Channeling Cleopatra (19 page)

Although she had just awakened, the lady was
so excited, she was missing a few little clues that something might
be slightly amiss.

Yes, gracious queen,
she thought to him.
How
brilliant of you to already grasp the essence of my husband's work.
I hope you will find me a worthy vessel for your exalted presence.
I also hope you will be smart enough to realize that this is a
second chance I give you to live through me, so you will not be
running always after Italian government officials, like you did in
old times. I have a very good husband. It is about him I have you
here. I want to keep him,
ja?
You will help me do this, teaching me feminine
wiles, and you and me, we will get along fine.

With all This babble happening inside the
head that seemed to be his own, Duke was momentarily baffled about
how to slop it, and the good frau continued.

I
am trying to hang onto my husband, you see, even as you once
clung to Caesar and later to Mark Antony. I know it all ended
tragically for you back then, but
mein
Wilhelm is not at war with
anybody, and neither am I. We have a good life and are very
well-off, but I have never learned how to fascinate men and now,
with his new prominence, Wilhelm meets so many attractive women. .
. .

Uh-huh,
Duke interrupted as if he were in a conversation he didn't
want to have. He had frequently left women who didn't know how to
fascinate him when he met those who did. He felt like he was on the
wrong side of this discussion.
I
hate to tell you, ma 'am, but I ain't a queen,
even if, being joined with you, I might appear to be one. You've
been robbed, and I've been shanghaied. My daughter told me that if
they found Cleopatra, you would be the one to
—
uh
—
benefit. But apparently, someone
pulled a fast one on you and transferred my DNA into you instead of
Cleopatra's.

Shock and disbelief filled
him—them—her, really. Hell, he knew what he was saying already, so
it didn't shock
him.
How did any of these people stand this process without going
totally nuts from bewilderment? Of all the crazy
mixed-up—

But
—
but that is impossible. Nucore alone
possesses the secret to preparing the codes for transmission from
the cells to the new host! A trusted friend of Dr. Chimera's
personally prepared Cleopatra's DNA from a tested specimen for me.
It was a secret.

Don't go blaming the Kid,
now, lady. I mean, Leda, Chimera's friend, she's my daughter. She
knows her stuff about getting the specimens ready.
See
,
I'm here,
aren't I? And I'm still me
—
well, mostly. But
look, you're going to have to pay close attention here,
because it's confusing, and I don't really understand it myself.
But what you got here is just that little bit of me from a cell,
and the rest of me is out there somewhere, maybe still alive and
kicking, but probably not, if somebody got their hands on the
specimen. I mean, that part of me that's
in
here with you. Obviously, I'm going to need your cooperation to
find out just what's happened to me.

To you! I went through this procedure to be
more alluring to my husband, and instead of the queen of the Nile,
I get a man who talks like an American, what is the term, gumshoe?
Private dick?

Policeman. Detective
Sergeant Duke Hubbard, or what's left of him,
he told her.

I thought we were supposed
to be blended, Detective Sergeant Hubbard,
she said
.

I think we're going to get real tired of
standing on formality, ma 'am, us occupying the same body and all.
I'll try to think of you as my new feminine side I'm getting in
touch with, and you can think of me as your inner Duke, if you
want.

Ja,
that is very amusing, Duke. But what am I to do? What are we
to do? This is a big mess we have here,
ja?

As
we say where I come from in the Pacific Northwest part of the
United States of America,
ya
shore, you betcha,
he told
her.

I
think first what I must do is call Chimera and have the
process reversed. I am told this can be done if done quickly. And
we two
—
why, we are
not a blend! We are two distinct people inside of me only, and I am
still me and you are still you, although I slept the required
length of time, I am sure. The blending part has failed entirely,
do you not think so? So it should be only a matter of removing you,
and 1 will be again me.

Glad to hear you sounding
so happy about it,
Duke said.
Nothing like a little disaster to give a person a
sense of perspective.

What do you mean?

Well, apparently this
marital problem you've been having that drove you to this desperate
act and so to this mess we find ourselves in
—

It was not a marital
problem!
she said.
I
am trying to prevent one,
only!

I understand that, but it
was enough of a problem for you to risk all the stuff that could
happen when you go through this kind of thing
—
like ending up with me instead of
Cleopatra, for instance, though that's probably not in the handout
they give at Nucore on what to expect when you go through the
process.

It was a worry,
ja,
but before it becomes
a problem, I am trying to correct what is wrong.

A preemptive strike, huh? Against . . . what
exactly? Yourself?

Against my own limitations. My husband is a
brilliant man. I wish not to be left behind. So now I call Chimera,
and you go your way, I go mine to begin again.

Okay, but first, can I ask you a favor?

I suppose so.

Can you tell me what you know about that
Cleopatra material you should have received? I seem to be missing
some time here, because the last thing I remember, nobody had found
anything of Cleopatra's. In fact, this character named Rasmussen
and some of his buddies were on the site in Alexandria harassing
people about it. Mr. Rasmussen was afraid he was losing money on
the deal. So, could you kind of fill me in on what you know that
happened after that?

Yes, certainly. I wish you
no harm, you understand. But I did not . . . invite . . .
you.
She was feeling, as the rape victims
and even robbery victims would say,
violated
.

