The Lost Army of Cambyses (11 page)

had a good night, her reply had been terse: 'No, I

bloody didn't.'

Oates swung the car through a gate in the

embassy's cream-coloured outer wall, flashing his

ID at the guard, and pulled up in a small car park,

87

taking Tara into the building through a side door.

They walked down a long corridor and up some

stairs to a suite of offices on the first floor, where

they were met by a thin, slightly dishevelled man

with white hair, thick eyebrows and a pair of

glasses hanging around his neck.

'Good morning, Miss Mullray.' He smiled,

extending a hand. 'Charles Squires, cultural

attaché.' His tone was gentle, avuncular, unlike

his grip, which was vice-like. 'Crispin, why

don't you see about some coffee? We'll be in my

office.'

He led Tara through a set of double doors into

a large, sunlit room with four armchairs arranged

around a table. Another man was standing beside

the window.

'This is Dr Sharif Jemal, of the Supreme Council

of Antiquities,' said Squires. 'He specifically asked

if he could be here this morning.'

The man was short and broad, with a heavily

pockmarked face. He stepped forward.

'May I offer my condolences on the death of

your father,' he said solemnly. 'He was a great

scholar and a true friend of this country. He will

be much missed.'

'Thank you,' said Tara.

The three of them sat down.

'The ambassador sends his apologies,' con-

tinued Squires. 'Given your father's eminence, he

would have liked to have been here in person.

Unfortunately, as you may have heard, there was

another terrorist incident last night, up near

Aswan, and two of the fatalities were British, so he

is somewhat preoccupied at present.'

88

He sat very still as he spoke, his thin, hairless

hands clasped in his lap.

'I know I speak for him, however, and indeed

the whole embassy, when I say how very sorry we

were to hear of the death of your father. I had the

pleasure of meeting him on several occasions. It's

a great loss.'

Oates returned carrying a tray.

'Milk?' asked Squires.

'Black, no sugar,' said Tara. 'Thank you.'

Squires nodded at Oates, who poured out cups

of coffee and handed them round. There was an

awkward silence.

'When I was a student I was fortunate enough

to spend a season with your father at Saqqara,'

said Jemal eventually. 'It was 1972. The year we

found the tomb of Ptah-hotep. I shall never forget

the excitement when we entered the burial

chamber for the first time. It was virtually intact,

untouched since the day it was sealed. There was

a magnificent wooden statue near the entrance,

about so high' – he indicated with his hand –

'wonderfully realistic, with inlaid eyes, in perfect

condition. It is currently on display in the Cairo

museum. You must let me take you to see it.'

'I should love to,' said Tara, trying to sound

enthusiastic.

'Your father taught me a great deal,' continued

Jemal. 'I owe him much. He was a good man.'

He removed a handkerchief and blew into it

loudly, apparently overwhelmed with emotion.

The four of them lapsed back into silence, sipping

their coffee. It was a while before Squires spoke

again.

89

'The doctor assures me your father's death was

swift and without pain. It was a coronary, appar-

ently. Death would have been almost immediate.'

Tara nodded. 'He was taking medication for his

heart,' she said.

'Please do not take this the wrong way,' said

Jemal, 'but I think if your father could have

chosen anywhere to die it would have been

Saqqara. He was always happy there.'

'Yes,' said Tara. 'It was like his real home.'

Oates began refilling their cups.

'I'm afraid there are various formalities to go

through,' said Squires apologetically, 'all of which

Crispin here can help you with.' He covered his

cup with his hand. 'No more for me, thank you.

And at some point you are going to have to decide

what you want done with your father's body,

whether it is to stay in Egypt or be returned to

Britain. For the moment, however, I simply want

to stress that if there's anything at all you need in

this difficult time you only have to ask.'

'Thank you,' said Tara. She was silent for a

moment, fiddling with her cup. 'There was . . .

um . . .'

She paused, uncertain how to continue. Squires

raised his eyebrows.

'I don't really know how to explain it. It sounds

so ridiculous. It's just . . .'

'Yes?'

'Well . . .' Again she paused. 'When I first went

into the dig house yesterday I noticed a smell of

cigar smoke, which was strange because my father

never allowed smoking anywhere around him. I

mentioned it to the police. And Crispin.'

90

Oates nodded. Jemal removed a set of jade

worry beads from his pocket and began telling

them off one by one with his thumb. Tara could

feel the three of them staring at her.

'A bit earlier I'd seen this man, a big man . . .'

'Big?' said Squires, leaning forward slightly.

'Yes, sort of tall, bigger than normal. I'm sorry,

it sounds so stupid when I say it . . .'

The Englishman flashed a glance at Jemal and

waved her on. The worry beads began clacking

faster, like someone tap-dancing.

'Well, he seemed to be watching me, through

binoculars.'

'The big man?' asked Jemal.

'Yes. And then last night I saw the same man, or

at least it looked like the same man, coming into

the hotel and I'm sure he was smoking a cigar. And

then in the middle of the night I heard someone

trying to get into my room. When I opened the

door there was no-one there, but there was a smell

of cigar smoke in the corridor.'

She grinned weakly, aware of how paranoid the

whole thing sounded. Events that in her head had

seemed suspicious and threatening, now,

recounted in front of other people, appeared no

more than mildly coincidental.

'I told you it sounded ridiculous,' she mumbled.

'Not at all,' said Squires, leaning forward and

laying his hand on her arm. 'This is a very up-

setting time for you. Given the circumstances it's

hardly surprising you should feel slightly . . . in-

secure. You're in a foreign country, after all, and

someone close to you has died. It's easy to lose

one's sense of perspective in such situations.'

