The Seventh Scroll

waiting for them were old acquaintances who were always on hand when the

Falcon carried a special cargo. After they had completed the formalities

they drank a schnapps with Gotthold von Schiller at the Falcon's tiny

fitted bar, and discreetly pocketed the envelopes that lay on the bar

counter beside each crystal glass.

The drive up into the mountains took most of the rest of the night. Von

Schiller's chauffeur followed the covered Pegasus truck along the icy

winding mountain road, never letting it and its cargo out of sight. At

five in the morning they drove through the stone gate of the Schloss,

where the snow lay half a metre deep in the deer park. The castle

itself, with its dark stone battlements and arrow-slit windows, looked

like something from Bram Stoker's novel.

However, even at this hour the butler and all his staff were on hand to

welcome the master.

Herr Reeper, the custodian of von Schiller's collection, and his most

trusted assistants were also waiting, ready to move the two wooden cases

down into the vault. Reverently they loaded them on to the forklift and

rode down with them in the specially installed elevator.

While they unpacked the crates, von Schiller returned to his suite in

the north tower. He bathed and ate a light breakfast, prepared by the

Chinese chef. When he had eaten, he went to his wife's bedroom. She was

even frailer than she had been when last he had seen her. Her hair was

now completely white, her face pinched and waxy. He sent the nurse away,

and kissed his wife's forehead tenderly.

The cancer was eating her away slowly, but she was the mother of his two

sons, and in his own peculiar way he still loved her.

He spent an hour with her, and then went to his own bedroom and slept

for four hours. At his age he never needed more sleep than that, no

matter how tired he might be. He worked until midafternoon with Utte and

two other secretaries, and then the custodian called on the house

intercom to tell him that they were ready for him in the vault.

Von Schiller and Utte rode down together in the elevator, and when the

door slid open both Herr Reeper and Nahoot were waiting for them. One

look at their faces told von Schiller that they were beside themselves

with excitement, bubbling over with news for him.

"Are the -rays completed?" von Schiller demanded as they hurried after

him down the subterranean passageway to the vault.

"The technicians have completed their work," Reeper told him. "They have

done a fine job. The plates are wonderful. Ja, wunderbar!'

Von Schiller had endowed the clinic, so any request of his was treated

as a royal command. The director had sent down his most modern portable

-ray equipment and two technicians to photograph the mummy of Lord

Harrab, and a senior radiologist to interpret the plates.

Reeper inserted his plastic pass card into the lock of the steel vault

door, and with a soft pneumatic hiss it slid open. They all stood aside

for von Schiller to enter first.

He paused in the doorway, and looked around the great vault. The

pleasure never palled. On the contrary, it seemed to grow more intense

every time he entered this place.

The walls were enclosed in two metres of steel and concrete, and were

guarded by every electronic device that genius could devise. But this

was not apparent.when he viewed the softly lit and elegantly appointed

main display room. It had been planned and decorated by one of Europe's

foremost interior designers. The theme colour was blue. Each item of the

collection was housed in its own case, and each of these was cunningly

arranged to show it to its best advantage.

Everywhere was the soft glimmer of gold and precious gems nestling on

midnight-blue velvet cushions. Artfully concealed spotlights illuminated

the lustre of lovingly polished alabaster and stone, the glow of ivory

and obsidian. There were marvelous statues. The pantheon of the old gods

were here assembled: Thoth and Anubis, Hapi and Seth, and the glorious

trinity of Osiris and Isis and Horus, the son. They gazed out with those

inscrutable eyes which had looked upon the procession of the ages.

On its temporary plinth in the centre of the room, in pride of place,

stood the latest addition to this extraordinary hoard, the tall,

graceful stone testament of Taita. Von Schiller stopped beside it to

caress the polished stone before he passed on into the second room.

Here the coffin of Tanus, Lord Harrab, lay across a pair of trestles. A

white-coated radiologist hovered over her back-lit display board on

which the ,ray plates were clipped, Von Schiller went directly to the

display and peered at the shadowy pictures upon it. Within the outline

of the wooden coffin, the reclining human shape with hands crossed over

its chest was very clear. It reminded him of a carved effigy atop the

sarcophagus of an old knight in the precincts of a medieval cathedral.

"What can you tell me about this body?" he asked the radiologist without

looking at her.

"Male," she said crisply. "Late middle age. Over fifty and under

sixty-five at death. Short stature." All the listeners winced and

glanced at von Schiller. He seemed not to have noticed this solecism.

"Five teeth missing. One front upper, one eye too and three molars.

Wisdom teeth impacted. Extensive caries in most surviving teeth.

Evidence of chronic bilharzia infection. Possible poliomyelitis in

infancy, withering in left leg." She recited her findings for five

minutes, and then ended, "Probable cause of death was a puncture wound

in upper right thorax. Lance or arrow. Extrapolating from the entry

angle, the head of the lance or arrow would have transfixed the right

lung."

"Anything else?" von Schiller asked when she fell silent. The

radiologist hesitated, and then went on.

"Herr von Schiller, you will recall that I have examined several mummies

for you. In this instance, the incisions through which the viscera were

removed appear to have been made with more skill and finesse than those

of the other cadavers. The operator seems to have been a trained

physician."

"Thank you." Von Schiller turned from her to Nahoot.

"Do you have any comments, at this stage?"

"Only that these descriptions do not fit those given in the seventh

scroll for Tanus, Lord Harrah, at the time of his death."

"In what way?"

"Tanus was a tall man. Much younger. See the portraits on the coffin

lid."

"Go on,'von Schiller invited.

Nahoot stepped up to the display of -ray plates and pointed out several

solid dark objects, all of them with clean outlines, that adorned the

body.

"Jewellery," he said. "Amulets. Bracelets. Pectorals.

Several necklaces. Rings and earrings. But, most significant," Nahoot

touched the dark circle around the dead brow, "the uraeus crown. The

outline of the sacred serpent is quite unmistakable, beneath the

bandages."

"What does that indicate?" Von Schiller was puzzled.

"This was not the body of a commoner, or even of a noble. The extent of

ornamentation is too extensive. But most significant, the uraeus crown.

The sacred cobra. That was only worn by royalty, I believe that what we

have here is a royal mummy."

"Impossible," snapped von Schiller. "Look at the inscription on the

coffin. Those that were painted on the walls of the tomb. Clearly this

is the mummy of an Egyptian general."

"With respect, Herr von Schiller. There is a possible explanation. In

the book written by the Englishman, River God, there is an interesting

suggestion that the slave Taita swopped the two mummies, that of Pharaoh

Mamose and his good friend, Tanus."

"For what earthly reason would he do that?" Von Schiller looked

incredulous.

"Not for any earthly reason, but for a spiritual and supernat urat

reason. Taita wished his -friend to have the use and ownership of all

Pharaoh's treasure in the afterworld. It was his last gift to a friend."

"Do you believe that?"

"I do not disbelieve it. There is one other fact that tends to support

this theory. It is quite obvious from the Xrays that the coffin is too

large for the body within. TO me, it seems obvious that it was designed

to accommodate a larger man. Yes, Herr von Schiller, I do believe that

there is an excellent chance that this is a royal mummy."

Von Schiller had gone ashen pale as he listened. Sweat headed upon his

forehead, and his voice was hoarse and chesty as he asked, "A -royal

mummy?"

"It may very well be so."

Slowly von Schiller moved closer to the sealed coffin on its trestle,

until he was staring down at the portrait of the dead man upon its lid.

"The golden uraeus of Mamose. The personal jewellery of a pharaoh." His

hand was shaking as he laid it on the coffin lid. "If that is so, then

this find exceeds our most extravagant hopes."

Von Schiller drew a deep steadying breath. "Open the coffin. Unwrap the

mummy of the Pharaoh Mamose."

It was painstaking work. Nahoot had performed the same task many times

before, yet never on the earthly remains of such an illustrious

personage as an Egyptian pharaoh.

Nahoot first had to establish where the joint of the lid lay beneath the

paint. Once he had done this, he could whittle away at the ancient

varnish and glues that secured the lid in place. Great care had to be

taken to inflict as little damage as possible: the fragile coffin in

itself was a priceless treasure. This work took the greater part of two

days.

When the lid was free and ready to be lifted, Nahoot sent a message to

von Schiller, who was in an executive meeting with his sons and the

other ' directors of his company in the library upstairs. Von Schiller

had refused to go into the city for this meeting: he could not bear to

be separated from his latest treasure. Immediately he heard from Nahoot

he adjourned the meeting until the following Monday, and dismissed his

directors and his offspring unceremoniously, Then, without waiting to

see them into their waiting limousines, he hurried down to the vaults.

Nahoot and Reeper had rigged a light scaffold over the coffin, from

which hung two sets of block and tackle. As soon as von Schiller entered

the vault, Reeper sent away his assistants. Only the three of them would

be present to witness the opening of the coffin.

Reeper brought him the carpet-covered block for him to stand on

and'positioned it at the head of the coffin, so that von Schiller would

be able to see inside as they worked. From this eminence the old man

nodded to them to proceed. The ratchets of the two blocks clicked, one

pawl at a time, as both Reeper and Nahoot gently put pressure on the

tackle. There was a faint crackling and tearing sound, at which von

Schiller winced.

"It is only the last shreds of glue holding the lid," Nahoot reassured

him.

"Go on!" von Schiller ordered, and they lifted the lid er six inches

until it hung suspended over the body anoth of the coffin. The

scaffolding was on nylon castors which rolled smoothly over the tiled

floor. They wheeled away the entire structure, with the coffin lid still

suspended from it.

Von Schiller peered into the open coffin. His expression changed to one

of astonishment. He had expected to see the neatly swathed human form

lying serenely in the traditional funereal pose. Instead, the interior

of the coffin was stuffed untidily with loose linen bandages that

entirely hid the body from view.

"What on earth-' von Schiller exclaimed with astonishment. He reached

out to take a handful of the old discoloured wrappings, but Nahoot

stopped him.

"No! Don't touch it," he cried out excitedly, and then immediately

apologetic. "Forgive me, Herr von Schiller, was im but this is

fascinating. It strongly supports the theory of an exchange of bodies. I

think we should study it, before we proceed with the unwrapping. With

your permission of Herr von Schiller."

course, Von Schiller hesitated. He was anxious to discover what lay

beneath this rat's nest of old rags, but he realized the virtue of

caution and prudence now. A hasty move might do irreparable damage. He

straightened up and stepped down from his block.

"Very well," he grunted. He pulled a handkerchief from the breast pocket

of his dark blue doublebreasted suit jacket, and mopped the heavy sweat

from his face. His voice was shaky as he asked, "Is it possible? Could

this be Mamose himself?"

Stuffing the handkerchief back into his trouser pocket, he discovered

with mild surprise that he had a painful erection. With his hand in his

pocket he rearranged it to lie flat against his stomach. "Remove the

loose wrapp

"With your permission, Herr von Schiller, we should take the photographs

first," Reeper suggested tactfully.

Of course," von Schiller agreed at once. "We are scientists,

archaeologists, not common looters, Take the photographs."

They worked slowly, and von Schiller found the delay tantalizing. There

was no sense of the passage of time down here in the vault, but at one

stage von Schiller, now in his shirtsleeves, glanced at his gold

wrist-watch and was surprised to see' that it was past nine 'clock at

night. He unknotted his necktie, threw it on the bench where his jacket

already lay, and reapplied himself to the task.

Gradually the shape of a human body emerged from under the compacted

mass of ancient bindings, but it was after midnight when at last Nahoot

teased away the last untidy clump of old cloth from the mummy's torso.

They blinked at the glimpse of gold just visible through the neat layers

of bandages laid upon the corpse by the meticulous and skilful hands of

the embalmers.

"Originally, of course, there would have been several massive outer

coffins. These are missing, as are the masks.

Those must still be in Pharaoh's original sarcophagus, covering the body

of Tanus in the royal -tomb that still awaits discovery. What we have

left here is only the inner dressing of the royal mummy."

With long forceps he peeled away the top layer of bandage asVon

Schiller, perched on his block, grunted and shuffled his feet.

"The pectoral medallion of the royal house of Mamose," Nahoot whispered

reverently. The great jewel blazed under the arc light. Resplendent in

blue lapis lazuli and red carrielian and gold, it covered the entire

chest of the mummy. The central motif was of a vulture in flight,

soaring on wide pinions, and in its talons it clutched the golden

cartouche of the king. The craftsmanship was marvelous, the design

splendid.

"There is no doubt now," von Schiller whispered. "This proves the

identity of the body." cartOUc xt they unwrapped the king's hands,

clasped over the the great medallion. The fingers were long and

sensitive, each of them loaded with circle after circle of magnificent

rings. Clasped in his dead hands were the flail and sceptre of majesty,

and Nahoot exulted when they saw them.

"The symbols of kingship. Proof on proof that this is Mamose the Eighth,

ruler of the Upper and Lower Kingdoms of ancient Egypt."

He moved up to the king's still veiled head, but von Schiller stopped

him. "Leave that until last!" he ordered. "I am not yet ready to look

upon the face of Pharaoh."

So Nahoot and Reeper transferred their attention to the king's lower

body. As they lifted away each layer of linen, so were revealed scores

of amulets that the embalmers had placed beneath the bandages as charms

to protect the dead man. They were of gold and carved jewels and ceramic

in glowing colours and marvelous shapes - all the birds of the air and

the creatures of the land and the fish of the Nile waters. They

photographed each amulet in situ before working it free and placing it

into a numbered slot in the trays that had been set out upon the

workbench.

Pharaoh's feet were as small and delicate as his hands, and each toe was

laden with precious rings. Only his head was still covered, and both men

looked enquiringly at von Schiller. "It is very late, Herr von

Schiller," Reeper said, if you wish to rest-'

"Continue!" he ordered brusquely. So they moved up each side of the

mummy's head, while von Schiller on remained on his stand between them.

Gradually the king's face was exposed to the light, for the first time

in nearly four thousand years. His hair was thin and wispy, still red

with the henna dye he had used in his lifetime. His skin had been cured

with aromatic resins until it was hard as polished amber. His nose was

thin and beaked. His lips were drawn back in a soft, almost dreamy smile

which exposed the gap in his front teeth.

The resin coated his eyelashes, so that they seemed wet with tears and

the lids only half-shut. Life seemed to gleam there still, and only when

von Schiller leaned closer did he realize that the light in those

ancient sockets was the reflection from the white porcelain discs that

the undertakers had placed in the empty sockets during the embalming.

On his brow the Pharaoh wore the sacred uraeus crown. Every detail of

the cobra head was still perfect, There was no wearing or abrading of

the soft metal. The I serpent fangs were sharp and recurved, and the

long forked tongue curled between them. The eyes were of shining blue

glass. On the band of gold beneath the hooded asp was engraved the royal

cartouche of Mamose.

"I want that crown." Von Schiller's voice was choking with passion.

"Remove it, so that I can hold it in my own hands."

"We may not be able to lift it without damaging the head of the royal

mummy," Nahoot protested.

"Do not argue with me. Do as I tell you."

"Immediately, Herr von Schiller," Nahoot capitulated.

"But it will take time to free it. If Herr von Schiller wishes to rest

now, we will inform you when we have loosened the crown and have it

ready for you."

The circle of gold had adhered to the resin-soaked skin of the king's

forehead. In order to remove it Nahoot and Reeper first had to lift the

complete body out of the coffin and lay it on the stainless steel

mortuary stretcher which already waited to receive it. Then the resin

had to be softened and removed with specially prepared solvents.

The whole process took as long as Nahoot had predicted, but finally it

was completed.

They laid the golden uraeus upon a blue velvet cushion, as if for a

coronation ceremony. They dimmed all the other lights in the main

chamber of the vault, anded a single spot to fall upon the crown. Then

they arrang both went upstairs to inform von Schiller.

He would not let the two archaeologists accompany him when he returned

to the vaults to view the crown.

Only Utte Kemper was with him when he keyed the lock to the armoured

door of the vault, and the heavy door slid open.

The first thing that caught von Schiller's eye as he entered the vault

was the glittering crown in its velvet nest.

immediately he began to wheeze for air like an asthmatic, and he seized

her hand and squeezed until her knuckles crackled with the pressure and

she whimpered with pain. But the pain excited her. Von Schiller

undressed her, placed the golden crown upon her head and laid her naked

in the open coffin.

"I am the promise of life," she whispered from the ancient coffin. "Mine

is the shining face of immortality." He did not touch her. Naked, he

stood over the coffin with his inflamed and swollen rod thrusting from

the base of his belly like a creature with separate life.

She ran her hands slowly down her own body, and as they reached her mons

Veneris, she intoned gravely, "May you live for ever!'

The wondrous efficacy of the crown of Mamose was proven beyond any

doubt. Nothing before had produced this effect upon Gotthold von

Schiller. For at her words, the purple head of his penis erupted of its

own accord and glistening silver strings of his semen dribbled down and

splattered upon her soft white belly.

In the open coffin Utte Kemper arched her back, and writhed in her own

consuming orgasm.

It seemed to Royan that she had been away from Egypt for years instead

of weeks. She realized just -how much she had missed the crowded and

bustling streets of the city, the wondrous smells of spices and food and

perfume in the bazaars, and the wailing voice of the muezzin calling the

faithful to prayer from the turrets of the mosques.

That very first morning she left her flat in Giza while it was still

dark, and since her injured knee was still swollen and painful she used

her stick as she limped along the banks of the Nile. She watched the

dawn cobble the river waters with a pathway of gold and copper and set

the triangular sails of the feluccas ablaze.

This was a different Nile from the one she had encountered in Ethiopia.

This was not the Abbay, but the true Nile. It was broader and slower,

and the muddy stink of it was familiar and well beloved. This was her

river and her land. She found that her resolve to do what she had come

home to do was reinforced. Her doubts were set at rest, her conscience

soothed. As she turned away from it she felt strong and sure of herself

and the course that she must take.

She visited Duraid's family. She had to make amends to them for her

sudden departure and her long, unexplained absence. At first her

brother-in-law was cool and stiff towards her; but after his wife had

wept and embraced Royan and the children had clambered all over her -

she was always their favourite ammah - he warmed to her and relented

sufficiently to offer to drive her out to the oasis.

When she explained that she wanted to be alone when she visited the

cemetery, he unbent so far as to lend her his beloved Citron.

As she stood beside Duraid's grave the smell of the , desert filled her

nostrils and the hot breeze rid'eted with her hair. Duraid had loved the

desert. She was glad for him that from now onwards he would always be

close to it. The headstone was simple and traditional: just his name and

dates, under the outline of the cross. She knelt beside it and tidied

the grave, renewing the wilted and dried bouquets of flowers with those

that she had brought with her from Cairo.

