The Grave Robbers of Genghis Khan (14 page)

N
imrod ignored all questions from the twins about an aunt of whom they knew absolutely nothing until the flying carpet was on the hot and arid ground, on which a deserted road led off to the north, where they could just make out the vague outline of the city of Kandahar.

The two Icelanders helped him to roll up the carpet into a long blue pillar.

“The carpet is too heavy to carry on our shoulders,” said Axel. “Then again, we can hardly leave it here, by the roadside.”

“No,” said Nimrod. “We’ll bury it.” He glanced at the twins. “Perhaps you two could do the honors? With some shovels? I’m feeling rather tired after all that flying.”

“Sure.” John spoke his focus word and then handed everyone a nice new shovel.

“I was thinking of something a little more instant,” said Nimrod. “Like a long trench. But these shovels will do almost as well. And now that I think of it, you’re right, John. If you used djinn power to make a trench, then you’d have to make some earth or sand to put in it.”

Everyone started to dig. In the hot sun it was hard work, but with five of them digging they quickly excavated a trench deep enough to hide the carpet, and then they filled it in again.

“How shall we mark the spot?” asked John.

“Oh, I shall remember where it is,” said Nimrod.

“I imagine that’s what the sons of Genghis Khan said,” observed Philippa. “When they buried him.” She smiled. “Anyone got a baby camel handy?”

“Touché, Philippa,” said Nimrod.

He thought for a moment and then planted a small stone on the ground near the burial site.

“We’re bound to spot that,” said John.

Ignoring his nephew’s sarcasm, Nimrod said that it was a special stone, but didn’t explain in what way special.

“What about our clothes?” said Axel. “We shall stick out a mile dressed like this.”

“Good point,” said Nimrod. “Philippa? Perhaps you could oblige us all with some local costume. And I rather think the professor here had better wear a
chadri.
On account of his mask. Which might be alarming to the locals.”

“What’s a
chadri
?” asked John.

“It’s like a burka,” said Nimrod.

John was none the wiser.

“It’s an all-enveloping outer garment for women,” explained Philippa. “Not all women, just those who want to prevent themselves from being seen by men.”

“Sounds like a good idea,” John said pointedly. “Anything that covers your face, Phil.”

Philippa flicked him a sarcastic smile. “It’s not for kids,” she said. “Just grown-up women.”

“Pity.”

A few minutes later, the little party of three djinn and two humans, dressed in local Afghan clothes, was heading into the ancient city. Along the way they passed almost a hundred wild camels grazing in a rough-looking field, which served to remind them all of why they were there in Afghanistan. But at that particular moment the twins were hardly interested in camels.

“You never said you were married,” Philippa told Nimrod.

“You never asked,” said Nimrod.

“I always thought you were, um …” John hesitated. “Single. After all, you never talk about — what’s her name?”

“Alexandra,” said Nimrod.

“Is she a djinn, like us?”

“Oh, yes. She’s a djinn, all right. But she’s not like us. For one thing she’s an Eremite.”

“That’s the djinn cult whose believers seek to imitate the lives of angels and saints and go without possessions,” said Philippa. “Yes, I remember.”

“Many years ago, she and your mother became Eremites together, in New York City. Your mother was lucky enough
to be rescued by your father. But Alexandra was not so fortunate. She persisted in the cult and came here after the Russian invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. On the basis that the Afghans needed her help more than any other mundanes. And has remained here ever since.”

“But I don’t understand,” said Philippa. “How can you and she be married if she’s an Eremite? Eremites believe in giving up not just possessions but relationships, too. Including marriage.”

“We were married before she became an Eremite,” said Nimrod. “It was partly me and my taste for the good things in life that drove her to it, I think. That and some other things.”

“Are we going to meet her?” asked John.

“I sincerely hope not,” said Nimrod. “She’s half mad, you see. And that’s another reason she’s not like us. A lot of the Eremites are a bit eccentric, of course. But Alexandra is more than just eccentric. Possibly she’s dangerous.”

“Why?” asked John.

“Because she believes she has the gift of prophecy,” said Nimrod.

“And does she?” asked Philippa. “Have the gift of prophecy?”

