'I tend to agree," Leda said. "But we should wait until she pays the rent this month, so we will have a place to stay a while longer."

'You are very devious," I congratulated her.

'I have another idea you're going to like," she said. "As you have gathered, I am not much for buying clothing unless it is purple or has a cartoon logo across the front of it. My sister, on the other hand, is a clotheshorse. We are approximately the same size, give or take a diet here and there. I'm sure that in exchange for her life, and because of the contrition she will no doubt feel when she learns she ruined our one good dress that's not in storage, she won't mind if we raid her closets." Following this pronouncement, an evil cackle escaped our lips as we hastened to pillage the closest wardrobe.

Garment upon colorful garment was pulled from its hanger and held before us. All of the colors in the fanned tail of the peacock were represented. A blue of marvelous brightness, a green heavily spiced with yellow, a deep turquoise and a lovely rust orange. Other garments were the pink of flamingos and an even stronger purple pink that could rarely be glimpsed on the horizon as Ra arose and retired. Ra's own brilliant yellow color was also represented, and scarlet and, of course, purple. After much discussion, during which I refused to allow us to don several far-too-casual and concealing garments of lowly cloth that Leda favored because of their purple color, we settled on a scoop-necked sleeveless bodice of the peacock blue that flowed loosely over matching trousers. Our body's legs are long and the hips small, so trousers are quite becoming. Leda would have been quite content with this, but I found another treasure—a flowing knee-length robe that draped from the shoulders with delicious suppleness and cupped our forearms in bands of iridescent blue much the same hue as our trousers. The robe was figured with swirls of design in the same blue, and turquoise, and, to mollify Leda, purple. The background of the material was sheer as my finest linen gown, but a soft fur of velvet comprised the multicolored designs. Once we had selected these clothes, we shed them again and padded barefoot to the garage, where, after much cursing and more death threats against Rusti, Leda located her cache of jewelry.

Never had I suspected that she would own such splendor! With her modesty in matters of clothing, I expected she might wear a small chain or two, perhaps an extra pair of earrings, but in this I was mistaken. True, there was little gold or fine metalwork among her treasures, though what there was often was silver, far more precious in my country than gold, which was plentiful and common. But what she did possess was to my eyes even finer. Pectorals made entirely of interwoven beads of glass in even more delicious colors than Rusti's wardrobe, earrings of the same manufacture and brilliance, with long tubular beads that swung to our shoulders. She had many, many examples of each and, best of all, most of them bore the sacred symbols of my kingdom. "Compliments of my friend the beader," she said.

'We should commission more bracelets and perhaps a circlet for our hair," I suggested, gleefully adorning us with a pectoral bearing kneeling and winged Isis flanking, to my pleased surprise, my own cartouche. Leda wore only a plain wrist chronometer she called a watch (I suppose because it watches the passage of the sun and moon to interpret the time of day for the wearer) and an even plainer band of some silvery metal with a man's name engraved upon it.

'My watch and my POW bracelet will do nicely, thanks," she said with all of the agreeableness of a bad-tempered camel.

'We need not remove them," I assured her. "We could simply overlay them with finer jewels."

'I guess you haven't been here long enough to hear that less is more," Leda said with a superior air.

I had no answer for such a ridiculous statement. It had the strange effect of plunging me into gloom. This new life was so odd, so very different from all that I had known. Spending the day in Leda's pastimes and personal concerns, exploring her everyday life insofar as she had one at this time, had been soothing. I had not thought of my lost family and kingdom, at least, not often. This life is so different it is like a dreamworld, where I need not concern myself with memory or responsibility. I had, of course, exercised my vast knowledge of the more superficial womanly arts to prepare us for the evening to come. But not once had either of us broached the subject of the evening's serious business. For the most part, I would need to disguise my presence and allow Leda to conduct our end of the conversation. I would help her with negotiating the final agreement, of course. I have learned from her memories of her past dealings that she is often too modest or too solicitous of the welfare of others to obtain the most favorable conditions. This particular pact dealt with my life, my tomb, and my reign, however, and I therefore felt entitled to negotiate my own terms. I only hoped she would agree.

'Okay, what's the matter?" Leda asked. I found myself staring out of our eyes straight back into them again. "See? Mascara! Eyeshadow. Lipstick. I've been using cosmetics for the last five minutes without a peep from you."

'Perhaps shock will explain my silence?" I suggested facetiously. I did not attempt to obtain her cooperation beforehand, for I knew that whether or not she gave it, she would do as she felt best unless I could override her objections when we both understood the situation.

'Very funny. I think we look fine," she said, twirling.

At that moment, a chime announced the arrival of our transport.

Have I yet mentioned the speed at which these vehicles travel and the vast distances they cover in little more than a few heartbeats? The distance from Rusti's house to the city is almost as far as from Alexandria to what is now called Cairo, and within that distance there is also a mighty river with which to reckon. And yet, this is done effortlessly, casually, almost thoughtlessly.

Before our trousers had a chance to crease, we were handed out of the long black vehicle Leda calls a limo and into the care of a uniformed guard in front of yet another palace like structure. A hotel, Leda said. This one was much more like an actual palace than the VA hospital. Here was luxury in rich woods and deep, patterned carpets over marble floors. Clever candles kindled by the scientific magic of electricity sparkled from a thousand tears of crystal illuminating our path from above.

As we entered, a woman dressed in a long scarlet gown split to the hip turned, smiled, and waved to us. At her neck and fingers jewels shot back the light from the chandeliers, matching the crystal teardrops in their brilliance. Her hair was black and fell in curls from a jeweled hair ornament. Her body was slender, and the gown well became it, but her movements were more purposeful than graceful. Glancing at her feet and noticing the severe elevation of her sandaled heels, I was somewhat surprised that she could walk at all.

'Dr. Hubbard, there you are!" she said when she drew nearer. She held out her hand. "I'm Iris Morgan."

Leda extended our own hand to shake hers and said her name in exchange for Iris Morgan's.

'Mr. Bernard is having a short business meeting with our financier, so it fell to me to come to meet you. I am, of course, delighted." She sounded ever so faintly annoyed to have been excluded from the business meeting, however.

She led us around to some carved wooden doors and pressed a button with the finger of a hand bearing long nails that matched her gown. From behind the doors issued a groan and a few clicks, then invisible servants opened them and we entered a box whose other side was glass. This box ascended upward and ever upward, climbing what seemed a mountainous height while we looked down upon balcony after balcony of rooms, and farther down into a banquet hall filled with people. At last, when I thought we were going to meet Ra himself, the box stopped, the invisible servants once more opened the doors, and we stepped out into an impressive hallway in which a single door faced our glass box.

'Oh ho, the penthouse no less!" Leda exclaimed, and gave a low and quite common whistle of appreciation. From this I gathered that in her culture chambers that are high in elevation are also elevated in status and, as we were soon to see for ourselves, luxuriousness.

CHAPTER 7

Gabriella was accustomed to doing her most serious work, the none administrative part, after everyone else had gone home. After her leave of absence, she had been kept so busy with meetings, trips to the field, fund-raising, and other tasks that she could only give Cleopatra a brief introduction to the museum. Even so, the former queen was verbally and visually impressed with the newest version of the library that had once been her pride and joy. "How beautiful! This building is not like ours, of course, but it has lovely lines—a lovely skeleton, you might say. And oh, look at that! How ingenious! The scrolls are cut into small pieces and set between boards so you need not unroll them. Very clever."

All week long as they worked in the crowded offices, schmoozed with patrons, discussed acquisitions, Gabriella had chortled gleefully to her secret friend. "They would be thunderstruck to know you are here. I wish we could tell them."

'The time will come," Cleopatra said.

But after ten days, the novelty of Gabriella's more public duties had worn off. Just before closing time, she arrived at the Biblioteca dressed in her real work clothes—-a pair of grubby trousers she wore on digs and her Marvin the Martian T-shirt. The contents of tombs tended to be extremely dusty, muddy, or otherwise untidy, at the very least. Some of the items she'd examined from the discoveries uncovered when the sewer pipes had been moved were far worse.

'Where are my scrolls?" Cleopatra asked as soon as they entered the library that evening. Gabriella had promised they would spend the night in study, as indeed she needed to do. The scrolls held priceless knowledge, and the longer they were left unattended, the more chance there was that they would be damaged and some portion of them lost forever.

'They're in the basement, waiting for us to translate them and prepare them for display," Gabriella told her. "We should get to it while we have the chance."

'My—body—is there as well?"

"I believe so. Unless someone has moved it in my absence. It was supposed to be kept below until we could study the mummy's wrappings and the charms and amulets that might have been wrapped with them. You did cause charms and amulets to be wrapped up with you, didn't you?"

"Oh yes, certainly, and I would very much like to find the amulet with Antony's hair so we could remake him again."

"Let's wait until the place empties out a bit. I don't want us to be interrupted when you first behold yourself again. In the meantime, we can translate."

Gabriella turned to a side door and a flight of steps leading downward. The building was new, paid for in part by generous contributions from foreign investors such as Nucor. One of the chief glories of it was lost to the patrons above. Instead of a drafty subbasement, this new museum boasted climate-controlled workrooms with lighting that was adequate for reading ancient script but sufficiently diffuse to avoid harming brittle old manuscripts and artifacts.

Gabriella's workstation was crowded with urns from Cleopatra's tomb. "Where shall we begin?" she asked, surveying the veritable Dead Sea of scroll-filled urns.

Cleopatra studied the wax seals of the urns, then brought one of the vessels over to the table. "This one is from the library at Pergamum. After Caesar accidentally set fire to part of our collection, the Pergamum one claimed to be greater. Antony brought it back as a gift for me from Asia Minor. I never really got the chance to examine the volumes yet, however. That's why I had them in my tomb. Something new to read in the afterlife! Let's see what they have to say."

Slipping on a pair of white gloves and placing a respirator over her mouth and nose as she opened the urn, Gabriella set to work. Soon both she and Cleopatra were so absorbed in the translation that they didn't notice the time or that the creaking and groaning of footsteps, and even the roar of the vacuum cleaner in the hallways, had ceased.

However, when the scuffling and whispering began upstairs, she looked up from her translations.

"Something is wrong"

"Yes. No one should be here but us."

She picked up the receiver of the telephone on her desk to call the police, but the line was dead.

Reaching into the desk, she drew forth a little revolver and started for the door.

"There are many whispers. How can we face them all with that small weapon?"

"We probably can't. I just want to get a better idea of what's going on."

But suddenly there were footsteps on the stairs and half-shouted commands. To her horror, the men behind the footsteps and voices seemed to be heading for her office. But one room short of it, they stopped.

'The mummy!" Gabriella and Cleo thought simultaneously.

'There it is. The infidel bitch's mummy. Grab her and let's go."

'We must stop them," Cleopatra said.

"Yes, but how? Whoever they are, they will be armed and there are several of them and we have only one body. When they leave, we'll get to a phone and notify the authorities."

'How I long for the days when my authority was all that was needed. But I understand. They must not know we are present. I have only begun this life with you. I do not wish to end it quite yet."

"We are in perfect agreement on that issue."

The men's steps seemed lumbering and clumsy as they passed the office door. She heard the rattle of falling objects and tried to imagine what they might be.

From upstairs there was more scurrying, more whispers, and then quiet. As soon as the men in the corridor outside her office left, she would try to escape through the main building. Their footsteps began climbing stairs, the grunting more pronounced.

'Hmph," Cleopatra said, "/ was not that heavy fully fleshed. They make a great deal of fuss over hauling a mummy that must be as light as dried leaves."

A door opened and closed, and for a moment there was silence. Gabriella rose and crept to the door, listening.

Which was fortunate because she heard more footsteps from overhead, voices, more footsteps and then, after a moment, a brief scuffle.

