“Please, Feisal, express our sympathy to the family.”
“I did. We may as well go. My explanation wasn’t well received,” he added morosely.
I put my glass of tea on the little table and stood up. I felt a need to do or say something, not just walk out. Feeling miserable and ineffectual, I said, “I’m sorry. So very sorry. If there is anything we can do…”
The old lady got to her feet. One bony hand shot out and caught hold of mine. Standing on tiptoe, she looked up at me. The sharp black eyes were blurred with tears. She spoke softly and urgently, squeezing my hand. Her fingers felt like birds’ claws, thin and strong.
Feisal translated, his voice hoarse. “‘My son was murdered. Find his murderer, sitt, so that he can rest in peace.’”
“I will,” I said. “Aywa. Yes. I promise. Inshallah.”
Feisal didn’t have to translate. The old lady nodded and sat down. “Inshallah,” she echoed.
God willing. Nobody makes a promise without adding that. In the end it is in the hands of God. But by her God and mine, I meant to do my damnedest.
Schmidt was openly wiping his eyes when we emerged from the house. “That was very beautiful, Vicky.”
“It was the right thing to say,” Feisal admitted. He gave me an odd look. “I can’t imagine why she should appeal to you. In this culture—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know, men rule the roost. Maybe some of the women know better.”
F eisal’s Jeep needed new springs (among other things). Schmidt kept bouncing off me as we hit potholes and swerved to avoid various fauna and other vehicles. A cloud of dust traveled with us, most of it inside the vehicle.
“Tell him to slow down,” I yelled at Feisal, who was up front with the driver.
“We’re late,” Feisal yelled back.
Late for what? I wondered. I didn’t ask. The Jeep hit another pothole; Schmidt ricocheted off the window frame and onto my lap.
Feisal deigned to explain after the driver had dropped us off at the entrance to the Valley of the Kings. “I’m meeting Ahmed Saleh, the subinspector in charge of western Thebes. He’s miffed because I haven’t been answering his calls. He’s a born complainer, but I figured I had better shut him up before he goes over my head. Or,” Feisal added, “behind my back, with a knife in his hand.”
“Is he after your job?” I asked.
“They’re all after my job. For ten piastres I’d let them have it.”
The subinspector was not at the guards’ kiosk. Feisal’s irritated question got an expansive gesture and an explanation Feisal cut short.
“He’s gone on along the main path. Confound him, I told him to wait for me here.”
He lengthened his stride. There’s no denying we were all a little sensitive about that particular tomb; like a murderer who is guiltily conscious of where the body is hidden, we got nervous whenever anyone went near it.
The sun was past the zenith. Many of the tourists had gone off to lunch, but there were enough of them left to slow our progress; we had to veer around groups clustered around a lecturing guide, and a few of those maddening trios and foursomes who spread themselves out across the path, yielding the way to no one. When we came in sight of the tomb—The Tomb—Feisal screeched to a stop. Dust spurted up from under his heels.
Perched on the enclosure wall above the entrance was a pretty little woman wearing a becomingly arranged head scarf and a full skirt which spread out around her in an amber pool. She was looking down, and seemed to be chatting with someone who was out of sight on the steps below.
Feisal let out a bellow. The woman looked up, displayed a set of gleaming white teeth, and sprang to her feet.
“Here you are at last,” she cried, hurrying toward him. “Saleh, here he is.”
Feisal put out a hand to fend her off. Unperturbed and still beaming, Saida threw her arms around me. Over her head I saw a man emerge from the depths of the stairs and come toward us. He didn’t seem to be in a hurry.
“What the hell are you doing?” Feisal shouted. “I told you no one was to be allowed in that tomb.”
Mr. Saleh’s most conspicuous feature was a magnificent black beard, which he kept stroking nervously. He greeted his superior with an ingratiating smile and looked imploringly at Saida.
Like the lady she was, she came to his rescue. “He was only inspecting the steps, Feisal. I asked him—”
“What’s to inspect? They’re steps!” Feisal lowered his voice a few decibels. “You asked him, did you? And smiled and fluttered your lashes and—”
Her melting brown eyes congealed like hardening fudge. “Don’t you dare talk to me that way!”
I detached myself from Saida’s fond embrace and took Feisal’s arm. “Watch it,” I muttered.
“What?” He stared at me and, with a visible effort, got himself under control. “Oh. Right. I’m sorry, Saida.”
Saida, now in Schmidt’s fond embrace, said cheerfully, “I forgive you.”
“As for you, Saleh,” Feisal began.
“I was only—”
“Never mind. What did you want to see me about?”
“It can wait. There is no problem. Whenever you can spare the time, Chief Inspector.”
He was backing away, step by step, as he spoke. Feisal nodded curtly. “Later, then.”
“Yes, sir. As you say.” He beat a hasty retreat, but I caught a glimpse of his face before he turned, and I understood why Feisal had mentioned knives in the back.
“Oooh,” Saida cooed. “I do love you when you are being masterful.”
“Knock it off, Saida,” Feisal growled. “What are you doing here?”
“Here in Luxor or here in the Valley?” She studied his flushed face and sobered. “I suppose I can travel where I please? I tried to reach you this morning but you did not answer your phone. Then I called your office, and they told me you would be in the Valley this afternoon. When I arrived, Saleh was at the guard post. He graciously accompanied me.”
She stopped talking and looked inquiringly at him, as if inviting him to reply. The eyes were melting and the lashes were fluttering. Poor bemused Feisal was trying desperately to think of a way of dropping the subject, but I, immune to melting eyes and so on, realized we were in for it. She was not the lady to let him off the hook or quit excavating when she suspected something important lay just beneath the surface.
“All right, Saida,” I said. “Let’s stop playing games. What are you after?”
She burst into speech, eyes blazing and hands weaving patterns. “Honesty! Candor! The trust of the man who says he loves me! You insult my intelligence, Feisal. Do you think I am too stupid to put two and two and two and two together? For days you have been worried and afraid—”
Stung, Feisal interrupted at the top of his lungs. “What do you mean, afraid?”
Saida brushed the interruption aside with a sweeping gesture. “Your friends, your famous friends, who helped you to save Tetisheri, suddenly appear. They are interviewed by Ashraf, who does not waste time on social courtesies. They visit the museum and one of them, a lady who is not known to suffer from squeamishness, expresses a dislike of mummies. I begin to wonder. And then Ali, poor Ali, who had not an enemy in the world, disappears and is found dead. I begin to ask questions. It is not difficult to get answers if you know what questions to ask. Ali was not the only one to see that interesting van stop at the tomb. The others thought nothing of it, because no one told them they should! They believed it was an official visit. But it was not, was it, Feisal, because if it had been you would have told me about it. Me, of all people. Me, who has been nagging Ashraf for years to take better care of—”