“That’s a little hard to say,” admitted Nimrod. “Alexandra has what you Americans call issues.”

“What kind of issues?” asked John.

“Anger-management issues,” said Nimrod. “She can manage to get cross about almost anything. Anything at all. And in the middle of all that, it’s a little hard to remember
her predictions at all. But whether she can or she can’t, knowledge of the future is the most dangerous thing in the universe.”

“I can’t see why,” argued John. “I reckon that it would be quite useful now, to know what’s going to happen.”

“I agree,” said Axel. “That way we might know if we’re on a wild-goose chase or not.”

Nimrod shook his head.

“Take my word for it, every manner of things can go wrong if you attempt to act on a prophecy. Fortunately, the way my wife speaks makes it hard to understand her. However, people, including djinn, come here from all over the world to have her tell the future.”

They reached the outskirts of Kandahar and found the city rather more modern than they had supposed. There were also a great many British and American soldiers on the streets, many of them heavily armed, and at almost every street corner, there was a large pile of sandbags and a military checkpoint where cars and trucks were stopped and searched. But mostly, the traffic was children on bicycles, heavily veiled women on donkeys and Pashtun tribesmen on mopeds and motorcycles, and local merchants leading camels laden with goods.

John glanced at Professor Sturloson in his bright blue
chadri
and then at a group of identically dressed but anonymous women and realized he could not tell the difference. Anyone could have been wearing this garment, anyone at all; even the aunt Alexandra he had never met and it now seemed wasn’t going to meet.

“How are you doing, Professor?” he asked.

“I feel a bit of a fool,” confessed the professor. “It’s like wearing a tent. I’ll be glad when we’ve found this camel trader and we can get out of here.”

“As I recall,” said Nimrod, “the camel market is north of Charsoo Square.” He pointed to the right. “Which is this way.”

He led the way through streets packed with rickshaws and scooters to a market where everything was for sale: fruit and vegetables, beautiful cloths and carpets, computer equipment, meat and bread, guns and ammunition. In a shop selling television sets, they stopped for a few moments to watch Afghanistan’s Tolo TV. It was hard for the twins and the two Icelanders to understand exactly what was being said, but the drift of the news report was clear: Mount Damavand, the region’s largest volcano at more than eighteen thousand feet, had blown its top, forcing many Iranians to flee their homes.

“This is bad,” said the professor.

His deep and manly voice attracted a few strange looks from the locals but mostly he was ignored.

“This is very bad. Mount Damavand has been dormant for hundreds, perhaps thousands of years.” He looked up at the sky, which was still the same color as his
chadri.
“No sign of any effects on the world’s weather. But if this kind of thing keeps up, it’s bound to create a volcanic winter. The eruption of Indonesia’s Mount Tambora made 1816 the year without a summer. Crops failed, livestock died, and the world endured the worst famine of the nineteenth century.”

“Then there’s certainly no time to waste here watching television,” said Nimrod, and snapped his fingers at the professor and his companions. “Let us quickly find this camel market. And, if we can, the descendants of Ali Bilharzia.”

They smelled it before they saw it. And heard it, too. Hundreds of loudly belching, enormously smelly camels in a square the size of a football field. Flies, dust, and argument filled the air as gesticulating traders and their apparently indifferent customers haggled to buy and sell the strange-looking animals that patiently awaited their fate. This was not always to be a humpbacked beast of burden; here and there were hawkers carrying mountainous trays of camel livers — a local delicacy — to be eaten raw, or, even more deliciously, coated with peanut sauce.

Just to look at these trays and catch the strong smell of the meat in her delicate, young nostrils made Philippa feel like throwing up; once or twice she had to bury her face in the silky depths of her Afghan clothes to escape the pungent stink of liver. And it was fortunate that Nimrod was in a hurry as he might otherwise have eaten some of this camel liver of which once he had been extremely fond; or worse, obliged his nephew and niece to eat some, too.

As it was, he took several cups full of
doh
, which is the national drink of Afghanistan and made of yogurt, lemon juice, club soda, mint, and salt.

John took one look into a glass proffered by Nimrod and, disliking any drink on principle that looked like snot, he decided against tasting it.

