Mummy Dearest (27 page)

“What kind of accident?” Alexander asked.

“I do not know. I am not of the rank to be given privileged
information.” He pressed the horn as he veered around a carriage, then kept his eyes on the road.

Miriam laughed unconvincingly. “Surely it’s an overturned tramcar or a gang of drunken Germans forcing their way into a tomb.”

“At this hour?” Mrs. McHaver snorted. “The Oktoberfest is held in Munich, not Luxor. My late husband and I were hiking in Bavaria one year and didn’t realize until too late that we had chosen an inopportune time. The disgraceful behavior, the drunkenness, the copulation in public places! We took the next train to Rome and never returned to Germany.”

“How fortunate,” Alexander drawled, “… for the Romans, that is.”

Mrs. McHaver harrumphed and fell silent. We drove across the bridge and through Gurna to the road that led past the Ramesseum. As we neared the entrance to the Valley of the Kings, we began to see soldiers in jeeps parked along the edge of the road. In several instances, cars had been stopped and their occupants were being questioned.

“I have a special license plate,” Bakr murmured, saving me the bother of asking. He parked by the gate and conversed in Arabic with a guard while we got out of the van. “Please stay with this man,” Bakr said to us. “He will escort you where you wish to go.”

The parking lot was nearly empty, I noticed, and no tour buses were idling along the back row. The soldiers at the entrance waved us by. I dropped behind Mrs. McHaver, who was making slow but relentless progress up the walkway, and gestured for Alexander to join me.

“Having one of those déjà vu moments?” I asked him.

“I wasn’t here last spring, if you’re referring to Oskar Vonderlochen’s so-called accident. We can rule out overturned tramcars but not marauding Teutonic warriors bearing cell phones and beer.”

“But all the excitement over that artifact last night, and now an accident. You believe it’s just a coincidence?”

“I don’t believe anything, Mrs. Malloy, including
Salima’s ridiculous story about the two of you locking yourselves in a laundry room in the basement last night. She may well be a pathological liar, but I must say I thought better of you.”

“I never said we locked ourselves in a laundry room.”

“Well, then?”

“Where’s that little tram? If it’s not operating, they should have sent a jeep to fetch us. Mrs. McHaver is an elderly lady in need of assistance.”

“Then I shall assist her,” he said huffily, catching up with her to offer his arm.

I did not harrumph, but only because I would have felt silly. I watched their backs as we made our way to the guard station, where several dozen soldiers and guards were smoking cigarettes and watching us.

Mrs. McHaver waved her cane at one of them. “See here, you idle oaf, fetch a vehicle and be quick about it. I shall wait in the shade until you do. Miriam, pour me a cup of tea and open that packet of digestive biscuits. I am feeling faint.”

The soldiers melted away. Mrs. McHaver sat down on a flat rock and took off her hat. Miriam poured tea from the thermos into a cup, then sat down to search through her knapsack. Alexander lit a cigarette and gazed at the mountains looming on either side of the valley. I found another perch and opened my water bottle. If we were to be buried under an avalanche of rocks, I needed to prepare myself as best I could.

Within five minutes, a jeep pulled up. The driver grinned nervously and pointed at the empty seats. Alexander helped Mrs. McHaver into the seat next to the driver, then climbed in the back, leaving the empty row for Miriam and me.

“This is worrisome,” Miriam said, clinging to the back of the seat as the jeep bounced up the road. “I have this horrid premonition. Everyone was excited about the
shabti
, and a goodly amount of alcohol was consumed as the evening went on. Shannon began taunting Magritta and Wallace. Poor Wallace burst into tears, and Magritta counterattacked
with aspersions on Shannon’s lack of field experience and shoddy credentials. That repulsive American graduate student tried to put his hand down the front of my dress. At one point, I feared that my aunt and Lady Emerson might engage in a duel with parasol and cane. Miss Portia offered to make book on the outcome. Ahmed came up several times to beg Lord Bledrock to restrain the party.”

“So sorry I missed it,” I said. “The
shabti
must be cursed.”

Her lips twitched, but she did not reply. Official cars, jeeps, and an ambulance were parked in the road by the excavation site. The workmen sat on a wall, smoking brown cigarettes and watching the activity as though they had ringside seats at a mud-wrestling match. The canvas tarps had been removed. The men standing near the pit were primarily dressed in khaki, although I caught a glimpse of Peter in a particularly fetching bronze cotton pullover. Lord Bledrock’s white hair bobbled into sight briefly. Other men in suits and ties were likely to be bureaucrats. Mahmoud was issuing orders to his uniformed officers.