Merde alors! The bastards are working in shifts! Gabriella thought.

With the help of Duke's contacts in Helix security and

Gretchen's deep purse, they had no trouble learning where Wolfe supposedly had gone to attend his seminars. The only problem was, he wasn't there.

Not that the receptionist and later the seminar leader were much help. "Very sorry, Frau Doktor Wolfe, but Herr Wolfe has not attended our sessions for several days."

'He is ill? Where is he?"

'I cannot say exactly, Frau Doktor. He was not ill when last I saw him. I saw him argu—having a discussion with— Dr. Bartoth, one of the board members, and I do not recall seeing him after that."

'This Dr. Bartoth, he can be found where?" Gretchen asked with a raised eyebrow.

'I'm not privy to that information, Frau Doktor. Excuse me, but I have a session to lead just now." He turned on his heel and left.

Gretchen started after him, but Duke said, "Whoa, there, partner. I don't think he knows any more than he's telling. Let's see what we can find out about this Bartoth and have a chat with him, shall we?"

"It is wrong, Duke. I am thinking maybe he has been made to vanish like those other people. We are too late."

"Don't get too hasty. My wives had to hunt way harder than we've had to when I wanted to get lost."

"But my Wilhelm does not wish to be lost! He would call me."

"He lost his job. Maybe he's at loose ends just now. But you're right in thinking it's a little fishy."

"It is whole oceans full of fishy, my friend."

'Something we can do real easy is check your joint bank account. See if he's made any withdrawals. Of course, if he's on company business still, they'd pick up the tab, but if he just decided to get lost…"

"This he would not do. But yes, we will check."

But Wilhelm Wolfe had not touched his and Gretchen's joint account in several weeks.

Gretchen was not the sort of female who cried at the drop of a hat, but she was seriously raising their body's blood pressure with her anxiety.

"Look here, hon, getting all uptight is the last thing you shoulddo right now. You're a doctor, a scientist. You do investigations of your own to find out what your patients have. We use the same kind of attitude when doing a police investigation …"

"Missing persons, you are saying?"

'Any kind. We've already started following the first rule, which is not, you'll be glad to know, cherchez la femme (Duke was pleased that his association with Gretchen had given him a pretty creditable accent when he used a French phrase these days. Had he still been alive and in his own body, that could come in useful when he wanted to cherchez some femmes, but these days, he didn't have to cherchez very far, being something of a femme himself, at least superficially). It's follow the money. The next thing we should do is talk to some more of our well-bought friends at Helix and see if we can access his company credit card records."

'You are not thinking he is buying things for another woman?" she asked, the insecurity that had led to her blending with Duke surfacing again.

'After all the little things we've taught him recently? I don't think so. If ever a guy looked like he could have his cake and— uh—eat it too, it was Willie. I mean, of course, from what I could tell after everything was over and you were both dressed again and had the lights back on."

"You peeked!"

'Would I do that?" he asked innocently, but she could tell of course that he was lying. He even meant for her to know that. Ah well, she was a doctor after all, and they did use all the same organs for everything else now. Why not?

'Why, Frau Doktorf We're blushing!" Ja, it was so, but she didn't mind too much. It made her feel rather deliciously naughty—kinky, as they said. Good! She saw Wilhelm so seldom that it should be memorable when they did get together. It was for her, certainly, and Duke, who was in an excellent, uh, position, to know such things, felt that it was for Wilhelm as well.

'No, the point is that if he's spent money on his company card, we'll know it's probably business but also it will tell us where he's been, if not where he is right now."

But several hours later and many dollars poorer, they learned only that Wolfe's company credit card had not been used since before he left Kefalos.

'I'd almost rather we hadn't found that out after all," Duke said grimly.

CHAPTER 8

By the time he was hired, and Abdul Mohammed and his buddies explained the mission to him, Mike was sorry he had ever followed up on the lead, sorry he had ever heard of Abdul Mohammed, sorry he had ever met Galen, and sorry that he'd come to Alexandria.

He didn't like the sound of this operation at all. These guys were going to make their points by blowing up ancient Egyptian national treasures. The political and military targets were too well guarded, and lately even the tourists had the special tourist police force shepherding them around like border collies. The group had tried to blow up the Suez Canal, but all that had accomplished was losing several of their younger and more foolhardy "patriots" to martyrdom aka suicide. Not that anyone actually explained all this to him, but he could tell from the pointing at the maps and floor plans, the body language, and the Turkish Arabic from his boyhood as a Navy brat. The others all seemed to assume that he didn't speak Egyptian, which was true enough. But he could make out some of what they were saying nonetheless.

The target of this mission was the newly expanded and remodeled Biblioteca Alexandrina library/museum complex in the heart—or maybe more accurately the brains—of the city. The library and its satellite museums had been built in the late twentieth century by UNESCO. In the meantime the older museums, the Graeco-Roman among them, had fallen into disrepair, their buildings plagued with leaking roofs and damp basements. The recent earthquake had been the kiss of death. Now their collections were to be housed in the Biblioteca as soon as the construction was complete. So much of Egypt's most recent history as well as the more distant past, was stored here, along with the manuscript collection.

Despite the fact that a lot of the manuscripts were sacred Islamic ones, the terrorists considered the library a juicy target. Abdul Mohammed explained to Mike that because of the holy texts the destruction would be selective and limited. "Charges will be set here," he said, indicating a map, "and here and here. But under no circumstances will they be set here. Therefore, we will exit under the wing of Allah." He smiled at his little wordplay.

Once the mission was under way, however, Mike knew that something was rotten in Alex. His suspicions were amply confirmed when he smelled the BO of his attacker as the dude tried to slip a garrote around his neck. Swearing mentally since it was hard to do so physically with his wind cut off, Mike stepped back into his attacker close enough to feel if the guy really loved his work, stomped hard on the man's instep, used the slack his backward move had created to twist, grab, and throw his attacker.

Much as Mike would have liked to inquire how he could possibly have offended his bosses so deeply as to be on their hit list this early in the operation, he couldn't risk letting the guy answer. The answer would be to yell at his buddies and bring their multiple wrath upon Mike's head, and that would not do. So he recycled the garrote, a piece of piano wire, in an environmentally sensitive if violent manner, and dragged the corpse to the nearest mummy case. The mummy didn't take up much room anymore and didn't make any complaint about a bunk buddy that Mike heard, so he hauled his would-be assassin up and tipped him in on top of the older resident.

What a revolting development. But Mike couldn't say he was exactly amazed or astounded that one of his supposed criminally bent compatriots of the revolution would try to do him in. Nor did he think for a moment it was something he'd said or a simple personality conflict.

He had no doubt that old Stinky there was following a set of orders completely different from his own. In fact, he suspected the whole mission had lost something in the translation. What he was told probably bore little resemblance to what was actually going down.

What this was supposed to be about was a little looting to fund The Cause with negotiable collectibles and a couple of small strategic explosions so the organization could claim credit for the coup. Terrorist groups liked doing that so the government would know exactly who was harassing them. He thought he'd understood someone to say they were going to swipe Cleopatra's newly discovered mummy and hold the old girl for ransom. Given what Galen had told him, it would be interesting to see who paid up.

He didn't like to think that Galen had set him up— probably Galen was the original candidate for Dead Employee of the Month. Hmmm. He needed to reassess the goals of the organization he thought he'd just joined. They would not be taking credit for this operation after all. They wanted him to take the credit. Which probably meant that his body would have been unrecognizable as that of a murder victim while at least providing some clue as to his identity as a Westerner. If Galen was to have filled the role originally, probably any non-Muslim fundamentalist more-or-less-Western guy would do. An infidel barbarian running dog capitalist lickspittle lackey American boy such as himself must have been a real bonus. No wonder these people had seemed so damn friendly when he was briefed on the mission.

He'd thought it odd at the time. Friendliness was not actually one of the characteristics he expected from terrorist employers; but then, it had been so long since he had been in the company of anything remotely resembling genuine friends that he was willing to settle for "not openly hostile." You just checked the hand patting your back for cutlery first and smiled back. It was still war after all. The only thing about this kind of war was that it was far less clear where one side began and another ended. He should have realized something was wrong when it was just the driver, himself, and the "security specialist" in the minivan earlier on. When he asked where the others were, he was told that they were already getting into position at the site, but there hadn't been enough room in the van, so it had come back for the two of them. He hadn't actually ever seen the other conspirators yet. He'd just assumed they were around. Everyone was to meet back at the souk two streets over, where the minivan would be waiting to whisk them away, out of sight of police cars and fire wagons.

His particular assignment had been to stand watch while the security specialist, the same guy who tried to kill him, disabled the alarms at the Museum. Afterward, his understanding was that the remaining terrorists were supposed to flit about like so many bad fairies swiping stuff, setting explosive charges, and committing acts of seemingly senseless destruction. He was sweating from more than the heat as he reasoned that what was left of his own personal person, had the strangler had his evil way with him, would no doubt be discovered in the destruction caused by a far larger explosive charge than he had been led to expect.

Mercy. His trusting nature had betrayed him again. He, or rather, his mangled American remains, was supposed to take the blame for destroying these priceless artifacts—part of an American plot to—what? Mistreat and burgle the downtrodden Egyptian government again or some such happy horseshit as that. It really didn't have to make sense when you were dealing with people who were inclined to hate you at the drop of a hat anyway.

He kept his—Galen's—sidearm handy and skulked around among the mummy cases and other exhibits. He had the odd feeling that he was quite alone, however. The others were supposed to have waited until the alarms were dismantled to come in, but that had apparently been a lie. Maybe the alarms had been dealt with earlier. No one had come past him, but there were many entrances and exits within the Biblioteca complex. But if anyone else was there, they were better at covert ops than he was because he didn't see a soul. He did, however, become aware of a faint ticking. Feeling a bit like Captain Hook when the croc came to call, he tracked the noise to the first of the explosive devices. Hmmm. These people had gone to a lot of trouble on his behalf. They'd apparently not only dismantled the security system but also preset the charges so everything would be ready to go as soon as he was dispatched and his corpse left to take the blame.

The bomb was a primitive satchel charge, a pound of Semtex wired to an alarm clock timer all in a handy carrying case; but its crudity wouldn't have kept it from making ancient hash of the contents of the building. He found it behind another mummy case and disarmed it. The case was an old metal lunch box, which would have made great shrapnel. Picking it up by the handle, he carried it with him. Should he and the library survive the night, he didn't want some unsuspecting kid picking the thing up tomorrow.

He himself was perfectly comfortable carrying the bomb along with him, swinging it a little as he walked. Demolitions was a specialty of his. Modesty prevented him from putting it on his resume—that and caution. But like most boys, he liked explosions. As long as he was not the one exploding. Maybe one of these days he'd retire and return to 'Nam and disarm land mines so schoolkids could plant trees there. That idea was as close as he got to the white picket fence, wife, and kids. He'd tried the wife and kids part, and it hadn't worked very well. She didn't appreciate explosions. Especially his explosive temper. Not that he laid a hand on her, but he yelled a lot and stomped around and she got scared and took his little girl and disappeared. He hoped wherever they were they were going to Al Anon.

Bomb number one had had five whole minutes remaining. That was probably enough time for a prudent man to break a couple of display cases, grab some of the gaudier loot, and escape with his epidermis intact. Normally, Mike considered himself a reasonably prudent man. He liked breathing well enough. But the truth was, he knew he should have been dead many years ago and many times since. It didn't especially bother him. What did bother him was being set up, betrayed, discriminated against, dammit, because of his race, nationality, and, well, lack of religious affiliation.

