The Golden One (5 page)

‘And you will want to see them,’ I said, realizing I ought to have thought of it. Basima was a devoted and dedicated woman who seldom asked anything for herself. In fact, it was an
admirable idea; the village near Cairo where the northern branch of Abdullah’s family lived was not far off, and Sennia would be under the close supervision of dozens of affectionate friends
who would prevent her from getting into mischief. I expressed my approval, and Gargery was pleased to agree. Nobody asked Horus for his opinion.

‘Where is Ramses going?’ demanded Sennia, who was nothing if not persistent.

‘Somewhere you cannot go. We will be back in time for tea.’

I left her pouting and Gargery fingering some object in his pocket which I hoped was not a pistol, though I feared it was. He took his duties as Sennia’s guard very seriously.

After I had collected Emerson and made him put on a waistcoat and tie, and had changed my blouse, which bore several sticky handprints, we left the hotel and strolled along the Muski, waving
away offers from cabdrivers.

‘Where are we going?’ I asked.

‘Don’t be coy with me, Peabody,’ said Emerson amiably. ‘You are going to the suk, aren’t you, to bully, harass, and interrogate antiquities dealers about
Sethos.’

‘I thought I might ask a few questions of a few people, yes. Wouldn’t that be preferable to having the children prowling about the city after nightfall, with Nefret decked out as
Ramses’s – er – his – um – ’

Emerson shuddered. ‘Good Gad, yes. But – but she didn’t mean it, did she?’

‘She meant it.’

It is a nice healthy stroll from Shepheard’s to the Khan el Khalili, along the Muski and through the old Fatimite city with its mosques and gateways. Yet how the character of the city had
changed! Motorcars and motorbicycles wove hazardous paths among horse-drawn cabs and donkey-drawn carts and caravans of camels. Uniforms were everywhere, the men who wore them as diverse as their
insignia: tall rangy Australians and bearded Sikhs, dark-skinned Nubians and pink-cheeked boys fresh from the English countryside.

It was a depressing sight. These men, now so bright-eyed and cheerful, were destined for the battlefields of Palestine and Europe, from which most would never return.

The Khan el Khalili at least had not changed – the same narrow lanes, covered with matting and lined with small shops selling every variety of goods from silks to carpets to silver.
Peddlers and sellers of sweetmeats wended their way through the crowds; a waiter, carrying aloft a tray with small cups of Turkish coffee, hastened to the shopkeeper who had ordered it.

Not far from the mosque of the venerated Saint Hosein is the area given over to the stalls of the booksellers, and it was here I hoped to rid myself of the amiable but inconvenient presence of
my spouse. Somewhat to my surprise he did not put up much of an argument.

‘You are calling on Aslimi, I suppose,’ he said.

‘And perhaps a few others.’

‘Very well.’ Emerson took out his watch. ‘I will give you three hours, Peabody. If you aren’t back by then, I will come looking for you.’

‘Anything but that!’ I exclaimed jestingly.

Emerson grinned. ‘Quite. Enjoy yourself, my love, and don’t buy any fakes.’

Aslimi did deal in fake antiquities, as had his father, who had met a very ugly death in his own shop some years before. At first I did not recognize him. He had gained an enormous amount of
weight and was almost as fat as his father had been. Seated on the mastaba bench outside his shop, he was importuning passersby in the traditional fashion and in a mixture of languages: ‘Oh,
Howadji, I have beautiful antiquities! Monsieur et madame, écoutez-vous!’ and so on. When he saw me he broke off with a gurgle and began wriggling, trying to stand.

‘Good morning, Aslimi,’ I said. ‘Stay where you are.’

Aslimi swallowed. ‘The Father of Curses – ’

‘Is not with me.’

‘Ah.’ Aslimi put his hands on the approximate region of his waist and sighed heavily. ‘He gives me pains in the stomach, Sitt Hakim.’

‘It is as God wills,’ I said piously. Aslimi shot me a look that indicated he was more inclined to put the blame on Emerson than on Allah, but he rallied enough to go through the
prescribed gestures of hospitality, offering me coffee or tea and a seat on the mastaba. Then we got down to business.

