by C J Turner
They travelled non-stop for several dusty hours and Max was hot, tired, aching in every limb from being bounced along on the bumpy roads, thirsty and for once, extremely irritable. They at last pulled off the main route and into the welcoming shade of a stand of palms grouped round a sprawling old village house, built in the traditional manner with adobe brick walls and flat roof. Their arrival caused a great deal of interest amongst the men gathered round the few outside tables there, who laid aside their bubbling narghilas (water-pipes) to greet them enthusiastically. In no time, two or three black veiled women came out to lead them into the dim and blessedly cool interior, where they found simple refreshments already laid out for them. After a wash and the judicious application of a long cold beer or three, which they had brought with them, Max announced himself a new man and ready to start on the final lap of their journey. However, Blake, who had spent most of the time pouring over his notes and jotting down some calculations in the margin, had arrived at some unpalatable conclusions.
‘Change of plan, what change of plan? You said we had to go back to the old excavation site to find Meredith!’ Max exclaimed accusingly.
‘I said we might pick up a lead there, that’s all. And we still can, but first I would like to take a small detour.’ Blake replied coolly. ‘There’s something I need to check out first.’ He reached out and lightly tapped a photocopy of some unidentifiable object that lay on the table in front of him, ‘Trust me on this, Max - I’ve got an idea.’
‘Huh, when have I heard that before!’ Max grumbled. ‘I wish you would tell me what’s on your mind!’
‘I am not entirely sure myself, yet - of anything, but I would remind you that we are up against some extremely ruthless individuals, so stay alert!’
‘Don’t worry, I did not come entirely unprepared, you know.’ Max adjusted his jacket, and Blake caught a fleeting glimpse of a shoulder holster. His eyebrow flew up and his mouth curling appreciatively. Max nodded, and continued, ‘So where are we going from here?’
‘Not sure Max, but I’m following a map, a map to the past.’ Blake answered thoughtfully. ‘We will have to see where it takes us.’
Carefully folding up the square of paper and thrusting it into his jacket, he walked out into the bright sunshine to supervise who was going to stay with the hired jeeps and which of the men they would need to go with them.
Exasperated, Max watched him go.
Chapter 12
Amunet had been dragged through a low doorway into a dark shadowy room, dimly lit with a couple of smoky oil lamps. Caught off guard initially, she recovered almost immediately, spinning away and dropping threateningly into attack posture as soon as she was released. Her captors recognised the body language of one who was not going to wait politely for an explanation, and backed nervously away.
Amunet had been through a lot that night and her tangled emotions screamed for release. Drawn taunt as a bowstring, she welcomed the chance of some action at last.
Slowly, she moved smilingly towards the two men, her hands held loosely by her sides making little curling movements of encouragement. Her attackers, on the other hand, now had the worried look of men who had gone fishing for sardines and had hooked a barracuda by mistake. Even as they hesitated, and Amunet gathered herself to spring, a strong authoritative voice rang out and stopped her dead in her tracks.
‘Amunet! Leave them be – they are your friends! Look, my child, it is I, your Aunt Hameeda!’
A tall elderly woman in a black cloak emerged from the shadows surrounding the young girl and gathered her into wiry arms. The hood was pushed back to reveal strong features etched in with harsh lines, a face weathered by many years of exposure to the dry winds of the desert. Deep sockets with dark eyes filled with concern looked anxiously into the bewildered young face before her.
The shaken girl stood dazed and uncomprehending as she tried to adjust to this new and unexpected development.
‘My child, what have they done to you?’ Hameeda crooned over the bewildered girl as she led her over to a couch on the far side of the room. She hurled a brief command over her shoulder to the two men, both hardly more than boys, who gave audible sighs of collective relief, and hurried to do her bidding.
Amunet shook her head in disbelief and got a grip on herself. ‘No, I am fine Aunt - I was just so amazed to see you, if you knew how much I’ve wanted to speak to you and then you were suddenly there, it was like a miracle – I thought I must be dreaming!’
