Birds of the Nile (20 page)

He awoke as normal, at first light and with the image of his telescope and tripod materialising in the corner. The association was so strong that he wondered whether there really had been a day before. Perhaps he’d simply fallen back to sleep and dreamt it all – the scene in Lee Yong’s cabin, the visit to the police station, it might all have been imagined in some semi-conscious vision. As if to confirm his delusion, Reda’s mobile phone and wallet still lay untouched on his dressing table.

But this was not
Groundhog Day
– something had definitely changed and it was not until he’d got up to visit the bathroom that he discovered what it was. A slight vibration was affecting the ship through the thrust of its propellers and as soon as he’d made himself comfortable, he went to the window and drew back the net curtain. The view he’d enjoyed for the past few days, the hill of sand and the Tombs of the Nobles, that had all disappeared and been replaced by the banks of the Nile gliding slowly by. Just as Mr Mohammed had promised, the ship had set sail and was now heading north towards Luxor.

The news inspired him to get dressed and go up on deck. After all that had happened, he wanted to check the rest of the world was still there. While they’d been bottled up in Aswan, there’d been a revolution, Reda had been arrested, then freed. He wondered what else might have changed and he was anxious to find out.

The sights that greeted him were both disappointing and yet refreshingly familiar. He’d missed the sunrise (once again), so the chance of viewing his skein of Glossy Ibis receded still further into the distance. Neither was he the first on deck, and he soon discovered that the same social norms applied as people nodded their good mornings. The sky was still blue, the sun (now up) was still a bright yellow and the Nile, forever brown
and muddied, slipped unhurriedly by. And yet, just as he’d expected Reda to have moved on after his one night in jail, he’d thought it might all be different.

Although in a way, it was. What had changed was not so much the physical nature of things but rather his perception of them. At times like these, the defining moments in life, you became much more aware of your surroundings. Today the sky was bluer, the sun brighter and the Nile more full of life than he could ever have imagined before. Merely to exist in this wonderful place they called the world was a thrill that ran through him, and he was suddenly overwhelmed by the desire to see it all before some accident, some unlooked-for freak event, snatched it all away. Tomorrow, it might not be there…

A return to birding was in order and he searched around, desperate for something to fix on. To his left, a pair of Little Egrets lifted from their roost and flew across the bows. Further downstream a sandbank approached, splitting the course of the river. Here would be the waders he’d spurned the previous day and he hurried toward the forward rail where he could set up his scope and tripod. With luck, if the ship kept its course, he could catch his prey in the full light of the sun.

The spit drew closer and he scanned the foreshore for stints and plovers – but there were none. Higher up the bank, tufts of saw-grass sprouted where the water couldn’t reach and just above them, he detected a series of white blobs. His pulse quickened. These were the bodies of Spoonbills, surely, and focusing in he discovered a group of a dozen or so, taking refuge on the sandy island. Shaped like a flamingo, they possessed the same long necks and stilt-like legs, but instead of the upturned base of a hockey stick, their beaks were more like the blade of a cricket bat. Common on the Delta, they were rarer in the Nile Valley and were probably on migration, heading for the lakes and estuaries of Southern Europe where they could settle down and breed.

Spoonbills were a favourite of Blake’s. As a young man he’d known them over-winter, like Avocets, close to his boyhood home, and on coming back each Christmas or New Year to visit parents he’d made a point of going out to find them. To him, they were the most beautiful of birds. And yet they were so inherently ugly. Perhaps that was why he loved them so much, and like an elephant and the wrinkled skin of its trunk, they defined the point at which ugliness became its own form of beauty. Their bills were quite preposterous, and yet they carried them with such dignity and grace that it was impossible to think of them without affection. And here they were, a dozen of them, waiting to be viewed…

He homed in to study them. Some were asleep, their long bills tucked beneath their wings, some awake and preening while others sifted through the shallows. They hadn’t changed. Just like the sky, the sun, and the Nile, they remained blissfully unaware of Egypt and its troubles – their lives were as yet untouched by upheaval. It gladdened his heart to see it. These were birds whose painted image had graced the tombs of the Pharaohs – they had survived another 3000 years – they could surely hold on a little longer.

