The Night Train to Luxor*

Posted on by Justin



1923

CHAPTER ONE
It had been a trying day for Grace Everley.
            If she were being entirely fair, she would have been forced to admit that the majority of her recent time in Cairo had been trying. Howard had sent her back to the center of Britain’s imperial holdings in Egypt just as events in the Valley of the Kings—events Grace had helped set in motion with a fortuitous stumble—reached fever pitch. It was precisely the sort of thoughtless, albeit well meaning, gesture for which the famous archeologist was known; God only knew Grace had defended him against charges of boorishness time and time again, convincing recalcitrant diggers and bearers that he meant well when he kept them working through the heat of the day or shoved them down into tombs of unfathomable blackness seemingly without a second thought.
            “After all,” she would say, in her textbook perfect Arabic, which so often seemed to promote smiles or outright mirth from the ragtag crew members, “Howard always goes first.”
            But there had been no one to defend Carter to her when he ripped her away from the impossible wonders of King Tutankhamen’s tomb and hustled her back to the British Museum in Egypt to deal with paperwork. Oh certainly, he’d made some noise about how “capable” she was, and how “only she” could wrangle the hordes of paper-pushers from the intolerable Supreme Council on Antiquities, who’d been breathing down their necks since word of the riches they’d discovered became a worldwide sensation the previous year.
            “See if you can quell those curse rumors, too,” he’d tossed out as he ushered her—well, perhaps dragged was more accurate, but really, she’d been in the middle of a transcription!—from the depths of the tomb. “Bloody annoying, that, and it’s been going on far too long.”
            Two weeks later, Cairo was unbearably hot and abominably dusty; the curse rumors were un-quelled … and a series of fantastic objects of untold value had been looted from the tomb that Grace, Howard, the lamentably deceased Lord Carnarvon, and the others working the dig site tentatively believed belonged to a minor Egyptian pharaoh named Tutankhamen.
            “Stolen?” Grace bleated again, looking down at the telegram in her hand. The ink was somewhat smudged from her gripping it so enthusiastically. Her aunt, Lady Delores Swithermore, wife of a high-ranked local British dignitary, looked down her nose at Grace and shrugged. Then, taking mercy, she reached out and gently unclenched her niece’s fingers from the brief message.
            “Do sit down, darling, before you fall into a faint. Kareem will prepare you a drink.” She slapped enthusiastically at a crystal bell located on one of the many end tables cramming her sitting room. The place was packed from one end to the other with bric-a-brac and furniture; Lady Delores couldn’t resist a bargain, and spent many days actively in search of same, scouring the back alleys of Cairo where, she claimed, the best pieces were to be found. Grace had accompanied her once, under strenuous pressure to reinvigorate her admittedly paltry wardrobe, and had found herself transfixed by the anthropological possibilities of the expedition. Lady Delores, in contrast, had purchased four lamps and a chestnut end table the vendor claimed had been hauled from a pharaoh’s tomb a millennia before. When Grace pointed out that chestnut was not indigenous to Northern Africa, and that a pharaoh dwelling in 2000 BC would not have been able to acquire said materials for construction, the vendor was so insulted that he chased her from his stand, screaming virulent invective. Lady Delores was allowed to remain. She bought a chest of drawers to make it up to him.
            Crossing the sitting room now, muttering about Kareem’s ongoing absence, Delores lifted her orange and white cat, Nefertiti, from atop the chest, opened the top drawer, and removed a large bottle of gin. Nefertiti’s whiskers twitched.
            “Devil take Kareem! I’ll make our drinks myself. I mix with a stronger hand than he does, anyway, and you’ll be better able to respond to that dear Mr. Carter once you’ve revivified your spirits.”
            Grace wrinkled her nose. “Oh Aunt. You know I can’t abide gin; it goes straight to my head. Just the tonic, please.” She ignored Delores’ censorious look and subsequent eye roll. Spending day in and day out stoically enduring the teasing of Carter and his almost entirely male crew of workers had given her, Grace thought, an admirable store of patience.
            The thought of Carter brought her back to the telegram, still in Delores’ possession. What could it possibly mean? Besides the obvious, of course.
            Valued artifacts missing STOP Bearer deceased STOP Events unclear STOP Do not alert SCA STOP Stay in Cairo for now STOP That is an order Grace
            Which artifacts? Which bearer? Surely not Omar. Grace’s heart clenched, and she took a drink from the glass her aunt had pressed into her hand without pausing to sniff at its contents. The juniper taste of gin hit the back of her throat, and she yelped, almost spitting the drink back out.
