The Mummy or Ramses the Damned Page 3

  "Father, I badly need consolation," Alex said.

  "What you need is courage, young man," Randolph said crossly. "Don't tell me you've taken no for an answer again."

  Alex took a glass of champagne from the passing waiter.

  "She loves me. She loves me not," he said softly. "The simple fact is I cannot live without her. She's driving me mad."

  "Of course you cannot." Elliott laughed gently. "Now, look. That clumsy young man down there is stepping on her feet. I'm sure she'd be very grateful if you came to her rescue at once."

  Alex nodded, scarcely noticing as his father took the half-full glass from him and drank down the champagne. He straightened his shoulders and headed back to the dance floor. Such a perfect picture.

  "The puzzling part is this," Randolph said under his breath. "She loves him. She always has."

  "Yes, but she's like her father. She loves her freedom. And frankly I don't blame her. In a way she's too much for Alex. But he'd make her happy, I know that he would."

  "Of course."

  "And she would make him supremely happy; and perhaps no one else ever will."

  "Nonsense," Randolph said. "Any young woman in London would give her eyeteeth for the chance to make Alex happy. The eighteenth Earl of Rutherford?"

  "Is that really so important? Our titles, our money, the endless maintenance of our decorative and tiresome little world?" Elliott glanced around the ballroom. This was that lucid and dangerous state with drinking, when everything began to shimmer; when there was meaning in the grain of the marble; when one could make the most offensive speeches. "I wonder sometimes if I should be in Egypt with Lawrence. And if Alex shouldn't peddle his beloved title to someone else."

  He could see the panic in Randolph's eyes. Dear God, what did the title mean to these merchant princes, these businessmen who had all but the title? It wasn't only that Alex might eventually control Julie, and thereby control the Stratford millions, and that Alex himself would be far easier than Julie to control. It was the prospect of true nobility, of nieces and nephews roaming the park of the old Rutherford estate in Yorkshire, of that miserable Henry Stratford trading on the alliance in every despicable way that he could.

  "We're not defeated yet, Elliott," Randolph said. "And I rather like your decorative and tiresome little world. What else is there when you get right down to it?"

  Elliott smiled. One more mouthful of champagne and he must tell Randolph what else there was. He just might....

  "I love you, fine English," Malenka said to him. She kissed him, then helped him with his tie, the soft touch of her fingers against his chin making the hairs rise on his neck.

  What lovely fools women were, Henry Stratford thought. But this Egyptian woman he had enjoyed more than most. She was dark-skinned, a dancer by profession--a quiet and luscious beauty with whom he could do exactly what he wanted. You never knew that kind of freedom with an English whore.

  He could see himself settling someday in an Eastern country with such a woman--free of all British respectability. That is, after he had made his fortune at the tables--that one great win he needed to put him quite beyond the world's reach.

  For the moment, there was work to be done. The crowd around the tomb had doubled in size since last evening. And the trick was to reach his uncle Lawrence before the man was swept up utterly by the museum people and the authorities--to reach him now when he just might agree to anything in return for being left alone.

  "Go on, dearest." He kissed Malenka again and watched her wrap the dark cloak about herself and hurry to the waiting car. How grateful she was for these small Western luxuries. Yes, that kind of woman. Rather than Daisy, his London mistress, a spoilt and demanding creature who nevertheless excited him, perhaps because she was so difficult to please.

  He took one last swallow of Scotch, picked up his leather briefcase, and left the tent.

  The crowds were ghastly. All night long he'd been awakened by the grind and huff of automobiles, and frenzied voices. And now the heat was rising; and he could already feel sand inside his shoes.

  How he loathed Egypt. How he loathed these desert camps and the filthy camel-riding Arabs, and the lazy dirty servants. How he loathed his uncle's entire world.

  And there was Samir, that insolent, irritating assistant who fancied himself Lawrence's social equal, trying to quiet the foolish reporters. Could this really be the tomb of Ramses II? Would Lawrence grant an interview?

  Henry didn't give a damn. He pushed past the men who were guarding the entrance to the tomb.

