The Moses Legacy

Chapter 2

‘I got the message at two in the morning,’ said Arthur Morris.

They were seated round an oval cherrywood table in a small meeting room; two men in their fifties and a woman in her early forties. Morris was practically bald, except for two small, neatly combed patches on either side of the crown that were silver, but with some slight remnant of the brown that it had once been. His eyes were also brown and held just a hint of menace, warning friend and foe alike that he was a man not to be denied his wishes.

Behind him, a 555-foot obelisk glinted in the morning sun, forming a backdrop to their tense gathering.

‘Would they have had time to figure it out yet?’ asked the second man.

He was slightly older than Morris, with a short, neatly-trimmed beard. He was also taller and thinner. But the main contrast between them was the informality of his attire. A pair of light summer trousers and a beige sweater with the word ‘Georgetown’ written across it. Arthur Morris, on the other hand, was impeccably clad in a dark-blue suit. He favoured blue over grey and solid over pinstripe because he had read somewhere that they were signs of political conservatism.

‘She had to be brief in her text message, Professor. But the fact that she sent the message with no qualifications or reservations suggests that they probably did. And even if they didn’t, it won’t take them long. They’re not stupid and we must assume that things will start moving quickly from here on in.’

‘I don’t know how you can use Jane like that,’ said the woman uneasily. ‘She’s just a child.’

Morris thought for a moment before answering slowly and deliberately. ‘She doesn’t need to understand the whys and wherefores.’

‘But if she doesn’t even understand our cause, then how can she support it?’

The woman – Audrey Milne – had once been a trophy wife. Though she had long ceased to be the spring chicken who had once attracted her husband via his libido, she had retained her position in his heart and home by good grooming, a rigorous fitness regime, an adroit and skilful manner in the salon, and most important of all, a readiness to accept her husband’s serial infidelity with stoic equanimity.

Her husband had always known that she would never embarrass him professionally or personally and she knew how to host a dinner party and say the right things to the right people at the right time. With those social skills and her selective blindness to her husband’s extra-curricular activities, there was no need for him to cut her loose. And for her part, she had no reason to break loose. In their relationship, the whole was greater than the sum of the parts.

She was, however, no longer a trophy wife. She was now a trophy widow.

‘Jane understands family loyalty,’ said Morris. ‘That means she’s loyal to me. That’s all that matters.’

‘Carmichael might be a problem,’ said the professor. ‘Once the shit hits the fan.’

‘Why?’ asked Audrey Milne defensively. ‘A befuddled old man suffering from dementia…’

The professor looked at her irritably. He had never really liked her and the only reason she was even at this meeting was because she had inherited proprietorship of a chain of fifteen newspapers from her husband. He had served the cause well, but had died towards the end of the previous year. So now, if their work was to continue unhindered, they needed his widow on-board, or at least access to her newspapers.

The Internet was fine for creating publicity, but what it couldn’t do was create credibility. A prestigious newspaper, on the other hand, lent the imprimatur of its authority to any story that went out under its masthead. That made Audrey Milne a powerful ally in their cause.

‘He’s already getting agitated over the fact that his paper still hasn’t been published.’

‘But the journal is only published once a year.’

‘He knows that, Audrey. But he’s angry that we missed the deadline for the last edition.’

‘So tell him that it took a few months to do a proper peer review. He’s an academic. He’ll understand.’

‘I did that!’ the professor snapped. ‘But he’s still upset about it. At one point he even threatened to pull the plug and send it to another journal.’

Ignoring their bickering, Arthur Morris played with the handle of his walking stick. It was an elaborate, overly ornate affair made of lacquered mahogany topped with a bronze snake head.

‘But if they’ve found the stone fragments,’ said Audrey, ‘then doesn’t that make it irrelevant what Carmichael does?’

Morris looked at Audrey as if trying to weigh up the subtext to what she was saying.

‘Whatever comes out of Egypt, we can control. It may even lead us to solve the questions posed by Carmichael’s research. But Carmichael himself is a problem. He isn’t one of us and he would resent any attempt to recruit him.’

‘He probably wouldn’t even understand it,’ said Audrey, ‘in his mental state.’

‘We can’t take a chance,’ said the professor.

‘I agree.’ This was Morris. And his word on the issue was final.

‘So what are you going to do?’ asked Audrey.

‘We need to send someone to deal with the problem.’

Morris’s mobile beeped. He took it out and cast a quick glance at the message.

Foreign Aid Bill vote 20 mins.

‘Sorry,’ said Senator Morris, ‘we’ll have to cut this short.’

‘Who are you going to send?’ asked Audrey hesitantly.

‘Someone whose loyalty is unwavering and whose talent for doing the work is unequalled.’

Audrey closed her eyes as she uttered the next word. ‘Goliath?’