The Lost Army of Cambyses (16 page)

They had left the tea-room, stares and whispers

pushing against their backs, and were now walk-

ing down Ahmed Maher towards the heart of the

city's Islamic quarter, past stalls selling lamps and

shisha
pipes and clothes and vegetables. The air

was heavy with the bitter-sweet odour of spices

and dung and rubbish; a hundred different noises

assaulted their ears – hammering and music and

beeping and, from one shop doorway, the slow,

rhythmic grinding of a huge vermicelli-making

machine.

They came to a crossroads and turned left

through an ornately carved stone gateway, a pair

of minarets rearing high above them. A narrow

street stretched ahead, even more crowded than

the one they had left. Fifty metres along they

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turned into a narrow alley and stopped in front of

a heavy wooden door. A sign on the wall read

'Hotel Salah al-Din'. Daniel pushed the door open

and they passed into a small, dusty courtyard with

a dried-up fountain at its centre and a wooden

gallery running above their heads.

'Home sweet home,' he said.

His room was on the upper floor, opening off

the gallery, simple but clean. He flicked on a light,

pushed back the window shutters, poured them

both a large whisky. From below came the rattle

of cart wheels and the babble of human voices.

There was a long silence.

'I don't know what to say,' he said eventually.

'Sorry, maybe.'

'Would that do any good?'

'It would be a start.'

'Then I'm sorry, Tara. Genuinely so.'

There was a pack of cheroots lying on the table

beside him and he pulled one out, lighting it and

exhaling a cloud of dense smoke. He seemed

uneasy, nervy, his eyes flicking over to her and

away again. In the clear cold light of the room she

could see that he'd aged more than she had at first

thought. There were flecks of grey in his dark hair,

and lines across his forehead. He was still hand-

some though. God, he was handsome.

'When did you start smoking those?' she asked.

He shrugged.

'A few years ago. Carter used to smoke them. I

thought a bit of his luck might rub off on me.'

'And has it?'

'Not really.'

He refilled his glass and hers too. There was a

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loud beeping from below as a moped fought its

way through the crowds.

'So how did you find me?' he asked. 'I take it

you didn't just walk into the tea-room by

accident.'

'I saw the note you left my father.'

'Of course. How is he?'

She told him.

'Oh Jesus. I'm sorry. I had no idea. Really I

didn't.'

He laid aside his glass and came over to her,

extending his arms as if to embrace her. She raised

a hand, however, warding him off, and his arms

dropped back to his side.

'I'm sorry, Tara. If there's anything I can

do . . . ? '

'It's all been taken care of.'

'Well, if you need . . .'

'It's all been taken care of.'

He nodded and backed away. There was

another long silence. She wondered what she

was doing here, what she was trying to achieve.

Tendrils of cheroot smoke were curling around the

light bulb.

'So what have you been doing for the last six

years?' she asked eventually, conscious of how

superficial the question sounded.

Daniel downed his whisky. 'The usual, I

suppose. Excavating. A bit of lecturing. I've

written a couple of books.'

'You live out here now?'

He nodded. 'In Luxor. I'm in Cairo just for a

few days. Business.'

'I didn't know you were still in touch with Dad.'

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'I'm not,' he said. 'We haven't spoken since—'

He broke off, poured himself another glass. 'I just

thought it would be nice to see him. I don't know

why. Old times' sake and all that. I doubt he

would have responded. He hated me for what I

did.'

'That makes two of us.'

'Yes,' he said, 'I guess it does.'

They finished the bottle of whisky, catching up

on each other's news, skating across the surface of

things, not going too deep. Outside the noise in

the street grew, peaked and slowly died away

again as the shops began to shut up for the night

and the crowds to dissipate.

'You didn't even write to me,' she said, cradling

her glass. It was late now and her mind was thick

with drink and exhaustion. The street outside was

empty and silent, wisps of paper blowing down it

as if the city's flesh were flaking away.

'Would you have wanted me to?'

She thought and then shook her head. 'No.'

She was sitting on the edge of the bed. Daniel

was on a dusty sofa against the far wall.

'You fucked my life up,' she said.

He looked up at her and their eyes met, briefly,

before she threw back her head and finished her

drink.

'Anyway, it's in the past. Finished.'

Even as she said it, though, she knew that it

wasn't. That there was still something to come.

Some deeper resolution.

Outside, beyond the great stone gateway through

which they'd walked earlier, the dusty black

Mercedes sat silently against the kerb, waiting.

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15

LUXOR

'And you know nothing about a new find?' asked

Khalifa wearily, stubbing out his cigarette in an

empty coffee glass.

The man in front of him shook his head.

'A tomb? A cache? Anything out of the

ordinary?'

Again a shake of the head.

'Come on, Omar. If there's something out there

we'll find it eventually, so you might as well tell

us.'

The man shrugged and blew his nose on the

sleeve of his tunic.

'I know nothing,' he said. 'Nothing at all.

You're wasting your time with me.'

It was eight in the morning and Khalifa had

been up all night. His eyes ached, his mouth was

dry and his head swimming. For over seventeen

hours, with only brief breaks for prayers and food,

he and Sariya had been interviewing every person

in Luxor known to have connections with the

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antiquities trade, hoping for a lead in the Abu

Nayar case. All yesterday afternoon, all through

the night and all morning a steady stream of

known dealers had passed through the police

station on Sharia el-Karnak, all giving precisely

the same answers to his questions: no, they knew

nothing about any new discoveries; no, they

knew nothing about any new antiquities coming

onto the market; and yes, if they could think of

anything else, they would get in touch. It was like

being made to listen to the same tape over and

over again.