Duke said softly,
I
think I understand
pretty much how you feel. Believe me, and you ought to be able to
do that now, since I don't know that I have any way to deceive you;
I didn’t
ask for this, either. I didn't
want it. I had no idea it was going to happen.

Yes,
she said, and he felt her heart open a little toward him.
Silently, he urged her to continue and tell him something that
would help him find his bearings.

Chimera called me three
weeks ago to tell me Dr. Hubbard, his friend at the Alexandria dig
on behalf of Nucore and
—
and me
—
had
found something. There was, you understand, a small earthquake,
much smaller than the one last night.

Last night?

Oh, yes, a very big one
last night. But that I will tell you of in its own time. This small
earthquake from the harbor floor extruded a canopic jar. Dr.
Hubbard is believing from its markings this jar is belonging to
Cleopatra. Inside of it are a lady's lungs. Immediately, Dr.
Hubbard is establishing that the remains belong to the mother or
aunt of Cleopatra's daughter, from whom there is a sample, you see?
The day of the disaster in Alexandria, she is sending a message to
Chimera that her father
—
this is you,
ja?

Yes, ma 'am.

That her father is bringing
the patched DNA along with the specimen ready for upload to me. She
is also sending to Chimera the code for uploading by computer, but
before it is received, the big earthquake is happening, and Chimera
does not receive the second message. So it is necessary to wait
until the specimen arrives. Yes, now I am thinking of it. Chimera
expressed to me concern that the specimen was brought by a person
not
—
ah, not
yourself So you were injured in the earthquake maybe,
ja?

Maybe. But that doesn't
explain how my specimen . . . Well, let me see, here, a little
induction. What would I do if I were me? When Leda took this
specimen from me and got it all ready so if somebody wanted to they
could actually load it into somebody else, I know me well enough to
know I wouldn't think much of the idea. I don't think I'd let
something like that out of my sight, to be mistaken for something
that
—
well
—
this
should happen to. So something must have happened to me, and then
someone found my specimen and thought it was Cleopatra's and
delivered it to Chimera by accident. But they didn’t
say something had happened to me?

Chimera did not say so, no.

Guess we both need to talk
to the doc then, and I sure would like to talk to Leda, too. She's
probably with the rest of me right now.
He
laughed.
I
really
need to pull myself together!

It is a problem, that. So. Now I will call
Chimera.

Good idea.

But they couldn't get through. The lines
were tied up, and when Gretchen called the operator, pleading an
emergency, she was told that the earthquake in Alexandria was also
an emergency. The operator sternly told her the best thing to do
was to clear the lines and pay attention to the news, when a
central emergency number would be broadcast. Neither Wolfe's nor
Chimera's cell phone numbers worked, either.

I guess we'll have to take two aspirin and
call back in the morning, Duke said.

I myself am a doctor. I
find that joke rather old,
Gretchen
informed him.

It's the only one I could
think of. But you know, it might be a good thing. This is all a
little fishy. Could be we shouldn't be discussing it on the phone
lines. I don’t
think much of the security
system they have on Kefalos, to tell you the truth. Maybe we should
just go pay the island a visit. Leda might be back there by now,
too. If not, I need to get to Egypt and let her know what's going
on. The Kid could be in trouble, especially if she has any more of
that Cleopatra DNA. If someone ambushed me to get their hands on
it, they might go after her, too.

Such an imagination you have put into my
head! I cannot be leaving on a whim. I have here a practice, a
household to run.

Well, I can understand the
inconvenience,
Duke said,
but I don't see how I'm going to go without you.
And come on, if I had been Cleopatra, you'd have taken some time
off anyway, wouldn't you? You girls would have wanted to go
shopping at least, and I'll bet she would have wanted to see her
old stomping grounds again, too.

That well may be, but you are not
Cleopatra.

That's true. But I am a cop, and it seems to
me you can use one if you 're going to find the real Cleo.

My husband's company has investigators for
such things.

I know,
Duke said patiently.
I'm one of them.
The one in charge of the site where you say Leda found the jar. I'm
the guy who would normally be doing this. Besides, I thought this
business was hush-hush. Just you and Chimera and Leda knew about
it?

Well . . . it was.

Who better than me then? I'm already in the
loop.

Knowing that his argument was unbeatable,
even by this stubborn Teutonic female, Duke relaxed a little and
pursued a more interesting line of thought. All he could do till he
could convince her to cooperate was think, after all, and all she
could do was think back at him. Maybe this was where the blending
took place? Lord, if the boys back at the precinct could see him
now!

You know, there's no reason
we can't work together on all of our problems while we're at it. I
mean, I could help you in ways Cleopatra wouldn't
have a clue about. You just sort of wanted a
marriage counselor and sex therapist, didn't you? Well, I've been
married more times than she was and probably am a lot more expert
on how to really please a man.

Perhaps. But it seems to me if you have been
married so many times you are no expert on how to hold on to a
husband, except perhaps as an example of what does not work.

Okay, I admit I deserved
that. But I doubt very much the queen has any tricks up her flimsy
pleated kilt that haven't been tried on me at one time or another.
And you know, where I am at the moment
—I
mean, with us
blended
—
though I
agree it seems more like oil and water or the makings for a Molotov
cocktail, I could not just advise you, I could actually make the
right moves, say the right things, with your body and in your
voice. Besides, when we've accomplished what we both need to do and
get the process reversed, if you listen to me, you'll have learned
a couple of things about men and have your husband back for
yourself.