Night Train to Memphis vbm-5

by Elizabeth Peters

  ‘Come now, Jean-Louis, you’re supposed to be mingling,’ he said.

  ‘Me too,’ I said, rising. ‘I haven’t had a chance to talk to our former shipmates.’

  Larry accompanied me. ‘Moody fellow, isn’t he?’ I inquired, when we were out of earshot.

  Larry frowned. ‘He hasn’t any reason to be moody right now. What did he say?’

  ‘I’m afraid I didn’t pay much attention.’

  ‘He was talking a lot. Unusual for him, he’s not very sociable.’

  ‘He was fishing for compliments,’ I said. ‘Getting them too.’

  Our shipmates greeted us with open arms. Sweet, who had apparently recovered from his bout of sickness, said slyly, ‘We were afraid you had deserted us, Vicky.’

  ‘I’d desert you too if I had the chance,’ Suzi said with a big grin. ‘How about wangling an invitation for me, Vicky?’

  ‘I was only asked . . . because of Schmidt,’ I said, fumbling for a reasonable explanation. ‘He and Larry are old pals.’

  ‘What about the Tregarths?’ Suzi demanded. ‘They aren’t old pals of Larry’s, are they?’

  ‘I’ve no idea what prompted that invitation,’ I said.

  ‘Tregarth is good at pushing in where he’s not wanted,’ said Perry, joining us.

  ‘I can’t get anyone an invitation,’ I said pointedly. ‘I wouldn’t be rude enough to try.’

  ‘So what are your plans?’ Sweet asked. ‘Will you be going on to Aswan with us day after tomorrow?’

  I said I hadn’t made up my mind. Some of the others were still wavering, but the majority had opted for the Aswan cruise. Including Sweet and Bright. Obviously I’d been wrong about them. But I still couldn’t understand why Bright had lied about his origins.

  ‘At any rate we will enjoy one another’s company for a day or two longer,’ Sweet said cheerfully. ‘Are you coming to Karnak with us this afterooon, Vicky?’

  The party was breaking up. Feisal began herding the group towards their bus and I returned to ‘my’ stretch limo, but not before I had agreed to join the others that afternoon. It was pure reverse snobbism; I didn’t want them to think I was too stuck up to mingle with non-billionaires.

  There were five of us in the limo, not counting the chauffeur, but it wouldn’t have seemed crowded if John hadn’t been one of the five. At least I didn’t have to sit next to him. I climbed in after Schmidt, and Larry took the seat beside me. Leaning back with a sigh, he loosened his tie.

  ‘You must be glad it’s over,’ I said.

  Larry glanced at me and smiled sheepishly. ‘I hate ceremony and long speeches. I am glad to be done with that part of it, but it will be hard to leave Egypt.’

  I figured I’d done my duty as a sympathetic female, and I couldn’t feel too sorry for a man who owned – if I remembered the newspaper stories correctly – six other residences, including a chateau in the Loire Valley.

  ‘You can always build another house,’ I said.

  ‘I have too many damn houses already,’ Larry said, with an uncanny impression of having read my thoughts. ‘No, I won’t live in Egypt again.’

  ‘I’m sure they’ll always have a spare room for a guest,’ said John.

  He was referring to Jane Austen, but none of the others caught the allusion, or its implications. Nasty old Aunt Norris in Mansfietd Park always had a spare room because she never invited anyone to stay with her.

  Schmidt chuckled fatly. ‘For you, Larry, there will always be a spare room anywhere in Egypt. You have done the country a great service. When will you be departing, mein Freund? You must tell us when we are in the way. The ETAP hotel, I understand, is very fine; we can take ourselves there at any time.’

  Larry assured us we were welcome to stay as long as we liked. ‘The packers are coming tomorrow. It will take a while, since some of the ceramics and furniture are old and fragile, so there’s no hurry. Have you decided on your future plans?’

  He looked at John. John was looking at me. One eyebrow went up.

  I remembered what Achmet had said. This seemed like an appropriate moment to indicate my complete disinterest in John Tregarth alias Smythe and all his works. ‘I’m going to Aswan,’ I said.

  ‘But Vicky,’ Schmidt began.

  ‘You don’t have to come along, Schmidt.’

  ‘I will go where you go,’ Schmidt said, as I had hoped he would. Otherwise I’d have had to kidnap him and drag him away by force.

