The Egyptologist (22 page)

that when the day comes Osiris will figure out whose intestines are
whose.

So, making a display of yourself fails. Working in secret fails. The
natural next notion is to endow a state-run and protected necropolis,
the Valley of the Kings, in which no one attempts secrecy but instead
the mummies rely on the well-paid living to protect the crowded, en•
closed city of the dead. "We will stick together," say the kings for an
optimistic period. "We will build openly, with immortal displays of our
wealth and power, and we will lie mummified cheek by mouldering
jowl, and make an institution, a governmental ministry of tomb man•
agement and protection. The kings who come after us will see that the
maintenance of a secure necropolis is in their own future interest; each
king will trust his successor, because each king will know that his suc•
cessor must, in turn, trust
his
successor to return the favour." A golden
rule to protect all that underground gold. "You, too, will need the falli•
ble living someday, oh yes you will, so do this for me today and the fu•
ture will protect us both." Ah, except! Except it does not take long for
the present to find the pious claims of the past and the hypothetical ne•
cessities of a distant future to be, both, of little weight when pressing,
present needs appear. Observe: to a government in need of money for
wars or monuments, the immortality insurance glinting under the sand
begins to look not unlike a well-located treasury, and the past seems to
be volunteering to finance the present, and the future immortality
problems of the current spendthrift king seem comfortably far away.

Suddenly, your immortality, which matters more to you than any•
thing else in the entire universe, seems horribly tenuous, as you grow
every day older and your enemies approach. How to bring everything
that you need for an uncertain future without losing anything or draw•
ing unwanted attention to yourself? Every traveller's dilemma, mine
heading south, the king's heading to the underworld: what to pack?

Three days until the wire.

The dancers on the narrow stage here remind one of a verse of
Atum-hadu's:

Atum-hadu admires two sisters.
He takes them to his chambers.
Too late they realise the dangers

Of a king whose love produces blisters.

— (Quatrain 9, Fragments A & C, from
Desire an? Deceit
in Ancient Egypt
by Ralph M. Trilipush)

The strenuous contortions poor Harriman performed to navigate
even that relatively mild passage! "Two sisters' unfortunate behaviour
comes to the king's attention," and "Atoom-Hadoo's chamber of jus•
tice," and "the heat of royal wrath," and so forth, the injured prude tak•
ing shelter in jurisprudence.

19 Oct.

Cairo, a cabaret, late at night
My darling Queen-to-be,

I have just reread your letter of 22 September, as I have done over
and over for three days now, and I see your face everywhere I look,
even in this Oriental stage show. The women on the stage remove their
silken scarves to the sound of the tambourines and moaning violins, and
the veils drift down like perfume. They seem practically naked when
they step onto the stage, but then even after removing veil after veil
after veil for minutes, strewing them in heaps on the stage and my table,
they leave not much nuder than they arrived, though the silken skins
they have shed form a pile as large as a desert bluff hiding a royal tomb.

Cairo teems with reminders of you. The palm trees at night resem•
ble quite precisely a giant wilted bouquet, like the one I held out for
you last spring, as you stepped down from the cab, a distant look in
your eye, scarcely recognising me, as I had just spent two hours in the
driving rain waiting for you. I was just now recalling the evening in

May you and I rode the swan boats in the Public Garden and I recited
Atum-hadu's verse to you and you laughed at us:

Atum-hadu sees his newest queen for the first time.
His heart and body swell and inflame.

He will go mad, will commit some crime,

If she is not brought to him at once, naked, without shame.

There you were, smiling up at me in such calm amusement. You saw
me,
saw past the shock of the poetry and of the king's appetites, and
saw the real
me,
as I am. I knew that instant what an extraordinary find
I had made, knew it as if I had opened a tomb full of jewels and flash•
ing gold. You looked at
me,
and saw what was valuable and worthy of
your love there. There is nothing buried under any sand that compares
to last spring with you, finding you, falling in love with you, winning
you. You are such a marvellous girl, Margaret. You are everything I
have ever wanted in a wife.

