face went creamy pale as all the blood drained from it.
The coffin was set into a stone shelf in the rear wall of the cell-like
tomb. On the exterior was painted the likeness of the man within.
Although it was badly faded and most of the paint had flaked away, the
pale face and reddish beard of the dead man were still discernible.
This was not the only reason for Royan's amazement.
She was staring at the walls above and on either side of the shelf on
which the coffin lay. They were a riot of colour, every inch of them
covered with the most intricate and elaborate paintings that had
miraculously weathered the passage of the millennia.
Nicholas played his torch beam over them in awestruck silence, and Royan
clung to his arm as if to save herself from falling. She dug her sharp
nails into his flesh, but he was heedless of the pain.
There were scenes of great battles, fighting galleys locked in terrible
combat upon the blue eternal waters of the river. There were scenes of
the hunt, the pursuit of the river horse and of great elephants with
long tusks of gleaming ivory. There were battle scenes of regiments
plumed and armoured, raging in their fury and blood lust.
Squadrons of chariots wheeled and charged each other across these narrow
walls, half obscured by the dust of their own mad career.
The foreground of each mural was dominated by the same tall heroic
figure. In one scene he drew the bow to full stretch, in another he
swung high the blade of bronze.
His enemies quailed before him, he trod them underfoot or gathered
together their severed heads like a bouquet of flowers.
Nicholas played the beam over all this splendid array of art, and
brought it to a stop upon the central panel that covered the entire main
wall above the shelf on which the rotting coffin lay. Here the same
godlike figure rode the footplate of his chariot. In one hand he held
the bow and in the other a bundle of javelins. His head was bare of any
helmet, and his hair flowed out behind him in the wind of his passage, a
thick golden braid like the tail of a lion. His features were noble and
proud, his gaze direct and indomitable.
Below him was a legen in classical Egyptian hieroglyphics. In a
sepulchral whisper Royan translated them aloud:
Great Lion of Egypt.
Best of One Hundred Thousand Holder of the Gold of Valour Pharaoh's Sole
Companion Warrior of all the Gods May you live for ever!
Her hand shook upon his arm, and her voice choked and died away, stifled
with emotion. She gave a little sob, and then shook herself as she
brought herself back under control.
"I know this artist," she said softly. "I have spent five years studying
his work. I would know it anywhere." She drew a breath. "I know with
utter certainty that nearly four thousand years ago Taita the slave
decorated these walls and designed this tomb."
She pointed to the name of the dead man carved into the stone above the
shelf on which his coffin lay.
"This is not the tomb of a Christian saint. Centuries ago some old
priest must have stumbled upon it and, in his ignorance, usurped it for
his own religion." She drew another shaky breath. "Look there! That is
the seal of Tanus, Lord Harreb, the commander of all the armies of
Egypt, lover of Queen Lostris and the natural father of Prince Memnon,
who became the Pharaoh Tamose."
They were both silent then, lost in the wonder of their discovery.
Nicholas broke the silence at last.
"It's all true, then. The secrets of the seventh scroll are all here for
us, if we can find the key to them."
"Yes," she said softly. "The key. Taita's stone testament." She turned
back towards the tabot stone and approached it slowly, almost fearfully.
"I can't bring myself to look, Nicky. I am terrified that it's not what
we hope it is. You do itV
He went directly to the column, and with a magician's flourish jerked
away the damask cloth that covered it. They stared at the pillar of pink
mottled granite that he had revealed. It was about six feet high and a
foot square at the base, tapering up to half that width at the flat
pedestal of the summit. The granite had been polished, and then
engraved.
Royan stepped forward and touched the cold stone, running her fingers
lingeringly over the hieroglyphic'script in the way a blind man reads
Braille.
"Taita's letter to us," she whispered, picking out the symbol of the
hawk with a broken wing from the mass of close-chiselled script, tracing
the outline with a long, slim forefinger that trembled softly. "Written
almost four thousand years ago, waiting all these ages for us to read
and understand it. See how he has signed it." Slowly she circled the
granite pillar, studying each of the four sides in turn, smiling and
nodding, frowning and shaking her head, then smiling again as if it were
a love letter.
"Read it to me," Nicholas invited. "It's too complicated for me - I
understand the characters, but I cannot follow the sense or the meaning.
Explain it to me."
"It's pure Taita." She laughed, her awe and wonder at last giving way to
excitement. "He is being his usual obscure and capricious self." It was
as though she were talking of a beloved but infuriating old friend.
"It's all in verse and is probably some esoteric code of his own." She
picked out a line of hieroglyphics, and followed them with her finger as
she read aloud, "'The vulture rises on mighty pinions to greet the sun.
The jackal howls and turns upon his tail. The river flows towards the
earth. Beware, you violators of the sacred places, lest the wrath of all
the gods descend upon you!"'
"It's nonsense jargon. It does not make sense," he pretested.
"Oh, yes, it makes sense all right. Taita always makes sense, once you
follow the way his oblique mind is working." She turned to face him
squarely. "Don't look so glum, Nicky. You can't expect to read Taita
like an editorial in The Times. He has set us a riddle that may take
weeks and months of work to unravel."
"Well, one thing is certain. We can't stay here in the maqdas for weeks
and months while, we puzzle it out. Let's get to work."
"Photographs first." She became brisk and businesslike.
"Then we can lift impressions from the stone."
He set down the camera bag and knelt over it to open the flap. "I will
shoot two rolls of colour first, and then use the Polaroid. That will
give us something to work on until we can have the colour developed."
She stood out of his way as he circled the pillar on his knees, keeping
the angle correct so as not to distort the perspective. He took a series
of shots of each of the four sides, using different shutter speeds and
exposures.
"Don't use up all your film," she warned him. "We need some shots of the
walls of the tomb itself."
Obediently he went to the grille gates and studied the locking system.
"This is a bit more complicated than the outer gate. If I try to get in
here, I might do some damage.
I don't think it will be worth the risk of being discovered."
"All right," she agreed. "Work through the openings in the grille."
He filmed as best he was able, extending the camera through the openings
at the full stretch of his arms, and estimating his focus.
"That's the lot," he told her at last. "Now for the Polaroids."
"He changed cameras and repeated the entire process, but this time Royan
held a small tape measure against the pillar to give the scale.
As he exposed each plate he handed it to her to check the development.
Once or twice when the flash setting on the camera had either