Journey to the Lost Tomb (Rowan and Ella Book 2) (14 page)

           
The
women of the village were engaged in a flurry of activity: grinding meal,
sewing, weaving baskets, and cooking. The children were naked and running around
with dozens of half-wild dogs. The narrow streets of the village were lined with
garbage, making them smaller still. Even though the village was surrounded by
fields, sand coated every surface. Ella had already discovered that the wind
never stopped blowing.

           
The
poverty of the little village was a slap in the face to Ella who suddenly
thought of the clean linen sheets on her camp bed, the roast beef she had eaten
off a china plate for dinner the night before and the pot of tea she had enjoyed
that morning. As she watched the children stop playing to stare at her, she saw
swarms of flies on their faces. They didn’t even bother to wave them away.

           
William
dismounted and dropped the reins of his horse on the ground. Ella knew this was
a signal to the horse to stay. She wondered how the Egyptians taught their horses
to do this and realized that in the desert without hitching posts, it was a
very valuable trick. She remained mounted while William approached a
grey-bearded old man who sat squatting by the fire. Ella tried to imagine her
own father, easily twenty years younger than this old fellow, managing to sit
in that position without falling over.

           
William
spoke slowly and respectfully to the old man, who nodded several times and
watched Ella closely. For one mad moment, Ella got the impression that William
was talking about her. The whole village was staring at her which clearly had
nothing to do with what William was saying. An image of a white slave market
flashed through Ella’s mind but she scolded herself from even thinking of it.

           
When
William finished talking to the villager, he went to his saddlebag and pulled
out a small leather bag. Ella knew that Carter employed men from the villages
around the dig site but she also knew that payday was only once a week. The day
after they arrived, she had seen the men toss down their pickaxes and shovels,
their baskets and ropes, and queue up in long sluggish serpentine lines to
receive their pay from Carter himself. He sat at a table, writing in a huge
ledger, as he gave the coins to each man and boy.

           
William
gave the small leather bag to the old man then jumped back on his horse.
 
 
He turned his horse around to leave the
way they had come. Ella followed and smiled at several children who had dared
come close to her as they departed. They broke into wide grins. She was struck
by what a handsome people the Egyptians were. A quick glance at the village
women reminded her of how quickly this arid, hard life aged and ruined that
beauty.

 
          
After
they had ridden out of the village, William explained that Mr. Carter worked
harder than most to keep good relations with his workers—above and beyond
paying them fair wages. By honoring the elders of their villages, he helped
ensure that when problems arose—as they always did—he had some
foundation from which to reason with them.

           
“The
poorest Egyptian is superstitious,” William said as they rode back to camp. “All
believe in
efreets
and the spirits of
the disturbed dead.” He waved a hand to encompass the valley of tombs before
them. “Here they have lived for dozens of centuries among the dead of our
kings, our people.”

           
“I
guess they don’t really see the difference between archaeology and
grave-robbing.”

           
William
looked at her with interest. “That is exactly true,” he said. “When it is
your
ancestor’s graves that are being
breeched by foreigners, it can be difficult to understand.”

Abdullah trudged
behind the two men as they walked back to camp from the dig site. Digby looked
back at him and grimaced.
For a dog, the
man was quite competent
, he found himself thinking.
Although it was yet to be seen how loyal he was
. Digby shoved his
hands in the pockets of his jodhpurs, mimicking Carter as he walked ahead of
him. They had spent an exhausting afternoon patrolling the work site, Carter
pointing out one tomb entrance as more extraordinary than the last. As far as
Digby was concerned, it was all just rubble and stone caves. He thought it was
incredible how enthused the world got over what was clearly shoddy artisan
workmanship. Some of the funeral vases Carter had unearthed were as rough as
aboriginal stoneware.
That is to say,
primitive in the extreme
.

But primitive or
not, they would fetch a pretty pence with his man in Cairo. Well, perhaps not
the funeral vases since Carter seemed to value them to the extent that he did
everything short of sleep with them, but there were several lesser pieces
within easy reach of an interested bystander. Digby smiled to himself.

Digby was white.
He was English. He was trusted. It didn’t hurt that he had known Carnarvon at
school, although perhaps he had exaggerated the connection in the telling just
a tad.

He stumbled over
a rock and wrenched his hands out of his pocket in time to avoid a fall. These
outings were damned tiring. One tour of the rocky no man’s land that Carter
looked at as his idea of nirvana had been more than enough. It took all his
powers of dissembling to act enthusiastic about returning day after day. He was
disappointed in his slowly-growing cache of stolen antiquities—a button,
a tiny mold of something, a scrap of papyrus.
Surely, there would be bigger treasure?

“Good evening,
ladies,” Carter called out as they entered the camp.

 
Digby jerked his head up to see Julia and
that American woman walking arm in arm back from the bathing tent.
Now that would have been a better spent use
of an hour
, he thought wolfishly, as he waved back to them. His assumption
that Julia would hate it at the dig site enough to insist on his removing her
immediately had been thwarted by the American’s presence. First, it made it
impossible to get Julia off alone in the desert. Second, the bloody woman
appeared to be making the whole living-in-a-tent experience a tolerable one for
Julia.

It was clear that
the time had come to move things along—even with the complications that
the American woman presented. His eyes narrowed as he watched the two women disappear
into Julia’s tent to dress for dinner.

