Pharaoh (Jack Howard 7) Read online

  ‘The nostril stones are peridot, from St John’s Island in the Red Sea,’ Hiebermeyer said. ‘The Egyptians sailed there specially to mine it. In the sunlight they reflect an amazing beam of light, almost too dazzling to look at.’

  ‘It’s huge,’ Costas said in a hushed tone. ‘I mean the crocodile. I’ve never seen anything like it.’

  ‘Despite the richness of the embellishments, it was pretty crudely mummified, and hasn’t survived so well, even taking into account the damage to the torso caused by the British soldiers digging through it,’ Hiebermeyer continued. ‘Our analysis of the wrappings shows that the smaller mummy was encased in linen and papyrus characteristic of the reeds grown along the banks of the Nile in upper Egypt, whereas this one is local desert grass mixed with Nile clay probably from the pool below, as well as scraps of papyrus documents that seem to have been discarded from the fort.’

  ‘This is where you found the Semna dispatch you read to us earlier?’ Jack said.

  Hiebermeyer nodded. ‘The smaller mummy was undoubtedly brought here from Egypt, whereas we’re sure this one is a crocodile that lived here and was mummified on the spot. And yes, it’s big. Huge. The largest known Nile crocs are those recorded in the nineteenth century by European hunters. Maybe there were leviathans among them, but this one now stands as the largest Nile crocodile ever recorded. I sent Lanowski the CT scan and his computerised reconstruction of the bones gives its length. Most fully grown male Nile crocs average about four to five metres. This one is almost nine metres, the size of a bus.’

  ‘Ibrahim was telling us about local stories of a leviathan in the river here,’ Jack said. ‘This seems to bear them out.’

  ‘Lanowski calculates the crush strength of the jaw at twenty-five kilonewtons, enough to split a cow in half,’ Hiebermeyer said. ‘But like all crocs, the muscles that open the jaws are weak, and you’d be able to hold them shut if you wrestled it down. Lanowski says the IMU medicos will be particularly interested in the integumentary sense organs on a crocodile of this size, as they may reveal ways of sensing pressure that have applications to diving technology. But you’d have to catch one live.’

  Costas stared at him. ‘Don’t even think about it. I’m not acting as fishing bait for one of Lanowski’s experiments. He wants a live crocodile, he can catch it himself.’

  Jack gazed back at the trench. ‘What are they doing buried up here, so high above the river?’

  ‘That was my first question too,’ Hiebermeyer replied. ‘Nile crocs lay eggs in November and December, the time of year when the level of the river was already well down, and yet they instinctively nested above the summer high-water mark in order to prevent their nests being inundated as the river rose again when the eggs were due to hatch. It was the reason why the ancient Egyptians thought crocodiles could foretell the future. They’d choose a sandy spot where they could bury their eggs and stand guard. Where we are now is one of the few locations with any depth of sand close to the cataract, even though it would have meant a lumbering climb for them up the slope. It’s an exposed location, but open on all sides so difficult for anyone intent on stealing the eggs to sneak up unobserved. Given the size of the crocs that lived here, anyone chancing on them would have kept their distance. On open ground like this a croc can move faster than most people can run. In the water, one this big would be even faster, up to forty kilometres per hour in bursts.’

  ‘I’m glad you used the past tense,’ Costas murmured. ‘Lived, not live.’

  ‘Don’t be too sure. Absence of evidence isn’t proof of absence. At night our workmen who sleep in the open claim they sometimes hear deep breathing from the pool, a snorting sound.’

  ‘Oh great,’ Costas muttered. ‘This gets better by the moment.’

  ‘Do you think there are more mummies here?’ Jack asked.

  Hiebermeyer shook his head. ‘You can see the lower courses of a masonry enclosure beside the trench with the soldier burials. We think the two crocodile mummies were buried side by side as offerings, one a tamed crocodile carefully mummified in Egypt, the other an untamed leviathan from this place. Perhaps there was some meaning to the double burial: the one to demonstrate that the priests could subdue the creature, the other to show respect for the primordial beast, here at this place on the very edge of civilisation.’

  ‘You mention priests,’ Jack said, peering at Hiebermeyer intently. ‘At all the other places where crocodile mummies have been found, they’ve been discovered in large numbers, stashed in temples to the crocodile god Sobek. At Crocodilopolis, for example.’