He knew it was juvenile to decide to show them what they got for messing with him, but there were certain kinds of impulses he didn't even try to control. The best payback here and now was the complete failure of their mission. It was a gamble. If they won, he didn't find all the bombs in time and one of them blew him up. If he won, none of the bombs went off, and nobody found anybody's body except maybe the guy in the mummy case after he got even stinkier. The whole carefully orchestrated mission would be a non-event, and he was just the guy to make it all not happen.

First he had to find the other charges. If he were a bomb, where would he hide in this building? Ah yes, the little red circles Abdul Mohammed had pointed out on the floor plan as being the sites for the explosives. From what he could recall, and he did pride himself on a photographic memory where such things were concerned, the first charge had been in one of the specified locations. So he set out for the other sites, stalking the building as silently and swiftly as a very hungry leopard who really didn't want to screw up catching dinner.

He kept moving and kept listening hard, hoping the other bombs had clocks, too—and that they weren't digital.

It didn't matter in the end because they were more or less where they were supposed to be, at the strategic points that would cause the most damage to the most area. He located three more devices, all larger than the first one he'd found. The last one he disarmed with half a second to spare. He cringed when the time expired and had his fingers halfway to his ears, but there were no explosions. With a deep sigh, he stood and began looking for an exit. Which was when he spotted the open door under the EXIT sign. Hmm. Here he was with a fistful of satchel charges and no place to dispose of them. The basement might be a good place. There could be another sewer or maybe an incinerator—that wouldn't set off the Semtex. Nothing would except an electrical charge. As he approached the doorway, however, he saw that there was a light on down below. Surely his former colleagues were not still hanging around? If they were, what joy would be his!

At first the hallway appeared to be deserted, though he spotted an open door. Then another one opened and a slender dark-haired woman in khaki slacks and a Marvin the

Martian long-sleeved crew-necked T-shirt stepped into the hall. She looked as surprised to see him as he was to see her, and a little squeal of despair escaped her. Cute. But she wasn't supposed to be here. Nobody was supposed to be here. She pulled a gun on him.

'I have a pistol," she said redundantly.

'I see your pistol and raise you four pounds of Semtex," he said, brandishing his bombs. "Who the hell are you anyway?"

'I am Cleopatra, I am Dr. Gabriella Faruk, and I work here. Who are you? is more the point."

'Never mind that right now. You didn't happen to see a bunch of terrorists go by recently, did you?"

'I didn't see them. I heard them, though. My mummy!" she suddenly seemed to recall a previous problem and darted into another room with an open door. He followed her. An empty sarcophagus with a splintered lid and some flakes of dried bandage were at the center of the room.

'Looks like it walked away," he said.

'We must have it back. It is the mummy of Cleopatra VII, Queen of Upper and Lower Egypt…"

She sounded as if she were about to list the queen's other titles, but he grabbed her arm in the hand that wasn't holding the Semtex, and said, "No use crying over spilt mummies, Doctor baby. We need to vacate the premises before someone decides to come back and make sure we join her majesty in the Land of the Dead."

'There is a way out into the courtyard back there," she said. "The ones who stole the mummy took it that way. Alas, we will not be in time to see where they go."

She hurried on ahead. He spotted something gleaming in the light still glowing from the open office doors. He stooped to pick it up. A little golden winged scarab set inside an ankh. There was a bail attached, as if it might have been a pendant of some sort at one time. It looked old and valuable,

and he had gone to a great deal of trouble with no other tangible reward, so he tucked it in his pocket and followed the doctor's shapely butt up the stairs.

Once she reached the courtyard level, she turned toward the street, but he caught her arm and pulled her back.

'But we need to call the police."

'You need to call the police. I need to avoid them, and I have a couple of other things to do. And you'll want to be alive when you call them, so I suggest you follow me so we can avoid being intercepted by the guys who set these." He jiggled the satchel charges. "I expect at least some of them may be waiting over there, across from the entrance, wondering about now why the library has failed to go boom. They could decide to come investigate."

'You know an awful lot about these people for someone who wants to avoid them," she said sourly.

But she followed without further comment as he led her to the street behind the Biblioteca, then circled around the entire complex via side streets until they reached the souk. His leadership and mastery of the situation was marred only because he had to ask her which streets would take them back where he wanted to go.

When they reached the souk, he looked around until he spotted the minivan parked in a deserted alley a block or so away from the main body of the marketplace. This was where he had been told it would be. He supposed they saw no reason to lie to him since he was supposed to be in several inanimate pieces by now. "You go ahead and make your phone call, Doctor. I have a little chore to do."

She gave him a short, quizzical glance, then walked away into the marketplace in search of a phone or maybe a police station. He turned to his own task at hand.

He had the wires from the Semtex in his pockets. Selecting one of the charges and one set of wires, he rigged it to

the ignition of the minivan. "Go with Allah, you mothers, if he'll have anything to do with you," he muttered with a final twist of wires.

Then he walked into the souk and found a booth carrying suitcases, one of which he purchased and into which he popped the Semtex packages. It also carried veils that hung from a rod and concealed him while he watched the van. Before too long, his supposed coconspirators, with the notable exception of Abdul Mohammed, returned to the van. Mike supposed that since they didn't bring the mummy with them, the boss must be disposing of it in some other fashion. The men were arguing among themselves in fierce low voices and climbed into the van with much gesticulation and probably a little name-calling, from the look of it.

He felt the heat of the blast through the veils and pretended to go looky look with the rest of the crowd, which was the least conspicuous thing to do.

Gabriella Faruk also came running. He caught her before she reached a policeman. "I don't think you're gonna need them right now, Doc. I just took care of most of your problem."

'But my mummy!" she said.

'I have a good idea who has it and how to find him."

He thought she'd be full of questions, but instead she grabbed his arm and dragged him toward a taxi that was pulling up as close to the souk as it could get. "In that case, you must come home with me. We have much to discuss."

Leda let Cleopatra take the helm as they entered the penthouse suite. The queen had been doing that sort of thing her whole life, after all, and had restored some of the grace Leda had lost during years of study and occasional illness, the stiff knees and stiff back from leaning over books and corpses.

Two men sat in leather chairs flanking a fireplace lit by a bonfire's worth of white candles ensconced upon a leafy wrought-iron screen. One of the men sprawled sideways in his chair with his right leg hooked up over the arm. He was wearing khaki Bermuda shorts and in case she was in any doubt about his identity, a white T-shirt with producer on the EDGE written across the front.

The other man she also recognized, though she hadn't seen him on any Time or Fortune covers lately. Andrew McCallum was the same freckled, jug-eared, red-haired boy wonder he had been then. Now, however, silver threads gleamed among the copper, and his face had a maturity more evident in his expression than complexion, lines, or lack thereof. She had never seen him in person before, but her first thought was that the pictures didn't really do him justice. He was a lot more attractive than depicted, and it wasn't just because of his billions. He was dressed a bit more formally than Bernard, in nice trousers and a jacket that was Harris tweed, unless she missed her guess. The effect was spoiled slightly by the waffle stompers on his feet, but she'd heard somewhere he lived in Scotland most of the year now, so maybe he was what they called a hill walker. He rose when she and Iris Morgan entered the room. Seeing the men's attire, Leda was glad she wasn't quite as overdressed as Iris.

'Dr. Hubbard, we're so delighted you could make it," McCallum said, sounding rather formal but still quite a lot warmer than Bernard, who waved and pointed to his cell phone, which was jabbering away at his right ear.

'It's nice to meet you, Mr. McCallum. I didn't realize you would be here."

'Oh yes, Edge TV is one of my projects. A market for my screenplays if nothing else. I've been branching out into more creative pursuits since—well, we'll discuss that later. Drink? We have wine, bourbon, Scotch, of course, or sherry if you prefer?"

'I like a nice ale?" she said hopefully. This time it was Leda of course, not Cleopatra.

'I believe we can have some sent up. Excuse me just a moment." He picked up the house phone, and said, "Is Heifeweizen to your taste?"

'I love it!" she said.

He put in the order and almost before he hung up the phone room service knocked on the door and brought in a silver tray with a chilled crystal mug and three bottles of her favorite Portland brew. She was glad they brought the bottles. It was part of the fun of specialty ales, in her opinion.

'We'll be having dinner soon. Was your trip from Egypt pleasant?"

They exchanged a few more remarks of equally deep relevance before Bernard disengaged himself from his phone.

'So, Leda," he said. "I hope you don't mind if I call you Leda? Call me Ro. Everybody does." She was glad he said that. She would have a hard time calling him Mr. Bernard, since he appeared to be about twelve years old. "Iris told you about the project. We know you've just returned from Egypt but are assuming you won't have any problems going back with our tech crews and experts to plot out the development of the program?"

Cleopatra said, wreathing Leda's face in her most roguish smile, "If I find your offer sufficiently attractive, certainly."

The three of them, with Iris Morgan chiming in now and then, discussed details for a short time before dinner was served. It consisted of a salad and an excellent seafood pasta that Leda managed, with some difficulty, to keep out of her beadwork.

They discussed the project further over cappuccino.

'Your voice is lovely," McCallum said. "How do you think you might bear up to narrating the program as well as appearing in it as yourself?"

'Normally you would pay two people for these jobs, yes ?" Cleopatra, who was learning fast how to be working-class, inquired sweetly.

'Of course," McCallum said.

'If Andy doesn't have a problem with that, neither do I," Ro said, slinging himself to his feet. "Okay, kids, that's it for Iris and me tonight. We need to check out a couple of other locations," he said, winking at Iris.

'Oh, oh yes," she said.

'I promised to take her dancing," he whispered. Leda thought they'd make a funny couple, him in his Bermudas and Iris in her slinky dress, not to mention the discrepancy in their ages. Iris looked to be about Leda's own age. Not that boy toys were unusual anymore, but it was a little unusual when the man had the money and power. Ro took care of one discrepancy by disappearing into one of the bedrooms and reemerging in a tux.

'Rude of him to wait until now to don his finest garments," Cleopatra said.

'/ imagine he thinks of it more as a costume," Leda replied, with an image of herself shrugging.

When they had gone, Leda smiled at Sir Andrew, who was looking after the couple with a bemused expression. "I didn't realize they were an item," Leda said. "Iris introduced herself on the phone as his agent."

He smiled. "She is. She's also his grandmother."

Not knowing what else to say to that, Leda changed the subject. "I know of course that you're famous as a businessman. You wouldn't be the same Sir Andrew McCallum whose name appears on the copyright page of the Scottish murder mysteries by Andrew Walters, would you?"

He beamed. "I am. How did you figure that out? I didn't think anyone knew who either of my—personas were."

'I always look on the copyright page when I'm reading a new author who writes like an experienced author, to see if I recognize their other name. I read everything, so a lot of times if, say, a romance writer turns to mysteries, I know them. If I'd known you were going to be here and had my books unpacked, I'd have brought some for you to sign. I loved Death of a Border Riever and went out and bought all the others."

'I'll have signed copies of them sent to you when I return home," he said. "But though I was accused of romanticizing Scotland once upon a time, I don't think anything I've written could be classified as a—-what are they called?—bodice ripper."

'No, though frankly, if you want to increase your sales, you could use a few more racy bits. But don't get me wrong. I love the books the way they are. Who you remind me of is a sort of modern Sir Walter Scott," she said. "Not quite so many detailed descriptions, but beautifully done descriptions where you need them, and such good insights into people. Then, too, there's that kindly feeling you get from his work even when horrible things are happening to the characters."

'Thank you," he said, looking a tiny bit uncomfortable. "Actually, I'm glad you brought that up because I wasn't sure how to approach you about this. I write like Sir Walter Scott because it's actually he who does the writing, with my help on updating his style. I'm a blend, you see. I am also one of the original large investors in the Chimera Process and happen to know that you, too, are blended."

'I thought that was a secret," she said.