Then she sat quietly beside him for a long while. She made no rehearsed

speeches, but " imply ran over in her mind so many of the good quiet

times they had passed together. She remembered his kindness and his

understanding, and the security and warmth of his love for her. She

regretted that she had never been able to return it in the same measure,

but she knew that he had accepted and understood that.

She hoped that he also understood why she had come back now. This was a

leave-taking. She had come to say goodbye. She had mourned him and,

although she would always remember him and he would always be a part of

her, it was time for -her to move on. It was time for him to let her go.

When at last she left the cemetery, she walked away without looking

back.

She took the long road around the south side of the lake to avoid having

to pass the burnt-out villa; she did not wish to be reminded of that

night of horror on which Duraid had died there. It was therefore after

dark when she, returned to the city, and the family were relieved to see

her. Her brother-in-law walked three times around the Citron, checking

for damage to the paintwork, before ushering her into the house where

his wife had set a feast for them.

'an Abou Sin, the minister whom Royan had Come specifically to see, was

out of Cairo on an official visit to Paris. She had three days to wait

for his return, and because she knew that Nahoot Guddabi was no longer

in Cairo, she felt safe and able to spend much of that time at the

museum. She had many friends there, and they were delighted to see her

and to bring her up to date with all that had happened during the time

that she had been away.

The rest of the time she spent in the museum reading room, going over

the microfilm of the Taita scrolls, searching for any clues that she

might have missed in her previous readings. There was a section of the

second scroll which she read carefully and from which she made extensive

notes. Now that the prospect of finding the tomb of Pharaoh Mamose

intact had become real and credible, her interest in what that tomb

might contain had been stimulated.

The section of the scroll upon which she concentrated was a description

that the scribe, Taita, had given of a' royal visit by the Pharaoh to

the workshops of the necropolis, where his funerary treasure was being

manufactured and assembled within the walls of the great temple that he

had built for his own embalming. According to Taita they had visited the

separate workshops, first the armoury with its collection of

accoutrements of the battlefield and the chase, and then the furniture

workshop, home of exquisite workmanship. In the studio of the sculptors,

Taita.

described the work on the statues of the gods and the lifesized images

of the king in every different activity of his life that would line the

long causeway from the necropolis to the tomb in the Valley of the

Kings. In this.workshop the masons were also-hard at work on the massive

granite sarcophagus which would house the king's mummy over the ages.

However, according to Taita's later account history had cheated Pharaoh

Mamose of this part of his treasure, and all these heavy and unwieldy

items of stone had been abandoned and left behind in the Valley of the

Kings when the Egyptians fled south along the Nile to the land they

called Cush, to escape the Hyksos invasion that overwhelmed their

homeland.

As Royan turned with more attention to the scribe's description of the

studio of the goldsmiths, the phrase which he used to describe the

golden deathmask of the Pharaoh struck her forcibly. "This was the peak

and the zenith. All the Unborn ages might one day marvel at its

splen&ur." Royan looked up dreamily from the micro film and wondered if

those words of the ancient scribe were not prophetic. Was she destined

to be one of those who would marvel at the splendour of the golden

deathmask? Might she be, the first to do so in almost four thousand

years? Might she touch this wonder, take itup in her hands and at last

do with it as her conscience dictated?

Reading Taita's account left Royan with a sense of ancient suffering,

and a feeling of compassion for the people of those times. They were,

after all - no matter how far removed in time - her own people. As a

Coptic Egyptian, she was one of their direct descendants. Perhaps this

empathy was the main reason why, even as a child, she had originally

determined to make her life's work a study of these people and the old

ways.

However, she had much else to think of during those days of waiting for

the return of Atalan Abou Sin. Not least of these were her feelings for

Nicholas Quenton Harper. Since she had visited the little cemetery at

the oasis and made her peace with Duraid's memory, her thoughts of

Nicholas had'taken on a new poignancy. There was so much she was still

uncertain of, and there were so many difficult choices to make. It was

not possible to fulfill all her plans and desires without sacrificing

others almost equally demanding.

When at last the hour of her appointment to see Atalan came around, she

had difficulty bringing herself to go to him. Like somebody in a trance

she limped through the bazaars, using her stick to protect her injured

knee, hardly hearing the merchants calling their wares to her.

>From her skin tone and European clothing they presumed she must be a

tourist.

She hesitated so long over taking this irrevocable step that she was

almost an hour late for the appointment.

Fortunately this was Egypt, and Atalan was an Arab to whom time did not

have the same significance as it did to the Western part of Royan's

make-up.

He, was his usual urbane and charming self. Today, in the-privacy of his

own office, he was comfortably dressed in a white dishdasha and a

headcloth. He shook hands with her warmly. If this had been London he

might have kissed her cheek, but not here in the East where a man never

kissed any woman but his wife and then only in the privacy of their

home.

He led her through to his private sitting room, where his male secretary

served them small cups of tar-thick coffee and lingered to preserve the

propriety of this meeting. After an exchange of compliments and the

obligatory interval of polite small-talk, Royan could come obliquely to

the main reason for her visit.

"I have spent much of the last few days at the museum, working in the

reading room. I managed to see many of my old colleagues there, and I

was surprised to hear that Nahoot had withdrawn his application for the

post of director."

Atalan sighed, "My nephew is a headstrong boy at times. The job was his,

but at the very last moment he came to tell me that he had been offered

another in Germany. I tried to dissuade him. I told him that he would

not enjoy the northern climate after being brought up in the Nile

valley. I told him that there are many things in life such as country

and family that no amount of money can recompense. But-' Atalan spread

his hands in an eloquent gesture.

"So who have you chosen to fill the post of director?" she asked with an

innocence that did not deceive him.

"We have not yet made any permanent appointment.

Nobody automatically comes to mind, now that Nahoot has withdrawn.

Perhaps we will be forced to advertise internationally. I for one would

be very sad to see it go to a foreigner, no matter how well qualified."

our excellency, may I speak to you in private?" Royan asked, and glanced

significantly at the male secretary hovering at the doorway. Atalan

hesitated only a moment.

"Of course." He gestured to the secretary to leave the room, and when he

had withdrawn and closed the door behind him Atalan leaned towards her

and dropped his voice slightly. "What is it that you wish to discuss, my

dear lady?"

It was an hour later that Royan left him. He walked with her as far as

the lift outside his suite of offices.

As he shook hands his voice was low and mellifluous "We will meet again

soon, inshallah."

hen the Egyptair flight landed at Heath, row and Royan left the airport

arrivals hall for a place in the queue at the taxi rank outside, it

seemed that the temperature difference from Cairo was at least fifteen

degrees. Her train arrived at York in the damp misty cold of late

afternoon. From the railway station she phoned the number that Nicholas

had given her.

"You silly girl," he scolded her. "Why didn't you let me know you were

on your way? I would have met you at the airport."

She was surprised at how pleased she was to see him, and at how much she

had missed him, as she watched him step out of the Range Rover and come

striding towards her on those long legs. He was bare-headed and

obviously had not subjected himself to a haircut since she had last seen

him. His dark hair was rumpled and wind-tossed and the silver wings

fluffed over his ears.

"How's the knee?" he greeted her. "Do you still need to be carried?"

"Almost better now. Nearly time to throw away the stick." She felt a

sudden urge to throw her arms around his neck, but at the last moment

she prevented herself from making a display and merely offered him a

cold, rosy brown cheek to kiss. He smelt good - of leather and some

spicy aftershave, and of clean virile manhood.

In the driver's seat he delayed starting the engine for a moment, and

studied her face in the street light that streamed in through the side

window.

"You look mighty pleased with yourself, madam. Cat been at the cream?"

"Just pleased to see old friends," she smiled, "but I must admit Cairo

is always a tonic."

"No supper laid on. Thought we would stop at a pub.

Do you fancy steak and kidney pud?"

"I want to see my mother. I feel so guilty. I don't even know how her

leg is mending."

"Popped in to see her day before yesterday. She's doing fine. Loving the

new puppy. Named it Taita, would you believe?"

"You are really a very kind person - I mean, taking the trouble to visit

her."

"I like her. One of the good old ones. They don't build them like that

any more. I suggest we have a bite to eat, and then I will pick up a

bottle of Laphroaig and we will go and see her."

It was after midnight when they left Georgina's cottage. She had

dispensed rough frontier justice to the malt whisky that Nicholas had

brought and now she waved them off, standing in the kitchen doorway,

clutching her new puppy to her ample bosom and teetering slightly on her

plaster-cast leg.

"You are a bad influence on my mother," Royan told him.

"Who's a bad influence on whom?" he protested. "Some of those jokes of

hers turned the Stilton a richer shade of blue."

"You should have let me stay with her."

"She has Taita to keep her company now. Besides, I need you close at

hand. Plenty of work to do. I can't wait to show you what I have been up

to since you went swanning off to Egypt."

The Quenton Park housekeeper had repared her a bedroom in the flat in

the lanes behind York Minster.

As Nicholas carried her bags up the stairs ripsaw snoring came from

behind the door of the bedroom on the second landing, and she looked at

Nicholas enquiringly.

"Sapper Webb," he told her. "Latest addition to the team. Our own

engineer. You will meet him tomorrow, and I think you will like him. He

is a fisherman."

"What's that got to do with me liking him?"

"All the best people are fishermen."

"Present company excluded," she laughed. "Are you staying at Quenton

Park?"

"Giving the house a wide berth, for the time being." He shook his head.

"Don't want it bruited about that I amback in England. There are some

fellows from Lloyd's that I would rather not speak to at the moment. I

will be in the small bedroom on the top floor. Call if you need me."

When she was alone she looked around the tiny chintzy room with its own

doll's house bathroom, and the double bed that took up most of the floor

area. She remembered his remark about calling if she needed him, and she

looked up at the ceiling just as she heard him drop one of his shoes on

the floor.

"Don't tempt me," she whispered. The smell of him lingered in her

nostrils, and she remembered the feel of his lean hard body, moist with

sweat, pressed against hers as he had carried her up out of the Abbay

gorge. Hunger and eed were two words she had not thought of for many

years. They were starting to loom too large in her existence.

"Enough of that, my girl," she chided herself, and went to run a bath.

Nicholas pounded on her door the next morning on his way downstairs.

"Come along, Royan. Life is real. Life is urgent."

It was still pitch dark outside, and she groaned softly and asked, "What

time is it?" But he was gone, and faintly she could hear him whistling

"The Big Rock Candy Mountain'somewhere downstairs.

She checked her watch and groaned again. "Whistling at six-thirty, after

what he and Mummy did to the Laphroaig last night. I don't believe it.

The man is truly a monster."

Twenty minutes later she found him in a dark blue fisherman's sweater

and jeans and a butcher's apron, working in the kitchen.

"Slice toast for three, there's a love." He gestured towards the brown

loaf that lay beside the electric toaster.

"Omelettes coming up'in five minutes."

She looked at the other man in the room. He was middle-aged, with wide

shoulders and sleeves rolled up high around muscular biceps, and he was

as bald as a cannonball.

"Hello," she said, "I am Royan Al Sirnma."

"Sorry." Nicholas waved the egg-whisk. "This is Danny Daniel Webb, known

as Sapper to his friends."

Danny stood up with a cup of coffee in his big competent-looking fist.

"Pleased to meet you, Miss Al Simma. May I pour you a cup of coffee?"

The top of his head was'freckled, and she noticed how blue his eyes

were.

"Dr Al Simma,'Nicholas corrected him.

"But please call me Royan," she cut in quickly, "and yes, I' love a

cup."

There was no mention of Ethiopia or Taita's game during breakfast, and

Royan ate her omelette and listened respectfully to a passionate

dissertation on how to catch sail fish on a fly rod from Sapper, while

Nicholas heckled him mercilessly, calling into question almost every

statement he made. Very obviously they had a good relationship, and she

supposed she would become accustomed to all the angling jargon.

As soon as breakfast was over, Nicholas stood up with the coffee pot in

one hand. "Bring your mugs, and follow me., He led Royan to the front

sitting room. "I have a surprise for you. My people up at the museum

worked round the clock to get it ready for you."

He threw open the door of the sitting room, with an imitation of a

trumpet flourish, "Tarantara!'

On the centre table stood a fully mounted model of the striped dik-dik,

crowned with the pricked horns and clad in the skin that Nicholas had

smuggled back from Africa. It was so realistic that for a moment she

expected it to leap off the table and dash away as she walked towards

it.

"Oh, Nicky. It's beautifully done!" She circled it appraisingly. "The

artist has captured it exactly."

The model brought back to her vividly the heat and smell of the bush in

the gorge, and she felt a twinge of nostalgia and sadness for the

delicate, beautiful creature.

Its glass eyes were deceptively lifelike and bright, and the end of its

proboscis looked wet and gleaming as though it was about to wiggle it

and sniff the air.

"I think it's splendid. Glad you agree with me." He stroked the soft,

smooth hide. She felt this was not the moment to spoil his boyish

pleasure. "As soon as we have Ir sorted out Taita's puzzle, I intend

writing a paper on it for the Natural History Museum, the same lads that

called Great-grandpapa a liar. Restore the family honour." He laughed

and spread a dust-sheet over the model. Carefully he lifted it down from

the table and placed it safely in a corner of the room where it was out

of harm's way.

"That was the first surprise I had saved up for you. But now for the big

one." He pointed to a sofa against one wall.

"Take a seat. I don't want you to be bowled over by this." She smiled at

his nonsense, but went obediently to the furthest end of the sofa afid

curled her legs under her as she settled there. Sapper Webb came to sit

awkwardly at the other end, obviously uncomfortable at being so close to

her.

"Let's talk about how we are going to get into the chasm on the Dandera

river," Nicholas suggested. "Sapper and I have talked about nothing else

the whole time that you have been away."

"That and catching fish, I'll warrant." She grinned at him, and he

looked guilty.

"Well, both subjects involve water. That is my justification." His

expression became serious. "You recall that we discussed the idea of

exploring the depths of Taita's pool with scuba gear, and I explained

the difficulties."

"I remember," she agreed. "You said the pressure into the underwater

opening was too great, and that we would have to find another method of

getting in there."

"Correct." Nicholas smiled mysteriously. "Well, Sapper here has already

earned the exorbitant fee that I have promised him - promised, I

emphasize, not yet paid. He has come up with the alternative method."

Now she too became serious and unfolded her legs.

She placed both feet on the floor and leaned forward attentively, with

her elbows on her knees and her chin cupped in her hands.

"It must have been all those brains of his that pushed out his hair. I

mean, it's very neat thinking. Although it was staring us both in the

face, neither you nor I thought of it."

Stop it, Nicky," she told him ominously, "you are doing it again."

"I am going to give you a clue." He ignored the warning and went on

teasing her blithely. "Sometimes the old ways are the best. That's the

'if you are so clever, how come you aren't famous?" she began, and then

broke off as the solution occurred to her.

"The old ways? You mean, the same way as Taita did it?

The same way he reached the bottom of the pool without the benefit of

diving equipment?"

"By George! I think she's got itV Nicholas put on a convincing Rex

Harrison imitation.

"A dam." Royan clapped her hands. "You propose to redam. the river at

the same place where Taita built his dam four thousand years ago."

"She's got it Nicholas laughed. "No flies on our girl!

Show her your drawings, Sapper."

Sapper Webb made no attempt to disguise his selfsatisfaction as he went

to the board that stood against the facing wall. Royan had noticed it,

but had paid no attention to it, until now he pulled away the cover and

proudly displayed the illustrations that were pegged to it.

She recognized immediately the enlargements of the photographs that

Nicholas had taken at the putative site of Taita's.dam on the Dandera

river, and others that he had taken in the ancient quarry that Tamre had

shown them. These had been liberally adorned with calculations and lines

in thick black marker pen.

"The major has provided me with estimates of the dimensions of the river

bed at this point, and he has also calculated the height that we will

have to raise the wall to induce a flow down the former course. I have,

of course, allowed for errors in these calculations. Even if these

errors are in the region of thirty percent, I believe that the project

is still feasible with the very limited equipment we will have available

to us."

"If the ancient Egyptians could do it, it will be a breeze for you,

Sapper."

"Kind of you to say so, major, but "breeze" is not the word I would have

chosen."

He turned to the drawings pegged beside the photographs on the board,

and Royan saw that they were plans and elevations of the project based

upon the photographs and Nicholas's estimates.

"There are a number of different methods of dam construction, but these

days most of them presuppose the availability of reinforced concrete and

heavy earth-moving Al.

equipment. I understand that we will not have the benefit of these

modern aids."

"Remember Taita," Nicholas exhorted him. "He did it without bulldozers."

"On the other hand, the Egyptians probably had unlimited numbers of

slaves at their disposal."

"Slaves I can promise you. Or the modern equivalent thereof. Unlimited

numbers? Well, perhaps not."

"The more tabour you can provide, the sooner I can divert the flow of

the river for you. We are agreed that this has to be done before the

onset of the rainy season."

"We have two months at the most." Nicholas dropped his flippant

attitude. "As regards the provision of tabour, I will be relying on

enlisting the aid of the monastic community at St. Frumentius. I am

still working out a sound theological reason that might convince them to

take part in the building of the dam. I don't think they will fall for

the idea that we have discovered the site of the Holy Sepulchre in

Ethiopia and not in Jerusalem."

"You find me the tabour, and I will build your dam," Sapper grunted. "As

you said earlier, the old ways are the best. It is almost certain that

the ancients would have used a system of gabions and coffer dams to lay

the foundations of the original dam."

"Sorry," Royan interrupted. "Gabions? I don't have an engineering

degree."

"I am the one who must apologize." Sapper made a clumsy attempt at

chivalry. "Let me show you my drawings." He turned to the board. "What

this fellow Taita probably did was to weave huge bamboo baskets, which

he placed in the river and filled with rock and stone. These are what we

call gabions." He indicated the plans on the board. "After that he would

have used rough-cut timber to build circular walls between the gabions -

the coffer dams. These he would also have filled with stone and earth."

"I get the general idea," Royan said, sounding dubious, "but then it is

not really necessary for me to understand all the details."

"Right you are!" Sapper agreed heartily. "Although the major assures me

that there is all the timber we will need on the site, I plan to use

wire mesh for the construction of the abions and human tabour for the

filling of the mesh 9 nets with stone and aggregate."

"Wire mesh?" Royan demanded. "Where do you hope to find that in the

Abbay valley?"

Sapper began to reply, but Nicholas forestalled him."

will come to that in a moment. Let Sapper finish his lecture. Don't

spoil his fun. Tell Royan about the stone from the quarry. She will

enjoy that."

