Barbara Silkstone - Wendy Darlin 03 - Cairo Caper (21 page)

“Forsooth, I know not of the matters you speak, but lo, if I have served you in some small way, my journey here abounds with joy.”

Sputum held out a shaky hand. “The brush with poison gas was too much. I need a drink. Come, let’s sit and celebrate.” He steered her toward the dining area.

“At yon table?”

Dork and Sydney were as close as shadows. The way Sputum was treating Darcy made it obvious that Sputum had been lying when he told them he had the medallion. I trailed the group, hoping to see and hear without being seen or heard, which wasn’t difficult. Sputum, Dork, and Sydney were totally focused on Darcy.

Sputum helped Darcy into his seat at the head of the table. Dork and Sydney stood next to her, showing no inclination to return to their seats at the far end. Sputum grabbed a bottle of vodka and a stack of shot glasses from the sideboard.

He placed four glasses on the table and held the bottle at shoulder height. “This is a fitting liquor for our toast. This is Blabnik vodka, one of the most expensive vodkas in the world.”

Sputum opened the bottle and extracted a clear wand filled with crystals. “This wand contains forty-eight crystals of smoky topaz, pink tourmaline, amethyst, citrine, peridot, cubic zircona, and one blood-red diamond.” He filled the glasses and set the bottle on the table.

“A toast to our savior-ess, Cleopatra,” Sputum said raising his glass of vodka.

Dorkovsky and Sir Sydney lifted their glasses while wiping remnant tears caused by the gas from their eyes.

Darcy raised her glass. “Dost thou perchance have mead?”

“To Cleopatra,” Sputum said.

“To Cleopatra,” Dork and Sydney repeated.

They all downed their shots except Sputum, who threw his vodka over his shoulder and placed his hand over Darcy’s glass so she couldn’t drink hers.

Dorkovsky dropped his glass and grabbed his throat with both hands. He gurgled like a backed-up drain and collapsed.

Sir Sydney’s lips pulled back in a blue-black sneer, his eyes bugged out. He hit the table with a crack and slid to the floor.

Sputum cackled. “Two with two shots.”

Darcy moved her glass away from Sputum’s hand. “No mead?” She shrugged and chugged.

Sputum keened, “Noooo, noooo. The medallion, you must tell me about the medallion.”

I held my breath waiting for her to drop. The secret of the medallion would be gone forever.

Chapter Thirty-eight

Darcy jerked the bottle off the table and took a long pull. “Not mead but not bad. Thou servest a mean drink, Antony my love.”

The bitch was clearly a demon in disguise. A devil with a blue dress on, or, more accurately, blue ooze on.

I glanced over my shoulder at Roger still standing by the stairs with Petri. He shook his head. He didn’t know what she was either.

Darcy held her nose in the air and did a hound dog sniff. “Hark, dost the aroma of camel meatballs fill my nostrils?”

Her perfect hair bobbed as she spotted one under the chair next to her. It must have rolled there during the Borgia fiasco. She snatched it off the floor and snarfed it in two bites, never getting a single drop on her chin. Definitely a demon.

She took another pull on the bottle. “Mark Antony, I gavest thou the bestest years of my life.” Her head swiveled to Roger.

Sputum waved his hand in front of her face. “I’m over here, my queen. Please give me the medallion.”

“It wouldst be my greatest pleasure, my love. First thou must rid us of these bodies so they beginst their path to the afterlife. And thou knowest how a clean bus pleaseth me.”

Sputum’s frustration showed in his bearing. He believed she had the medallion. The easiest way was to shoot the crazy bitch and be done with it. But if he shot her and she didn’t have it on her, he’d never find it. And she was so nutty he’d never be able to force the information out of her. Her game was the only game in town.

“A short drive into the desert will take care of this trash,” Sputum said through clenched teeth.

He waved his gun at Roger and Petri. “Downstairs! One of you is my new driver.”

They started down the stairs. Their body language told me they were thinking that together they had a chance of taking him down. But getting into a gunfight without a gun is never a good idea. I had to act before they did something foolish, fatally foolish.

I raised my hand timidly as I did in Catholic school when I needed a potty pass.

Sputum pointed his gun at me. “Why are you still here? And alive? Oh yes, it’s because I’m in a nest of traitors and enemies. Now I’ll have one less.”

His finger tightened on the trigger.

“I can drive the bus. I used to work for the LTA.”

His eyes spun a bit. “LTA?”

