The Wrath of Fu Manchu and Other Stories (25 page)

At first, thinking that she understood the motives of delicacy which prompted him, Moira had dropped the subject; but she had returned to it later; and now she made the request in a manner which invited no evasion.

“Very well,” said Lake, “of course. It’s not a pleasant business from any point of view, but if you are set on it we can go, say, on Tuesday morning. The shaft has been closed up, of course, but not permanently. I’ll go into the town and gather up a few men to prepare the way. Men who know the work are easy to find.”

Moira just replied, “Thank you, Vernon,” and didn’t refer to the matter again.

“If you want to picture Schroeder’s shaft to yourself,” said Tom Borrodale, “don’t confuse it in your mind with an elevator shaft. It wasn’t straight and it wasn’t smooth; it was more like the inside of a Swiss chimney. It went sheer down for about ten feet and then it had been cut in at a pretty sharp angle to avoid solid granite. That part was shored up. Beyond, it went straight down again, a rugged, rock-studded pit. At this point Schroeder had met more rock and had had to give the job up. Thomson, later, tunnelled around this obstruction and broke into the antechamber from the south.”

Lake (so Borrodale told me), although a man of proved courage, had an almost morbid horror of snakes. So that when, early on the appointed Tuesday morning he and Moira arrived at the reopened shaft, Lake sent the Arabs down first to report if all was clear.

They were an experienced crew, one of whom had worked with Thomson and Lake before. “These fellows are born excavators,” said Borrodale, “whose fathers dug for Flinders Petrie and Howard Carter. The ghafir of one of the Luxor temples, a white-haired veteran who remembered Maspero, was in charge, and although already he had assembled a gang of six, he had roped in an odd man who came from the Faiyûm, a big, bearded fellow, who seemed, for all his physique, since he kept well in the background, to be work-shy. I need not say that such a mob was unnecessary, but the old boy had jumped at the chance to employ all his friends and relations. It’s their way.”

Lines had been rigged and arrangements made for forming a sort of human escalator by means of which Moira and Lake could be passed down to the foot of the shaft. From the moment that they proceeded beyond the angle, daylight disappeared: but Lake had a big army flashlight which he housed in the hip pocket of his shorts.

They managed the descent successfully and then squeezed around that narrow semicircular cutting which gave access to the anteroom. It was very still down there, when the Arabs had been told to clear out, and it smelled of Ancient Egypt. “That smell of Ancient Egypt,” said Tom Borrodale, “is something which no one has ever been able to define. But although it isn’t strictly pleasant, it has some hypnotic quality which, even over a bridge of years, can call a man back to the Old Land.”

A feature of the antechamber was a central pillar hewn out of the rock, and before this pillar, on the westward side, stood a sort of shrine, also of rock, upon which had rested a porphyry statuette of the goddess, Maat. The statuette had been taken to the Cairo Museum, but the rock altar was immovable, of course. There were some fine mural paintings in perfect preservation, and the floor of the square room was paved with black stone.

It is necessary to remember the shape of the entrance passage and the presence of this central pillar in order to understand why Moira, after the Arabs had gone, suddenly said, “Are you sure there’s no one in the room?”

“No one but you and I,” Lake, assured her, and shone his light all around from where they stood. “Why?”

“I thought, or perhaps I imagined, that someone else was here,” Moira explained.

Lake was wearing a white silk shirt open front, and it seemed to Moira, in the reflected light, that he looked rather ghastly. He was of a naturally pale complexion, which illness had accentuated, but since leaving hospital he had enjoyed plenty of open-air exercise and had regained colour. All the same, as he stood there, Moira thought that his face looked almost as pale as his partly exposed chest. It must be borne in mind, however, that the air of the place was hot and oppressive. Lake laughed but not overconvincingly.

“Suppose we get the inspection through,” he suggested, “and return to the outer air. Although I took up this business, once, I may as well admit that the atmosphere of tombs, or their lack of atmosphere, soon bowls me over.”

