Elizabeth encounters the Veiled Lady while Jon runs afoul of the Residency while seeking answers.
Additional music by:
In the Persian Market by Mar Knox
Signs To Nowhere by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com
If you like THWDY, tell people about us! It will help us grow!
Elizabeth encounters the Veiled Lady while Jon runs afoul of the Residency while seeking answers.
Additional music by:
In the Persian Market by Mar Knox
Signs To Nowhere by Shane Ivers - https://www.silvermansound.com
If you like THWDY, tell people about us! It will help us grow!
THIS HOUSE WILL DEVOUR YOU: THE HUNGRY TOMB Season Two
A Podcast concerning love, madness, mystery, murder and dead gods in 1920's Ireland, England and Egypt.
THWDY Episode 2.07
'Out of the Shadows'
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Luxor,
15th February 1926
My dear Jon,
I am very glad to hear that you are better, although concerned to know that you have been unwell in Cairo. Was it the sparkling water? Anyway, best wishes for a speedy recovery and perhaps you will make it to Luxor before the expedition sets off? I have heard from Celia that George is recovered, which is wonderful. That essence must have worked!
Things are strange here as well, and I too, have had a vision, which, although unnerving, was I feel overall a rather positive experience, for myself, at least. The morning after the incident with Mabel’s drink and Irina’s hysterical outburst we docked in Luxor, and after picking up the post and your telegram, we are now free to be tourists for a day or two while the expedition materials are being unloaded and transferred to the railway depot, for the train that will take us to El Kharga.
There has of course been some delay in terms of reporting the missing waiter to the authorities, but there is no sign of him, and the expedition, it seems, will continue as planned.
I was quite happy to be spending some time ashore and decked myself out in a fine white muslin dress and a shady hat that were both trophies from the Cairo cloth bazaar. I was very anxious to do a tour of the fine temples of Karnak, and as Expedition Scholar I thought it was my due. But I could find no suitable company – the Americans seemed to want to stay aboard and lounge on the after deck, and I was keen not to get too close to Hayley after the mishap with the dress. Jeremy and Artie were both busy with managing the cargo, Mr Ashraf I think went ashore, to interview for a cook, Irina was still nowhere to be seen, and despite the good news about the essence, I deplored the idea of Sir Malcolm as a companion. It would have been nice if Mabel could have joined me. I spoke to her briefly after breakfast, to ensure she had recovered from nearly being poisoned, and we had a lovely conversation about the incomparably rich and diverse history of ancient Egypt, the stunning antiquities that are embedded into the landscape, and the contrast and connection with Nubia. However she was dressed in a rather fetching pyjama suit in dusky pink with a feathery trim, not really ready for going ashore, and I sensed she would rather take it easy after the action of the previous night.
For me, however, it might be my only chance to see Karnak and it was therefore a pleasant surprise when, on going to the Purser’s office to enquire about a tour, that I bumped into none other than Dr Rookfield! Given our short history of chance encounters, this was less astonishing to me than maybe it should have been. Had I any hopes that he and you had travelled together they were quickly dashed when Rookfield explained how he had flown from Marseilles and set off from Cairo two days ago by train.
“Would love to have come by water, but alas, ‘twere not to be,” he said. “And now it seems I’ll be taking a room at the Winter Palace until your expedition train leaves, which isn’t for another day or so. You are looking very soignee, Miss Sanderson, if I might make so bold as to say so. I would be more than happy to accompany you to the ancient ruins of Karnak.” With a word – and possibly a banknote – to the Purser, he had organised the redirection of his luggage to the hotel, hailed a camel cart – and we were off!
I don’t know your opinion of the man, now that you have spent some time with him, and I too remain unsure as to his real motivations. But he seems to have turned out in support of me that time at the Society of Esoterica, and he had helped you with saving Lily from a fate which a classical scholar like she surely did not deserve, so I am inclined to trust him – up to a point. He seemed to be already well aware of the rumours of the curse supposedly afflicting our little expedition, this deadly dog-headed man and such nonsense. Or at least that’s how I still thought of it that sunny February morning in Karnak.
