by Anne Rice
Miles went on as if he hadn't heard this outburst, with maddening civility.
"Now, the Earl, we must talk to the Earl also, and at the moment we can't find him." He looked to Alex.
"I don't know where my father is," Alex said helplessly.
"And Henry Stratford, where can we find him?"
The two Egyptians hurried through the narrow streets of old Cairo, with the blanket over their shoulders, the bulging body quite a weight in the noon heat.
But it was well worth the sweat and time taken, for the body would bring them plenty. As the winter months approached, tourists would descend in droves upon Egypt. They had found a good and handsome corpse just in time.
Finally they reached Zaki's house, or "the factory," as it was known to them in their own tongue. Through the courtyard gate they entered, hurrying with their trophy into the first of a series of dimly lighted rooms. They had taken no notice of the mummies propped against the stone wall as they passed, or of the numerous dark, leathery bodies on tables in the room.
Only the stench of the chemicals bothered them. And they waited impatiently for Zaki to come.
"Good body," said one of the men to the workman who stirred a giant pot of bitumen in the center of the room. A great bed of coals beneath it kept it bubbling, and it was from this pot that the foul smell came.
"Good bones?" asked the man.
"Ah, yes, beautiful English bones."
The disguise was a good one. Thousands of such Bedouins roamed Cairo. He might as well have been invisible, that is, when he took off the sunglasses which did occasionally bring stares.
He pocketed them now beneath the striped robe as he entered the rear yard of Shepheard's Hotel. The brown-skinned Egyptian boys, lathering a motor car, did not even look up from their labor as he passed.
Moving along the wall, behind the fruit trees, he approached a small nondescript door. An uncarpeted rear stairs lay within. Mops, brooms, a wash pail in the alcove.
He took the broom and made his way slowly up the stairs. He dreaded the inevitable moment when Julie would ask what he had done.
She sat on the side of the bed, eating from the tray he'd put before her on the small wicker table from the yard. She wore a thin chemise now, the only undergarment he'd found in Malenka's closet. He had helped her put it on.
Malenka had prepared the food for him-fruit, bread, cheese and wine-but she would not come near the room.
The creature's appetite was fierce and she ate almost savagely. The bottles of wine she'd drunk as if they were water. And though she had remained in the sun steadily, no more healing had taken place, of that he was fairly sure.
As for Malenka, she remained shivering in the front room. How long he could control her, Elliott was unsure.
He slipped away now and went in search of her. He found her crouched, her arms folded, against the far wall.
"Don't be frightened, dear," he said to her.
"My poor English," she said in a whisper.
"I know, my dear, I know." But that's just it, he didn't know. He sat down in the peacock chair again, and took out a few more bills. He gestured to her to come and take them. But she merely stared at him, dull-eyed, shivering, and then turned her head to the wall.
"My poor English,'' she said, "is in the boiling vat by now.''
Had he heard her properly?
"What vat?" he asked her. "What are you saying?"
"They make a great Pharaoh of my English. My beautiful English. They put him in the bitumen; they make a mummy of him for tourists to buy."
He was too shocked to answer her. He looked away, unable to form the simplest words.
"My beautiful English, they wrap him in linen; they make him a King."
He wanted to say, Stop, he could hear no more. But he only sat there in silence until suddenly the sound of the gramophone startled him-the sound of a pinched voice speaking English grinding out from the other room. The English records. She had found them. He trusted that they would content her, that they would give him this little time to rest.
But there came a great shattering crash. The mirror. She had broken it.
He rose and hurried towards her; she stood rocking back and forth on the carpet, the broken glass all over the dressing table, all over the floor around her, the gramophone droning on.
"Regina, " he said. "Bella Regina Cleopatra. "
"Lord Rutherford," she cried. "What has happened to me! What is this place?'' A long string of words in a strange tongue she spoke rapidly, and then the words gave out altogether into hoarse hysterical cries breaking one after another, and finally forming one great roaring sob.
Zaki inspected the operation. He watched them sink the naked body of the Englishman deep into the thick, viscous green fluid. On occasion, he would embalm these bodies; he would carry the replication of the original process to the extreme. But that was no longer necessary. The English weren't so keen anymore to unwrapping them at their parties in London. It was only necessary to have them thoroughly soaked in bitumen, and then the wrappings could be applied.
He approached the vat; he studied the face of the Englishman floating below the surface. Good bones, that was true. That's what the tourists like-to see a real face beneath the linen. And this one would look very good indeed.
A soft knock on her door.
"I don't want to see anyone," Julie said. She sat on the couch in the sitting room of her suite, beside Samir, who had been holding her as she cried.
She could not understand what had happened. There was no doubt Ramses had been in the museum, that he had been badly wounded, and that he had escaped. But the murder of the maid, she could not believe he would do such a thing.