The old lady smiled grimly and patted her hand reassuringly.
‘We heard of your encounter with that scum of the bazaars, and when Karem brought word that the creature had been found dead, I knew something had gone very wrong and came to find you, guessing that you might need help.’
While she talked, her Aunt was calmly dispensing the coffee that one of the young men had brought to her with a deferential bow. ‘Just as well, I did, or it might have been Karem and young Jaleel here, who needed to be rescued!’ she continued, with a brief upwards smile to the brawny young men who served her.
Abashed, they responded with dazzling grins, nodding their curly heads in rueful agreement.
‘Now, tell me all that has happened since we last met. I can see you have been hurt and - ’
‘Hush, Aunt, I am well, I tell you. Listen now and I will tell you all, but quickly, because we have little time and then we must decide what has to be done.’
So Amunet told her Aunt the whole, starting from the time she arrived in England, the Rassim’s first abortive attempt to kidnap her, and their second attempt to put her out of action for good. She skimmed over her injuries and the amnesia, and told instead how they had stolen the receipt from her pocket, but misread Blake’s address, and targeted the wrong house. When they did not find the dagger on the first attempt, they had settled down to wait until the owner of the house returned, unaware that their real quarry was living just across the road. Then the shock when Amunet had recognised Mustaf, and her memory had returned
Hammeeda’s face mirrored her growing consternation, but she did not interrupt. She felt Amunet was skirting round some unpalatable fact, and was proved correct when Amunet, took a deep breath and covered her Aunt’s hand with her own. In a voice carefully devoid of all expression, Amunet spoke of her conviction that Blake was no longer to be trusted. She had confirmed that the dagger had been delivered to the right address, he therefore knew her identity but had said nothing. It could only mean that he saw the dagger as a means of finding the intact tomb for himself.
‘But there is no intact tomb, I told you that the chamber Na’ill found was empty except for a few poor scraps,’ her Aunt protested.
‘Well, Ahmed seems to think there is, Blake was there at the time, perhaps he knows something we don’t.’
Hameeda shook her head, this did not sound at all like the man she had known and whom her husband had liked and trusted.
Hurriedly, before Hameeda could start asking the type of searching questions which she was in no mood to answer, Amunet moved swiftly on.
The first night she had gone out to find old Ben Ferouk, hoping that he would take a message to Hameeda, she had unwittingly interrupted a nasty scene outside one of the more unsavoury coffee shops, and had intervened to save a young boy from a severe beating. The lad had run off but the drunk had turned his attentions on her.
Now she coloured under her Aunt’s disapproving eye and shifted uneasily on her seat.
‘I know it was not well done of me - he was so drunk he could hardly stand, but he would not stop hitting the little boy. I felt like killing him, but it was only his arm that was damaged – I hope every time he is tempted to throw a punch in the future, he will be reminded of me!’
An icy shiver trickled down her Aunt’s back. So much anger, so much enmity against those who scorned the law; the criminals who cared nothing for how many innocent lives were lost as long as they fulfilled their mean and greedy ambitions. Such as they had been responsible fo
r the explosion that had killed Amunet’s parents and set her on her determined way to make a stand against such evil.
Hameeda was suddenly filled with an inexplicable sadness for her niece, as perhaps one would contemplate a flower bud in winter. Perfect with the promise of beauty, but doomed to be killed by the frost, before it had a chance to come to full blooming. Recovering herself, she shook her head and tut-tutted disapprovingly under her breath, she was not usually given to such flights of fancy.
‘Your training was not undertaken to waste on such as that snapping cur – and he has no future –he is dead, murdered by the Rassim gang!’ Hameeda admonished her sharply, but her eyes softened as she added, ‘You will at least be pleased to know that the boy is fully recovered, and he and his family are your devoted slaves for life!’
Amunet looked up quickly, her face alight with pleasure and her Aunt laughed ruefully, but shook her head with mock severity at her unrepentant niece.