  "Mr. Stratford, please," Samir called after him. A lady reporter was on his heels. "Let your uncle alone now," Samir said as he drew closer. "Let him savor his find."

  "The hell I will."

  He glared at the guard who blocked his path. The man moved. Samir turned back to hold off the reporters. Who was going into the tomb? they wanted to know.

  "This is a family matter," he said quickly and coldly to the woman reporter trying to follow him. The guard stepped in her path.

  So little time left. Lawrence stopped writing, wiped his brow carefully, folded his handkerchief and made one more brief note:

  "Brilliant to hide the elixir in a wilderness of poisons. What safer place for a potion that confers immortality than among potions that bring death. And to think they were her poisons--those which Cleopatra tested before deciding to use the venom of the asp to take her life."

  He stopped, wiped his brow again. Already so hot in here. And within a few short hours, they'd be upon him, demanding that he leave the tomb for the museum officials. Oh, if only he had made this discovery without the museum. God knows, he hadn't needed them. And they would take it all out of his hands.

  The sun came in fine shafts through the rough-cut doorway. It struck the alabaster jars in front of him, and it seemed he heard something--faint, like a whispered breath.

  He turned and looked at the mummy, at the features clearly molded beneath the tight wrappings. The man who claimed to be Ramses had been tall, and perhaps robust.

  Not an old man, like the creature lying in the Cairo Museum. But then this Ramses claimed that he had never grown old. He was immortal, and merely slept within these bandages. Nothing could kill him, not even the poisons in this room, which he had tried in quantity, when grief for Cleopatra had left him half-mad. On his orders, his servants had wrapped his unconscious body; they had buried him alive, in the coffin he had had prepared for himself, supervising every detail; then they had sealed the tomb with the door that he himself had inscribed.

  But what had rendered him unconscious? That was the mystery. Ah, what a delicious story. And what if--?

  He found himself staring at the grim creature in its bindings of yellow linen. Did he really believe that something was alive there? Something that could move and speak?

  It made Lawrence smile.

  He turned back to the jars on the desk. The sun was making the little room an inferno. Taking his handkerchief, he carefully lifted the lid of the first jar before him. Smell of bitter almonds. Something as deadly as cyanide.

  And the immortal Ramses claimed to have ingested half the contents of the jar in seeking to end his cursed life.

  What if there were an immortal being under those wrappings?

  There came that sound again. What was it? Not a rustling; no, nothing so distinct. Rather like an intake of breath.

  Once again he looked at the mummy. The sun was shining full on it in long, beautiful dusty rays--the sun that shone through church windows, or through the branches of old oaks in dim forest glens.

  It seemed he could see the dust rising from the ancient figure: a pale gold mist of moving particles. Ah, he was too tired!

  And the thing, it did not seem so withered any longer; rather it had taken on the contour of a man.

  "But what were you really, my ancient friend?" Lawrence asked softly. "Mad? Deluded? Or just what you claim to be--Ramses the Great?"

  It gave him a chill to say it--
what the French call a frisson. He rose and drew closer to the mummy.

  The rays of the sun were positively bathing the thing. For the first time he noticed the contours of its eyebrows beneath the wrappings; there seemed more expression--hard, determined--to its face.

  Lawrence smiled. He spoke to it in Latin, piecing together his sentences carefully. "Do you know how long you've slumbered, immortal Pharaoh? You who claimed to have lived one thousand years?"

  Was he murdering the ancient language? He had spent so many years translating hieroglyphs that he was rusty with Caesar's tongue. "It's been twice that long, Ramses, since you sealed yourself in this chamber; since Cleopatra put the poisonous snake to her breast."

  He stared at the figure, silent for a moment. Was there a mummy that did not arouse in one some deep, cold fear of death? You could believe life lingered there somehow; that the soul was trapped in the wrappings and could only be freed if the thing were destroyed.

  Without thinking he spoke now in English.

  "Oh, if only you were immortal. If only you could open your eyes on this modern world. And if only I didn't have to wait for permission to remove those miserable bandages, to look on ... your face!"

  The face. Had something changed in the face? No; it was only the full sunlight, wasn't it? But the face did seem fuller. Reverently, Lawrence reached out to touch it but then didn't, his hand poised there motionless.