  So that afternoon we went to the temple of Karnak. John and Mary decided to join us. I hadn’t invited them. Schmidt had. Larry declined; he said he had work to do, and he’d seen the temple several dozen times.

  We had to wait a few minutes for the rest of the group to arrive. Studying the crowds that filled the passage between the rows of ram-headed sphinxes, I said, ‘I can’t imagine what this place is like when tourism is at its peak. look at all those people.’

  ‘This is not an area where there have been attacks on tourists,’ Schmidt said, nodding encouragingly at Mary.

  Mary’s devoted husband wasn’t so considerate of her feelings. Frowning slightly, he said, ‘Not precisely true, Schmidt. There was a bombing here a couple of years ago and another attempt earlier this season.’

  ‘Ah, but those attacks were in objection to what the fundamentalists consider the worship of the old heathen gods,’ Schmidt explained. ‘Some of these peoples’ – his pointing finger indicated a group of unkempt visitors in ponytails and cut-off jeans – ‘the New Agers, you call them, hold ceremonies in the temple. We, we don’t worship anything.’

  ‘We sure don’t,’ I agreed. John grinned at me. Avoiding his eyes, I went on, ‘You’re right about that bunch, Schmidt, they’re all wearing amulets and crystals and earrings and junk. Why do they have to look so scruffy?’

  ‘Their spiritual consciousness has elevated them above earthly desire,’ said John, in a voice I knew well. ‘I should think you’d approve, Vicky; you dislike crass materialism and vulgar acquisitiveness, don’t you?’

  I was saved from replying by the arrival of our shipmates. Falling in step with Feisal I remarked, ‘You’re looking very pleased with yourself, Feisal. Are you going to tell me about that good news you mentioned, or is it still a secret?’

  ‘Not any longer.’ Feisal stopped and turned to face me. He thumped himself on the chest. ‘Greet, with proper respect, the assistant director of the institute.’

  I caught his hand and shook it vigorously. ‘Congratulations! I’m absolutely delighted.’

  Feisal kept hold of my hand as we walked on. ‘You’ll help me celebrate, perhaps. I promised to show you some of the night life of Luxor.’

  ‘That would be great. But why are you guiding this tour?’

  ‘I’m no quitter, as you Americans say. As soon as I get the last of this lot onto the plane in Cairo I’ll come back and take up my new position. In the meantime I will carry out my duties like a good little soldier. All right, friends, gather around; the temple of Karnak is not one temple but a complex of temples, built over many centuries. The Avenue of Sphinxes . . .’

  People wandered off as we proceeded, some to stop and rest, others to inspect a particular area in more detail. Schmidt and I had paused to look at an obelisk and he was lecturing me about the career of Hatshepsut – ‘one of the first feminists, Vicky, she should be of interest to you’ – when I saw a familiar face that didn’t belong to our group. A familiar beard, rather.

  ‘I have been looking all over for you,’ Jean-Louis said grumpily.

  ‘What for?’ I asked. He certainly didn’t look like a man who has finally found the girl of his dreams.

  ‘To show you the temple, of course. Didn’t you ask that I do so?’

  ‘We are delighted to have you, of course,’ Schmidt exclaimed, before I could answer. Just as well; I would have said no, I hadn’t. However, I was familiar with the habit some people have of believing in their own fantasies. I must have made a hit with Jean-Louis. That would teach m
e not to go around oozing sympathy.

  He’d worked on the Aton Temple project for three years before leaving it to take up Larry’s offer, and he knew Karnak as I know my own apartment. We finally managed to pry him away from that part of the temple and talked him into showing us boring tourist stuff like the Hypostyle Hall. ‘Impressive’ is an overused word, but it’s the only word for that cluster of mammoth columns. The only thing wrong with it was the tourists. One group had squatted in a circle and I recognized the seekers after truth we had seen entering the temple earlier. They were muttering to themselves and waving their hands. I heard somebody say something about auras.

  ‘Cretins,’ Jean-Louis muttered.

  ‘They do no harm,’ Schmidt said tolerantly.

  Finally I decided I’d absorbed enough for one day and I cut Jean-Louis short in the middle of a translation of the annals of Thutmose III. He was reading the hieroglyphs off the wall. It was a wasted exhibition so far as I was concerned; how did I know he was reading them right?