I was only too happy to have some erudite company as we explored the magnificent temple, its many high columns arrayed in a tight grid, their capitals designed as palm trees reaching to the sun. Guides for climbing were touting their services, and considering the sheer scale of the pillars gave me a shudder of vertigo, daring to think what it might be like to be atop them. The strong light cast striking shadows in the gaps between the columns. Even at ground level, it was a dizzying effect and several times I had to blink my eyes and shake my head, to be sure I wasn’t suffering an optical illusion.
It was at one of these times that it happened. I had got separated from Rookfield in the stone forest. The contrast between sun and shade was so intense I thought I was seeing things when a shadowy figure emanated from within one of the dark space s. I felt suddenly weak and sat down on a nearby broken column and as I did so, the figure took shape and emerged. It was a tall Egyptian woman, dressed in a long tunic, her face obscured by a gauzy black veil. It was the veiled woman I had seen several days ago in the Shepheard’s Hotel foyer.
I tried to convince myself that it was just a trick of the light, mixed with a touch of the sun, and vowed that as soon as Rookfield turned up we would go and find a cafe for some tea. But the figure advanced, and reached out a hand towards me, middle-aged but strong, with a large signet ring on it on which was a hieroglyph sign of a circle inside horns. I was, I have to say, utterly mesmerised, and although I think I heard a faint yell, I paid no heed to anything other than the apparition standing before me.
“I am all that is, that was, that will be,” sighed the figure, almost just as a breath, rather than words. “No mortal has yet lifted my veil.”
She was tall, leaning over me as I sat there. I could see the whites of her eyes behind the veil and got a hint of powerfully strong dark features. Those eyes! They bored into me and gave me a premonition that if I were to see her face it would be my annihilation, that while I might learn everything there is - to know, in doing so, it would destroy me.
Her hand came forward and caressed my face. I could not move, though my heart was beating fast and I wanted to run. Her fingers were warm and alive, but despite the heat, I shivered then, at her touch. I shrugged off the hypnotic effect for long enough to look over my shoulder, but no sign of Rookfield or indeed any other tourists. All seemed to have completely disappeared. I was alone with the Veiled Lady.
“E-liz-a-beth,” breathed the spectre, like she was trying out how my name sounded. Now I was both afraid and disconcerted.
“Child,” she said softly, and despite myself I bristled at that epithet, “you are unlike the others, those you travel with. You have done a great magic in recent times but in doing so, you have left the door to your soul open.”
She paused, then said more harshly, “Foolish girl.”
She leaned in now, the lace of her veil inches from my face, the hand that had caressed gently, now gripping me firmly by the back of my head, hard enough to hurt.
“I will take that which is offered even if unwittingly. I accept your invitation.”
I had a blinding stab of pain in my head then and a light that hurt was forming in front of my eyes. I’ve never had a migraine but I imagine this was very much what one must be like.
I couldn’t see clearly anymore but I heard the Veiled Lady say in a fading voice,
“Evil travels with you but I cannot see it clearly. Everyone must die, but you, Elizabeth, you I will keep.”
The pain and light faded. The Veiled Lady was gone. Once more the sun beat down hard on both me and the bleached ruins that surrounded me. Terrified, I gathered my bag and hat and ran, ran away down those long corridors of pillars, palm groves made of stone, caring not for the light and shadow, stumbling almost, but with momentum keeping me on my feet, until I gained the entrance, a great avenue of identical stone figures, but facing away, so it was their behinds, their curled tails, that the visitor saw. I had a mental flashback then to the cat in the bazaar, whose essence does in fact seem to have cured George! and recalled that the animal is a favourite in the Egyptian pantheon. The thought and memory reassured me slightly. But these figures were different, horned animal-headed, and the thought of that wretched curse quickly dispelled any ease I might have gained.
At the gateway to the temple, Rookfield was lounging against a post, eating an ice cream; looking as calm and composed as if he was on a day trip to Henley Regatta.
“Where have you been, Elizabeth?” he asked. “I got one for you too but it was melting so I’ve had to eat them both.”