  He spoke in Latin again. "It's the year 1914, my great King. And the name Ramses the Great is still known to all the world; and so is the name of your last Queen."

  Suddenly there was a noise behind him. Henry:

  "Speaking to Ramses the Great in Latin, Uncle? Maybe the curse is already working on your brain."

  "Oh, he understands Latin," Lawrence answered, still staring at the mummy. "Don't you, Ramses? And Greek also. And Persian and Etruscan, and tongues the world has forgotten. Who knows? Perhaps you knew the tongues of the ancient northern barbarians which became our own English centuries ago." Once again, he lapsed into Latin. "But oh, there are so many wonders in the world now, great Pharaoh. There are so many things I could show you...."

  "I don't think he can hear you, Uncle," Henry said coldly. There was a soft chink of glass touching glass. "Let's hope not, in any case."

  Lawrence turned around sharply. Henry, a briefcase tucked under his left arm, held the lid of one of the jars in his right hand.

  "Don't touch that!" Lawrence said crossly. "It's poison, you imbecile. They're all full of poisons. One pinch and you'll be as dead as he is. That is, if he's truly dead." Even the sight of his nephew made him angry. And at a time such as this....

  Lawrence turned back to the mummy. Why, even the hands seemed fuller. And one of the rings had almost broken through the wrapping. Only hours ago....

  "Poisons?" Henry asked behind him.

  "It's a veritable laboratory of poisons," Lawrence answered. "The very poisons Cleopatra tried, before her suicide, upon her helpless slaves!" But why waste this precious information on Henry?

  "How incredibly quaint," his nephew answered. Cynical, sarcastic. "I thought she was bitten by an asp."

  "You're an idiot, Henry. You know less history than an Egyptian camel driver. Cleopatra tried a hundred poisons before she settled on the snake."

  He turned and watched coldly as his nephew touched the marble bust of Cleopatra, his fingers passing roughly over the nose, the eyes.

  "Well, I fancy this is worth a small fortune, anyway. And these coins. You aren't going to give these things to the British Museum, are you?"

  Lawrence sat down in the camp chair. He dipped the pen. Where had he stopped in his translation? Impossible to concentrate with these distractions.

  "Is money all you think about?" he asked coldly. "And what have you ever done with it but gamble it away?" He looked up at his nephew. When had the youthful fire died in that handsome face? When had arrogance hardened it, and aged it; and made it so deadly dull? "The more I give you, the more you lose at the tables. Go back to London, for the love of heaven. Go back to your mistress and your music hall cronies. But get out."

  There was a sharp noise from outside--another motor car backfiring as it ground its way up the sandy road. A dark-faced servant in soiled clothes entered suddenly, with a full breakfast tray in his hands. Samir came behind him.

  "I cannot hold them back much longer, Lawrence," Samir said. With a small graceful gesture, he bid the servant set down the breakfast on the edge of the portable desk. "The men from the British embassy are here also, Lawrence. So is every reporter from Alexandria to Cairo. It is quite a circus out there, I fear."

  Lawrence stared at the silver dishes, the china cups. He wanted nothing now but to be alone with his treasures.

  "Oh, just keep them out as long as you can, Samir. Give me a few more hours alone with these scrolls. Samir, the story is so sad, so poignant."

  "I'll do my best," Samir answered. "But do take breakfast, Lawrence. You're exhausted. You need nourishment and rest."

  "Samir, I've never been better. Keep them out of here till noon. Oh, and take Henry with you. Henry, go with Samir. He'll see that you have something to eat."

  "Yes, do come with me, sir, please," Samir said quickly.

  "I have to speak to my uncle alone."

  Lawrence looked back at his notebook. And the scroll opened above it. Yes, the King had been talking of his grief after, that he had retreated here to a secret study far away from Cleopatra's mausoleum in Alexandria, far away from the Valley of the Kings.

  "Uncle," Henry said frostily, "I'd be more than happy to go back to London if you would only take a moment to sign ..."

  Lawrence refused to look up from the papyrus. Maybe there would be some clue as to where Cleopatra's mausoleum had once stood.

