Touchstone (Meridian Series) (22 page)

       “Forty-eight
hours,” said Nordhausen.

       “Two
days,” breathed LeGrand. “Two days. That’s not much time at all, but then the
important things never need much. Damn! I had better have my wits about me. I
never thought I would have a hand in a major transformation, but here it is,
right in front of me, and all because of a loose strap on that damn purse to
set me on your trail.”

Part VI

Travelers

“The use of travel is to
regulate imagination by reality, and, instead of thinking how things may be, to
see them as they are.”

—Samuel Johnson:
Anecdotes

16

Le
Grand’s eyes
seemed to
light up with the revelation t
hat now filled
his mind, his thoughts spilling quickly into animated speech as he considered
the situation.

       “First
things first,” he said. “You must tell me why you’ve come. Oh, joy! What an
honor this is. You really have no idea. Why, it’s livened up things quite a
bit! This was the last month of my tour, you see. Napoleon is on his way here
even as we speak. He’s received word that the Turkish fleet has appeared, but
that wheezing old Mustapha Pasha is just sitting on the beach out there while
his men try to secure the French garrison at
Aboukir
Castle
. That’s where those two kind soldiers were off to when you
arrived. Well, I suppose you know the history as well as I do.”

       “Quite
so,” said Nordhausen. “Napoleon left
Cairo
on the eleventh of July, but he will be
twelve days getting here.”

       “Too
bad you can’t stay for the final battle! I’ve seen it twice now, and it’s well
worth the wait. Oh, it’s not quite as spectacular as the
Battle
of the Pyramids, but it’s a darn site better than that nasty
business in
Palestine
. Murat is leading the French Cavalry in the
van. Napoleon won’t wait for Kleber’s Division. With the Turks picking their
noses on the beaches, he just sends in enough foot soldiers to force the Pasha’s
entrenchments, and then Murat dashes in with one of those cavalry charges that
he becomes so famous for. It’s really quite a show!”

       “Sorry
we’ll miss it,” said  Nordhausen, “but we came on… other business.”

       “Oh,
yes,” LeGrand rolled his eyes. “The discovery. You’re here for just 48 hours.
You arrive on the 14
^th
and leave on the 16
^th
. The big day
is tomorrow, of course. It’s nothing so grand as a battle, but the finding of
the stone is something of a windfall for Western scholars. Being somewhat of a
Savant myself, I always ride forward to Rashid here for the recovery. But why
are you so interested in it? Did you pick up on the variation as well?”

       “Yes,”
said Nordhausen. “Damn lucky I suppose. As I have said, I was doing some
research at the
British
Museum
. It’s a long story, but suffice it to say
that I wanted to have a good look at the Rosetta Stone to confirm a suspicion
I’ve been brooding on. Imagine my surprise when I found it damaged.”

       “Damaged?
What are you speaking of?”

       Nordhausen
related the details of his mission to
London
, and the harrowing discovery that no one
could read the glyphs upon his return.

       “I
see,” said LeGrand. He thought for a moment, then broke into a broad smile.
“You want to see if it’s damaged upon discovery!”

       “Quite
so,” said Nordhausen.

       “So,
that’s what this is all about. The courier didn’t have any details, just a
watch order. Still, it seems that the Order is now as interested in the
condition of this stone as you two seem to be.  I can’t imagine why, but what’s
good for the Founders sits well with me.” He dipped his head in a bow and
smiled again. “I am at your service then: Jean LeGrand, First Able Sergeant of
the Milieu, Order of the Temporal Knights. How may I assist you?”

       “We
need to observe the discovery, of course,” said Maeve. “And we want to be as
inconspicuous as possible. You say you’ve witnessed this event before?”

       “Twice.”

       “Well
man—was it damaged?” Nordhausen was eager for all the information he could get.

       “Not
that I could tell. No, the discovery went off without any hitch that I could
discern. Captain Bouchard is already at the Fort. He’ll be directing the
improvements to the west wall tomorrow—that’s where they find it, embedded in
the wall of
Fort
Julien
.”

       “You
can take us there?”

       “Of
course. It’s just to the north a tad, at the edge of the plantation country, on
the west bank of the
Nile
. We’ll use the carriage. The two of you can
sit inside and I’ll lead it right past the dig site at precisely the moment the
stone is uncovered. We’ll have a perfect vantage point.”

       “Excellent,”
Robert rubbed his palms together.

       “If
I may ask,” LeGrand put in. “What kind of damage are you talking about? Was the
stone defaced?”

       “Oh
nothing as simple as that. It was broken clean across the top when I observed
it at the
London
Museum
. All the hieroglyphics were gone, and the
curator of antiquities there claims it was always so.”

       That
news gave LeGrand a start. “I see,” he mused. “This is more serious than I
thought. What do you hope to determine here?”

       “The
time of the damage, for one thing,” said Robert. “If it’s intact when they dig
it up tomorrow, it will mean that the damage was incurred somewhere forward of
this point on the continuum.”

       “Obviously,”
said LeGrand.

       “I
know it’s not much, but it is at least a starting point. We’re fairly hopeful
that it will be uncovered intact.”

       “Yes,
if it was damaged somehow, that narrows down the window of opportunity to just
a few years before it reaches
London
in 1802.”

