Laughter of Dead Kings

FIFTEEN

H e hadn’t shaved. His clothes were wrinkled and his face was that of an old man. His tie was twisted and the top button of his shirt undone, as if he couldn’t get enough air.

“Where is he?” he demanded. Even his voice was unrecognizable, hoarse and broken.

“Who?”

It was the best I could come up with on short notice. I looked from the knife in Jan’s hand to the telephone on the bedside table.

“Don’t try it,” he said. “Where is Schmidt?”

I gave up the idea of trying to reach the phone. My brain was in overdrive, all remnants of sleep dispersed. There’s nothing like terror to promote quick thinking. Unfortunately I couldn’t think of anything heroic, or even useful.

“Why are you mad at Schmidt?” I asked, stalling for time.

“He hates me,” Jan said.

“No, no,” I said soothingly. “He doesn’t hate you. Nobody hates you. Why don’t you sit down and—”

“They all hate me. They have made me look like a fool. Schmidt is the worst. He has held a grudge since the Trojan Gold affair.”

I sneaked a quick look at the clock on the bedside table. Almost noon. Where was everybody? They ought to be back by now. Why had they left me alone with a homicidal lunatic?

Jan went on ranting. All he had ever wanted was to rescue the world’s treasures. And this was his reward—to be humiliated and abused and threatened.

He was the one doing the threatening, but I decided not to mention that. Nor did I point out that to the best of my knowledge he hadn’t been named as the source of the rumors about the theft of Tut. We had discussed exposing him and decided, regretfully, that proving the accusation would be time-consuming if not impossible. He would suffer enough, said Schmidt, from knowing he had been foiled and defeated.

“How did you find out?” I asked. “You clever man,” I added.

Jan blinked and stared at me as if he had forgotten I was there. “Find out…Oh.” He passed his hand over his mouth. When he replied, he sounded almost rational. “I flew to Cairo last night. The news of the press conference was on the radio and television this morning. They were speculating, some of the announcers, about the return of Tutankhamon.”

So somebody had been unable to resist spreading the news. It was only to be expected.

“I couldn’t believe it,” Jan said in an aggrieved voice. “So I telephoned at once to Luxor, to the German Institute, to Wolfgang Muhlendorfer. He informed me that most of the journalists had left the Valley and that Dr. Khifaya’s limousine had been observed leaving Luxor in haste and with many people in the vehicle. Even then I did not believe it, not until I saw the press conference itself, and heard Khifaya boasting, telling a pack of lies…And Schmidt, in the background, smiling and stroking his absurd mustache…”

His voice had soared into the high pitch of hysteria.

“Ashraf picketed the museum too,” I said, hoping to distract Jan from Schmidt. No good.

“Khifaya behaved with dignity. But Schmidt! Prancing up and down with that appalling banner, shouting rude slogans, handing out wurst to the spectators, like a circus clown…It was all on the television, and me, hiding behind a column like a frightened rabbit. He made me a laughing stock.”

“I was there too,” I said.

“Aber natürlich. You would obey your superior.”

And I was a lowly woman. It was insulting but reassuring to hear Jan dismiss me so cavalierly. I didn’t think he would attack me unless I did something drastic. My body didn’t believe it. My mouth was dry and my heart was racing.

“Why isn’t he here?” Jan demanded. “The press conference ended an hour ago.”

“I expect he’s on his way.” I had to think of something quick, before Schmidt walked in. “Tell you what, Jan. Why don’t you hide in the bathroom. Then, when they get here, you can jump out and surprise everybody!”

Degrees of mania are hard to calculate. Like Hamlet, Jan was only mad north-northwest; he knew a hawk from a handsaw, or, in this case, a helpful suggestion from a really stupid idea.

“And what would you be doing?” His eyes narrowed. “But perhaps if I tied you up and gagged you…”

He’d have to put the knife down in order to do that. I had learned a few dirty tricks from John, and Jan had gotten flabby, but he was crazy and I was scared and what if he decided to knock me unconscious or use the knife in ways I didn’t want to think about before he…The alternative was worse, though. Schmidt, with that knife in his chest.

“Okay,” I said.

“You agree too readily,” Jan said. “Wait. I have a better idea. I will lock you in the bathroom and conceal myself behind the door.”

“Okay.”

I slid off the bed and stood up. I felt a little braver now that I was on my feet. I wondered if I could trick him into the bathroom and slam the door. No, that wouldn’t work, there was no lock on the outside.

Jan stood back and waved me through the bedroom door as I walked slowly toward him. Maybe I could make it to the door of the suite before he…No, that wouldn’t work either. He was so close behind me that I could feel his breath on the back of my neck. Let him shut me in the bathroom, lock the door, and start yelling? No good. He’d be on Schmidt the second the outer door opened, before anyone heard my screams or understood what they meant.

The decision was taken out of my hands. There was no warning, not even the sound of voices. The door swung open. As I had expected, Schmidt was the first to enter. Make way for Schmidt, the greatest swordsman in Europe! He stopped in the doorway, petrified and gaping. John and Feisal were behind him.

