by Tom Bane
“I have heard that before,” Suzy said, squinting up in the fading light of the evening, “I did not realize you could still see the actual paint.”
“I have arranged an early entrance for you,” Omid said, leading her on to the pyramids. “Some of the people I see, the tourists from Europe and America, think that the pyramids were built by alien beings. I do not know why they are thinking this. I consider it an insult to Egyptian people.”
“So you should,” said Suzy indignantly. “Maybe the monuments are so incredible and perfect that some people just cannot believe it; they simply cannot see how ordinary people could construct something so beautiful and so huge, but you should be proud of your nation’s achievement.”
“Thank you,” he smiled sweetly, as if she had complimented him personally. “Indeed they are incredible. Just south, over there, is the recently discovered workers’village, where the people who built the pyramids and the Sphinx lived and died. The distinguished Dr. Hawass, head of Egypt’s antiquities program, has partially excavated this area. They’ve uncovered part of a vast royal complex that contained bakeries, paved streets, and a huge dormitory for the rotating force of temporary workers. An estimated twenty thousand workers took eighty years to build the pyramids at Giza, and they lived right there, but I can show you the manmade imperfections in the pyramids that I have noticed—they make them with the hand of man, if you wish to see them.”
“That would be very interesting.”
“Come, let’s follow the causeway to the second Pyramid of Khafre.”
He led the way, talking as he went, clearly happy to have someone showing such intelligent interest in the subject he seemed to love above all else.
They continued along the sandy causeway to the Pyramid of the Pharaoh Khafre, the second-largest. Suzy wished she had more time to take it all in.
The imposing Pyramids of Giza seemed to set alight the sky, as she watched the fiery sun turning it successive shades of pink, apricot, orange and purple, as it sank snugly between the two largest pyramids and shone down the causeway, illuminating the Sphinx like a searchlight.
Robed men were dragging camels along the horizon as the tourists started to evaporate for the night. The plateau took on a menacing air at this time in the evening as armed guards patrolled, on the lookout for any drunken tourists who might decide to try and climb the sides of the Pyramids, or maybe even the rare tomb raider.
Omid pointed at the top of the Pyramid of Khafre.
“Look, Suzy, is it not the most divine spectacle on earth? The only surviving seventh wonder of the world. Its sides are at a perfect angle of fifty-two degrees. How did they achieve such a perfect fifty-two-degree angle of slope? They were masters of the angles, a skill they had acquired in part through astronomy, and also through mathematics. Each mason that worked on finishing the outer blocks had a template with an angle of fifty-two degrees that he used to cut his block to fit just perfectly. But take a very careful look at perfection,” Omid grinned as he pointed to the upper pinnacle of the pyramid again, tracing his hand against the triangular silhouette. “The errant hand of man is at work.”
“Oh, yes,” Suzy exclaimed in surprise. It was actually easier to make out in the setting sunlight. “I can see it’s twisted slightly at the top.”
“Exactly, the stones are not quite flush at the top. This shows that the pyramids aren’t perfect. They are only a couple of millimeters off, but it’s enough to discern the twist. We don’t advertise this though. I have only ever told you and two others that it is not perfect, Professor Piper and an American archaeologist. This, I think, proves it was built by man.”
The sun was almost completely below the horizon as Suzy followed Omid over the tricky, undulating sand to the base of the first and largest Pyramid of Khufu, also known as the Great Pyramid.
“Its original name was Khufu Akhet, because of its resemblance to the sacred shape of the akhet when the rising sun nestled between the two pyramids” said Omid.
It looked threatening in the twilight and Suzy kept losing her footing on scattered rocks. It was growing very cold now; the heat of the sun had been withdrawn and the whole Giza plateau had gone deathly quiet.
Now she could see the outbuildings and the mortuary temples and the three prominent mini-pyramids that lay at the foot of the Great Pyramid of Khufu. These were the often ignored Queen’s Pyramids. They were still massive even though they were only one-tenth the height of the giant Great Pyramid. She remembered Piper’s Oxford lecture: the Nubian queens had pyramids the same size as their kings. It seemed some were more equal than others in Ancient Egypt, Suzy thought, wryly.