"The theft of the mummy, this I understand," she had told Samir only moments before. "He knew that woman; he knew who she was. He could not bear to see the body desecrated any longer, and so he sought to remove her."
"But none of the pieces fit together," Samir said. "If he was taken prisoner, who then removed the mummy?" He paused as Rita answered the door.
Julie turned, caught a glimpse of a tall Arab standing there, in full flowing robes. She was about to turn away when she saw a flash of blue eyes.
It was Ramses. He pushed his way past Rita and shut the door. At once she rushed into his arms.
She did not know what her doubts had been, or her fears. She held him, burying her face in his neck. She felt his lips graze her forehead, and then his embrace tightened. He kissed her hard, yet tenderly, on the mouth.
She heard Samir's urgent whisper. "Sire, you are in danger. They are searching for you everywhere."
But she couldn't release him. In the graceful robes, he looked more than ever otherworldly. The pure precious love she felt for him was sharpened to the point of pain.
"Do you know what's happened?" she whispered. "A woman in the museum was murdered and they are accusing you of the crime."
"I know, my dearest," he said softly. "The death is on my head. And worse horrors than that."
She stared at him, trying to accept his words. Then the tears rose once again, and she covered her face with her hands.
She sat on the bed, staring stupidly at him. Did she understand when he told her the dress was a very fine dress? She mimicked the words of the gramophone in perfect English. "I should like a little sugar in my coffee. I should like a bit of lemon in my tea." Then she fell silent again.
She let him button the pearl buttons; she stared down in amazement as he tied the sash of the pink skirt. She gave an evil little laugh and lifted her leg against the heavy gores of the skirt.
"Pretty, pretty," she said. He had taught her that much hi English. "Pretty dress."
She brushed past him suddenly and picked up a magazine from the dressing table and looked at the pictures of the women. Then in Latin, she asked again, What is this place?
"Egypt," he told her. He had told her over and over. Then would come the blank look, then the look of pain.
Timidly he
lifted the brush, and brought it down through her hair. Lovely, fine hair. Hair so black there were feint glints of blue in it. She sighed, lifted her shoulders; she loved him brushing it. A low laugh came from her lips.
"Very good, Lord Rutherford," she said in English. She arched her back and moved her limbs languidly, a cat stretching, her hands exquisitely graceful as she held them poised in the air.
"Bella Regina Cleopatra," he sighed. Was it safe now to leave her? Could he make her understand? Perhaps if Malenka stood outside in the street before the bolted door until he came back.
"I must go now, Your Majesty. I must get more of the medicine if I can."
She turned, stared at him blankly. She didn't know what he was talking about! Was it possible she could not even remember what had happened moments before? She was trying to remember.
"From Ramses," he said.
There was a spark in her eye, then a deep shadow over her face. She whispered something, but he didn't hear it. "Kind Lord Rutherford," she said.
He pulled firmly, on the hairbrush. Her hair was now a great soft drift of rippling waves.
The strangest light had come into her expression; her mouth was stack; her cheeks flushed.
She turned and stroked his face. She said something quickly in Latin that meant he possessed an older man's knowledge and a young man's mouth.
He puzzled over it, trying to think as she looked into his eyes. It seemed his own awareness of things drifted in and out; one moment she was this deeply afflicted creature he must care for; the next the great Cleopatra, and the full shock of it struck him again.
Luscious, this woman; the seducer of Caesar. She drew closer to him. It seemed the shrewdness had returned. Then her arm went up around his neck. Her fingers stroked his hair.
Warm her flesh. Dear God, the same flesh that had lain rotted and black beneath that dirty glass, thick and impenetrable as tar, that mass.
But these eyes, these deep hazel eyes with the tiny flecks of yellow in the pupils, impossible that they had sprung alive again from the dark filth. The filth of death. . . . Her lips touched his suddenly. Her mouth opened against his and he felt her tongue sliding between his teeth.
Instantly, his sex stirred. But this was madness. He was incapable. His heart, the pain in his bones, he could not possibly . . . She pushed her breasts against him. Through the cloth he felt their throbbing heat. The lace, the pearl buttons; they only made her seem all the more deliciously savage.
His vision blurred, he saw the naked bones of her fingers as she reached to force his hair back oft" his forehead, as her kiss became more insistent and her tongue plunged deep into his mouth.
Cleopatra, the lover of Caesar, of Antony, and of Ramses the Damned. He closed his arms around her waist. She went back on the lace pillows, pulling him down on top of her.
He groaned aloud, his mouth gnawing at her. God, to take her. His hand gathered up the silk skirts and plunged between her legs. Moist, hot hair mere, moist lips.
"Good, Lord Rutherford," she said in Latin. Her hips knocked against him, against his sex bulging and ready to be free.
He opened the few buttons quickly. How many years had it been since the thing was done in such haste? But there was no question now of what was meant to happen.
