The Moses Legacy (16 page)

‘Can you hear me?'

The big man on the bed didn't want to hear him. He didn't want to do anything. All he wanted to do was sleep. But he couldn't sleep any longer; the time for sleeping was over.

Goliath opened his eyes. There were maybe half a dozen people in the room. Two of them were nurses. The rest…

They were in white.

Doctors? Policemen?

At the back of his mind, he remembered seeing Egyptian policemen in their white summer uniform.

‘Mr Carter? Can you talk?'

He felt the bandages upon him. Where was he? Hospital. He remembered what had happened to him. Fire… driving …woman… she threw something…

‘Yes,' he muttered.

Through blurred vision, he fancied that he saw one of the nurses smiling. Was she happy because he could talk? Or was she cunning and scheming, like most women?

‘Do you know what day it is?' asked one of the men in white coats.

What day is it?

He couldn't think. How long had he been here? He had been slipping in and out of consciousness.

‘Mr Carter…'

Goliath turned his head and tried to sit up, but he couldn't.

‘We need to ask you about the car you were driving… the car… it was destroyed by the fire. But we need to ask where you got it?'

‘The woman…'

‘The woman? The woman gave you the car?'

The man who had asked the question looked at his colleague. The other man shrugged.

‘But didn't the woman have another car? Her own car?'

‘Petrol bomb…'

‘What?'

‘She threw it into my car…'

‘The woman threw a gasoline bomb into the car?'

Goliath made a slight nodding motion.

‘Did you
know
the woman, Mr Carter?'

Goliath said nothing, just looked at the policeman blankly.

‘Mr Carter, we need to know what's going on. That jeep you were in was hired by our Deputy Minister of Culture. Someone tried to lock him in a tomb.'

Something flickered in Goliath's mind when he heard the words ‘
tried
to lock him' – did that mean that he had failed?

‘Was it you, Mr Carter? Was it you who killed the guardian and locked him in the tomb? Or was it the woman?'

‘Captain, this man is extremely weak,' said one of the doctors. ‘He needs time to recover.'

‘I need
answers
!' snapped the captain.

‘He isn't going anywhere. You can ask him when he's stronger.'

‘I will ask him now!'

‘Look, Captain, it's obvious that he isn't fully conscious. At the moment he's in no position to give you any answers. Give me a day or two to get him better and you can have
all the answers you want.' The tone was as appeasing as the words.

‘All right. You have
one
day.'

And with that the captain turned and left, followed by another man.

Goliath felt an itch on his nose and tried to rub it. It was then that he noticed that his left hand was handcuffed to the iron bed frame.

On the
felucca
, the rest of the day drifted by uneventfully as Daniel and Gabrielle sat on deck with Walid and his two-man crew, chatting and watching the scenery go by. They even both had a go at smoking through the
narghilla
, which neither of them liked, though Daniel pretended to.

The evening meal was a light affair, after the very filling lunch. As the evening descended upon them, Daniel amused them with his Wild West, cowboy style of harmonica playing. The harmonica belonged to Walid, but he confessed, with some embarrassment, that he had never learnt to play it. But despite the cultural differences, they seemed to enjoy Daniel's rendition of ‘Clementine' and ‘The Yellow Rose of Texas'.

A few hours later, they were shown to their sleeping quarters – a space on the open deck. Daniel and Gabrielle had the privilege of sleeping in the semi-covered part of the boat, although the cover was little more than a tarpaulin thrown over a metal frame. Walid and his crew slept at the other end of the boat, under the moonlight, affording their Western guests at least a modicum of privacy. But the quilt that Walid had offered them to soften the discomfort of the wooden deck was not the cleanest of items, and it seemed to have lost most of its padding a long time ago.

As he lay there in the darkness, with only the stars, the moon and the lights from the riverbank for company, he saw Gaby as she was now, rather than as the teenage girl that he remembered from his student years. They were lying together like two spoons, him behind her. But even though she was fully clothed, he could see her firm arms and strong shoulders – the powerful build of the swimmer who had won the silver medal in the student games. And he realized how incredibly sexy he found her. Daniel was never one to be drawn to thin, spindly women, but nor was he particularly enamoured of the fat women favoured by some Eastern cultures. He admired fitness and his ideal women were athletes, not sexless supermodels.

And Gabrielle was one such woman. It amazed him to realize now that she had been like this for some time, yet he hadn't realized even when he worked with her on a dig in Jerusalem. Thinking about her as she was now, he wasn't sure if he wanted to make love to her or wrestle with her. And if he did wrestle with her, he was equally unsure if he would want to win or lose. Then again, perhaps it really made no difference.

As if sensing his eyes upon her, she rolled over on to her back and then turned another ninety degrees to face him.

‘Have you got something on your mind?' she asked.

