Masks of the Lost Kings (Suzy da Silva Series)

by Tom Bane

  CHAPTER NINE

  Suzy hurried down Park End Street, aware that to be late for such an appointment would be like failing the first test. She had to show these people how keen she was, and how reliable. She had spent ten frantic minutes online finding everything she could about the Horus Corporation and she was reading as she went, bumping into people and apologizing and trying to think through what she was going to need to say to this man to persuade him she would be a good investment for his money. There was surprisingly little background information available about Horus, beyond the fact that they were a global telecommunications company.

  She realized she was lucky to be given such an opportunity, but she wished the Professor could have allowed her at least a few days’ notice so she could have prepared some sort of presentation. Maybe he did it deliberately, wanting to put her under pressure. She already felt uneasy that her research goals had been redefined to reflect someone else’s agenda. Suzy also recalled her father’s warning about academic integrity in research, something that can easily be undermined by private sponsorship. However, this was her only chance, and although she felt neither mentally prepared nor properly dressed for a business meeting, this Al Kharismus guy was going to have to take her just the way she was.

  She had received a strange email from an anonymous address before she had left for Horus: To find the Tutankhamun cycle, look for the hidden doorway, in the mask, in the tomb before Xul, a human number, the alpha and the omega. She tried to put it out of her mind, probably just some nutcase that sent random messages as spam. She had to concentrate on getting the funding she needed for her thesis.

  She reached the discreet doorway of an immaculate town house, and noticed the dead black eyes of several camera lenses watching her from different angles as she pressed the buzzer. The door instantly clicked open and she found herself in an elegant granite reception area walking toward a Middle Eastern woman sitting behind a desk. Once the door clicked shut behind her, cutting out the buzz of the street, the stillness inside the building was total.

  “Good afternoon,” the woman smiled sweetly. She had a hint of an accent but Suzy couldn’t place it. “Are you here to meet Dr. Al Kharismus?”

  “Er, yes,” Suzy was surprised to find that she was expected. Surely there would be visitors coming and going from a place like this all day?

  “It’s Miss da Silva, isn’t it?”

  Suzy nodded. The serenity of this immaculate woman was making her feel scruffy and flustered. She took several deep breaths as the receptionist spoke softly into her headset.

  “Miss da Silva to see Dr. Al Kharismus … Certainly.” She looked back up at Suzy. “Getsu will take you up to the executive suite.”

  A slightly built, elegant Japanese man in a pristine black suit and white shirt had silently materialized just behind her. Getsu bowed his head and gestured for her to walk toward the elevator doors that stood open and waiting.

  There was no sensation of motion as the lift rose silently through the building. As the words “Executive Suite” appeared in pale neon, the doors slid open and Getsu indicated for her to step out ahead of him with another courteous bow.

  The heavily carpeted suite was decorated in grey and black, broken up by gentle pools of light from subtle down-lights. The corridor was guarded by ranks of mini stone obelisks, interspersed with rare orchids. They walked toward a frosted glass wall, flanked by what looked to her nervous eyes like priceless Egyptian antiquities, on black granite pedestals. She would have liked to stop and examine them but her mind was too preoccupied with the ordeal that lay ahead of her.

  As they approached the doors, the frosted glass of the windows melted into transparency. The glass must have been made of some kind of electronic liquid crystal, Suzy thought. Beyond was a man sitting at a table inside the meeting room waiting for her. The doors opened automatically and, as Getsu stood back to let her walk through, she noticed he was not much taller than she.

  “Miss da Silva.” The man inside, who she was sure must be Al Kharismus, rose from behind the table and walked toward her. A perfectly tailored dark suit disguised his generous stomach and exactly the right amount of gleaming white shirt cuff protruded as he extended his hand to her. The red silk of his tie matched the handkerchief folded neatly in his breast pocket. Everything about him from the dome of his bald head to his gold cufflinks and hand-stitched leather shoes seemed burnished to a rich sheen. His neatly trimmed beard enhanced the impression that he was of Arab descent.