Suffice it to say that we ended the tour there and then and returned to the boat. But I did not tell Rookfield what I had seen. I find myself blushing slightly even as I write this. Until this incident, speaking with the Veiled Lady, no-one has actually alluded to my actions on that cold December dawn at Clatbury when I invoked the ancient forces to bond me to you at Kilphaun and to exorcise your demons. Aunt Edith did write me a rather reprimanding letter about it when I was in the sanatorium with suspected pneumonia, but I don’t think she realised it was my intention to be completely undressed for the spell to work. I was never really sure to be honest but it seems as though it not only worked, but that it was a great magic. I am beginning to feel less afraid and even, I am ashamed to admit, slightly self-satisfied. Clearly though there were proper wards or some such that I did not know about. Well I was surrounded by Egypt and Egyptologists, so I vowed that once I felt recovered and had left Rookfield to his unpacking, I would be a scholar and do some research. If I have accidently let something into me, I want to know what it is.
On the way back to the boat, Rookfield asked about Irina and seemed very concerned when I said I hadn’t seen her since the previous night. In fact, with the incident of Mabel’s drink and the waiter, who’d doubtless had malicious intent, I wonder myself that I hadn’t raised the alarm. Mabel had mentioned her this morning though, something about visiting the Luxor museum where there were some Nubian elements, and I think from that comment I had assumed she must be all right.
As we approached the boat, I was spared the uncertainty of Irina’s whereabouts, as we came upon the girl herself, mooching – there is no other word for it – aimlessly along the riverfront, a sketchbook in one hand, and dragging a paintbrush in the other against the railings, making a rhythmic ringing noise much as a child might. Rookfield was delighted to see her and rushed forward with greetings, but she gave him that same thousand yard stare that I had received the previous night, and when I asked wouldn’t she come and take tea with us on the boat, she shook her head slowly and continued on her languorous way. Rookfield seemed very concerned, rather peremptorily grilled me for further details on the change in her, and abruptly decided to go straight back to his hotel.
As I boarded the boat, once again there seemed to be havoc and confusion. Jeremy, Mr Ashraf and a crowd of others were at the Purser’s desk, with Jeremy saying, “this can’t be true....did he really go alone....? But surely it’s safe..... what a tragedy!”
“He is in the hospital,” said Mr Ashraf calmly. “The police are on their way.”
“Elizabeth!” Jeremy called, seeing me. “Did you go to Karnak today?” In response to my nod, he said, “Did you see old Trevor with you?” Trevor was one of the crowd I had met in the Ezbekiyya nightclub. This time I shook my head.
“The fellow’s only got himself thrown off the top of the temple and broken every bone in his body,” said Jeremy sombrely. “Is that even possible?”
“It’s very high,” I said, my earlier misgivings flooding back. “I wouldn’t like to be standing on the top of those pillars, but the tourists do climb up, I did see some of them try. A sudden gust of wind, a misplaced step – you wouldn’t stand a chance.”
“He’s not expected to live,” said Jeremy shortly. “Dear God, what a nightmare. What on earth will I say to Sir Malcolm?”
“Pasha Malcolm has been informed,” said Mr Ashraf. This did not seem to console Jeremy, who continued with his forehead-wiping and hand-wringing, to which I saw Mr Ashraf raise his eyes heavenward. Seeing that I had noticed, I gave him a conspiratorial wink, though it does seem like yet another nail in the coffin for our expedition. A bunch of semi-official looking men turned up then and Mr Ashraf disembarked to talk to them, these presumably being the police.
I left Jeremy alone with his quandary as I felt it was more than I could take in right now, after the incident with Irina, the Veiled Lady, Rookfield’s dratted insouciance. Passing the sundeck on the return to my cabin, I could see Hayley Valentino in a deckchair beside Mabel Whitton, the pair of them never having lifted a finger all day. I scurried past, anxious to avoid any vacuous small talk, or worse, having to divulge any word of my misadventures.
I am back in my cabin, Jon, and hope to see you here soon. We leave for El Kharga the day after tomorrow, notwithstanding any more mishaps.
With much love,
Elizabeth
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Bahariya Oasis
Farafra Depression
Western Desert
February 20th
1926
My dearest Elizabeth,
As you will note from the above address, I have had to move on from Cairo since I telegrammed you, in some haste and subterfuge I might add. I am a wanted man, it would seem, and I am lying low here for a few days before crossing the desert south to you. I have arranged with some difficulty for this letter to be sent post restante to El Kharga that it may be waiting when you get there. Your Luxor letter, and actually meeting this mysterious woman, did nothing to assuage my growing alarm over these intrigues we have stumbled into. I have a deep, gnawing dread of what horrors await your expedition at the Hungry Tomb.
