The Book of the Dead (32 page)

“Then we need someone who can translate the Arabic tongue. Birch would aid us.”

Birch was in camera on a parliamentary matter that evening, but sent a young man with a letter of introduction. The callow youth was called Wallis Budge, an unprepossessing fellow yet accredited by Birch with remarkable linguistic skills, fluent in many modern and ancient languages. So it proved.

The youth took in the scene – the body – with remarkable equanimity, a sign of a useful sanguine temperament. He would do well in the sands of Egypt if ever he made it there, for one could only prosper with indifference to the cruelty of those climes. Richards directed him to the half-burnt papers he had collected, on the assumption that these perhaps be considered the most sensitive. Meanwhile, I tackled the riot of papers scattered across the desk in a dark corner, lighting the stubs of the candles again to feel my way through the papers and dust.

The papyri, Budge soon declared, were standard reproductions of passages from the
Book of the Dead
, texts rolled and placed in the sarcophagus to guide the dead through the underworld. They were of no special quality, in keeping with this lowly trader’s place of business. The Arabic notes, he said, were a mixture of letters from family and agents. Men were sending intelligence about excavations in Dendara, notorious for mummy pits and treasure. It was Egypt’s oldest trade.

“If you find any mention of Thoth, in the old writings or those letters, we are especially interested.”

“I have gathered that from the shrine, already, sir,” the boy said.

“Can you tell us any more about that?” Richards asked, looking up sharply.

“I’ve never seen anything like it before. It’s syncretic – a mixture,” he explained, “of ancient and modern. You have noticed the wedjat eye on the doors and windows? They are for protection against enemies natural and supernatural. But the Thoth, the incense, the offering plate, I can make neither head nor tail of it. It seems Indian, not Arabic. The fellaheen are notorious for their superstitions, sir, but Thoth was a god for the intelligentsia, the scribes. I have not seen such a peculiar mix of traditions. And the stela is cracked, I notice.”

“Broken?”

“Recently. In transit, perhaps.”

“Richards, what do you have?”

He had been shuffling the papers we had found in English.

“There are letters here from a Greville Chester, an Englishman who clearly has a brisk trade in antiquities.” I saw Budge start at the name momentarily before controlling himself. Chester was evidently known to the Museum, perhaps trading on the less legitimate side: here was a potential connection. “The rest are newspapers, torn pages from the
Daily Telegraph
, the
Maine Intelligencer
, and the
Illustrated London News
. I can’t see any consistency between the dates or the news stories, and no connection with the newspapers found with Gaddis’ body.”

I had discovered the ledger in which Mazhar had recorded his trade. It was a simple task to discern that the second desk drawer had a false bottom. The book naturally had to be close to hand, since the illegitimate trade was brisk. Double-entries beetled down the pages, paid receipts interleaved with the columns of figures.

“Collect the newspapers up, Richards,” I commanded. “I ask you to glance through and take note if any passages are marked. In the meantime, I must peruse these lists.”

Mazhar could have subjected several leading families to considerable moral pressure if the book was to be believed. He was clearly a crucial figure for several famous private cabinets in London and country houses in the Shires. No aristocratic collection was excluded, but these families can hardly be held responsible for the actions of their agents. I was startled by several political and philanthropic names lodged there, however, who dealt with Mazhar personally. There was no sign of blackmail, only evidence of the trade of a diligent and masterful smuggler able to reach into any excavation in Egypt and the Levant.

I cleared space on an uncomfortable divan where I could angle the candlelight. It took me the work of an hour to find what I was looking for amongst the cryptic references to goods bought from sordid agents and sold to the greatest houses in the land.

“Richards, I have it. There surely had to have been a link to Gaddis. We know that he frequenting the antiquities dealers in search of a protective funerary stela with the figure of Thoth.”

“Gaddis purchased one from Mazhar?”

“Not at all. The appointments diary yesterday has a note that reads ‘3 p.m., G.’, which may or not have been Gaddis. That, we will never be able prove one way or another. But we must assume that Gaddis’ disordered final days were not leavened by relief in what he so despairingly sought.”