            “Really, Grace. Your manners.” Lady Delores took a healthy drink of her own gin and tonic, smiled in a satisfied manner, and settled into one of the overstuffed green armchairs by the window. The shades were drawn against the heat of midday, but at night the view was a delightful one, which Grace had enjoyed at the many raucous dinner parties her aunt and uncle threw. A street teeming with life and energy: overloaded burros, carrying impossible burdens of hay and greenery, being switched about the ears by their youthful riders; wide, flat-bottomed wooden carts hauling all manner of objects from the bazaars to the homes of their new owners; vendors peddling sugar cane and mango juice, which Grace enjoyed surreptitiously on hot days, though most of the British in Cairo turned up their noses at it. It was a tableau that brought joy to her heart in the direst of circumstances—until today.
            “How can you care for my manners at this time, Aunt Delores?” Grace snatched back the telegram and stared more deeply at it, as if seeking meaning it did not contain. “And how can Howard be so infuriatingly vague? He’s hardly told me anything! I know the bearers; they’re like my brothers. My friends. What if … And the artifacts! He doesn’t even specify what items the thieves have made off with. You don’t understand the significance of this loss, aunt. What we’ve found is unlike—”
            “I know, my darling.” Nefertiti hopped onto Delores’ lap, and Delores stroked her back meditatively, taking another long drink of her gin and tonic. Nefertiti pressed closer, as if wanting to sip from the cup herself. “You’ve hardly spoken of anything besides your—” her voice dipped ironically—“wondrous discovery for the last year.”
            “Terribly sorry I can’t be blasé about untold millions of never before seen pharaonic gold!” It was all Grace could do to avoid stamping her foot. She had spent the last six years dreaming of this sort of discovery. For Howard and poor Lord Carnarvon, it had been more than twenty, albeit with the brutal introduction of the war. Twenty years, spent slaving away in the beating sun, which at the height of summer could render a strapping man mad in a matter of hours! And all that time, the secrets they sought had lain beneath their noses, undiscovered, undisturbed, surrounded on all sides by tombs unscrupulous robbers had picked clean over the centuries. To have their great discovery ripped from them now, after all this time—
            “Sit down, Grace. You’re white as a sheet. And stop whinging at me. You’ll be pleased to know that I’ve already worked out a solution to your and Mr. Carter’s little problem.” Lady Delores smiled absently at the mention of Carter’s name. She had a soft spot in her heart for men with resplendent mustaches, and since her husband, Basil, was utterly unable to grow one, she devoted a substantial amount of time at those fabled dinner parties to unrepentant flirtatious banter with the noted archeologist.
            “A solution?” Grace lifted her glass to her mouth, remembered its contents, and set it back down. Nefertiti was upon it in a flash. “What do you mean?”
            “Do you remember that fellow who came to my last dinner party?” Lady Delores raised an eyebrow. “The … rumpled looking one. You remarked that his jacket could use a good pressing, which I found rather forward for a young woman of your meticulous manners.”
            Grace cast her mind back, struggling to remember the evening in question. Lady Delores’ dinner parties tended to blur together, particularly when one was hanging back against the wall, trying to stay out of the increasingly debauched goings-on. “The dark haired man? Wasn’t he drunk? I recall him practically reeking of Auld Stag.”
            “Ah yes.” There was a palpable glow in Lady Delores’ eyes, as if she were trying to restrain the broadest of smiles. “That’s Raymond.”
            “I don’t understand what your brigand friends have to do with our stolen artifacts!” Grace cried, crumpling the telegram in her fist. Lady Delores, who had already finished her gin, shooed Nefertiti away from Grace’s glass and took a satisfied swig.
            “He’s going to find them for you,” she said.
CHAPTER TWO

Artifact recovery was the last thing on Raymond Hawk’s mind.
            “Tell me about your dreams,” he said, slouching casually, feeling the familiar crinkle of dusty crushed velvet behind his back. Nothing in Cleopatra’s Den had been updated since the establishment opened in the late 1800s. Hell, it might have opened a century before that, and still it would have looked as opulently worn as it did today, with its cascades of intermittently faded brocade curtains, its velvet settees, the fabric once the color of rich, freshly spilled blood, now worn to a dull echo of their former grandeur, the shabby and peeling “gold” plate that covered every available surface. Some might have found it dingy, or tawdry. Hawk found it exhilarating.
            But not as exhilarating as the young woman beside him. Her hands were clasped in her lap, her head tipped forward so that her long dark hair fell between them like a curtain. Thoughtfully, Hawk reached out and pushed her hair back, tucking it behind her ear, revealing the curve of her cheek. He traced his finger along her smooth skin, and she smiled at him, her teeth flashing white in the artificial gloom.
            “I’m surprised you’re here so early, Mr. Hawk. The other girls told me you usually come in later in the evening.”
            “Please, Aamira. Call me Raymond.”
            She smiled at him again. “Of course, Mr. Raymond.”
