But now revenge was in his reach: not the revenge he had once planned, when he had attempted to elope with Darcy’s sister, but still a desirable revenge and one which was capable of making his fortune.
“I do not see why we have to live on this boat,” said Lydia. “I am sure there is no fun to be had here.”
She had grown tired of flirting with the sailors, and she joined her husband at the front of the flat-bottomed boat which had brought them from Cairo and which was now moored a mile upstream of Darcy’s boats.
“Because, my sweet, this is where we will find the tomb. If my father had not destroyed his piece of the map, thinking it might lead me astray, we could go to the right spot and find the tomb ourselves, but as it is, we must wait for Sir Matthew to find it and then rob it of its treasures once it has been excavated.”
“I thought he had already found it.”
“He has found something, but whether it is the intact tomb we do not know. It could be nothing but another false doorway.”
Lydia looked out across the green banks of the Nile to the endless sand dunes beyond and said, “I hope Sef is more use than the sailor you employed to steal the other parts of the map on the ship taking Elizabeth and Darcy to Egypt. He was not only caught but put ashore, and all without getting us the map. That was a waste of a pretty penny.”
“The man was a fool, but Sef is more reliable, and what we give him is a small price to pay for the information he brings us,” said Wickham. “Look, here he is now.”
Wickham left his place at the front of the boat and jumped down onto the bank in his eagerness to hear his spy’s news.
“Effendi,” said Sef, as he hurried toward them. “It is the tomb you seek, effendi. He has found it! It is full of the most beautiful treasures, and your enemy goes there even now to claim them for his own.”
“Why did you not bring me news of this earlier?”
“Because I waited to discover more for you, effendi. Your enemies’ fellahs refuse to go with him. They are ignorant peasants, not educated men like me, and they are convinced the tomb is cursed. Sir Matthew Rosen, he was struck down with a plague when he opened the tomb, and there is an afrit loose in the camp, so they say.”
“Well, well,” said Wickham thoughtfully. “And so Darcy is going to the tomb alone.”
“Not alone, effendi. He has his cousin with him and another man and two women. Then, too, there are some guards, though they will run away at the first sound of a magical wail, and if they do not, they can be bribed. Your enemies take many palm ropes and many planks of wood. They say there is a pit inside the tomb that none may cross, and beyond it lies the treasure, gleaming and tempting. But it is cursed, effendi. It will bring ruin to any man who touches so much as a single cup.”
“I will touch more than a cup,” said Wickham. “Ready me a camel and another for any of the sailors who will come with me. Let us see if they are made of sterner stuff than Darcy’s men. Load the camels with sacks and let me know when you are done. Then we will see who will come away the richer man, Darcy or I.”
***
Despite the setback to their plans, Edward, Paul, Elizabeth, Darcy, and Sophie were in good spirits as they returned to the tomb: Edward was feverishly excited, Sophie was intrigued, Paul was eager to sketch the wonderful treasures, Elizabeth was happy for Edward, and Darcy was quietly gratified that his father had not broken his health for nothing and that his young cousin had achieved his dream.
It seemed strange to see the site so deserted, for even those men left to guard it had fled, afraid that some terrible calamity would befall them if they stayed.
Elizabeth stopped for a moment and drank in the silence. It was something she never experienced at home. There was always the noise of the servants as they moved about the house or the voices of the children, and when they were occasionally quiet, there was the ticking of a clock or the shifting of coals in the fire. But here, everything was still. The sands stretched out in every direction, gleaming under the sun-drenched sky, and even the breeze did not stir.
Then Edward dismounted and said, “Let us begin.”
Without another word, he disappeared inside the tomb, leaving Paul to help Sophie dismount.
“Tether the donkeys here,” said Darcy. “We can carry the treasure across the bridges in sacks and leave the sacks stacked at the foot of the steps. Then, when we have retrieved as many treasures as the donkeys can carry, we can bring the sacks up to the surface and load them onto the donkeys before returning to camp.”
“If I might make a suggestion,” said Paul. “If I am allowed some time to quickly sketch the treasures in their locations before we move them, we will have a record of everything we take and where it came from. It might be of some interest to scholars, and I can then paint a mural on the wall of the Egyptian gallery at Pemberley, giving an accurate feel for the discovery.”
“An excellent notion,” said Darcy.
They agreed, and the men began to unload the ropes and planks of palm wood while Elizabeth lit a flambeau and descended the steps into the tomb, followed by Sophie and Paul. She went through the entranceway into the vast open space and stood looking about her in renewed wonder. The pictures on the walls were as fresh as if they had been painted the day before, with their bright colours and their odd, flat people together with symbols of daily life: wine, figs, bread, grapes, lotus flowers, and rolls of linen.
“Do you know, I think I would like an Egyptian style portrait of us,” she said to Darcy as he came down the steps, carrying ropes over his shoulder.
Paul, following Darcy, immediately took up the idea.
“It has never been done before,” he said with enthusiasm. “Those flat shapes, those strong blocks of colour, it would make a striking painting, or I could create a mural in the Egyptian style.”
“Then let us have one, by all means,” said Darcy. “And we must have some of these extraordinary symbols in the painting, too. Paul, you have been making a study of it. What do they mean?”
“The phoenix is the symbol of the sun god,” he said, looking at the bird that stood, man-size, next to one of the human figures. “And see here, on this painting, there is a barge, the barge that carries the sun on its night’s journey. The hieroglyphs in the background must mean something, and one day they will be deciphered. The pictures of food and drink are symbols of everyday life. I could paint you with bottles of wine instead of jugs and apples instead of grapes. I could paint some of the more attractive hieroglyphs behind you, too, although their meaning would be obscure.”
“And you must be surrounded by all your treasures!” said Edward.
“And what of you, Edward?” asked Elizabeth, as they progressed through the vast space, their voices echoing as though they were in a cathedral and their flambeaux flickering fitfully, shedding dancing light on the painted walls. She fell back a little and put a hand on his arm to detain him so that the others should not hear. “You must take care how you treat Sophie, you know. She has been badly hurt in the past and the time is coming when you must make your intentions plain. Before, when there was no question of a marriage between you, it was different, but now you are in a position to take a wife and you must not lead her on if your feelings are not serious.”
“I mean to marry her, or at least to ask her if she will have me,” he said with a quick glance at Paul, who was some way behind them. “You know her, Elizabeth. Do you think she will say yes?”