I left the shop an hour and a half later, with several parcels. Bargaining takes quite a long time, and the subtle interrogation at which I excel takes even longer. Since I had time to spare, I
stopped at a few more stalls, learning little more than I had from Aslimi, but purchasing a number of items that would be needed in our new home: a set of handsome copper cooking vessels, thirty
yards of blue-and-silver Damascus silk, and two elegant carpets, all of which I directed to be sent to the hotel.

I found Emerson surrounded by loosely bound volumes and piles of manuscripts and several of the more learned booksellers, with whom he was engaged in heated argument. I had begun to suspect that
they enjoyed egging him on, for his views on religion – all varieties of religion – were unorthodox and eloquently expressed. The discussion ended when I appeared, and after an exchange
of compliments all round, I led Emerson away.

‘Why do you do that?’ I scolded. ‘It is very rude to criticize another individual’s religious beliefs, and there is not the slightest possibility that you will convert
them.’

‘Who wants to convert them?’ Emerson demanded in surprise. ‘Islam is as good a religion as any other. I don’t approve of Christianity or Judaism or Buddhism
either.’

‘I am well aware of that, Emerson. I don’t suppose you learned anything of interest?’

‘It was very interesting. I raised several unanswerable points . . .’ He noticed my parcels and took them from me. ‘What have you got there?’

‘Don’t unwrap them here,’ I cautioned, for Emerson was, in his impetuous fashion, tugging at the strings. ‘While you were wasting your time debating theology, I went
about the business for which we came to the Khan. Aslimi showed me some remarkable things, Emerson. He told me he had never known the supply of merchandise to be so great. He is getting objects
from all over Egypt, including Luxor.’

‘What the devil!’ Emerson came to a dead stop in the middle of the road. He began to unwrap the largest parcel, ignoring the camel advancing ponderously towards him. The driver,
recognizing Emerson, managed to stop the recalcitrant animal before it ran into my equally recalcitrant spouse. He turned an outraged glare on the camel, which responded with its usual look of
utter disgust. I stifled my laughter, for Emerson would not have found anything amusing about his attempt to stare down a camel.

Somehow the driver got the beast past Emerson, who had not stirred an inch. I took the parcel from him.

‘It is not like you to be so careless, Emerson,’ I said severely. ‘Careless with antiquities, I mean. Come out of the middle of the road and let me undo the wrappings enough to
give you a peep.’

Care was necessary, since there were two objects in the wrappings, both of them breakable – or at least, chippable. The one I showed Emerson was an alabaster disc with a thin band of gold
around the rim.

‘No hieroglyphs,’ he muttered. ‘Beautiful piece of work, though. It’s the lid of a pot or jar.’

‘A very expensive pot,’ I amended. ‘I have the pot as well – an exquisitely shaped alabaster container, most probably for cosmetics. Now shall we go back to the hotel
where we can examine it in private?’

‘Hmmm, yes, certainly.’ Emerson watched me rewrap the lid. ‘I beg your pardon, my dear. You were quite right to scold me. What else have you got?’

‘Nothing so exciting as the cosmetic jar,’ I said, ‘but I believe they are all from the same tomb – the one Cyrus told us about.’

‘So Mohassib didn’t get everything.’ Emerson strode along beside me, his hands in his pockets. ‘How did Aslimi come by these?’

‘Not from Sethos.’

‘You asked him point-blank, I suppose,’ Emerson grumbled. ‘Aslimi is a congenital liar, Peabody. How do you know he was telling you the truth?’

‘He turned pea-green at the very mention of “the Master”. It would have been rather amusing if he had not been in such a state of abject terror; he kept wringing his hands and
saying, “But he is dead. He is dead, surely. Tell me he is really dead this time, Sitt!” ’

‘Hmmm,’ said Emerson.

‘Now don’t get any ideas about pretending
you
are “the Master”, Emerson.’

‘I don’t see why I shouldn’t,’ said Emerson sulkily. ‘You are always telling me I cannot disguise myself effectively. It is cursed insulting. So – from whom
did Aslimi acquire these objects?’

‘He claimed the man was someone he’d never seen before.’

‘I trust you extracted a description?’

‘Certainly. Tall, heavyset, black beard and mustache.’

‘That’s no help. Even if it was true.’