"Ah, take me, Lord Rutherford!" came her hissing whisper. "Plunge your dagger into my soul!"
And this is how I die. Not from the horrors I've beheld. But from this, this which is beyond my strength yet irresistible. He kissed her almost cruelly, his sex pumping between her damp thighs. The sweet evil laughter was bubbling out of her.
He shut his eyes as he thrust against the tight little fount.
"You cannot stay here, sire," Samir said. "The risk is too great. They're watching the entrance. Surely we are being followed wherever we go. And sire, they searched your room, they found the ancient coins. They may have found . . . more than that."
"No. There was nothing else for them to find. But I must speak with you, both of you."
"Some sort of hiding place," Julie said. "Where we can meet."
"I can arrange this," Samir said. "But I need a couple of hours. Can you come to me outside the Great Mosque at three o'clock? I shall dress as you are dressed."
"I'm coming with you! "Julie insisted. "Nothing is going to keep me away."
"Julie, you don't know what I've done," Ramses whispered.
"Ah, then you must tell me," she said. "These robes, Samir can get them for me as well as for himself."
"Oh, how I love you," Ramses whispered very low under his breath. "And I need you. But for your own sake, Julie, do not-"
"Whatever it is, I stand with you."
"Sire, leave now. There are policemen everywhere in this hotel. They will come back to question us. At the mosque. Three o'clock."
The pain in his chest was bad, but he wasn't dying. He sat slumped in a small wooden chair near the bed. He needed a drink from the bottle in the other room, but he had no stamina to get it. It was all he could manage to slowly button his shirt.
He turned to look at her again, her smooth waxen face in sleep. But now her eyes were open. She sat up and held out the glass vial to him.
"Medicine," she said.
"Yes, I shall get it. But you must stay here. You understand?" In Latin first he explained it. "You are safe here. You must remain in this house."
It seemed she did not want to do this.
"Where will you go?" she asked. She looked around her; she looked at the window beside the bed, open onto the slanting afternoon sun and a barren whitewashed wall. "Egypt. I do not believe this is Egypt."
"Yes, yes, my dear. And I must try to find Ramses."
That spark again, and then the confusion, and suddenly the panic.
But he rose; he could delay this no longer. He could only hope and pray that Ramses had somehow gotten free of his captors. Surely Julie and Alex had marshalled the appropriate lawyers. Whatever the case, he must try to reach the hotel.
"Not very long, Your Majesty," he said to her. "I shall return with the medicine as soon as I can."
She did not appear to trust him. She watched suspiciously as he went out of the room.
Malenka sat crouched still in die corner of the sitting room. She was shivering and she stared at him with empty, stupid eyes.
"My dear, listen to me," he said. He found his cane by the drinks cupboard and took it in hand. "I want you to go out with me, lock the door and stand guard."
Did the girl understand? She was staring past him; he turned around and saw Cleopatra in the door-barefoot, her hair streaming, so that again she looked utterly savage in the proper pink silk English dress. She stared at Malenka.
The girl recoiled, whimpering. Her loathing and fear were plain.
"No, no, dearest. Come with me," Elliott said. "Don't be afraid, she won't hurt you."
Malenka was too terrified to listen or obey. Her piteous cries grew louder. Cleopatra's blank face had changed to a mask of rage.
She came towards the helpless woman, who stared at the naked bones in her hand and in her foot.
"She's only a servant girl," said the Earl, reaching out for Cleopatra's arm. She pivoted and slapped him, knocking him backwards so that he fell against the parrot's cage. As Malenka screamed in pure hysteria, the bird began to screech frantically, beating his wings against the bars.
Elliott tried to steady himself. The girl must stop screaming. This was a disaster. Cleopatra, looking from the screeching bird to the screaming woman, appeared on the verge of hysteria herself. Then she lunged at the woman, grabbing her by the throat and forcing her down on her knees as she had done to Henry only hours before.
"No, stop it." Elliott hurled himself at her. This time he could not let it happen, and once again he felt her powerful blow knocking him yards across the room. He fell against the wall, his hand up on the plaster. Then came that sound, that unspeakable sound. The girl was dead. Cleopatra had broken her neck.
The bir
d had ceased its screeching. It stared with one round senseless eye into the room. Malenka lay on her back on the carpet, her head wrenched to one side at an impossible angle, her brown eyes half-closed.
Cleopatra stood staring down at her. Thoughtfully she looked at the girl. Then she said in Latin:
"She is dead."
Elliott didn't answer. He gripped the edge of the marble-top cupboard and pulled himself to his feet. The throbbing in his chest meant nothing to him. Nothing could equal the pain in his soul.
"Why did you do it!" he whispered. Oh, but was he mad to ask such a question of this being? This thing whose brain was damaged, without doubt, as her body was damaged, beautiful though she was.