"Although I have designed the dam as a temporary Structure, we have to

make certain that it is capable of holding back the river long enough to

enable the members of our team to enter the underwater tunnel in the

downstream pool Safely-'

"We call it Taita's pool,'Nicholas told him, and Sapper nodded.

"We have to make sure that the dam does not burst while people are in

there. You can imagine the consequences, should that happen."

He was silent for a moment while he let them dwell upon the possibility.

Royan shuddered slightly and hugged her own arms.

"Not very pleasant," Nicholas agreed. "So you plan to use the blocks?"

he prompted Sapper.

"That's right. I have studied the photographs taken in the quarry. I

have picked out over a hundred and fifty granite blocks lying there

completed or almost completed, and I calculate that if we use these in

combination with the steel mesh gabions and the timber coffer walls,

this would give us a firm foundation for the main dam wall."

"Those blocks must weigh many tons each," Royan pointed out. "How will

you move them?" Then, as Sapper opened his mouth to explain, she changed

her mind. "No!

don't tell me. If you say it's possible, I will take your word for it."

"It's possible," Sapper assured her.

"Taita did it," Nicholas said. "We will be doing it all his way. That

should please you. After all, he is a relative of yours."

"You know, you are right. In a strange sort of way, it does give me

pleasure." She smiled at him. I think it's a good omen. When does all

this happen?".

"It's happening already," Nicholas told her. "Sapper and I have already

ordered all the stores and equipment that we will be taking with us.

Even the mesh for the gabions has been precut to size by a small

engineering firm near here. Thanks to the recession, they had machines

standing idle."

"I have been down there at their workshop every day, supervising the

cutting and packing," Sapper butted in.

"Half the shipment is already on its way. The rest of it will follow

before the weekend."

Sapper is leaving this afternoon to take charge and get it all loaded.

You and I have some last-minute arrangements to see to, and then we will

follow him at the end of the week. You must remember I was not expecting

you back from Cairo so soon,'Nicholas said. "If I had known, I could

have arranged for us all to fly down to Valletta together."

"Valletta?" Royan looked mystified. "As in Malta? I thought we were

going to Ethiopia."

"Malta is where Jannie Badenhorst has his base."

"Jannie who?"

"Badenhorst. Africair."

"Now you have really lost me."

"Africair is an air transport company that owns one old ex-RAF Hercules,

flown by Jannie and his son Fred. They use Malta as their base. It's a

stable and pragmatic little no country African politics, no corruption -

and yet it is the door to most of the destinations in the Middle East

and in the northern half of Africa where Jannie and Fred do most of

their work. His main employment is smuggling booze into the Islamic

countries, where of course it is prohibited. He's the Al Capone of the

Mediterranean.

Bootlegging is big business in that part of the world, but he does take

on other work. Duraid and I flew into Libya from there with Jannie on

our little jaunt to the Tibesti Massif.

Jannie will be taking us down to the Abbay."

"Nicky, I don't want to be a killjoy, but you and I are now undesirable

immigrants to Ethiopia. Had you over looked that little fact? How do you

propose to get back in there?"

"Through the back door," Nicholas grinned, "and my old pal Mek Nimmur is

the gatekeeper."

"You have been in contact with Mek?"

"With Tessay. It seems that she is now his go'between.

I imagine it's very convenient for Mek to have her on board. She has all

the right connections, and she can slip in and out of Khartoum or Addis

or places where it might be awkward or even dangerous for him to be

seen."

"Well, well!" Royan looked impressed. "You have been busy."

"Not all of us can afford a holiday in Cairo whenever the fancy takes

us," he told her tartly.

"One more little question." She ignored the jibe, although she realized

that despite his easy smile her absence must have irked him. "Does Mek

know about Taita's game?"

"Not in detail." Nicholas shook his head. "But he has some suspicions,

and anyway I know I can rely on him." He hesitated, and then went on.

"Tessay was very cagey when I spoke to her on the phone, but it seems

that there has been some sort of attack on St. Frumentius monastery. Jah

Hora. and thirty or forty of his monks were massacred, and most of the

sacred relics from the church were stolen."

"Oh, dear God, no!" Royan looked stricken. "Who would do a thing like

that?"

"The same people who murdered Duraid, and made three attempts to wipe

you out."

"Pegasus."

"Von Schiller," he agreed.

"Then we are directly responsible," Royan whispered.

"We led them to the monastery. The Polaroids they captured from us when

they raided our camp would have shown them the stele and the tomb of

Tanus. Von Schiller wouldn't have to be a clairvoyant to guess where we

had taken them. Now there is more blood on our hands."

"Hell, Royan, how can you take responsibility for von Schiller's

madness? I am not going to let you punish yourself for that." Nicholas's

tone was sharp and angry.

"We started this whole thing."

"I don't agree with that, but I admit that von, Schiller is the one who

must have cleaned out the maqdas of St. Frumentius and that the stele

and the coffin are now almost certainly part of his collection."

"Oh, Nicky, I feel so guilty. I never realized what a danger we were to

those simple devout Christians."

"Do you want to call off the whole thing?" he asked cruelly.

She thought about it seriously for a while, then shook her head.

"No. Perhaps when we go back we will be able to compensate the monks for

their losses with what we find in the bottom of Taita's pool."

"I hope so," he agreed fervently. "I do hope so."

The giant Hercules -Mkl four-engined turbo, prop aircraft was painted a

dusty nondescript brown, and the identification lettering on the

fuselage was faded and indistinct. There was no Afticair legend

displayed anywhere on the machine, and it had a tired and scruffy

appearance that spoke eloquently of the fact that it was almost forty

years old and had flown well over half a million hours even before it

had fallen into Jannie Badenhorst's hands.

"Does that thing still fly?" Royan asked, as she looked at it standing

forlornly in a back corner of the Valletta airfield. Its drooping belly

gave it the air of a sad old streetwalker who had been put out of

business by an unexpected and unlooked-for pregnancy.

Jannie keeps it looking that way deliberately," Nicholas assured her.

"The places that he flies to, it's best not to draw envious eyes."

"He certainly succeeds."

"But both Jannie and Fred are first-rate aero-engineers, Between them

they keep Big Dolly perfect under her engine cowlings.

"Big Dolly?"

"Dolly Parton. Jannie is an avid fan." The taxi dropped them and their

meagre luggage outside the side door of the hangar, and Nicholas paid

the driver while Royan thrust her hands -into the pockets of her anorak

and shivered in the cold wind off the Mediterranean.

"There's Jannie now." Nicholas pointed to the bulky figure in greasy

brown overalls coming down the loading ramp of the Hercules. He saw them

and jumped down off the ramp.

"Hello, man! I was beginning to give up on you," he said as he came

shambling across the tarmac. He looked like a rugby player, as he had

been in his youth, and the slight limp was from an old playing-field

injury.

"We were late leaving Heathrow. Strike by French air traffic control.

The joys of international travel," Nicholas told him, and then

introduced Royan.

"Come and meet my new secretary," Jannie invited.

She may even give you a cup of coffee."

He led them through a wicket in the main hangar door and into the

cavernous interior. There was a small office cubicle beside the entrance

with a sign over the door saying Africair' and the company logo of a

winged battleaxe.

Mara, Jannie's new secretary, was a Maltese lady only a few years

younger than himself. What she lacked in youth and beauty she fully made

up for across the chest.

"Jannie likes them mature and with plenty of top hamper," Nicholas

murmured to Royan from the side of his mouth.

Mara gave them coffee, while Jannie went over his flight plan with

Nicholas.

"It's a little complicated," he apologized. "As you can imagine, we will

have to do a bit of ducking and diving.

Muammar Gadaffi is not wallowing in affection for me at the moment, so

I' rather not overfly any of his territory.

We will be going in through Egypt, but without landing there." He

pointed out their flight path on the maps spread over his desk.

"Bit of a problem over the Sudan. They are having a little civil war

there." He winked at Nicholas. I However, the northern government are

not equipped with the most up-to'date radar in the world. Lot of old

Russian reject stuff. It's an enormous bit of country, and Fred and I

have worked out their blank spots. We will be keeping well clear of

their main military installations."

"What's our flying time?" Nicholas wanted to know.

Jannio pulled a face. "Big Dolly is no sprinter, and as I have just told

you we will not be taking any short-cuts."

"How long?"Nicholas insisted.

"Fred and I have rigged up bunks and a kitchen, so that during the

flight you will have all the comforts of home." He lifted his cap and

scratched his head before he admitted, "Fifteen hours."

"Has Big Dolly got that sort of endurance?" Nicholas wanted to know.

"Extra tanks. Seventy-one thousand kilos of fuel. Even with the load you

have given us, we can get there and back without refuelling." He was

interrupted by the huge hangar doors rolling open, and a heavy truck

being driven through. "That will be Fred and Sapper now." Jannie swigged

the last of his coffee and hugged Mara. She giggled, and her bosom

quivered like a snowfield on the point of an avalanche.

The truck parked at the far end of the hangar, where. an array of

equipment and stores was already neatly stacked, ready for loading. When

Fred climbed down from the cab, Jannie introduced him to Royan. He was a

younger version of the father, already beginning to spread around the

waist, and with an open bucolic face, more like a Karroo sheep farmer

than a commercial pilot.

"That's the last truckload." Sapper came around the front of the truck

and shook Nicholas's hand. "All set to begin loading."

"I want to take off before four 'clock tomorrow morning. That will get

us into our rendezvous at the optimum time tomorrow evening,'Jannie cut

in. "We have a bit of work to do, if we are going to get some sleep

before we leave." He gestured to the pallets waiting to be loaded.

I wanted to get some of the local lads to give a hand with the loading,

but Sapper wouldn't hear of it."

"Quite right," Nicholas agreed, "The fewer who are in on this, the

merrier. Let's get cracking."

The cargo had been prepacked on the steel pallets, secured with heavy

nylon strapping and covered with cargo netting. There were thirty-six

loaded pallets, and the canvas packs containing the parachutes formed an

integral part of each load. This huge Cargo would require two separate

flights to ferry it all across to Africa.

Royan called out the contents of each pallet from the typed manifest,

while Nicholas checkd it against the actual load. Nicholas and Sapper

had worked out the loads carefully to ensure that the items that would

be required first were on the initial flight. Only when he was Certain

that each pallet was complete in every detail id he signal to Fred, who

was operating the forklift. Fred ran the arms into the slots of the

pallet and lifted it, then he drove it out of the hangar and up the ramp

of the Hercules.

In the hold of the enormous aircraft, jannie and Sapper helped Fred to

position each pallet precisely on the rollers and then strap it down

securely. The last part of the cargo to go aboard was the small

front-end-loading tractor.

Sapper had found this in a secondhand yard in York, and after testing it

exhaustively declared it to be a "steal'. Now he drove this up the ramp

under its own power, and lovingly strapped it down to the rollers.

The -tractor made up almost a third of the total weight of the entire

shipment, but it was the one item that Sapper considered essential if

they were to complete the earthworks for the dam in the time that

Nicholas had stipulated.

He had calculated that it would require a cluster of five cargo

parachutes to get the heavy tractor back to earth without damage. Fuel

for it would of course present a problem, and the bulk of the second

cargo would be made up of dieseline in special nylon tanks that could

withstand the impact of an airdrop.

it was after midnight before the aircraft was loaded with the first

shipment. The remaining pallets were still stacked against the hangar

wall awaiting Big Dolly's return for the second flight. Now they could

turn their full attention to the farewell banquet of island specialities

that Mara had laid out for the ' in the tiny Africair office.

"Yes," Jannie assured them, I she's also a good cook," and gave Mara a

loving squeeze as she rested her bosom on his shoulder, leaning over him

to refill his plate with calamari.

"Happy landings!" Nicholas gave them the toast in red Chianti.

"Eight hours between the throttle and the bottle," jannie apologized, as

he drank the toast in Coca-Cola.

They lay down their clothes to get a few hours' sleep on the bunks

bolted to the bulkhead behind the flight deck, but it seemed to Royan

that she was woken only a few minutes later by the quiet voices of the

two pilots completing their pre-take-off checks, and the whine of the

starters on the huge turbo-prop engines. As Jannie spoke on the radio to

the control tower, and Fred taxied out to the holding point, the three

passengers climbed out of their bunks and strapped themselves into the

folding seats down the side of the main cabin. Big Dolly climbed into

the night sky and the lights of the island dwindled and were swiftly

lost behind them. Then there was only the dark sea below and the bright

pricking of the stars above. Royan turned her head to smile at Nicholas

in the dim overhead lights of the cabin.

"Well, Taita, we are back on court for the final set." Her voice was

tight with excitement.

"The one good thing about being forced to sneak about like this is that

Pegasus may take a while to find out that we are back in the Abbay

gorge." Nicholas looked complacent.

"Let's hope that you are right." Royan held up her right hand and

crossed her fingers. "We will have enough to worry about with what Taita

has in store for us, without Pegasus muscling in on us again just yet."

They are on their way back to Ethiopia," said von Schiller with utter

certainty.

"How can we be certain of that, Herr von Schiller?" Nahoot asked.

Von Schiller glared at him. The Egyptian irritated him intensely, and he

was beginning to regret having employed him. Nahoot had made very little

headway in deciphering the meaning of the engravings on the stele that

they had taken from the monastery.

The actual translation had offered no insurmountable problems. Von

Schiller was convinced that he could have done this work himself,

without Nahoot's assistance, given time and the use of his extensive

library of reference works.

It comprised, for the most part, nonsensical rhymes and extraneous

couplets out of place and context. One face of the stele was almost

completely covered by columns of letters and figures that bore no

relation whatsoever to the text on the other three faces of the column.

But although Nahoot would not admit it, it was clear that the underlying

meaning behind most of this had eluded him. Von Schiller's patience was

almost exhausted.

He was tired of listening to Nahoot's excuses, and to promises that were

never fulfilled. Everything about him, from his oily ingratiating tone

of voice to his sad eyes in their deep lined sockets, had begun to annoy

him. But especially he had come to detest his exasperating habit of

questioning the statements that he, Gotthold von Schiller, made.

"General Obeid was able to inform me of their exact flight arrangements

when they left Addis Ababa. It was very simple to have my security men

at the airport when they arrived in England. Neither Harper nor the

woman are the kind of people that are easily overlooked, even in a

crowd. My men followed the woman to Cairo-'

"Excuse me, Herr von Schiller, but why did you not have her taken care

of if you were aware of her movements?"

"Dummkopf!" von Schiller snapped at him. "Because it now seems that she

is much more likely to lead me to the tomb than you are."

"But, sir, I have done-' Nahoot protested.

you have done nothing but make up excuses for your ilure. Thanks to you,

the stele is still an enigma,'

own fa von Schiller interrupted him contemptuously.

"It is very difficult-'

"Of course it is difficult. That's why I am paying you a great deal of

money. If it were easy I would have done it myself. If it is indeed the

instruction to find the tomb of Mamose, then the scribe Taita meant it

to be difficult."

"If I am allowed a little more time, I think I am very near to

establishing the key-'

"You have no more time. Did you not hear what I have just told you?

Harper is on his way back to the Abbay gorge. They flew from Malta last

night in a chartered aircraft that was heavily loaded with cargo. My men

were not able to establish the nature of that cargo, except that it

included some earth-moving equipment, a front-endloading tractor. To me,

this can mean only one thing.

They have located the tomb, and they are returning to begin excavating

it."

"You will be able to get rid of them as soon as they reach the

monastery." Nahoot relished the thought.

"Colonel Nogo will-'

"Why do I have to keep repeating myself?" Von Schiller's voice turned

shrill and he slapped his hand down on the tabletop. "They are now our

best chance of finding the tomb of Mamose. The very last thing that I

want to happen is that any harm should come to them." He glared at

Nahoot. "I am sending you back to Ethiopia immediately.

Perhaps you will be of some use to me there. You are certainly no use

here."

Nahoot looked disgruntled, but he had better sense than to argue again.

He sat sullenly as von Schiller went on, "You will go to the base camp

and place yourself under the command of Helm. You will take your orders

from him.

Treat them as if they come directly from me. Do you understand?"

"Yes, Herr von Schiller," Nahoot muttered sulkily.

"Do not interfere in any way with Harper and the woman. They must not

even know that you are at the base camp. The Pegasus geological team

will carry on its normal duties." He paused and smiled bleakly, then

went on, "It is most fortunate that Helm has actually discovered very

promising evidence of large deposits of galena, which as you may know is

the ore from which lead is obtained. He will continue the exploratory

work on-these deposits, and if they bear out their promise they will

make the entire operation highly profitable."

"What exactly will be my duties?" Nahoot wanted to know.

"You will be playing the waiting game. I want you there ready to take

advantage of any progress- that Harper makes. However, you are to give

him plenty of elbow room.

You will not alert him by any overflights with the helicopter, or by

approaching his camp. No more midnight raids.

Every move that you make must be cleared with me before, I repeat

before, you take any action."

"If I am to operate under these restrictions, how will I know if Harper

and the woman have made any progress?"

"Colonel Nogo already has a reliable man, a spy, in the monastery. He

will inform us of every move that Harper makes."

"But what about me? What will be my work?"

"You will evaluate the intelligence that Nogo collects.

You are familiar with archaeological methods. You will be able to judge

what Harper is trying to achieve, and you will be able to tell what

success he is enjoying."

"I see,'Nahoot muttered.

"If it were possible I would have gone back to the Abbay gorge myself.

-However, this is not possible. It may take time, months perhaps, before

Harper makes any important progress. You know as well as anybody that

these things take time."

"Howard Carter worked for ten years at Thebes before he found the tomb

of Tutankhamen," Nahoot pointed out maliciously.

"I hope that it will not take that long," said von Schiller coldly. "If

it does, it is very unlikely that you will still be involved with the

search. As for myself, I have a series of very important negotiations

coming up here in Germany, as well as the annual general meeting of the

company. These I cannot miss."

"You will not be coming back to Ethiopia at all, then?" Nahoot perked up

at the prospect of escaping from von Schiller's malignant influence.

"I will come as soon as there is something for me there.

I will be relying on you to decide when my presence is needed."

"What about the stele! I should-'

"You will continue to work on the translation." Von Schiller forestalled

his objections. "You will take a full set of photographs with you to

Ethiopia, and you will continue your work while you are there. I shall

expect you to report to me by satellite, at least once a week, on your

progress."

"When do you want me to leave?"

ly, "Immediately. Today if that is possible. Speak to Frulein Kemper.

She will make your travel arrangements." For the first time during the

interview Nahoot looked happy.

Dolly droned on steadily southeastwards, ig and there was very little to

relieve the boredom of the flight. The dawn was just breaking when they

crossed the African coast at a remote and lonely desert beach that

Jannie had chosen for just this reason.