The birds might last, but the moment did not and the sandbank and its occupants slipped by. The experience had been transitory, but with his heightened perception of his surroundings it had given him a few minutes of unexpected pleasure. His foray on deck had been rewarded and before the memory of it could be tainted by some disappointment, he decided to pack away his scope and go back down below. For the first time in a while he was excited by his discovery – not just of the birds themselves, but more of his old love of them – and he wanted to mark it in some way.

He returned to his cabin, laid down his things then sat at the dressing table and opened his notebook. His intention was to add the word ‘Spoonbills’ to his bird list, probably with a star by
it to indicate a particularly good view.

But if the point of such entries was to record what he’d been doing, then his recent jottings told a very different story. They showed it had begun with Spur-winged Plover, although that had been some days ago now. Then he’d absent-mindedly followed it with the name of Lee Yong. Further down the page, after what appeared to be a random space, were the words ‘Hossein Rasheed, 10000 Egyptian pounds’ and what he assumed was the telephone number of the police station in Aswan. It didn’t seem right to follow that with ‘Spoonbills’. The logical thing was to add ‘Reda’ or ‘Mrs Biltmore’ or even some of the others to his list. He was fighting a losing battle and he would have to start over. But it was too late for that now and with a feeling of resignation, he put down his pen and went down to breakfast.

It was an opportunity to catch up on what the group had discussed after he’d left the dinner table the night before – although there’d been little, if any, progress. The internet was still shut down, so there were no emails in or out. Phone lines remained difficult, but those with mobiles had at least been able to send texts, and most had succeeded in contacting and reassuring their loved ones as to their safety.

Other than that there’d been little else to do and rather than sit and speculate, they’d welcomed the captain’s initiative and spent the evening watching
Casablanca
. It had been shown in English with Arabic sub-titles, and according to David the main point of interest had been the reaction of the party of Germans. They’d either failed to understand it, or had understood it only too well as they’d taken themselves off to their rooms where they’d spent their time playing cards. Everyone else had enjoyed it.

What had changed, though, was the general atmosphere. The day before had been filled with tension and with no-one sure of how much danger they were in or how they were going to get out
of it, there’d been an air of uncertainty. But now the ship had set sail and they were on the move, they felt they were heading towards a solution and with the prospect of returning home, things had become more relaxed. Contrary to hysterical opinion, they had not been murdered in their beds. Nor were they in, or going to Cairo, Alexandria or Suez or any of the other major trouble spots. True, there’d been a ‘minor disturbance’ in Aswan, but that was behind them now and as yet there were no reports of problems in Luxor. Cocooned on the boat, they were floating free, and with the wide expanse of the Nile acting as insulation, to all intents and purposes they were in a world of their own.

“I was looking at the original schedule this morning,” said Keith, pouring a round of coffee. “If we make Luxor tonight, which all being well we should do, I don’t think we’ll have missed out on very much you know.”

“Oh, and how do you work that out?” David was busy tucking into a plate of scrambled egg. The breakfast offering had substantially improved and now there was a cooked option available, although it had not quite returned to the standard they’d first enjoyed.

“So today’s Thursday, right?” continued Keith. “Given that we lost a day yesterday, I shouldn’t think we’ll be stopping at Kom Ombo or Edfu on the way back.”

“Well that wouldn’t be a disaster,” said David. “We’ve already been to Edfu and I can’t say I’d be sorry about missing Kom Ombo. That’s supposedly a ruin with a tiny museum containing two stuffed crocodiles and not much else.”

“Ugh!” Janet shuddered. “Well, I for one don’t mind giving that a miss. I hate crocodiles. They give me the creeps.”

“You and me both, honey,” said Mrs Biltmore. “Why, I can’t stand the darned things. The reason I won’t go to Florida’s because of the alligators. Isn’t that right, Ira?”

“Yup,” said Ira. “Sure is.”

“You see,” said Mrs Biltmore, “when we were on safari in
South Africa…”

With his fork poised in mid-air, David assumed an apologetic look as if he knew he was going to regret ever mentioning the word ‘crocodile’, while round the rest of the table there was a struck-dumb silence as they waited to for Mrs Biltmore to finish her story.

