CHAPTER TWO

September 20, 9:00 P.M.

Giza, Egypt

MARJORIE BURTON STOOD on the balcony of her guesthouse room and gazed toward the Sphinx. The music and historical narration booming over the tinny loudspeaker finally ebbed, and the colorful laser lights transformed into a golden illumination, making the Sphinx glow, giving it an enchanting aura and a noble grace. Throngs of people exited the seating area and filed toward the chaotic streets of Cairo in a reverent hush.

Marjorie understood their awe. She never tired of looking at the massive stone masterpiece, and when the crowds thinned and eventually left for the night, the monument’s power grew, and its stoic grimace seemed to mock those who tried to unlock its secrets.

She rubbed the ache in her neck, thinking over the project’s progress, while the sounds of honking horns and the smell of rotting food from the encroaching city assaulted her senses. At one time, the Sphinx and the Pyramids of Giza overlooked ancient Cairo, carrying on its business at a respectful distance. Now the structures appeared to be losing the battle to avoid being swallowed up by the growing metropolis of nearly twenty million people closing in on the Giza Plateau from all sides.

As the last tourist left the seating area, some of the lights flickered out, signaling to Marjorie it was time to leave the hot, humid confines of her dingy room behind and make her way to the site, where Kamal would be waiting for dinner and to begin the night’s excavation. They did most of their work after sunset, due to the heat, as well as to avoid the mobs of tourists and hawkers who overran the site during the day, making accomplishing anything a difficult task.

Every time Marjorie came to Cairo, she swore she would never come back. The crowds grew exponentially, those selling souvenirs became more aggressive, and the politics deteriorated with each visit, making her work much more difficult and dangerous. But the draw of the Sphinx was powerful, and rejecting an opportunity to delve deeper into the mysteries of the ancient site proved impossible.

Recognizing her good fortune to be part of the excavation of a recently discovered room in the burial preparation building adjoining the Sphinx did little to diminish her frustration with the slow progress. With only her Cairo Museum counterpart, who seldom left his office, and her two assistants, Kamal and Ahmed, the dig proceeded at a snail’s pace, and funds for additional help had never materialized. Marjorie feared her time would run out before they cleared the debris from the newest chamber and found out if any treasures remained inside.

The British Museum of Mankind had given her six months to work on the project, but made it clear there would be no extensions unless something of major historical significance was uncovered. They had been generous in the past, even though she had yet to locate anything noteworthy, and now their patience was wearing thin. At only thirty-four, she had thought there was plenty of time to prove herself, but donors, who provided much of the museum’s funding for field work, expected immediate results and notoriety.

Marjorie wove her way through the congested alleys outside the guesthouse until she found her favorite food stall. The wind swirled, mixing the spicy aromas from the many vendors’ dishes with the stench of sewage and pungent odors of decaying scraps, creating an uncommon aroma, and making her nauseous. Despite her sudden loss of appetite, she bought thin local bread and curried lentils for herself and Kamal, then headed toward the Sphinx.

Each day Ahmed and Kamal worked with their Cairo counterpart at the museum inputting data and analyzing their finds, and then the two young men toiled half the night with her removing debris from the newly discovered room. Tonight, she and Kamal would start out together until Ahmed relieved him halfway through the shift and continued on with her until the morning crowds arrived. She realized her assistants had to be exhausted, existing on little sleep, but she had no choice except to keep up the brutal pace. Ahmed grumbled occasionally, while Kamal expressed his discontent more fervently, and she feared he might soon walk out on her.

The moon, stars and city lights illuminated the area enough that she didn’t bother to turn on the flashlight dangling from her wrist as she walked toward the Sphinx, hands filled with two water bottles and the just-purchased food. The guard at the gate to the complex let her in, saying nothing, as usual. When she reached the excavation chamber, she spied a lantern burning brightly outside the barred and locked entrance, but she saw no sign of Kamal.