            Now Hawk smiled, and gestured toward the bottle of whiskey on the table. Obligingly, Aamira leaned forward and poured him a glass. The Madame who ran Cleopatra’s insisted on dressing all the girls up like refugees from the Arabian Nights; the effect, when a gentleman first stepped through the layers of whispering curtains, was akin to passing back in time, to an era when sultans gathered around them the greatest beauties in the land, to be called upon whenever their pleasure dictated. Hawk’s pleasure dictated that he come to Cleopatra’s frequently, sometimes several times a day, though the magical effect had long since been lost on him. Now, watching Aamira, her lovely curves obscured by ballooning pants, a veil draped half across her really very impressive chest, he was mostly excited for the pretense to be over, and the fun to begin. But then, wasn’t the pretense half the fun at Cleopatra’s?
            Aamira leaned forward and pressed the glass of Auld Stag into his hand, leaning close, very close. He could smell rosewater, which mixed not unpleasantly with the dear, familiar, burning odor of Auld Stage. Nile River Dan was always comparing it to the rubbing alcohol used to sterilize wounds in the war, usually before swigging down half a bottle and offering to fight Raymond for the rest. Raymond didn’t mind fighting, but he didn’t want to talk about the war. He frowned. Not ever.
            “Is something wrong?” It was Aamira’s turn to put a hand on his cheek. “You look so sad, Mr. Raymond.”
            “Sometimes I’m sad,” Hawk said, bringing his mind back to the present, passing the glass of Auld Stag around the girl’s soldiers so that he could take a long and lingering drink. “But I have the feeling you’ll be able to cheer me up.”
            The light of a challenge flashed in her eyes. It was a look Hawk loved. Some of his friends—the boring ones, the ones with absolute parcels of tiny brattish children running around, knocking over tables and clamoring for attention—claimed they couldn’t understand his penchant for ladies of the night.
            “Where’s the chase?” Portnoy or Drew would drawl, tossing back some watered-down swill they’d only ordered so their prissy wives wouldn’t complain later about the liquor on their breath. “The challenge! You’re a handsome fellow, Hawk. You should be knocking young girls off their feet at balls and what-have-yous at the embassy, not skulking around that flea-infested dive paying for your pleasure.”
            “Cleopatra’s,” Raymond would reply, matching them drink for drink and sometimes double, knowing the club bartender would never dare water down Hawk’s whiskey, “is delightfully clean. I know Cecile; I’ve known her for years. She’s an artist, and the girls she selects are masterpieces. You’d rather I spend my days jitterbugging with gawky children, when I could be looking at Nefertiti reborn?”
            “Christ, man,” Portnoy or Drew or Nigel would say, drawing his brows together, ordering another drink, no doubt determined to stay out at least until the last child had been dragged off to bed by the nannies. “You’ll never settle down at this rate.”
            “That’s the idea,” Raymond would murmur, intentionally losing the words in the amber depths of his drink.
            In Cleopatra’s Den, in his element, he took another sip, then smiled delightedly as Aamira—with unexpected aggressiveness—took the glass from his hand and sipped herself. Immediately, she wrinkled her nose.
            “So strong,” she said, toying with the corner of her veil, her eyes never leaving Raymond’s.
            “I like it that way,” he said, lowering his voice and setting the glass to one side.
            “Strong like you.” She stepped forward, reached down and with delicate, perfectly manicured hands—Cecile’s girls, in addition to being beauties, were always impeccably feminine and well-groomed—tugged one of his legs to the side. Then the other. She stepped between them and paused, her fingers toying ever so briefly with the tie behind her head. The veil slipped to the ground, and for the first time Hawk could see the round curve of her breasts, barely concealed by a small circlet of cloth. Reaching up with one hand, Hawk took another long drink of Auld Stag. She’d poured him a triple measure.
            “Well done,” he whispered, pulling expertly at the circlet and tossing it to the side. Her breasts were bigger than he’d guessed, full and heavy in his hands. He leaned forward slightly, brushed her nipples with his thumbs, felt them grow stiff beneath the easy motion of his fingers.
            “Cecile told me,” Aamira said, her shoulders pulled back, her posture easy and relaxed. She enjoyed it when he touched her. “Cecile said to spare no expense for Mr. Raymond.”
            “Very generous,” Hawk said, the corner of his lips quirking.
            “I can be very generous, too,” Aamira said. Leaning forward, she caught his ear lobe in her teeth and nipped gently. Despite the generous draught of Auld Stag, Hawk felt the familiar rush of heat through his body, the quickening of his blood that, since the war, he’d only experienced here, in these intimate shadow-draped moments at Cleopatra’s. He pulled Aamira back, a little more forcefully now, and drew her face toward his for a kiss.