But she sensed their apprehension and cut short, contenting herself with an excuse. “Well, I guess it doesn’t matter now what we did on safari…” as she too recognised that things had changed.

Keith resumed his analysis.

“As I was saying…If we get to Luxor tonight, that gives us all day tomorrow to look round Karnak. Then we can catch our scheduled flights home on Saturday, just as originally planned.”

“You’re assuming everything will be running as usual,” said David. “There’s no guarantee of that.”

“You’ve got to make some sort of assumption. What else can you do?”

They looked in the direction of Blake in the hope he could provide an answer. He raised his eyebrows and shrugged.
Don’t ask me
. This was Egypt. Even if everything ran as usual, there was still no guarantee, anything could happen. They’d already had a revolution for goodness sake – what more did they want?

As he’d anticipated, Lee Yong did not come down to breakfast. Today she had the burden of looking after Reda and besides, she was not known for her attendances at table.

More surprisingly, neither had Joan. Polite enquiries as to her whereabouts revealed that she was suffering from a bad case of sunburn which had manifested itself overnight and she’d decided to confine herself to her room until the effects wore off. Feeling it was unsafe to leave the ship, she’d apparently spent the previous afternoon stretched out on a sun-bed on the upper deck to improve her tan –
I can’t be doing with sitting in the room all day –
and had fallen asleep in the full glare of the sun. She’d also been wearing eye patches, and while the rest of her face was the colour of burnt sienna, her eye sockets had remained a deathly white. According to David, in her own words she looked ‘hideous’.

“It’s as though I’ve been visited by someone from the Rocky Horror Show,” he explained. “Only for God’s sake don’t tell her I said so. Anyway, she asked me to fetch her something to eat, so if you’ll excuse me…”

He left the table and made his way over to the cold buffet where he took a plate and covered it with a selection of bread, cheese, sliced ham, fruit and a pot of yoghurt. It struck Blake that he might do the same and take it up to Lee Yong’s room. If she didn’t eat it herself, he was sure that Reda would – there was no way the young Egyptian was going to come down to the dining room.

“That’s a good idea,” he muttered under his breath and having folded his napkin, he too got up and followed David to the buffet.

He found himself preceded in the queue by Mrs Biltmore. She was apparently on a similar mission, although her plate was piled far higher than David’s and with greater variety. She and Blake exchanged polite smiles. He would not embarrass her with comment, but he’d often wondered how she managed to maintain her bulk when she appeared to eat so little. Of the two of them, it was Ira who over-indulged (he regularly ate three sweets at dinner) and yet he remained as thin as a rake while she picked at her food and grew large. Here then was the answer. Ashamed of doing so in public, Mrs Biltmore ate in private and was preparing a picnic to consume in her room.
Each to their own
, thought Blake. He took a plate and heaped it likewise.

His intention was to take it straight to Lee Yong’s cabin – not that he needed an excuse to visit, but it would nevertheless serve as one. He was halfway up the stairs when he remembered Reda’s mobile phone and wallet were still on his dressing table
and he decided to double back and fetch them.

Once back in his room he took the opportunity to use the bathroom and clean his teeth, so it was fully ten minutes before he presented himself at Lee Yong’s door. With a fully loaded plate in one hand, Reda’s phone and wallet in the other and feeling like a contestant on a children’s game show, he managed to fumble a knock. He was quite taken aback when Mrs Biltmore answered it.

At first he thought he’d made a mistake, and in his confusion had taken a wrong turning or come back up the wrong flight of stairs.

“I’m dreadfully sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you…” He instinctively checked the room number and when he saw it was right, “I was looking for Lee Yong…”

“Why, she’s right here, Mr Blake.” Mrs Biltmore shuffled to one side to let him in. “Lee, honey,” She called across to the other side of the room. “Here’s Mr Blake come to see us now.” She turned back to him. “We’ve been expecting you. She kept asking me where you’d got to and I said you were right there in the dining room and I was sure you’d be along just any minute.”