And soon nothing will stand in the way of our wedding. I beg of
you to wait, be patient, stay strong and healthy, and wait, wait for me,
wait. I will be home before you know it, sweeping you away, covering
you in treasure, setting you down in a home beyond your wildest
dreams, filling your days with entertainments and rest in whatever pro•
portion you desire. In your letter you asked where we shall live. Why,
we shall be in a palace, you and I, in a palace, by a river, under palms,
wanting for nothing.

Your king,
RMT.

P.S. — I hope you will take this expression of my concern in the proper
light: it seems to me your father is relying too heavily on Inge to cure
you. Whatever the diagnosis, your fatigues and spells should be curable
by a proper doctor and medicine that gives you more energy, but judg•
ing by the fragment of a letter you posted to me in a medicated delir-

ium, it appears she is administering substances that
exacerbate
your
symptoms. Allow me to say that no one knows you better than I, espe•
cially when you are fully healthy and vibrant, and when you are my
wife, we will spare no expense to have you seen by the best specialists
in these matters. You have all my love. You are my Queen.

Sunset on the Bayview Nursing Home
Sydney, Australia

December 24, 1954

Still here, Macy, still here. Though I must've left you wondering. Another
week on my back. Christmas upon us. Cheery season, I'm told.

I wonder, Macy, if you're a religious man. I'm not in the slightest, not I, it's
patent foolishness. But there's an old woman here, quite out of her mind, like
most of them, hasn't spoken in ages, just stares at the telly, but she said to me this
morning—first time she's said word one to me—she said people are judged in the
next world by all the animals who'd seen them in this one. Not just the cows you
ate up or the fish you caught, she isn't a "vegetarian," I don't think, just the nice
animals that watch you as you go about your business, if you see what I mean.
The cats that watched you when you were otherwise alone. The dogs lying in the
heat across the street from you. Birds outside your window. Goldfish in a bowl.
They all report on what they've seen you do, she says, they all parliament them•
selves and then they decide if you fly or if you fry. What do you think of that idea?
I think about all those sad-eyed animals I've been alone with, figure they're nap•
ping, not understanding anything even when they're awake. Very strange notion,
very unsettling. Can't be true, but you ever heard anyone say it before?

Your aunt Margaret, don't suppose you'd know this, back in '22, she used to
have these little dogs, although maybe you've seen pictures. Tibetan spaniels, I re•
member her saying to me when I turned up at your great-uncle's door, October
the 13th, 1922. Your aunt opened the door, and these little dogs were yapping at
me when I walked in. First thing she says, before I could say a word, she says, "Ti•
betan spaniels, very pricey, exceedingly r
rrrare."
When she said
rare,
she sort of
growled and curled her Up at me. Hello, here's a live one, I thought. She was some•
thing to look at, your aunt, and obviously an electric sort of modern girl. I won•
der if she mentioned me to you at all, if there's anything you might tell me, not

that she wouldve said anything, I don't fool myself I had that much effect on her,
and not that she wasn't above stretching the truth now and again for a story, if
there's anything hard to credit in those papers of hers.

Your great-uncle was a no-nonsense kind of man, an admirable man. Tough
as a croc, big fellow, hair slicked right back, offered me a very fine cigar. In his
great big study, he sat at a large, shiny desk and showed me an advertisement he
was examining, turned the board towards me. "For the holiday season," he said.
"Trying to decide if I approve or not." A drawing of a woman serving an enor•
mous roast bird of some sort on a huge platter, and the words "Don't serve fine
fowl on foul finery! Trust Finneran's Finer Finery for all your holiday needs! (Our
goods last an eternity, guaranteed!)" The woman in the drawing was your aunt,
you see, she'd modelled for it. "It took such a long time." She sighed. "At least I
didn't have to hold the turkey, the artist drew that later. He was a bit of a sissy, I
think."