            A throat cleared in the doorway, a delicate sound, somehow quintessentially French.
            “Oh for God’s sake.” Hawk’s hands dropped down Aamira’s body, skimming regretfully down her arms, her sides, feeling the soft warmth of her skin. He hadn’t even seen her ass yet. “What is it, Cecile?”
            “Obviously an emergency.” Her voice was warm; her English perfect, but she chose to speak in a deliberately heavy accent for, she’d told Raymond once, that extra dose of exoticism. What did people come to Cleopatra’s for, if not a taste of the Orient? “You know that if it were not quelle urgent, my dearest Raymond, I would never interrupt you when you are … working.”
            “Is it that fool from the Council again? Come seeking his errant wife?” Hawk eased Aamira to his side on the couch—she was blatantly sulking—and finished his Auld Stag in one burning gulp. Quickly, he leaned forward and refilled the glass. “Tell him if he’s going to dog my steps, he can expect a duel. He can also expect to lose.”
            “You drink all of that,” Cecile said, leaning back against the doorframe, “you will not be able to shoot your pistol straight. So luckily, it is not Mr. Hollande. It is Lady Switherborne’s butler. He says come at once, and you will be paid finely.”
            “Switherborne? Delores? What the hell?” Hawk adjusted himself and rose, casting a reluctant look at Aamira. Cecile saw, and smiled.
            “Don’t pout, pretty girl. He will be back, probably tonight. If not tonight, tomorrow morning, and tomorrow afternoon too.” Hawk joined her in the doorway, and Cecile tapped familiarly at his chest. “She is new. Just in Cairo now, from Cewa. She will learn your ways.”
            “She’s stunning. Lovely breasts,” Hawk said, intentionally baiting Cecile. Not that it worked. The Madame was probably one of the few people on the whole misbegotten planet who’d seen more sexual congress than he, and she only nodded enthusiastically.
            “This is why I have taken her on. Her face—it is pretty, yes. But Cairo is full of pretty girls. I know where it is you gentlemen are really looking. Especially in a city full of these sad British women, with their horse’s faces.” Cecile shared her countrymen’s disdain for the British, and particularly for the vast profusion of English wives packing Cairo, seeking endlessly for dry meat and boiled potatoes in the city’s endless bazaars, complaining about the heat, the staff, the bugs, the dogs, the smell; henpecking their husbands until the poor nebbishy men fled, tails between their legs, to the warm, rose-scented embraces of the girls at Cleopatra’s.
            “You should be kinder to the British Isles,” Hawk said, leaning back, jutting out his long legs, and smiling his practiced rogue’s smile at Cecile. “If they were one shade warmer, your business would be fifty percent worse. Luckily, I’m the only hot-blooded things that sad rock of an island has ever produced.” He paused, considering. “Delores isn’t bad, though. Get seven gin and tonics in her, and you can expect a rousing good time.”
            “This may not be such a good time.” Cecile pursed her lips, perfectly painted in a deep vermillion that recalled the furnishings of her brothel. She was a former stunner whose beauty had largely been worn away by the harsh grind of her life in Cairo; in a way, she made Hawk think of the Sphinx, that strangely alluring androgynous face, rubbed and chiseled by storms of sand for centuries, cruelly defaced by the idiot antics of Napoleon and his troops, yet still arresting, still something that would make you pause in a crowd and think: and yet.
            And she had a head on her shoulders that would put ninety percent of the buskers and touts in the city to shame. If she thought there was something amiss …
            “What’s going on, Cecile?” Hawk said. And there was something different in his voice, a tone of seriousness Cecile could not recall having heard before.
            She handed him the summons that had come to her door a few minutes before, the bearer frantic, his horse in a positive lather of sweat. While Hawk read, she gestured brusquely to Aamira, who still sat petulantly on the couch, her hips cocked at a provocative angle.
            “Put your clothes back on, girl, and get back down to the salon.” Cecile paused, searching Hawk’s face. He wouldn’t show a response to the message; he was far too canny for that. Nonetheless, she knew the truth of what she felt. “It’s the end of an era. I think Mr. Hawk will not be returning to Cleopatra’s tonight.”

CHAPTER THREE

The carriage bore Hawk away from the Den, the driver leaving Hawk alone with the telegram, his thoughts – and the dram of Auld Stag he’d taken for the road.
            “It’s never good to be without a drink,” Hawk said to no one in particular. Outside the coach, the purple light of an early winter dusk fell heavily over the city. Hawk watched the light on the grand buildings across the river, the mansions and embassies that made up the island of Zamalek, where he was now headed. The trees along the river trailed their branches into the tranquil water, which held onto the day’s last light. A few water taxis plied the Nile. Somewhere, Hawk suspected, Nile River Dan was down there, getting into God knows what kind of trouble.