I myself have much skullduggery to report, but first let me say that I hope the desert you are traversing is as strange and wonderful as that which I have just flown over.
My pilot, Youseff Urfy, and I took off in his plane before dawn and travelled for hours, west at first and then south to the oasis. I was quite dubious about his ability to navigate the desert, especially the first long leg at night, but my circumstances were pressing and in the end my doubts unfounded.
The plane’s wheels barely cleared the top of the car, full of British soldiers, that had skidded onto the sandy runway in a desperate attempt to stop us. Then we were soaring above it all. The pyramids and the great Sphinx slipped past below, indistinct in the silvery light of the waxing moon, the lights of Cairo behind us.
Youseff’s plane was a decommissioned Bristol Fighter and its powerful Rolls Royce engine and the air rushing past our open cockpits drowned everything out. Youssef, forward of me, would occasionally shout something and jab with his hand pointing down below us but I couldn’t make out a word he said. Dawn found us travelling southwards as the sun appeared on our left to rise spectacularly over the desert. I think I had expected an endless sea of sand and while portions were like that, from my vantage point it seemed more like a broken plateau scattered with stones and rubble and devoid of life.
When we landed and the engine had fallen silent, I had thanked Youssef and commended him on his ability to both navigate and fly. He had grinned widely and shrugged nonchalantly but I could see he was pleased with the compliment. He said we had been following the Behr-bala-Ma, a dead river that once had run from the Second Cataract all the way north to the Mediterranean. The great oases of Bahariya and El Kharga were once lakes that flowed into this long gone river, according to him. As you mentioned in one of your letters, the world we see now, is not the world that once was. I had seen no sign of this River Without Water, which I think is the translation, but then it all looked like sand and rock to me.
Apart that is from the Black Desert which we flew low over on our approach to Bahariya. This strange expanse was composed of odd conical black hills that seemed to merge downwards into the orange sands of the desert. It was like a god had taken a blowtorch to the tops of all the hills, charring them. Youssef has offered to fly me southwest over a place called the White Desert, which sounds even stranger and possibly somewhere, if I have understood him correctly, for his description seems far-fetched, that your Polish artist might find suitably inspiring. However I have reminded him that I am a wanted man and am not here to play the tourist. I think he is disappointed in me.
When I sent you that telegram from Shepheards, I had just recovered from a strange and compelling delirium, connected with the curse of Anubis. I believe this Brotherhood of the Veil sect brought it upon me, though I know not why. But I fear for your safety. It cannot be a coincidence that your mysterious lady wears a veil. I believe she may be behind the Brotherhood and that Anubis, as keeper of curses, is merely the catalyst for its initiation.
I say ‘merely’, but that dark figure was terrifying to behold. The madness has passed and yet the damned gun remains. I have hidden it for the moment at the bottom of my travel trunk, which along with the rest of my belongings is still hopefully in my room at the Shepherd hotel.
I had bathed, dressed and breakfasted, and feeling like a new man, got directions to the Ministry of the Interior from reception and set out to confront Clarke. With Fatima’s information that he was Special Section and therefore involved in intelligence work, I felt he would have answers. The ministry was housed in an imposing stone edifice, its dim, hushed interior of dark wood, brass fittings and marble floor in stark contrast to the dusty hot air of the busy street. Egyptian and British clerks criss-crossed the floor and I joined a short queue of locals waiting patiently for their turn at a window. I gave my details to the young man behind it and sat to wait for Clarke. It was a good half hour before he appeared, chatting away to another fellow who shook his hand and departed. Churlishly I thought there was something of the pantomime about it, to show me that Clarke was a busy, important man. He was smiles enough when he came over but I couldn’t help but notice his eyes darting all over me as I rose to shake his hand, as if looking for something, perhaps an injury.
We went across the street to a small cafe and took a shady table outside. I had sweet mint tea and Clarke ordered coffee. I’ll be honest Elizabeth. I’d intended to grill Clarke but my questions just slid off him as he evaded them with practiced ease. I was hampered by a sudden decision not to confide in him, made wary by the way he had looked at me. I sense too that his attitude to me had changed. Before it had been partly indulgent, partly patronising - an old comrade he saw as a potentially useful mark; now there was something else, a wariness to match my own but also I thought, a tinge of fear.