  Costas looked horrified. ‘At where?’

  ‘Crocodilopolis. Crocodile town. On the Nile near Memphis.’

  ‘They had a place called that?’

  Hiebermeyer snorted impatiently. ‘That’s Jack being Greek again. The ancient Egyptians called it Arsinoe. The priests there kept a crocodile embellished with jewels and gold in a special pool, replacing and mummifying him when he died. They called him Petsuchos.’

  ‘Petsuchos? You’re kidding me. They kept a pet crocodile?’

  ‘Not a pet exactly,’ Jack said. ‘More like a personification of a terrifying monster god. I don’t think you stroked it and took it for walks.’

  Costas stared at the mummy. ‘I’m beginning to get it. You think the same kind of thing was going on here, don’t you?’

  Jack peered at Hiebermeyer intently. ‘The cult of Sobek was always associated with a temple. That’s the one thing missing here. I may be wrong, but I think you have something more to show us.’

  Hiebermeyer’s eyes gleamed, and he dropped the flap covering the mummy. ‘Back to the plateau where we started. We should get moving. We haven’t got much time.’

  ‘One final question,’ Costas said. ‘How did the crocodiles here get so big?’

  Hiebermeyer’s phone went off, and he read a text message. He clicked it shut and put it away. ‘That was Aysha. The inspectors have arrived at the opposite bank. Scheisse. They were supposed to come here first. We’re not ready for them yet over there.’ He snorted in annoyance, glanced at his watch and charged out of the tent, then stopped and looked at Costas. ‘Did you say something?’

  ‘How did the crocodiles get so big?’

  Hiebermeyer scratched his chin, looked thoughtfully down and then peered at Costas, a glint in his eye. ‘Oh, human sacrifice, I should imagine.’

  ‘What? Human sacrifice?’

  ‘The priests couldn’t do it in the civilised heartland of Egypt, where that sort of thing was a no-no. But I’ve always thought there were those among the Egyptian priests who were itching to do it. Thank God they couldn’t know what the Aztecs used pyramids for, otherwise Giza would have been a bloodbath. But out here, where no one was looking, they could have had a field day. There were all those awkward foreign prisoners of war: Hittites, Canaanites, Hebrews, Nubians. Perhaps even the odd Greek too, as a tasty morsel.’ He eyed Costas mischievously. ‘So instead of summoning up a mythical monster, they create a real-life leviathan. What better way to placate the god than to keep him happily engorged in his pool of death here, rather than letting him go hungry and swim south to bring darkness over Egypt?’

  ‘Pool of death,’ Costas said miserably. ‘That’s where we’re going diving.’

  Hiebermeyer grinned at him. ‘And where it’s been waiting for three thousand years. Pretty hungry by now.’

  Costas groaned, and Hiebermeyer strode on ahead. A few minutes later they stood on a rocky plateau about the size of a tennis court overlooking the Nile, just beyond the site of the sangar. Aysha appeared over the ridge and joined them, holding the baby. Jack could see that Hiebermeyer was bursting to tell them what he had found. ‘Well?’

  Hiebermeyer pulled a folded sheet out of his pocket. ‘Extra-high-frequency ground-penetrating radar,’ he said, beaming. ‘Another little project with my friend Lanowski, developed for a new search I’m planning in the Valley of the Kings. The new technology can penetrate deeper into rock t
han ever before, and I’m certain it’s going to give us another find to rival Tutankhamun’s tomb. But this is the first chance I’ve had to try it out for real. And it came up trumps. Big-time.’

  He unfolded the sheet and passed it to Jack, his hand shaking slightly with excitement. Jack opened it out, and Costas peered over. ‘Holy cow,’ Costas murmured. ‘There’s something really big down there.’

  Jack stared at it, his heart pounding. The printout showed the ghostly image of a square chamber beneath the rock, some twenty metres across. ‘How deep under the surface is this?’ he asked.

  ‘Our geophysicists agree with Lanowski that the ceiling of the chamber is at least eight metres below ground level. Before you ask, there’s no chance of getting to it from here, at least not without explosives and mining equipment. This whole outcrop is solid pre-Cambrian rock, as hard as iron. It must have taken the ancient Egyptians decades to dig out that chamber.’

