Amanda Grange & Jacqueline Webb (21 page)

Sir Matthew did not appear at breakfast the next morning. Edward was at first impatient and then annoyed, for he was longing to be off.

“Patience,” said Darcy as he drank his coffee. “I am sure he will join us before long.”

But when, sometime later, Sir Matthew had still not appeared, Elizabeth said, “He did not look well last night. I think perhaps someone had better go to his tent and make sure he is all right.”

“Let me,” said Edward, jumping to his feet and moving off toward Sir Matthew's tent with restless energy.

He returned a few minutes later looking annoyed and said, “You were right, Elizabeth; he is not very well. He seems to have a fever. He is tossing and turning in his bed and he feels very hot. The physician should be arriving later today, but…”

Elizabeth was on her feet at once.

“I will take a look at him,” she said. “It might be some hours before the physician arrives.”

She made her way to Sir Matthew's tent, calling her maid as she did so. The two women went into his tent and discovered that he was delirious.

“Bring me my medicine box,” said Elizabeth, as she silently thanked Lady Potheroe for advice on which medicines to bring.

The maid departed and returned quickly, whereupon Elizabeth prepared a tincture for Sir Matthew and managed to get him to take it. Then, leaving Sir Matthew in the capable hands of his manservant, with instructions for Sir Matthew's care, she left his tent and walked back across the camp.

The air was punctuated by frightened murmurs coming from the
fellahs
, and there was a good deal of wailing as well. She spoke little Egyptian, but the sight of charms being prepared left her in no doubt as to the cause of their fear: Sir Matthew had opened the tomb, and Sir Matthew had immediately been taken ill; therefore, the tomb had been cursed.

Shaking her head, she returned gladly to Darcy and to common sense.

“I am afraid Sir Matthew will not be coming with us today,” she said as she reached the breakfast tent. “He is far from well. He will be in bed for a few days at least.”

“This is the worst thing that could possibly happen,” said Edward, looking glum.

“It is not so bad,” she reassured him. “I am sure he will be up and about again before long, but not before the
fellahs
have decided his illness is a result of a curse.”

He saw her face and said, “So, it has started. They have already decided. At best, it will cost me a pretty penny to persuade them to return to the tomb, and at worst they will refuse to go anywhere near it.”

“I will speak with the men and find out what they are thinking,” said Saeed.

He returned ten minutes later and said, “It is not good. The men are saying that the magician is angry and that he has struck Sir Matthew down for his meddling. They are saying that Sir Matthew will be dead before nightfall.”

“But that is absurd,” said Elizabeth. “It is a fever, nothing more. You must tell the men, Saeed.”

“It will do no good. I have already tried to reason with them but they are convinced it is the work of a magician. And that is not all. They are now saying that a djinn was in the camp last night. One of the servants has been saying that she thought there was a rat in your workbasket last night, but that when the basket was opened there was nothing there. So they are now convinced that the rocking of the basket must have been the work of an evil spirit, one of the guardians of the tomb who is intent on revenge.”

“We must put a stop to this at once. If not, the men will run away and we will be alone in the camp. Even worse, they could spread their panic among the sailors and persuade them to leave, taking the boats back to Cairo,” said Darcy. “The best way to halt their flight is to show them that we are not afraid. If we cannot persuade them to come with us, then we must go ourselves to the tomb, just as if nothing had happened. When they see us setting out in good spirits and then, more importantly, see us return this evening, they will soon calm down—particularly when Sir Matthew shows signs of recovery. I suggest we start as soon as we are ready. Saeed, you had better stay here to make sure that Sir Matthew is given every care and to contain the panic.”

Edward lost no time in ordering the donkeys to be made ready and laden with everything they would need, as well as giving instructions for the planks of wood they would need to cross the moat to be carried between the donkeys. Their intentions were soon plain, and a pitiable wailing went up in the camp.

“Do not go, I beg of you,
effendi
,” said one of the
fellahs
, clutching at Edward most pitifully. “The magician will strike you down.”