Marjorie set her load down and called out, but received no answer. She was torn between anger at him for leaving his post and fear something bad had happened to her surly assistant. The gate over the entrance appeared intact, offering no indication of trouble, but she knew remaining alert and cautious on any archeological project could mean the difference between life and death. The lucrative black-market antiquities trade made looters dangerous if anyone stood in their way.

She glanced around for something to use as a weapon and her eyes rested on a small rock hammer Kamal must have left behind. Marjorie grabbed the tool and stuck the handle through her belt, called out again, then made a quick check of the many corridors linking the rooms in the burial preparation building—still there was no hint as to Kamal’s whereabouts.

By the time Marjorie reached the gateway leading out of the Sphinx complex, the guard had left his post and the lock was left to look closed, but hadn’t been clicked shut. Letting herself out, she ran toward the guesthouse, trying desperately not to let her imagination run wild and panic.

“Ahmed, are you awake?” she whispered as she tapped on his door.

Marjorie didn’t want anyone to see her at her male assistant’s room for fear of offending any conservative onlookers, but her patience wore thin as worry for Kamal’s safety and a nagging sense something was drastically wrong filled her mind. She knocked louder, then reached for the doorknob—it was unlocked. Glancing in both directions down the hallway, she eased the door open and nearly collided with Ahmed as he stumbled toward her, his eyes half-covered with the t-shirt he pulled over his head while walking.

“What is it?” he asked, annoyance etched on his face.

“Kamal. He isn’t at the site, but I can tell he’s been there.”

“He probably had to go to the bathroom. We are still human, you know? We’re not machines.”

“No. He didn’t take the lantern. I called to him and received no answer, and then I checked all the rooms and corridors. Something is wrong. It’s too quiet.”

Marjorie knew neither of her assistants liked taking instructions from a woman, especially a foreigner. Accepting their attitude as primarily cultural, it didn’t bother her much, but she hated the fact they had no respect for her as a professional. While she hadn’t made any significant discoveries in her career, or published many earth-shattering papers, she was thorough and competent. She had good technique and was as capable as any other archeologist—man or woman—of making the next major find. She just needed a bit of luck and a little cooperation.

“I’m sure everything’s fine. Why don’t you go get food while I check on him?”

“No. We’ll look together. Besides, I already bought dinner. I feel responsible for you two. I’m the head of this project, and if anything goes wrong, I’m the one who’s accountable.”

“Why must you Western women always take charge?” he demanded as he turned his back on her and strode into his room, leaving the door open.

How tired she was of her two assistants questioning her on everything. She suspected they criticized her leadership to their Egyptian counterparts. But, they had been good workers, and Marjorie needed them. She only hoped they didn’t realize it, or she would have an even bigger challenge on her hands.

Marjorie fought the urge to give Ahmed a strong shove in the back to get him moving faster. He took so much time splashing water on his face and searching for his shoes that she was certain he was trying to annoy her or stall. Fidgeting, she smoothed an errant strand of her short blonde hair behind her ear, while watching Ahmed slowly lace his shoes. She hated his shoes—the tread on his soles left tiny divots in the sand, reminding her of the holes created by the creepy spiders that had invaded her tent the last time she had worked on a dig in a remote part of the Egyptian desert.

She could tell he wasn’t convinced they had a problem, but at least he quit arguing, though he continued to move slow enough to make thoughts of strangling him with his belt flash through her mind. He meticulously fed the leather strap through each belt loop of his pants. She watched impatiently as he cleaned his glasses on the tail of his shirt and ran his fingers through his unruly mop of dark, curly hair.

“Let’s get this over with, so maybe I can have a couple hours of sleep before relieving Kamal in a few hours,” he said as he grabbed a flashlight and followed Marjorie out into the night.

They hiked the short distance between the guesthouse and the gate to the Sphinx complex in silence. Marjorie’s mind whirled, wondering if she should have gone straight to the authorities. She had no proof anything was wrong, though every nerve in her body sizzled on high alert.

“The guard was here when I arrived, but gone when I left.”

Ahmed ignored her comment and kept walking. They reached the entrance to the chamber and nothing had changed. She waited as Ahmed called out to Kamal half-heartedly and strolled around the corridors she had already checked.