  ‘You’re sure it’s that old?’

  ‘I’m certain of it, Jack. You said it: there’s one thing missing in the archaeology of this place, and that’s a temple. Finding those crocodile mummies clinched it for me. I knew it had to be to the crocodile god Sobek. I used our database to check the dimensions of known Sobek temples elsewhere in Egypt, and what we have here looks bang-on. It would have opened up beside the river, and had access to that pool.’

  ‘Do we know what the cliff face looks like?’

  Hiebermeyer produced another sheet of paper. ‘Ibrahim’s been hard at work over the last few days. He was desperate to tell you, but I asked him to wait until I’d put you in the picture. He took a Zodiac out on the river and used an echo-sounding imager he’d brought from his Red Sea equipment store. It couldn’t penetrate the mud in the centre of the pool, but it did produce this.’ He handed Jack the sheet. It showed a graduated profile image of the underwater cliff and the former rocky shore in front of it. At the base of the cliff Jack could clearly see the outline of a massive doorway, the jambs and pediment carved out of the living rock. Maurice was right. It was an incredible image, an ancient temple carved into the cliff, the entrance submerged completely under the waters of the Nile.

  ‘The door looks shut, and it’s probably stone,’ Hiebermeyer said. ‘But below it, you can just about see what I think is a rock-cut channel that led out to the pool. That also fits with other temples of Sobek: a channel to allow tame crocodiles to swim between the river and a sacred pool within the temple. It’s just possible that you might be able to get inside that way. The channel is about thirty metres below the present level of the Nile.’

  ‘What about before the Aswan dam?’ Jack said. ‘At low water before the 1960s the temple would have been exposed. Has it ever been reported?’

  Hiebermeyer shook his head. ‘The photographs show a huge drift of sand and rocky debris coming down from the plateau below the sangar and concealing the entire entrance. It might have been possible for someone to slide into the upper part of the doorway, where there was usually a narrow triangular opening above the actual door to let in air and light. But it looks to me as if there’s been a rock fall that’s blocked up any opening that might have existed. If the locals know anything about a temple here, they’re keeping quiet. They seem to be terrified of this place.’

  ‘Can’t say I blame them,’ Costas murmured.

  ‘Can you do it?’ Hiebermeyer asked Jack. ‘Can you dive here?’

  Jack slapped him on the back. ‘We can certainly try.’

  ‘That’s great,’ Costas mumbled. ‘First you violate the sacred crocodile mummies by excavating them, and now we plan to swim right into their lair. Just great.’

  Jack gestured at the printout. ‘Have you told your Sudanese inspector about this?’

  Hiebermeyer pulled down his hat and stood up. ‘We haven’t told anyone except you and Costas and Ibrahim. And I’ll be doing my very best to avoid him. I don’t get on with him and I’m liable to say something that will scupper us. Aysha’s the official permit-holder and site director here, and she knows how to deal with men like that.’

  Costas watched Hiebermeyer’s shorts sink dangerously below his waistline, and then stared as he hitched them up and tightened the lederhosen suspenders. He shook his head. ‘Well, if Aysha can deal with you, she can deal with any man.’

  Aysha waved dismissively. ‘Maurice is a piece of cake. Dangle an Egyptian mummy in front of him, and he’s putty in my hands.’

  ‘Even a crocodile mummy?’

  ‘Just one mummy,’ Hiebermeyer said, gazing fondly at Aysha and the baby, then glaring at Costas. ‘Just remember, not all the crocodiles around here are mummified.’

  Costas suddenly looked dismayed, and Jack grinned. ‘While the inspection’s going on, my aim is to be underwater. It’s always the best place to be.’

  Costas looked doubtfully at the river. ‘Usually the best place to be.’ He checked his iPhone. ‘Huh. A message from Sofia.’

  ‘She reminding you about that dinner date?’ Jack said.

  ‘She says she’s sending you her draft of the press release on the Beatrice for your approval. And she’s come up with a name for the submersible: Nina. It was one of Columbus’ ships; apparently its master was an ancestor of Sofia’s. It means “girl”. I like it. She wants us to do more exploration in the Americas.’

  Aysha peered at him. ‘Who’s Sofia?’