'There are few secrets from those holding the purse strings," he said, more grimly than primly, Leda thought. "I was on a screening committee for deciding whose DNA should be cultivated for blending. When your rather unusual situation transpired, naturally the committee was consulted."

Leda nodded, hoping that Gretchen's blend with her dad hadn't gone past the committee, because Wolfe was probably on it. Thus far Gretchen hadn't seen fit to tell Wolfie about the other man more intimately involved in her life than her husband.

'The board recently voted to re-form the committee with broader parameters as to who was an appropriate donor."

'So I was told," she said.

'Yes, well, I don't approve of what is happening. I know that Chimera's successor on Kefalos rather abruptly dismissed you, and I wish to apologize for that. I am hoping that what we're proposing to do here will in some measure counteract what I fear is a grave mistake on the part of Helix."

'How far has the cat been let out of the bag?" Leda asked. "I've seen stuff in tabloids and on the Internet but haven't noticed anything in the less-jaundiced branches of the press thus far."

'It's being leaked slowly. Some of the stories and Internet solicitations are plants by Helix, deliberately appearing to be unreliable. Much as they would like to increase their presence in the market, there is still some fear of political and legal repercussions, depending on the governments of the countries where they operate. What we actually want to do with the Cleopatra program is to have you present the finding of the tomb and the events leading up to and away from the queen's death in her own words, from her own viewpoint. We will allude to but not focus on the process that allows you access to the queen's thoughts and memories."

'And I to Leda's," Cleopatra interjected.

'Yes, exactly. What do you think? It is an historic opportunity, but it would also expose you to a great deal of publicity and negative attention from everyone from the Egyptian government to casual crackpots the world over."

'I think I may regret our ability to speak or understand thirty languages," Leda said. "And I will have to make it clear to Cleo that no matter how annoying these people are, we're not allowed to have them killed. I also think that we will be needing combat pay for this program in addition to what the usual fee is."

'Let me put it this way," Andrew said slowly. "If you actually follow through with this, I will personally guarantee to make you wealthy enough that you can afford to hide out for the duration of your life in fine style if you so desire."

'Please accept, Leda," Cleo said. "From what I have learned from you and our mutual research, my reign has been trivialized throughout a history largely written by my enemies. We could set the record straight."

'What we will probably do is make me look like a nutcase," Leda told her. "And what about Gabriella and Cleo 7.2? Will we expose them when we come out of the closet—or I guess you might say tomb? We don't really have a right to do that.

"Then we will not if they do not wish it. We must contact them and discuss that aspect of the matter."

To Sir Andrew, Leda said, "Cleo is all for it, but I really feel like I need to think it over a little."

'Take all the time you want. But I hope, knowing what we have in common, that you will at least tell me the story of how you were blended with the queen, how her canopic jar came to be where it was, how you found the tomb, all of it."

'Are you asking this as Andrew McCallum, Helix board member, or as Sir Andrew Walters, author relentlessly searching for fresh grist for his mill?"

'Both, but more the latter perhaps."

'Okay, but only if you'll tell me what it's like to host Sir Walter Scott and how you guys have managed. You seem a little better integrated than we are. I'd like to hear more about it."

'I believe we may be in need of a few more pints and drams in that case," he said, picking up the phone to ring room service.

They sipped their drinks slowly, but their talk soon picked up a quicker pace, their words tumbling over each other as they compared experiences and insights and realized how much they had all—Leda, Andy, Cleopatra, and Sir Walter, needed to talk, tell their stories, share their complaints and revelations.

When they grew stiff from sitting so long, since even the plush armchairs of the penthouse became uncomfortable when pressing on the same body parts for too long, they stepped out to the balcony and watched the sun rise over the river, while Sir Walter talked about sunrises he had seen from the hills of the Border and from Edinburgh Castle. Cleopatra spoke of dawns along the Nile and over the Mediterranean Sea. Leda chimed in with dawns from the deck of a battleship and having no dawns aboard a submarine, while Andy also spoke of being dawn-deprived while working with his computers and accounts till all hours, when mornings only meant the opening numbers from the stock exchange.

Cleopatra admitted that she often missed the sunrise while making plans for buildings or battles, excursions or dramatic displays to parade her country's wealth and power in hopes of staving off conquest for another few months. And Sir Walter said that he often missed sunrise when his writing carried him into breakfast.

Speaking of breakfast, was she feeling at all hungry? Because he definitely was. He was told this particular hotel fixed a smashing bowl of oatmeal. Leda wondered if they did eggs Benedict properly. But when Andy said they made the best cinnamon-roll French toast in the country, everyone decided that was what their two mouths should eat.

After Andy ordered, Cleopatra paced Leda back and forth for a bit, then lifted the mug with the dregs of her ale. "To sunrises one cannot see from the tomb!"

'Sunrises!" Walter and Andy agreed, downing the last of the dram in Andy's fist.

By the time their plates bore nothing but the syrupy tracks of vanished toast, the sun was well up.

'I understand there is an exceptionally fine bookstore here in Portland," Andy said in Sir Walter's voice. "I would very much like to see it."

'That can be arranged," Leda said.

'We would not be conspicuous wearing evening attire and arriving in a limousine?"

'Anything goes at Powell's," she assured him. Then Cleopatra piped up, flickering her lashes flirtatiously at Andy, "Though perhaps it would be good to return to Rusti's house first. As we have talked the night away, she will assume we have done more than talk."

By the time the limo pulled up in front of Powell's City of Books, the store that occupied an entire city block of new and used books and associated wares, it was nearly 11 A.M. Rusti had been sleeping and hadn't even noticed when Leda came in, changed from the evening outfit to one of Rusti's more fetching aubergine scoop-necked knit tops and pants, and returned to the car where Andy waited.

As they stepped into the bookstore, Leda suddenly swayed on her feet and reached out for something to grab hold of.

'Leda? Are you all right?" Andy asked, taking her elbow.

But she was neither Leda at that moment nor all right. She was Cleopatra and in desperate trouble.

She saw herself as she had once been in time-frayed royal robes, her fragile body being almost pulled apart by the rough handling of several men. Initially, the scene before her seemed to be a memory, except that she could recall no such incident ever occurring within her lifetime. All the while they were tearing off bits of her, another part of her listened helplessly, detached from her plight so that she seemed to be able only to hear the argumentative voices of her tormentors. They seemed more clumsy and impatient than purposely cruel, not because they were not cruel men—she felt that they were—but because she was only an object, and one could not be cruel to an object.

The impression was so strong that when the vision faded, she expected to find cuts and bruises on her body at the very least. But she saw only Andy's freckled brow creased with concern. Leda once more regained awareness of her surroundings.

Man, I had the weirdest nightmare, she thought, shaking her head and thumping her forehead with the heel of her hand, as if to clear it.

'Leda?" Andy asked, "What is it? What's the matter? Did you faint?"

Her first instinct was to deny the vision that had overcome them as a nightmare while they were still awake. But then she remembered with relief that Andy understood. If the episode had anything to do with the blend, Andy and Walter might well have had a similar experience that would shed light on her own.

Shakily, she led him over to the little coffee and tea shop within the store, and over a pot of tea, in low tones, Cleopatra told the others what she had seen and felt.

'I dreamed it, too," Leda said. "But not as vividly as that. Have you—two—experienced anything similar?"

Andy shook his head. "No. Never. I dream Walter's story ideas, of course, and he dreams spreadsheets at times, which he finds disturbing, since he was never much good with money. But the only violence has been in our blended imagination. Mostly sword fights. A few hangings. But that's all."

Leda sipped her tea for a moment and mused to Cleopatra, "Maybe because you are the less corporeal of us, when you saw my nightmare it was more on your plane or something, which is why it seemed more real to you."

"It was real. It was happening to me. Perhaps the feeling of detachment I experienced was actually you having the nightmare."

'Whatever," Leda replied. She was still baffled.

Chimera followed the monks—and the suitcase-through the terminal until they reached the Indian Airlines counter. The monks presented three tickets, and Chimera presented a passport for identity confirmation.

Aboard the plane, after a lengthy delay in takeoff, during which the monks meditated and Chimera attempted to follow suit, the flight attendants served beverages. Chimera had the window seat, with the monks occupying the other two.

Sipping fruit juice, Chimera noticed that it had an odd taste and looked a bit cloudy. Before the scientist could mention this, however, sleep overcame all other functions.

It was a long and deep sleep, and by the time Chimera awakened, the plane was landing in Delhi.

Two things, other than the odd drink and deep sleep that followed, puzzled Chimera. The middle and aisle seats of the row were vacant and the scientist found that the inside of his cheek was a bit sore and raw. The other passengers crowded the aisle.

Chimera blinked and found it hard to focus, but finally rose and followed the others to the front end of the aircraft. "Did you happen to see when the Buddhist monks who were with me left?"

'Yes, of course, sir," the male flight attendant said. "They departed when the aircraft landed in Dubai, sir. You were sleeping very soundly. I remember."

What were two Buddhist monks going to do in Dubai in the Arab Emirates, Chimera wondered. Oh well, they had not mentioned that they were leaving, but then, perhaps they had not wanted to disturb their sleeping companion. Chimera hoped that was the explanation, but was afraid that it was not. Perhaps another team of monks was meeting the plane to shepherd the scientist on to Dharmsala. But of course, they weren't.

CHAPTER 9

The driver of the taxi, who evidently knew Gabriella

Faruk, drove them to a compound in what had once been a fairly ritzy section of Alexandria.

'You must tell me what you know," Gabriella said. "It is urgent that we get the mummy back again."

'It wouldn't do you any good if I told you," Mike replied. "They're rough characters. Besides, they plan to hold the old girl for ransom, so you'll have a chance to get her back if your museum can pay enough."

'Unacceptable," Gabriella told him. "We must get the mummy back. Cleopatra's DNA is worth a fortune, and there were other things as well, the amulets and charms wrapped inside her bandages. Some of them were priceless."

'I thought she hadn't been unwrapped yet. How do you know?"

'You wouldn't believe me if I told you." She stopped speaking suddenly, and called out, "Gihen, please find Mohammed for me. I must return to the library at once."

A fully veiled woman in a bright blue dress appeared.

'Yes, Gabriella. I will radio him at once. But you look weary, my friend. Is there something he could bring you from the library so that you need not return?"

'If only there was! But no, it's something I must find for myself."

Mike wondered if maybe his new trinket was worth more to her than it would be to any other potential buyer. "Something like this maybe?" he asked, withdrawing the scarab from his pocket and holding it out of her reach for her to see.

'That's mine! Give it to me at once!" she commanded. Very bossy, even for an academic female, he thought.

'Unh-uh, finders keepers," he told her, closing his fist over it. "Unless you give me a good enough reason—or enough good reasons, that is." He rubbed his thumb and first two fingers together meaningfully. "This has been a pretty unprofitable night so far. I'm willing to negotiate if it's all that important to you."

Her reaction was startling. She seemed to be having a desperate internal struggle to control herself. "Please excuse me," she said. "But don't go anywhere, and don't let go of that amulet."

Then she got up and paced the courtyard back and forth three times. At last, as if she'd been having a seizure, the tension that drove her relaxed. Her walk slowed and changed, acquiring a sinuous roll of the hips, somewhat lost in the baggy cargo pants, but a spectacular movement nonetheless. When she turned back to him, she was smiling as if they shared something. Good Lord, she was coming on to him! This happened to the heroes in men's adventure novels and even best-sellers whenever the guys in the books met beautiful, brainy women. The girls instantly turned into steamy temptresses who turned all of their brains, talents, and skills into erotic maneuvers to get him into bed. Well, adrenaline rushes such as the one they had—face it—shared did have an erotic component, which was one of the reasons he kept going for them, he knew. But usually there were no temptresses around—not living ones anyway.