‘Scum such as that bring about their own fate. Many people saw what happened, but were too frightened to help the child; I gather that his attacker had a brutal reputation, drunk or sober! If he had not returned to the café to boast of what he would do to you when he found you, the Rasims would not have heard of the incident. It created quite a stir and you were described in detail. Later, they picked him up to question him. But obviously, knowing nothing, he could tell them nothing, so they cut his throat and left him near your hotel as a warning to you.’
Amunet’s eyes widened, she had not been aware of this. Nodding grimly, Hameeda continued.
‘They made sure that the threads from the shawl you were wearing, stained with his blood, which he had torn from you in the fight, were found in his hands. They hoped to incriminate you – if you were in jail, neither the Professor nor myself would have been able to help you. The Rassims have many friends, both in and outside the law! Karem here heard all this and contacted me. We have been waiting for you to leave your hotel, and when Karem and Jaleel saw you tonight, they followed you until they could collect you – discreetly. I did not think you would go with anyone you did not know, and we could not afford for you to make a fuss and draw attention to yourself again. We did not want anyone else to trace where you are.’
Her Aunt leant forward and patted her arm reassuringly.
‘We must make sure that it stays that way. Tomorrow, Professor Gasgoine and Sir Maxwell leave on their expedition, and you will go with them. No, no need to look like that, they will not be aware that you are there, I promise you. But you know, you are wrong about the Professor, out of anyone in the world, I would trust him with my life.’
Amunet looked at her sadly, ‘I wish you were right, Aunt but he has changed, oh so much, in the last few year, perhaps his values and priorities have changed too.’
‘Oh yes, he was a green boy then, now he is a man. Of course he has changed in twelve years, it is a long time.’ Hameeda laughed, the hollow sound echoing strangely in the quiet room. ‘And so have you, my chicken, so have you! Did you not think of that? You met him only briefly as a child and you were veiled, why would he recognize you? But listen, this is what we have contrived.’
Their plan was simple; all Luxor knew that Sir Max and Professor Gasgoine were hiring for an expedition into the desert. Tomorrow, one of their camel boys would inexplicably fall sick and be unable to leave.
Fortuitously, his young cousin would be at hand to take his place.
The long white galabeeyah and loosely tied turban still worn by many of the native men, one end of which was often draped over the nose and lower part of the face when travelling, would provide an excellent disguise. She would also wear a long waistcoat to further conceal her shape. So long as she remembered to stay in the background and keep her eye lowered, she should be able to pass inconspicuously among the other men. In this way, Amunet could watch and wait to see what unfolded, without revealing her own hand until she knew what he was up to. This suited her admirably, not least because if the Rassims started anything, she would be on hand to take the appropriate action. She guessed Blake could take of himself and Max as well, but she also thought that he may not be taking the threat posed by the gang seriously enough.
Amunet found that most of the men taken on for the Professor’s party were known to the Sitt Hameeda, and pledged to help her in any way they could. She had no brief except to stay alert and be ready for trouble. Her Aunt felt they were coming to a climax and that it was not far away.
Amunet was bitterly concerned that not only had she lost the dagger, but she also had to nervously confess that she had left the necklace behind as well. Rather surprisingly, Hameeda had merely said that doubtless the Professor would have found it and kept it safe. But Amunet thought she looked grim at the news of this new catastrophe, and it seemed to her that there was a greater urgency in her Aunt’s preparations.
Two days later, night had fallen like a shroud over the western desert and Blake lay apparently asleep in his narrow camp bed. Never trust appearances. Opening one eye just a slit, he cautiously watched the dark figure go stealthily through the heap of clothes discarded carelessly some few hours earlier, until a tiny chink of metal told him that the thief’s search had been rewarded. Blake waited until the man had squirmed his way back under the tent flap and prepared to follow.
The Professor had come well equipped on this trip and as he did not intend to flounder around in the dark, decided to make for a vantage point on higher ground where, with any luck, he could find and follow the thief’s progress with night vision binoculars. His aim was not to catch the man, but to find out where he went. Blake suspected that he was on his way to a meeting with a confederate to pass on information about the expedition, and where they were making for.