Well he warned me off seeking out the brotherhood when I asked him where I might find them. In fact what he said was that “his majesty’s government would not look kindly on me if I started stirring things up in Cairo just as they’d got a lid on them again.”
It would be better for me to leave and go back to Ireland if I wanted trouble. I did not miss the implied demotion from being ‘one of us.’
When I raised seeking out Fatima if he wouldn’t help me, he got irritated and tried to warn me off. I gathered that she is not a member of the brotherhood but is aligned with them in their shared interest in an independent Egypt. Clarke and I parted with much shaking of hands and smiles but there was no longer any warmth in it. His parting shot to me was, “Beware the sparking water, sparkling wine and sparkling eyes of Egypt.”
I detoured to Ezbekiyya on my way back to the hotel but it was in a closed somnolent state. A slow day passed while I waited in the Shepard until evening. After dinner in the hotel restaurant, my impatience eventually got the better of me and I set out for Emad al Din street. I noticed a man, British I assumed from his sandy hair and sunburnt fair skin, in the lobby reading a newspaper. I had a feeling he had tailed me back from the ministry earlier so I was not surprised when he folded his paper under his arm and followed me out onto the street. Clarke was watching me.
Ezbekiyya was just beginning to liven up. The clubs and theatres were all open in a blaze of light but the street was sparsely populated with punters. I quickly discovered as I asked in one establishment after the next that as a matter of principle nobody was going to help an unknown European man looking for Fatima al-Mahdiyya. I felt foolish wandering lamely from theatre to theatre, my watcher observing my continued failure. I felt even more silly when I stopped across the street from the Memphis Theatre, for there was Fatima’s name proudly displayed across the top of the marquee! I was about to brave the carts, cars and trams when who should walk past me oblivious, but the man who handed me my wallet back, the trick that set the curse on me. I’d recognise that lavish moustache anywhere. I dithered torn between chasing after the brotherhood man and seeking out Fatima, then I turned on my heel and followed him as close as I dared. I couldn’t see my own tail anywhere but that didn’t mean he wasn’t watching still.
The Brotherhood fellow moved confidently through the crowd, never checking behind him. Then he turned down a side street and I paused at the top. He entered a building at the far end and once he was out of sight, I sauntered down as if I knew where I was going. The premises here were quite discreet though usually with a large chap standing outside. The door he had entered was unguarded however and appeared to be some sort of rundown theatre, the single word Zala remaining on a small marquee above their door. A small foyer with an empty ticket booth was beyond the door. Emboldened by the lack of security I pushed past a velvet curtain and into a small dim theatre space. Rows of dusty seats, enough to hold maybe twenty punters, were arranged in front of a most curious stage. It consisted of a white cotton screen stretched on a frame easily six foot by six foot. I thought it might even be a cinema screen of some sort but then it began to glow from the bottom edge with the flickering light of oil lamps. It felt like an invitation so after glancing around to check I was still alone, I sat near the back and close to the door.
The screen grew brighter and a large indistinct shadow moved somewhere behind it. Then to my astonishment, the silhouette of a man, maybe a foot high and all stylised angles emerged and strolled jauntily across the screen. After an initial thrill of fear at what new madness this was, I realised it was some sort of flat puppet on the other side of the cotton that was being manipulated so that its shadow from the oil lamps fell on the screen. As parts of the puppet moved closer to the screen and away again, they became sharper and then softened.
“Captain Ross,” it said or rather its operator did, in artificially high pitched voice, “You are a man of surprises.”
The shadow puppet did a little dance before a skilful cock of its head gave me the distinct impression that it was alive and looking directly at me. I shuffled nervously. I knew it was just a puppet but even so.
“Do we really need to do this song and dance?” I asked annoyed, “Can we not just talk?”
The shadow man put a hand to his ear for a moment as if listening off stage.
“No Captain Ross, you can talk to me. The curse is inefficient but always effective, and of course no evidence of foul play. And yet here you are, alive and having found us. Not something many have done.”
He did another little jig.