  ‘Oh, just a friend.’

  ‘A dinner-date friend?’

  ‘I’ve sent her a picture of me with Ahren.’

  ‘Whoa,’ Aysha said. ‘That’s diving in at the deep end.’

  ‘Just showing her my friends.’

  Aysha smiled. ‘You know how to touch a lady’s heart.’

  Costas paused. ‘Will Sofia think I’m hitting on her?’

  ‘Well, are you?’

  ‘She and Costas met in a submersible,’ Jack said. ‘They plummeted to the depths together.’

  ‘You were there too, Jack!’ Costas exclaimed.

  ‘So, you’re taking a page right out of Lanowski’s book,’ Hiebermeyer said, smiling at Costas.

  ‘I’d rather not take anything out of Lanowski’s book,’ he muttered.

  Hiebermeyer slapped him on the back. ‘You ever need any advice on the man stuff, you come to me.’

  ‘Yeah, you and Lanowski both,’ Costas said glumly.

  ‘He’d be more than happy to help out, I’m sure,’ Hiebermeyer said. ‘We could do the male bonding thing, a weekend maybe, and combine it with the two-day seminar I know he’s itching to give you on submersible circuitry. Or is it three days? He’s told me all about it. I think he called it an idiot’s guide. I might even sit in on it myself. I could learn a few things.’ He beamed at Jack mischievously.

  ‘I think you’ve just been had,’ Jack said, turning to Costas. ‘No more jokes about his shorts, maybe?’

  ‘No way,’ Costas said, suddenly determined, giving Hiebermeyer a steely look. ‘From now on, it gets serious.’

  Jack grinned, and then his phone rang. He answered it quickly. ‘That was Ibrahim. He’s got the equipment stowed in the Toyota ready to drive to the river’s edge. Time to saddle up.’

  ‘What do you mean, saddle up?’

  ‘I thought we’d take a camel ride to get there. Immerse ourselves in desert culture before we immerse ourselves in the Nile. The full Sudan experience.’

  Costas stared at the camel, which had ambled over to the plateau and was gazing at him dolefully. ‘Oh no,’ he said. ‘That thing’s got it in for me.’

  ‘It’ll be all right,’ Aysha said. ‘If you mount it while it’s lying down, you won’t have to go anywhere near its orifices.’

  Costas looked at the camel, than back at the river. ‘Camel, crocodile. Camel, crocodile. Camel. Crocodile.’

  Hiebermeyer thrust a picture he had been carrying of a Nile crocodile in front of Costas. ‘Snap,’ he said.

  ‘What do you mean, snap?’

  ‘I mean snap, the card game. If you do
n’t get on the camel now, I’ll put another picture on this one and then when you get in the water, snap.’

  ‘Snap,’ Costas repeated feebly. ‘Okay. I get it. Crocodiles. A really bad joke. You can make up for it by helping me get up on this camel. Where’s yours, Jack?’

  Jack pretended to look shocked. ‘Oh, I’m not getting on a camel. No fear. I’ll be walking far ahead, at the end of a very long lead.’ He took a deep breath and turned to the others. ‘Good luck with the inspection, Aysha. I thought I’d been pretty well everywhere, but I’ve never dived in the Nile. I’m itching to get in.’

  He turned and peered again at the plateau beside the river where the temple lay concealed. Only a few hours earlier, he had been flying over the Abu Simbel temple beside Lake Nasser, imagining diving into the submerged chambers in the cliff face where the statues of Ramses the Great had once stood. That would have been a remarkable dive, for the haunting atmosphere rather than the possibility of new discoveries; before the Aswam dam, the inner chambers at Abu Simbel had been above the level of the Nile and had been scoured by treasure-hunters and archaeologists for generations. Here, though, it was different. The temple at Semna had never been explored, and may have been sealed up for millennia. They might be like Carter and Carnarvon in the tomb of Tutankhamun, entering a space that had been undisturbed since the time of the pharaohs, except underwater and with dangers that made the curse of the tomb seem lame. But they had dived on the very edge of possibility before – into an iceberg, down mine shafts, above a live volcano – and Jack would confront the risks here as he had done then, with Costas to keep him from straying too far into the unknown. He felt the adrenalin pumping already. This could be the dive of a lifetime. If they could get inside.