Khalifa lit another cigarette. He didn't really

want it, he just needed something to keep him

awake.

'How is it, do you think, that someone like Abu

Nayar could afford a new television set and fridge

for his mother?' he asked.

'How the hell should I know?' grunted Omar, a

small, wiry man with close-cropped hair and a

bulbous nose. 'I barely knew him.'

'He found something, didn't he?'

'If you say so.'

'He found something, got killed because of it

and you know what it was.'

'I don't know anything.'

'You're an Abd el-Farouk, Omar! Nothing

happens in Luxor without your family knowing

about it.'

'Well, in this case we don't. How many times do

I have to tell you that? I don't know anything.

Nothing. Nothing.'

Khalifa stood and walked over to the window,

puffing on his cigarette. He knew he was wasting

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his time. Omar wasn't going to tell him anything

and that was the end of it. He could ask questions

till he was blue in the face and it wouldn't do any

good. He sighed deeply.

'OK, Omar,' he said without turning. 'You can

go. Let me know if you think of anything else.'

'Of course,' said Omar, making swiftly for the

door. 'I'll call you straight away.'

He slipped out, leaving Khalifa and his deputy

alone.

'How many left?' he asked.

'That's it,' replied Sariya, hunching forward and

rubbing his eyes. 'We've done them all. There's no

one else.'

Khalifa collapsed into a chair and lit another

cigarette, not noticing that he'd left one burning in

an ashtray on the windowsill.

Maybe he'd got it wrong. Perhaps Nayar's death

had nothing to do with antiquities after all. From

what he'd heard there were plenty of other reasons

why someone might want him dead. He didn't

have a shred of evidence to connect it with

antiquities. Not a single shred.

And yet he felt – he couldn't properly explain

why – he just sensed, deep down, that Nayar's

death was tied up with the trade in ancient

artefacts, in the same way some archaeologists can

feel deep down that they're close to an important

find. It was a sixth sense, an instinct. As soon

as he had seen the man's body with its scarab

tattoo he had known: this is going to be a case

where the present can only be explained by the

past.

And there were hints. Enough, at least, to stop

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his line of enquiry looking totally pointless. Nayar

had definitely been involved in the antiquities

trade. He had definitely come into money recently

– more money, certainly, than could be explained

by the odd jobs he did to support his family. His

wife, when he had questioned her briefly the

previous afternoon, had denied all knowledge of

her husband possessing any artefacts, which

wasn't surprising, except that she had done so

before he himself had mentioned them, as though

it was a question for which she had been prepar-

ing. And then there had been the reaction of the

dealers they'd interviewed.

'Fear,' he said, blowing a smoke ring towards

the ceiling and watching as it rose, expanded and

then slowly dissipated.

'What?'

'They're frightened, Mohammed. The dealers.

All of them. Terrified.'

'I'm not surprised. They could get five years for

handling stolen antiquities.'

Khalifa blew another ring. 'It's not us they're

frightened of. It's something else. Or someone.'

Sariya narrowed his eyes. 'I don't understand.'

'Someone's got to them, Mohammed. They

were trying to hide it, but they were petrified. You

could see it when we showed them the pictures of

Nayar. They went white, as if they could see the

same thing happening to themselves. Every

antiquities dealer in Luxor is crapping his pants.

I've never seen anything like it.'

'You think they know who killed him?'

'They suspect, certainly. But they're not going to

talk. The fact is they're a damned sight more

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scared of the people who cut up Nayar than they

are of us.'

Sariya yawned. His mouth, Khalifa noticed,

seemed to have more fillings in it than teeth.

'So who do you reckon we're dealing with?'

asked the sergeant. 'Local mob? Guys from Cairo?

Fundamentalists ?'

Khalifa shrugged. 'Could be any of those or

none. One thing's for sure, though: this is big.'

'You really think he might have found a new

tomb?'

'Possibly. Or maybe someone else found one

and Nayar got wind of it. Or maybe it's just a few

objects. But it's something valuable. Something

that was worth killing him for.'

He flicked his cigarette through the window.

Sariya yawned again.

'Sorry, sir,' he said. 'I haven't been getting much

sleep lately, what with the new baby.'

'Of course,' smiled Khalifa. 'I'd forgotten. How

many is that now?'

'Five.'

Khalifa shook his head. 'I don't know where

you get the energy. Three almost killed me.'

'You should eat more chick peas,' said Sariya.

'It, you know, gives you staying power.'

The earnestness with which his deputy offered

this advice amused Khalifa and he started to

chuckle. For a moment Sariya looked offended.

Then he too started laughing.

'Go home, Mohammed,' said Khalifa. 'Eat some

chick peas, get some sleep, relax. Then you can go

over to the west bank and talk to Nayar's wife and

family. See what you can dig up.'

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Sariya stood and removed his jacket from the

back of his chair. He turned towards the door, but

then turned back again. 'Sir?'

'Hmm?'

He was fiddling with the sleeve of his shirt, not

looking at Khalifa.

'Do you believe in curses?'

'Curses?'

'Yes. Ancient curses. Like, you know, the curse

of Tutankhamun.'

Khalifa smiled. 'What, that those who disturb

the sleep of the dead will meet a terrible end?'

'Something like that.'

'You think that's what we might be dealing with

here? A curse?'

His deputy shrugged non-committally.

'No, Mohammed, I don't believe in them. It's all