The Bone House Read online

  Against all natural inclination, he forced himself to stop as instructed by Wilhelmina.

  “Terrific.” He turned, stepped off the ley, and hurried back to the starting place. “Second time lucky,” he muttered, and strode off again. Once again he felt the now-familiar tingle on his skin, as when, just before a lightning strike, the air becomes electrically charged. The wind gusted, driving fine grit into his eyes, which instantly started watering so that he had difficulty seeing where he was going. He must have unconsciously slowed a step, because he reached the eighth sphinx and still had not made the leap.

  “Bugger!” he muttered. Had he lost the knack?

  The thought that he might be stuck in 1920s Egypt with the Burley Men on his tail did not bear thinking about, so he dashed back to the starting point and took his place, putting his toes to an imaginary line. Lowering his head like a sprinter awaiting the gun, he muttered, “Third time lucky!” and shot off.

  This time, with a determination absent from the first two attempts, he willed himself to leap. Perhaps it was this heightened resolve that turned the trick, for upon approaching the eighth sphinx he felt the air quiver; the ground beneath his feet trembled, and the world around him grew dim and indistinct, but only for the briefest of instants—the merest blink of an eye. He lurched forward and, like a drunk who has misjudged his footing, tottered dizzily for a few steps before righting himself and stopping.

  When his head cleared he found himself standing almost exactly where he had been standing before—in the centre of the avenue at the eighth sphinx. The temple at the end of the avenue was still a ruin and empty, the ragged hills just as arid and dusty as before, but the sun was now high overhead and blazing down on him with a ferocity that brought tears to his eyes.

  The discomfort of the crossing quickly passed. He noted with satisfaction that with each jump he was a little less nauseated and disoriented. The first had left him dazed and confused and upchucking over his shoes; this last spate of dizziness was nothing compared to that.

  Now to get himself to Luxor. Assuming that the leap had been successful, and that he was in the time zone anticipated by Wilhelmina, he knew in general what he had to do: get to the river and follow it downstream until he came to the town, which was ten miles or so as the crow flew—depending, of course, on the crow. Then he was to make his way to the hotel and collect the package. Simple. Mina’s letter would tell him what to do next.

  He set off. Reaching the river meant working his way up and over the hills—no easy task, as he soon discovered. Following a goat track, he slowly climbed the barren slopes and was soon panting with the exertion. The heat bounced off the pale rock all around, scorching through his clothing. Sweat ran down his face and neck, the fat drops raising little dust puffs with every step. Mina had given him a skin of water for the journey, but as the heat took hold he worried that it would not be enough, so he nursed it carefully, taking only tiny sips of the now-warm, slightly brackish liquid.

  To take his mind off his hike, he thought about where he was going and what he might find when he got there. He wondered what year it was, and why he had remained in Egypt when always before when using a ley, the traveller ended up in a startlingly different location. It probably had something to do with the length of distance travelled along the ley, he decided—for lack of any better explanation. Maybe that was why Mina had been so adamant about making the leap between the fifth and eighth sphinxes. If he had missed that mark, where would he have ended up? More to the point, without a map, how would he have found his way back?

  That was the question. Finally, if somewhat belatedly, he was beginning to gain a more fundamental appreciation of Arthur Flinders-Petrie’s singular courage and the awful importance of his Skin Map. “Don’t leave home without it,” Kit mused aloud to himself.

  Other questions bubbled to the surface: What era had he landed in now? There was no way to judge from his bleak surroundings—the desert had not changed in a few thousand years, so far as he could tell. What epoch was it? Here was another poser: How had Wilhelmina found her way to rescue him and Giles from pretty near certain death at the hands of Burleigh and his goons? She did not seem to have a map—even a paper one—or any other sort of guide. How had she accomplished this feat? More to the point, how had she become such an expert on ley travel? The last time Kit had seen his former girlfriend, she had been bawling in a London alley as a freak storm drenched her head to heel. They had been separated then: he went one place, and she ended up . . . who knew where? And Kit still didn’t know, because she had not had time to tell him.