Once they were over the land there was as little of interest to see as

there had been over the sea. The desert stretched away, bleak and brown

and featureless in every direction.

At irregular intervals they heard Jannie in the cockpit speaking to air

traffic control, but as they were able to hear only half the

conversation they had no idea as to- the identity or the nationality of

the station. Occasionally Jannie dropped the heavily accented English he

was affecting and broke into Arabic. Royan was surprised by Jannie's

fluency in the language, but then as an Afrikaner the guttural sounds

came naturally to him. He was even able to mimic the different accents

and dialects of Libyan and Egyptian convincingly as he tied his way

across the desert.

For the first few hours Sapper pored over his dam drawings; then, unable

to proceed further until he had the exact measurements of the site, he

curled up on his bunk with a paperback novel. The unfortunate author was

unable to hold his attention for long. The open book sagged down over

his face, and the pages fluttered every time he emitted a long grinding

snore.

Nicholas and Royan huddled on her bunk with the chessboard between them,

until hunger overtook them and they moved to the makeshift galley. Here

Royan took the subservient role of bread'sticer and coffee-maker, while

Nicholas demonstrated his artistry in creating a range of Dagwood

sandwiches. They shared the food with Jannie and Fred, perched up behind

the pilots' seats in the cockpit.

"Are we still over Egyptian territory?" Royan asked.

With his mouth full, Jannie pointed out over the port wingtip of Big

Dolly. "Fifty nautical miles out there is Wadi Halfia. My father was

killed there in 1943. He was with the Sixth South African Division. They

called it Wadi Hellfire." He took another monstrous bite of sandwich. "I

never knew the old man. Fred and I landed there once.

Tried to find his grave." He shrugged eloquently. "It's a hell of a big

piece of country. Lots of graves. Very few of- them marked."

Nobody spoke for a while. They chewed their sandwiches, thinking their

own thoughts. Nicholas's father had also fought in the desert against

Rommel. He had been more fortunate than Jannie's father.

Nicholas glanced across at Royan. She was staring out of the window at

her homeland, and there was something so passionate and fraught in her

gaze that Nicholas was startled. The temptation to think of her as an

English girl, like her mother, was at most times irresistible. It was

only in odd moments such as these that he became intensely aware of the

other facets of her being.

She seemed unaware of his scrutiny. Her occupation was total. He

wondered what she was thinking what dark and mysterious thoughts were

smouldering there.

He remembered how she had seized the very first opportunity on their

return from Ethiopia to hurry back to Cairo, and once again a feeling of

disquiet came over him. He wondered if other emotional ties of which he

was unaware might not transcend those loyalties which he had taken for

granted. He realized with something of a shock that they had been

together for only a few short weeks, and despite the strong attraction

that she exerted over him he knew very little about her.

processor' Alost POPU

At that moment she started and looked round at him quickly. Crowded as

they were at the portside window, they stared into each other's eyes

from a distance of only a foot or so. It was only for a few seconds but

what he saw in her eyes, the dark shadows of guilt or some other

emotion, did nothing to allay his misgivings.

She turned back to Jannie, leaning over his shoulder to ask, "When will

we cross the Nile?"

"On the other side of the border. The Sudanese government concentrate

all their attentions on the rebels in the far south. There are some

stretches of the river here in the north that are completely deserted.

Pretty soon now we will be going down right on the deck, to get under

the radar pings from the Sudanese stations around Khartoum.

We will slip through one of the gaps."

jannie lifted the aeronautical map on its clipboard from his lap, and

held it so she could see it. With one thick, stubby finger he showed

Royan their intended route.

it was drawn in with blue wax pencil, "Big Dolly has taken this route so

often that she could fly it without my hands on the stick, couldn't you,

old girl?" He patted the instrument panel affectionately.

Two hours later, when Nicholas and Royan were back at the chess board in

the main cabin, Janrfie called them on the PA, "Okay, folks. No need to

panic. We are going to lose some altitude now. Come up front and watch

the show."

Strapped into fold-down seats in the back of the flight deck, they were

treated to a superb exhibition of low flying by Fred. The descent was so

rapid that Royan felt they were about to fall out of the sky, and that

she had left her stomach back there somewhere at thirty thousand feet.

Fred levelled Big Dolly out only feet above the desert floor, so low

that it was like riding in a high-speed bus rather than flying. Fred

lifted her delicately over each undulation of the tawny, sun'scorched

terrain, skimming the black rock ridges and standing on a wingtip to

swerve around the occasional wind-blasted hill.

"Nile crossing in seven and a half minutes." jannie punched, the

stopwatch fixed to the control wheel in front of him. "And unless my

navigation has gone all to hell there should be an island shaped like a

shark directly under us as we cross."

As the needle of the stopwatch came up to the mark, the broad,

glittering expanse of the river flashed beneath them. Royan caught a

brief glimpse of a green island with a few thatched huts on the tip, and

a dozen dugout canoes lying on the narrow beach.

"Well, the old man hasn't lost his touch yet," Fred remarked. "Still

good for a few thousand miles before we trade him in."

"Not so much of the old man stuff, you little squirt. I have some tricks

up my sleeve that I haven't even used yet."

"Ask Mara." Fred grinned affectionately at his father as he banked on to

a new southwesterly heading, and with his wingtip so close to the ground

that he scattered a herd of camels feeding in the sparse thorn scrub.

They lumbered away across the plain, each trailing a wisp of white dust

like a wedding train.

"Another three hours' flying time to the rendezvous." Jannie looked up

from the map. "Spot on! We should land forty minutes before sunset.

Couldn't be better,'

"I' better go back and change into my hiking gear, then." Royan went

back into the main cabin, pulled her bag from under the bunk and

disappeared into the lavatory. When' she emerged twenty minutes later

she wore khaki culottes and a cotton top.

"These boots were made for walking." She stamped them on the deck.

"That's fine." Nicholas watched her from the bunk.

"But how about that knee?"

t vopuiuj ProcesV

"It will get me there," she said, defensively.

"You mean I am to be deprived of the pleasure of back acking you again?"

The Ethiopian mountains came up so subtly on the eastern horizon that

Royan was not aware of them until Nicholas pointed out to her the faint

blue outline against the brighter blue of the African sky.

"Almost there." He glanced at his wrist-watch. "Let's go up to the

flight deck."

Looking forward through the windshield there was no landmark ahead of

them - just the vast brown savannah, speckled with the black dots of

acacia trees.

"Ten minutes to go," Jannie intoned. "Anyone see anything?" There was no

reply, and they all stared ahead.

"Five minutes."

"Over there!" Nicholas pointed over his shoulder.

4 "That's the course of the Blue Nile." A denser grove of thorn trees

formed a dark line far ahead. "And there is the smokestack of the

derelict sugar'mill on the river bank.

Mek Nimmur says that the airstrip is about three miles from the mill."

"Well, if it is, it's not shown, on the chart," Jannie grumbled. "One

minute before we are on the coordinates."

The minute ticked off slowly on the stopwatch.

"Still nothing-' Fred broke off as a red flare shot up from the earth

directly ahead and flashed past Big Dolly's JI nose. Everyone in the

cockpit smiled and relaxed with relief.

"Right on the nose." Nicholas patted Jannie's shoulder in

congratulations. "Couldn't have done better myself."

Fred climbed a few hundred feet and came round in a one-eighty turn. Now

there were two signa I fires burning out there on the plain - one with

black smoke,, the other sending a column of white straight up into the

still evening sky. It was only when they were a kilometer out that they

were able to make out the faint outline of the overgrown and

long'disused landing strip. Roseires airstrip had been built twenty

years before by a company that tried to grow sugar cane under irrigation

from the Blue Nile. But Africa had won again and the company had passed

into oblivion, leaving this feeble scrape mark on the plain as its

epitaph.

Mek Nimmur had chosen this remote and deserted place for the rendezvous.

"No sign of a reception committee," Jannie grunted.

"What do you want me to do?"

"Continue your approach," Nicholas told him. "There should be another

flare - ah, there it is!" The ball of fire shot up from a clump of thorn

trees at the far end -of the runway, and for the first time they were

able to make out human figures in the bleak landscape. They had stayed

hidden until the very last moment.

"That's Mek, all right! Go ahead and land."

As Big Dolly finished her roll-out and the end of the rough and pitted

runway came up ahead, a figure in camouflage fatigues popped up ahead of

them. With a pair of paddles it signalled them to taxi into the space

between two of the tallest thorn trees.

Jannie cut the engines and grinned at them over his shoulder. "Well,

boys and girls, looks like we pulled off another lucky one!'

Then from the height of Big Dolly's-cockpit there was no mistaking the

commanding figure of Mek Nimmur as he emerged from the cover of the

clump of acacia trees. Only now did they realize that the trees had been

shrouded with camouflage netting; this was why they had not been able to

spot any sign of human presence from the air. As soon as the loading

ramp was lowered, Mek Nimmur came striding up it.

"Nicholas! They embraced and, after Mek had kissed him noisily on each

cheek, he held Nicholas at arm's was proce Wolrlc, length and studied

his face, delighted to see him again. "So I was right! You are up to

your old tricks. Not simply a dikdik shoot, was it?"

"How can I lie to an old friend?"Nicholas shrugged.

Hell' "It always came easy to you," Mek laughed, "but I am lad we are

going to have some fun together. Life has been very boring recently."

"I bet!'Nicholas punched his shoulder affectionately.

A slim, graceful figure followed Mek up the ramp. In the olive-green

fatigues Nicholas hardly recognized Tessay until she spoke. She wore

canvas para boots and a cloth cap that made her look like a boy.

"Nicholas! Royan! Welcome back!" Tessay cried. The two women embraced as

enthusiastically as the men had done.

"Come on, you Ous!" Jannie protested. "This isn't Woodstock. I have to

get back to Malta tonight. I want to take off before dark."

Swiftly Mek took charge of the offloading. His men swarmed aboard and

manhandled the pallets forward on the rollers, while Sapper started up

his beloved front-end loader and used it to run the cargo down the ramp

and stack it in the acacia grove under the camouflage netting.

With so many hands to help it went swiftly, and Big Dolly's hold was

emptied just as the sun settled wearily on to the horizon, and the short

African twilight bled all colour from the landscape.

Jannie and Nicholas had one last hurried discussion in the cockpit while

Fred completed his flight checks. They went over the plans and radio

procedures one last time.

Four days from today," Jannie agreed, as they shook hands briefly.

"Let the man go, Nicholas," Mek bellowed from below.

"We must get across the border before dawn."

They watched Big Dolly taxi down to the end of the strip and swing

around. The engine beat crescendoed as she came tearing back in a long

rolling shroud of dust and lifted off over their heads. Jannie waggled

his wings in farewell and, without navigation lights showing, the great

aircraft blended like a black bat into the darkening sky and disappeared

almost immediately.

"Come here." Nicholas led Royan to a seat under the acacia. "I don't

want that knee to play up again." He pushed her culottes halfway up. her

thigh and strapped the knee wit han elastic bandage, trying not to make

his pleasure in this task too apparent. He was pleased to see that the

bruising had almost faded and there was no longer any swelling.

He palpated it gently. Her skin was velvety and the flesh beneath it

firm and warm to the touch. He looked up, and from the expression on her

face realized that she was enjoying this intimacy as much'as he was. As

he caught her eye she flushed slightly, and quickly smoothed down her

culottes.

She jumped up and said, "Tessay and I have a lot of catching up to do,'

and hurried across to join her.

I am leaving a full combat platoon to guard your stores here," Mek

explained to Nicholas as Tessay led Royan away. "We will travel in a

very small party as far as the border. I don't expect any trouble. There

is very little enemy activity this sector at the moment. Lots of

fighting in the south, but we are quiet here. That is why I chose this

rendezvous."

"How far to the Ethiopian border?"Nicholas wanted to know.

"Five hours' march," Mek told him. "We will slip through one of our

pipelines after the moon has set. The rest of my men are waiting in the

entrance to the Abbay gorge. We should rendezvous with them before dawn

tomorrow."

"And from there to the monastery?"

"Another two days' march," Mek replied. "We will be there just in time

to receive the drop from your fat friend in the fat plane."

He turned away and gave his last orders to the platoon commander who

would remain at Roseires to guard the stores. Then he assembled the

party of six men who would form their escort across the border. Mek

divided up the loads between them. The most important single item was

the radio, a modern military lightweight model which Nicholas carried

himself.

"Those bags of yours are too difficult to carry. You will have to repack

them," Mek told Nicholas and Royan. So they emptied their bags and

stuffed the contents into the two canvas haversacks that Mek had ready

for them. Two of his men slung the haversacks over their shoulders and

disappeared into the darkness.

"He is not taking thatV Mek stared aghast at the bulky legs of the

theodolite that Sapper had retrieved from one of the pallets. Sapper

spoke no Arabic, so Nicholas had to translate.

"Sapper says that it is a delicate instrument. He cannot allow it to be

dropped from the aircraft. He says that if it is damaged he will not be

able to do the work he was hired for."

"Who is going to carry it?" Mek demanded. "My men will mutiny if I try

to make them do it."

"Tell the cantankerous bugger that I will carry it myself." Sapper drew

himself up with dignity. "I wouldn't let one of his great clumsy oafs

lay a finger on it." He picked up the bundle, placed it over his

shoulder and stalked away with "a stiff back.

Mek let the advance guard have a five-minute start, and then he nodded.

"We can go now."

Thirty minutes after Big Dolly had taken off, they left the airfield and

set out across the dark and silent plain, headed into the east. Mek set

a hard pace. He and Nicholas seemed to have the eyes of a pair of cats,

Royan thought, as she followed close behind them. They could see in the

darkness, and only a whispered warning from one of them prevented her

falling into a hole or tripping over a pile of rocks in the darkness.

When she did stumble, Nicholas seemed always to be there, reaching back

to steady her with a strong, firm grip.

They marched in complete and disciplined silence. It was only every

hour, when they rested for five minutes, that Nicholas and Mek sat close

together, and from the few quiet words she picked up Royan realized that

Nicholas was explaining to him the full reasons for their return to the

Abbay gorge. She heard Nicholas repeat the names "Mamose' and "Taita'

often, and Mek's deep voice questioning him at length. Then they would

be up again and moving forward in the night.

After a while she lost all sense of the distance they had travelled.

Only the hourly rest periods orientated her to the passage of time.

Fatigue crept over her slowly, until it required an effort to lift her

foot for each pace. Despite her boast, her knee was beginning to ache.

Now and then she felt Nicholas touch her arm, guiding her over the rough

places. At other times they would stop abruptly at some whispered

warning from up front. Then they would stand quietly waiting in the

darkness, nerves tensed, until at another whisper they would move on

again at the same pressing pace. Once she smelt the cool muddy effluvium

of the river on the dry warm night air, and she knew that they must be

very close to the Nile. Without a word being spoken she sensed the

nervous tension in the men ahead of her, and was aware of the alertness

in the way they carried themselves and their weapons.

"Crossing the border now," Nicholas breathed close to her face, and the

tension was infectious. She forgot her tiredness, and heard her pulse

beating in her own ears.

This time they did not stop for the usual rest break, but continued for

another hour until slowly she felt the mood of the men changing. Someone

laughed softly, and there was a tightness in their pace as they swung on

towards the luminescence in the eastern sky. Abruptly the moon thrust

its crescent horns above the dark silhouette of faroff mountain ranges.

"All clear. We are through," Nicholas told her in his normal voice.

"Welcome back to Ethiopia. How are you feeling?"

"I' okay."

"I am tired too." He grinned at her in the moonlight.

"Pretty soon we will camp and rest. Not much further."

He was lying, of course- the march went on and on until she wanted to

weep. And then suddenly she heard the sound of the river again, the soft

rushing flow of the Nile in the dawn. Up ahead she heard Mek talking to

the men who were waiting for them, and then Nicholas guided her off the

path and made her sit while he knelt in front of her and unlaced her

boots.

"You did well. I am proud of you," he told her, as he stripped off her

socks and examined her feet for blisters.

Then he unbandaged the knee. It was slightly swollen, and he massaged it

with a skilled and tender touch.

She sighed softly, "Don't stop. That feels good."

"I'll give you a Brufen for the inflammation." He dug the pills out of

his pack and then spread his padded jacket AI for her to lie on. "Sorry,

the sleeping bags are with our other gear. Have to rough it until Jannie

makes his air drop."

He passed her the water bottle, and while she swallowed the pill he

pulled the tab on a pack of emergency rations. "Not exactly gourmet fare

He sniffed the contents.

"In the army we call them rat packs." She fell asleep with her mouth

still halffilled with tasteless meat loaf and plastic cheese.

When Nicholas woke her with a mug of hot sweet tea, she saw it was

already late afternoon. He sat beside her and sipped at his own mug,

noisily blowing away the steam between each mouthful.

"You will be pleased to know that Mek is now fully in the picture. He

has agreed to help us."

"What have you told him?"

"Just enough to keep him interested."Nicholas grinned.

"The theory of progressive disclosure. Never tell everything all at

once, feed it to them a little at a time. He knows what we are looking

for, and that we are going to dam a river."

hat about men to work on the dam?"

monks at St. Frumentius will do whatever he tells them. He is a great

hero."

"What have you promised him in return?"

"We haven't got round to that yet. I told him that we have no idea what

we are going to find, and he laughed and said he would trust me."

"Silly boy, isn't he?"

"Not exactly how I would describe Mek Nimmur," he murmured. "I think

when the time is ripe he will let us know what the price of his

cooperation is." He looked up at that moment. "We were just talking

about you, Mek."

Mek strode up to them, and then squatted on his haunches beside

Nicholas.

"What were you saying about me

"Royan says you are a hard bastard, pushing er on a forced march all

night."

"Nicholas is spoiling you. I have been watching him fussing over you,'

he chuckled. "What I say is, treat them rough. Women love it." Then he

grew serious. "I am sorry, Royan. The border is always a bad place. You

will find me less of a monster now we are on home ground."

"We are very grateful for all you are doing." He inclined his head

gravely, "Nicholas is an old friend, and I hope that you are a new

friend."

"I have been terribly distressed. Tessay told me last night that there

had been trouble at the monastery."

Mek scowled and tugged at his short beard, pulling a tuft of hair from

his own chin with the force of his anger.

"Nogo and his killers. This is just a sample of what we are fighting

against. We have been rescued from the tyranny of Mengistu, only to be

plunged into fresh horror."

"What happened, MA?"

Speaking tersely but vividly, he described the massacre and the plunder

of the monastery's treasures. "There was no doubt it was Nogo. Every one

of the monks that escaped knows him well."

His anger was too fierce for him to contain, and he stood up abruptly.

