the river, and the distant figures of the troglodytic monks in their
white robes lining the parapet of the caves to watch impassively as we
passed. Some of us waved up to them) and felt quite rebuffed when they
made no response."
"How would we ever reach that spot again, without a full-scale river
expedition?" she wondered aloud, staring disconsolately at the board.
"Discouraged already?" He grinned at her. "Wait until you meet some of
the mosquitoes that live down there.
They pick you up and fly with you to their lairs before they eat you."
"Be serious," she entreated him. "How would we ever get down there?"
"The monks are fed by the villagers who live up on the highlands above
the gorge. Apparently, there is a goat track down the wall. They told us
that it takes three days to get down that track into the gut of the
gorge from the rim."
"Could you find your way down?"
"No, but I have a few ideas on the subject. We will come to that later.
Firstly, we must decide what we expect to find down there after four
thousand years." He looked at her expectantly. "Your turn now. Convince
me." He handed her the silver-headed pointer, dropped into the chair
beside her and folded his arms.
"First you have to go back to the book." She exchanged the pointer for
the copy of River God. "You remember the character of Tanus from the
story?"
"Of course. He was the commander of the Egyptian armies under Queen
Lostris, with the title of Great Lion of Egypt. He led the exodus from
Egypt, when they were driven out by the Hyksos."
"He was also the Queen's secret lover and, if we are to believe Taita,
the father of Prince Memnon, her eldest son," she agreed.
Tanus was killed during a punitive expedition against an Ethiopian chief
named Arkoun in the high mountains, and his body was mummified and
brought back to the Queen by Taita,'Nicholas expanded the story.
Precisely." She nodded. This leads me on to the other clue that Duraid
and I winkled out."
"From the seventh scroll?" He unfolded his arms and sat forward in his
seat.
"No, not from the scrolls, but from the inscriptions in the tomb of
Queen Lostris." She reached into her bag and brought out another
photograph. This is an enlargement of a section of the murals from the
burial chamber, that part of the wall that later fell away and was lost
when the alabaster jars were revealed. Duraid and I believe that the
fact that Taita placed this inscription in the place of honour, over the
hiding-place of the scrolls, was significant." She passed the photograph
to him, and he picked up a magnifying glass from the table to study it.
While he puzzled over the hieroglyphics Royan went on, "You will recall
from the book how Taita loved riddles and word games, how he boasts so
often that he is the greatest of all boa players?"
Nicholas looked up from the magnifying glass, "I remember that. I go
along with the theory that bao was the forerunner of the game of chess.
I have a dozen or so boards in the museum collection, some from Egypt
and others from further south in Africa."
"Yes, I would also subscribe to that theory. Both games have many of the
same objects and rules, but bao is a more rudimentary form of the game.
It is played with coloured stones of different rank, instead of chess
men. Well, I believe that Taita was not able to resist the temptation to
display his riddling skills and his cleverness to posterity. I believe
that he was so conceited that he deliberately left clues to the location
of the Pharaoh's tomb, both in the scrolls and amongst the murals that
he tells us he painted with his own hands in the tomb of his beloved
Queen."
"You think that this is one of those clues?" Nicholas tapped the
photograph with the glass.
"Read it," she instructed him. "It's in classical hieroglyphics - not
too difficult compared to his cryptic codes."
"'The father of the prince who is not the father, the giver of the blue
that killed him,"' he translated haltingly, "'guards eternally hand in
hand with Hapi the stone testament of the pathway to the father of the
prince who is not the father, the giver of blood and ashes."'
Nicholas shook his head, "No, it doesn't make sense," he protested, you
"Don't despair. You are making your first acquaintance with Taita, the
champion bao, player and consummate riddler. Duraid and I puzzled over
it for weeks," she reassured him. "To work it out, let's go back to the
book.
Tanus was not the father of Prince Memnon in name, but, as the Queen's
lover, was his biological father. On his deathbed, he gave Memnon the
blue sword that had inflicted his own mortal wound during the battle
with the native Ethiopian chief There is a full description of the
battle in the book."
"Yes, when I first read that section, I remember thinking that the blue
sword was probably one of the very earliest iron weapons, and in an age
of bronze would have been a marvel of the armourer's art. A gift fit for
a prince," Nicholas mused, and went on, "So "the father of the prince
who is not the father" is Tanus?" He sighed with resignation.
"For the moment I accept your interpretation."
"Thank you for your trust and confidence in me," she said sarcastically.
"But to proceed with Taita's riddle Pharaoh Mamose was Memnon's father
in name only, but not his blood father. Again the father who was not the
father. Mamose passed down to the prince the double crown of Egypt, the
red and white crowns of Upper and Lower Kingdoms - the blood and the
ashes.