       “Better
than that,” said Nordhausen. “The stone was taken to the National Institute in
Cairo
soon after it’s discovery. My research indicates that Napoleon ordered an
inscription made of the writing. Two prominent lithographers were called from
France
. They’re going to ink the stone and roll paper over it to get
a good image of the text. The damage
must
occur before that is
accomplished.”

       “I
see, then that compresses the affair to just a few months. Very clever! Napoleon
won’t bother to pay any attention to it in the next week or so. He’s busy
planning his battle with the Turks at
Aboukir
Bay
.”

       “That
means the time of greatest vulnerability will be the journey from the discovery
site to
Cairo
.”

       “Quite
so,” LeGrand concurred. “If I were planning something, that’s when I would
strike. All the French troops in the area will be converging here, their minds
set on the Turks. Let me think… Yes. If I were going to make a move on the
stone I would probably arrange an ambush along the road—and considerably south
of here so as to forestall any interference by the French.”

       “How
long is the journey to
Cairo
likely to take?” asked Nordhausen.

       “I’m
not exactly certain,” said LeGrand. “I’m here for the discovery, but then I take
up with the Engineers as they make ready to join Napoleon’s attack at
Aboukir
Bay
. I usually go on to the battle, but not
this time. The watch order didn’t give me any specific instruction but, given
this news, I’m afraid I have to stay with the stone. Problem is, the damn thing
just lays around here for a good long while before they get round to moving it.
Now I’ll have to come up with some plan to account for my necessary interest in
the artifact for what may turn out to be a very long month.  Too bad you can’t
stay to keep me some company.”

       “You
realize that this situation is likely to be dangerous now,” said Maeve.

       “Dangerous?
My lady, everything I do here is dangerous. I have to watch things like an owl,
being constantly vigilant while also remaining discreetly uninvolved, as much
as possible.

       “Take
those two French soldiers this morning. They were supposed to carry a message
to the commander of the garrison at
Aboukir
Castle
. Then I get word to put a watch on the road
west of town. Incursion watch! That’s what we call it when someone initiates a
breaching point on the continuum in the area. We look for the telltale
signs—white haze, extreme cold, and that wonderful aurora that settles around
you as you manifest. Well, as far as I could tell, the road was clear of
traffic in the pre-dawn hours. Then I learned that this message was being sent,
and so I found out who was going and claimed that I had lost track of some
associates. I tagged along and,
voilá!
There you were. I handled the
incident quite adroitly, wouldn’t you say? ”

       “To
be sure,” said Maeve. “You made your rendezvous with us and managed to send the
two soldiers on their way to avoid any contamination.”

       “Exactly!”
LeGrand beamed with satisfaction. “The trick was in figuring how to prevent any
interaction between the two of you and the soldiers. I had to find you before
they did, and make sure your arrival did not deter them from their courier
assignment in any way.”

       “Well,
you’ve made a fine resolution of that one, and here we are.” Maeve set down her
teacup, a pensive expression on her face. “But I have a question,” she said.
“Just who would be trying to damage the stone, in your opinion, and why?”

       “Our
enemies, of course.”

       “Enemies?
Who exactly are they?”

       “Well,”
said LeGrand, “that’s quite a long story. As to who, radical Islam has been
most inconvenient for us over the last several decades. There have been a
hundred nefarious groups that have sprung up over the years, but the heart of
the nest is the Ismaili Cult of Assassins. As to why, I suppose you and
professor Nordhausen have as much of a clue as I do.  These people will simply
not stop interfering. They won’t be satisfied until the whole of the world
supplicates itself to the will of Allah. Their religion is infused with bad politics,
and it’s becoming insufferable—nothing more than a thin veil of hypocrisy for
their devious political aims. Do you know that Mohammed was the only major
religious figure who was also a warrior?”

       “I see,” said Maeve, somewhat unconvinced.
“Religion is like that sometimes… the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition, the
Hundred Years War, Protestants and Catholics at each other’s throats, popes
paying huge bribes to Venetian merchants to have crusading armies delivered to
targets of opportunity. You know the routine well enough, I suppose—’Soldiers
of Christ,’ out to secure lands and fortunes for the Vicar. When it comes to
hypocrisy, there seems to be plenty left over for the Christians.”

       “Yes, well at least we had the good sense to work
most of that out during the Middle Ages,” said LeGrand.

       “Quite so,” Maeve returned. “Now it’s politics and
economics to keep things interesting. Take this little adventure by Napoleon…”
She gestured broadly to the unseen world outside the walls of the roadside inn.
“It’s politically motivated, to be sure, but I wonder what the reaction would
be in
Paris
if thirty thousand
Turks suddenly landed in
Marseilles
?”

       “Oh, they’ve tried, but Charles Martel put an end
to Moslem expansion in
Europe
at the battle of
Tours
in 732.”    “True,” said Maeve. “And ever since then it
seems the West has been on the offensive. Recent history would argue that
you’ve got it all wrong, Doctor. The West has been sticking its thumb in the
Islamic pie for the last few centuries—not the other way around.”

       “I
suppose that’s one way of looking at it.” LeGrand set down his cup, crossing
his arms.  “It really does come down to a clash of cultures when you get to the
root of it all. The Islamic world is still centuries behind the West in terms
of its social systems and politics.”

       “And
so your Order is helping them along?” Maeve had that look in her eye that
Robert knew all too well. He gave LeGrand a sideward glance, wondering if he
knew what he was in for, and smiling uncomfortably.