“London Transit Authority. Double-deckers are my specialty.”

Darcy’s eyes darted between Sputum and me. “Anthony my love, methinks she is a Chariotress.”

Sputum’s gun wavered. A good sign, unless it went off.

“Chariotress?”

“Yes, a driver of the first order. One who will protect our temple and lead us to our destiny in the afterlife. We must put ourselves in her hands.”

The confusion on Sputum’s face was nothing compared to the confusion in my mind. Why was Darcy vouching for me?

“You better be telling the truth.” He glared at me. “Start charioting.”

He followed me down the stairs. The door hung open from Darcy’s grand entrance. A full moon peeked over the crumbled temple walls.

Sputum walked to the bottom entry step and peered out. He turned around and pointed his gun at Roger and Petri. “Ashtray Girl is going to drive us a few miles into the desert. You two drag those double-dealers down here and dump them out. One good sandstorm and they’ll disappear forever.”

I got in the driver’s seat and set my purse on the floor. A computer screen was mounted in the dash to the right of the steering wheel. There were no other controls. If I hadn’t seen Tyson operate this thing, I’d have been screwed. But I was merely buying time. I didn’t have a plan. Maybe all of us could jump Sputum when we stopped to dump the bodies. Stupid. Another version of getting into a gunfight without a gun.

I adjusted the rearview mirror so I could watch Sputum. Tapping a few buttons on the computer screen, I managed to fire up the engine. It was running but not in gear. What would Sandra Bullock do?

The screen was the same as when Tyson used it. I wasn’t sure what the Feet setting was for. I hit Next and the letters PRNDL popped up across the top edge. If those letters meant the same as the shift lever in a car, D stood for Drive. If not, the D would stand for Dead, my next state. I placed the cursor on the D and aimed my finger toward the Enter button.

I heard a scratchy sound. The Camapoos had escaped from my purse and were making a break for the open door and the moonlight. Sputum was mean enough to kill them for no reason. Remembering his phobia, I yelled, “Rats! Rats with saddles!”

Sputum screamed, “Aaaaiiiieeee,” as he jumped to the side.

Fiona bolted upright. “I said no talking in the library!”

She flung her pith helmet like Oddjob in
Goldfinger
catching Sputum in his left eye. He fell out of the bus, then still screaming, dove under it to hide from the rats with saddles.

My hand bumped the Enter button when I lunged for the Camapoos. I nabbed both of them as the bus lurched into drive. I halfway fell out of the driver’s seat. Sputum’s screaming stopped with a snap, crackle, and pop. Ooops.

I slid back into the seat, slammed on the brakes, put the cursor on P, and hit Enter, struggling with two wiggly Camapoos the whole time.

My hands shook as I secured them in their box. I was pretty sure I’d used up my quota of kills for this caper, but I wasn’t just Ashtray Girl anymore.

Fiona piped up, “I just had a library flashback.” She shot me a thumbs-up. “Boy I licked his ass!”

“Kicked. You kicked his ass.”

Petri helped her stand. She hung from his neck, dangled her tiny booted feet in the air, and kissed him with a sound like a pole being pulled out of mud.

With a stiff upper lip and Jell-O legs, I stepped over to the smoochers and patted Fiona on the back.

She jerked her head around. “Did you see me blow that Russian?”

“Away. You blew him away,” I said.

“Excuse me… gotta go potty.” She skipped to the loo.

Petri and I joined Roger as he knelt on the bottom step. He was hanging on to the exit pole, leaning out the door into the moonlight, his face the color of Kermit. But, for Roger, being green
was
easy. He just had to see blood or, as in this case, be close to something really gory. I caught him just before he keeled over.

I ruffled his hair. “C’mon, Mister Archaeologist. It’s time to find Cleopatra’s tomb.”

Chapter Thirty-nine

Roger’s eyes opened wide and clear. The mention of Cleopatra’s tomb evidently gave him an adrenalin rush.

“Can you get us there?” His expression sitting on maximum puppy-dog.

I nodded. “But it would be easier with a black light.”

Petri dug in his pants. He pulled out a pocket black light and handed it to me. “This should do it. I always carry one.”

Of course, who doesn’t?

Fiona returned from the loo. “I still feel a bit woozy. I don’t think I can make that trip into the temple again.” She put her hands together in prayer fashion. “Please, please, please bring me Cleopatra’s Kama Sutra.”