  “My name is Al Kharismus.” He held her hand tightly then raised her fingers, brushing them with his lips as he stared at her unashamedly. Her casual student uniform of jeans and a loose shirt emphasized her exquisite figure, although Suzy’s mind was fully occupied by the urgency of getting her research funded.

  As Getsu stepped back out of the room, the glass frosted over again, cutting them off from the outside world.

  “Please,” he gestured toward a red leather chair, “take a seat. Make yourself comfortable. Water?” he asked, filling a sparkling glass for himself.

  “No thanks, I’m OK,” said Suzy gazing around her. At one end of the room a simple alabaster vase stood on a plinth. Then her attention was caught by a statue that stood in a pool of light in another corner. Al Kharismus followed her gaze.

  “I see you like the Falcon-god Horus, God of the Pharaohs. In Ancient Egypt, the falcon soared above all living creatures. Sometimes I think we waste our lives and our potential. Few of us ever soar to the heights we are capable of. The key to immortality, Suzy, is first to live a life worth remembering.”

  Suzy looked back at him sharply. It was almost as if he had read her mind. How did he know that questions like these constantly haunted her?

  “So, Miss Da Silva,” Al Kharismus said, steepling his hands and resting his lips on the manicured tips of his fingers “why will future generations remember you?”

  Suzy searched her mind and found nothing to say. His suave presentation had succeeded in knocking every thought out of her head.

  “I’m not sure yet,” she said after what seemed like an age. “But I feel that I do have a destiny.” That sounded so weak, but Al Kharismus seemed to accept it, giving a small nod of understanding.

  “Well, you certainly seem to impress my good friend, Professor Piper. So, what is it I can do for you?”

  Suzy was puzzled that her gentle professor, so immersed in the city’s academic life, had so much influence with a man like this. And how did Al Kharismus know what the Professor thought about her? Had they talked in the last few minutes or had she come up in conversation between them before? She really needed time to think through what was going on, but time was one thing they were definitely not granting her.

  “I don’t know quite how to approach this,” she said, feeling completely out of her depth. “I … I would like to apply for funding from the Horus Corporation for my doctoral thesis.” There, she’d said it. It was out in the open and he could either say yes or no. Al Kharismus didn’t seem shocked by the request or amused. He merely nodded as if she had told him what time of day it was. He was obviously waiting for her to continue.

  “The subject of my thesis will be the connection between Ancient Egypt and Christianity, and also the links between the Amarna Period, Tutankhamun and Christianity. I want to reinvigorate the debate and put some factual context around it, using the twin constructs of evidence and proof that underpin all serious academic research.”

  “I see, I see.” Al Kharismus leaned forward, apparently interested in what she was saying. “Could you give me a little more flavor of your proposed research?”

  Suzy pulled out a photo of a large boat that she had stuffed into her bag in her rush to get there in time. She laid it on the desk in front of him, aware of how crumpled and unprofessional it looked in these surroundings. Al Kharismus looked at it without touching it, as if he feared it might soil his fingers.

  “Well, for example, looking at these funerary boats. The sola
r barge, or barque, was a mythological representation of the sun riding around the sky on a boat. This Khufu ship was found buried outside the Great Pyramid, sealed in an underground pit. It was forty-four meters long. The ship of the Sun god was richly adorned, complete with a steering oar. It contains a central cabin structure that in turn holds an image of the god flanked by two kneeling celestial beings whose outstretched wings touched each other. They provided protection similar to what can be seen on Tutankhamun’s sarcophagus where they represent the gods Isis, Nephtys, Selkis and Neith.”

  “Yes, I know the boat you mean,” Al Kharismus said, sitting back in his chair again. “I have visited it many times in the Solar Barque museum just outside the Great Pyramid.”

  “Really?” Suzy said without thinking. “I would love to go there.”

  Even before the shadow of a frown flickered across his polished brow, she realized she now sounded like an inexperienced amateur. How could someone hope to be seen as an expert Egyptologist having never been to the Great Pyramid? She decided to keep talking.