            Hawk sighed. It might be a damn long time before he could engage in such escapades again. Just minutes ago, he held the finest breasts in the eastern hemisphere – and now, he was embroiled in what was sure to be the scandal of the century. How quickly the hands of fate could turn!
            In the failing light, he read the note once more, scrawled in Dolores’ frantic, messy cursive.
            My dearest Raymond,
            I hope you’ll forgive me for dispatching with my usual pleasantries, but there’s no time for hollow talk. My dear Niece, Gracie, has just received the most alarming telegram from that dear Mr. Carter, rushed all the way from that wretched, dusty valley outside of Thebes. The details are sparse, and I’d prefer not to divulge them – you know how shifty and dastardly Kareem is – but let’s just say there is some distress among the expedition, and I fear it’s quite serious.
Gracie is beside herself. It’s all I can do to keep her from hopping the next coach down the Nile! I told her to sit still, that if there was one person in all of Egypt – nay, the entire world – who possessed more information, it would be you, my esteemed Raymond. You know I would only disturb you for matters of the utmost importance. And I also know that you’re well aware of the many favors Lord Switherborne and I have bestowed on you over the years – all done with the utmost kindness and the least expectation of return…
My dear Raymond, I, too, am beside myself – with anger at that galoot Howard! I always warned him that their reckless adventuring would be the end of us all, and now it appears they’ve really done it. If only they’d stayed here, where the flowers are always in bloom and the gin flows without cessation …
            Well, I’m letting my emotions get the better of me. Please, hurry, Raymond. I need you. My poor Gracie needs you.
           
What he’d heard was true, then. They’d really made off with the Tutankhamen treasure.
Hawk had first heard rumours of the sort – impossible rumours, he’d thought – at Nile River Dan’s weekly poker game. It was hardly the most reputable game in town, and it brought in the most unsavory, braggadocios crowd this side of Tangier. But it was a rousing good time, and exactly the kind of place one went if they were hoping to hear the latest mischief on the black market. Hawk had won many a glittering artifact in that game – very few of them had been legally procured, he suspected.
But along with artifacts, the game was treasure trove of outlandish boasting – women of unimaginable beauty, treasures buried in the deepest depths of the Sahara, prison breaks of unfathomable treachery. When you combine scoundrels and barrels of Auld Stag, its fertile ground for tall tales.
So when a motley duo from Tripoli claimed some mates of theirs were about to pull off the heist of the century, Hawk laughed it off the way he laughed off ninety-five percent of the bollocks he heard at Nile River Dan’s (at least half of which he told himself). Sure, this bollocks was a bit more detailed than the usual horse crap – they weren’t big drinkers, and the Auld Stag made them a bit loose lipped; they mentioned names, travel routes – but still: could any roughnecks associated with such buffoons possibly pull of the Tutankhamen heist?
Impossible, Hawk had thought. His doubts were confirmed when he cleaned both men out, and found that their “treasures” were little more than cheap swill, half-assed knockoffs that any decent smithe could make.
But for once, his impeccable instincts had been wrong; the swindlers must’ve been telling the truth.
Hawk folded the letter and put it back in his vest. He pulled a cigarette from his case and lit it, reclining and watching the other carriages on the Nile – women and children out for an evening ride; young men courting young women, hoping for a kiss upon the cheek …
            It was all so quaint. If only they knew what roiled just beneath the surface! Hawk took a drag of the smooth Egyptian tobacco. He knew he should be attempting to recall the names from the poker game, but, having been left so unsatisfied at Cleopatra’s, Hawk found that poor, distressed Grace Everley had suddenly wormed her way into his brain.
            He’d occasionally espied Grace at Dolores’ legendary parties. She was, even by Hawk’s liberal standards, a stunning beauty – tall and effortlessly fit, she had legs as long as willow branches, eyes as deep as onyx, and skin the consistency of alabaster. But her beauty aside, she was a vexing woman – prim and almost impossibly proper, she ruthlessly resisted Hawk’s (considerable) charms, chastising him for his (completely within reason) consumption and incessantly corrected his (completely adequate) grammar. Hawk found it impossible that she and Dolores, whose warmth was the stuff of renown, were of the same stock. Needless to say, he wasn’t used to women who were immune to his charms, and because of this, Grace Everley had left the kind of impression that few women left.
            Hawk finished his Auld Stag, trying to clear his head. Now was not the time for fancies of the loins. He furrowed his brow …
The names they’d mentioned … what were the names?


CHAPTER FOUR

There wasn’t enough room in her aunt’s apartment to pace satisfactorily, Grace thought, reaching the sideboard of the dining room, executing a neat turn, and starting back the way she’d come. Though she could always commandeer the ballroom, and just might do so, if something didn’t happen soon. It wasn’t clear to her what good she could do Howard and the expedition by going outside to roam the streets, especially at this time of the evening, but it had to be more useful than what she was accomplishing here.