“You think he was refused? By Mazhar?”

“I do. I rather think that what forms the centrepiece of the shrine, there, is one of the pieces Gaddis was desperate to find. I doubt the shine has been there long; it seems improvised hastily to me. I suspect that it is something Gaddis said to Mazhar that made the latter seek protection from the gods. Vainly, as it transpired.”

“Do you think Budge will be able to make any more sense of it?”

“We shall see.” Budge had been dispatched back to the Keepers’ rooms, his mind already absorbed by the bundles of papyri he carried. “But there is something rather more urgent to address. There is an interesting transaction in the ledger here. Two weeks ago, Mazhar took receipt of a fine pair of Thoth stele. They came from a boat that travelled directly from Alexandria, from a dealer called Vansittart. It says that they are authenticated finds taken from the German excavation currently underway at Hermopolis.”

“Vansittart, you say? We must ask the Egyptian authorities for information on this gentleman.”

“Indeed. Rather more significantly, though, is the fact that this stela is one of a pair. The other has been sold within the last week.”

“To whom?” Richards cried.

“To a somewhat more respectable dealer of antiquities in Mount Street, an Arabic gentleman called Khulafa. If he sells to families such as this,” I said, showing him a page of the ledger, “I am somewhat anxious at how this story might unfold.”

Richards held the ledger for a moment, glimpsing down the list of names. He blanched. He turned the pages with a trembling hand. He muttered a profanity.

“Our evening is not yet over,” I said, “although it is likely to end in considerably more salubrious surroundings. Are you prepared to come with me, Richards?”

We travelled the short distance by hansom, the crepuscular backstreets of St Giles soon replaced by the gas-lamps and pavements of Mayfair. It was late, the hooves echoing back at us from the shuttered windows of the mansions lining Berkeley Square as we turned into Mount Street. A lone policeman recognized Richards and saluted him. I found it hard to contemplate that these streets could house a crime so queer and unprecedented as I had now begun to suspect. My stomach knotted.

I was glad to have the authority of Richards at my side. I had contemplated whether upon arrival it would become necessary to force an entry rather than raise alarm. Alarm was what it was becoming crucial to avoid. But once we had located the brass plate of Khulafa’s business, we found that in the deep shadow under the portico the front door had been left ajar.

Darkness inked that tiled hallway, a staircase twisting into black night above us. Doom led us to the correct door: Richards turned the brass handle and for a third time that day we were confronted with a drama of disorder and death. The lights that slanted in through the windows revealed that this time something of great strength had hurled the man we presumed the dealer against a cabinet with much force; the body was pinioned there on a shard of shattered glass, staring horribly at a thing now vanished. The floor was a chaos yet again of torn newspapers and the contents of Khulafa’s filing system were strewn across the floor. The desk was ransacked. Richards stepped forward and checked: the ligature was formed by a twist of paper once more. It was our man – or beast.

“This has become a race to the line, Richards. You will observe that our Egyptian friend here is still dripping his life-blood onto the floor – not yet time to coagulate.”

“The body is still warm. There has been a desperate search here. Do you think he has it? The other stela?”

“We can only hope that the documents will reveal something of import,” I said.

We expended ourselves as fast as we were able. Richards stepped outside for a moment and gathered two policemen, one to stand guard at the door, but in the shadows so as not attract attention; the other to alert Scotland Yard, with a warning not to hinder any exit we might need to make from that dreadful room.

I had a conviction that Khulafa’s order book would lead us to a final confrontation, yet I was unable to locate any trace of it amongst the riot of paper. The desk drawers had been yanked off their runners; if the Egyptian was stupid enough to affix his book to the underside, it was now in our enemy’s hands.

Richards, having examined the doors and windows, noting what look like recent scratchings of wedjat eyes on the limns, fell to perusing the strewn papers,
The Times
and the
New York Star
.

“There is only one book, torn in half,” he observed. It had been flung to the farthest corner in a gesture of rage or triumph.

“Bring it to me,” I commanded with a sudden certainty. It was the privately printed
catalogue raisonnée
of the collection of Lord Anstruther-Thompson. Khulafa had jotted additions in a graceful script: he had evidently been commissioned for an updated volume.