  “The Ark of the Covenant, or Moses’s Ark, was made on the orders of God, and is described in detail in Exodus. It was to be made of acacia wood overlaid in gold and the golden cover should have at its ends ‘two cherubim of gold, the cherubim angels spreading their wings on high, screening the ark with their faces one to another.’ The similarities between that description and the solar barge are striking. In fact the cherubim are identical to those on the solar barge, although they are guarding the Pharaoh’s sarcophagus rather than the stone tablets with the ten commandments of God. And I have found out that the acacia was sacred for Egyptians. Here, take a look.”

  Suzy pulled out two more photos she had hastily torn out of her book, one of the Ark of the Covenant and the other of the solar barge cabin with the angel lookalikes.

  Al Kharismus leaned forward again and inspected the pictures thoughtfully. “Anything else?” he asked, straightening back up in his chair.

  “OK,” she said, taking a deep breath. “I have researched the sacred gods of the Pharaohs and of kingship, the cobra, the vulture and their similarity with the lotus flower … and they may be linked.”

  “The Virgin Birth?” he interrupted with a skeptical arch of his eyebrow.

  Suzy couldn’t hide her disappointment. “Oh, you have heard of that link before.”

  “Not something mainstream archaeologists like to talk about,” he smiled. “Don’t want to offend the Christians and all that.”

  “Did you know that there are animals that are capable of experiencing virgin births?” Suzy tried again to shock him with something new.

  “No. That I did not know. Which animals?”

  “It’s only during the last few years they have discovered that animals, such as sharks and komodo dragons, can experience virgin births.”

  “Very interesting, Miss da Silva,” he chuckled. “Perhaps my gender will be defunct in a few years. Tell me something else new.”

  “Well, the three wise men, they could be related to the Pyrami—”

  “Yes I know the hypothesis,” he interjected. “We three Kings of Orion are, and all that.”

  “But there is more to it. The three gifts they brought the infant Jesus—gold, frankincense and myrrh—may have been linked to the Ancient Egyptians. Gold was a traditional symbol of kingship in Egypt. Frankincense was a resin obtained from the pine tree and has its earliest recorded instance in the tomb of fifteenth century BC Egyptian queen Hatshepsut. Ancient Egyptians burned frankincense as incense and ground the charred resin into a powder called kohl. Kohl was used to make the distinctive black eyeliner seen on so many figures in Egyptian art. Finally, myrrh was a gum resin used as a powerful medical sedative, which was symbolic of death, but it was also associated with higher knowledge. The Ancient Egyptians had a word for this higher knowledge—Daath—this transformed into the modern day word ‘death,’ but it’s still used in the Tarot in its uncorrupted form of Daath.”

  “Hmm, yes.” Kharismus looked thoughtful. “The three wise men each had something symbolic of Ancient Egypt. Quite a piece of research. And the word, Daath—I must take a look at that. I am sure your friend Piper would want some scientific proof but it sounds so right.”

  “There is scientific evidence. I found that archaeologists managed to forensically identify frankincense found at the ancient Egyptian site of Quasr Ibrim, in the Nubian Desert, providing a direct evidential link. Some people even think one of the wise men, Balthasar, was Nubian or a black African. Professor Piper tells me that Rubens painted him that way and so did other rebel artists in the Renaissance, but then the image of the black wise man became less popular later in history.”

  “Yes,” Kharismus agreed, “the name, Magi, used for the three wise men signifies magic. The Egyptians had extraordinary magic of this kind: alchemy, astrology and ancient numerology. These were their true gifts to the world, not just their Pyramids. Their understanding of the cosmos was highly advanced. Their ancient arts like magic are ridiculed now, but they were so far ahead of their time. So,” Kharismus slapped his palms on the table as if to signify that now it was time to talk business. “What is it you need from me?”

  “I have no money and the University won’t back me for this,” she explained. “I need to go to Egypt and I need the time to do the research.”

  “We can get you to Egypt,” Kharismus waved his hand as if brushing away a gnat. “We will arrange your accommodation and your flight. Getsu will come with you to look after you.”

  “I’m sure that won’t be necessary,” Suzy protested, not liking the idea of a chaperone cramping her style.

  “I’m afraid I must insist, Miss da Silva. You are a young woman—and a very attractive one—traveling to a dangerous city for the first time. You would be our responsibility and my lawyers would worry about liability should anything bad befall you. You can trust Getsu to be discreet. He will not hamper your researches.”