            Which was precisely nothing. And if there was one thing Grace Everley hated, and had hated since the war, it was idleness.
            “Are you sure this Mr. Hawk is really coming?” She asked her aunt, stopping and resting her hands on the back of her chair. Lady Delores continued to eat in blissful disregard of her niece’s agitation, pausing only to extract more rice, delicately flavored with cinnamon and cumin, from the breast cavity of her pigeon.
            “Such a shame to let your dinner go to waste, dear Grace,” she said, casting a pointed look at Grace’s untouched plate. “You’ll never get married at this rate, you know, hiding out in the desert, turning yourself brown as shoe leather and wasting away to nothing. I’m sure your dear departed mother would agree.”
            “Mother was an independent woman,” Grace said fiercely, her knuckles going white where they clasped the chair. “And as she’s been dead for almost ten years, I suppose her opinions are irrelevant, aren’t they, Auntie?”
            Lady Delores huffed.
            “Kareem will be pleased with your lack of regard for his cooking. More for him.” This statement was accompanied by a black look toward her long-suffering valet, who stood at perfect attention beside the serving platters, placed neatly on the left side of the dining table. Though it wasn’t proper manners, strictly speaking, Lady Delores preferred a more relaxed dining atmosphere when family were the only ones in attendance. “So lovely that Egypt allows one such tiny indulgences,” she was fond of saying.
            “Kareem knows I think his food’s delightful,” Grace said, drawing her aunt’s attention back to the present moment. “His pigeon is the best I’ve had in Cairo—and we both know I swore I’d never touch the things when I arrived. But I can’t possibly eat right now, Aunt!” She threw her hands up in the air and went back to pacing, her footfalls sounding louder and more urgent now. “I must come up with some sort of plan. You know the media frenzy surrounding the tomb! It’s absurd. We hardly get any work done as it is. All the blather about a curse, and mysterious deaths, and—you know I told George, Lord Carnarvon, that is, to be careful of the mosquitoes. God knows they devour me alive. If he’d only been more wary of his bites …”
            “You’re babbling, Gracie.” Lady Delores finished her gin and tonic and gestured for another. “Oh, don’t give me that look, Kareem. Keep pouring. Yes, thank you. That will do. Now—” She turned back to Grace, who pulled out her chair, flung herself down into it in a fit of pique, then stood a second later and began to pace anew. “God, child, you will make me dizzy. Are you trying to suggest that the thefts are part of this mummy’s curse?”
            “Of course not! The whole thing is the most dire sort of absolute foolishness! Those inscriptions they’re always quoting in the papers aren’t even carved in Tut’s tomb.” Grace paused at the sideboard, turned the large-faced clock towards her, and stared at the numbers as if she could move them with her mind. “But if they get wind of this news, the reporters won’t give two ticks for historical accuracy. They’ll spin some sort of fabulous tale, and it will make us all look like rote amateurs, and this is my career, Auntie! It’s all I have left with Mother and Father gone.” A new thought occurred to her, and Grace put one hand to her slender throat, body rigid. “Oh, what if they find a way to blame me? I’m the only woman on the dig! Perhaps they’ll say that’s bad luck, like women at sea. God knows that odious Mr. Hollande will suggest it if he gets the chance. He’s still angry because we removed a selection of inscribed alabaster tablets back to England for closer inspection. He’s threatened to send me back after them at the slightest provocation, and this is far more than the slightest. Oh!” She slammed the clock down again, interrupting her monologue with its aggrieved clashing of gears. Tears choked her voice, but she resolutely refused to let them fall. “I can’t take this anymore! Your Mr. Hawk is clearly as much of a loutish gadabout as he seemed when he was falling over drunk at your party. I’m sure he couldn’t bestir himself from whatever bed of iniquity he is currently occupying—”
            “I see my absence is anticipated,” drawled a voice from the doorway.
            “Raymond!” Lady Delores cried, springing to her feet as if elevated by pure joy and clapping her hands together delightedly. “Kareem, you know what to do.”
            “An Auld Stag for the gentleman!” Even Kareem sounded happy as he poured out what Grace was absolutely certain was meant to be a water glass’ worth of whiskey for the new arrival. Steeling herself, Grace unclenched her fists, one finger at a time, and turned, pasting a closed-lipped smile on her face.