"That's enough language," muttered Finneran. "We have company. What can
we do for you today, Mr. Harold Ferrell of Tailor Enquiries Worldwide all the way
from Australia?" He examined my business card and rolled his unlit cigar back
and forth between his lips. "I don't think I've ever had any business in Australia."

I told him I was working on the inheritance of an Australian fellow and that I
thought his business partner Professor Trilipush might be able to help me find
this missing heir, as the two of them might've known each other in the War.
"Ralphie?" your aunt breaks in. "He's a bit more than a
business
partner, Harry!"
I liked how she named me Harry straightaway and never let it go.

"This gentleman has business with me, Maggie, so scram." She raised her eye•
brows, made a sarcastic curtsey, collected her dogs, and slammed the door be•
hind her. I understood all about your aunt already, I thought: spoilt, charming
when she wants to be, bit of a would-be snob, but she's young and doesn't have
anyone to show her how it's done. The money smelled new, no offence, Macy. No
butler to answer the door, still a household with real people in it. Understand: I
prefer that. I liked the way Finneran spoke, and I liked his home right off. He was
a wealthy man (I thought), but still understood what drove real men, understood
the limits of his money. I hope I'm describing you as well there in your New York
mansion, Macy.

"High-spirited filly," says her father after the door's echo dies away. "But what
she meant was, she's engaged to Professor Trilipush." That was intriguing news
to me, Macy. "He's a fine fellow," continues Finneran with a certain tone. "Do you
know him? No, well, he's a hell of a fine fellow. Old English family, brave as hell

soldier, expert in his field. Quite a thing. You don't see many men like him, even
in England, I wouldn't figure, and to catch a fellow like that in Boston, and for
Margaret to win his heart, we're a pretty happy family here, Mr. Ferrell." I might
not have the exact words, but that was the thrust of it. As I was trying to explain
just now, your great-uncle wasn't all polished over with lacquer like the Mar-
lowes, but if you'll excuse me for saying it, I knew this was why he was so proud
of Trilipush as a son-in-law. No question: this wedding would bump him up a
notch or two or three in his Boston social scene.

I started slow, just explained the Davies inheritance case, and asked if Mr.
Finneran could tell me where I could find Professor Trilipush. "Of course, of
course," and as he's taking his address book out of his desk drawer, I asked, "Just
out of curiosity, how'd you come to meet Professor Trilipush here in Boston?" He
says Margaret introduced them, brought Trilipush round the house one day like
a girl who's bought a fine necklace. She'd seen him give a public lecture, she'd
talked to him, become a friend of his, and then had really "taken a shine to the
limey." Were they already in love, then, when she introduced Trilipush to her
father? "No, no," Finneran says, "she brought him around as a favour to
me.
To
have him describe the expedition he was planning, because she knew that a few
of my business partners and me are always looking for investment possibilities,
and Margaret thought Ralph's project sounded promising. Clever girl, that time."
Sure enough, Finneran's "money club" had looked into it and decided to back the
Egyptian expedition. (Macy, pay attention: Finneran has bet money, his friends'
money, his daughter's heart, and his social standing on Trilipush.) "All the while,
I was telling Margaret, that's a fine fellow there, and unless I'm mistaken, he's
looking at you with a certain look. She didn't believe me. She's actually quite shy,
Mr. Ferrell, but I know these things. Not long after we told Trilipush we wanted
in on his expedition, he asked me for Margaret's hand, very gentlemanly, old En•
glish.

"I was glad of the opportunity, financially. Just the sort of thing our club likes,
a winner, not without risk, but we're protected, built-in protections. Thanks to
my little girl, we got the chance to invest ahead of museums and banks and such.
Any of them would have jumped at a chance like this, that's sure, but we got first
dibs. And, of course, I could see Maggie falling in love, whether she understood
enough to put a name to it, and who am I to argue with love? When you have
a little girl and a fellow like this comes along, you'll understand, Mr. Ferrell."
The wedding would take place as soon as possible after Trilipush's return from
his dig.