Jan shoved me aside and started for Schmidt. John tried to push Schmidt out of the way, but the solid shape of Schmidt only swayed a little. I was past thinking, I just planted my feet and grabbed hold of Jan’s arm. He swung around.

Something hard, like a fist, hit me in the side. It knocked the breath out of me for a second or two, and then I saw that Jan was on the floor, arms and legs thrashing, as Feisal tried to subdue him. John, who didn’t believe in hand-to-hand combat, put an end to it by kicking Jan in the head.

Schmidt was still on his feet, but he was very pale. I tried to ask him if he was okay, but my voice didn’t seem to be functioning. They were all staring at me. John came toward me, stepping as delicately as a cat in a puddle, his hands reaching. His face had gone as white as Schmidt’s.

“Easy,” he said. “Don’t move. Let me…”

Three words. That was all I needed, three little words. I tried to say them. Then the lights went out.

I came to in a strange room. I lay still, wondering why I felt so peculiar and trying to figure out where I was. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a window. It was dark outside. The room was dimly lit. There was a funny smell. Several funny smells, actually. Not disgusting smells, just…funny.

I turned my head. The first thing I saw was a chair next to the bed, and someone sitting in it. Someone familiar. He looked very uncomfortable, slumped over, arms dangling, head bowed.

The name came back to me. “John?” somebody said. The voice didn’t sound like mine.

John sat up with a start. “You’re awake.”

“No, I’m not. I’m not even here. I don’t know where I am.”

“Shh.” He slid from the chair, onto his knees beside the bed. “You’re going to be all right.”

“I want a drink.”

“No drink, not even water for a while. Have a bit of ice.”

He slipped a sliver into my dry mouth. It dissolved like the nectar of Paradise.

“I’m in a hospital,” I said. “More ice. You look terrible.”

“So do you. Here, open your mouth.”

A door opened and somebody came in. I deduced that she was a nurse, on account of her wearing a nurse’s uniform. She did nurse’s things, smiled a professional nurse’s smile, and went away.

“How do you feel?” John asked. He grimaced. “Why do people ask imbecile questions like that, I wonder.”

“I feel like hell. What happened?”

“You’re supposed to rest.”

“I’ve been resting. Why don’t you sit in that chair?”

“I’m not sure I can stand up. My knees feel like Schmidt’s.”

“Have you been here since…Since when?”

“Since they brought you in. A little after midday.”

“What time is it now?”

“Night,” John said briefly.

“I want to know what happened.”

I hadn’t fully realized how drawn his face was until he smiled. “You sound almost yourself again. In a nutshell, Jan Perlmutter is locked up in a psychiatric ward, under guard, and Schmidt is fine. You probably saved his life—and lost your spleen in the process.”

“Is that an organ I can do without?”

“Generally speaking, yes. Anything else you want to know? You are supposed to be resting.”

“I want to know lots of things.”

He reacted to that harmless statement as if I had told a bad joke. Covering his face with his hands, he sat back onto his heels. His shoulders shook.

“Are you laughing?” I demanded.

“No,” John said in a muffled voice.

“Oh.”

After a few moments he took his hands away from his face. His eyes were wet.

I had never seen him cry. I didn’t think he could. I didn’t know what to say.

He took hold of my hand. “Schmidt and Feisal and Saida are in the waiting room. I’m supposed to tell them when you wake up.”

“Send ’em in,” I said grandly. “We’ll have a party.”

“You’re doped up to your eyeballs,” John said, shaking his head. “No party, not yet.”

“Stop squeezing my hand, it hurts. Can’t you just enclose it tenderly in your long, strong fingers, like heroes in books?”

His face lit up. “You are going to be all right. You sound like your normal, rude self. Do you know what you said, just before you keeled over?”

“Three little words,” I murmured.

“Three little words, yes. Words you fought a deadly injury to utter. Could they have been ‘I love you’?”

“I don’t think so.”

“You said,” John snapped, “‘Elizabeth of Austria.’ Why did you say ‘Elizabeth of Austria’?”

“I remember now,” I said drowsily. The shot the nurse had given me was beginning to take effect. “You remember her, the empress of Austria back in 1890 something…She got stabbed by an anarchist, he’d probably be called a terrorist these days, and then she went on walking for, gee, I forget how long, before she collapsed, because she thought he had just punched her in the side, and that was what it felt like, and I thought I should tell you that that was what it felt like, in case you didn’t notice—”

“A knife sticking out of your side? I noticed.”

“I love you.”

He leaned closer. “What was that?”

“I said…I don’t remember.”

“Coward. I love you too. Go to sleep.” He enclosed my hand tenderly in his long, strong fingers.

Six weeks later. Munich.

J ohn came down the stairs, with Clara draped over his shoulder. Caesar, lying beside the couch on which I reclined, jumped up with a howl and dashed toward them.

“Stop that, you idiot dog,” I said. “You saw him ten minutes ago, before he went upstairs.”

Caesar stopped and thought it over. Then he came back and lay down again.

“Schmidt is on his way here,” John reported. “He’s bringing dinner.”

“He’s brought dinner almost every day. I’m getting fat.”

“Maybe you ought to get more exercise.”