“Nonsense,” said Edward, his eyes strangely bright. “There is no such thing as magic. If any man here is brave enough to come with me, I will give him double wages. If not, you must all stay here and wail like women.”

But neither the gold nor the jibe could sway the men, and at last Edward mounted his donkey with only Elizabeth, Darcy, Sophie, and Paul for company and a selection of guards for safety.

Saeed made one last attempt to shame the
fellahs
into picking up their spades, saying, “See, Mrs Darcy and Miss Lucas are brave enough to visit the tomb. Will you allow yourselves to be shamed by women?” But it did no good, for although the
fellahs
shuffled their feet and looked at the ground, they would not move.

“I'll come!” said Laurence, who had been trying to persuade his parents to agree to his company all morning.

“See, even a child is not afraid!” said Saeed.

But although the men shuffled even more, they would not brave the tomb.

“Laurence, you can come with us another day, when we have made it safe,” said Elizabeth, “but today you must stay here. Be a good boy and do what Saeed and Grandmama tell you.”

“Never mind,” said Edward, seeing Laurence's face. “We will soon make it safe and then you will have your fill of excavations, I promise. I would rather have one of you than ten of these milksops,” he finished, looking at the
fellahs
in disgust.

Then, without further ado, they set out for the tomb.

***

George Wickham stood at the front of the boat with the wind rippling his hair. He was still a handsome man, and still very charming, still attractive to women. But underneath his superficial good humour, he was soured by his failure as a young man to marry an heiress. He had at last been forced into marriage with Lydia Bennet, having run away with her to London and compromised her beyond all hope of reclaim, and still bore a grudge against Darcy, who had forced the marriage.

It was Darcy who was to blame for every ill that had befallen him since then, for if he had not been forced to marry Lydia, he could have continued his quest to find an heiress and been living a life befitting his hopes and dreams, instead of one fitting his just deserts. And if Darcy's father had not behaved so shabbily to his own father, then he would have been wealthy from birth and a gentleman of equal standing with Darcy.

But now revenge was in his reach: not the revenge he had once planned, when he had attempted to elope with Darcy's sister, but still a desirable revenge and one which was capable of making his fortune.

“I do not see why we have to live on this boat,” said Lydia. “I am sure there is no fun to be had here.”

She had grown tired of flirting with the sailors, and she joined her husband at the front of the flat-bottomed boat which had brought them from Cairo and which was now moored a mile upstream of Darcy's boats.

“Because, my sweet, this is where we will find the tomb. If my father had not destroyed his piece of the map, thinking it might lead me astray, we could go to the right spot and find the tomb ourselves, but as it is, we must wait for Sir Matthew to find it and then rob it of its treasures once it has been excavated.”

“I thought he had already found it.”

“He has found something, but whether it is the intact tomb we do not know. It could be nothing but another false doorway.”

Lydia looked out across the green banks of the Nile to the endless sand dunes beyond and said, “I hope Sef is more use than the sailor you employed to steal the other parts of the map on the ship taking Elizabeth and Darcy to Egypt. He was not only caught but put ashore, and all without getting us the map. That was a waste of a pretty penny.”

“The man was a fool, but Sef is more reliable, and what we give him is a small price to pay for the information he brings us,” said Wickham. “Look, here he is now.”

Wickham left his place at the front of the boat and jumped down onto the bank in his eagerness to hear his spy's news.

“
Effendi
,” said Sef, as he hurried toward them. “It is the tomb you seek,
effendi
. He has found it! It is full of the most beautiful treasures, and your enemy goes there even now to claim them for his own.”

“Why did you not bring me news of this earlier?”

“Because I waited to discover more for you,
effendi
. Your enemies'
fellahs
refuse to go with him. They are ignorant peasants, not educated men like me, and they are convinced the tomb is cursed. Sir Matthew Rosen, he was struck down with a plague when he opened the tomb, and there is an afrit loose in the camp, so they say.”