Back in the camp, Natheer, their reis, the foreman of the expedition, shook Amunet from her sleep. Putting a finger to his lips, he beckoned her to follow him.
The desert floor was not smooth sand but uneven with hidden pits and tumbled rocks which made the going extremely hazardous. The huge arc of the sky was blazingly lit by a zillion twinkling stars and their cold white light was enough for the shivering girl to pick her way silently past the tents and sleeping men, and clamber down a sandy bowl like depression, out of sight and ear shot of the camp. Natheer moved closer to her and spoke, not in a whisper that would have carried in the night air, but in a low soft voice just on the edge of hearing.
‘There is something wrong, Sitt, I fear we have brought a traitor with us. He could be just a common thief, of course but the Lady Hameeda told us to be wary. I have just seen Sitpah leaving the Professor’s tent from under the back flap. He is not one of our own. He did not see me and I marked which way he went, but thought to tell you first before I followed. He will not get far without donkey or camel.’
‘You did well, Natheer. Show me which way he went, for I must follow him to see what he is up to,’ she breathed back.
He shrugged his shoulder in disapproval, but silently led her round to the other side of the camp, pointing out a faint but rocky path leading indirectly to an escarpment of sheer cliffs. As he turned to go with her, Amunet put a restraining hand on his arm.
‘No, you must stay here and cover for me - this may be nothing, but I have to check it out.’
With no more sound than a cloud passing over the moon, she slipped away into the night.
Natheer stared after her into the hostile shadows. His mistress must be mad to allow the young Sitt to go on such a dangerous mission, but his orders were clear, get her there and let her get on with it and he could only trust to Allah that she would come back safely. He had been told, of course, of her astonishing fighting skills (his lips twitched with amusement at the very idea), but when for the first time he saw her slight form and gentle smile, he had thought that the stories must be greatly exaggerated.
Now he fervently hoped, that for her sake, rumour had not lied.
In the shadows deep under the overhang, the motionless night air was
suddenly rent by the unexpected sound of a mobile phone. Jarringly incongruous in the brooding silence of the desert, it rang just once and the response was immediate.
‘Get ready – he is coming.’
Amunet paused abruptly; she had heard something, barely a flicker of sound but not right, an incongruity carrying just enough in the cold clear night air to make her freeze and then, very cautiously, move forward again, but this time in a slightly different direction.
Hidden by a contortion in the soaring limestone cliffs, Sitpah reeled back from a vicious blow that cut his lip open, the bright scarlet blood spraying like the petals of a flower over his assailant’s immaculate white robe. He fell sprawling against the jagged rocks whimpering with pain, while the other man absently rubbed a fist, viciously encrusted with heavy gold rings, on the palm of his other hand which was held in a sling across his chest, and looked down in disgust at his clothes.
‘Now, look what you have done to me, you cretinous idiot! I tell you to bring me artifacts and all you can come up with is this miserable rubbishy trinket that anyone can buy for a few coins in the bazaar! What’s more, your clumsy bungling has alerted that accursed man. Perhaps we should leave you here tied to a rock so you can explain yourself to him – or better still, cut out your worthless tongue so that you cannot explain! Ha! That is a much better idea – Ali, fetch me a knife.’
The speaker, a slight, suave man with receding grey hair and a jutting prow of a nose, wore a light coloured European suit under the, now regrettably stained, white native robe. Petulantly, he threw the necklace to the ground, where his companion swiftly swooped upon it. There could not have been any greater contrast between this unlikely pair, as this other man was much older, weak looking and emaciated, carrying a long staff of polished wood. He looking more like a wandering mendicant dressed in disreputable old patched robes, with his straggling grey hair and matted beard, but his rheumy, red-rimmed eyes were still keen with a shifty intelligence. Holding the necklace up close to his face, he turned the scarab over and over between long, dirty fingers, mumbling incomprehensibly under his breath.