"The monastery means much to all the people of the Gojam. I was

christened there, by Jali Hora himself. The murder of the abbot and the

desecration of the church is a terrible outrage." He jammed his cap

down, on his head. "And now we must get on. The road ahead is steep and

difficult.

Now that they were clear of the border, it was safe to move in daylight.

The second day's march carried them into the depths of the orge. There

were no foothills: it was like entering through the keep of a vast

castle. The walls of the great central massif rose up almost four

thousand feet on either hand, and the river snaked along in the depths,

its entire length churned by rapids and breaking white water. At noon

Mek broke the march to rest in a grove of trees beside the river.

There was a beach below them, sheltered by massive boulders which must

have rolled down from the cliffs that hung like a rampart above them.

The five of them sat a little apart from each other.

Sapper was still smarting from his altercation over the theodolite with

Mek, and keeping himself aloof. He placed the heavy instrument in a

conspicuous position and sat ostentatiously close to it. Mek and Tessay

seemed strangely quiet and withdrawn, until suddenly Tessay reached out

and grasped Mek's hand..

I want to tell them, she blurted out impulsively.

Mek looked away at the river for a moment before he nodded. "Why not?"

he shrugged at last.

"I want them to know," Tessay insisted. "They knew Boris. They will

understand."

"Do you.,want me to tell them?" Mek asked softly, and he was still

holding her hand.

"Yes," she nodded, "it is best that it comes from you." Mek was silent

for a while, gathering his words, and then he started in that low

rumbling voice, not looking at them, but watching Tessay's face. "The

very first moment I looked upon this woman, I knew that she was the one

that God had sent my way."

Tessay moved closer to him.

"Tessay and I said our vows together on the night of Timkat and asked

for God's forgiveness, and then I took man."

her away as my wo She laid her head upon his great muscular shoulder.

"The Russian followed us. He found us here, on this very spot. He tried

to kill us both."

Tessay looked down at the beach upon which she and Mek had so nearly

died, and she shuddered at the memory.

"We fought," he said simply, "and when he was dead, I sent his body

floating away down the river."

"We knew he was dead," Royan told them. "We heard from the people at the

embassy that the police found his body downstream, near the border. We

didn't know how it had happened."

They were all quiet for a while, and then Nicholas broke the silence, "I

wish I had been there to watch. It must have been one hell of a fight.

He shook his head in awe.

"The Russian was good. I am glad I don't have to fight him again," Mek

admitted, and stood up. "We can reach the monastery before dark, if we

start now."

ai Metemma, the newly elected abbot of St. Frumentius, met them on the

terrace of the monastery overlooking the river. He was only a little

younger than Jah Hora had been, tall and with a dignified silver head,

and today he was wearing the blue crown in honour of such a

distinguished guest as Mek

After the visitors had bathed and rested for an hour in the cells that

had been set aside for them, the monks came to lead them to the welcome

feast that had been prepared.

When the tej flasks had been refilled for the third time, and the mood

of the abbot and of his monks had mellowed, Mek began to whisper into

the old man's ear.

"You recall the history of St. Frumentius - how God cast him up on our

shore from the storm-tossed sea, so that he might bring the true faith

to us?"

The abbot's eyes filled with tears. "His holy body was entombed here, in

our nwqdas. The barbarians came and stole the relic away from us. We are

children without a father. The reason for the building of this church

and monastery has been taken away," he lamented. "No longer will the

pilgrims come from every corner of Ethiopia to i pray at his shrine. We

will be forgotten by the Church. We are undone. Our monastery will

perish and our monks will be blown away like dead leaves on the wind."

"When St. Frumentius came to Ethiopia he was not alone. Another

Christian came with him from the High Church in Byzantium," Mek reminded

him in a soft, soothing rumble.

"St. Antonia." The abbot reached for his tei flask to allay the

intensity of his sorrow.

Mek agreed. "He died before St. Frumen "St. Antonia tius, but he was no

less holy than his brother."

"St. Antonia was also a great and holy man, deserving of our love and

veneration." The abbot took a long swallow from the flask.

"The ways of God are mysterious, are they not?" Mek shook his head at

the wonder of the workings of the universe.

"His ways are deep and not for us to question or understand., "And yet

he is compassionate, and he rewards the devout."

"He is all'compassionate." The abbot's tears overflowed and ran down his

cheeks.

"You and your monastery have suffered a grievous loss.

The sacred relic of St. Frumentius has been taken from you alas, never

to be recovered. But what if God were to send you another? What if he

were to send you the sacred body of St. Antonia?"

The abbot looked up through his tears, his expression suddenly

calculating. That would be a miracle indeed."

Mek Nimmur placed his arm around the old man's shoulders and whispered

quietly in his ear, and Mai Metemma stopped weeping and listened

intently.

have obtained your workers for you," Mek told Nicholas as they began the

march up the valley the next morning. "Mai Metemma has promised to give

us a hundred men within two days and another five hundred to follow them

within the next week. He is handing out indulgences to all those who

volunteer to work on the dam. They will be spared the fires of purgatory

if they take part in such a glorious project as the recovery of the holy

relic of St. Antonia."

Both the women stopped in their tracks and stared at him.

"What did you promise the poor old man?" Tessay demanded.

"A body to replace the one that Nogo plundered from the church. If we do

discover the tomb, then the monastery's share will be the mummy of

Mamose."

"That's a mean thing to do,"

A Royan exploded. "You will cheat him into helping us."

"It is not a cheat." Mek's dark eyes flashed at the accusation. "The

relic that they lost was not the veritable body of St. Frumentius, and

yet for hundreds of years it served the purpose of uniting the community

of monks and drawing Christians from all over this land. Now that it is

gone, the very existence of the monastery is threatened.

They have lost their reason for continuing."

"So you are tempting them with a false promiseP Royan was still angry.

"The body of Mamose is every bit as authentic as the one they lost. What

does it matter if it is the body of an ancient Egyptian rather than that

of an ancient Christian, just as long as it serves as a focus for the

faith and if it is the means by which the monastery might survive for

another five hundred years?"

"I think Mek is making sense." Nicholas gave his opinion.

"Since when have you been an expert in Christianity?

You are an atheist," Royan flashed at him, and he held up his hands as

if to ward off a blow.

"You are right. What do I know about it anyway?

You argue it out with Mek. I am going to discuss the theory of

dam-building with Sapper Webb." He sauntered up to the head of the file

of men and fell in beside his engineer.

From time to time he heard heated voices raised behind him, and he

grinned. He knew Mek, but he was also beginning to understand the lady.

It would be fascinating to see who would win this argument.

They reached the head of the chasm in the middle of the afternoon, and

while Mek 6.. searched out a campsite Nicholas took Sapper immediately

to the narrow neck of the river just above where it plunged over the

waterfall. While Sapper set up the theodolite, Nicholas took the

graduated levelling staff.

Sapper ordered him up and down the face of the cliff with peremptory

hand signals, all the while peering into the lens of the theodolite,

while Nicholas teetered on insecure footing and tried to keep the staff

upright for Sapper to take his sightings.

"Okay!" Sapper bellowed, after taking his twentieth shot. "Now I want

you on the other side of the river."

Tine!" Nicholas bellowed back. "Do you want me to fly or swim?"

Nicholas hiked three miles upstream to the ford where the trail crossed

the Dandera river, and then fought his way back through the tangled

river in undergrowth to the point on the bank opposite which Sapper lay

in the shade smoking a soothing cigarette.

"Don't rupture yourself, will you?" Nicholas yelled across the water at

him.

It was almost dark before Sapper had made all the shots he wanted, and

Nicholas was still faced with the long return trip over the ford. He

covered the last mile in almost total darkness, guided only by the

flicker of the campfires.

Wearily he stumbled into the camp and flung down the levelling staff.

"You had beer tell me that it was worth it," he tt growled at Sapper,

who did not look up from his slide rule.

He was working over his revised drawings by the glaring light of a small

butane lantern.

Most Populiir VPIL

"You weren't too far out in your estimates," he congratulated Nicholas.

"The river is forty'one yards wide at the critical point above the

falls, where I want to site the structure."

"All I want to know is if you will be able to throw a dam across it."

Sapper grinned and laid his finger down the side of his nose, "You get

me my ruddy front-ender, and I'll dam the bleeding Nile itself."

had eaten their dinner - another of the packs - Royan glanced across

the fire at cholas. -When she caught his eye she inclined her head in

invitation. Then she stood up and casually drifted out of camp, looking

back once to make sure he was following her. Nicholas lighted the path

with his torch as they picked their way back to the dam site and found a

boulder overlooking the water on which to sit.

He switched off the torch and they were silent for a while as their eyes

adjusted to the starlight, and then Royan whispered, "There were times

that I thought we would never return here - that it was all a dream, and

that Taita's pool never existed."

"For us perhaps it never will, without the help of the monks from the

monastery." There was a note of enquiry in his voice.

"You and Mek Nimmur win," she chuckled softly. "Of course we have to

accept their help. Mek's arguments were very convincing."

"So you agree that their reward should be the mummy of Mamose?"

"I agree that they may take whatever mummy we discover, if we discover

one at all," she qualified. "For all we know, the true mummy of Mamose

may be the one that Nogo stole."

Quite naturally he slipped his arm around her shoulders, and after a

moment she relaxed against him. -oh, Nicky, I am afraid and excited.

Afraid that all our hopes are vain, and excited that we might have found

the key to Taita's game." She turned her face to his, and he felt her

breath on his lips.

He kissed her, tenderly. Then he drew back with the warmth of her

lingering on his lips and studied her face in the starlight. She made no

movement to pull away from stead she swayed towards him, and kissed him

back., him. In At first it was a staid sisterly kiss, with her mouth

tightly losed. He brought his right hand up behind her head and weaved

his fingers into her hair, holding her face to his.

He opened his mouth over hers, and she made a little sound of dissent

through her closed lips.

Slowly, voluptuously, he worked her lips apart, and her protests died

away as he probed her mouth deely with his tongue. She was making a

contented little mewling sound now, like a kitten nursing on the teat,

and her arms went around him. She kneaded his back with strong supple

fingers, her mouth wide open to his kiss, her tongue sinuous and

slippery as it twined around his.

He slid his other hand up between their bodies and unhooked the buttons

of her shirt down as low as her belt.

She leaned back slightly in his embrace to make it easier for him. With

a delicious shock he discovered that her breasts were naked under the

thin cotton shirt. He cupped one of them in his hand: it was small and

firm, only just filling his hand. When he pinched the nipple gently , it

stiffened between his fingers like a tiny ripe strawberry.

He broke off the kiss and bowed his head to her bosom.

She moaned softly, and with one hand guided him down.

When he sucked her nipple into his mouth she gasped and hooked the nails

of her other hand into his back, like a cat responding to a caress. Her

whole body undulated in his embrace, and after a while she pulled his

mouth away. He thought for a moment that she was rejecting him, but then

she moved his head across and placed her other nipple in his mouth. Once

again she gasped as he sucked it in.

Her movements became mote abandoned, keeping pace with his own arousal.

He could restrain himself no longer and he reached up under her khaki

culottes and laid his hand on the plump mound of her sex. Then with one

swift lithe movement she broke away and sprang to her feet. She stood

back from him, smoothing down her culottes and buttoning her shirt with

fingers that trembled

"I am so sorry, Nicky. I want to, oh God, you will never know how much I

want to. But-' she shook her head and she was panting wildly, "not yet.

Please, Nicky, forgive me. I am caught between two worlds. One half of

me wants this so very much but the other half will not allow me He stood

up and kissed her chastely. "There is no hurry. Good things are worth

waiting for," he told her with his mouth just touching hers. "Come! I

will take you home now."

while it was still dark the next morning, the first levy of priests that

Mai Metemma had promised came filing up the valley. Their chanting awoke

the camp, and everyone came sleepily out of their thatched lean-to

shelters to welcome the Ion column of holy men.

"Sweet heavens," Nicholas yawned, "it looks as though we have started

another crusade. They must have left the monastery in the middle of the

night to get here at this hour." He went to find Tessay, and when he did

he told her, "You are hereby appointed official translator. Sapper

speaks not a word of either Arabic or Amharic. Stick close to him."

As soon as it was fully light, Mek and Nicholas left camp to reconnoitr

the drop site. By noon they had agreed that there was only one

possibility: they would have to use the valley itself Compared to the

rocky ridges that surrounded them, the floor of the valley was level and

fairly free of obstructions. It was imperative that the drop should take

place as close to the dam site as possible, for every mile that the

stores must be manhandled would add immeasurably to the time and effort

needed for the work.

"Time is the major factor," Nicholas told Mek as they stood in the

chosen drop zone the following morning.

"Every day counts from now until the rains break."

Mek looked up at the sky. "Pray God for late rains." They marked out

their drop site a mile down from the river, along the stretch where the

valley was widest and there was a clear approach through a gap in the

hills.

Jannie would need to fly straight and level for five miles under full

flap and with the loading ramp down.

"Cutting it fine," Mek remarked, as they surveyed the rugged slopes and

frowning peaks that surrounded them.

"Can your fat friend fly?"

"Fly? He is half-bird,'Nicholas told him.

They moved down the valley to check the placement of the flares and the

markers, The markers consisted of crosses of quartz stones laid out down

the centre of the valley floor, and they would be highly visible from

the air.

Sapper was up at the head of the valley. They could see him there on the

skyline as he moved around, setting out his smoke flares to mark the

approach to the drop zone.

When Nicholas turned around and looked in the opposite direction, he

could see the two women sitting on a rock together at the far end of the

valley. Sapper had already helped them to set up their flares. These

would mark the far limit of the zone, and give Jannie a mark for his

climb out of the valley.

Nicholas then turned his attention back to Mek's men as they finished

laying out the stark white quartz markers.

Once these were all in place, Mek ordered the area to be cleared. Then,

lugging the radio, they climbed up to join Sapper on the high ground at

the head of the valley. Mek helped Nicholas string out the aerial. Then

Nicholas switched on and adjusted the gain carefully before he thumbed

the microphone.

"Big Dolly. Come in, Big Dolly!'Nicholas invited, but the static hummed

and whined.

"They must be running late." Nicholas tried not to let his disquiet

show. Jannie will be coming straight in from Malta on this run. After

the first drop he will go back to your base at Roseires and pick up the

second load. With luck, both loads should all be dropped before noon

tomorrow.

"If the fat man comes at all," Mek remarked.

Jannie is a pro," Nicholas grunted. "He will come." He held the

microphone to his lips, "Big Dolly. Do you read?

Over."

Every ten minutes he called -out into the empty echoing silence. Each

time his call went unanswered he had visions of Sudanese MiG

interceptors racing in with their missiles cocked and locked, and the

old Hercules plunging earthwards in flames.

"Come in, Big Dolly!" he pleaded, and at last a thin, scratchy voice

floated into his headset. "Pharaoh. This is Big Dolly. ETA forty-five

minutes. Standing by." Jannie's transmission was terse. He was too much

of an old hand at the smuggling game to give a hostile listener time to

fix his position.

"Big Dolly. Understand four five. Pharaoh standing by." Nicholas grinned

at Mek. "Looks like we are in business after all."

Mek heard it first. His ear was battle-tuned. In this i land, if you

wanted to go on living it paid to pick up any aircraft long before it

arrived. Nicholas was out of training, so it was almost five minutes

later that he picked up the distinctive drone of the multi-props echoing

weirdly off the Cliffs of the gorge. It was impossible to be certain of

the direction, but they shaded their eyes and stared into the west.

"There she is." Nicholas redeemed himself as he spotted the tiny dark

speck, so low as almost to blend into the background of the escarpment

wall. He nodded at Sapper.

Sapper ran out to his flares and fussed over them briefly. When he

backed away they bloomed into clouds of dense marigold-yellow smoke that

drifted out sluggishly on the light breeze. The smoke would give Jannie

the strength and direction of the wind, as well as his orientation for

the drop zone.

Nicholas lifted his binoculars and gazed towards the other end of the

narrow valley. He saw that Royan and Tessay were busy with their flares.

Suddenly crimson smoke billowed from them, and the women ran back to

their original position and stood staring up at the sky.

Nicholas called softly into the microphone. "Big Dolly.

Smoke is up. Do you have it visual?"

"Affirmative. You are visual. For what you are about to receive may you

be truly thankful." Jannie's South African accent was unmistakable as he

uttered the cheerful blasphemy.

They watched the aircraft grow in size until its wings seemed to fill

half the sky, and then its profile altered as the great wing flaps

dropped and the ramp below its belly drooped open. Big Dolly slowed her

flight so dramatically that she seemed to hang suspended on an invisible

thread from the high African sun. Slowly she came around, banking

steeply as Jannie tined her up on the smoke flares, dropping lower and

still lower, headed directly at where they stood.

With a savage roar that made all three of them duck, she passed so low

over their heads that it seemed she would wipe them off the crest.

Nicholas had a glimpse of Jannie upwarliov peering down at him from the

cockpit, a fat smile on his face and one hand raised in a laconic wave,

and then he was past.

Nicholas straightened up and watched Big Dolly sweep majestica Ily down

the centre of the valley. The first pallet dropped out of her and

plunged earthwards, until at the last moment its parachutes burst open

like a bride's bouuet. The fall of the heavy container was arrested

abruptly.

It. dangled and swung, and seconds later struck the floor of the valley

in a cloud of yellow dust and with a crash they could hear up on the

ridge. Then two more loads dropped from her, and they too hung for a

moment on their chutes before they slammed in.

Big Dolly's engines howled under full throttle and her nose lifted as

she bored for height while she passed over the crimson smoke clouds, and

then climbed out of the deadly trap of the valley. She came round in

another wide turn and lined up for the second run. Once again the

pallets dropped out of her as she roared over the quartz markers and

then climbed out over the end wall of the valley, skimming the rocky

spikes that would have clawed her down.

Six times Jannie repeated the dangerous manoeuvre, and each time he

dropped three of the heavy rectangular loads. They lay strewn down the

length of the valley, shrouded by the tumbled white silk of their own

parachutes.

As Jannie climbed away from the last pass, his voice echoed in

Nicholas's earphones. "Don't go away, Pharaoh!

I will be back." Then Big Dolly lifted her belly ramp like an old lady

hoisting her knickers and headed away westwards.

Nicholas and Mek ran down into the valley, where the monks were already

jabbering and laughing. around the pallets. Quickly the two of them took

control, sorting the men into gangs and directing them as they broke

down the loads and carried them away.

Nicholas and Sapper had planned that the pallets should be dropped in

the order that their contents would be needed. The first pallet

contained canned and dried food, all their personal effects and camping

equipment, along with those other little creature comforts that Nicholas

had allowed, including mosquito nets and a case of malt whisky. He was

relieved to see that there was no leakage from the precious case: not

one of the bottles had been broken in the drop.