“Besides,” he said, “it sounds more like a swear word than a drink. Like the sound you’d make if someone had just stepped on your toe.” He glanced down at his feet. “Which, in these sandals, would be kind of painful.”

Nimrod grimaced. “And I thought Groanin was picky about what he’d eat and drink.”

John smiled. “I expect the first thing he did when he got back to Manchester was make a cup of tea.”

Nimrod frowned for he felt incomplete without his butler. “Yes, I shall miss his tea. No one, not even me or Mr. Rakshasas, could ever make tea like Groanin. In that respect, at least, the man was a genius.”

“Followed by a large plate of sausages with fried eggs and buttered toast,” said John. “And maybe some trifle for — what did he call dessert again?”

“Afters,” said Philippa. “And stop it, John. You’re making me feel hungry.”

“Me, too,” said Axel. “I’m not keen on raw liver.”

“Don’t know what you’re missing.” Speaking the local dialect of Pashto, which is the main language in Afghanistan, Nimrod began to inquire of the local camel traders if the Bilharzia family were still in the business of selling used dromedaries.

Finally, he was directed along to a group of handsome-looking men seated on the ground and leaning on their camel saddles. Of these men, one was taller and more distinguished than all the rest; he had a white beard, blue eyes, and a nose like a catalina macaw’s beak. In his hand was a
long length of cane with which he tapped the ground in front of him; from time to time, he would use this cane on the thickest part of a camel’s neck to make it kneel down or stand up to be inspected by a prospective buyer.

Nimrod bowed politely and inquired if he was speaking to Mr. Bilharzia and, having established he was, Nimrod explained the purpose of his mission: “Many years ago, about one hundred and fifty years ago to be more precise, I believe that your ancestor Ali Bilharzia owned a saddle and a bridle of great antiquity and value, which were themselves more than five hundred years old and that had adorned Dunbelchin, the famous camel that once belonged to the sons of Genghis Khan.”

Mr. Bilharzia frowned. “Who told you such a wicked lie?”

“This is what was written in a book by a man called Sidi Mubarak Bombay,” said Nimrod.

“I have heard of this book,” admitted Mr. Bilharzia. “But I have not read it myself. This is the book that was written with the collaboration of Henry Morton Stanley, was it not? The famous British explorer.”

Nimrod nodded.

“This Stanley,” said Mr. Bilharzia. “I have heard that he was a great liar. That many things of which he himself wrote were not true. That he never said ‘Doctor Livingstone, I presume’ and other things like that. So perhaps this man, Bombay, inspired by his friend Stanley, felt that he, too, could be similarly cavalier with the truth. Of course, this is true of all writers of books, to some extent. They are all wicked people who would never let the facts obstruct the
telling of a good story. After all, there is only one book that is completely true and that is the holy Quran.”

Nimrod bowed again. “Forgive me,” he said. “It was my mistake, Mr. Bilharzia.”

“My family has been in the business of selling camels for many centuries,” said Mr. Bilharzia. “And I tell you that there never was any such camel as the one you mention. What was the name again?”

“Dunbelchin,” said Nimrod.

Mr. Bilharzia shook his head. “No such camel called Dunbelchin ever existed. Or was ever stolen. Nor was there any such saddle or bridle that belonged to Genghis Khan, as you describe. No, sir, you have been cruelly misinformed.”

Nimrod bowed again. “Please forgive the intrusion, sir,” he said. “It was my mistake.”

“You should be very careful making such allegations,” said Mr. Bilharzia. “Perhaps you have not heard of the Darkhats. A dangerous clan of fanatics who claim descent from nine of the wicked Khan’s generals and closest followers. For more than seven hundred years they have guarded his memory and I do not think it possible that they could allow any man not of their clan to remain in possession of the great and priceless treasures you describe. I think that they would cut many throats for such a bridle and saddle.” He smiled. “That is, always supposing that they even existed.” He stretched for a moment. “Myself, I have always believed that they were nothing more than the stuff of legends.”

“Quite,” said Nimrod.

“As for Dunbelchin, I believe she was not a white dromedary camel, but a Bactrian camel, with two humps rather than one. And as you can see, I only sell dromedaries. My family has only ever sold dromedaries. Bactrians are quite outside my family’s expertise.”