“I don’t feel up to it yet.” I leaned back against the cushions and tried to look like Camille.

John wasn’t looking too healthy himself. His Egyptian tan had faded and he had lost weight. As soon as I was able to travel, we had returned to Munich. John had made a couple of flying trips to London, leaving at dawn and getting back by midnight, leaving Schmidt to fuss over me. The shop was closed until he found a replacement for Alan. I knew he was losing business, not to mention money. Jen had been driving him up the wall, demanding to know what he was doing and why he wasn’t in London. When he explained I had had a serious accident and he was looking after me, she had offered to come and play nurse—an offer that almost brought on a relapse.

I was being unfair and selfish. The truth was that I liked having him around, bringing me things, walking the dog, doing the washing up. We argued all the time and fought some of the time. I liked that, too.

Alan had died without recovering consciousness. Schmidt had wallowed in self-reproach when he heard, but taking care of me cheered him up, and the news from Egypt was balm to his wounded soul. The news from Berlin was even balmier. Jan Perlmutter had resigned from his position. The museum tried to hush up the details, but Schmidt’s gossips had told him that Jan was locked up in a maximum-security psychiatric institution. He kept telling the attendants he was King Tutankhamon and demanding that they kneel when they addressed him. I failed to feel sorry for him. The people I felt sorry for were innocent victims like Ali and his grieving mother. We would never know whether Ali had gone to the expedition house as part of his normal custodial duties, or whether he had had a sudden inspiration. It didn’t matter, not to him. He was dead because he had tried to do his duty. His family would be taken care of, at any rate. Schmidt had seen to that.

Tutankhamon’s triumphant appearance at the Cairo Museum had been featured in the media for days. Ashraf had wrung every ounce of publicity out of it. Privately he had apologized for being unable to give us rewards, medals, and universal acclaim; but that, as he pointed out, would have necessitated making the whole embarrassing affair public.

“That seems to be the story of my life,” John had remarked caustically. “The next time I become involved in a case like this I shall demand to be paid in advance.”

It had had its moments, though.

“Why didn’t you ever tell me you were related to the world’s most famous family of archaeologists?” I asked. “Professor Emerson and his wife dominated Egyptology for over half a century!”

Hands in his pockets, shoulders hunched, John stood looking out the window. He didn’t turn around. “I and about eighty other people.”

“Surely not that many.”

“Look it up. They had only one child, but he had three, and their descendants bred like rabbits. I’m not even in the direct line; I’m descended from their younger granddaughter. That and two pounds ten, as the saying goes, is good for a cup of coffee at any Starbucks.”

“Be blasé if you want to. I’m impressed. Amelia P. Emerson is one of my heroines. It was their house we were in, their things we saw. Her legendary parasol, his knife—”

“According to tradition, the knife and the swords belonged to their son.”

“But he was a scholar, not a soldier. Degrees from all sorts of places, dozens of books to his credit.”

“There are a lot of stories about Ramses Emerson, as he was called,” John said. “Some almost certainly apocryphal…Never mind my damned ancestors, Vicky, I have to talk to you about something important.”

“Okay.”

He turned around, opened his mouth, closed it, coughed, and then said, “Would you like a drink?”

“No, thanks.”

“I think I will, if you don’t mind.”

“Go right ahead.”

He took his time about mixing it. Here it comes, I thought. Anytime John needed liquor to strengthen his nerve, the news was going to be bad.

He sat down in a chair next to the couch and cleared his throat. Suzi had managed to get the goods on him after all? He was dead broke and had decided to go back into his old business? Jen was on her way to Munich? When he came out with it, I was caught completely off guard.

“You want to have a child.”

“I do?”

“I saw it in your face, when you were working on that pathetic baby cap.”

“You did?”

“I lack the qualifications for being a proper father.”

“You do?”

“That being the case,” John said, taking a deep breath, “the only decent thing is for me to get out of your life so you can get on with it.”

I sat up straight, yelped, and clutched at my side. “Are you dumping me, you rat?”

John’s face turned red. The color contrasted nicely with his cornflower-blue eyes. “Bloody hell,” he shouted, “it is impossible to carry on a reasonable conversation with you.”

“You weren’t being reasonable, you were being noble,” I growled. “It doesn’t become you. Be yourself.”

“Be myself.” The angry color faded from his face. His mouth twitched. “I’m over my ears in debt. My business is failing. Another situation like the last one may arise at any moment, without the slightest warning.”

“Go on,” I said encouragingly.

“Isn’t that enough? Oh, all right. My mother is a consummate nuisance. She will never love you. After four weeks in your company I have lost my command of proper English syntax. Do you want to get married, or what?”

“Are you proposing, or what?” My face opened in a big, silly grin.

“According to family tradition, it’s the woman who does the proposing.”

“The tradition ends here.”

“Oh, hell.” He dropped to one knee next to the couch and clasped his hands over his heart. “Will you marry me?”

Mouth open, tongue lolling, Caesar looked adoringly at him.

“Not you,” John told him. “Vicky?”

It might not be the high point of my life, but it came close.

“I’ll think about it,” I said.