Sapper took charge of the building material and heavy equipment. With

Tessay relaying his orders, it was dragged and manhandled away to the

ancient quarry where it would be packed and stored until needed on site.

Darkness fell with More than half the pallets still not unpacked, lying

where they had fallen. Mek placed an armed guard over them, and they all

traipsed wearily back up the valley to the camp.

That night, with a dram of whisky and a decent meal warming his belly, a

mosquito net over his head and a thick foam mattress under him, Nicholas

drifted off to sleep with a smile on his face. They were off to a good

start.

The chanting of the monks at their matins woke him, "We won't need an

alarm clock here," he groaned, and staggered down to the river to wash

and shave.

As the sun gilded the battlements of the escarpment, he and Mek were

already at their post on the heights, searching the western sky. The

plan had been for Jannie to spend the night at Roseires, while Mek's men

assisted him with the loading of the cargo they had stored-there on

their first flight out from Malta. This was one of the vulnerable stages

of the operation. Although Mek had assured them that there was little

military presence in the area at the moment, it needed only a stray

Sudanese government patrol to stumble on Big, Dolly while she was on the

ground to plunge them all into disaster. So it was with a leap of the

heart that they heard the familiar drone of the turbo-props

reverberating off the cliffs.

Big Dolly lined up again for her first pass down the valley, and as she

flew over the quartz crosses the huge yellow front'end loader tumbled

out of her hold. Instinctively Nicholas held his breath as he watched it

come the parachute hurtling down and then jerk up short on shrouds. it

swayed wildly all over the sky, yoyoing on the nylon ropes, and the

monks howled with amazement and excitement as they watched it drop in.

it struck in a cloud of dust.

Sapper was standing next to Nicholas, groaning and covering his eyes so

that he did not have to watch the "Shit!' he said in a hollow cloud of

dust rising into the air.

voice.

"Is that a command, or merely a request?" Nicholas asked, but he wasn't

really amused.

As the last pallet dropped, and the aircraft climbed away under full

power, Nicholas called Jannie on the radio.

"Many thanks, Big Dolly. Safe flight home."

"Inshallahl If God wills!'Jannie called back.

"I will call you when I need a lift back."

"I'll be waiting." Big Dolly trundled away. "Break a leg!'

"Well now." Nicholas slapped Sapper's back. "Let's go down and see if

you still have a front'ender."

The battered yellow machine lay on its side with oil pouring out of her,

like blood from a heart-shot dinosaur.

"You can push off. just leave me a dozen of these black guys to help

me," Sapper told them as sorrowfully as if he was standing at the

graveside of his beloved, Sapper did not return to camp for dinner, so

Tessay sent a bowl of wat and some injera bread down to him to

1i eat while he worked. Nicholas considered going down to offer his help

with repairing the damaged tractor, but thought better of it. From

bitter experience he knew that at certain times Sapper wanted to be left

alone, and that this was one of those times.

in the small dark hours of the morning the camp was lit up by the blaze

of headlights and the hills reverberated to the roar of a diesel engine.

With, even his bald head covered with grease and dust, hollow-eyed but

triumphant, Sapper drove the yellow tractor into the camp and shouted at

them from the high driver's seat.

okay, knaves and nymphs! Drop your cocks and grab your socks. Let's go

build a dam."

t took them another two full days to gather in all the pallets that lay

strewn down the valley and to carry the stores into the ancient quarry.

There they stacked them carefully in accordance with the manifest that

Nicholas and Sapper had drawn up in England. it was essential that they

knew where every item was stored, and that they had immediate access to

it when needed. In the meantime Sapper was at work on the dam site,

laying out his foundations, driving numbered wooden pegs into the banks

of the river, and taking his final measurements with the long steel

surveyor's tape.

During this preliminary work Nicholas was watching the performance of

the monks, and getting to know them individually. He was able to pick

out the natural leaders and the most intelligent and willing men amongst

them.

He was also able to identify those who spoke Arabic or a little English.

The most promising of these was a monk named Hansith Sherif, whom

Nicholas made his personal assistant and interpreter.

Once they were settled into the camp, and had worked out a relationship

with the monks, Mek Nimmur took of Nicholas aside out of earshot the two

women.

"From now on, my work will be the security of the site.

MOS Maa's :rllar WV.

We will have to be ready to prevent another raid like the one on your

camp, and the slaughter at St. Frumentius.

Nogo and his thugs are still out there. It won't take long for him to

hear that you are back in the gorge. When he comes, I will be waiting

for him."

"You are better with an AK-47 than with a pickaxes' Nicholas agreed.

"Just leave Tessay here with me.. I need her."

"So do I' Mek smiled and shook his head ruefully, "I am only just

learning how much. Look after her for me. I will be back every night to

check on her."

Mek took his men into the bush and deployed them in defensive positions

along the trail and around the campWhen Nicholas looked up from his own

work he could often make out the figure of one of Mek's sentries on the

high ground above the camp. It was reassuring to know that they were

there.

However, as he had promised, Mek was back in camp most evenings, and

often in the night Nicholas heard, coming from the shelter he shared

with Tessay, his deep rumbling laughter blending with her sweet silvery

tones.

Then Nicholas lay awake and thought about Royan in the hut so close, but

yet so far away from where he lay.

On the fifth day the second draft of three hundred labourers that Mai

Metemma had conscripted for them arrived, and Nicholas was astonished,

Things seldom worked that way in Africa.

Nothing ever happened ahead of the promised time. He

wondered what exactly they decided

that he didn't really want to know, for now main construction work could

begin.

These men were not monks, for St. Frumentius had already given its all

to the sacred labour, but villagers who lived up on the highlands of the

escarpment. Mai Metemma had coerced them with promises of religious

indulgences and threats of hellfire.

Nicholas and Sapper divided this work force into gangs of thirty men

each, and set one of the picked monks as foreman over each gang. They

were careful to grade the men by their physical appearance, so that the

big strapping specimens were all grouped together as the project

storm.troopers, while the smaller, more wiry men could be reserved for

the tasks in which brute strength was not a necessity.

Nicholas dreamed up a name for each gang - the Buffaloes, the Lions, the

Axes and so on. It taxed his powers of invention, but he wanted to

inspire in them a sense of pride and, to his own particular advantage,

to encourage the gangs to compete with one another. He paraded them in

the quarry, each group headed by its newly appointed ecclesiastical

foreman. Using one of the ancient stone blocks as a platform, and with

Tessay interpreting for him, he harangued them heartily and then told

them that they would be paid in silver Maria Theresa dollars. He set

their wages at three times the going rate.

Up to this stage the men had listened to him with a sullen air of

resignation, but now a remarkable transformation came over them. None of

them had expected to be paid for the work, and most of them were

wondering how soon they could desert and go home. Now Nicholas was

promising them not only money, but silver dollars. In Ethiopia for the

past two hundred years the Maria Theresa dollar had been regarded as the

only true coinage. For this reason they were still minted with the

original date of 1780 and the portrait of the old Empress, with her

double chin and her decolletage exposing half her great bust. One of

these coins was more prized than a sackful of the worthless paper birr

issued by the regime in Addis. To pay his labour bills, Nicholas had

included a chest of these silver coins in the first pallet load that

Jannie had dropped.

Celestial grins bloomed as they listened, and white teeth sparkled in

their ebony faces. Someone began to sing, and they all stamped and

danced and cheered Nicholas as they trooped off to queue for their

tools. With mattocks and shovels at the slope they filed off up the

valley to the dam site, still singing and prancing.

"St. Nicholas," Tessay laughed. "Father Christmas. They will never

forget you now."

"They may even enshrine you and build a monastery over you" Royan

suggested sweetly.

"What they don't know is that they are going to earn every single dollar

, the hard way."

From then onwards the work began as soon as it was light enough to see,

and stopped only when it was too dark to continue. The men came back to-

their temporary compound each night by the light of grass torches, too

weary to sing. However, Nicholas had contracted with the headmen from

the highland villages to supply a slaughter beast every day. Each

morning the women came down the trail driving the animal before them,

and with huge pots of tej balanced on their heads.

Over the days that followed, there were no deserters from Nicholas's

little army of workers.

ounted on the high seat of the front-ender, Sapper lifted the first

filled mesh gabion in the hydraulic arms. The mesh'bound parcel of

boulders weighed several tons, and all work on the site came to a halt

as the men crowded the banks of the Dandera river to watch. A hum of

astonishment went up as Sapper eased the yellow tractor down the steep

bank and, with the gabion held high, drove the vehicle in to the water.

The current, affronted by this invasion, swirled angrily around the high

rear wheels, but Sapper pushed in deeper.

The crowds lining the bank began to chant and clap encouragement as the

water reached as high as the belly of the machine, and louds of steam

hissed from the hot steel of the sump. Sapper locked the brakes, and

then lowered the heavy gabion into the flood before reversing back up

the bank. The men cheered him wildly, even though the first gabion was

instantly submerged and only a whirlpool on the river's surface marked

its position. Another filled gabion lay ready. The Contender waddled up

to it, lowered its- steel arms and picked it up as tenderly as a mother

gathering up her infant.

Nicholas shouted at the foremen to get their gangs back to work. The

long lines of men came up the valley, naked except for their brief white

loincloths. Sweating heavily in the heat of the gorge, their skin

glistened like anthracite freshly cut from the coal face. Each of them

carried on his head a basket of stone aggregate, which he dumped into

the mouth of the waiting gabion. Then he returned with his empty basket

down the hill to the quary.

As each gabion was filled, another team fitted the mesh lid and laced it

closed with heavy eight-gauge wire.

"Twenty dollars bonus to the team with the most baskets filled

today!'Nicholas bellowed. They shouted with glee and redoubled their

efforts, but they were unable to keep up with Sapper on the Contender.

He laid his stone piers artfully, working out from the shallow water

alongside the bank so that each gabion lay against its neighbour, keying

into the wall to give mutual support.

At first there was little evident progress, but as a solid reef was

built up beneath the surface the river began to react savagely. The

voice of the water changed from a low rustle to a dull roar as it tore

at Sapper's wall.

Soon the top of the wall of gabions thrust its head above the surface,

and the river was constricted to half its former width. Now its mood was

truculent. It poured through the gap in a solid green torrent, and crept

almost imperceptibly up the banks as it was forced to back up behind the

barriers The rive worried the foundations of the dam, clawing at it to

find its weak spots, and the progress of the work slowed down as the

waters rose higher.

Up in the river in forests along the banks the axemen were at work, and

Nicholas winced each time one of the great trees toppled, groaning and

shrieking like a living creature. He liked to think of himself as a

conservationist, and some of these trees had taken centuries to reach

this girth.

"Do you want your bleeding dam, or your pretty trees?" Sapper demanded

ferociously, when Nicholas lamented in his hearing. Nicholas turned away

without replying.

They were all becoming tired with the unremitting labour. Their nerves

were stretching towards snapping point, and tempers were mercurial.

Already there had been a number of murderous fights amongst the workmen,

and each time Nicholas had been forced to duck in under the swinging

steel mattocks to break it up and separate the combatants.

lowly they squeezed the' river in its bed as the pier crept out from the

bank, and the time came when they had to transfer their efforts to the

far bank. It required the combined efforts of their entire labour force

to build a new road along the bank as far as the ford.

There they manhandled the front-ender into the water, and, with a

hundred men hauling on the tow ropes and her tall lugged rear wheels

spinning and churning the surface to a froth they. dragged her across.

Then they had to build another road back along the far bank to reach the

dam site. They cut out the treetrunks that obstructed them and levered

the boulders out of the way to get the tractor through, Once they had

her back at the dam site they could begin the same process of laying out

gabions from the far bank.

Gradually, a few metres each day, the two walls crept closer to each

other, and as the gap between them narrowed the water rose higher and

became more raucous, making the work more difficult.

In the meanwhile, two hundred metres upstream of the dam site, the

Falcons and the Scorpions were at work.

These two teams were building the raft of treetrunks that they had

hacked from the forest. The timbers were lashed together to form a

grating. Over this was laid heavy PVC sheeting to make it waterproof,

then a second grating of treetrunks went over this to form a gigantic

sandwich. It was all lashed together with heavy baling wire. Finally,

one end of the grating was ballasted with boulders.

Sapper arranged the ballast of boulders to make the raft one-side heavy,

so that it would float almost vertically in the water, with one end of

it scraping the bottom of the river and the other sticking up above the

surface. The dimensions of the completed raft were carefully related to

the gap between the two buttresses of the dam. And while the work on the

raft and the wall continued Sapper built up a stockpile of filled

gabions, which he stacked on both banks below the dam.

Three other full work teams, the Elephants, the Buffaloes and the

Rhinos,,comprising the biggest and strongest men in the force, laboured.

at the head of the valley. They were digging out a deep canal into which

the river could be diverted.

"Your hot-shot engineer, Taita, never thought of that little

refinement," Sapper gloated to Royan as they stood on the lip of the

trench. "What it means is that we only have to raise the level of the

river another six feet before it will start flowing down the canal and

into the valley.

Without it we would have had to lift the water almost twenty feet to

divert it."

"Perhaps the river levels were different four thousand years ago." Royan

felt a strange loyalty to the long-dead Egyptian, and she defended him.

"Or perhaps he dug a canal but all traces of it have been obliterated."

"Not bleeding likely," Sapper grunted. "The little perisher just plain

didn't think of it." His expression was smug and self-satisfied, "One up

on Mr Taita, I think."

Royan smiled to herself. It was strange how even the practical and

down-to-earth Sapper felt that this was a direct personal challenge from

down the ages. He too had been caught up in Taita's game.

dint of neither threat nor heavenly reward could the monks be inveigled

into working on Sundays. Each Saturday evening they knocked off an hour

earlier and trooped away down the valley on the trail to the monastery,

so as to be in time for Holy Communion the next day. Although Nicholas

grumbled and scowled at their desertion, secretly he was as relieved as

any of them for the chance to rest. They were all exhausted, and for

once there would be no chanting of lock the next morning.

matins to wake them at four ' So on Saturday night they all swore to

each other that

they would sleep late the next morning, but from force of habit Nicholas

found himself awake and fully alert at that same iniquitous hour. He

could not stay in his camp bed, and when he came back from his ablutions

at the riverside he found that Royan was also awake and dressed.

"Coffee?" She lifted the pot off the fire and poured a mugful for him.

"I slept terribly badly last night," she admitted. "I had the most

ridiculous dreams. I found myself in Mamose's tomb lost in a labyrinth

of passages-. I was searching for the burial chamber, opening doors, but

there were always people in the rooms that I looked into. Duraid was

working in one room and he looked up and said, "Remember the protocol of

the four bulls. Start at the beginning." He was so real and alive. I

wanted to go to him but the door closed in my face, and I knew I would

never see him again." Tears filled her eyes and glistened in the light

of the campfire.

Nicholas sought to distract her from the painful memory. "Who were in

the other rooms?" he asked.

"In the next room was Nahoot Guddabi. He laughed spitefully and said,

The jackal chases the sun," and his head changed into the head of

Anubis, the jackal god of the cemetery, and he yelped and barked. I was

so frightened that I ran."

She sipped her coffee. "It was all meaningless and silly, but von

Schiller was in the next room, and he rose in the air and flapped his

wings and said, "The vulture rises, and the stone falls." I hated him so

much I wanted to strike him, but then he was gone."

"And then you woke up?"Nicholas suggested.

"No. There was one other room."

Who was in it?"

She dropped her eyes, and her voice was small, "You were," she said.

"Me? What did I say?" He smiled.

"You didn't say anything," she whispered, and blushed so suddenly and

fiercely that he was instantly intrigued.

"What did I do then?" He was still smiling.

"Nothing. I mean, I can't tell you." The dream returned to her, vivid

and real as life, every detail of his naked body, even the smell and the

feel of him. She forced herself to stop thinking about it. She felt

vulnerable as she had been in the dream.

"Tell me about it he insisted.

"No! She stood up quickly, confused and still blushing, trying to thrust

the images from her.

Last night had been the first time in her life that she first time she

had ever dreamed of a man in that way, the had ever experienced a full

orgasm in her sleep. This morning, when she awoke, she found that she

had soaked right through her pyjamas bottoms.

"We have a full day ahead of us with no work to do," she blurted - the

first thought that came into her mind.

have On the contrary." He stood up with her. "We still to make the

arrangements for getting out of here. When the time comes, we will

probably be in something of a hurry."

"Mind if I tag along?" she asked.

wo teams, the Buffaloes and the Elephants, with only their foremen

missingi were waiting, for them at the quarry. They comprised sixty of

the strongest men in the Tabour force. Nicholas unrill from one of the

pallets.

packed the inflatable Avon rafts neat pack, with Each raft was deflated

and folded into a ese craft had been the paddles strapped along the

sides. It is specifically designed for river'running in turbulent water,

and each was capable of carrying sixteen crew and a ton of cargo.

strap the heavy packs on to Nicholas directed them to they had cut for

that purpose. Five the carrying poles that men on each end of the long

poles, with the bundle of the boat stung in the centre, made light of

the load They se off at a cracking pace down the trail, and as soon as

one was ready to take over. They made the team tired the nex exchange

without even stopping, the new porters slipping their shoulders under

the pole on the run while the exhausted team dropped out.

proof and water Nicholas carried the radio in its shock uch a precious

reglass case. He would not trust proof fib He and Royan trotted

instrument to one of the porters.

behind the caravan, joining in the chorus of the along work chant that

the porters sang as they carried their loads down to the monastery.

Mai Metemma was waiting on the terrace outside the church of St.

Frumentius to welcome them. He led them down the staircase hewn out of

the rock of the cliff, two hundred feet to the very water's edge. There

was a narrow rocky ledge against which the Nile waters dashed, and the

spray from the high waterfalls drifted over them like a perpetual

drizzle of rain. After the heat and the bright sunlight above, it was

cold and gloomy and dank down here in the depths of the gorge. The black

cliffs ran with water, and the ledge on which they stood was wet and

slippery underfoot.

Royan shivered as she watched the river racing by, forming a great

spinning vortex as it swirled around the deep rock bowl and then raced

out through the narrow throat of the gorge on its long hectic journey

towards Egypt and the north.

"If only I had known that this was the road you were planning on taking

home-' she eyed the river dubiously.

"If you would prefer to walk, it's okay by me,'Nicholas told her. "With

luck we will be carrying some extra baggage.

The river is the logical escape route."

"I suppose it makes sense, but still it's not terribly inviting." She

broke off a piece of driftwood from a stranded tangle that lay trapped

upon the ledge and tossed it into the river. It was whipped away, and

raced over the standing wave where some submerged obstacle forced the

surface to bulge up.