  These and other questions occupied him to such an extent that he was surprised when he looked up and saw, shimmering like a mirage in the near distance, the Nile: a gently undulating line of silver nestled between two verdant strips and cradled by bone-coloured hills and desert highlands on either side. The sight was so arresting that he paused to treat himself to a long drink of water before starting the climb down. In the shade of a rock overhang, he sat and closed his sun-dazzled eyes.

  Instantly the image of the corpses in High Priest Anen’s tomb came winging back to him: the bodies of his poor dead great-grandfather and Sir Henry Fayth, laid top to tail in the lidless sarcophagus. Shocked by their deaths, and mindful of his own close call, he still felt a little stunned. In their haste to make a clean escape, he had not yet had time to mourn them properly. Instead, what he felt was not grief exactly, but was closer to a churning animosity towards Burleigh at the wicked waste of those good men’s lives. So far as Kit was concerned, the earl and his men were vile low-life scum, evil through and through. In his burgeoning fantasies of revenge, Kit concocted inventive and agonising punishments for them all.

  This was the first sign of the new attitude rapidly crystallising in Kit’s character: call it stalwart determination. Perhaps, at last, one could detect the vestiges of a sturdier, more robust backbone. Although it took little more than the form of a swiftly hardening resolve to discover the secret of the Skin Map, still, it was a beginning. Taking up the quest in dead earnest, he decided, would be the best tribute he could offer Cosimo and Sir Henry. They deserved that much, at least.

  Whatever else could be said, they did not deserve to die like that: stricken down by the contagion of the tomb, some airborne plague germ or something—wasn’t that what killed Howard Carter and those other archaeologists who opened King Tut’s tomb? Whatever infested the tomb, dear old Cosimo and Sir Henry had succumbed to it, and if Wilhelmina had not turned up when she did, no doubt he and Giles would have suffered the very same fate. He wondered if he had caught the bug already. Truth to tell, he did not feel any too strong just now. What I need, he breathed to himself, is a good meal and a restful night’s sleep to see me right. That’s all.

  Was that too much to ask? Kit did not think so.

  With this thought in mind, Kit roused himself and, fortifying himself with another swig of water, started down the long meandering path into the broad Nile valley. Upon rejoining the rock-strewn way, the heat hit him anew and he considered taking off his shirt and wrapping that around his head turban-style. But that would just be trading a present misery for the future one of sun-fried shoulders. He would get a good hat at the first opportunity.

  Picking his way over the shattered landscape, he dropped lower into the valley; the air grew slightly more humid the closer he came to the river. His progress, though steady, was not as swift as he hoped it would be. Distances could be deceiving in the desert, he knew, and for all Kit’s donkeylike progress he seemed to come no nearer his destination.

  As the sun drifted lower and ever lower in the western sky, Kit watched his shadow stretch out before him over the rocky waste. Mesmerised by his ever-lengthening silhouette, he was brought once more to his senses when a chorus of barking dogs announced his arrival in a small riverside village.

  CHAPTER 3

  In Which an Omen Is Proved True

  Turms the Immortal opened his eyes on the eight thousand
and thirty-first day of his reign. Rising from his gilded bed, he bathed in the sacred basin beside the door, his lips moving in silent prayer as he laved perfumed water over his face and limbs. His ablutions finished, he dried himself on clean linen and drew on his crimson robe. A house servant appeared with his golden sash and tall ceremonial hat. Turms allowed the servant to belt the sash, and then put on the hat and went out to greet the crowd that had gathered with gifts and offerings to receive his judgement and blessing. He moved though the marble-tiled rooms of his lodge to the portico, stepped across the threshold, and passed between the sacred blue pillars and quickly down the three clean-swept travertine steps.

  As he stepped onto the path, he chanced to see a small black pebble lying precisely in the centre of the path: a stone worn smooth and round by many waters, an almost perfect sphere. Beside the stone lay three long needles from the nearby pine trees; the three formed a neatly placed arrow.

