The Seventh Scroll - Smith Wilbur (бесплатные онлайн книги читаем полные .txt) 📗

wet hair hung in tangled disarray over her face, and her clothing was

torn and running with lake water and stained with mud and green algae.

Her right arm was wrapped in muddy rags and her blood oozed through,

diluted pink by the dirty water.

She did not see him. She stopped in the centre of the terrace and stared

in horror into the burning room. Was Duraid in there? She started

forward, but the heat was like a solid wall and it stopped her dead. At

that moment the roof collapsed, sending a roaring column of sparks and

flames high into the night sky. She backed away from it, shielding her

face with a raised arm.

Duraid tried to call to her, but no sound issued from his smoke-scorched

throat. Royan turned away and started down the steps. He realized that

she must be going to call for help. Duraid made a supreme effort and a

crow-like croak came out between his black and blistered lips.

Royan spun round and stared at him, and then she screamed. His head was

not human. His hair was gone, frizzled away, and his skin hung in

tatters from his cheeks and chin. Patches of raw meat showed through the

black crusted mask. She backed away from him as though he were some

hideous monster.

"Royan," he croaked, and his voice was just recognizable. He lifted one

hand towards her in appeal, and she ran to the pond and seized the

outstretched hand.

"In the name of the Virgin, what have they done to you?" she sobbed, but

when she tried to pull him from the pond the skin of his hand came away

in hers in a single piece, like some horrible surgical rubber glove,

leaving the bleeding claw naked and raw.

Royan fell on her knees beside the coping and leaned over the pond to

take him in her arms. She knew that she did not have the strength to

lift him out without doing him further dreadful injury. All she could do

was hold him and try to comfort him. She realized that he was dying no

man could survive such fearsome injury.

"They will come soon to help us," she whispered to him in Arabic.

"Someone must see the flames. Be brave, my husband, help will come very

soon."

He was twitching and convulsing in her arms, tortured by his mortal

injuries and racked by the effort to speak.

"The scroll?" His voice was barely intelligible. Royan looked up at the

holocaust that enveloped their home, and she shook her head.

"It's gone," she said. "Burned or stolen."

"Don't give it up," he mumbled. "All our work-'

"It's gone," she repeated. "No one will believe us without-'

"No!" His voice was faint but fierce. "For me, my last---2 "Don't say

that," she pleaded. "You will be all right."

"Promise," he demanded. "Promise me!"

"We have no sponsor. I am alone. I cannot do it alone."

"Harper!" he said. Royan leaned closer so that her ear touched his

fire-ravaged lips. "Harper," he repeated. "Strong hard - clever man-'

and she understood then. Harper, Of course, was the fourth and last name

on the list of sponsors that he had drawn up. Although he was the last

on the list, somehow she had always known that Duraid's order of

preference was inverted. Nicholas Quenton Harper was his first choice.

He had spoken so often of this man with respect and warmth, and

sometimes even with awe.

"But what do I tell him? He does not know me. How will I convince him?

The seventh scroll is gone."

"Trust him," he whispered. "Good man. Trust him-' There was a terrible

appeal in his "Promise me!'

Then she remembered the notebook in their flat at Giza in the Cairo

suburbs, and the Taita material on the hard drive on her PC. Not

everything was gone. "Yes," she agreed, "I promise you, my husband, I

promise you."

Though those mutilated features could show no human expression there was

a faint echo of satisfaction in his voice as he whispered, "My flower!"

Then his head dropped forward, and he died in her arms.

The peasants from the village found Royan still kneeling beside the

pond, holding him, whispering to him. By that time the flames were

abating, and the faint light of dawn was stronger than their fading

glow.

The staff from the museum and the Antiquities were at the funeral the

church of the oasis. Even Atalan Abou Sin, the Minister of Culture and

Tourism and Duraid's superior, had come out from Cairo in his official

black air-conditioned Mercedes.

He stood behind Royan and, though he was a Moslem, joined in the

responses. Nahoot Guddabi stood beside his uncle. Nahoot's mother was

the minister's youngest sister, which, as Duraid had sarcastically

pointed out, fully made up for the nephew's lack of qualifications and

experience in archaeology anj for his ineptitude as an administrator.

The day was sweltering. Outside, the temperature stood at over thirty

degrees, and even in the dim cloisters of the Coptic church it was

oppressive. In the thick clouds of incense smoke and the drone of the

black-clad priest intoning the ancient order of service Royan felt

herself suffocating. The stitches in her right arm pulled and burned,

and every time she looked at the long black coffin that stood in front

of the ornate and gilded altar, the dreadful vision of Duraid's bald and

scorched head rose before her eyes and she swayed'in her seat and had to

catch herself before she fell.

At last it was over and she could escape into the open air and the

desert sunlight. Even then her duties were not at an end. As principal

mourner, her place was directly behind the coffin as they walked in

procession to the cemetery amongst the palm groves, where Duraid's

relatives awaited him in the family mausoleum.

Before he returned to Cairo, Atalan Abou Sin came to shake her hand and

offer her a few words of condolence.

"What a terrible business, Royan. I have personally spoken to the

Minister of the Interior. They will catch the animals responsible for

this outrage, believe me. Please take as long as you need before you

return to the museum," he told her.

"I will be in my office again on Monday," she replied, and he drew a

pocket diary from inside the jacket of his dark double-breasted suit. He

consulted it and made a note, before he looked up at her again.

"Then come to see me at the Ministry in the afternoon.

Four 'clock," he told her. He went to the waiting Mercedes, while Nahoot

Guddabi came forward to shake hands. Though his skin was sallow and

there were coffeecoloured stains beneath his dark eyes, he was tall and

elegant with thick wavy hair and very white teeth. His suit was

impeccably tailored and he smelt faintly of an expensive cologne. His

expression was grave and sad.

"He was a good man. I held Duraid in the highest esteem," he told Royan,

and she nodded without replying to this blatant untruth. There had been

little affection between Duraid and his deputy. He had never allowed

Nahoot to work on the Taita scrolls; in particular he had never given

him access to the seventh scroll, and this had been a point of bitter

antagonism between them.

"I hope you will be applying for the post of director, Royan," he told

her. "You are well qualified for the job."

"Thank you, Nahoot, you are very kind. I haven't had a chance to think