What speed is that current? she asked in a subdued voice as the splinter

of driftwood was sucked below the surface.

"Oh, not much more than eight or nine knots," he told her off handedly,

'but that's nothing. The river is still very low. just wait until it

starts raining up in the Mountains, then you will really see some water

passing through here.

it will be great fun. Lots of people would pay good money for the chance

to run a river like this. You are going to love it."

Thanks," she said drily. "I can't wait."

Fifty feet above the ledge, out of reach of the Nile's highest water

level, was a small cavern - the Epiphany shrine. Long ago the monks had

cut this passage deeply into the rock face, and it ended in a spacious,

candle-lit chamber that housed a life'sized statue of the Virgin,

dressed in faded velvet robes, with the infant in her arms.

Mai Metemma gave them his sanction to store the rafts in the shrine, and

they stacked them against a side wall.

When the porters had left, Nicholas showed Royan how to operate the

quick-release handles on the packs, and the CO, cylinders which would

inflate the rafts within minutes.

He wrapped the radio case and his small emergency pack in a sheet of

plastic and stowed them in one of the boat packs, where he could lay his

hands on them again in a hurry.

"You do intend coming along on this joy ride?" she asked anxiously. "You

aren't planning on sending me down on my ownsome?"

"It is best that you know how it all works," he told her.

if things start to get a little hairy when the time comes to leave here,

I may need your help in launching the rafts." When they climbed back up

the staircase into the warmth and the sunlight, Royan's uncertain mood

had changed. "It's not yet noon, and we have the rest of the day to

ourselves. Let's go back to Taita pool again," she suggested, and he

shrugged indulgently.

the Elephants accompanied them as The Buffaloes and far as the branch in

the trail. Here the teams headed back towards the dam, and shouted and

hallooed their farewells after Nicholas and Royan.

their last visit, the path Even in the short time since through the

undergrowth had become overgrown. Nicholas was forced to use his machete

to hack a way through, and they ducked uqder the trailing thorn

branches. It was midafternoon when they eventually crossed the high

ridge and stood once again on the cliff directly above Taita's pool.

"It looks as though we were the last ones here., Nicholas's tone was

relieved. "No signs of any other visitors since us."

"Were you expecting any?"

"You never know. Von Schiller is a formidable character, and he has some

charming lads working for him. Helm is one that worries me, and I had a

nasty feeling that he might have been snooping around here. I am going

to take a closer look."

He worked quickly around the entire area, casting widely for any sign of

intruders. Then came back to where she sat on the lip of the abyss and

dropped down beside her.

"Nothing," he admitted. "We have still got the running to ourselves."

"Once Sapper stops the river upstream, this is going to be our main area

of operations, isn't it?" she asked.

"Yes, but even before Sapper closes the dam I want to open a fly camp

here, and move all the gear and equipment we will need from the quarry

to have it handy when we start the exploration of the pool."

"How are we going to get down into the pool? Down the river bed, once it

is dry?"

"I suppose we could use the dry river bed as a road, and come down it

from below the dam or up from the monastery end, through the pink

cliffs."

"But that is not the way you are planning to get in, is it?" she

guessed.

"Even with no water in it, the river bed will be a long way round. It's

a three- or four-mile haul from either end of the abyss, added to which

it will be a pretty rough road to travel." He grinned ruefully. "You are

speaking to an expert on the subject. I went down it the hard way, and I

wouldn't want to do it again. There are at least five chutes and rock

jams that I can remember being thrown over."

"What is your better idea, then?" she asked.

"It's not my idea," he contradicted her. "It's Taita's idea really."

She peered over the edge. "You mean to build a scaffold down the cliff,

just the way he did it?

"What's good enough for Taita is good enough for me," he acknowledged.

"The old boy probably had a good look at the alternative of using the

river bed as an access road, and abandoned the idea."

"When will you start work on the scaffold, then?"

"One of our teams is already cutting bamboo poles higher up the gorge.

Tomorrow we will begin carrying them up here, and stacking them. We

can't waste a day.

Once the darn is closed we have to get into the dry pool as soon as

possible."

As if to add weight to his words there came a far-off mutter of thunder,

and they both craned their heads to peer up with trepidation at the

escarpment. Probably a hundred miles to the north, faintly washed as a

sepia print superimposed upon the razor-edged blue silhouette of the

loescarpment wall rose high tumbled towers of cumu nimbus clouds.

Neither of them spoke about it, but both "were aware of how ominously

the torm clouds were settling on the distant mountains.

Nicholas glanced at his wrist-watch and stood up.

"Time to start back if we are to get into camp before dark."

He gave her his hand and lifted her to her feet. She dusted off her

clothes and then stepped right to the very lip of the canyon.

ks," she called I "Wake up, Taita. We are hot on your trac down into the

shadows.

"Don't challenge him." Nicholas took her arm and drew VI, her back. "The

old ruffian has given us enough trouble already."

The axemen had left the stumps of several great trees standing on the

banks of the Dandera upstream from the dam- Sapper used these as anchor

points for the heavy cables that he strung across the river. Through the

cables he had rigged a cunning series of pulley blocks. The main cable

was run back and connected to the tow hitch on the front-ender.

Two other cables were laid out, one to each bank, where the Buffaloes

and the Elephants stood ready to handle them- One team was under the

direction of Nicholas, and the other under Mek Nimmur. For this crucial

part of the construction, Mek had come down from the hills to lend a

hand.

The grating of massive treetrunks lay on the river verge, already half

in the water. Heavily weighted with boulders, it was an unwieldy

structure that would require all their combined efforts to manoeuvre

into position.

Sapper slitted his eyes as he studied the layout, and then looked

downstream to the partially completed dam. The two walls of gabions

stretched out from either bank, but the gap in the middle of the river

was twenty feet across and the whole volume of the river roared through

it.

"The one thing we don't want is to let the bleeding plug run away from

us and slam into the ruddy wall," he warned Nicholas and Mek. "Otherwise

we are going to lose a big chunk of what we have done so far. I want to

cuddle her in there, nice and softly, and let her sit snug in the gap.

Any questions? This is your last chance to ask. You all know the

signals."

Sapper took one last drag on his cigarette, and flicked the stub into

the river. Then, looking lugubrious, he said, "Okay, gents. The last one

in the water is a sissy,'

Compared to their men, Nicholas and Mek were overdressed in their khaki

shorts. The others were all stark naked. When the order was given they

trooped waist-deep into the river and took up their stations along the

cables.

Before he followed them into the river, Nicholas took one last look

round. At breakfast that morning Royan had innocently asked to borrow

his binoculars. Now he knew why. She and Tessay were perched up on top

of the slope high above the gorge. Even as Nicholas watched, he saw

Royan pass the binoculars to Tessay. They were not missing a moment of

this fateful operation.

Nicholas looked back from the ridge to the rows of big naked men, pulled

a face and muttered, "My oath, there are some prize specimens around

here. I just hope that Royan isn't making comparisons."

Sapper climbed up on to the yellow tractor, and with a roar and a cloud

of diesel smoke the engine burst into life. He raised one hand above his

head with the fist ji clenched, and Nicholas relayed the order to his

team, "Take the strain."

The foremen repeated it in Amharic, and the men leaned back against the

cables. Sapper threw the tractor into extra low, and eased her forward.

The belly straightened in the lines, the sheave wheels squealed, and the

timber grating slid ponderously down the bank into the river. The

weighted end of the grating sank immediately and bumped along the

bottom, while the lighter end floated ut into midstream, until it was

high. Slowly they hauled it hanging vertically in the water.

The current seized it and began to bear it away, straight at the wall of

gabions. It picked up speed alarmingly. The tractor bellowed and- blew

out clouds of black smoke as Sapper threw her into reverse and backed up

on the cables.

The teams of naked black men heaved and chanted - some of them had

already been dragged in neck-deep as they hauled on the lines.

The grating steadied across the current, and they let it fall away at a

more sedate pace, down towards the open gap in the wall. As it began to

slew towards one bank, Sapper lifted his right arm and windmilled it.

Obediently, Mek's team on the far bank paid out rope and Nicholas's team

on the near bank picked it up. Once again the grating was lined up on

the gap.

"Rock and roll. Close the hole," bellowed Sapper, and now the full

current was too powerful to resist. It dragged both teams into the river

until some of them were in over their heads, losing their hold on the

lines and floundering and swimming. However, those men who still had

their footing managed to slow the rush of the grating just enough to

prevent it smashing out of control into the dam. It settled firmly

across the gap, like a mammoth plug in the outlet of a giant's bathtub,

and instantly the current was cut off.

While the men in the water struggled ashore, their bodies wet and

gleaming in the sunlight, Sapper threw off the cables from his tow hitch

and roared along the bank with the front-ender in its highest gear. As

it passed him, Nicholas grabbed a handhold and swung himself up on to

the footplate behind Sapper's seat.

"Got to shore up now, before the grating bursts," Sapper yelled.

From his vantage point, clinging to the rear of the tall machine,

Nicholas had a moment to assess the Position.

The dam was holding, but only just. Numerous jets of water spurted

through every gap between the grating and the gabions. The pressure of

water against the sheets of PVc in the grating was enormous. It was

taking the full thrust of the river, flexing and bowing before it like a

castle Portcullis attacked with a battering ram.

Sapper picked up one of the gabions that were standing ready on the bank

and drove down into the river bed below the dam. The flow of the water

had shrivelled to a mere knee-deep trickle. jets of water squirted

through every chink in the wall, and the gabions were not impermeable;

ay through the tightly packed stones.

water was finding its was the front-ender churned and lurched over the

rough bed at the back of the wall, Nicholas and Sapper were drenched by

the jets spurting over them. It was like working rove in close behind

the under a cold shower. Sapper straining grating and placed the heavy

gabion against it.

He threw the tractor into reverse and climbed up the bank to pick up

another gabion, Slowly he built up a retaining the gabions in sloping

wall behind the grating, placin s, until this revetment was as strong as

the side piers.

rank Nicholas jumped down from the tractor and left Sapper to it while

he ran back upstream to the canal that the teams had dug at the head of

the valley. Most of the banks of this cutting workers had gathered along

the Nicholas saw both Royan and Tessay in the already, an front row of

the excited crowd.

is way -through to Royan's side, and Nicholas pushed she grabbed his

hand. it's working, Nicky. The dam wall is holding."

Even as they watched they could see the level of the trapped waters

rising up the wall of grating and gabions.

While the men chattered and laughed and urged it on, the river lapped at

the entrance of the canal.

the Fifty men seized their tools and jumped down int bottom of the

canal. Dust flew in clouds as they shovelled the broken earth aside to

lead the first trickle of water into the mouth of the canal. The men on

the banks above them and a thin snake whooped and chanted to encourage

them, of river water found its way into the mouth of the canalTan ahead

of it, The men with the mattocks and shovels it on down the cutting.

Every time it met any enticing obstruction and faltered, they fell upon

the blockage and tore it away.

the gradient fall At last the thin trickle of water felt away as the

valley opened before it. The trickle increased to a freshet, and then to

a torrent. With its new strength it gouged out the canal and burst

through with the full flow of the river behind it.

The men in the bottom of the cutting yelled with fright at the

suddenness and ferocity of it, and scrambled up the sides of the canal.

But some of them were not quick enough and were swept away, struggling

and screaming for help. The men on the banks ran alongside them,

throwing ropes and dragging them sodden and muddy from the flood.

Now the river roared through the canal and tore on down the valley,

rediscovering the ancient course that it had not followed for thousands

of years. For almost an hour they stood upon the bank watching it, for

it exercised over them the particular spell that turbulent waters always

have over men. They were forced to retreat step by step as the river cut

the banks out from under their feet.

At last Nicholas roused himself, and went back to where Sapper was still

shoring up the dam wall. By now he had erected a sloping revetment on

the downstream side of the dam wall, with four rows of gabions on the

bottom course gradually narrowing as it reached the top of the retaining

wall. For the time being the dam was secure, the vulnerable grating had

been shored up with the heavy, stone-filled mesh baskets, and the

overflow through the canal into the valley had relieved much of the

pressure upon it.

"Do you think it will hold?" Royan eyed the structure with suspicion.

"Until the rains come, we hope." Nicholas drew her away. "We don't want

to waste any more time here. Time to go on downstream to begin work at

Taita's pool."

hey followed the banks of the new river that they had created, down

the length of the long 6- valley. At places they were forced to detour

higher up the slope because the overflow from the dam had cut away and

submerged the old trail. Eventually they reached the confluence of the

stream that had as its source the butterfly fountain that they had

explored with Tamre.

They paused on the bank, and Nicholas and Royan looked at each other

wordlessly. The stream had dried up.

Turning aside, they followed the empty stream bed up the hills and at

last scrambled out on to the ledge from which the butterfly fountain had

poured. The cave was still surrounded by lush green ferris, but it was

like the eye socket in a skull, dark and empty.

"The spring has dried up!" Royan . "The dam -Iispere has shrivelled it.

That's the proof that the fountain was fed from Taita's pool, Now we

have diverted the river we have killed the fountain." Her eyes were

bright and sparkling with excitement. "Come on. Let's waste no more time

here.

Let's get on up to Taita's pool."

'Nicholas was the first one down into Taita's pool. This time, he had a

bosun's chair to sit in and a properly rigged block and tackle to lower

him over the cliff. As he swung down around the overhang of the cliff,

the chair swung awkwardly against the rock and the thumb of his right

hand was trapped between the wooden seat of the chair and the wall. He

exclaimed with the pain and, when he wrenched it free, he found that the

skin had been torn from the knuckle and that blood was oozing up and

dripping down his legs. It was painful -but not serious, and he sucked

the wound clean. It was still weeping drops of blood but he had, no time

to attend to the injury now.

He was around the overhang, and the abyss opened under him, sombre and

repellent. His eye was drawn irresistibly to the engraving on the wall,

etched between the vertical rows of niches. Now that he knew what to

look for, he could make out the outline of the maimed hawk. It cheered

and encouraged him. Since their flight from the gorge over a month

previously he had often been haunted by the feeling that they had

imagined it all, that the cartouche of Taita was a hallucination, and

that when they returned they would find the cliff wall smooth and

unblemished. But there it was, the signpost and the promise.

He peered down past his own feet to the bottom of the gorge, and saw at

once that the waterfall above the pool had been reduced to a trickle.

The water still coming down the smooth black chute of polished rock was

that which was filtering through the gaps and chinks in the dam wall

upstream and the last drainage from the sandbanks and the pools higher

up the gorge.

The level of the great Pool under him had fallen drastically. He could.

make out the highwater level by the wet markings on the rock cliff.

Fifty feet of the wall that had previously been submerged was now

exposed. Another eight pairs of chiselled niches were visible in the

face Where once he had been forced to swim down to them, they were now

high and dry.

However, the pool was not completely drained. It was dished below the

level of the downstream outlet, so that it was unable to empty itself by

gravitational flow. There was still a puddle of black water trapped in

the centre, with a narrow ledge surrounding it. Nicholas landed on this

ledge and stepped out of the bosun's chair. It was strange to stand on

firm rock down here where last he had struggled for his life and very

nearly been sucked under and drowned.

He looked up to where beams of sunlight penetrated the upper levels of

the chasm. It was like being in the bottom of a mineshaft, and he

shuddered at the feel of the clammy air on his bare arms and the eerie

sensation in the pit of his stomach. He tugged on the line to send the

rope chair back to the surface, and then edged his way along the

slippery rock ledge towards the cliff face where the rows of dark niches

stood out clearly against the lighter stone.

Now he could make out the shape of the opening in the wall that had so

nearly sucked him down into its dark and slimy throat. It was almost

completely submerged in a deeper corner where the pool flowed back

against the cliff.

All that was visible above the surface was the top arch of an irregular

entrance at the foot of the descending rows of niches. The rest of it

was still submerged.

The ledge narrowed as he worked his way along the foot of the cliff

until he had his back to the rock and was moving sideways with his toes

in the water. Eventually he could go no further without actually

stepping down into the water. He had no way of judging the depth of the

waters, which were turbid and uninviting.

Still trying to keep his feet dry, he squatted down on the narrow ledge

and leaned out so far that his balance as threatened. He steadied

himself with one hand against the wall, and with the other reached out

towards the partially submerged opening.

The lip of the hole was smooth, as he had remembered it, and once again

it seemed to him that it was too square and straight to be anything

other than man-made. As he rolled up his sleeve he noticed that his

injured thumb was still bleeding, but he ignored it and thrust his arm

down below the surface of the pool. He groped downwards, trying to trace

the sill of the opening, He felt what seemed to be blocks of roughly

dressed masonry, and reached down further until the water reached

halfway up his biceps.

Suddenly some living creature, swift and weighty, swirled in the dark

waters right in front of his face, and as an immediate reflex he jerked

his arm out of the water.

The thing followed his arm up to the surface, slashing at his bare flesh

with long, needle'sharp fangs, and he had a glimpse of a head as evil

and villainous as that of a barracuda' He realized instinctively that it

must have been attracted by the smell of the blood from his injured

thumb.

He leaped to his feet and teetered on the narrow ledge, clutching his

arm. Only one of the creature's frontal fangs had touched him, but it

had opened the skin like a razor cut, a long shallow wound across the

back of his right hand from which fresh blood dribbled and splattered

into the pool at his feet.

Instantly the black waters seemed to come alive, roiling and seething

with frenzied writhing aquatic shapes.

Nicholas, his back flattened against the rock wall, stared down at them

with loathing and horror. He could vaguely make out the shape of them,

sinuous and ribbonlike, some of them as thick as his calf, black and

gleaming.

One of them thrust its head out on to the ledge and snapped its jaws.

Its eyes were huge and glistening and its snout was elongated, the long

jaws lined with fangs that overlapped its thin lips. The body behind the

head was six feet long, and lashed like a whip as it drove itself high

up on to the ledge, reaching out for Nicholas's bare legs. He shouted

with revulsion and leaped back, stumbling and splashing on to safer

footing. Clutching his bleeding hand, stare aC Ae evi . aead had

disappeared, but the surface of the pool was still agitated by the lithe

ophidian shapes.

"Eels!the realized. "Giant tropical eels."

Of course the blood had excited them. The fall in the water-level had

trapped them in the pool, congregated them in such numbers that they had

probably already devoured the fish that they depended upon for food. Now

they were ravenous. Probably all the pools of water that remained in the

abyss were infested with these fearsome creatures. He was thankful that

during his last swim in this pool he had not bled into the water.

He unwound the cotton kerchief from his neck and wrapped it round his

wounded hand. The eels were a deadly threat to any attempt to explore

the opening in the cliff.