I squirmed through the crowd and touched Peter’s shoulder. “What’s going on?”

“They’re bringing up the body now,” he said. “We need to move out of the way.”

“Whose body?”

“Shannon King’s. A guard found her this morning while he was making his rounds. He called to report, then closed the Valley before the tourists and buses arrived. There was quite a scene at the front gate when Mahmoud and I arrived. The Ministry of Tourism must be flooded with calls from angry tour directors, and probably a few embassies as well.”

“Oh, dear,” I said, shocked. “What happened?”

“Shannon?” said Alexander, who’d come up behind us. “My God, what happened to her? Is she dead?”

Magritta joined us. “Of course she’s dead. Would these buffoons be moving so slowly if she wasn’t?” Groaning, she gulped down water from a bottle. “I cannot believe the timing. The head of the Supreme Council of Antiquities
will be here today to inspect the excavation and grant us permission to continue. Once something of significance has been uncovered, they take a keen interest in making sure that proper procedures are followed. They have the right to withdraw the concession if they’re not satisfied.”

“You’re not concerned about Shannon?” I asked her.

“I’m very sorry, naturally, but if she wanted to do something reckless, I wish she had done it at the Winter Palace, not here. When I think of all the years Oskar and I devoted to finding a tomb …”

“Peter, my darling,” I said, “would you help me find a seat in the shade? You know how fragile I am.”

“About as fragile as a tank,” he said under his breath as he escorted me to a low rock shaded by an overhang. “Mahmoud thinks Dr. King came out here at least an hour before sunrise. The guards who were on duty swear they never saw her, but they’re not about to admit they accepted a bribe to look the other way. There are pieces of glass from a champagne bottle in the pit. Lord Bledrock said that she was inebriated when she left his suite, and mumbling about the need for better security at the site. He was worried about her, but not so much that he saw her safely to her room. They were all displeased by her verbal attacks on Magritta and Wallace. He went so far as to describe her as ‘lacking grace.’ That’s the ultimate insult in his circle.”

“How did she get here at that hour?”

“Most likely a taxi driver, who’s now home asleep. If the taxi driver is a conscientious citizen, he’ll contact the police later today, but it’s possible he charged her an outrageous fare and will decide not to get involved.”

I glanced at the pit, then looked away as several officers emerged with a body bag. “The modern-day version of a mummy, I suppose. She didn’t have the
shabti
with her, did she?”

“It’s in the safe in Lord Bledrock’s suite. He put it there when things got rowdy. He said Shannon was in no condition to take proper care of it.”

“It doesn’t sound as though she was.” I took a sip of
water and blotted my face with a tissue. “Has Mahmoud acknowledged the parallel with what happened to Oskar Vonderlochen last spring?”

“Oh yeah,” Peter said. “I need to go back to Luxor and make some phone calls to, ah, interested parties. You might as well come, too. There’s nothing to see. I assume Bakr drove you, so we can ride back together.”

“Along with Mrs. McHaver, Miriam, and Alexander. I was waylaid at breakfast, and bullied into offering them a ride. If I’m a tank, Mrs. McHaver is a battalion. Her deceased husband’s name was probably MacArthur. Quite a mouthful if she’d hyphenated.”

“Gather them up and start for the parking lot. I’ll catch up with you after I have a few words with Mahmoud and a certain Mr. Jones from the American Embassy.”

“Taxi drivers may work from dusk till dawn, but a spy’s work is never done,” I said with a grin, then obediently followed his instructions.

Caron and Inez were sitting on the balcony when I returned, Peter having kept the van so that Bakr could drive him to wherever clandestine calls were to be made. I had no idea what was going on in the basement; nor did I want to find out at the expense of marital bliss (which was in short supply).

I called a greeting, then went into our bedroom to freshen up and change into less sensible shoes. “Did you sleep late?” I asked as I joined them.

“Where have you been?” demanded Caron.

“In the Valley of the Kings. There was an accident at the excavation site. Did you two ever meet Shannon King, the blond woman from the college in Maine?”