Perhaps, at the end of the day, Julia’s unfortunate accident
would look even more believable if it involved two?

After a wonderful
meal of roast lamb and couscous, the servers cleared the table and replaced the
setting with wide-bottomed brandy decanters, crystal snifters and a heavy
dessert wine. Julia was watching her closely and Ella knew another scolding
about how she had spent the morning would be in the offing once they were
alone.

           
Because
Digby and his man, Abdullah, typically followed Carter around the valley all
day, Julia was left alone in the camp for long hours at a time. While Ella knew
she spent the time reading, napping and sketching, Ella also saw her friend
becoming more and more tense and withdrawn. Although Julia was a competent
rider—as most young women from her class were in England—she
disdained the rugged, surefooted little Egyptian ponies, saying they were no
better than the filthy donkeys that wandered everywhere and befouled the
walking paths.

           
Ella
was sorry that Julia couldn’t break out of her dour mood long enough to enjoy the
magical Egyptian countryside. But Ella had given up trying and found herself
partially grateful not to have Julia along, feeling she would surely put a
damper on even the exquisite Egyptian sunrise.

           
Ella
watched from the dinner table as dusk settled on the camp. She saw the shadows
come towards the little encampment like an advancing army, blackening the
western cliffs, and obliterating the appearance of their looming menace until
all that was left was a canopy of glittering stars.

           
Carter
had announced a surprise as soon as they seated themselves for the meal.
 
 
Immediately after the coffee and brandy
was poured and the cigars lighted, he stood up at the end of the table and,
with much drama, pulled out a rolled papyrus and held it in his outstretched
hands.

           
“I
am delighted to share with you, my friends,” Carter said with unconcealed
excitement, “a find today that is the first of many leading to what I believe
will be considered the most significant archaeological find of the century.”

           
 
Ella noticed Digby frown and wondered if
he was annoyed because he wasn’t in on the surprise. She saw his eyes flash to
Abdullah as if to say:
why did I not know
about this
?

           
Very
carefully, Carter laid the papyrus down on the table and unrolled it to expose
a yard-square portion. Using crystal decanters and polished stones as paper
weights, he anchored the four corners of the paper. Everyone jumped up from
their chairs to crowd around him to see the document.

           
“No
drinks, if you please, ladies, Digby,” Carter said. “Mustn’t take the chance of
dribbling claret on one of the finest examples of a Book of the Dead I have
ever seen.”

           
Ella
started.
This was the Book of the Dead?
So obviously there was more than one of them. She squeezed under Carter’s elbow
to peer at the document. The segment of the scroll visible revealed a complex
series of illustrations and hieroglyphics. Many of the drawings were very
faint.
 

           
“I
say, old man,” Digby said behind her, his hips pressing against her bottom in
his eagerness to see the book over her shoulder. “That is bloody marvelous!”

           
“Yes,
isn’t it?” Carter said, clearly delighted with his find. Ella squirmed to get
away from the pressure of Digby as he ground his pelvis into her backside. He
cupped her bottom with his hand and she pushed it away.
   

           
“Is
it valuable?” Julia asked.

           
“Oh,
it is
in
valuable,” Carter said. “I
will be deciphering it tonight but I couldn’t wait to show it to you. It is a guide
to the treasures that await the dead. All royalty had these to aid them in
their journey to the afterlife.”

           
Ella
pushed back against Digby and jammed her heel into his instep. The result was negligible
as his foot was protected in a hard leather boot and her heel in only a soft
slipper. Nonetheless, he removed his hand as she pushed out of the scrum of
bodies around Carter.

           
“Well,
it’s very impressive,” Ella said, giving a filthy look to Digby as she walked
back to her chair. He continued to look over Carter’s shoulder as if nothing
had happened.

           
“So
the kings and queens were buried with these Books of the Dead?” Julia asked
vapidly. Ella had never seen a more staged expression of interest. Julia
clearly did not give a damn.

           
Carter
responded eagerly. “Oh, yes, it was their roadmap to reaching heaven.
Metaphorically. The Egyptians believe that there are many tests one must pass
in the afterlife if they are to achieve the paradise that awaits them. These
documents are the answer sheet, if you will. They are full of the incantations
to create the magic when it is needed. In some cases, the incantations can
actually prevent or even reverse certain death.”

           
“You
see this?” he said, pointing to one of the faint illustrations. “That is
clearly
Anubis
who
most
recently deceased Egyptians would expect
to encounter. This papyrus lays it all out such that the owner may answer the
tests appropriately. One couldn’t expect to reach the afterlife without a
properly detailed, personalized Book of the Dead.”
      

           
“Did
all Egyptians have one of these? Because it looks pretty time consuming to
create,” Julia asked as she reseated herself.

           
“Oh,
no my dear. Only royalty and the wealthy.”

           
“So,
common Egyptians couldn’t expect to make it to the afterlife?” Ella asked.

           
“I’m
afraid not,” Carter said, chuckling. “Only those with enough money got the
treasures. As it is in life it is after death.”

           
“That
sucks,” Ella said. The words were out of her mouth before she realized she was
speaking. Three heads snapped to look at her.

           
“I…I
said,
aw shucks
,” she stuttered.
“It’s an American phrase. I’m not sure it translates.”

           
“I
have heard of it,” Julia said brightly, obviously trying to cover for her.