Well, they walked right around the antechamber, examining its murals, which Lake did his best to explain. He showed Moira where the portcullis was hidden in the eastern wall beyond which lay the real tomb.

They had completed their tour and stood one on either side of the empty shrine before the central pillar when Moira whispered, “There it is again!”

She grabbed Lake’s arm so suddenly that he dropped his flashlight. It fell on the black pavement with an awesome crash and immediately went out.

“Damn,” he exclaimed; then, “Don’t get frightened, Moira,” he added. “Stand quite still until I strike a match.”

“Please don’t strike a match,” she said—”at least, not for a moment.”

Her voice was not entirely steady, but she spoke so quietly that it was evident that she had herself well in hand.

“Whatever do you mean?” Lake asked, and his tones were pretty husky.

“Oh, it’s just an impulse—perhaps a silly one. It came to me as the light went out. When you asked me to marry you, Vernon, in Cairo, don’t think that I refused lightly, or frivolously. Indeed, I was honoured, and very, very sorry to have to hurt you. But I told you, quite honestly, why it was impossible, and I respected you enough to tell you, when you asked me, the other man’s name—although he didn’t know.”

“That’s all true,” said Lake, in a low voice. “But what has it to do with our remaining here in the dark?”

“Just that while we stand here, by this shrine of Maat, which you—and he—discovered, I want to ask you a question. Will you promise to answer truly—in the name of Maat?”

“In the name of
Maat!
That’s a queer pagan oath.”

“Perhaps it is. But will you?”

“Of course.”

“Very well. Swear, by Maat, with your hand on her altar, that you buried him as well and as deeply as was in your power.”

For the next few seconds there was that sort of silence which seems to throb, as though an astral dynamo vibrated near by. Then, Lake’s voice came out of the darkness:

“I buried him as well, and as deeply, as was in my power. I swear this—in the name of Maat.”

The thing that followed may never be satisfactorily explained. Conjecture is permissible, but proof unlikely. There was a blinding flash of light. It shone directly onto Lake’s face, leaving everything else in utter blackness. Something shot toward him, something which Moira described as “a brown shadow”. Lake uttered a choking sound and fell. There was utter blackness again.

Moira’s shriek—the only sound that she uttered before collapsing, unconscious—was heard by the waiting Arabs. It had a curious (but by no means unusual) effect. For a number of reasons, Schroeder’s shaft was reputed to be haunted by a powerful and evil spirit. In consequence, on hearing that wild cry, three of the gang promptly bolted and were seen no more.

It was the white-bearded ghafir who carried Moira up. Laying her in a shady place, he returned for Lake. And when they brought Lake out into morning sunshine, only the old Arab’s holy reputation (he was a hadji who had five times kissed the black stone of the Kaaba), his fists, and his uncommonly fluent invective, prevented the others from deserting as well.

Imprinted on Lake’s pale skin, right over the heart, and growing plainer every minute, was a reddish-blue mark, like a bruise. It was clearly defined, resembling a seal, and it represented the conventional Feather of Justice: the mark of Maat!

“This extraordinary story does not rest on the testimony of the Arabs alone,” said Tom Borrodale. “By the time that Moira was in a fit state to see Lake (who was dead) the mark had faded into a sort of general contusion. But she could swear to its character, nevertheless: there were many similar inscriptions on the walls of the antechamber.”

Medical evidence, when it could be obtained (they had to hold a post-mortem), showed that death had been from shock, apparently caused by a tremendous blow over the heart.

“So there’s your mystery,” Borrodale commented; “and I flatter myself it’s a pretty deep one. Which brings me to Thomson’s story.”

“To Thomson’s story?” I echoed.

“Yes. About a week later Thomson turned up in Cairo. He had a story to tell, also; but he told it (in full) to no one but Moira.”

And this is Thomson’s story:

* * *

Thomson came temporarily to his senses in that dreadful hour just before dawn of the third day in the desert. Hovering between sanity and delirium, he saw Lake creeping stealthily away over a neighbouring mound—taking with him their remaining stock of food and water!