91

She could tell he was simply being polite. 'I just

had this feeling there was something going on,' she

said. 'Something . . .'

'Sinister?'

'Yes.'

Squires smiled thinly. 'I don't think you should

worry yourself, Miss Mullray. Egypt is one of

those countries where it's easy to imagine that

something's going on behind one's back when in

fact it isn't. Wouldn't you agree, Dr Jemal?'

'Certainly,' snorted Jemal. 'Not a day goes by

without me thinking someone is plotting against

me. Which in the Antiquities Service they usually

are!'

The three men laughed.

'I'm sure all the things you've mentioned have a

perfectly harmless explanation,' said Squires. He

paused and then added, 'Unless, of course, you're

not telling us everything.' He said it as a joke,

although there was something vaguely threatening

in his tone, as though he was accusing her of

holding something back.

'Have you told us everything?' he asked.

A brief silence.

'I think so,' Tara said.

For a moment Squires stared at her, then he sat

back and laughed again. 'Well, there you are then.

I think you can sleep safely in your bed at night,

Miss Mullray. Can we get you a biscuit?'

They made polite conversation for another ten

minutes before Squires rose to his feet, followed

by the other two.

'I think we've taken enough of your time.

Crispin will take you along to his office, where

92

he'll help you with whatever paperwork needs to

be done.'

He handed her his card and they moved

towards the door.

'Feel free to call if you have anything further

you'd like to discuss. It's my direct line. We'll do

whatever we can to assist.'

He shook her hand, and ushered her out into

the ante-room. Jemal raised his hand in farewell.

'Come on,' said Oates. 'Let's get you some

lunch.'

For some time Squires and Jemal sat in silence, the

former staring out of the window, the latter

fiddling with his worry beads. Eventually Jemal

spoke.

'Is she telling the truth?'

'Oh I would say so, yes,' said Squires, a glimmer

of a smile playing around the corners of his thin,

pale lips. 'She doesn't know anything. Or at least

she doesn't think she knows anything.'

He reached into his pocket and extracted a

boiled sweet, which he began slowly to unwrap.

'So what's going on?' asked Jemal.

Squires raised his eyebrows. 'Well, that's the

question, isn't it. Dravic certainly appears to be on

the trail, but how Mullray got mixed up in it all

. . . your guess is as good as mine. It's all very

mysterious.' He removed the last of the wrapper

and popped the sweet into his mouth, sucking

contemplatively. The room echoed to the rhythmic

clack of the worry beads.

'Have you told Massey?' asked Jemal. 'The

Americans ought to know.'

93

'Taken care of, old boy. They're not especially

happy, but that was to be expected.'

'So what do we do now?'

'Not much we can do. We can't let them know

that we know about the tomb. That would be

fatal. We just have to sit tight and hope things

work out.'

'And if they don't?'

Squires tilted his head, but said nothing.

Jemal fiddled with his beads. 'I don't like it,' he

said. 'Maybe we should just drop the whole thing.'

'Come, come. This is a once-in-a-lifetime oppor-

tunity. Think of the rewards.'

'I don't know. I just don't know. It's getting out

of hand.' The Egyptian stood and began pacing

around the room. 'What about the girl?'

Squires drummed his fingers lightly on the arm

of the couch, rolling the sweet around with his

tongue.

'It seems to me,' he said after a long pause, 'that

she might actually be rather useful. Help us to . . .

clarify the situation. So long as she doesn't go

shouting her head off. That wouldn't be at all pro-

ductive. I trust you can handle things at your end?'

'The police do as I tell them,' grunted Jemal.

'They won't be asking unnecessary questions.'

'Jolly good. Then I think I should be able to

take care of Miss Mullray. Crispin's keeping an

eye on her. And I've got other people on the job

too. The most important thing is that they don't

cotton on we're using her. That would be fatal.'

He rose and walked to the window, staring out

across the neatly clipped lawns of the embassy

garden. 'We just have to play our hand carefully.

94

So long as we do that, I firmly believe we'll achieve

our goal.'

'I hope so,' said Jemal. 'For all our sakes.

Because if we don't we're down the fucking creek.'

Squires chuckled. 'You have a wonderful way

with words, old boy.'

There was a loud crunching sound as his teeth

ground into the boiled sweet.

95

10

LUXOR

Khalifa had no idea there were so many alabaster

workshops in Luxor. He'd known there were a lot,

of course, but only when he started visiting them

each in turn did he realize what a huge task it was

going to be to track down the one he wanted.

He and Sariya had started late the previous

afternoon immediately after the autopsy, him on

the west bank, Sariya on the east, going from shop

to shop with a photograph of the scarab tattoo,

asking if anyone recognized it. They'd continued

late into the night and resumed at six this morn-

ing. It was now midday and by Khalifa's

reckoning he'd visited over fifty workshops

already without any success. He was beginning to

wonder if Anwar had sent them on a wild-goose

chase.

He stopped in front of yet another shop: 'Queen

Tiye for Alabaster, best in Luxor'. On its front

were painted an aeroplane and a camel alongside

the black cube of the Ka'ba – a sign the owner had

96

performed the Hajj to Mecca. A group of work-

men sat cross-legged in the shade beneath an

awning chiselling lumps of alabaster, their arms

and faces white with dust. Khalifa nodded at

them and, lighting a cigarette, went inside. A man

emerged from a back room to greet him, smiling.

'Police,' said Khalifa, showing his badge. The

man's smile faded.

'We have a licence,' he said.