  The priest king of Velathri paused to contemplate this small marvel. The pebble, he knew, had come from the seashore a few miles distant. A bird had picked it up—a seagull, perhaps—and then flown inland to drop the stone before his door. The arrow of green needles directed his attention to the west.

  It was an omen, a sign to him from the world beyond, the meaning of which came clear to him as he gazed upon the simple beauty of the pebble, for Turms could comprehend all manner of omens. The meaning was this: he would soon receive a visitor—a guest arriving by way of the sea from the west—a foreign visitor, then, whose friendship he would do well to accept.

  Turms closed his fist over the pebble and thanked the gods for their continued blessing of his long reign. This little stone would be added to all the others in the jar of his days.

  Tucking the omen stone into the wide sleeve of his robe, he continued down the long, sloping ramp of the artificial hill on which the royal lodge was constructed. He walked slowly down the cypress-lined path, enjoying the astringent fragrance of the tall trees. The early-morning sunlight deepened the colour of the soil to a rich rusty red that contrasted nicely with the brilliant blue of the sky. Down below, at the foot of the ramp, his attendants and acolytes waited: two apprentice priests and four temple servants. The latter each held a pole attached to a corner of orange cloth, the canopy beneath which the priest king would receive his faithful subjects. Upon the king’s approach the attendants, bare to the waist, stretched out the canopy, and Turms took his place before the small crowd.

  Pressing the palms of his hands together, he raised his arms above the heads of the people and said, “May the blessings of this day be yours in abundance.”

  Then he greeted them, saying, “It pleases me to receive your gifts on this most auspicious morning. Come near to me, for this is the acceptable hour. Who will be first?” He lowered his hands and looked around him at the hopeful faces of his subjects. He saw a young girl with blue cornflowers in her hair, holding a sprig of laurel. “You, little one, what is your desire?”

  The girl, nudged forward by her father, stepped timidly closer. She did not dare to meet the gaze of the king, but kept her head bowed, her eyes upon the laurel clasped in her trembling hands.

  “Is this for me?” asked Turms, bending near.

  The girl nodded.

  “I thank you,” he said, gently taking the laurel sprig, “and the gods thank you.” He placed a hand on her head and felt the gentle heat there. “What do you want me to do for you?” She hesitated, and he said, “Speak, child. All heaven stands ready to do your bidding.”

  “It is my mother,” replied the girl, head low, her voice faint as a whisper.

  “Yes? Tell me, what is in your heart?”

  “She is very sick.”

  “Your mother is sick and you would see her made well again—is that your desire?”

  The little girl nodded.

  Glancing up, Turms addressed the father, who was now standing behind his daughter. “How long?” he asked.

  “Two days, my lord king,” replied the man.

  Turms nodded. He straightened, raised his face to the sky, and covered his face with his hands. He stood in silence for a moment and then, lowering his hands once more, smiled and said, “There is nothing to fear.” He reached towards the girl and took her chin between his finger and thumb, lifting her head. “Your mother will be well. This illness will pass. In three days, her strength will be renewed.”

  “Thank you, lord,” said the man, relief visible on his face.

  Turning to one of the acolytes, Turms said, “Send one of the court physicians to this man’s house with a potion for sleep and the easing of fever.” To the man and little girl, he said, “Go in peace. The gods are pleased to grant your petition.”

  Bowing from the waist, the man backed away through the crowd, drawing his daughter with him, thanking his king as he went.

  “Who will be next?” asked Turms.

  A man dressed in the short tunic and sandals of a day labourer stepped forward and went down on his knees. He stretched forth his hands, holding a heavy bunch of ripe purple grapes. “My lord and king, hear me. I am in need.”

  Directing one of the acolytes to take the offered gift, Turms asked, “What is your need, my friend?”

  “It is for justice, my king.”

  “I am listening. Speak freely.”

  “I have been working for a man who promised to pay me each evening when work was completed. I have worked two days without pay, and last night he dismissed me. When I complained that I was not paid, he set his dogs on me. They tore my clothes.” He indicated a ragged rent in the hem of his simple garment. “I seek the promised wages.”