  Jean-Louis consulted his watch. ‘Yes, we must go. Mr Blenkiron has sent the car for us, it will be waiting.’

  I spotted Suzi as we passed through the Hypostyle Hall. She waved and I waved back, but Jean-Louis didn’t stop. I deduced that we were late. When we emerged from the last – or first, depending on which way you were going – pylon into the Avenue of Sphinxes, John and Mary were waiting. She looked done in. I didn’t blame her; we had covered a lot of territory and still seen only part of the enormous complex.

  That was when it happened. The force of the explosion threw me to the ground, or maybe it was Schmidt who threw me to the ground. He was on top of me when I got my breath and my wits back.

  I decided I probably wasn’t dead. I wished I could be sure about Schmidt. The plump pink hand lying on the ground near my face was flaccid and unmoving. I tried to squirm out from under him. People were screaming and there were sounds like firecrackers.

  The weight on my back lifted. I got to my hands and knees, then to my knees. John was bending over Schmidt, shaking him. Schmidt’s head rolled back and forth, then his eyes opened and he let out an anguished bellow. ‘Vicky? Vicky, wo bist du? Bist du verletzt? Ach, Gott – ’

  ‘You’ll do,’ John said, stepping back. ‘Stop shrieking, Schmidt, she’s not hurt.’

  ‘Speak for yourself.’ My shins and forearms had taken the brunt of the fall. Blood oozed from a few square feet of scraped skin. ‘What happened?’

  Schmidt, crawled over to me and enveloped me in a hug. ‘It was a bomb, Vicky. Terrorists, setting off bombs and shooting. Gott sei Dank, you are not injured.’

  I could see over his shoulder. The cloud of dust from the explosion was still settling. Other people had been bowled over but they didn’t appear to be badly hurt, for they were moving and cursing. All except one. The bloody cavern where his face had been was framed all around by sticky wisps of hair.

  Chapter Nine

  MARY HAD CRUMPLED to the ground in a huddle of green voile and tumbled brown curls. John dragged her to her feet. ‘Let’s get out of this.’

  ‘Shouldn’t we wait for the police?’ I squawked. I was trying not to throw up.

  John didn’t bother to answer. Towing his stumbling bride, he was already on his way, leading the retreat as usual. Schmidt tugged at me. ‘He is right, there may be more shooting. Come, we can do nothing here.’

  That seemed to be the general consensus. Screaming and shoving, people poured through the entrance. Their sheer numbers overwhelmed the guards, who appeared to be as shaken as the visitors. They were waving their rifles around in a disorganized manner, and one of them fired into the air. I think it was into the air. If it was intended to stop the stampede, it failed, the sound of gunfire made people even crazier. The crowd exploded into the parking lot, carrying us with them.

  John materialized out of somewhere. He grabbed Schmidt by the collar. ‘This way.’

  Ed was standing by the car. When he saw us coming he opened the back door and motioned vigorously with the large, heavy, lethal object he was holding in his right hand. ‘In. Move it!’

  John still had Schmidt by the collar. He heaved him in, gave me a hard shove, and followed close on my heels, scooping said heels and the legs to which they were attached in with him. The door slammed and the car took off.

  We got our arms and legs sorted out eventually. Ed had gotten in front with the driver. The gun was no longer in sight. Mary crouched in the corner; her eyes were open, but they had a fixed, glassy stare. Her pretty frock was crumpled and dusty. Perched on the jump seat opposite, John ran his fingers through his dishevelled hair. There wasn’t a mark on him, or on Schmidt, who had cleverly managed to fall on top of me. I was bleeding all over Larry’s expensive velvet upholstery.

  I fully expected a visit, if not a reprimand, from the police. I should have known no such vulgarity would be perpetrated on a person like Larry. Schmidt was in my room trying to persuade me to let him wind yards of bandages around my scraped arms and legs when a servant knocked at the door and informed us that the master hoped we would join him on the terrace for drinks.

  The others were already there. Mary had changed her dress. She was wearing white – and the Greek earrings. Larry began fussing over my injuries, but I cut his expressions of sympathy short. ‘Just scrapes and bruises. I’m fine. Unlike poor Jean-Louis. It was he, wasn’t it? I couldn’t . . . I couldn’t be sure.’

  ‘So I have been informed. He was carrying identification, of course.’ Always the perfect host, Larry handed me a glass before dropping into a chair. He covered his eyes with his hand. ‘I dread telling his parents. They were so proud of him.’