"I am able to swallow that more easily. What about the rest of the
inscription?"Nicholas was clearly intrigued.
"The expression "hand in hand" is ambiguous in ancient Egyptian. It
could just as well mean very close to, or within sight of, something."
"Go on. At last you have me sitting up and taking notice,'Nicholas
encouraged her.
"Hapi is the hermaphroditic god or goddess of the Nile, depending on the
gender he or she adopts at any particular moment. Throughout the scrolls
Taita uses Hapi as an alternative name for the river."
"So if we put the seventh scroll and the "inscription from the Queen's
tomb together, what then is your full interpretation?" he insisted.
"Simply this: Tanus is buried within sight of, or very close to, the
river at the second waterfall. There is a stone monument or inscription
on, or in, his tomb that points the way to the tomb of Pharaoh."
He exhaled through his teeth. "I am exhausted from all this jumping to
conclusions. What other clues have you ferreted out for me?"
"That's it," she said, and he looked at her with disbelief.
"That's it? Nothing else?" he demanded, and she shook her head.
"Just suppose that you are correct so far. Let us suppose that the river
is recognizably the same in shape and configuration as it was nearly
four thousand years ago. Let us further suppose that Taita was indeed
pointing us towards
the second waterfall at the Dandera river. just what
do we look for when we get there? If there is a rock inscription, will
it still be intact or will it be eroded away by weather and the action
of the river?"
"Howard Carter had an equally slender lead to the tomb of Tutankhamen,'
she pointed out mildly. "A single piece of papyrus, of dubious
authenticity."
"Howard Carter had only the area of the Valley of the Kings to search.
It still took him ten years," he replied. "You have given me Ethiopia, a
country twice the size of France.
How long will that take us, do you think?"
She stood up abruptly, "Excuse me, I think I should go and visit my
mother in hospital. It's fairly obvious that I am wasting my time here."
"It is not yet visiting hours," he told her.
"She has a private room." Royan made for the door.
"I will drive you to the hospital," he offered.
"Don't bother. I will call a taxi," she replied in a tone that crackled
with ice.
"A taxi will take an hour to get here," he warned, and she relented just
enough to let him lead her to the Range Rover. They drove in silence for
fifteen minutes, before he spoke.
"I am not very good at apologies. Not much practice, I am afraid, but I
am sorry. I was abrupt. I didn't mean to be.
Carried away by the excitement of the moment She did not reply, and
after a minute added,'You will have to talk to me, unless we are to
correspond only by note. It will be a bit awkward down in the Abbay
gorge."
"I had the distinct impression that you were no longer interested in
going down there." She stared ahead through the windscreen.
am a brute," he agreedi and she glanced sideways at him. It was her
undoing. His grin was irresistible, and she laughed.
"I Suppose I will just have to come to terms with that fact. You are a
brute."
"Still partners?" he asked.
"At the moment you are the only brute I have.
suppose that I am stuck with you."
He dropped her off at the main hospital entrance. "I will pick you up
here at three 'clock," he told her and drove on into the centre of York.
From his university days Nicholas had kept a small flat in one of the
narrow alleys behind York Minster. The entire building was registered in
the name of a Cayman Island company, and the unlisted telephone there
did not route through an internal switchboard. No ownership could be
traced to him personally. Before he had met Rosalind the flat had played
an important part in his social life. But nowadays Nicholas only used it
for confidential and clandestine business. Both the Libyan and the Iraqi
expeditions had been planned and organized from here.
He hadn't used the flat for months, and it was cold and musty-smelling
and uninviting. He put a match to the gas fire in the grate and filled
the kettle. With a mug of steaming tea in front of him he placed a call
to a bank in Jersey, followed immediately by another to a bank in the
Cayman Islands.
"A wise rat has more than one exit from its burrow."
This was a family maxim, passed down through the generations. He was
going to need funds for the expedition, and the lawyers had most of
those locked up already.
He gave the passwords and account numbers to each of the bank managers,
and instructed them to make certain transfers. It always amazed him how
easily matters could be rranged, as long as you had money.
He checked his watch. It was still early morning in Florida, but Alison
picked up the phone on the second ring. She was the blonde feminine
dynamo who ran Global Safaris, a company that arranged hunting and
fishing expeditions to remote areas around the world.
"Hello, Nick. We haven't heard from you in over a year. We thought you
didn't love us any more."
"I have been out of it for a while," he admitted. How do you tell people
that your wife and two little girls had died?
"Ethiopia?" She did not sound at all disconcerted by the request. "When
did you want to go?"