'Lady, I don't know what you had in mind to exchange for this trinket, but I'm thinking cash myself. I ain't sayin' you ain't pretty, but I need something a little more bankable. On the other hand, if you have the cash and you really sorta like my manly rugged good looks, we might work something out."

She laughed. It was a throaty chuckle that went straight to his groin. "My dear new friend, you are getting, one might say, your cart ahead of your ass. While I do indeed like your looks, as what woman would not, I was simply trying to decide what to tell you about the amulet. You may find what I have to say difficult to believe. But if you snap the right wing of the scarab back, you will find that the center opens." She sat down beside him at the little table where they'd been having coffee. She scooted her chair close to his and rested her elbows on the table, moving her fingers in an elegant and graceful way to indicate how he should move his, though she did not seem to be trying to get closer to the locket. He did what she said.

'Inside you will find a lock of hair. It was cut from the head of Marc Antony as he lay dying in the arms of Cleopatra. It contains his DNA."

'So?" Mike thought immediately of what Galen had told him but kept his horse-trading face on. He could have sworn that Gabriella had not been wearing perfume when they were in the cab, but now she exuded a subtle scent that he found distractingly stirring.

'So a person such as yourself, open to unusual financial opportunities, shall we say, must be aware that there is a very lucrative market in DNA these days. It is a somewhat clandestine market, true, but there are those who would pay handsomely for a few cells from any reasonably notable individual. Can you imagine what a great price you might get for the key to the great Marcus Antonius himself?"

'Aha! I thought that might come up," Mike said, waggling a finger at her. "You're talking about those guys at that Nucor place, aren't you? The ones that—uh—blend, isn't it called? Blend old dead people with live ones?"

'Helix," she said.

'What?"

'The company changed its name. It's called Helix now. How did you find out about the blends? I hope it isn't common knowledge among people of your—er—calling?"

'No. I met this guy who used to work for a fellow who was very into it till he got snuffed. I think a mutual friend of ours might have had something to do with it. At least, they said on the news that you girls were the ones who found Cleopatra's tomb. You and Leda."

'You know Leda?"

'I know a lot of things," he said. "See, this guy who worked for the fellow whose name I can't recall…"

'Rasmussen?" she asked, learning forward a bit. "Could it have been Rasmussen?"

'That's the one," he said, though he wasn't sure. "This fellow, Galen, said his boss, this Rasmussen, had paid for one of these blends for him. Galen told me all about it. He wanted no part of it, he said. I guess he thought he had a life but then somebody, not me, honest, but somebody else, decided otherwise. I was with him when he died. Terrible thing. Tragic. So young. And generous. I was his sole heir, it seems. He left me all his stuff, including this." He flashed the card at her, holding it out of her reach.

She didn't look all that surprised and she didn't look all that unhappy. She sat back in her chair and crossed her legs in a way that would have been sexy except for the cargo pants. "Ah, well, then, you do know where to market my— the contents of the amulet then, don't you?"

'Indeed I do," he said, adding, "And you're not exactly giving me a good reason to give it back to you. Quite the contrary. In fact, if you were preparing to make me an offer, you're driving the price up. I can't help but wonder why that is. I know you aren't stupid."

She shrugged in a way that made Marvin the Martian positively leer from his vantage point atop her breasts, which rose and fell with a Jell-O-like quiver with her gesture. The courtyard had seemed quite cool when he arrived, but now it was getting very warm. "I am hoping my honesty if nothing else will disarm you. You see, I have spent many of the years of my career studying Antony in order to find what became of his treasure."

'What treasure?"

'The treasure he looted from Byzantium. Not just the library scrolls in Pergamum. We found those in the tomb. The precious jewels, spices, and metals he looted from the city have never been found. At first it was assumed that they flowed into the coffers of Rome, but there is no evidence to support that. And Cleopatra was not in possession of them. He gave her the scrolls from the library and a trinket or two, but the rest he must have hidden. And the secret of the hiding place died with him. If he confided in Cleopatra, she told no one. We now study the scrolls to see if some might be her own account of his death, and possibly his deathbed confidences."

'I still don't get why you're telling me this if you want me to give it back to you."

'Because you deserve to know. In reviewing what occurred tonight, I have come to the understanding that you saved my life, the Biblioteca, the priceless ancient scrolls that will be the object of my most passionately devoted study for the rest of my days.

'So you must understand that although you have all the information you need to sell the amulet for a lot of money,

I am the one who really knows how to use what it contains. Who knows what fascinating knowledge that treasure would reveal? And of course I would include you in any financial profit to be made from its secrets."

Of course, she wasn't mentioning that if she found this treasure she was talking about, the Egyptian government got the whole thing and he got nothing. Maybe she thought he was stupid.

'You are a real sweetheart," he said. "And that's a generous offer. What do you say we sleep on it, and I'll let you know in the morning?"

About that time Mohammed, the cousin and cabbie, showed up in the courtyard. "Sorry to have disturbed you, Mo," Gabriella said. "I won't need that ride after all, but maybe, since you're here, you'd show this gentleman to one of the men's guest rooms."

Mike blinked at her twice. She wasn't flirting anymore. Not, he thought, because he'd failed to take her bait, but because the woman who'd been flirting with him was no longer there. The scholarly Dr. Faruk in the funny T-shirt and baggy cargo pants was back, wild-haired and intense, but not in the same way as she had been a few moments ago.

'Aw, Doc, don't be such a bad sport," he said, low enough, he hoped, so that she heard and her male cousin didn't. "I thought we might work something out together tonight from the way you were—you know, coming on."

'I was not!" she whispered fiercely. "Or rather—never mind. Just follow Mo. We'll speak of this after we've— each—had some sleep."

He gave her a look, more in sorrow than in censure, and followed the cabbie. His door had no lock on the inside. He fell asleep with Galen's pistol under the pillow and the amulet clutched in his left hand. He told himself to wake up when someone came to try to take the amulet away from him or in two hours, whichever came first.

'You will understand I have no choice but to report my husband missing,^?" Gretchen said to the Helix corporate headquarters when they failed to produce an accurate location for Wolfe.

But once she was alone again she asked her inner cop, "But we are reporting this to which authority? We do not even know what country he is in."

"True. And you can't just go to Interpol with a missing person report, even if he's an influential missing person. Not unless you think someone is trafficking in him, or he's trafficking in somebody else."

"This is Wilhelm we are discussing, Duke. You will take this seriously."

"I am, doll, I am. I'm just trying to tell you how it works. We need to report that he's missing to the nearest police and let them know that we don't know where he is, then they can go to Interpol on our behalf. Probably a liberal application of incentive would grease the wheels."

'Money. Ja."

Duke was a little surprised at just how readily they got action for a few lire and a little name-dropping. He thought at first that the Italian police were solicitous mostly because Gretchen was a cute blonde with deep pockets. But he was not entirely right.

'Signora," an officer said deferentially, "I can imagine how distressing this is for you. We will give this matter the most urgent priority."

'Danke," Gretchen said, then added, "Grazie. You understand that the company officials are denying that Wilhelm is missing, and yet, they do not tell me where he is, only where he is not."

'You've made that clear, and I quite understand your concern. You have my personal guarantee that we will leave no stone unturned to find him."

'Hmph," Gretchen said. "I am hoping he is under no stones at all. Here is my hotel. I will wait there, when I am waiting. When I am not hearing from you in three days, I am waiting no longer, you understand?"

'Si, yes, ja, signora. Perfectly."

Though the man's expression was sympathetic and his downright Latin effusiveness seemed sincere enough, Duke was still surprised when there was a knock on their hotel room door that night.

'Signora Wolfe?" said the eye on the other side of the peephole.

"Ja?"

'We have news of your husband. May we come in please?"

Duke eyed them warily. It still all seemed too easy.

'You do not look like the Italian police," Gretchen said.

'No, signora, we are with Interpol. When the Italian police contacted us about your husband's disappearance, we were able to locate him. But he isn't in Rome."

'He is not? Where is he?"

'If you'll let us in, signora, we will explain and take you to him."

Gabriella finally pulled off her dusty, sweaty T-shirt and pants and bathed, then defiantly pulled on another T-shirt to sleep in. Her alter ego had been strangely quiet throughout her bedtime preparations. "Nothing to say? Good. And you needn't think we are going to slip into that man's room and try to take the amulet from him. He is a very dangerous person. I hope he can help us recover your mummy, but I'd really prefer he leaves."

"Calmly, my dear. Calmly. I think slipping into his room would be rather fun actually but not to take the amulet from him. He's very handsome, isn't he?"

"If you like that sort of looks. And he's not to be trusted."

"He helped us tonight and with a little effort on your part, we could win him over."

"He seems willing enough to help us locate your mummy without additional incentive, and I think you've been quite winning enough for one night. As for the amulet, that sort is only interested in money. Perhaps we can buy it back."

"Do it my way, and he'll beg us to take it as a token of his devotion. "

The telephone beside the bed rang. It was three o'clock in the morning. "Yes?" Gabriella said cautiously.

'It's Ginia. Listen. You must post a guard and not leave the compound. The Saudi princess had a change of heart and telephoned her mother. A strange helicopter landed on the pad and picked her up. The stupid woman led them straight to me, and I don't doubt she'll tell them about you, too. I dismissed my staff, locked up the house, and had my pilot pick me up and take me to Kefalos."

Gabriella sighed. "I have not had a very good day either, Ginia. But perhaps you're overreacting. She probably won't tell them anything about our operation. Why should she? She might change her mind again."

'I don't think so. A few minutes ago the shore patrol from Mykonos called to tell me that a yacht weighed anchor offshore from Delos. It dispatched two landing crafts full of people. The patrol promised to investigate for me. I pay them well enough. But I fear the woman may have been forced to tell about us, which means you, too, are in danger."

'She was never here," Gabriella said.

'No, but we didn't conceal your identity or mine. It wouldn't be hard for someone to find your residence. I wish that you would…"

The phone went dead in Gabriella's hand. "Damn," she said. As she stepped out of her room into the courtyard connecting her compound with that of Mohammed and his brothers and all of their family members, she reached for the switch to turn on the fairy lights along the path. Behind her, the glow of her bedside lamp died as the switch flipped uselessly between her fingers.

She quickly stepped into the deeper shadows, trying to blend with the darkness as noises and low whispers penetrated the courtyard. Keeping to the wall, she slunk around the perimeter, feeling the roughness of the exterior stucco under her fingers. Behind her she felt rather than saw her own door flung open. Two figures darted inside. They whispered curses on finding the room empty and crashed back out again, no longer stealthy. The noise of their movements reverberated in her ears like the explosion earlier in the evening. She recoiled from it, wishing she had had time to arm herself or at least get dressed. Then someone grabbed her, at the same time clamping a hand over her mouth.

'Shhh," a voice whispered into Gabriella's ear. Mike Angeles. Probably that was good. "We're being invaded."

He took his hand from her mouth. Her teeth had bitten into her lips in several places. "I did notice," she whispered back.

'Sorry to have got you into this," he said. "I should have known there'd be others and they'd come looking for me."

'Actually they didn't," she said. "These people are looking for me."

'You? Why?"

'Maybe this could wait until later? I need to warn my cousin and his family."

'Excuse me." Mike pushed her aside. Instead of satchel charges, he now brandished a small handgun with which he dropped the shadowy figure who suddenly loomed up in front of them. Before the gun stopped smoking, another figure dropped onto him from the courtyard's roof, and the men began struggling. Gabriella tried to pull the stranger off of her ally, but once more someone grabbed her.

Why did these things happen when she had nothing but her T-shirt between her and her attackers and that perhaps not for long?

He held her tightly around the throat and she felt the sharp edge of a knife tickle her jugular.