            Raymond Hawk was not unpleasant to look at. In fact, if Grace were set down across a banquet table from him at some sort of civilized event, ideally one that prohibited alcohol consumption, she would have gone so far as to say that he was incredibly handsome. His face was one she might have admired in her courses on Greek and Roman sculpture: perfectly symmetrical features capped by a strong jaw and piercing, pale blue eyes that were—too often, and regretfully—red-rimmed and underscored by shadows and bags the size of Grace’s thumb. Still, Hawk had a ready smile that lit his whole face like the flash of a lantern in the darkest tomb, and when he threw back his head and laughed, which he did easily and often, there was not a female head in the room that wasn’t inclined to turn. His voice was low and smooth, with the twang of an American accent; not often heard in Cairo, the sound was enchanting.
Rumor had it he spent his every waking hour engaged in some sort of charitable effort, a prospect about which Grace entertained the strongest doubts. Surely one had to be in the vicinity of sobriety to help the less fortunate? What sort of message could a constant haze of whiskey fumes and strange floral odors be sending? But whatever Hawk’s activities entailed, they had kept him fit despite a steady—and exclusive, Grace thought—diet of Auld Stag and soda water. He had a lean frame, a leanness that could tend toward austerity, though standing in the doorway now, his suit coat flung back over one shoulder, the beautifully cut if somewhat wrinkled shirt below revealing a well-muscled frame, Raymond Hawk seemed the very embodiment of Cairo’s most fashionable and charming men.
Grace had had the same impression upon their first meeting. Her enrapture had ended almost immediately when Hawk knocked his glance against hers with unnecessary force, slopping a mixture of whiskey and water over her hand (Grace shook it off disdainfully; Hawk failed to notice) and inquired what she was drinking.
“Water,” Grace said, and took a delicate swallow.
“Seems appropriate, as from all accounts you’re a bit dry.” Hawk raised an eyebrow, as if waiting for Grace to fall into paroxysms of mirth at the quip. So very American. She raised one right back, and took another swallow.
“From all accounts, you haven’t yet made it through one of my aunt’s parties without falling asleep on a settee or drunkenly colliding with a female guest’s décolletage,” Grace rejoined. She’d been six months on the Thebes dig at that point, and had slowly started to become more comfortable referring to parts of the female anatomy in public. Hawk seemed a safe testing ground for this ability, and indeed, he was nonplussed—if not delighted—by her words. His eyes lit up, and he nodded enthusiastically.
“Hardly an accident. What is a party, my dear Miss Everley, without a few fortuous mishaps?”
“I believe you mean ‘fortuitous,’” Grace said, finishing her water and placing the empty glass down on a passing waiter’s tray. “Or perhaps ‘fatuous,’ as you seem to be implying that your stumbles are no accident at all. A gentleman would hardly resort to such tactics, Mr. Hawk. But I suppose the concept is a vague one to you, as you hail from America, and the social customs of the provinces are notoriously rough.”
“I believe you just misused the word ‘province,’” Hawk said, still smiling, but he gestured for Kareem to top off his already very full glass, and Grace thought she saw a trifle less mirth in his blue eyes than she had a moment before. Hopefully he would soon be inspired to leave, and take his vexingly striking eyes with him, she thought, motioning to Kareem herself for more water. Hawk was babbling on about constitutional democracy; all most wearying—though he seemed to have an oddly inclusive grasp on the separation of church and state, a topic to which Grace had paid little mind. It was hardly relevant when the only church one really heeded had ceased to exist 3,000 years ago.
“That’s all so very fascinating, Mr. Hawk,” she said brightly when he finally paused to take a breath. “Perhaps you might enlighten dear Laura—” She snagged the tiny blonde’s arm as Miss Laura Arden wafted past, and was annoyed to see an instant blush, like two blooming roses, spring to the girl’s cheeks. She gazed wide-eyed at Hawk, and began to flutter her lashes, which were so dark and thick that Grace was sure she had to be enhancing their charms with kohl from the bazaars. Not that it mattered. If the little twit was full enough to be taken in by Hawk, she deserved every minute of the sure-to-be-awful conversation that would ensue. Grace left them, Hawk leaning in close, offering Laura a sip of his Auld Stag, complimenting her on the cut of her dress—it was the new style, very straight down the body, with a low-dipped bodice. Grace preferred a more Victorian look. Far more practical for working in the field.
With effort, she drew her mind back to the present moment and chastised herself fiercely. Woolgathering, when there was so much at stake! Utter foolishness. If only Mr. Hawk were not such a low kind of person; then he would not invite such rumination. She couldn’t imagine why her aunt had called him here, and as she squared her shoulders and stepped forward, rejoining the conversation, a blush bloomed on her own cheeks—but her blood was heated by anger, not infatuation. There was serious work to be done.
“It appears there’s serious work to be done,” Hawk said. “Ms. Everley,” he looked Grace directly in the eyes. “I need to know everything.”