He felt embarrassed, almost as if she actually knew what he had just been thinking.

‘I was wondering, maybe we should turn ourselves in to our respective embassies when we get to Cairo.'

‘I don't think that's a good idea, Daniel.'

‘It'll get us out of immediate danger. Maybe we can be tested for whatever they think is causing this illness. If they're still worried that we're infectious they'll let us stay in the embassies or arrange to have us quarantined instead of shot by trigger-happy cops.'

Gabrielle was looking at him with that same implacable look as before. ‘That's all right for me, but what about you? That message on Mansoor's phone said there's a warrant out for your arrest in England. Do you want to be extradited back to London to face a murder charge before we can figure this out?'

‘I don't think I
will
be facing a murder charge.'

‘Then why did they issue a warrant?'

‘Probably because I breached my bail conditions. That's an offence in its own right.'

‘You may be right, but if they arrest you and send you back, you'll be putting yourself in their hands – and we don't know for how long. In the meantime you'll be treading water, waiting for someone else to solve the mystery. The way I see it, whoever killed Uncle Harrison is probably the same person who locked us in the tomb and we need to find out—'

‘We don't
know
that.'

‘I think it's a reasonable starting point. And then there's the small matter of these manuscripts that you're supposed to be translating for our joint paper. This could be the biggest thing in our careers. Do you think the British authorities will let you work on academic papers while you're a guest of Her Majesty? I can just see the citation: “Daniel Klein is currently the Professor of Semitic Languages at Wormwood Scrubs. He is sharing a cell with a pyramid salesman who…”'

Daniel burst out laughing. If nothing else, Gabrielle's humour had broken some of the tension.

‘That's the only thing that's holding me back,' said Daniel.

‘What, the prospect of prison?'

‘No, the fact that I still want to solve this mystery – well, actually both of these mysteries.'

‘How do you mean,
both
?'

‘The disease
and
your uncle's missing paper. And I guess
also his death and the people trying to kill us. I think you're right: it probably
is
all tied in together. Your uncle said his paper was based on a translation of a manuscript in Proto-Sinaitic. We need to find that manuscript. Maybe it's the one that Mansoor was going to show us.'

Gabrielle thought about this for a moment. ‘So let's stick to the original plan. When we get to Cairo we try and get a look at that papyrus that he was going to show us: the one from the tomb of Ay.'

‘I wish we could actually phone Mansoor and find out if he's all right. Maybe he could even help us.'

‘It's too risky. Even just switching on our phones could give away our position.'

‘Okay, but how are we going to get into the museum archives without Mansoor to help us?'

He saw the twinkle in her eye.

‘You're forgetting what he said. He has copies in his office at the SCA.'

Daniel waited for the other shoe to drop. After a couple of seconds, he prompted: ‘And what do you think we're going to do, Gaby? Just walk in there and take a copy of an ancient papyrus from under the noses of the staff?'

‘No, we'll go in after lunch when most of them are out. You're forgetting, Daniel – this is Egypt and we're heading towards summer.'

‘So?'

‘So, the old ways of the Levant die hard. Between one and four in the afternoon, most of them are away taking a siesta. That'll give us the perfect opportunity.'

‘Oh, don't tell me these trusting Levantines leave the door unlocked?'

‘Of course not. But a locked door never stopped anyone really determined, especially if they're properly equipped.'

‘And I suppose you're also an expert on picking locks?' he asked with a sarcastic smile.

‘Oh, do me a favour. This isn't
Charlie's Angels
!'

‘Then how are you going to get us past that locked door?'

She reached into one of her pockets, and with a smile and a flourish, pulled out a key.

‘These are very serious charges, Miss Stewart,' the police captain said, leaning forward to emphasize his point. ‘This is no longer just a case of leaving the scene of an accident. According to Mr Carter you threw a gasoline bomb through the window of his car. And I have to tell you that despite the fire, we found melted glass fragments in the burnt-out wreckage that supports this claim.'

Sarit knew that she had to think quickly. The story she had told them so far was that she had thought the car was trying to force her off the road and that she had sped on to escape, having heard that women drivers on their own are sometimes vulnerable on these roads at night. However, in the light of this new accusation, she realized that it wouldn't work and she'd have to change her story.

‘All right, I'll tell you. I didn't throw a petrol bomb at him – but he tried to throw one at me. We'd had an argument earlier on the road and I drove away ahead of him. Then he caught up with me and I saw him lighting the Molotov cocktail and holding it like he was going to throw it. So I sideswiped his car and he dropped it. Then his car went up in flames.'

‘So why did you drive on? Why did you not report the incident immediately?'

‘Because I was afraid. A woman alone in a foreign country,
attacked on a lonely stretch of road in the dead of night. What was I to think?'

‘And you thought our policemen are corrupt woman-haters who would rape you or beat a confession out of you.'