“Why are you meddling in our affairs?” he said petulantly, “Do you not have enough trouble at home?”
I asked, “What did Sir Malcom find in the desert? Why does everyone want it?”
“Not everyone,” he replied, “Those things that were lost in the desert so long ago, should stay lost. That has always been the Brotherhood’s mission. Every so often over the centuries, and more so since you Europeans started lumbering around poking at things, digging things up, some old dangerous magic will come out of the western desert, sometimes slow and insidious like a plague, sometimes catastrophic like an earthquake, other times a screaming death for all who encounter it. If Sir Malcolm finishes what he has started, the Nile will run red with blood.”
I was wrong in my estimation of the puppet’s size as it mimed something attacking it and dramatically falling dead before rising to do another dance. It was at least two foot tall and most definitely staring belligerently at me, even it it was nothing more than a black shadow on a white screen. I realised that three men had entered from the far side of the room and were arranged in shadow against the wall. At least I hoped they were men.
“Will you be devoured Captain Ross? For that surely is the fate of all who enter the Hungry Tomb. The priestess who would be pharaoh came out of the west with an army of horror, a tide of blood before her and only trickery and betrayal killed her. Her tomb is a pit of dread and terror, and must not be entered. Those that do must be killed lest they bring something of her back into the world.”
“Well, why not just get rid of Malcom Whitton and be done with it? Why harm the rest of the expedition?”
“We are not assassins in the night Captain Ross, this is how we work.”
The puppet was easily three feet tall now and it pushed against the cotton of the screen, its two dimensional shape evident. Then its featureless head twisted and the cloth stretched around some sort of impossible devil’s face. Its hands had become claws whose talon points pricked the screen. Then the snarling monstrosity was pushing through the screen. I jumped up in fright, scattering chairs. The men by the wall were moving to intercept me. I flung the chair in front of me at the horror emerging from the screen and then kicked more at the men. Thank god I had stayed close to the door rather than following the natural impulse to sit up front. The thing would have had me then. I ran, Elizabeth, as fast and hard as I could, out through the foyer and into the street. I ran for the hopeful safety of Emad al Din street as the puppet monster and the men of the Brotherhood came charging after me. I wouldn’t have made it either, if it were not for Clarke’s man. That brave fellow stepped out of a doorway, pistol in hand and fired a volley of shots at my pursuers. I kept running and heard a scream and a crashing thud behind me.
People gave me a wide berth as I stumbled wild-eyed down the street. I ran heedlessly through the traffic to the other side and stopped by a kiosk close to the Memphis Theatre. There was no sign of my attackers, though I could hear police whistles from that direction. I ran my fingers through my hair, straightened my jacket and walked up in fake calmness to the theatre.
I paid the entrance fee and passed through a dim hall into a large ornate space with an empty stage at one end and busy tables spread out in front of it. Chandeliers threw a warm glittering glow over it all. Fatima was doing well for herself. At this hour the clientele was still mostly British administration officials. I took a table and when I ordered a drink I asked the girl if she would be kind enough to let Madame al-Mahdiyya that Captain Jon Ross was in the house and would appreciate a word.
I wasn’t kept waiting. Almost immediately a thin cadaverous man dressed in a tuxedo arrived at my shoulder and murmured that Madame would see me now. I followed him up stairs to a mezzanine floor where Fatima was sitting at a table with three men. Paperwork was spread out in front of them but upon my arrival two of the men gathered it up and excused themselves. The other also made to get up but Fatima restrained him with a hand on his arm. My guide stayed also, standing unobtrusively where he could watch me and the floor below. This time Fatima was dressed in a tasselled red dress in the modern style, a matching headband sitting in her tight dark curls. It looked expensive, not that I am a judge. Diamonds glittered at her ears and neck. She stabbed a cigarillo out in an ashtray and looked at me in concern and yes, there was fear there as well.
She waved me to a chair beside her as a girl arrived with two small glasses of something sweet and alcoholic.
“Captain Ross,” she said, “what a - surprise. I did not expect to see you again.”
“And yet here I am,” I said, “Still alive, still with questions needing answers.”
“It was nothing to do with me,” she said quickly, “Even for the brotherhood, it was nothing personal.”