Petri put his hand on her forehead. “You seem a bit warmish. I shall stay here with you while Roger and Wendy continue their quest.”

Roger searched in the compartment above the driver’s seat. “Here’s what we need.” He pulled two flashlights out and tested them. “So far, so good. These are a lot better quality than the junk Sputum gave us.”

Darcy boomed, “Alas, poor Yorick, I knew him well.”

What now? I turned. She stood at the head of the stairs holding Sir Sydney’s corpse by the scruff of his neck with his golf-ball eyes and blue-black version of the Rolling Stones tongue and lips symbol. A sight for bad dreams.

She dropped him and bounded down the steps, three at a time, skidding to a stop in front of me. “Come, Chariotress, let us hasten to the temple.” She looped her arm through Roger’s. “Antony and I have business to attend.”

Wow! She switched Antonys like Pony Express riders switched horses. But this wasn’t the same Darcy I’d battled before. She was erratic, unreliable, and spooky.

Okay, she was the same Darcy, but something happened to her in the embalming pool. Did that something include her finding the Isis half of the medallion? The only way to find out was to play this charade to the end.

I removed the Camapoo box from my purse and handed it to Fiona. “Take good care of these little guys. They probably need food and water.”

The bus had moved about twenty feet or so when I lurched it forward. I couldn’t back up to get closer to the entrance because Sputum’s bloody body would be exposed and Roger would pass out. Plus I wasn’t all that keen to see the body myself. So we had to hoof it through about thirty feet of disgusting knee-deep locust guts and barely alive bugs.

“With haste, Chariotress, with haste,” Darcy said.

“Forward ho!” Roger chimed in.

I didn’t know which of them I wanted to pop the most.

My foot slipped when I stepped off the bus. If I fell in that insect stew I might puke myself to death. I stabbed my high heel into the mess and caught my balance. I didn’t use the flashlight. The moonlight was bright enough. I didn’t want to see more detail than necessary. I slogged to the entrance with a stab-shuffle move that was in no danger of becoming the next dance craze.

Using our flashlights we made it down the ladder and through the main transversal passage without incident despite a light slippery coating of bug goo which, fortunately, decreased the deeper we went.

At the top of the third burial shaft, I fished Petri’s black light out of my purse and flicked the beam on the wall. The first dot glowed lavender. I exhaled. The Revlon Forty-Eight Hour Luminescence Lip Stick worked as advertised.

“Lo and behold,” Darcy said.

“That shiny stuff, is that lipstick?” Roger asked.

“It is,” I said, proud of myself.

“When we get interviewed by National Geographic please don’t mention the lipstick.”

Dot by dot with the black light shining on the wall and step by step with the flashlights shining on the floor, we made our way into the bowels of the earth.

The pain of all my injuries increased to agony as I marched on, but not enough to stop me. Roger groaned behind me. He was hurting too, his pain possibly greater than mine. We had pushed our bodies to the limit but the prize of Cleopatra’s tomb was worth it. Darcy hummed
The Way We Were
.

The tunnel began to level out. We were getting close. I said to Roger over my shoulder, “Do you think we can find the tomb without the MUDD?”

“Our only hope is the medallion. Maybe the power of the Osiris half will lead us to the Isis half. A long shot, but better than no shot.”

I tripped on a crack in the floor and shut up.

We went around a gentle curve. A faint glow appeared.

“Hark,” Darcy whisper-shouted. “Yon pool.”

She vaulted past me and ran through the tunnel without the benefit of a flashlight.

Roger yelled, “Darcy, stop, wait for us. You’ll fall and hurt yourself.”

He passed me and followed her as fast as he could in two left shoes while avoiding loose rocks. I tried to catch him but couldn’t keep up.

The pool came into full view, shimmering and foreboding.

Darcy turned to face Roger, wavered at the edge, seemingly defying gravity as she leaned backward until her head nearly touched the water then forward till her face almost hit the floor. She elongated and thinned each time.

Roger was at the entrance to the chamber hopping around on one foot. I thought he had twisted an ankle. I rushed to him to give him a shoulder to lean on.

“My left-left shoe, get it off. My foot’s on fire.”

I pulled the shoestring and yanked his wingtip off. It was blistering hot. I dropped it and the medallion fell out. It’s protective case burst into flames. It tumbled toward Darcy who was now translucent and leaning backward over the pool. The medallion separated from its flaming case and bounced to the roof of the cavern then with a screaming-eagle whistle drove straight through Darcy’s heart into the pool.