  “I need to travel there fairly soon,” she said. “I am running late with my research. My thesis is due before the end of June.”

  “You can go tomorrow if you like,” Kharismus shrugged. “We will make the arrangements. But you must be careful investigating Tutankhamun. Remember the curse. Many have met ignominious ends.”

  “Oh, I don’t think I believe in the curse,” she laughed, assuming he was teasing her now. “It’s an urban myth. They did a study that showed that all the people connected with the Tomb actually lived just as long as anybody else would, on average, so it’s just the press fantasizing and trying to mislead people.”

  Kharismus shook his head. “You’ve been listening to Professor Piper too much. He does not believe in the curse, you know; he’s too rational these days. Did you know that Carnarvon’s dog died at Highclere Castle in Berkshire at the same time as his master died in Cairo 2000 miles away?”

  “Yes I read that, but it doesn’t necessarily mean anything. It might be a coincidence, right?”

  “Did you know that Carnarvon died cutting a scar from a mosquito bite to the face?”

  “Yes, I knew that as well.”

  “But did you know that Tutankhamun’s mummy has a scar at exactly the same point on his face? And he died of malaria as well.”

  “No,” Suzy was taken aback for a second. “Probably just another coincidence.”

  “Ah, well, let me tell you about another mere coincidence, Miss da Silva. When they transported Tut’s death mask to England in 1972, Dr. Gamal Mehrez, Director of Antiquities in Cairo, said he did not believe in the curse either, that all the deaths were coincidences. He died of a heart attack the day after the RAF plane took off for England.” Suzy opened her mouth to protest but Al Kharismus put up a finger to silence her and continued talking. “The RAF aircrew accidentally kicked the casket in the plane. They did not show it enough respect. Three of them became seriously ill shortly afterward, and the other airman suffered a heart attack every year on the anniversary of the flight, unt
il finally he died six years later. I know this for a fact, because I went to see his family near Oxford. That is the true reason Egypt never sent Tutankhamun’s death mask abroad again and why it must stay in Cairo forever. I bet the good Professor Piper did not tell you that, did he?”

  Once again Suzy felt confused about her professor. Why had Piper never mentioned these things, even if only to dismiss them? She shook her head.

  “OK, thank you for warning me. I will be careful and respectful.”

  “Good.” Kharismus stood up. “Let me accompany you back down to reception.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Kharismus, I really am very grateful.”

  Suzy stood up and they shook hands again as he steered her toward the door.

  Outside the meeting room, the Japanese guard was waiting quietly.

  “Ah, let me introduce you, properly. This is Getsu. He will be your protection. He will stick to you like glue, but he is very discreet and you will barely notice him. What matters is that he will guard your life like it was his own.”

  Getsu bowed and summoned the lift. The three of them descended in silence. As they walked across reception toward the door, Suzy noticed a huge man standing like a statue in the shadows. He was well over six feet and must have weighed more than two hundred and eighty pounds. When he moved, Suzy jumped.

  “This is Rakuta,” Al Kharismus laughed. “One of Getsu’s colleagues.” When Rakuta stepped forward into the light, Suzy saw he had a huge, spidery facial tattoo, the Moko tattoo of the Maori warriors.

  When she arrived back at New College, Suzy checked her computer and found that her secret mentor, Professor Logan, in Boston, had forwarded her an email he had received:

  Where the feathered snake crosses, lies the numbers of the Gods, the Lord’s number, a human number.

  She had no idea what it meant or why the professor had sent it to her, or indeed who had sent it to him, but there was too much to be done to prepare for the following day for her to spend any time dwelling on it. A couple of hours after she had left the Horus office, a messenger appeared at her door with an envelope containing a carefully typed itinerary for her trip. Finally, it seemed, she really was on her way to the pyramids she had been studying and dreaming about for so many years. She looked through the itinerary for details of her flight, and realized that Al Kharismus was giving her use of the Horus company jet. There was another smaller envelope inside the first one, marked “money for expenses.” She opened it. One hundred twenty-dollar bills fell into her lap.