CHAPTER 10

Cleopatra's Narrative:

We drank tea from amusing mugs while sitting on a small stool at a table almost as small. For a time, Andrew held our hand, purely out of concern for our health, of course, as Leda assured me. I knew better. I have seen that look in the eyes of other men. Mild and unprepossessing as Andrew McCallum appears, he must have drive, must have fire and ambition. Otherwise, how could he amass so much uninherited wealth? And in my experience, that sort of drive and fire often indicates fire in other regions, those useful to a woman who wishes to acquire favors.

Furthermore, from Leda's memories we know that Andrew's guest, Sir Walter Scott, was well-known as a romantic and a fantasizer, one who loved grand lives and sweeping tales—such as my own. Earlier, that part of him had expressed considerable interest in my saga, but now, when Sir Walter came forth, it was generally to answer one of Leda's rather breathless questions about one of his books.

Which shows that my hostess certainly knows her way around certain kinds of men as well. When we left the sanctuary of the tea shop to continue our exploration of Powell’s, the first place we went was to what Leda referred to as an "antique" leather-bound collection of Sir Walter Scott's books, which Andrew presented to us, signed, along with the three volumes written under his pen name of Sir Andrew Walters. Scott, the grandson of thieving ruffians who were minor gentility in his native land, is inordinately proud of the "Sir." It indicates a special favor on the part of the monarch. At one time it was given to those who were half courtier, half soldier, particular friends or favored servants of the royal house. Nowadays it is granted, he says, to confer honor to his country's celebrities, be they writers, musicians, artists, soldiers, or other noteworthy persons, especially those of great wealth.

It seems a useful institution. I am slightly chastened that in all of our generations of Ptolemys since Alexander, not one of us thought of it.

Leda seems very impressed with some of the books that were once owned by others. Many of the books in our library were owned by others—until we considerately made copies for the original owners and acquired the books for the library, where more people could have the benefit of them.

After signing the books, Andrew telephoned his chauffeur and had him collect and pay for the books and take them to the car. Afterward, the servant reappeared with a capacious box that rolled on wheels, and trailed us at a discreet distance.

This truly was a magnificent place—and I am sorry to say it made my Great Library pale by comparison. Of course, in this age they have devices that copy manuscripts at amazing speed, and many of the books had duplicates sitting on the shelves next to them, but even so, it was miraculous to behold. Rooms and rooms of books, shelf upon shelf of colorful covers of papers whose textures were more varied than the fabrics available in my land. A feast of books, whole floors of them devoted to particular subjects— travel, with an entire bookcase devoted to Egyptian studies— folklore, philosophy, medicine, cosmetics, any and all possible subjects. I was awestricken, amazed, stupefied.

'Cool, huh?" Leda inquired smugly. "Thoughtyou'dlike it."

'It rivals the Pharos Lighthouse as one of the wonders of the world," I admitted.

'It's even better because it still exists, and the lighthouse doesn't," Leda replied. She does have a tendency at times to, as she would put it, rub it in.

We wandered the rooms for hours, now and again plucking up books to examine or buy. Andrew generously, and rather recklessly, offered to purchase whatever we wished. I could actually feel the acquisitive glint kindle in Leda's gaze. However, as we had no place of our own to live, she managed to control her powerful lust and confined us to a single carefully chosen rolling-cart load.

We spent glorious hours in there while, with Andrew, we examined many books, reading aloud from what Leda calls "dust jackets" and first pages to each other. Most of these books are so small that one can hold the entire text in one's hand without it rolling across the floor or flying off in a dozen different directions. If there is a fault in this place, I would say that it is that the vast majority of the work contained within its walls is in a single language and of comparatively recent vintage. There is no chance to read various translations and interpretations in order to gain a deeper understanding of the meanings held within each volume. On the other hand, some of the books do not seem to require actually being read in any language at all, as the illustrations on the cover tell much of the story. The man with the long hair and the bared chest, holding a similarly attired woman, for instance. Time and language have not changed the stories people tell very much after all, it seems.

Andrew paid for our loot, and we returned to the car to return to the hotel to join Ro and Iris again to discuss further details of the production.

The chauffeur placed our books onto the wide, cushioned bench in the rear of the vehicle so that we might gloat over our acquisitions.

I was thoroughly enjoying this when the books vanished, Andrew vanished, the light of day vanished, and I was in darkness.

The cool of the rainy afternoon was replaced by the heat of my native land. A hot sand-bearing breeze rasped against the bare skin of my legs and arms. This was surprising since a portion of myself recalled that I still wore the trousers with which I had attired myself at Rusti's. Nevertheless, it seemed that I wore only a single thin short garment.

In the next moment something—a hand smelling of tobacco and—Leda's senses supplied the name—cordite— clamped onto my throat with bruising strength, lifting me from my bare feet and choking me with brutally strong hands. Something sharp pricked me just under my right ear, the blade biting into my skin. He was going to—Leda said—open our jugular—cut our throat.

Then, suddenly, both blade and hand released their pressure and we started to fall. Abruptly, new hands replaced those of the assassin's. "Leda, are you all right? Is it happening again?"

I nodded. "I believe I understand now. I have joined minds with my sister soul and felt what she felt. I must telephone Gabriella at once. It is very different in some ways from what I felt the first time, but I am positive now that this is what has happened. My twin and her hostess have been attacked twice within the last few hours."

Leda reached into her bag for her cell phone, but

Andrew handed her the car phone recessed into the back of the driver's seat. "It's got a bit more juice than the average cell," he said.

Leda, heedless of the traffic whizzing past them on the bridge, dialed Gabriella's home phone number. A recorded voice in Arabic told her something she didn't entirely translate but picked up enough words to gather that the phone was out of order. Although it was probably too late for Gabriella to be at the Biblioteca, Leda knew her friend sometimes worked nights, so she dialed her office number there.

A man's voice answered.

'Who is this?" Leda asked.

'Who is this?" he asked.

'I am calling for Dr. Faruk. Is she working late by any chance?"

'Not any longer."

'Who is this?" she repeated.

'I am a police officer, madam. Please state your name and reason for calling."

'I'm Dr. Hubbard, Dr. Faruk's associate, and I'm calling from the United States. What has happened to Gabriella? Please put her on the line if she's able to come to the phone."

'Calm yourself, madam. No harm has come to Dr. Faruk. There has been an incident here, and she is returning to help us with our inquiries."

'Thank you. Please tell her I called and to call me as soon as possible."

But the policeman had hung up.

Gabriella had learned a few self-defense moves, though she was by no means a martial arts expert. Her dangerous activities required the use of brains and contacts to maneuver herself and the women she was protecting from peril to safety. She could butt her assailant in the chin with her own head, but he could sever her vein before she had a prayer of disarming him.

Suddenly there was a loud crack. Had he shot her? It seemed like overkill when he was ready to slit her throat. Then something sharp fell onto her nose followed by a rain of other objects and a shower of something coarse and powdery.

His knife hand relaxed, but before she could react, the arm restraining her also dropped, though he still almost pulled her down with him as he crumpled to the mud-brick pavement of the courtyard. Her aunt Fatima stood over him, brandishing the base of a large ceramic planter with the remains of her favorite jasmine bush and soil still dangling from it.

Mike Angeles doubled his opponent over with a jab to the midsection then drop-kicked him in the head, sending the man sprawling.

'You okay?" Mike asked Gabriella.

Behind them, Mo and his brothers and their older male children, armed to the teeth, poured out into the courtyard.

The attackers didn't even try to take them on. Someone yelled a command, and the man Mike had felled scrabbled away like a crab until he could gain his feet and run.

'You're not having a real good day, are you, lady?" Mike asked her.

'I've had better."

'Good thing your relatives are well armed. Unusually well armed." He looked around as Gabriella's kinsmen and women lowered all manner of automatic rifles, assault rifles, and other implements of selective destruction. "What is this? You guys rob caravans for fun and profit or what? If so, need any help?"

'Nothing like that," Gabriella said. "And there's no profit in what we do. I doubt it would interest you. I spend a great deal of my own money on it, and sometimes, like tonight, you find your efforts have gone unappreciated."

'Speaking of which, you could either say thank you or slip me a little tip. I seem to have saved your life."

'Perhaps," she said, cautious again. "What is the matter with you?" Cleopatra asked. "He did. This very attractive man just saved our life. He should be rewarded."

"Maybe, but what if he is only trying to gain our trust for some purposes of his own? He seems to turn up at strangely opportune moments. He was working for the people who stole your mummy. I'm sure of it."

"Clearly he changed his allegiance. Men do that if sufficiently motivated."

'Yes, but we know nothing about his motivation. It can hardly have been our charms, since he had already removed the bombs before he knew we were there. So, unless he had some as-yet-undisclosed reason for turning on the others, he may have been told to win our confidence and infiltrate our organization. I find it very strange that this compound has been invaded so soon after the attack on the museum and that he is here for the second event as well."

'Luckily for us. He did save our life."

Mo called out to her. "Gabriella, Hamid was stabbed. He has lost a great deal of blood."

Hamid was the bohab, gate guard and groundskeeper, for both compounds. A distant relative, he had served in that capacity faithfully for many years.

Gabriella sprinted off to tend to her wounded kinsman.

She didn't see where Mike Angeles went, and with no guard at the compound's gate, neither did anyone else.

Mike slipped out of Gabriella's compound while she was commiserating with her relatives, who had congregated beside her and the wounded man at the front gate.

Mike left the way the terrorists had come in, over the rooftops.

When he reached the opposite side from the courtyard, he didn't drop immediately into the street. Instead, he crawled around to the front of the house, where the entrance gate was tightly closed. Below he heard the voices of Gabriella and her family.

Dawn was just breaking, making the light a little tricky, but directly across from him, on a rooftop on the opposite side of the street, he saw movement, two black-clad figures, one stooping, another lying down. The rising sun caught like a drop of blood on what Mike figured was a sniper scope.

He'd been expecting something like that. Since the direct assault had failed, picking off the inhabitants of the compound as they left it wasn't a bad alternative.

He scooted back around the way he'd come, silently lowered himself to the ground, and approached the other house from the side. It wasn't that hard to get up. They'd left a knotted rope. Mike pulled himself up with ease and swung his body up onto the tiles.

His boot caught on a loose one and it clattered to the street.

He waited, expecting someone to run across to his position and put him out of his misery. Rather to his surprise, nobody did. Maybe they had heard, though, and were waiting to ambush him when he reached their position. He only saw one now, the horizontal one, about fifty feet away. Maybe the other guy had gone for coffee? He'd be quick and not give the other one a chance to return and discover him.

His target lay facing Gabriella's compound, his rifle rather carelessly pointing at the entrance. What was this, amateur hour? The guy didn't seem to know how to hold his weapon. Something was wrong here.

Mike was not surprised when his flying sprint closed the distance between himself and his target before the other man made it all the way to his feet. He was surprised that the man didn't move from his position, even when Mike was on top of him.

Then Mike saw what the man's black mask and the dawn's ruddy light hadn't let him see before—or what had happened while he was crossing the street and climbing up to the roof. The guy had his head on backward. It had been twisted till his neck broke.

Mike sat back on his heels and considered for a moment. So—there were two groups of black-clad people—no, make that three, counting the gang at the museum—skulking around the general vicinity tonight? Maybe the body in front of him was the work of one of Gabriella's relatives, but you'd have thought someone would have mentioned it. Oh well. Crisis over. Problem solved without any work on his part. He'd been going to leave this guy as a sort of hostess gift for Gabriella, to thank her for the hospitality, but now he'd just have to send her some scented soap or something.

CHAPTER 11

While Gabriella was examining Hamid, the police arrived. "Dr. Faruk, we would like a word with you," the officer in charge said.

Gabriella blinked stupidly and almost asked them where they were when they were needed. It took her a moment to think why they were there at all.