They arrived at the rocky base of the Great Pyramid. There was not much left of Khufu’s mortuary temple, but Suzy could make out its outline in the twilight of the night lamps. She remembered her version of the Orion Correlation theory in which the hidden doors of the mortuary temples aligned with the three stars of Orion. She also remembered the way she had ruined Doctor Tom Brooking’s slideshow and was unable to suppress a mischievous smile. The Great Pyramid loomed above them, looking like it was going to devour them out of the black sky. Suzy checked over her shoulder. She had a feeling she was being watched.
“Don’t worry, Miss Suzy,” Omid laid a comforting hand on her arm. “It is common to feel this way in the presence of the Great Pyramid. She is merciful but you should still respect her.”
He removed his shawl and cracked it loudly like a whip in the air. Two figures appeared like shadows on the horizon, and tracked toward them. Suzy felt a surge of panic. She had been right, someone had been watching. She was suddenly aware of how vulnerable she was. If anything went wrong now there was no one around to witness it. For the first time she regretted giving Getsu the slip back at the hotel. Had she been foolish? Was she in over her head? She told herself that Omid must have the temple guards under his wing and that the snapping of the head cloth must be a prearranged secret call.
As two military figures walked toward them, their progress lit only by the dull glow of the odd halogen light that pockmarked the Pyramid plateau, Omid seemed to be suddenly seized by a doubt.
“Hide, hide,” he hissed, roughly pushing her head down into the rocky sand. Suzy was shocked. What the hell was going on?
Her body suddenly alert and ready for flight, she somersaulted over a big limestone block, break-falling as she somersaulted. She could see a sub-machine gun at the guard’s side. Was this a planned rendezvous? Did Omid know what he was doing? What was going wrong?
She could feel the warmth of Omid’s body as he crouched close beside her, the powerful scent of his skin filling her nostrils. His body quivered. He had crouched down far too slowly; the guard would surely have to be blind to have missed him. Suzy could see the tops of the guards’ heads as they halted about ten feet away. One of them casually lit a cigarette.
“It’s bloody foreigners, much trouble, kill dem all!” one of them said, dropping the safety catch on his gun before pirouetting round in the dark. Surely they had seen Omid. The guard stooped low and rested the muzzle up in the air just above their heads. There was a huge silencer on the barrel and Suzy braced herself to run.
Then he started to dance around like a whirling dervish, pointing the gun at the three pyramids, like an excited schoolboy raking the sky with imaginary bullets. Was he high on something? Had he been smoking too much shisha? Her heartbeat went into overdrive.
Then, just as abruptly, he stopped and pointed the gun straight toward Suzy.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are!” he chanted in a singsong voice.
“Ha, ha, my friend, Ismael.” Omid leaped up, apparently recognizing the voice.
“Did we scare your pretty friend?” laughed the guard and Suzy had to make a conscious effort not to hit him. Her anger was lightened by the relief of finding it had all been a childish joke. She knew they needed the help of these men to get inside the Great Pyramid so she smiled grimly and said nothing.
“Yes, yes,” Omid laughed with what sounded to her like a false jollity, like he was humoring the other men. “And you scared me as well.”
“Ha, ha, safety catch is very funny, no? It had you shitting in boots; you could not see it was me, my friend.” As they laughed, the two guards were eyeing Suzy up and down, one of them pointing at her suggestively with the muzzle of his gun.
“Ah, such a beautiful woman.” The big-mouthed one lurched forward and tried to kiss her hand. She snatched it away.
“Hmm, you have some balls, lady, huh?” he said, turning back to Omid. “Why you bring woman at this time of night, my friend? A little bit of the belly dancing in the pyramid perhaps?”
“This is Captain Ismael,” Omid said, as if trying to correct the inappropriate behavior of his contacts before things got out of hand.
