Flora's War (9 page)

Frank gave in. ‘You two are impossible. Do what you like.’ He was serious again. ‘But I know you’ll remember what I said.’

We nodded.

‘Oh, and by the way, Flora.’

‘Yes?’

‘Christmas? That mistletoe?’

‘Yes?’

‘I’ll be first in line.’

…

Fa and I moved into the House of the Butcher and Blacksmith just before the Australian medical team took over our hotel in late December. The first thing I did when we arrived was step across the alley and try to open the small, mysterious door I’d seen the first time I’d visited the house. It was locked. That wasn’t unexpected, it opened into the alley, after all.

Mr Bilal had opened the main door across the alley for us, and was waiting for us to come in.

‘Where does that door lead to?’ I asked him.

Was it my imagination, or did his eyes shift sideways a little guiltily? ‘It is nothing,’ he said. ‘It is unused.’

‘But what
was
it?’ I persisted.

‘It was an old storeroom. It has easy access to the street and many years ago the blacksmith used it to store materials.’

‘May I see it sometime?’ I asked. I’d be interested in seeing where the ancient blacksmith had kept his tools.

‘Of course,’ said Mr Bilal.

Over the next few days I asked Mr Bilal several times to show me the blacksmith’s storeroom. Often he was busy and said he’d show me later, or he couldn’t find the key, and somehow I never saw inside the storeroom. Then Christmas came and my mind was on other things, and I forgot all about the mysterious door.

Christmas wasn’t widely celebrated in Cairo, except among the European community. Even the local Christians, the Copts, held their Christmas on the seventh day of January. But I decided we would have a Christmas party in our own new home, and Fa agreed.

I knew many of the nurses and officers and invited them to the party. Fa, Professor and Mrs Travers, Lady Bellamy and her ladies, and many of Fa’s archaeologist friends took over the hall. The young people went up to the roof terrace and danced to records on the new, wind-up gramophone that I’d told Fa I really, really needed for Christmas.

I’d visited the street of tinsmiths and ordered dozens of lanterns with pierced sides and I had them strung all over the terrace. Candles burning inside them cast soft, dappled shadows over the dancers.

Frank presented me with some new records from New York as a Christmas present. ‘Oh, thank you! Please put one on!’ I said.

As he placed a record on the turntable, Frank said, ‘Scott Joplin’s “Maple Leaf Rag”.’

It was a type of music I’d never heard before, fast music with a strong beat. I couldn’t wait to dance to it! But what kind of dance would you do? Frank held out his hand to me. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘I’ll show you how to do the bunny hug and the turkey trot. They’re all the rage in New York.’

The nurses and officers crowded around to watch. They laughed as Frank hopped on one foot, flapped his elbows like a turkey and skipped to the side. Then, as he grabbed me and clasped me tightly to him, they realised this was a dance they’d
like
. They clasped each other closely and followed Frank’s steps.

I held myself stiffly. Frank was clutching me so closely our bodies were welded together from chest to thigh. I’d never danced like this before. I didn’t think I liked it.

‘Flora,
relax
,’ Frank said in my ear. ‘The point of the dance is to be
close
and move
together
. You’ve got about as much give in you as a folded umbrella.’

I have, have I? I glared at him.

Frank grinned down at me. ‘All the really modern girls dance the turkey trot,’ he informed me.

All right, I thought, watch me then!

I took a deep breath and stopped trying to hold myself apart from Frank. It was actually easier that way, I found. Our bodies moved together in the silly, syncopated steps of the dance. We pranced across the terrace, hopping and skipping in perfect time, until the music finished and the record came to a scratching, hissing end as the needle slid towards the centre of the record.

Frank stopped, took a step back and stared at me. ‘Wow!’ he said.

I stared back. I didn’t say anything, but I was thinking ‘Wow!’ myself. Two minutes ago, I hadn’t liked being held to a boy’s chest. Now, I found I liked it. In fact, I liked it a
lot
.

‘I’ll just – uh – change the record,’ Frank said.

‘Good idea,’ I said. Our eyes were still locked.

‘Don’t move. I’ll be right back.’

‘I’ll be here.’

For the rest of the evening, Frank determinedly cut out any young officer who wanted to dance the turkey trot with me. When one did manage to claim my hand, Frank was quick to put on a slow foxtrot or waltz that involved no close body contact.