The policeman saw her confusion. "The break-in at the Biblioteca, Doctor. You called to report it. We naturally assumed you would be there to meet our officers and point out the damage and what articles were stolen. It's taken us some time to examine the scene and even longer to contact someone who could tell us where you lived. Why did you not remain behind?"

Gabriella blinked again. "Shock, I suppose," she said finally, returning her attention to Hamid's wound.

'What happened to this fellow?" the officer asked.

She thought fast. If the police knew why the Saudi lady's relatives had attacked the compound, they were likely to side with the Saudis. And they might look into things at the compound she preferred to keep quiet. "Oh, he is my uncle. He was coming to collect me at work and surprised the intruders. As you see, they wounded him. Partly it was to look after him that I left the Biblioteca."

'And yet you are only now treating his wound?"

'We were detained," she said, deliberating about whether or not to betray Mike Angeles to them to throw them off her own scent. It seemed the only viable distraction. "One of the conspirators apparently had a change of heart. He removed the explosive devices but insisted that I leave with him. My uncle was collected by my cousin Mohammed and brought back here. I finally convinced the man to come back here with me, too. His friends stole Cleopatra's mummy, the one I recently helped locate. This man said he had some idea where they might be keeping the mummy. Of course, its value is inestimable, and I had to humor him in hope that he might be telling the truth. I'm glad you're here to interrogate him now. You'll find him over there." She nodded toward the section of courtyard where she had left Mike Angeles.

A moment later the officer sent to look for him returned. "The man was there, according to other witnesses, sir, but left just prior to our arrival."

Gabriella shrugged. "He is obviously a very experienced criminal. I'm sorry, but I can hardly be expected to anticipate his actions."

'Naturally, Doctor. We are not suggesting that you should. But we would like your assistance at the Biblioteca nonetheless."

'Can it not wait until morning, Captain? I am very weary from the shock and stress of this day."

'I can appreciate that, Madame. However, the staff will begin arriving soon, and while my officers can prevent them from entering, we wish to have your corroboration of the

damage to your area with minimal interruption to the normal operation of the library. I'm sure you are the first to appreciate that."

'Yes. Yes, of course," she said. She became aware of the other officers goggling at her bare arms and legs. "If I can get dressed first?"

The captain nodded stiffly.

As she turned, she saw her aunt Yasmin standing warily just beyond the circle of the police. She gave her a wink and a slight nod in the direction of her own room.

Yasmin, clad in her black robes, melted easily into the shadows and was inside Gabriella's room when the younger woman arrived.

'Two attacks in one day?" Yasmin's whispered question was somewhat admiring. "Who have you offended now, child?"

'I tell you honestly I have no idea why any of the usual suspects should choose this time to be more offended than others, to the extent that they attack us. But we are none of us safe here until we discover who is launching these assaults and cause them to stop. Therefore, it is time to use the plan we arranged before."

'As soon as you return," Yasmin agreed.

'I will not return here. Mo knows where I shall emerge if all goes well and in time will meet me with a few necessities, but for now he will help the rest of you pack and guide you to the beginning of your path. Your rubber boots are in readiness. Be sure to take them the rest of the way with you when you ascend into the city to make your way to those who will shelter and protect you. As soon as you are safe, leave your marks as we discussed, one for each, so that Mo may ascertain you found your way. Should trouble befall you, wait. Do not wander from your path, or you may become so lost we will not find you in time to prevent you from starving. Remember what happened to Sitt Miriam, the Afghan warlord's wife."

'What happened to her?" Cleopatra asked.

"Drowned in afoot of water when she became lost and died from exhaustion. She wandered off when Fatima was guiding her in from the desert and stopped to kill a snake."

"Where did this happen?"

'In the aqueducts Alexander caused to be built beneath the city. We have long used these to come and go secretly from the compound when conducting our friends to safety. After my colleagues have finished working for the day, the necropolis also make good hiding places for our friends. The tomb robbers over the centuries interconnected the passages so that the three major necropolis of the city have access to the aqueducts. That is the positive aspect. The negative is that it has allowed water to enter some of the tombs, making work difficult for those of us who would preserve …"

'Enough! I understand," Cleopatra said. "Did I myself not issue decrees to repair and extend the aqueducts?"

'Do not forget our rubbers, stay where we are if we become lost, remember the fate of those who were disobedient!" Yasmin said. "You speak as if we were children."

'There are children among us," Gabriella replied, tugging on the rugged clothing she wore while digging, cargo pants that unzipped to make knee-length shorts, a T-shirt, an outer shirt, a scarf for her hair, and a voluminous skirt to cover the pants. She had plastic boots in her office, and a compass, and, most importantly, maps of the aqueducts and necropolis. She slipped her cell phone, now recharged, into her bag, but she knew it wouldn't help her when she went underground.

Her preparations complete, she returned to the gate, where Hamid was being removed by ambulance. His transfer to a safe house could be arranged later.

The police captain nodded with approval, relief, and perhaps a bit of regret at her more decorous costume and, with a hand on top of her scarfed head, helped her into the backseat of the police car.

Dropping to the ground, Mike made his way to a busier street and caught a taxi to the Helix corporate airstrip.

There he presented Galen's credit card as well as the pass to the past his late friend's late boss had bought for him. He was proud of how effortless his forgery of Galen's signature looked.

Once they arrived at the Kefalos airstrip, the easy part was over. Mike went to find someone who could stir him together with Marc Antony's hair follicles at least long enough to find the treasure Gabriella mentioned.

That had been a weird incident. He began to wonder if maybe she was blended, too. She certainly sounded like two different people at times. In retrospect, he decided she probably was. It wasn't something he was used to factoring in, but it looked like that was going to have to change.

But people apparently didn't just walk into the facility and order a blend like they'd order a haircut.

He showed all and sundry Galen's doctored ID and the business card with the doctor's name on it, but the pilot had radioed ahead, so he was detained at the airstrip until a teenage Greek girl driving a golf cart showed up to claim him.

The golf cart took the mountain like a goat with a Harley engine. Once at the top, they entered a ruin.

'There must be some mistake," Mike said. "I'm not a tourist. I'm here for the—"

'Oh yes, do you think I don't know that?" the girl asked with an airy wave of one hand while she used the other to drive them straight into a wall, which turned out to be a holographic elevator. "This is where everybody comes."

The elevator purred down an indeterminate number of floors—there were no markings on it that said lingerie, hosiery, or housewares, much less something simple like numbers. When they reached their floor, the door opened, and the girl drove out and down the long corridor. While she drove, she spoke into a cell phone or walkie-talkie, and a door about a mile away opened. A woman in a lab coat stood there waiting. If she wasn't exactly smiling, she at least looked lukewarmly welcoming. "Hello, Mr. Kronos. We accessed your file when you presented your card in Alexandria. It is customary to make an appointment prior to undergoing the process, but I presume this is a preliminary visit to select your donor?"

'Actually, no. I—uh—brought my donor with me." He took the charm from his pocket. "By a hair. Marc Antony's hair, actually."

She held out her hand. He pulled his back.

'Sir, we'll have to test the specimen to ascertain that your information is correct. You wouldn't want to be stuck hosting a Roman tax collector for instance, would you?"

'I guess not. But let me take it out of the amulet first," Mike said. "It's gold."

'Yes, I see that. But of course, if the specimen is genuine, it will be worth considerably more. I'll personally return the amulet when the specimen has been successfully and safely extracted. As old as it is, it would disappear if you attempted to extract it now."

'We can't have that, can we?" Mike agreed. Grudgingly, he handed over the little hunk of treasure.

She left him standing there and disappeared behind the beakers and computers. Meanwhile a rather tasty young thing in a lab coat conducted him to a lounge.

The TV was tuned to CNN, and the magazines looked current. He noticed three laptop computers set up on a table and asked the girl what they were for.

'Research," she said. "If you would care to access our database, we've had our librarians compile files on the notable individuals whose DNA we've acquired or that is of interest to us. You can also access the Net from it if there's someone you want to know about who's not in our DB."

That sounded like a good, if slightly scary, idea. Mike tried the Helix DB but couldn't find a lot on Marc Antony, though there was a lot on Cleopatra and Julius Caesar. He did an on-line search and came up with a few disparaging bits by a contemporary of the general's, but apparently not a friend. No mention was made of Antony's conquests, other than sexual, or any possible misplaced treasure. His defeats were discussed at some length, however.

Mike sighed. The guy was described as a heavy drinker. This was not going to be easy.

By Galen's watch it was only about an hour and a half before the first woman reappeared, handing him the locket. "Your vessel, sir. It's quite possible from what we can tell that the sample is, as you believed, from Marc Antony. It's also quite possible that it's not. Can you give us any other information, or are you satisfied that your source is correct?"

'She seemed pretty sure—I mean, yes. I'm willing to take the chance. This thing is reversible, isn't it?"

'There's a high probability we can reverse the process within a limited time, though you may have residual effects. There are no money-back guarantees, however."

'No, no, that's not what I meant," he said. He was thinking about it. Gabriella knew her stuff when it came to mummies, he was pretty sure, and she had seemed pretty sure about the Marc Antony specimen. And the treasure.

What the good Dr. Faruk had said about Antony's treasure made sense. The guy needed to finance world conquest, according to the story Mike remembered from the History Channel. Why would he surrender all that loot to Rome when he supposedly was representing Rome in the field? Cleopatra was rich. She didn't need the negotiable assets. He'd given her the library to keep her sweet.

So it stood to reason that there was treasure, and if he, Mike, resurrected Antony, he'd know where to find it. Oh well, what the hell. He was due for another change anyway. He hadn't had one for at least fifteen minutes or so.

'I have it on excellent authority that the specimen is authentic," he said in his best imitation of a college professor.

That seemed to satisfy the woman. She led him to a large chamber that resembled a deluxe hotel suite. Except that the bed was only double size.

She waved him to the bed. "Please make yourself comfortable, sir."

Mike nodded and lay back on the bed. "Wouldn't a lab table be more atmospheric?" he asked, wanting to make a more suggestive joke but not wanting to give the woman any ideas. She was built like a refrigerator and had a mustache like Groucho Marx.

She ignored his question and said with the warmth of a prerecorded instruction manual, "After the blending, you will need to sleep thirty-six hours or more for the process to begin."

'Kind of a honeymoon, huh?"

'If you like to think of it that way," she said, and came at him with what looked like a couple of pairs of eyelash curlers minus the handle. "Please don't be alarmed, but we must ensure that you don't blink during the transfer. These retractors may be somewhat annoying at first, but they won't be in place long enough to cause you serious discomfort. The actual procedure is very quick."

Mike didn't like that part. It reminded him of interrogation rooms he had heard of but so far been fortunate enough to escape. "Why is that necessary?"

'The process uses encoded light to transfer the DNA in the sample to your retinas. The retinas must remain fully accessible during the transfer."

'Can't I just wear goggles or something?"

'You will. But the splinting of your lids is also necessary. Do you wish to continue?"

Mike thought about it, about what Gabriella had said, about treasure, about how his life hadn't amounted to much so far and seemed to be getting seedier all the time. Getting up close and personal with one of history's greatest lovers and fighters seemed like a sound entertainment investment if nothing else. In his line of work, getting a bigger television wasn't real practical. Maybe he'd attract a better class of employers—or victims, with a famous Roman general on board. With the treasure, he could finance a war of his own. Or not. Probably not. He could at least retire and do the land mines to landscaping project.

'Okay," he said finally.

'You're very lucky you decided to do this when you did. Up until recently, the inventor of the process, Dr. Chimera, handled everything personally. The doctor was somewhat overly cautious, even though he—they—had been through the process as well. We're under new management now, and so the long screening process that used to be required of both the DNA and the host has been much abbreviated. We do think our clients are wise enough to know if the procedure is for them or not, without us dictating to them when and with whom they may blend. I do need to ask once more, however, before we begin, although you signed the waiver of responsibility already—are you sure you wish to go through with this? Have you any further concerns you wish me to address?"