“Delighted,” Suzy muttered, looking away, leaving the men to their business.
“Yes, so am I, I am bloody delighted,” sneered the captain. Omid looked embarrassed but was obviously holding his tongue.
“So, you want to get inside of her?” the captain leered. “Hmm, the Pyramid, she is a tricky woman at this time of night, be careful. I will watch out for you, unlock gates and turn lights on, have safe journey … into the underworld.” He took a final drag of his cigarette and laughed as he ground the stub out beneath his boot, all the time staring at Suzy.
“This isn’t very discreet. Are we going to get into trouble?” Suzy whispered to Omid, as they followed the captain.
“Enjoy,” he smiled reassuringly. “Be happy that we enter the pyramid. I have done this many times before. Everything will be fine.”
They made their way to the visitors’ entrance. Alarm bells were ringing in Suzy’s head. She knew exactly how illegal this was. Most visitors were forbidden from exploring the innards of the pyramid, apart from the King’s Chamber, and only then under strict supervision. But, on the other hand, she knew she would never get another chance to roam all around the secret tombs on an unofficial visit. Professor Piper had pulled a lot of strings to get her this far and she knew Omid was right, she should be happy.
“Have a nice time with yourself,” the other guard jeered, waving at Suzy as he padlocked the iron gate behind her and walked off into the darkness, following his captain.
“I thought they were going to wait there for us?”
“They are,” Omid hesitated, “but they don’t want to go to prison. While we are inside, they do not want to get caught if the gate was left unlocked. Think about it—if other guards passed by then there might be trouble if the gate was unlocked. We meet them in an hour. They will go for a walk, then come back and unlock the gate and let us out. Everything is easy. Relax, Miss Suzy. I will look after you.”
She wished she could feel more confident, but the way he had jumped when the guards approached made her wonder who was going to be looking after whom. She already felt like she was the one in prison but she bit her tongue. She knew this was the way things were done in Egypt, with fixers. Professor Piper had said there was nobody better than Omid.
Omid’s mood seemed to have changed. He was very excited now, almost like a child as he set off into the dimly lit interior with her following. The tunnel started to ascend steeply and she thought they would head straight up to the King’s burial chamber, but Omid stepped down a side hole and another small steel grille appeared in front of them. He pulled a jangling ring of keys from his pocket and deftly unscrewed the bolts, removing the grille and waving Suzy to follow him. They then started to descend, forced to crouch low as the rock walls and ceiling closed in on them.
“We are going down to the subterranean chamber first,” he explained over his shoulder as he shuffled ahead. “You will be one of the precious few to have witnessed it; nobody can go there, only the real special ones.”
Suzy could feel the “baksheesh-ometer” was going to break soon. He must have paid a hefty sum, a big bribe, to get the keys to this forbidden tunnel. But she was too elated by thoughts of what she was about to see to worry about the cost.
All her muscles were starting to ache as they shuffled on down the narrow tunnel, bent double. By this stage it was no more than three feet high and was perfectly angled at twenty-six degrees, half the slope of the exterior surface. It was so dimly lit she could only follow Omid’s silhouette. She could feel a growing sense of claustrophobia, making part of her want to turn round and run back to the surface. There were now millions of tons of rocks above them, pressing down.
“Is it safe?” she asked, her voice croakier than she would have liked.
Omid did not answer.
“Is it safe?” she asked again.
“Yes,” he said, “it’s been safe for 4500 years!”
Suzy could see a distant light but it looked about a mile away. “How far is it to the end?”
“It is only 330 feet,” he replied, pausing for a second to rest. “It looks further away when your eyes cannot see the end. The descending passage is one of the straightest in the world, it is straight to less than a quarter-inch along its entire length.”
As they shuffled on toward the light, Suzy noticed a huge crack running across the ceiling and down the wall.
“What’s that?”
“Oh, it’s just a natural fault in the rock.”
“How did it get there?”
“Earthquake.”
“Earthquake!” Suzy squeaked.