‘Aslimi would not lie to
me
. Emerson, please don’t walk so fast.’

‘Ha,’ said Emerson. But he slowed his steps and gave me his arm. We had emerged onto the Muski, with its roaring traffic and European shops. ‘We’ll just have time to tidy
up before luncheon,’ he added. ‘Do you suppose the children are back?’

‘One never knows. I only hope they haven’t got themselves in trouble.’

‘Why should you suppose that?’

‘They usually do.’

The alleys of el-Wasa were fairly quiet at that early hour. The stench was permanent; even a hard rain only stirred up the garbage of the streets and gathered it in oily pools, where it settled
again once the water had evaporated. There were no drains. Ramses glanced at his wife, who walked briskly through the filth, giving it no more attention than was necessary to avoid the worst bits,
and not for the first time he wondered how she could bear it. To his eyes she was always radiant, but in this setting she glowed like a fallen star, her golden-red hair gathered into a knot at the
back of her head and her brow unclouded.

Initially the clinic had been regarded with suspicion and dislike by the denizens of the Red Blind district, and Nefret and her doctor friend Sophia had deemed it advisable not to advertise its
presence. Now it was under the protection of the Cairo police. Russell sent patrols around frequently and came down hard on anyone who tried to make trouble. Emerson had also come down hard on a
few offenders who had not known that the person in charge was the daughter of the famed Father of Curses. They knew now. Nefret had found another, unexpected supporter in Ibrahim el-Gharbi, the
Nubian transvestite who controlled the brothels of el-Wasa, so the expanded building now proclaimed its mission in polished bronze letters over the door, and the area around it was regularly
cleaned of trash and dead animals.

‘I’ll not come in this time,’ Ramses said, when they reached the house.

Nefret gave him a provocative smile. ‘You don’t like trailing round after me and Sophia, do you?’

He didn’t, especially; he felt useless and ineffective, and only too often, wrung with pity for misery he was helpless to relieve. This time he had a valid excuse.

‘I saw someone I want to talk with,’ he explained. ‘I’ll join you in a bit.’

‘All right.’ She didn’t ask who; her mind was already inside the building, anticipating the duties that awaited her.

He went back along the lane, kicking a dead rat out of his path and trying to avoid the deeper pools of slime. The man he had seen was sitting on a bench outside one of the more pretentious
cribs. He was asleep, his head fallen back and his mouth open. The flies crawling across his face did not disturb his slumber; he was used to them. Ramses nudged him and he looked up, blinking.

‘Salaam aleikhum, Brother of Demons. So you are back, and it is true what they say – that the Brother of Demons appears out of thin air, without warning.’

Ramses didn’t point out that Musa had been sound asleep when he approached; his reputation for being on intimate terms with demons stood him in good stead with the more superstitious
Egyptians. ‘You have come down in the world since I last saw you, Musa. Did el-Gharbi dismiss you?’

‘Have you not heard?’ The man’s dull eyes brightened a little. It was a matter of pride to be the first to impart information, bad or good, and he would expect to be rewarded.
He looked as if he could use money. As a favourite of el-Gharbi he had been sleek and plump and elegantly dressed. The rags he wore now barely covered his slender limbs.

‘I will tell you,’ he went on. ‘Sit down, sit down.’

He shifted over to make room for Ramses. The latter declined with thanks. Flies were not the only insects infesting Musa and his clothes.

‘We knew the cursed British were raiding the houses and putting the women into prison,’ Musa began. ‘They set up a camp at Hilmiya. But my master only laughed. He had too many
friends in high places, he said. No one could touch him. And no one did – until one night there came two men sent by the mudir of the police himself, and they took my master away, still in
his beautiful white garments. They say that when Harvey Pasha saw him, he was very angry and called him rude names.’

‘I’m not surprised,’ Ramses murmured. Harvey Pasha, commander of the Cairo police, was honest, extremely straitlaced, and rather stupid. He probably hadn’t even been
aware of el-Gharbi’s existence until someone – Russell? – pointed out to him that he had missed the biggest catch of all. Ramses could only imagine the look on Harvey’s face
when el-Gharbi waddled in, draped in women’s robes and glittering with jewels.