I took sip of the sweet liquor and sat back. Her companion was Egyptian, maybe in his fifties with a roguish air about him and a faint, confused grin on his face.
“I need answers Fatima,” I said, “What did Sir Malcom find that the brotherhood have such a thirst to kill Sir Malcolm and his team, and by such, ah, esoteric means? And why is Clarke so interested? Does he believe in this stuff?”
She relaxed slightly and I suddenly understood she had thought I was here to kill her, that surviving the curse had for the moment given me a certain dangerous aura, certainly enough for the brotherhood to attack me outright. Fatima opened a silver case and offered me a cigarillo before taking one herself. Her bodyguard leaned in with a lighter first for her and then me, the flame flaring as I drew on it, before stepping back into the shadows.
“It is dangerous to talk about the brotherhood, Captain Ross,” she said with a glance to where the bodyguard stood, “they have as you say, esoteric means of making their displeasure known. They are very old as an organisation and up to recently not much more than a club for old men to meet, drink coffee and tell lies about old glories. But all this turmoil. First the French. Then you British. This city teems with secret societies and young men have flocked to them, including the brotherhood. They have gone in a political direction now, this is why William Clarke is interested in them, you know? He has seen things, he understands the power they could wield. There are stories of them defeating the old things that every so often come out of the desert. I thought them tall tales at first but I know better now. An old magic came out of the desert with Sir Malcom I think but he is still seeking.”
“I have been to see the Brotherhood,” I said, “at their puppet theatre. The Zala I think it is called.”
Fatima started at that. She said, “No one performs shadow plays in Cairo anymore. The Zala… Well it is long gone and Cairo is the better for it. You must be mistaken.”
“And the veiled lady?” I asked deliberately vague.
Now there was definite fear in her expression, her eyes widening. She pushed back from the table, signalling the end of the interview.
“Do what you want Captain Ross. Clarke is preparing another expedition to follow after Sir Malcom. I’ve seen the armoured cars being loaded onto the train. The brotherhood is also talking of going out into the desert, scared now that their damned curse is not working. I’ll tell you no more. Find your girl and leave Egypt. There is nothing for you here.”
As I left she called out my name. I looked back. She was sitting pensively, light glittering off her jewellery but somehow in shadow at the same time, an arm across her stomach cradling the elbow of the other arm holding her cigarillo. She drew on it and said,
“Why are you alive, Captain? Who are you?”
That is a good question Elizabeth and I pondered it as I walked up Emad al Din street. At its simplest, it may be the the curse was misdirected - I am not Mr John with an H Ross of England after all. It may be that I have scar tissue on my soul from the war so Crom too found it difficult to get a grasp of me. But the thought that came to me was the veiled lady’s talk of you doing a great magic when you decided to come to my aid. Maybe it wasn’t beneath the mound that you aided me. Maybe time has no meaning for such magics and you aided me here and now when I most needed it. Or maybe, or maybe, I do not know.
The way off Emad al Din to the hotel was blocked by police and British soldiers. They were armed and checking everyone before allowing them past. I turned around and headed back the way I came. I could hear voices raised in protest at their end of the street and over it all, a loud speaker asking everyone to remain calm. I stopped. I was being hemmed in. Exhaustion rolled over me. Bad enough to have dealt with whatever that was in the theatre but all this now? It was too much. Then ahead of me I saw three men, one of who was definitely Brotherhood, moving towards me. I turned again, lost as to what to do.
Then a hand wrapped around my shoulder and a man said, “This way, Captain, and step lively.”
It was Fatima’s companion. Well he led us a merry dance in and out of establishments before suddenly we exited the back door of one of them on the far side of the army cordon and no brotherhood in sight.
So that was how I met Youssef Urfy. He is a pilot, an Oxford graduate and I suspect, a smuggler. Clarke apparently turned up at the Memphis immediately after my departure looking to arrest me for treason. Consorting with secret societies and killing a police officer are the trumped up charges. Fatima had a change of heart, or at least subscribes to the doctrine of my enemy’s enemy is my friend, and sent Youssef after me.
So I will wait amongst the date palms and citrus groves of the oasis while we plan our next move. Keep an eye out for the army, Elizabeth, and the brotherhood, and ancient evils!
Wait for me before you enter the tomb.
I love you.
Jon