A, il " the pool of 1V But already he was considering ways of ridding

them and of gaining access to the underwater opening.

Slowly the frenzy in the pool quietened and its surface grew still

again, Nicholas looked up to see the bosun's chair descending, with

Royan's slim, shapely legs dangling below the wooden seat.

"What have you found?" she called down to him excitedly. "Is there a

tunnel-' then she broke off suddenly as she saw the blood on his

clothing, and the bandage wathing his hand.

"Oh dear God," she exclaimed. "What have you done?

You are hurt. How badly?" Her feet touched the ledge beside him and she

slid from the chair and took his injured hand gently. "What have you

done to yourself?"

"It's not as bad as it looks, he assured her. "Lots of blood but not

deep."

"How did you do it?" she insisted.

For an answer he tore a corner off the bloodstained kerchief. "Watch!"

he instructed her, wadding it into a ball and tossing it out into the

pool.

Royan screamed with horror as the waters boiled with the long fleeting

shapes. One of them wriggled half its monstrous length out on to the

ledge, before flopping back.

It left a shining trail of silver slime across the black stones.

"Taita has left his guard dogs to see us A' Nicholas remarked. "We are

going to have to take care of those beauties before we can explore the

entrance below the surface."

/4P- -I he bamboo scaffolding that Sapper and Nicholas had built down

the cliff was L*, - anchored in the niches that had been cut into the

rock nearly four thousand years before. Taita had probably lashed his

framework together with bark rope, but Sapper had used heavy-gauge

galvanized wire, and the structure was strong enough to bear the weight

of many men. The Buffaloes formed a living chain and passed all the

material and equipment down the scaffolding from hand to hand.

The very first piece of equipment to reach the floor Of the cavern was

the portable Honda EM500 generator.

Sapper connected it up to the lights that he had rigged along the foot

of the cliff. The small petrol engine ran smoothly and quietly, but the

amount of power it put out was impressive. The floodlights chased the

shadows from the furthest corners of the cavern, and lit the deep rock

bowl like a stage.

Immediately the mood changed. Everybody became more cheerful and

confident. There was laughter and excited chatter from the chain of men

on the scaffolding as Royan climbed down to join Sapper and Nicholas at

the side of the pool.

"Now that we know that they are working, switch off those lights,'

Nicholas ordered.

"It's so dark and gloomy without them," Royan protested.

"Saving fuel," Nicholas explained. "No filling station on the corner. We

only have two hundred litres in reserve, and although the little Honda

is pretty economical we have to be careful We don't know how long we are

going to need it in the tunnel."

Royan shrugged with resignation, and when Sapper cut the generator the

cavern was plunged once more into gloom and shadow. She looked at the

dark pool and pulled a face.

"What are you going to do about those horrid pets of yours?" she

demanded, glancing at Nicholas's bandaged right hand.

"Sapper and I have worked out a plan. We thought of trying to empty the

pool completely, using a bucket chain.

But the amount of water still coming down the river bed makes that a

poor choice."

"We would be lucky to hold our own against that flow, even working

around the clock with buckets," Sapper grunted. "If only the major had

thought to bring along a high-speed water pump-'

"Even I can't think of everything, Sapper. What we are going to do is to

build a small coffer dam around the riderwater opening, and bale that

out with buckets."

Royan stood back and watched the preparations. Half a dozen of the empty

mesh gabions were carried down the scaffolding and placed at the edge of

the pool. Here they were partially filled with boulders that the men

gathered up from the river bed. However the gabions were not filled so

full that they became too heavy to handle. There was no front-ender down

here to move them around, and they would be forced to rely on

old-fashioned manpower. There was just sufficient of the yellow PVC

sheeting left over to wrap around each gabion and render it waterproof.

"What about your eels?" Royan was fascinated by these loathsome

creatures, and she hung well back from the edge of the pool. "You can't

send any of your men in there!

"Watch and learn." Nicholas grinned at her. "I have a little treat in

store for your favourite fish."

Once all the preparations for the construction of the coffer were

complete, Nicholas cleared the cavern, sending Royan and Sapper and all

of the men up the scaffolding.

He alone remained at the edge of the pool, with the bag of fragmentation

grenades that he had begged from Mek Nimmur slung over his shoulder.

With a grenade in each hand, he hesitated. "Seven second delay," he

reminded himself "Quenton-Harper dry flies. More effective than the

Royal Coachman!'

He pulled the pins from each of the grenades and then lobbed them out

into the middle of the pool. Quickly he turned away and hurried to the

furthest corner of the cavern. He knelt with his face to the rock wall

and covered his ears with both hands.

Squeezing his eyes shut, he braced himself. The rock floor jumped under

him and the double shock waves from the explosions swept over him in

quick succession, with a savage power that drove in his chest and

stopped his breath. In the confines of the chasm the detonations were

thunderous, but his ears were protected and the deep water of the pool

absorbed much of the blast. A twin fountain of water shot high into the

air and splashed against the cliff above his head. It poured down in a

sheet over him, soaking his clothing.

As the echoes died away, he stood up, His hearing had not been adversely

affected, and he had suffered no injury other than the shower of cold

water. Back at the edge of the pool the water shimmered with movement.

Scores of the great eels flopped and writhed on the surface, flashing

their white bellies as they twisted. Many of them were dead, their

bellies burst open, floating inert, while others were merely stunned by

the blast. Knowing how tenaciously they clung to life he suspected that

they would soon recover, but for the time being they were no longer a

danger.

He bellowed up toward the top of the cliff. "All clear, Sapper. Send

them down."

The men came swarming down the scaffolding, amazed by the carnage that

the grenades had wreaked in the pool.

They lined the bank and began to fish out the bodies of the dead eels.

"You eat them?" Nicholas demanded of one of the monks.

"Very good!" The monk rubbed his belly in anticipation.

"Enough of that, you greedy perishers." SappeT drove them back to work.

"Let's get those gabions in place before they wake up and start eating

you."

With a bamboo pole Nicholas sounded the depth of the water that covered

the entrance to the shaft, and found that it was well over the height of

a man's head. They were forced to roll the gabions down into it, and

complete the filling once they were in position. It was difficult and

taxing work, and took almost two days to complete, but at last they had

built a half-moon-shaped weir around the under, water entrance, walling

it off from the main body of water in the pool.

Using leather buckets and clay tej pots the Buffaloes began to bale out

the coffer and scoop the water over the wall into the main pool.

Nicholas and Royan watched with silent trepidation as the level in the

coffer fell and the opening in the cliff was gradually revealed.

Very soon they were able to see that it was almost rectangular, about

three metres wide by two metres high, The sides and the roof had been

eroded by the rush of water through the opening, but as the level fell

lower they could see the remains of shaped stone blocks that had

probably once sealed the opening. Four courses of them I still stood

where the ancient masons had placed them across the threshold of the

opening, but the others had been torn out by thousands of years of flood

seasons and thrown into the tunnel behind, partially blocking it.

Ea erly Nicholas climbed down into the coffer. It was not yet empty but

he could not control his impatience.

The water was knee-deep as he crawled forward into the opening, and with

his bare hands tried to shift some of the rock debris that choked it.

"It's definitely some sort of shaft," he shouted back, and Royan could

not restrain herself either. She came slithering and sloshing down into

the offer, and pushed into the opening beside him.

"There's an obstruction," she cried in disappointment.

"Did Taita do that deliberately?"

might have," Nicholas gave his opinion. "Hard to tell.

A lot of this rubble and flotsam has been sucked in from the main flow

of the river, but he might have filled the tunnel behind him as he

pulled out."

"It's going to take a tremendous amount of work just to clear it enough

to find out where this passage leads to." Royan's voice had lost its

ring of excitement.

"I am afraid it is," Nicholas agreed. "We are going to have to clear

every bit of this rubbish by hand, and there won It be time for the

niceties of formal archaeological excavation. We are just going to rip

it out." He clambered back out of the coffer, and reached back to hand

her up the bank. "Well, at least we have the-floodlights he added, "We

can keep the men working in shifts, night and day, until we get

through."

hey have dammed the Dandera river," said Nahoot Ouddabi, and Gotthold

von Schiller stared at him in astonishment.

"Dammed the river? Are you certain?"he demanded.

"Yes, Herr von Schiller. We have a report from our spy in Harper's camp.

He has over three hundred men working in the gorge. That is not all. He

has air-dropped huge amounts of equipment and supplies. It is like

a.military operation. Our spy tells us that he even has an earth, moving

machine, some sort of tractor, which he has brought in."

Von Schiller looked across the table at Jake Helm for confirmation, and

Helm nodded. "Yes, Herr von Schiller.

That is true. Harper must have spent a large amount of money. The air

charter alone could have cost him fifty grand."

Von Schiller felt the first stirrings of real passion since the "Urgent

satellite message had summoned him from Frankfurt. He had flown directly

to Addis Ababa, where the jet Ranger had been waiting to carry him to

the Pegasus base camp on the escarpment above the Abbay gorge.

If this was true, and he did not doubt Helm's word, then Harper was on

to something of enormous importance.

He looked out of the window of the Quonset hut to where flowed down the

valley below the base camp.

the Dandera It was a large river. To dam that volume of water would be

an expensive and difficult project in this remote and primitive

situation - not a project to be taken on lightly without the prospect of

substantial reward.

He felt a reluctant admiration for the Englishman's achievement. "Show

me where he has placed his dam!" he ordered, and Helm came around the

table to stand beside him. Von Schiller was standing on his block, and

their eyes were on the same level.

Helm bent over the satellite photograph and carefully marked in the site

of the dam. They both studied it for a minute, and then von Schiller

asked, "What do you make of it, Helm?"

Helm shook his head, hunching it down on his bulllike shoulders. "I can

only guess."

"Guess then," said von Schiller, but still Helm all, hesitated.

"Go on!'

"Either he wants to move the water to another area downstream, to use it

for washing out a deposit, gold nuggets or artefacts made of precious

metals, perhaps even site of the to use it for hosing the overburden off

the tomb,$

"Highly unlikely!" von Schiller interjected. "That would be an

inefficient and expensive manner of excavation."

"I agree that it is far-fetched." Nahoot obsequiously followed von

Schiller's lead, but no one even looked at him.

"What is your other supposition?" Von Schiller glared at Helm.

"The only other reason for damming the river, that I can think of, would

be to reach something that has been covered by the water. Something

lying in the bed of the river."

"That is more logical," von Schiller mused, and turned his attention

back to the photograph. "What is there below this dam site?"

"The river enters a deep and narrow ravine here." Helm pointed at the

spot. "Just below his dam. The ravine stretches about eight miles, down

to this point, just above the monastery. I have flown over it in the

helicopter, and it seems to be impassable, and yet-' he broke off, "Yes,

go on! And yet - what?"

"On one flight over the area, we found Harper and the woman on the high

ground above the ravine. They were at this spot here." He touched the

photograph, and von Schiller leaned forward to peer at it.

"What were they doing there?" he demanded, without looking up.

"Nothing. They were merely sitting on the top of the cliff above the

ravine."

"But they were aware of your presence?"

"Of course. We were in the helicopter. They heard our approach. They

were watching us, and Harper even waved."

And so they would have ceased whatever activity they were engaged in

when they became aware of your approach?"

Von Schiller was silent for so long that they began to fidget

uncomfortably and exchange glances. When he spoke it was so unexpected

that Nahoot started.

"Harper obviously has reason to believe that the tomb lies in the gorge

below the dam. When and how do you make contact with your spy that you

have in Harper's camp?"

"Harper is receiving some of his supplies from the villages here on the

escarpment. The women are driving down slaughter cattle to feed his men,

and carrying down pots of tej. Out man sends back his reports with the

women when they return."

"Very well. Very well!" Von Schiller waved him to silence. "I don't need

to know his life history. All I want to know is if Harper is working in

the ravine below his dam.

How soon can you find this out?"

"By the day after tomorrow at the latest," Helm promised him.

Von Schiller turned to Colonel Nogo at the far end Of the conference

table. So far he had not spoken, but had watched and listened quietly to

the others.

"How many men have you deployed in this area?" von Schiller asked.

"Three full companies, over three hundred men. All well trained. Many

are battle-hardened veterans."

"Where are they? Show me on the map."

The colonel came to stand beside him. "One company here, another

billeted at the village of Debra Maryam, and the third company at the

foot of the escarpment, ready to move forward and attack Harper's camp."

"I think you should attack them now. Wipe them out, before they can

uncover the tomb-' Nahoot came in again.

"Shut your mouth," von Schiller snapped' without looking up at Nahoot.

"I will ask for your opinion when I need it."

He considered the map for a while longer, then asked Nogo, "How many men

has this guerrilla commander, what is his name, the one who has allied

himself to Harper?"

"Mek Nimmur is no a guerrilla. He is a bandit, and notorious shufta

terrorist," Nogo corrected him hotly.

"One man's freedom fighter is the next man's terrorist," von Schiller

remarked drily. "How many men has he under his command?"

"Not many. Fewer than a hundred, perhaps no more than fifty. He has them

all guarding Harper's camp, and the dam."

Von Schiller nodded to himself, plucking at the lobe of his ear. "How

did Harper and his gang return to Ethiopia?" he mused. "I know he flew

from Malta, but it is not possible that the aircraft could have landed

down there in the gorge."

He hopped down off his block and strutted to the window of the hut

through which he had a panoramic view spread below him. He stared down

into the depths of the gorge, a vista of cliffs and broken hilltops and

wild tablelands, smoked blue with distance.

"How did they get in without being discovered by the authorities? Did he

parachute in, the same way as he dropped his supplies?"

"No, said Nogo. "My informer tells us that he marched in with Mek

Nimmut, some days before the supplies were dropped to him."

"So from where did he march?" von Schiller pondered.

"Where is the nearest airfield where a heavy aircraft could land?"

"If he came in with Mek Nimmur, then they almost certainly came in from

the Sudan. That is where Nimmur operates from. There are many old

abandoned airfields near the border. The war," Nogo shrugged

expressively, "the armies are always on the move, that war has been

going on for twenty years."

"From the Sudan?" Von Schiller picked out the border on the map. "So

they must have trekked in along the river."

"Almost certainly,'Nogo agreed.

"Then just as certainly Harper plans to escape the same way. I want you

to move the company of men that you have at Debra Maryam and deploy them

here and here. On both banks of the river, below the monastery. They

must be in a position to prevent Harper reaching the Sudanese border,

if he should try to make a run for it."

"Yes. Good! I understand. That is good tactics," Nogo nodded gloatingly,

his eyes bright behind the tenses of his spectacles.

"Then I want your remaining men moved down to the foot of the

escarpment. Tell them to avoid contact with Mek Nimmur's men, but to be

in a position to move forward very quickly and seize the dam area, and

to block off the ravine below the dam as soon as I give you the word."

When will that be?"Nogo asked.

"We will continue to watch him carefully. If he makes a discovery, he

will start moving the artefacts out. Many of them will be too large to

conceal. Your informer will know about it. That is when we will move in

on him."

"You should move in now, Herr von Schiller," Nahoot advised him, "before

he gets a chance to open the tomb."

"Don't be an idiot," von Schiller snarled at him. "If we strike too

soon, we might never discover what he obviously has learned about the

whereabouts of the tomb."

"We could force him-'

"If I have learned anything in my life, it is that you. cannot force a

man like Harper. There is a certain type of Englishman - I remember

during the last war with them' He broke off and frowned. "No. They are

very' difficult people. We must not rush it now. When Harper makes a

discovery in the ravine, that will be the time to pounce."

The frown faded and he smiled a small, cold smile. "The waiting game. In

the meantime, we play the waiting game."

The debris that filled the shaft was not so tightly packed that it

completely blocked the flow of water through it. If it had done so,

Nicholas would never have been sucked in by the current, as he had been

on his first dive into the pool. There were still gaps in the blockage

where the larger boulders had lodged or where a treetrunk en sucked in.

and jammed sideways across the width of the tunnel. Through these

sections the water had found the weak spots and kept them open.

Nevertheless, the debris had taken centuries to wedge itself in, and it

required back-breaking effort to prise it apart. The clearing operation

was further hampered by the lack of working space in the shaft. Only

three or four of the big men from the Buffaloes were able to work in the

shaft at -any one time. The rest of the team were employed in passing

back the rubble as it was levered out.

Nicholas changed the shifts every hour. They had more labour than they

needed, and changing them often meant that the men at the face were

always rested and strong, and eager to earn the bonus of silver dollars

that Nicholas promised them for their progress along the shaft.

At each change of shift, Nicholas disappeared into the mouth of the

tunnel with Sapper's steel tape and measured the advance.

"One hundred and twenty feet! Well done, the Buffaloes," he told Hansith

Sherif, the foreman monk, and then watched the water tric ing past is

feet. The floor of the tunnel was still sloping downwards at a constant

angle. He looked back along it towards the pool, and now in the

floodlights the rectangular shape of the walls was very clear to see. It

was obvious that the tunnel had been designed and surveyed by an

engineer.

He transferred his attention back to the floor of the tunnel and watched

the run of water, trying to judge how deep they were below the original

river level.

"Eighty or ninety feet," he estimated. "No wonder the pressure in the

mouth of the tunnel almost crushed me-' he broke off as an unusually

shaped fragment in the muck at his feet caught his eye. He stooped and

picked it up.

Then took it to one of the floodlamps and by its light examined it

closely. As he rubbed it clean between finger and thumb, he began to

grin.

Sloshing back along the tunnel, he yelled, "Royan!" Triumphantly

brandishing the fragment, he demanded, "What do you make of that, then?"

She was sitting on the wall.of the coffer, and reached down and snatched

the object out of his grasp.

I "Oh, sweet Mary! Where did you find this, Nicky?"

"Lying in the mud. Right there in the adit, where it's been for the last

four thousand years. Where one of Taita's workmen dropped and broke it,

probably while he was sneaking a sup of wine behind the slave driver's

back."

Eagerly Royan held the broken shard of pottery up to the lamplight. "You

are right, Nicky," she exclaimed. "It's part of a wine vessel. Look at

the flared neck and belled lip. But if there was any doubt, which there

isn't, the black firing around the rim dates it perfectly in our period.

No older than 2000 BC."

Still clutching the fragment of broken pottery, she jumped down into the

mud and slush of the coffer and flung both arms around his neck.

"Further proof, Nicky. We are on Taita's tracks. Can't you get them to

clear any faster? We are breathing down the back of the old rogue's

neck."

Halfway through the next shift an excited yelling echoed out of the

mouth of the tunnel, and Nicholas hurried back down to the face.

"What is it, Hansith?" he demanded in Arabic of the foreman monk. "What