narrowed it down to four. There is the Getty Museum of course, but I
never like to work with a big impersonal institution. I prefer to have a
single man to answer to.
Decisions are always easier to reach."None of this was new to her, but
she listened dutifully.
"Then there is Herr von Schiller. He has the money and the interest in
the subject, but I do not know him well enough to trust him entirely."
He paused, and Royan had listened to these musings so often before that
she could anticipate him.
"What about the American? He is a famous collector," she forestalled
him.
"Peter Walsh is a difficult man to work with. His passion to accumulate
makes him unscrupulous. He frightens me a little."
"So who does that leave?" she asked.
He did not reply, for they both knew the answer to her question.
Instead, he turned his attention back to the material that littered the
work table.
"It looks so innocent, so mundane. An old papyrus scroll, a few
photographs and notebooks, a computer printout. It is difficult to
believe how dangerous these might be in the wrong hands." He sighed
again. "You might almost say that they are deadly dangerous."
Then he laughed. "I am being fanciful. Perhaps it is the late hour.
Shall we get back to work? We can worry about these other matters once
we have worked out all the conundrums set for us by this old rogue,
Taita, and completed the translation."
He picked up the top photograph from the pile in front of him. It was an
extract from the central section of the scroll. "It is the worst luck
that the damaged piece of papyrus falls where it does." He picked up his
reading glasses and placed them on his nose before he read aloud.
"'There are many steps to ascend on the staircase to the abode of Hapi.
With much hardship and endeavour we reached the second step and
proceeded no further, for it was here that the prince received a divine
revelation. In a dream his father, the dead god pharaoh, visited him and
commanded him, "I have travelled far and I am grown weary. It is here
that I will rest for all eternity."" Duraid removed his glasses and
looked across at Royan, "'The second step". It is a very precise
description for once. Taita is not being his usual devious self."
"Let's go back to the satellite. photographs," Royan suggested, and drew
the glossy sheet towards her. Duraid came around the table to stand
behind her.
"To me it seems most logical that the natural feature that would
obstruct them in the gorge would be something like a set of rapids or a
waterfall. If it were the second waterfall, that would put them here-'
Royan placed her finger on a spot on the satellite photograph where the
narrow snake of the river threaded itself through the dark massifs of
the mountains on either hand.
At that moment she was distracted and she lifted her head. "Listen!" Her
voice changed, sharpening with alarm.
"What is it?" Duraid looked up also.
"The dog," she answered.
"That damn mongrel," he agreed. "It is always making the night hideous
with its yapping. I have promised myself to get rid of him."
At that moment the lights went out.
They froze with surprise in the darkness. The soft thudding of the
decrepit diesel generator in its shed at the back of the palm grove had
ceased. It was so much a part of the oasis night that they noticed it
only when it was silent.
Their eyes adjusted to the faint starlight that came in through the
terrace doors. Duraid crossed the room and took the oil lamp down from
the shelf beside the door where it waited for just such a contingency.
He lit it, and looked across at Royan with an expression of comical
resignation.
"I will have to go down-'
Duraid," she interrupted him, "the dog!'
He listened for a moment, and his expression changed to mild concern.
The dog was silent out there in the night.
"I am sure it is nothing to be alarmed about." He went to the door, and
for no good reason she suddenly called after him.
"Duraid, be careful!" He shrugged dismissively and stepped out on to the
terrace.
She thought for an instant that it was the shadow of the vine over the
trellis moving in the night breeze off the desert, but the night was
still. Then she realized that it was a human figure crossing the
flagstones silently and swiftly, coming in behind Duraid as he skirted
the fishpond in the centre of the paved terrace.
"Duraid!" She screamed a warning and he spun round, lifting the lamp
high.
"Who are you?" he shouted. "What do you want here?" The intruder closed
with him silently. The traditional full-length dishdasha robe swirled
around his legs, and the white ghutrah headcloth covered his head. In
the light of the lamp Duraid saw that he had drawn the corner of the
headcloth over his face to mask his features.
The intruder's back was turned towards her so Royan did not see the
knife in his right hand, but she could not mistake the upward stabbing
motion that he aimed at Duraid's stomach. Duraid grunted with pain and
doubled up at the blow, and his attacker drew the blade free and stabbed
again, but this time Duraid dropped the lamp and seized the knife arm.
The flame of the fallen oil lamp was guttering and flaring. The two men
struggled in the gloom, but Royan saw a dark stain spreading over her
husband's white shirt front.
"Run!" he bellowed at her. "Go! Fetch help! I cannot hold him!" The
Duraid she knew was a gentle person, a soft man of books and learning.
She could see that he was outmatched by his assailant.
"Go! Please! Save yourself, my flower!" She could hear by his tone that
he was weakening, but he still clung desperately to his attacker's knife
arm.
She had been paralysed with shock and indecision these few fatal
seconds, but now she broke free of the spell and ran to the door.
Spurred by her terror and her need to bring help to Duraid she crossed
the terrace, swift as a cat, and he held the intruder from blocking her
way.
She vaulted over the low stone wall into the grove, and almost into the
arms of the second man. She screamed and twisted away from him as his
outstretched fingers raked across her face, and almost broke free, but
his fingers hooked in the thin cotton stuff of her blouse.
This time she saw the knife in his hand, a long silvery flash in the
starlight, and it goaded her to fresh effort. The cotton tore in his
grip and she was free, but not quickly enough to escape the blade. She
felt the sting of it across her upper arm, and she kicked out at him
with all the strength of panic and her hard young body behind it. She
felt her foot slam into the softness of his lower body with a shock that
jarred her knee and ankle, and her attacker cried out and fell to his
knees.
Then she was away and running through the palm grove. At first she ran
without purpose or direction. She ran simply to get as far from them as
her flying legs would carry her. Then gradually she brought her panic
under control. She glanced back, but saw nobody following her.
As she reached the edge of the lake she slowed her run to conserve her
strength, and she became aware of the warm trickle of her own blood down
her arm and then dripping from her finger-tips.
She stopped.and rested her back against the rough hole of one of the
palms while she tore a strip of cloth from her ripped blouse and
hurriedly bound up her arm. She was shaking so much from shock and
exertion that even her uninjured hand was fumbling and clumsy. She