There, at last, it was: “Limestone stela, 10 x 4”, round-topped, incised text with sunken relief depicting Thoth, traces of paint still remaining. Good condition. Text a highly unorthodox injunction to ward off the daytime agents of the Devourer of Souls. One of pair discovered at Heliopolis, presumed of use by high priest or magician. Unique item.”

I calculated it was barely four streets away to the Anstruther-Thompson’s town house on Park Lane. I virtually swept Richards off his feet in the rush to bundle us out. I was too agitated to ask for a man to bring a hansom: we set off on foot.

“Lord Anstruther-Thompson has an extensive private museum of curiosities much cherished by scholars of the Orient, one that he opens to the public on holidays. It is very popular. I should have thought of him at once, Richards: I am a fool. We have come at this matter backwards. The stela has been there a matter of days. Gaddis must have started there, worked out somehow that Khulafa had purchased it from Mazhar. Now they are all dead. I fear the Lord may be in danger.”

“And the Lady,” Richards added, a little ragged in his breath.

“The Lady?”

“Lord Anstruther-Thompson married but two weeks ago, to an American heiress.” I evidently looked uninformed with this society intelligence. I was momentarily amused that a man like Richards paid attention to tittle-tattle, but reflected how much a detective required to know the great houses. Richards continued: “Emily Prospero is the daughter of the oil and paper-mill baron, Jeremiah Prospero. He is said to be a Puritan and somewhat displeased with his daughter’s choice of a decadent Englishman, however much the match multiplies their respective fortunes.”

My amusement vanished. If only I had known. “Of course!” I exclaimed. “We have lost hours through my ignorance and stupidity. Now it all makes sense. I only hope we are in time.” Ahead of us I could see the black immensity of Hyde Park. My pocket watch told the hour of two.

Here the Professor paused in his telling, and contemplated the dying coal of his cigar. He was somewhat obscured by the fug and his listeners leant forward. We were willing him to conclude this fantastical tale. It was evident he hesitated, grappling with the matter of how best to continue. It was Coningsby who reached out to touch his elbow with a gentle grace. “Come on, Ferrara, you know you must finish it.” Professor Ferrara nodded, rueful.

At the tradesman’s door of 19 Park Lane, Richards’ hammerings soon roused a startled maid, who called the head butler. There was something soothing about Richards’ presence: thanks to it, my deranged insistence on entering the Lordship’s cabinet of curiosities at the dead of night eventually gained purchase amongst the staff. “It is a matter of life and death for your master and mistress,” I stated in as calm a manner as I could.

Within minutes, Heddon, the butler, took us to the fine oak doors in the extension at the back of the building that housed the cabinet. He was surprised that we asked him to snuff the candles before unlocking the doors.

A quick glance was enough to see that there was no evident disorder or signs of damage, either on the main floor or the iron gallery that girdled the walls. Stone statues loomed in the shadows, the main floor arrayed with sarcophagi and wrapped mummies that seemed thankfully undisturbed in their immemorial sleep.

“We are in time,” I muttered to Richards. “It has not happened yet.” I turned to the butler. “Your master acquired a stela depicting Thoth in recent days, Heddon: do you know of it?”

“I know nothing, sir, it is the keeper of the rooms whom his Lordship employs that concerns himself with these matters. Is there something seriously wrong?”

“A keeper? What is his name?”

“Hebdige. A scholar from Cambridge. A young man, but most erudite.”

“Hebdige, eh? Does he have a room in the building?”

“No sir, I believe he resides in the Soho district.” Heddon looked pained.

“Indeed: but he will have a key to the museum and can come and go, I don’t doubt?”

“Of course. There are always new acquisitions, and they are much concerned with a catalogue to be prepared.”

“Let us try to find sign of this stela, Richards,” I said, and we passed through the museum, two pools of light from a single candle each. I grasped the classification of his Lordship’s museum with speed, and located a vitrine with a fine collection of stele. There the prize was displayed, a label indicating the date of acquisition but a week before. It matched the one in Mazhar’s shrine, but unbroken.