It was a night from a fairytale. Stars glittered ice-cold above us in the dark blue sky, scents of spiced cooking and incense rose from the streets below, passers-by looked up as our dancing shadows whirled and hopped on the walls of the buildings beside our house. And Frank and I danced and danced. We didn’t say anything to each other, but that evening I discovered I was looking at Frank in a way I’d never looked at him before.

As they left, some of the nurses told Fa it was the best night they had ever had in Egypt.

‘What a wonderful country! So beautiful, so romantic,’ sighed Sarah, the nurse Frank had been flirting with a few weeks before. ‘It was an enchanted night!’

Fa held up his glass to her. ‘And here’s to many more,’ he said.

Chapter 7

After Christmas, I began serious work on Fa’s excavation. The sand had been cleared all around and it stood alone, a solid, squat, flat-topped building of stone. The entrance had been fully opened and the workers carried out the sand that had accumulated over the years. Wall carvings and paintings were emerging as they worked.

I watched, holding my breath, as the workmen revealed scenes of the tomb’s owner hunting hippopotamus and birds, and feasting with his family and friends. I laughed at a scene showing his boatmen fighting. I felt sad when I saw him standing before the great God Osiris to be judged after his death. It was like opening a wonderful present every day, as scene after scene was uncovered. I understood how Fa and Professor Travers and Frank felt about archaeology. I felt it too.

From the wall paintings, we discovered the man the tomb had been built for had died before his tomb was completed. Some paintings were unfinished, just sketched in as rough outlines in red ochre and charcoal. The tomb would have been under construction well before he died; all wealthy Egyptians planned and built their tombs years before they expected to need them. When he died, work would have stopped on the tomb immediately. He would have been mummified, buried, and the tomb sealed up at once.

The workers were uncovering small finds, pieces of pottery, beads and a shabti or two: little figures of workers which were meant to take the place of the tomb’s owner when it was his turn to work in the fields in the after-life. It was my job to list, describe and draw these small objects. I wasn’t yet busy, but as we uncovered more of the contents I knew I soon would be.

Fa was totally immersed in the work. He was at the excavation every day. I drove him there in the morning, stayed and worked with him, or – if I had time – drove back to the town to work at Lady Bellamy’s Rest and Recreation Centre or visit at a hospital.

Now I was visiting at the Australian hospital that had once been our hotel. It was strange to see many of the bedrooms with their wooden doors removed, the rooms converted to wards. The patients seemed awed by the former hotel’s fantastical Oriental design. In the letters home I wrote for them, the boys often said their hospital was ‘like an Arabian palace, Mum!’

Lydia Herschell had transferred to the Australian hospital, along with many of the Australian nurses, and I often saw them when I visited. I’d been waiting until there was a significant discovery at the excavation before asking Fa if the nurses could visit. Since many of the wall paintings had been uncovered, and we were anticipating finding the owner’s statue soon, I thought the time was right. I invited Lydia to afternoon tea one day to talk about it.

We met at Groppi’s café, rather grandly termed a
Confiserie
by its proprietor, and a very popular place for tea and cakes. As usual, it was full of soldiers on leave. We knew several of them, but when some attempted to join us, Lydia waved them away. ‘We have business to discuss,’ she said to them. ‘How many people can your father have visit at one time?’ Lydia asked me.

‘Ten would be a manageable number,’ I said. ‘Any more, and the tomb will be overcrowded.’

Lydia was making notes. ‘Ten,’ she said thoughtfully. ‘Then we should invite people who will be genuinely interested, don’t you think?’

I nodded. Lydia began to jot down names. ‘That’s seven, eight, nine,’ she said. ‘Now who for the tenth? Hmmm. I know! Jim.’

‘Jim?’ I said.

‘I don’t think you’ve met him. He’s always at the museum.’

‘He sounds perfect,’ I said.

We settled the date for a week later.

Fa tasked me with showing the visitors around. It was quite different from being an unofficial guide to the pyramids and I was a little nervous. I asked Gwen to come along for moral support, even though I knew she wasn’t terribly interested in Egyptian history and had seen the insides of more tombs than she ever really cared to.