  A tear rolled down Schmidt’s cheek. ‘It is furchtbar – frightful, terrible. Just when he had attained his fondest dream. What will you do now about the institute, Larry?’

  Impeccably groomed, gracefully lounging, John drawled, ‘Every cloud has a silver lining, they say. This seems to be Feisal’s silver lining. Or are you going to appoint someone else as director?’

  Even Larry had a hard time remaining courteous in the face of that outrageous speech. He answered shortly, ‘Feisal will assume the post, of course. He’s on his way here now. We have a number of things to discuss, so I’ll have to ask you to excuse me when he arrives.’

  ‘Have they caught the terrorists?’ I asked.

  ‘Not yet. Apparently there was a great deal of confusion. The police are rounding up – ’

  ‘The usual suspects,’ I murmured. From what I’d heard ahout the SSI, the usual suspects wouldn’t have a pleasant time.

  John put his glass on the table and stood up. ‘I think I’ll have a swim. Anyone join me?’

  Mary shook her head. Schmidt said doubtfully, ‘It does not seem proper.’

  Hands in his pockets, lips pursed in a whistle, John sauntered towards the house. His pitch was perfect. I recognized the strains of ‘The Wreck on the Highway.’ He really was exceeding himself in tactlessness that afternoon. There hadn’t been any whiskey but there had been plenty of blood. And I hadn’t heard anyone pray.

  Larry reassured Schmidt – ‘After all, you hardly knew the poor man – ’ but Schmidt remained seated. I wouldn’t like to imply that he was lacking in sensitivity, but I suspected mixed motives. He wanted more to eat and more to drink and more in the way of information. Browsing among the hors d’oeuvres, he peppered Larry with questions. Had anyone else been injured? Had a motive for the attack been established? Where had the bombs been placed, how had they been set off . . . Larry had no answers. A servant finally came to announce that Feisal was waiting in Larry’s study, and Larry excused himself. Schmidt decided he’d have a swim after all and since I could not decide which alternative was less appealing – having a heart-to-heart with the pregnant bride or watching the pregnant bride’s husband flex his muscles at me – I went to my room.

  I didn’t know the answers to the questions Schmidt had asked either, but my admittedly confused memories of
the event raised a couple of others he hadn’t asked. I had seen a big hole in the pavement and a lot of dust, but to the best of my recollection not a single column had toppled and nary a sphinx had been scarred. I had seen a lot of fallen bodies, but only one that was undeniably dead. The murder of a foreigner, and a foreign archaeologist at that, would raise a real stink. The usual suspects were in for a hard time. But maybe this time they were fall guys, not perps. (Note the technical vocabulary. We well-known amateur sleuths like to sound professional.)

  I cannot say I felt particularly professional at that moment. What I felt was scared spitless, as my mother used to say, innocently unaware of the word the euphemism concealed. Bits and pieces of a theory were scuttling around in my brain like beetles with too many legs and shifty dispositions, darting for cover behind lumps of stupidity whenever I tried to swat one of them. The overall pattern was so preposterous I’d have laughed it off if anyone but John had been involved.

  One thing stood out shining and clear though, and when I joined the others for dinner I was trying to think of a way of proposing it that wouldn’t make matters even worse. Larry did not join us. He had sent his apologies, claiming he would be busy all evening. It seemed a heaven-sent opportunity for making my move.

  ‘I feel guilty about taking advantage of Larry,’ I said, poking at a delectable fruit salad. ‘He’s too polite to say so, but I’m sure we’re making things more difficult for him. Not only is he getting ready to leave, but Jean-Louis’s death will involve a good many additional administrative problems. What do you say we check out and move to a hotel, Schmidt?’

  Usually Schmidt was agreeable to any activity as long as he could do it with me, but this time he looked mutinous. ‘We can give help and comfort to our poor friend – ’

  ‘I doubt you can give him the sort of help he needs,’ John said dryly. ‘I think Vicky’s hit on a splendid idea. We’ll miss you when you’re gone, of course. Both of you.’

  If that wasn’t a hint I’d never heard one. From the tilt of John’s eyebrow I deduced it was also a quote from one of Schmidt’s country ballads. Lots of them are about missing people after they’ve gone, and in most cases ‘gone’ doesn’t mean temporarily removed from the scene.