“Are you satisfied? You two always question every word I say. I’m tired of having to prove everything and wasting valuable minutes. I realize you don’t care about the timetable established for the project, but if something has happened to Kamal, your hesitation to my concerns might have—”

“Quiet.”

Marjorie stopped in mid-sentence and listened. At first, she heard nothing, but after several moments the sound of metal scraping against rock reached her ears. She glanced over at Ahmed and watched his eyes track the sound to the same place as she had—outside the burial preparation chamber, near the Sphinx.

Ahmed flipped off his flashlight and took several silent steps toward the exit. She followed his lead, stowed her light, pulled the hammer from her waistband, and crept after him. As they left the structure and stood on the hard-packed earth facing the monument, the noise grew louder.

“We should go for help. The guard must be here somewhere. He couldn’t have gone far. He probably just went for food.”

“I’ll go. Why don’t you try to get closer and find out what’s going on? If you backtrack through the corridors you can reach a higher vantage point to the left side of the Sphinx,” Ahmed replied as he looked down at the tool clutched in her hand.

Marjorie nodded in agreement, knowing it wasn’t a good plan, but unwilling to risk the safety of another one of her students. She had to ascertain whether or not someone was damaging the Sphinx, and if Ahmed left the area to search for the guard, he would remain out of harm’s way.

Once Ahmed was out of sight, Marjorie had to fight to hold back the fear. She was alone, scared, and angry. If someone harmed the Sphinx while she stood nearby and did nothing to try and stop the damage, the guilt would be unbearable.

Marjorie gripped the hammer handle, took a deep breath, and crept back toward the entrance of the burial preparation area. The scraping sounds grew louder as she inched forward. The silhouette of a man appeared. Marjorie froze, squatting low to the ground to minimize her outline. She squinted into the darkness, unable to make out the man’s identity.

The figure knelt near the left paw of the Sphinx, but she couldn’t see what he was doing. Suddenly, the man stood and ran away, scaling the fence separating it from the road. Kamal! Marjorie leapt to her feet, ready to call out, but before the words could be spoken, a massive explosion vaulted her to the side, throwing her into the bottom of the excavated trench in front of the Sphinx. Landing on her belly, face plastered into the dirt, she braced herself as debris rained down. Chunks the size of bricks pelted her back, forcing air violently from her lungs. She wanted to scream in pain, but with a mouth full of grit and her lungs void of air, no sound escaped.

When the shower of rubble finally stopped, Marjorie continued to lay still. The all-consuming pain confirmed she wasn’t dead. Wiggling her toes and then her fingers, she groaned in relief that everything worked. Her ears rang from the deafening sound of the blast, every inch of her body ached, but nothing felt broken.

As quietly as possible, Marjorie dug herself out from under the stone fragments and inched her way to the lip of the trench. She peered over the edge of the pit and the sight brought tears to her eyes. It was gone—everything destroyed.

She couldn’t look away from the pile of rubble marking the spot where one of the greatest manmade wonders of the world had once stood proudly over the desert. Transfixed on the complete destruction of the Sphinx, her mind refused cognitive function. Marjorie wasn’t sure how long she stared in disbelief at the dusty pile, until a bright light caught her eye and forced her thoughts back to reality.

Kamal and Ahmed stood at the edge of the rubble on the far side of the fence. Kamal held something in front of him at arm’s length, as if afraid of getting too close to the item. Ahmed directed the beam from his powerful flashlight through the back of a clear object. The light shot out two openings, resembling eye sockets, with such intensity that the beams smoked and ignited a tent canopy ten yards away.

Ahmed doused the light and both men hurried toward a small dented pickup. Marjorie didn’t even hear the doors slam, the engine roar to life, or the vehicle leave as she stared at the dancing fire, the flames quickly spreading from one canopy to the next, eating away at the canvas. She shuddered, thinking about what would have happened to her if she had stood next to the Sphinx, exposed, as Ahmed had suggested.