“Raymond, please. Call her Grace,” Aunt Dolores interrupted. Hawk shot her a glance; his seriousness surprised Grace.
“Mr. Hawk, I … this is a very confidential matter. Discretion is of the utmost concern. A very many reputations, including mine, are hanging in the balance. And I’m just supposed to spill the beans to a … to a man who comes in three sheets to the wind and with a woman’s perfume rank on his coat!”
“Grace Winston Everley!” Aunt Dolores once again interjected. Grace shuddered at the mention of her middle name, which was a remnant of her father’s hopes, after four daughters, for a son. “If your mother could see you now, speaking with such disdain. And to a guest of your family’s house!” Aunt Dolores shook her head, her face flushed.  She guzzled her gin and tonic to calm her piqued nerves.
Hawk, however, was unperturbed. In fact, he was even smiling! Grace couldn’t believe his nerve.
“What in Osiris’ name are you smiling about?” she queried.
“Ms. Everley, I understand your reservations. But time is of the utmost importance. The longer we wait, the closer the thieves will get to Antioch, which is, I suspect, where they’ll be headed. Right now, you’re in a hostile city, with very few friends and no leads. You might find my methods … distasteful. But they’re all you’ve got. But we truly must work quickly. Please, Grace. Let me see the telegram.”
Grace peered, unflinching, into Hawk’s clear eyes. She did not want to be the one to look away; it seemed a matter of pride.
Perhaps this is what bothered her about Raymond Hawk. She’d spent her whole life proving herself competent and capable to men who were prone to dismiss her solely on the basis of her being a female. Every hill she’d climbed had been twice as high as it would’ve been had she been born Winston Everley. And here was this incorrigible man who made her dedication, her straight-laced devotion seem so small and insignificant. His very existence mocked her way of life. He was everything she’d spent her career fighting against.
But the longer she looked, the more she saw something else in Hawk’s eyes, beneath the booze and the lasciviousness: a deep weariness. It was a look she knew all too well from looking into her bedroom mirror …
“Okay,” she said. She pulled the letter from her bodice and, begrudgingly, handed into Hawk.
He took it from her gently and walked across the parlor to the window, which overlooked one of Zamalek’s shaded, narrow avenues. The Spanish consulate was across the way, a grand building whose granite façade had been coated with desert dust. On the street, a heavily burdened burro bravely bore its load. Its rider called out his wares: scavenged material, which in Cairo, meant the banal mixed with the rare. Some of the finest treasures of antiquity were trucked around the city on these little carts, buried beneath garbage.
            Grace looked at her aunt as Hawk read the telegram twice. Dolores’ gaze looked upon Hawk with a sense of awe. Grace felt her blood boiling: why was half of Cairo so enthralled to this bumbling lush? Why had she entrusted him with her life’s work?
            Without a work, Hawk set the telegram down. He threw on his overcoat and finished, in one tremendous gulp, his tumbler of Auld Stag. He was halfway out the door before Grace called after him.
            “Hawk!” she called.
            He turned and set his gaze on her.
            “There’s no time to waste.”
            “I’m not leaving the fate of the greatest treasure in human history to a drunk swindler like you!”
            “Good,” he said, smiling his roguish smile. “Then you’re coming with me.”
            Grace felt her heart racing. Finally, she wanted to exalt. Finally she was going back out in the field.
            “Absolutely not!” Aunt Dolores said, literally stamping her foot. “Gracie, dear, I will not have your wandering about the darkest, dankest alleys of this dreary city. Please, stay here where it’s safe. Leave this to Raymond. He’s very experienced in this kind of thing. He can handle himself.”
            But Grace had already retrieved her overcoat.
            “What will I tell your uncle?” Aunt Dolores called after them. “His heart isn’t strong, Gracie! It might well give out.”
            “Tell him I’ve gone to save Howard Carter’s ass,” Grace said, her face flushing with the bravado. A mere ten minutes in his company and Hawk’s loutish ways were already rubbing off on her!
            “Well, I…” Aunt Dolores mumbled, but her niece and Raymond were already out of ear shot. She went to the window and watched them disappear around the corner, Grace refusing Hawk’s offer of his arm. “Kareem!” Dolores called. “Kareem, you intolerable brute, another gin, please. I’m feeling a bit faint.”
            On the street, the euphoria of the moment was subsiding. The stench of Auld Stag emanating from Hawk was practically overpowering; Grace worried she was getting drunk just from proximity. Where was he possibly taking her?
            “Raymond, where are we going?”
            Without breaking stride, Hawk smirked over his shoulder. “To the vilest den of swindlers and thieves in the entire Empire.”
            So it was settled: they were headed to Nile River Dan’s.
            Grace swallowed hard. Now she was the one who needed a dram of Auld Stag.

*Written with (major) contributions from Genevieve