The Pharaoh's Secret

9

Renata Ambrosini sat on the floor of the operating room with her back to the wall, waiting and powerless. A state of affairs she was neither used to nor enjoying.

Taking only shallow breaths to conserve what oxygen remained in the sealed-off room, she ran her fingers through her lush mahogany-colored hair, pulled it together and reset the ponytail that kept it out of her way. She stretched and smoothed the fabric of her lab coat and did everything she could to keep her mind off of the clock and the almost uncontrollable urge she felt to rip the seal from the door and fling it wide open.

Low levels of oxygen made the body ache and the mind groggy, but she kept her priorities straight. The air inside was bad, the air outside was deadly.

Originally from Tuscany, Renata had grown up in various parts of Italy, traveling with her father, who was a specialist for the Carabinieri. Her mother had been killed in a crime wave when Renata was only five and her father had become a crusader, dragging her around the country as he built up special units that would fight organized crime and corruption.

Inheriting her father’s grit and determination and her mother’s classic looks, Renata had gone to medical school on a scholarship, graduated top of her class and spent time modeling to pay the bills. All in all, she preferred the ER to the runway. For one thing, the life of a model meant being judged by others, an arrangement she would not stand. In addition, she was barely tall enough, even for a European model, at five foot three, and curvy, not cut out to be used as a walking clothes hanger.

In an effort to get others to take her more seriously, she kept her hair back, wore little makeup and often donned a set of unflattering glasses that she didn’t really need. Yet, at thirty-four, with smooth olive skin and features that bore a passing resemblance to a young Sophia Loren, she still caught her male colleagues staring at her often enough.

And so she’d decided to take on a tougher craft, one that brought her to Lampedusa and that would leave no doubt just who she was and what she was all about. Though in the wake of the attack, she wondered if she’d survive this latest mission.

Hang on, she said to herself.

She took another breath of the stale air and fought the weariness brought on by the high concentrations of carbon dioxide. She glanced at her watch. Nearly ten minutes had gone by since she’d spoken with the American.

“What could be taking them so long?” a young lab tech sitting beside her asked.

“Perhaps the elevator is out of order,” she joked, and then wearily forced herself to stand and check on the others.

The room was crowded with all those she’d managed to corral as the attack began. Including a nurse, a lab tech, four children and twelve adult patients with various ailments. Among them were three immigrants who’d sailed on a dilapidated rowboat from the coast of Tunisia, surviving the blistering sun, the tail end of a storm and a pair of shark attacks when they’d been forced to swim the last five hundred yards. It seemed unfair, after all that, for them to die of carbon dioxide poisoning in the operating room of the hospital that had been their salvation.

Finding several of the patients unresponsive, she picked up the last of the portable oxygen bottles. She turned the valve but heard nothing. It was empty.

The bottle dropped from her hand, banged against the floor and rolled across to the far wall. No one around her reacted. They were passing out, falling into a sleep that might soon end with brain damage or death.

She stumbled to the door, put her hand on the tape and tried to peel it off. Her grip was too weak.

“Focus, Renata,” she demanded of herself. “Focus.”

An orange blur entered the room beyond. A man in some kind of uniform. Her tired mind thought he looked like an astronaut. Or possibly an alien. Or just a hallucination. That he seemed to disappear suddenly all but confirmed her last guess.

She gripped the tape, went to pull it and heard a voice shouting.

“Don’t!”

She let go. Fell to her knees and then over onto her side. Lying on the floor, she saw a thin tube poke through the plastic beneath the door. It hissed like a snake and for a second that’s what she imagined it was.

Then her mind began to clear. Oxygen — pure, cold oxygen — was pouring in.

Slowly, at first, but then with sudden speed, the cobwebs began to vanish. A head rush followed, painful but welcome. She inhaled deeply as a shiver ran through her body and the surge of adrenaline hit like a runner’s high.

A second tube poked through and the flow doubled. She moved out of the way so the oxygen would reach the others.

When she had the strength, she stood up and put her face to the window in the door. The astronaut in orange reappeared, moving to the intercom on the far wall. Beside her, the speaker came alive with a scratchy tone. “Is everyone okay?”

“I think we’ll make it,” she said. “What happened to your head? You’re bleeding.”

“Low bridge,” Kurt said.

She remembered hearing gunshots. She’d thought it was her imagination or even a delusion. “We heard shooting,” she said. “Did someone attack you?”

He grew more serious. “As a matter of fact, someone did.”

“What did he look like?” she asked. “Was he alone?”

Her rescuer shifted his weight and his posture stiffened slightly. “As far as I can tell,” he said, no longer sounding so flip and jocular. “Were you expecting trouble of some kind?”

She hesitated. She’d probably said too much already. And yet if there was more danger, this man in front of her was the only one who could possibly defend them until the Italian forces arrived.

“I just…” she began, then switched tactics. “This whole thing is so confusing.”

She could see him studying her through the cracked visor and the window in the door. There was enough distortion that she couldn’t truly read his expression, but she sensed him gauging her. As if he could look right through her.

“You’re right,” he finally replied. “Very confusing. All the way around.”

There was enough in his tone that she knew he was partially referring to her. There was little she could do now but stay silent and cover up. He’d saved her life, but she had no idea who he really was.