"Digging deeper in our stone safe we find deposited such blue-chip securities as the rudiments of plane geometry, solid geometry, the beginnings of trigonometry, and – probably more valuable than all these mundane directions and distances and weights put together – the three mightiest mathematical tricks of them alclass="underline" first being of course pi, that constant though apparently inconclusive key to the circle. Second, phi, the Golden Rectangle transmission box of our aesthetics enabling us to shift harmoniously and endlessly without stripping gears so long as 2 is to 3 as 3 is to 5 as 5 is to 8 as 8 is to 13. Get it? And, third, the Pythagorean theorem, which is really just an astute amalgam of the first two shortcuts and about as attributable to Pythagoras as soul is to Eric Clapton."
"Bravo," the German applauded, but the Englishman's blood was up and he was not to be distracted.
"In Accounts Probable, the dividends look equally inviting. Based on the admission that so far we have been able to comprehend and appreciate the pyramid's info in terms of and thus only up to our own, then how much must be contained in this bloody five-sided box that we cannot yet see? Wouldn't a folk who knew enough about the sun to utilize its rays and reflections – even its periodic sunspots and their effects – be likely to have a suggestion or so for us about solar power? Hut! Call the Minister of Energy! And mightn't an astronomy so accurate as to aim a stone tunnel in pure parallel with our axis at a starless space in space, or point a radius from the center of the earth through the summit of this stone pointer at the star in Pleiades-that is indicated by drawings gleaned from centuries as the center star about which the other six of the constellation are orbiting and perhaps our sun as well! -- have some helpful hints for NASA? Call them, I say – hut hut – the Home Office, the UN, the Pentagon. What's a few billion in research to the Pentagon if they can get their hands on a ray so precise as to cut granite to watchwork accuracy yet so powerful as to sink a whole bloody continent from the face of the waters to the mud and mire of mythology?"
"It's as viable as research on the fusion bomb," the American encouraged.
"But let us speak frankly, mates. The aforementioned is all just collateral, just bloody pignoration compiled to get us bonded by the bureaucrats. The real treasure, as all Pyramidiots passionately know in their secretmost chamber of hearts, whether they mention it in their prospectus or not, lies in Accounts Receivable."
The vision of this priceless prize brought him unsteadily to his feet. He stood weaving a moment, his chin trembling, then spread his arms as though he addressed all creation.
"Something is owed us. The debt is clearly implied by the scar of its erasure. We've been shortchanged and the books have been brazenly juggled. It's obvious to even the densest bleeding auditor: they are trying to cover up our fall! A whole long column has been rubbed out and written over and the embezzlement assiduously concealed by fraudulent bookkeepers from Herodotus to Arnold Toynbee! But for all their artfulness the debt still shows, a bloody eighteen-and-a-half-minute buzzing gap marking the removal of something important – no, of something imperative! – to this court's search for our dues. How much has been pilfered from us, mates? How much of our minds, our souls? How is it that the same species responsible for that great temple out there is now administering this bloody bushwah tourist trap featuring flat beer and unpredictable hoodlums strolling the grounds outside my window wearing dark glasses and revolvers?"
He had found his focus again. His voice rang through the lobby like Olivier in a Shakespearean tirade.
"I demand an explanation! As a human being I am owed an accurate accounting, by the heavens, owed an honest audit!"
It was a cry for the benefit of all the shortchanged everywhere, spoken out of a caldron of social outrage and cosmic inspiration and flat beer. He did not let his eyes drop back to us. He turned on his heel and strode from the lobby in his stateliest stagger. There was actual clapping.
When the reviews of the Englishman's speech subsided I hoped to find out more about their ray results, but the mention of the Mena House's new gun-toting tenants had led instead to the topic of Arafat. Not a man much loved, I gathered; even the Moslem students had bad things to say about the Palestinian guerrilla leader. The German was scathing.
"Storm trooper at heart, a filthy terrorist with a limousine." He took off his glasses and massaged the bridge of his nose. "I was at the Munich games when they murdered those fine young Israeli athletes. Wrestlers, as I remember. Filthy! I will confess to you alclass="underline" If given the opportunity I would sprinkle ground glass in his Turkish coffee when they wheel the cart past in the hall."
The American said he would use LSD instead. "It'd be a gasser watching Yasir on a bummer. Clean up his Karma, too, heh heh. If we just knew where to get a hit…"
I excused myself and bought a beer and carried it back here to my cabana. I suppose I could have given them my Murine bottle; I'm sure not using it. But I'm against dosing. We just don't have the right to launder other people's Karmas, no matter how filthy. Besides, those desert gunsels? Who knows what they might do with the jams kicked out. Watching them prowl around with their revolver butts showing, I too find myself thankful their prophet forbade them booze: they're wild enough sober. As the Englishman said, unpredictable.
October 27, Sunday. It's all looking less and less resultful to Jacky. This morning we found a fence had been put up around the Sphinx.
"Little like closing the barn door," Jacky observed, "after the Turks have already shot off the Sphinx's nose."
Ignoring the mixed metaphor, the big cat-thing kept on glowering, over our heads past the squalor of Nazlet el-Samman, toward the Nile.
This afternoon things look a bit better to Jack. He's struck up an acquaintance with Kefoozalum, even had room service bring them two rum Cokes.
"She's not a Moslem, she's a Copt. The Copts are a sect of Egyptian Christians, tolerated because of their tiny size and their seniority. In fact they claim to be the first Christians, the people who cared for Joseph, Mary, and the Kid while they were in Egypt escaping Herod. Some even say they are the last remnants of the Essenes, thus actually preceding Christ as Christians by dint of second sight and signs and visions supposedly indigenous to their faith."
"That could explain her stare," I mused; the traditional Moslem woman is never supposed to look into any man's eyes but her father's, brother's, or husband's. "So frank and forward."