw the girl he referred her on to the head of plastic surgery at Cairo University, who will perform corrective plastic surgery on her. No cost. No fuss.” Justine was still astonished by the selfless action, executed so casually.

  “I’m not surprised,” said Nadia. “Egyptians turn to one another. For medical care, small loans to help with family weddings, bean pots, sewing machines . . . it’s our way.”

  Mohammed stood silent, pensive, his plate in one hand, juice in the other. “I recognize and appreciate how we help each other, yet, unfortunately, much of the help here now—in Shoubra and Bulaq particularly, as well as in old Islamic Cairo—is coming from the Muslim Brotherhood. They’re doling out money for food, clothing, and rebuilding.” A hint of sarcasm permeated his voice as he spoke of the proud and patriotic group that had originated in Egypt in the ’20s during the struggle against British occupation and King Farouk’s oppressive rule. Presidents Nasser and Sadat had both been part of this group, but had separated themselves from the Brotherhood’s influence as the social changes the two presidents advocated for confronted a sharpening fundamentalist agenda. An agenda that had been suppressed for the last thirty years.

  “I’ve seen their charities at work,” Nadia added. “When your mother and I used to visit families who had taken out microloans, Mohammed, I saw young men from the Brotherhood going into damaged houses—that was after the ’92 earthquake—and handing out money.” She absentmindedly fingered her wedding band. Justine had observed Nadia in at least a dozen black blouses made of every kind of material. In the Muslim world, mourning a spouse was a lifelong occupation.

  “The Brotherhood originated direct family help and taught it to fledgling groups like Hamas and Hezbollah. I’ve got to admit, it works well,” Mohammed said. “Bastards,” he added caustically.