Читать книгу The Exodus Quest - Will Adams - Страница 29

NINE

I

‘Reverend!’ said Griffin again. ‘A word please.’

Knox turned sharply and hurried away along the corridor, glad that the gloom evidently made his white shirt look sufficiently like a dog collar against his dark polo neck to fool Griffin.

‘Reverend!’ cried Griffin in exasperation. ‘Come back. We need to talk.’

Knox continued walking as fast as he dared. The passage straightened out, hit a dead end some twenty paces ahead. Just before that, there was a high heap of ancient bricks and plaster fragments and a gaping hole in the wall, through which he could hear Peterson reading from the Bible; though, from the accompanying hiss, it sounded more like an old recording than the real thing.

‘“And there came two angels to Sodom; and Lot sat in the gate of Sodom: and Lot seeing them rose up to meet them.”’

Knox reached the hole, glanced through. There was a large chamber on the other side, young men and women kneeling on dustsheets cleaning the walls with sponges moistened with distilled water and soft-bristled brushes. The men had the standard crew-cuts, the women short-bobbed hair, and they were all wearing the same cornflower-blue and khaki livery. They were too intent on their work to notice him step through into the chamber. Only once inside did he see Peterson to his left, deep in earnest discussion with a young woman, while his voice incongruously continued to declaim scripture on the portable CD-player in the centre of the chamber.

‘“Behold now, I have two daughters which have not known man; let me, I pray you, bring them out unto you, and do ye to them as is good in your eyes.”’

Griffin was still approaching down the corridor. Knox had only one possible hiding place, the baptismal bath. His foot slipped as he hurried down the wide flight of stone steps so that he had to fight for balance, but he found the shadows even as Griffin poked his head in. ‘Reverend!’ he said. Peterson gave no sign of having heard him, however, so he said it again, louder this time, until one of the young women turned the volume down on the CD-player. ‘Why on earth did you walk away from me?’

Peterson frowned. ‘What are you talking about, Brother Griffin?’

Griffin scowled but let it go. ‘We’ve emptied the magazine,’ he said. ‘It’s time to close up.’

‘Not yet,’ said Peterson.

‘It’s going to take hours to fill in the shaft,’ said Griffin. ‘If we don’t start now we’ll never finish before—’

‘I said not yet.’

‘But—’

‘Have you forgotten why we’re here, Brother Griffin?’ blazed Peterson. ‘Have you forgotten whose work we’re doing?’

‘No, Reverend.’

‘Then go back outside and wait. I’ll tell you when to start.’

‘Yes, Reverend.’

Footsteps faded as he walked away. The young woman turned the volume back up.

‘“For we will destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxen great before the face of the Lord; and the Lord hath sent us to destroy it.”’

Knox waited a few moments before risking a glance over the rim of the baptismal bath. Everyone was once more concentrating on cleaning their section of wall, bringing an array of scenes back to life: portraits, landscapes, angels, demons, texts in Greek and Aramaic, mathematical calculations, signs of the Zodiac and other symbols. Like a madman’s nightmare. He photographed the ceiling, two sections of wall, then Peterson and the woman examining a mural.

‘“The sun was risen upon the earth when Lot entered into Zoar. Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven.”’

‘Reverend, sir!’ said a young man. ‘Look here!’

Knox ducked down, but not quite quickly enough. One of the women saw him as she turned. Her mouth fell open in shock. She pointed at him with a trembling finger and began to scream.

II

Meals with Fatima were notoriously frugal affairs usually, but tonight the table was laden with a colourful and fragrant spread of dishes in honour of Stafford and Lily: ta’amiyya, fu’ul, hoummos, beans, tahina, a salad of chopped tomatoes and cucumber seasoned with oil and garlic, stuffed aubergines, chicken dressed in vine leaves, all looking succulent in the rippling candlelight. There were even two bottles of red wine, from which Stafford poured himself a liberal glass that he drained and immediately refilled. For all Gaille’s dislike of him, she had to admit he was looking rather dashing, wearing a borrowed galabaya while his own clothes were being washed in readiness for the morning.

Lily was looking nervously at the food, as though apprehensive both of local etiquette and cuisine. Gaille gave her a reassuring nod and helped herself to some of the safer dishes, allowing Lily to emulate her, which she did with a grateful smile.

‘Will you be in Egypt long?’ asked Fatima, as Stafford sat next to her.

‘Amarna tomorrow, then Assiut the day after for an interview. Then off to the States.’

‘You’re packing an awful lot in to two days, aren’t you?’

‘We were supposed to be here for the best part of a week,’ he shrugged. ‘But then my agent got me on the morning shows. I could hardly turn that down, could I?’

‘No. I suppose not.’

‘It’s the only market, the States. If you’re not big there, forget about it. Anyway, we’re only filming a short section here. We’re coming back later in the year to film in …’ He caught himself on the verge of his indiscretion, smiled as though she’d almost wheedled great secrets out of him. ‘For the other sections of my programme.’

‘Your programme, yes. Won’t you tell me a little more about it?’

He took another swallow of wine as he considered this. ‘Will you give me your word that you won’t repeat what I tell you?’

‘Of course. I wouldn’t dream of telling anyone your theories, believe me.’

‘Because it’s explosive, I assure you.’

‘It always is.’

Stafford’s cheeks pinked, as though he’d only just realized she’d been having a little sport with him. He lifted his chin high, giving himself a swan-neck for a moment. ‘Very well, then,’ he said. He waited for silence to fall around the table, for them all to be still. Then he waited a little longer, building the suspense. An old storyteller’s trick, yet effective all the same. When finally he had their complete attention, he leaned forward into the candlelight. ‘I intend to prove that Akhenaten wasn’t just another Eighteenth Dynasty pharaoh,’ he said. ‘I intend to prove he was also founder of modern Israel. That’s right. I intend to prove beyond doubt or argument that Akhenaten was Moses, the man who led the Jews out of Egypt and into the Promised Land.’

III

Heads swivelled to see what had made the woman cry out. A shocked and frozen silence fell as they saw Knox crouching there in the baptismal bath, camera-phone in his hand. But it was Knox who acted first. He raced up the steps, dived headlong through the hole in the wall, crashed onto the passage floor outside.

‘Stop him!’ thundered Peterson. ‘Bring him back!’

Up to his feet, sprinting through islands of lamplight, yells behind, Knox glanced around as an athletic young man, face contorted with the joy of duty, flung himself into a tackle, taking his legs. He went down hard, grazing his palm and elbow on the rough stone, wind punched from his lungs, but twisting around, throwing the young man off, up and away towards the atrium.

Griffin and one of the young men appeared in the doorway ahead, standing shoulder-to-shoulder to block his escape. No way could he fight past both of them. He reached down and yanked the electrical flex from the generator, plunging the passage into sudden darkness, then shoulder-charged Griffin flat onto his back, fought his way through his flailing arms into the atrium then up the steps. The two other young men were coming across, summoned by the commotion. Knox cut the other way, over a low ridge, running headlong until he crashed into the wire-mesh fence of the neighbouring power station.

He ran alongside it for a couple of hundred metres, trying to work out where he was, how best to get back to Omar and the Jeep. But his efforts were taking their toll, a stitch worsening in his side, his breath coming short and fast. He glanced back, silhouettes all around, shouting exhortations and instructions to each other, the moonlight too strong and the terrain too bare for him to go to ground. He gritted his teeth and kicked again. But his legs were growing heavy and his pursuers were gaining all the time.