He staggered to his feet and tried to run after Lake. He shouted—or he thought he was shouting: it may have been a husky whisper.

And Lake? Lake looked back and then began to run, also…away from Thomson! Thomson ran on until he fell.

His next recollection was one of lying in an Arab tent, raving. A man and an old woman were trying to soothe him. They forced him to swallow some bitter draught. A good Moslem respects insanity, looking upon it as a visitation of God and a thing to merit a True Believer’s pity…

In time (Thomson had no idea if in days or in weeks) he recovered. He had been picked up and tended by a small party of wandering Bedawi; and he was his own man again.

Lake! The mere thought of Lake set Thomson’s brain on fire. His first idea was how soon he could find his way back and expose Lake. Nothing else mattered until he had broken Lake, until he had shown him up for the cad and cur he thought him to be. Then—he fell to thinking about the thing from another angle.

“You will recall,” said Borrodale, “that both had been bitten, or stung, by some unspecified reptile or insect. It occurred to Thomson that Lake might not have been in his right mind when he deserted, when he left a fellow man to almost certain death in the desert. This theory worried him so much that he determined to prove or disprove it before he acted.”

“Thomson must have been a fellow of singular generosity—or simplicity.”

“That’s as may be. I merely state the facts. Anyway, he knew that he would be posted missing, perhaps dead, and he made up his mind to stay missing until he could find out if Lake had got back—and, if so, what Lake had said.”

I gathered that, according to Thomson’s explanation when he turned up in Cairo, he had been wandering about in Arab dress, bearded to the eyes (he was heavily hirsute), in Libya and Egypt for many weeks, still uncertain of his real identity. The fact was (or so Borrodale hinted) that Thomson was seeking news of Lake.

“It is probable,” said Borrodale, “that he learned of Lake’s illness, and it is possible that he made his way up to Luxor in order to confirm the reported facts. He might have reached Cairo, for instance, just after Lake left. It is even possible, if a little farfetched, that he was watching Lake and Moira. I hesitate to suggest so fantastic a theory, but he may have been one of the party recruited by the ghafir to reopen Schroeder’s shaft. The blinding light described by Moira would not be inconsistent with someone suddenly turning on a flashlight—someone concealed behind the central pillar.”

While Tom Borrodale had been talking, people had begun to drift onto the formerly deserted terrace, and now, from behind me, I heard a soft call: “Coo-ee, Tom!”

Tom Borrodale came to his feet at a jump; his eyes gleamed; his whole rugged face irradiated happiness. I turned and stared at a girl who had just come up the steps. She was well worth staring at: a petite chestnut blonde with that Irish rose complexion which has inspired so many songs, and widely spaced violet eyes. She wore nurse’s uniform. A quick intake of breath drew my glance away. Tom Borrodale was grasping his left arm, which evidently pained him.

“Moved my chair too hurriedly,” he explained. “Stopped a bit of shrapnel with this arm.”

He had also grasped it too hurriedly; for a heavy gold ring which he wore with the bezel concealed had got twisted, and I saw that it was set with a large amethyst scarab.

“You don’t know Sheila Asthore, do you?” he asked. “Sheila, one of my oldest friends has turned up in the nick of time—to act as best man.” He turned to me. “We’re to be married in three days.”

Brian Desmond recognised that he was no more than a wretched interloper. Almost he regretted his own temerity. Camp life within the precincts of the Temple of Medinet Habu has many drawbacks, but at least one may stand where heaps of precious ingots once gleamed within the treasury of Rameses in Thebes, the city of the hundred gates; one may share the apartment over the great pylon with bats and creeping things, and, by the light of that same old moon which shone upon golden Pharaoh, watch painted ladies of the royal harem wave flabella before the mighty one, cast flowers at his feet, and receive the reward of his godlike caresses. According to the inscriptions, the queen was never present.