  "How many times must I say it?" he murmured indifferently. "No. I will sign no papers. Now take your briefcase with you and get out of my sight."

  "Uncle, the Earl wants an answer regarding Julie and Alex. He won't wait forever. And as for these papers, it's only a matter of a few shares."

  The Earl ... Alex and Julie. It was monstrous. "Good God, at a time like this!"

  "Uncle, the world hasn't stopped turning on account of your discovery." Such acid in the tone. "And the stock has to be liquidated."

  Lawrence laid down the pen. "No, it doesn't," he said, eyeing Henry coldly. "And as for the marriage, it can wait forever. Or until Julie decides for herself. Go home and tell that to my good friend the Earl of Rutherford! And tell your father I will liquidate no further family stock. Now leave me alone."

  Henry didn't move. He shifted the briefcase uneasily, his face tightening as he stared down at his uncle.

  "Uncle, you don't realize--"

  "Allow me to tell you what I do realize," Lawrence said, "that you have gambled away a king's ransom and that your father will go to any lengths to cover your debts. Even Cleopatra and her drunken lover Mark Antony could not have squandered the fortune that has slipped through your hands. And what does Julie need with the Rutherford title anyway? Alex needs the Stratford millions, that's the truth of it. Alex is a beggar with a title the same as Elliott. God forgive me. It's the truth."

  "Uncle, Alex could buy any heiress in London with that title."

  "Then why doesn't he?"

  "One word from you and Julie would make up her mind--"

  "And Elliott would show his gratitude to you for arranging things, is that it? And with my daughter's money he'd be very generous indeed."

  Henry was white with anger.

  "What the hell do you care about this marriage?" Lawrence asked bitterly. "You humiliate yourself because you need the money...."

  He thought he saw his nephew's lips move in a curse.

  He turned back to the mummy, trying to shut it all out--the tentacles of the London life he'd left behind trying to reach him here.

  Why, the whole figure looked fuller! And the ring, it was plainly visible now as if the finger, flesh
ing out, had burst the wrappings altogether. Lawrence fancied he could see the faint color of healthy flesh.

  "You're losing your mind," he whispered to himself. And that sound, there it was again. He tried to listen for it; but his concentration only made him all the more conscious of the noise outside. He drew closer to the body in the coffin. Good Lord, was that hair he saw beneath the wrappings about the head?

  "I feel so sorry for you, Henry," he whispered suddenly. "That you can't savour such a discovery. This ancient King, this mystery." Who said that he couldn't touch the remains? Just move perhaps an inch of the rotted linen?

  He drew out his penknife and held it uncertainly. Twenty years ago he might have cut the thing open. There wouldn't have been any busybody officials to deal with. He might have seen for himself if under all that dust--

  "I wouldn't do that if I were you, Uncle," Henry interrupted. "The museum people in London will raise the roof."

  "I told you to get out."

  He heard Henry pour a cup of coffee as if he had all the time in the world. The aroma filled the close little chamber.

  Lawrence backed into the camp chair, and again pressed his folded handkerchief to his brow. Twenty-four hours now without sleep. Maybe he should rest.

  "Drink your coffee, Uncle Lawrence," Henry said to him. "I poured it for you." And there it was, the full cup. "They're waiting for you out there. You're exhausted."

  "You bloody fool," Lawrence whispered. "I wish you'd go away."

  Henry set the cup before him, right by the notebook.

  "Careful, that papyrus is priceless."

  The coffee did look inviting, even if Henry was pushing it at him. He lifted the cup, took a deep swallow, and closed his eyes.

  What had he just seen as he put down the cup? The mummy stirring in the sunlight? Impossible. Suddenly a burning sensation in his throat blotted out everything else. It was as if his throat were closing! He couldn't breathe or speak.

  He tried to rise; he was staring at Henry; and suddenly he caught the smell coming from the cup still in his trembling hand. Bitter almonds. It was the poison. The cup was falling; dimly he heard it shatter as it hit the stone floor.

  "For the love of God! You bastard!" He was falling; his hands out towards his nephew, who stood white-faced and grim, staring coldly at him as if this catastrophe were not happening; as if he were not dying.