“Well, well,” said Wickham thoughtfully. “And so Darcy is going to the tomb alone.”

“Not alone,
effendi
. He has his cousin with him and another man and two women. Then, too, there are some guards, though they will run away at the first sound of a magical wail, and if they do not, they can be bribed. Your enemies take many palm ropes and many planks of wood. They say there is a pit inside the tomb that none may cross, and beyond it lies the treasure, gleaming and tempting. But it is cursed,
effendi
. It will bring ruin to any man who touches so much as a single cup.”

“I will touch more than a cup,” said Wickham. “Ready me a camel and another for any of the sailors who will come with me. Let us see if they are made of sterner stuff than Darcy's men. Load the camels with sacks and let me know when you are done. Then we will see who will come away the richer man, Darcy or I.”

***

Despite the setback to their plans, Edward, Paul, Elizabeth, Darcy, and Sophie were in good spirits as they returned to the tomb: Edward was feverishly excited, Sophie was intrigued, Paul was eager to sketch the wonderful treasures, Elizabeth was happy for Edward, and Darcy was quietly gratified that his father had not broken his health for nothing and that his young cousin had achieved his dream.

It seemed strange to see the site so deserted, for even those men left to guard it had fled, afraid that some terrible calamity would befall them if they stayed.

Elizabeth stopped for a moment and drank in the silence. It was something she never experienced at home. There was always the noise of the servants as they moved about the house or the voices of the children, and when they were occasionally quiet, there was the ticking of a clock or the shifting of coals in the fire. But here, everything was still. The sands stretched out in every direction, gleaming under the sun-drenched sky, and even the breeze did not stir.

Then Edward dismounted and said, “Let us begin.”

Without another word, he disappeared inside the tomb, leaving Paul to help Sophie dismount.

“Tether the donkeys here,” said Darcy. “We can carry the treasure across the bridges in sacks and leave the sacks stacked at the foot of the steps. Then, when we have retrieved as many treasures as the donkeys can carry, we can bring the sacks up to the surface and load them onto the donkeys before returning to camp.”

“If I might make a suggestion,” said Paul. “If I am allowed some time to quickly sketch the treasures in their locations before we move them, we will have a record of everything we take and where it came from. It might be of some interest to scholars, and I can then paint a mural on the wall of the Egyptian gallery at Pemberley, giving an accurate feel for the discovery.”

“An excellent notion,” said Darcy.

They agreed, and the men began to unload the ropes and planks of palm wood while Elizabeth lit a flambeau and descended the steps into the tomb, followed by Sophie and Paul. She went through the entranceway into the vast open space and stood looking about her in renewed wonder. The pictures on the walls were as fresh as if they had been painted the day before, with their bright colours and their odd, flat people together with symbols of daily life: wine, figs, bread, grapes, lotus flowers, and rolls of linen.

“Do you know, I think I would like an Egyptian style portrait of us,” she said to Darcy as he came down the steps, carrying ropes over his shoulder.

Paul, following Darcy, immediately took up the idea.

“It has never been done before,” he said with enthusiasm. “Those flat shapes, those strong blocks of colour, it would make a striking painting, or I could create a mural in the Egyptian style.”

“Then let us have one, by all means,” said Darcy. “And we must have some of these extraordinary symbols in the painting, too. Paul, you have been making a study of it. What do they mean?”

“The phoenix is the symbol of the sun god,” he said, looking at the bird that stood, man-size, next to one of the human figures. “And see here, on this painting, there is a barge, the barge that carries the sun on its night's journey. The hieroglyphs in the background must mean something, and one day they will be deciphered. The pictures of food and drink are symbols of everyday life. I could paint you with bottles of wine instead of jugs and apples instead of grapes. I could paint some of the more attractive hieroglyphs behind you, too, although their meaning would be obscure.”

“And you must be surrounded by all your treasures!” said Edward.