“We saw her in the lobby a couple of times,” Inez said. “Is she going to be okay?”

I shook my head. “Do you recall what Alexander said about Oskar Vonderlochen going out to the Valley late at night and tumbling into the pit? She seems to have done the same thing. A guard found her early this morning. From what I heard, she drank heavily last night and most likely took a taxi over there. She bribed a guard, then staggered up the hill and… fell.”

“Alexander said he thought this Oskar person was murdered,” Caron said, shivering. “It’s like there’s a curse. I don’t think we ought to go there anymore. In fact, I don’t think we ought to stay in Egypt. We’re juniors, Mother. We have to protect our reputations.”

“Everybody at school already thinks we’re weird,” Inez added gloomily.

“But not boring,” I said with a bright smile.

Caron and Inez exchanged looks, which seemed to be their primary mode of communication for the last ten days. Before I pointed this out, Caron said, “By the way, our room was searched.”

“Oh, really? How could you tell? I was in there yesterday, and it looked worse than the back room of a thrift store. Clothes everywhere, suitcases on the floor, towels on the backs of chairs, enough plastic shopping bags to build a squishy pyramid.” I had doubted Luanne’s assertion that my apartment had been searched because it was too tidy. I was even more reluctant to buy theirs. “I don’t know how anyone can clean in there without a bulldozer. Is something missing?”

Caron hesitated. “Not really, but things have been disturbed. It may look like a mess to you, but it’s actually very organized.”

“In its own way,” Inez said, nodding. “Do you think that man with the scar got in while we were on the cruise?”

“Why would he?” I asked.

“Why was he stalking us?” Caron countered. “Maybe he ordered his henchmen to kidnap us before we got to Abu Simbel. They grabbed Buffy by mistake. I’ll bet they’re sorry now.”

I conceded defeat. “Peter’s gone off again. Do you want to have lunch in one of the cafés in the neighborhood? There are some little shops with local crafts.”

Inez blushed. “I sort of told this boy from Ohio that I’d meet him at the pool this afternoon. I promise I won’t leave the hotel grounds, Mrs. Malloy. He and his parents are staying here. I have their room number if you want to call them.”

I glanced at Caron, who was simmering dangerously. “That’ll be fine, Inez. Caron and I will enjoy a chance to go shopping.”

“Sure we will,” said my darling daughter, her words enunciated with lethal precision. “I can’t think of anything
I’d rather do than buy a camel made out of clay and a set of napkin rings. Inez, you’d better wear a lot of sunscreen. Your nose is liable to start peeling any minute now. It’s already flaky.”

“It is not.”

“Like you stuck on onion skins. You should cover it with a Band-Aid.”

Inez shoved back her hair. “You should cover your whole face with a Band-Aid.”

“Go get ready,” I said, unamused.

There was no conversation in the girls’ bedroom, although I knew dirty looks were as abundant as dirty socks on the floor. I told Inez to meet us at four, and then Caron and I went down through the lobby to the corniche. We headed in the direction of Luxor Temple and walked up the side street into the neighborhood where Peter and I had eaten lunch the previous week.

Caron claimed to have no interest in where we ate, so I selected a café. Once we were seated, I said, “Why are you so sure your room was searched? It’s not as if anyone would think you had expensive jewelry or camera equipment. When I asked you if anything was missing, you were evasive. Is something missing?”

“You should have seen Inez flirting with that boy last night. It was disgusting.” She picked up a menu. “This is all in Arabic. How are we supposed to order? I’m not about to point at something and end up with a bowl of mushy potatoes and green beans. I loathe mushy potatoes and green beans. I loathe everything about this place and this trip. You should have just brought Inez and let me stay home with one of my friends. If I wanted to see boring old temples, I could have watched the Discovery Channel. At least I could have had a pizza while I was soaking up all that culture.”

A waiter appeared, begged our pardon, and put down menus written in English. Caron crossed her arms. I ordered for both of us, then acknowledged the futility of attempting any sort of semicivilized conversation with her.
She relinquished her martyred pose only when the waiter brought us kebabs and rice, although she ignored my chatter as she ate.

“All right,” I said when we went out to the street, “I give up. If you want to spend the next couple of hours feeling sorry for yourself, then you’ll have to do so alone in the suite. Or you can go spy on Inez. I’m going to browse in some of these shops.”