‘I don't know what I thought! Okay, maybe I had that stereotype in the back of my mind. I don't know.'

A man from the Irish Embassy was sitting there, but strangely he was sitting opposite her next to the police captain, rather than at her side. He was not talking; just listening. Occasionally he made a note of something, but not very often. She had been told that she could have a lawyer, but so far none had materialized.

‘And this man – the one in the car – did you know him?'

Tread carefully
, a little voice inside her head said.

‘I'd been at the Valley of the Kings that day. I think I may have seen him there.'

‘And the jeep he was driving… do you know anything about that?'

Don't let it show on my face
, her mind was screaming.

‘No. It was just an ordinary jeep. I mean, I didn't really think about it.'

‘Why were you driving back to Cairo, Miss Stewart?'

She swallowed nervously. ‘I don't understand,' she said, trying to buy time.

‘You flew into Luxor Airport from Cairo and then you hired a car to visit the Valley of the Kings. Nothing unusual in that. But then instead of driving back to the airport and taking a plane back to Cairo, you set out on a seven- or eight-hour night-time drive on an unfamiliar stretch of road that you yourself admit is dangerous for women.'

‘I didn't have a return ticket. I'd wanted to keep my plans flexible.'

‘You could have bought a ticket at the airport.'

‘It was late.'

‘They have a five to eleven flight. And another at one-twenty in the morning.'

‘I didn't know.'

‘Well, you could have tried. Or why not stay overnight in a hotel in Luxor? You said yourself your plans were flexible.'

‘I'm not exactly rich. I was already paying for a hotel in Cairo. I hadn't checked out. I didn't want to pay twice.'

She realized after she had said it that this was a mistake. The hotel she was staying at, although far from deluxe, was not cheap and she had now drawn attention to this. It was another contradiction, which the police captain would surely flag as another lie – even if it hadn't registered yet.

‘Well, why didn't you take the train?'

‘That's also seven hours.'

‘But at least it's safer than the road.'

‘I didn't think about it. I wasn't thinking straight.' And then she suddenly had an idea. ‘Look, could I go to the bathroom? I need to…' She looked at the man from the embassy. ‘It's a woman's thing… the time of the month.'

The embassy man blushed and then leaned over to the police captain and whispered a word in his ear. The police captain nodded, though the look on his face remained neutral.

‘Very well.'

He called for a female officer to escort her to the bathroom. Only when they got there did Sarit say, ‘I haven't got any tampons or sanitary pads.'

The policewoman didn't react.

Not wanting to alert the policewoman to the fact that she spoke fluent Arabic, Sarit spoke hesitantly and falteringly, like she had been taking lessons but lacked confidence.

‘
Leisal adeiya ay al-fau'ad asahaya
.'

The policewoman reacted to this. ‘
Sa ahduru lekawa ahad
.' I'll get you one.

And with that she left. Sarit knew that there was no prospect of simply walking out of there. There would be a policeman outside the door. But she had a few minutes to act. There was a window. It was high, but it could open. The problem was how to reach it.

The cubicle on the end was empty. She went in and stood on the toilet. She gripped the ledge of the window and pulled herself up, using all her upper-body strength and the tension of her legs and feet against the sides of the cubicle. With an almighty effort, she found herself perched precariously on top of the cubicle – its door and walls a couple of feet below the ceiling.

She pulled down the latch and opened the long thin window. Then she inserted her head and hands and then arms and began pulling herself through. Now came the tricky bit. She was thin enough to get through, but the problem was landing safely. The building was set over different levels and this window opened out on to a stretch of roof. But it was an eight- or nine-foot drop from the window to the roof.

Falling head first would probably break her neck. Of course if she slid through slowly and lowered herself as she did so, the actual drop would be less than that. And of course, she could also take the fall on her hands, albeit at the risk of a broken wrist or worse. But then she noticed some kind of a utility box against the wall. By putting her hands on this as she hung there, she was able to angle her body, swing her legs round and…

Yes!

She landed on her feet, albeit awkwardly, like a springboard
diver whose dive had gone horribly wrong. But there were no points to be had here; it was all about escape and survival. Right now she was on a section of the roof. She didn't know how long it had been, but she realized that if her escape hadn't been discovered yet, it pretty soon would be. And escape was perhaps not quite the right word. She had escaped from the toilet, but she had not yet escaped from the building.

She looked for a way down, realizing that if there was a utility box on the roof then there had to be a ladder or some other way of reaching the ground. All large public buildings must have accessible roofs to enable work to be done. The question was where was it? And would it simply take her back into the building, which would almost certainly be locked down before she could affect a complete escape?

Then she saw it: a fire escape, diagonally across the roof from where she was standing. She raced towards it, but as she did she thought she heard someone shouting out to her in Arabic.