"Have you ridden far to-day?"

"Yes. I've been in the desert for some time now. We started this morning at dawn." He put the gla.s.s down on the rough trestle-table.

"Thanks most awfully. I feel a lot better. You said there was no truth in the report about the gold and the jewels--what are you expecting?"

"We have seen no trace of gold so far, but you must remember that it was a native who brought the information. Any discoverer is bound to inform the Government, and any portable object accidentally found must be given up within six days."

"But the finder receives half its value?"

"Yes, but if there was this treasure-trove of gold and jewels, it's doubtful if natives would hand that over. It would have been a different thing if it had been monumental objects, or even antiques, as they always run the risk of being caught trafficking in them. They would be inclined to think that half their value is better than none, with the added risk of the heavy penalty. The new rules are very stringent."

"But the jewels? Is there no trace of any precious stones? Don't you think there's a little fire for all that smoke?"

"We heard all these wonderful reports, but we have found no trace of any treasure. What the native reported was that he, along with some other _fellahin_, had accidentally come across some traces of ancient masonry, not far from Akhnaton's tomb. After digging for a few days, they discovered an underground pa.s.sage, which led into a chamber; in it we came upon some papyri."

"You have found papyri?" Michael said. His tired eyes suddenly glowed; his excitement was obvious.

"Yes, we have found papyri. They promise to be of exceptional interest."

"Of what dynasty?" Michael could scarcely speak, or hide his anxiety while he waited for an answer to his question. To be able to a.s.sume an outward appearance of calmness, he was putting a great strain on his self-control. He held himself so well in hand that the stranger little guessed how much his answer meant to the exhausted traveller.

"Amenhotep IV."

A cry rang through the room. "Akhnaton! did you say? Then it is true!" Margaret, the old man in el-Azhar, and the saint, they had all seen and spoken the truth. For a moment the stranger was forgotten.

It was Margaret who was looking at him with glad triumphant eyes.

Happy Meg!

"Yes, the heretic Pharaoh," the stranger said, as he gazed fixedly at Michael. Was this man more than a little touched with the sun? He felt nervous of how to proceed. Why was he so excited and pleased?

"These hills, you know, were the boundary of his capital. You appear interested in him? He certainly was a wonderful character."

The more conventional and colder tones of his voice made Michael guarded. Kind as he was, he was just the type of man who would laugh to scorn anything he might have told him. Freddy's friendly laughter never troubled Michael; the scorn of a stranger was a different thing.

"Have they deciphered any of the papyri?"

"No, we haven't had the time. We've only gone into them sufficiently to discover their date. This is, of course, a temporary search. We can only do in a month what is absolutely necessary. If regular excavations are to be made, which I presume there will be, we shall, of course, have to wait for a bit, while the final regulations are gone through, and until the necessary money is forthcoming. These last new rules and restrictions are putting a stop to any private enterprise.

There is nothing left to pay the cost of the dig."

"On the whole, I suppose, they do good?"

"They don't do what they were meant to do--and that is, stop the stealing and the selling of valuable antiques which the Government, rightly enough, does not wish to leave the country, and desires to have the disposal of."

"I had hoped the new restrictions would stop that."

"You see, the penalties only apply to the natives and the Turks, with the result that the native dealer simply puts an Italian or a Greek name over his door. To the foreigner, the native is only the agent, officially--the dealer is the Greek or Italian whose name is over the door."

"They'd be sure to get out of the difficulty somehow," Michael said.

"About antiques they have no conscience, and they are awfully clever."

"An inspector may now raid their premises at any time of the day or night, and nothing is allowed to be sold outside authorized and licensed shops. Every dealer has to keep a day-book, with an entry of each object in his shop over five pounds in value, the purchaser's name must be filled in, and every page of the register sealed by the Inspector of Antiquities."

Michael laughed. "Trust the native mind to find a way to circ.u.mvent all these fine restrictions!"

His thoughts had flown to Millicent. If she had, as Abdul believed, discovered the jewels and the gold, where were they now? It was very odd that, even with this d.a.m.ning evidence that she had antic.i.p.ated his find before his eyes--for she and she alone could have known of it--his finer senses refused to believe that she had cheated and tricked him.

He had no argument to put forward to justify his belief; it was one of those beliefs which are rooted in something finer and truer than circ.u.mstantial evidence. His only argument in her favour was that he had never found her mercenary, but, as Abdul had answered him, a woman will sell her soul for jewels.

He felt woefully sick and dejected, far too physically exhausted to run the risk of exposing himself to the scorn and laughter of the excavator, who was speaking to him in a manner which unconsciously betrayed to the hypersensitive Michael that he considered the traveller rather too odd to waste much valuable time over. Michael wondered, in a slow, broken sort of way, what the cold eyes would look like if he suddenly produced the uncut crimson amethyst from the purse in his waistbelt. He would probably have said that it was a clever part of the native fable; he would probably say that the ancient stone might have come from any royal tomb in Egypt, that it proved nothing.

As a lengthy silence had elapsed, Michael felt that it was inc.u.mbent on him to be getting on his way. He must pretend to the excavator that he was now well enough to resume his journey. As he rose, rather inertly, from his low seat, he said:

"You say the native who brought the information of the find said nothing at all about the jewels and the gold?"

"Not a word! We have heard all that since. As you know, news travels in the desert in the most amazing fashion, once the natives get ear of it."

"Won't you try and follow up the track of the story--find out how it originated? Are you content to take it for granted that it is all moonshine?"

"We are doing something about it--but it's very difficult." The stranger spoke guardedly. "The only way is to set a thief to catch a thief. Gold can be melted, ancient stones can be cut, a hundred dealers will be eager to run any risk to get them."

A flood of anger coloured Michael's face; it brought out beads of perspiration on his forehead. He could scarcely contain himself; his rage tore at his bowels. His long journey, all that he had gone through--was this the end of it? Could anything be more fiat, more stale, more unprofitable? What a sudden tumble from the blue to brown earth! Above all, how maddening to have to hold his tongue, because no man would believe the story he could tell them, to have meekly to submit to the conventional etiquette of the moment! He felt anything but conventional. His anger had driven all finer feelings from his mind. If he could only find the native who had desecrated the treasure-trove, he would hang and quarter him without mercy!

"I'm afraid I must be getting back to my work," the excavator said.

"But you needn't hurry. Rest here for as long as you like, only don't think me inhospitable if I leave you. Time's too precious to waste one moment."

"Thanks very much," Michael said. "But I'm quite fit. You've been awfully kind. It's time I was on my way."

"Where are you going to?"

"Back to my camp."

"Back to your camp? where did you leave it?"

Michael told him.

"Then did you come on here on purpose to visit this dig? Had you heard of it before you saw the _Omdeh_ in the underground village?"

"I'd rather not answer your question at present, if you don't mind.

All that I know about it, Lampton also knows. . . . Some day, I hope, if we meet again, I will tell you the whole thing. It's an odd story, even for Egypt."

The man looked annoyed. "You can't tell me anything more? Have you any information that could help us? We have our suspicions that things aren't straight. If the natives weren't wading knee-deep in jewels, there was probably, as you say, some truth in the report that there were valuable antiques."

"I've nothing reliable to go upon," Michael said. "Nothing that a man in his normal senses would pay any attention to--that was Lampton's verdict."

Again the stranger looked at Michael with calm, searching eyes.

"Yet you believe in what you heard? You believed enough to bring you across the desert to find it?"

"If you ask Lampton, he'll tell you that I'm not quite in my normal senses--that I frequently walk on my head."

"Lampton's a sound man."

"Well, that's his opinion."