  Gazing down at the man, who still had not raised his head, Turms asked, “What reason did he give for dismissing you?”

  “None whatever, my king.”

  “Did he have cause to dismiss you without pay?” inquired the priest king gently. “Theft, perhaps, or drunkenness? Or laziness?”

  “My king,” said the man, bridling at the insinuation that he might have been in some way to blame for his troubles, “I am an honest man and do an honest day’s work. I earned my pay and now I am hungry, and my children are hungry.”

  “How much are you owed?”

  “Twenty-five denari,” replied the man readily. Turms looked into the fellow’s eyes for a moment, and the man returned his gaze unwaveringly.

  “I am satisfied,” declared the king. Turning to one of the acolytes, he said, “Give this man fifty denari out of the treasury. Then send the Master of the Rolls with two soldiers to collect the same from this man’s employer.”

  The acolyte picked up his wax tablet and, with a rosewood stylus, recorded the king’s judgement in the soft wax. Other petitioners came forward then—some seeking a judgement, others in search of a decision or knowledge of the most favourable time to begin some undertaking or another, still others for healing of various ailments. Each brought an offering that was added to the growing heap, just as every judgement and decision was dutifully recorded on the tablet.

  Then, as the ranks of supplicants thinned, there came a commotion from the rear. Turms, in the middle of a pronouncement, sensed a ripple of excitement pass through the remaining crowd. He finished quickly and then turned to address his people. “What is happening here? Why this unseemly murmuring?”

  “Someone has come, lord king,” offered a nearby subject. “A stranger. He is asking to see you.”

  “A stranger has come?” wondered Turms; his fingers felt for the pebble couched in his sleeve. “Make way and let him appear before me.”

  At the king’s command, the gathering parted to allow the newcomer through. Striding towards him was a tall man in strange colourless clothing that bisected his long body—white above and black below—but the face was open and friendly; moreover, it was a face he knew. “Behold!” called King Turms, raising his hands in exclamation. “My foreign visitor has arrived.”

  The stranger went down on one knee, then rose and was recogn
ised by his friend. “Arturos! Is it you?”

  “The sight of you gladdens my heart and makes my spirit soar,” replied Arthur Flinders-Petrie, reciting the ancient greeting response. “I have longed to see you, my lord king.”

  “My people,” said the king, “I present to you my friend Arturos. Make him welcome among you during his sojourn with us.”

  There were murmurs of assent all around, and others called greetings, which Arthur returned in kind.

  Turms turned to one of the acolytes and said, “Guide my esteemed visitor to the royal lodge and command my house servants to make him welcome and give him refreshment.” To Arthur, he said, “The day’s audience is nearly finished. I will join you soon.”

  “As you must,” agreed Arthur. “I have no desire to interrupt your holy offices.”

  With that, the acolyte led the king’s guest away, up the long earthen ramp to the royal lodge where his arrival was announced.

  “Arturos! You have returned!” cried the Master of the King’s House, rushing out onto the broad porch of the lodge. “On behalf of my king and all the people of Velathri, I bid you peace and welcome.”

  “It pleases my heart to see you, Pacha,” said Arthur, feeling his way back through a long-disused corridor of language. “I had hoped to return sooner, but . . .” He shrugged.

  “Life is a constant turmoil for men in the world,” offered the king’s housekeeper. “But you are here now, and I trust you will stay long enough to allow Tyrrhenia to soothe your soul.” Laying a finger to his lips, he paused, then added, “I think a libation of sweet wine will prove efficacious in this regard.” Indicating a low couch covered with red cushions, he said, “If you will please make yourself comfortable, I will return shortly.”

  “You are too kind, Pacha,” replied Arthur. “I am happy to look after myself.”

  The royal housekeeper bowed and backed away; he disappeared, clapping his hands and calling to the kitchen servants to attend him at once. Arthur sat down on the couch and stretched his long legs before him. He did not feel like relaxing—the opposite, in fact. No doubt he could persuade Turms to take a walk with him in the vineyards and olive groves later. After weeks aboard ship, it was a little light exercise he wanted.