“Relax,” he stopped and placed his hand on her shoulder to calm her. “We’re not in the pyramid any more. We have gone below ground level now, from the main pyramid to the mother bedrock which has natural faults, as you would expect.”
“Yes, of course,” replied Suzy, awed at the thought that they were actually underneath the Great Pyramid. They crawled and crawled and she could feel her skin stinging in spots. She wondered if she was bleeding from the places where the unseen, rough rock had grazed her skin like coral.
Finally they reached the end and a gap opened up on the right, a short, narrow tunnel that led vertically to the bottom of another concealed tunnel and chamber, which was just visible. This, she guessed, was the so-called well shaft.
“Sadly,” Omid said, panting for breath, “the well shaft is blocked with rubbish which built up through people dropping litter down it from the top end in the Grand Gallery. So, we cannot climb up it. I will show you it later though.”
“OK.” Suzy was relieved they didn’t have to climb it. She tried to compose herself and quell the fears that were threatening to overwhelm her. She wanted to be able to remember every detail of this experience once they were back outside, which meant she had to remain calm and not allow these feelings of claustrophobia to overcome her.
BANG! CRACK! Suddenly they were plunged into inky blackness.
“The electricity has cut out.” Omid’s voice pierced the darkness. “It is a common problem in Cairo,” he sighed.
The air supply had gone as well—the fans had stopped whirring and Suzy guessed they would have no more than ten minutes before the air started to go stale. They were one hundred feet beneath millions of tons of rock with no ventilation.
“What do we do now?” Suzy hissed.
“Not a problem,” Omid assured her.
He pulled a flashlight from his robe and suddenly the blackness was vanquished. “But we must be quick to get to some air.”
Suzy said nothing, wanting to save energy and oxygen. She had no option other than to trust him. He guided her now a little more slowly.
They came upon a dark recess and the incline flattened out. Omid shone his flashlight down another low, narrow tunnel, about eighteen feet long. They had reached the subterranean chamber, deep in the bedrock, below the limestone and granite of the pyramid blocks. They crouched again. Ouch! Suzy banged her head against the rock ceiling. Were the Ancient Egyptians all bloody midgets, she wondered. She noticed a small granite niche on the wall and then suddenly they stepped into a large room. It must have been about twenty-f
ive feet wide, but the roof height varied peculiarly from about three to twelve feet. Suzy gratefully straightened up, stretching her aching muscles.
Omid shone his flashlight around the room. It looked unfinished, with strange block shapes, a roughened floor and walls, and jagged upright rocks that looked like an oriental landscape painting, with miniature, Chinese, dome-shaped rock mountains toward the back of the room. A beveled channel cut through one of the stone blocks like an empty aqueduct. The floor was uneven and littered with rock debris; it was difficult to see anything properly with only the one small beam of light. Suzy wondered whether the rock debris had fallen from above or whether it was deliberately placed, as the ceiling was kind of smooth. Weird! The whole place was eerie. It had the air of an abandoned crypt and she felt frightened, like a child. She struggled to hide her fears from Omid, and then the flashlight caught a large square mouth on the wall, making her jump back in shock. She managed to stifle the scream that tried to escape and luckily Omid did not notice.
“What’s that?” she asked, her voice trembling slightly. “A ventilation shaft?”
“No,” Omid drawled, in a voice that suggested she should know better.
“Oh, yes, of course not,” she realized, embarrassed. “It’s the Dead End tunnel.”
“Yes, that’s right, a mysterious horizontal tunnel that leads to nowhere.” He was talking to her like he was a teacher and she was a pupil in class. “Do you have a theory for why it’s here, Miss Suzy?”
“No, if I knew that I might be more famous than Howard Carter,” she joked, trying to regain her authority.
“Yes, it is very mysterious, is it not?”
Suzy walked forward to have a closer look. Suddenly the ground disappeared beneath her and she pitched forward.
“Watch out!” screamed Omid, grabbing hold of her arm by the elbow, as she dangled over the hole. She was shocked by the strength she could feel in his fingers.