"How about next week?"
"You have to be joking. We only work with one hunter there, Nassous
Roussos, and he is booked two years in advance."
"Is there nobody else?" he insisted. "I have to be in and out again
before the big rains."
"What trophies are you after? she hedged. "Mountain nyala? Menelik's
bushbuck?"
"I am planning a collecting trip for the museum, down the Abbay river."
It was as much as he was prepared to tell her.
She hedged a little longer and then told him reluctantly, This is
without our recommendation, do you understand. There is only one hunter
who may take You on at such short notice, but I don't even know if he
has a camp on the Blue Nile. He is a Russian, and we have had mixed
reports about him. Some people say he is ex-KGB an was one of Mengistu's
bunch of thugs."
Mengistu was the "Black Stalin' who had deposed an then murdered the
old Emperor Haile Selassie, and in sixteen years of despotic Marxist
rule had driven Ethiopia to its knees. When his sponsor, the Soviet
Empire, had collapsed, Mengistu had been overthrown and fled the
country.
"I am desperate enough to go to bed with the devil," he told her. "I
promise I won't come back to you with any complaints."
"Okay, then, no comebacks-' and she gave him a name and a telephone
number in Addis Ababa.
"I love you, Alison darling Nicholas told her.
"I wish," she said, and hung up on him.
He didn't expect that it would be easy to telephone Addis, and he wasn't
disappointed in his expectations. But at last he got through. A woman
with a sweet lisping of Ethiopian accent answered and switched to fluent
English when he asked for Boris Brusilov.
"He is out on safari at present," she told him. "I am Woizero Tessay,
his wife." In Ethiopia a wife did not take on her husband's name.
Nicholas remembered enough of the language to know that the name meant
Lady Sun, a pretty name.
"But if it is in connection with safari business I can help you," said
Lady Sun.
Nicholas picked Royan up outside the hospital entrance.
"How is your mother?"
"Her leg is doing well, but she's still distraught about is Magic -
about her dog."
You will have to get her a puppy. One of my keepers breeds first-class
springers. I can arrange it." He paused and then asked delicately, "Will
you be able to leave your mother? I mean, if we are going out to
Africa?"
"I spoke to her about that. There is a woman from her church group who
will stay with her until she is well enough to fend for herself again."
Royan turned fully around in her seat to examine his face. "You have
been up to something since I last saw you," she accused him. "I can see
it in your face."
He made the Arabic sign against the evil eye, "Allah save me from
witches!'
"Come on!" He could make her laugh so readily, she was not sure if that
was a good thing or not. "Tell me what you have up your sle
eve."
"Wait until we get back to the museum." He would not be moved, and she
had to bridle her impatience.
As soon as they entered the building he led her through the Egyptian
room to the hall of African mammals, and then stopped her in front of a
diorama of mounted antelope. These were some of the smaller and
mediumsized varieties - impala, Thompson's and Grant's gazelle, gerenuk
and the like.
"Madoqua harperii." He pointed to a tiny creature in one corner of the
display. "Harper's dik-dik, also known as the striped dik-dik."
It was a nondescript little animal, not much bigger than a large hare.
The brown pelt was striped in chocolate over the shoulders and back, and
the nose was elongated into a prehensile proboscis.
"A bit tatty," she gave her opinion carefully, unwilling to bend, yet
knowing he was inordinately Proud of this Specimen. "Is there something
special about it?, "Special?" he asked with wonder in his voice. The
Woman asks if it is special." He rolled his eyes heavenward and she had
to laugh again at his histrionics. "It is the only known specimen in
existence.
creatures on earth. So rare that It is One of the rarest now. So rare it
is probably extinct by that many zoologists believe that apocryphal,
that it never really existed. They think it is that my sainted
great-grandfather, after whom it is named, actually invented it. One
learned reference hinted that he may have taken the skin of the striped
mongoose and stretched it over the form of a common dik-dik. Can you
imagine a more heinous accusation?)
"I am truly appalled by such injustice,'she laughed.
"Darned right, You should be. Because we are going to Africa to hunt for
another specimen of Madoqua harpent, to vindicate the honour of the
family., "I don't understand."
"Come with me and all will be explained."He led her back to his study,
and from the jumble on the tabletop Picked out a notebook bound in red
Morocco leather. The cover was faded and stained with water marks and
tropical sun light, while the corners and the spine were frayed and
battered.
"Old Sir Jonathan's game book,) he explained, and opened it. Pressed
between the pages were faded wild flowers and leaves that must have been
there for almost a century. The text was illuminated by line drawings in
faded Yellow ink of men and animals and wild landscapes.