‘All right,’ she agreed. ‘As long as you find time for the concert at Shepheard’s on Saturday night. There’s a violinist I want to hear.’

On the afternoon of the excavation tour, Gwen arrived early at the site. She’d driven herself out from Cairo, causing a great stir as she sped along the road from the town. She arrived, pulled up in a scatter of sand – Gwen couldn’t quite get the hang of slowing down gradually before stopping – and jumped out. Discarding her dustcoat, she revealed a pretty, frilled dress, completing the picture with a large straw hat trimmed with organza flowers and a parasol retrieved from the back seat. In my work clothes of drab-coloured divided skirt and shirt and dusty boots, I didn’t compare. Gwen had sucked all the available elegance out of the immediate atmosphere.

‘So what are you showing them?’ Gwen wanted to know. I gave her a quick look at the uncovered rooms, pointing out the inscriptions and paintings. ‘Yes, this should keep them busy,’ she said, looking around.

‘And then tea,’ I said. ‘And then they can all go!’

Gwen looked at me. ‘Flora, you aren’t nervous, are you?’ she said.

‘I am a bit,’ I said. ‘I’ve never done this before. Aren’t you nervous when you give a violin performance?’

‘I suppose I am. But you’ll be fine,’ Gwen assured me. ‘Just ask me if you can’t remember any of the dates.’

‘Ask
you
about dates!’ I said.

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I can make something up in an instant. They’d never know the difference.’

We were still giggling when the group arrived by donkey.

I needn’t have worried; they were all either very interested or polite enough to pretend. I was introduced to several young officers I’d never met before, but their names immediately went out of my head as I tried frantically to remember all the things I wanted to tell them.

I conducted them through the entrance and the small rooms at the front of the tomb. ‘We know now that his name was Khnumhotep,’ I said. ‘His wife was Merithathor. We don’t know, yet, if she’s buried here as well. Or even if he’s still here.’

We arrived in the central chamber where Fa was supervising the excavation. Just the day before, the workers had uncovered the entrance to the shaft that led down to the burial chamber. At the back of the chamber others were uncovering the statue of Khnumhotep. It appeared to be undisturbed, and Fa was jubilant.

‘We expect the shaft will drop straight down for some way, at the end we’ll find a passage at right-angles which will lead to the burial chamber,’ Fa explained. ‘We’re hoping it’s blocked with rubble.’

‘You’re
hoping
it’s blocked?’ an officer asked. ‘Why?’

‘It was usual for the shaft and passage to be blocked up after the burial. It might be filled with blocks of solid stone,’ I said. ‘Rubble is much easier to remove.’

After a few minutes, I took the group outside again, to Fa’s relief I rather suspected. Now he could get back to serious work.

We went to the tents where the finds were sorted, described, sketched and stored. I’d spread some of the objects out on a long trestle table; shabtis, many pieces of pottery, a few pots that were almost intact, some decorated dishes and beads from necklaces.

Fa came to join us as I served tea to the visitors. They all seemed very impressed and had plenty of questions. So many that Fa didn’t go back to work after his tea; he stayed and answered the questions, and explained things and showed the small artefacts to the visitors all over again. Finally at sunset they left, some on donkeys, some in Gwen’s car.

‘Hold onto your hats,’ I warned them. ‘She drives like a demon.’

‘But looks like an angel,’ said one of the young officers gallantly.

Gwen laughed. ‘Tell me that if I get you back to camp safely!’ she said. By the way she roared off, spraying sand, I hoped they would.

I sat down with a thump. ‘Thank goodness
that’s
over!’ I said to Fa.

‘Well, I have to say I was rather dreading it,’ he said. ‘But they’re delightful young people and very interested. Especially that one young man.’

‘What young man?’ I asked.

‘Oh, one of the officers,’ said Fa vaguely. ‘Very interested indeed and quite well informed. I’d say he’s actually studied some Egyptian history. Now, what was his name? He did introduce himself. Something with a J in it. Joseph? James? John? You’ll know, Flora.’

I shook my head. ‘I don’t know all of them. There is a Jim the boys have mentioned who spends a lot of time in the museum. Perhaps it’s him.’

‘He asked if he could come again sometime, when we’re a little further along with the work,’ Fa said. ‘I suppose you’ll be able to put a face to the name, if he comes.’