'Just about the reversal thing. How long have I got?"

'It varies, I would think, but up until a certain time, it seems to be possible."

'Seems to be? Haven't you tried it?"

'Most people do not wish to reverse the process. The few who did were able to reverse it fully, but each case will be different. Have you specific doubts?"

'No. No, go ahead."

Mike settled back against the comfy pillows and the woman—Dr. B. Amalfi from her name tag—applied the retractors, which were cold but only pinched a little, then fitted the lenseless goggles over them. They reminded him of nippleless bras or crotchless panties, an interesting analogy which kept his imagination busy while the process was completed. It took about the same amount of time it might take to have a photograph taken.

He wasn't even aware when she removed the hardware from his eyes. First, he had the odd sensation that someone was watching him, then all of a sudden he started remembering things he knew he couldn't possibly have done. Finally, he fell into a deep sleep full of confused dreams. He started to awaken sometime later with an urgent craving more compelling than it had been in many years, "By the huge hairy balls of the bull, I need wine, and I need it now!"

CHAPTER 12

"Damn, I can see you're going to be a lot of help," Mike

said. "No wine. We've been sober for twenty years, man, and we're going to stay that way."

'I outrank you," Marc Antony told him. "I am a general, and you are nothing but a mercenary—like those Gauls. I will have wine, and I will have it now or I'll have you killed."

'That would be a big problem for you," Mike told him. "Where do you think you are exactly and how do you think you got here?"

He felt the confusion of the other man, the memory of loss, pain, the last touch of his lover's hand. The despair at the desertion of his god and at the knowledge that he himself was considered a deserter from his own country.

'Yeah, yeah," Mike said. "So you died, big deal. Tell me about that treasure."

'What treasure?" Antony asked, but Mike could feel him holding back.

"You know what treasure. Look, I think you'd better assess your situation here. Look down. Look at the body you're in. It's all me,

all the time. If you get drunk, I get drunk, and I'm not going to do that, so just forget it. Getting drunk in my line of work will get us killed."

'In my line of work, getting killed was what you expected. Getting drunk was a way to enjoy life while it lasted."

"Yeah, well, I've found it lasts longer if you do it sober."

"Maybe it just seems longer?"

"You're in denial."

"I don't believe so, no. Unless this is a very large boat we're in here."

'Don't get cute. I have a T-shirt with that joke. I knew it was old, but I didn't know it was as old as you are. Anyway, what I'm trying to tell you is that anything I do, you do, and vice versa, so you may as well clue me in about the treasure, Cleopatra, and all that stuff. Like I said before, if you get rich, I get rich. If I get laid, you get laid. If I bleed, you …"

'Yes, no need to demonstrate," Marc Antony said much more dryly than he liked. "Is this sorcery?"

'Not exactly," Mike said. As he struggled to explain it, the explanation, both the part Mike deliberately clarified and the rest of it, became clear to Marc Antony. All but the bits that were so modern he had no reference for them. Mike's memories tried to make up the deficit and nearly succeeded.

"So Cleopatra is dead, and you found my essence in a lock of hair she had saved?"

"Pretty much."

"You have doubts about my essence or doubts that Cleopatra is

"Well, she was dead, and most of her is still dead, but I think maybe something happened to her like happened to you and me. The Egyptian librarian, Gabriella, seemed to know a lot more about you and Cleopatra than just book learning."

The entire internal dialogue took place in the first few

moments after Mike awakened with his new buddy on board.

Dr. B. Amain reentered the room and looked inquisitively at him. "We've been monitoring your external responses. How do you feel?"

'I, for one, think I need a meeting," Mike said. "I don't suppose there's a support group for blended people, is there?"

She said, "No, though our predecessor planned to start one."

'It'd be a good idea. Thing is, you need to build trust. These old-timers come aboard, they got a lot of issues. First, they're not who they used to be. Second, they didn't expect to be anybody, and third, they may not be who they were cracked up to be in the first place. I think this guy I have with me here has some serious trust problems."

Inside of him, Marc Antony barked a short laugh. Aloud he said, "We're both trained to kill people. My Caesar was murdered by most of the rest of my government. I believe we have good reason not to trust."

'Like I said," Mike told Amalfi, "issues."

She smiled, white teeth in a surprisingly friendly display that made her mustache seem insignificant beside the game host smile that rendered her actually somewhat attractive. What did the B stand for, he wondered? Betty? Becky? Babs? Bambi?

'If you are having doubts, Mr. Kronos, perhaps you would like to speak with one who has undergone the process and had it reversed? The lady is staying here with us now."

'Yeah. That might be a good idea."

'I'll find out if the Contessa will see you."

The laws of hospitality could be extremely inconvenient at times, Abdul Mohammed reflected. He had henchmen and a minivan to replace, a mummy in the room once occupied by Selim, one of the men who had been killed in the explosion of the minivan. He also needed to launch the next mission and, neither last nor least, find that loose cannon of a mercenary. The man's body should have been found after the bombing of the library. Neither the bombing nor the body materialized. This was a matter of the utmost concern to Abdul Mohammed, who had standards to maintain and an example to set if he was to succeed in his goals.

However, at present he was forced to listen politely to someone else's setbacks.

Amir Marid ibn Yasin Abu Kadar was a good customer, a patron of Abdul Mohammed's cause, and an unhappy man.

He sat on the screened balcony of Abdul Mohammed's home in the heart of Alexandria. The balcony was quiet and relatively private. The house was on the water side of the Corniche, and the balcony faced away from the noise of the street and toward the sea. The refreshing salt breeze did little to cool the choler of the amir, who sat sipping a soft drink and complaining bitterly. "I come to you, my friend, as one head of a household to another. My father indulged my younger brother, sending him to the West for his education. It had disastrous results for our family. Hakim spoiled his wife and daughter. He sent the girl to France to study. Fortunately, she is a rather stupid girl and came home before long. But she learned bad habits while she was there. When my brother was killed in an auto accident, I became the guardian of my brother's wife and children. This girl has been constant trouble to me. I sought to marry her to the son of one of my wife's sisters, but she found excuses to delay the marriage. Then we learned she was carrying on a flirtation—possibly an affair—with our chauffeur. I spoke to her mother about the poor upbringing she had given this girl, but before I could deal with the girl, she disappeared. The mother warned her, for which, of course, she received the punishment due her for such behavior.

'I have been searching for my poor misguided niece for a week. Meanwhile, I have moved her mother from my brother's home into my own, where my wife and mother can keep an eye on her. They informed me at once when my slut of a niece called her mother. I have the caller ID and traced the number to the island villa of a rich Greek woman. I forced the girl's mother to tell Mariam she must return at once and sent a helicopter for her."

'It sounds as if it ended well, my friend," Abdul Mohammed said soothingly.

'I suppose so, but I could not understand how Mariam eluded me for so long. I finally was able to beat it out of her when she returned. It seems the Greek woman has a network of accomplices, including an Egyptian woman Mariam understood to be a relative. The Egyptian woman met Mariam and spirited her away to the island, where she would be taken to Europe for who knows what immoral purposes. I suspect that these women are brothel keepers and slave dealers. Naturally, I sought to avenge my honor upon them and their accomplices. Those who helped Mariam escape my home have been appropriately dealt with, and I sent back some of my security force to capture the Greek woman while I led a party here to find and punish the Egyptian."

'Commendable zeal on your part, illustrious friend," Abdul Mohammed told him.

'But the woman lives in a fortified house full of armed fighters. Your police seem to be in league with her because they arrived before we could subdue the resistance. My nephew stayed behind, thinking to pick the woman off as she left the compound. When he did not return after a day,

I sent someone to look for him. They found him dead, his neck broken."

'My deepest condolences," Abdul Mohammed said with a small bow. "May Allah receive him in paradise."

'Indeed. But meanwhile, the Egyptian woman remains at large, free to corrupt other sheltered girls and dishonor their families. I am a busy man, Abdul Mohammed. I have many matters to attend to at home and cannot stay here indefinitely to finish what I have begun. Therefore, I ask for your assistance in this matter of disposing of the Egyptian woman in a suitably exemplary fashion. My people in Greece have orders to do likewise with her confederate."

'I am always your humble servant, gracious friend, but alas, I find myself shorthanded at the moment." He explained about the aborted mission and the explosion, the treachery from within his own ranks.

The amir was unmoved. "As I explained, it is a matter of family honor."

'Of course, of course. I meant only that a direct assault on the woman's stronghold would be difficult in my present situation. However, an indirect approach…"

'I knew I could count on you," the amir said.

Cleopatra's narrative:

Soon after I experienced the strangulation of my newly embodied soul-twin, I also experienced a sense of relief and release. She was safe, though I did not know the particulars in the same way that I had known her danger. However, by the time I was certain that she was safe, Leda had telephoned Gabriella Faruk and received answers that deepened her worry for her friend.

Then she tried the private cell phone number of Gretchen Wolfe, whose messenger reported that the user was unavailable but invited us to leave a voice message. This Leda did, with a frown at the instrument in her hand.

She turned to Andrew. "Look, I realize we just met, and you don't know me well, but your station wants to produce this program and—well, I need to borrow some money. I have to get back to Egypt and see what's going on with Gabriella. Gretchen Wolfe might be able to help, if I can reach her, but so far I can't."

'I can do better than loan you the money," Andrew replied stoutly. "Let's return to the hotel and meet with Ro and Iris again. I think we can mount a preproduction expedition that will pay your way and provide you, and Dr. Faruk if need be, with a cover and the dubious protection of safety in numbers."

'Ah," I said with relief, "we have another protector."

'Alright," Leda replied. "And who's going to protect him if whoever's been after Gabriella comes for us? Whole boatloads of tourists have been wiped out by terrorists along the Nile. There's always the tourist police, of course, but what if someone is paying them? Andy is a good target for ransom."

'True," I admitted, but nonetheless, it felt good to be accompanied by a man who commanded wealth and influence, if not, alas, an army.

There followed two days of miracles, in which Andrew caused to appear a number of scrying glasses that greatly resembled the television set at Rusti's. However, unlike the television, which impersonally performed certain plays on certain stations without regard for the viewer, these marvelous items allowed Andrew and indeed, ourselves, to speak with various individuals whose faces appeared in the glass. Sometimes many appeared at once, sometimes fewer, sometimes only one. But the result was that within that two-day period, Andrew purchased a boat for our journey, assisted Ro in rounding up videographers, photographers, and experts of various sorts, as well as actresses and actors to portray Iras, Charmion, Antony, Octavian, my priests, and myself in a reenactment of my death. All of these people were to accompany us on our journey, although the main portion of the filming would not take place until later, Andrew said. All he spoke to seemed amazed and bewildered at his haste.

'I didn't think you could possibly get it together this fast," Leda said. "From what I've heard, TV productions, especially new ones, can be kind of glacial."

Andrew shrugged. "Most of the delays are about money, getting the money, keeping the money, paying the money. When it's the moneyman who wants things to happen, they can, as you see, happen pretty quickly."

Various assistants now crowded the hotel suite armed with their own telephones so that the chatter sounded like my palace at festival time. Food came and went, airplane reservations were made for people in all parts of the world, authorities were notified.

Leda was on the telephone to Rusti, whom she called as soon as we returned to the hotel and who, by the end of day two, had finally succeeded in repacking our bags and delivering them to the hotel. Leda also called her brother Rudy, who brought his wife Dana and their children to the suite to bid her farewell. She was not so successful at reaching Gretchen Wolfe, within whom resided her father's ba. Nor did she hear anything further from Gabriella. For my part, I watched and listened within myself for any indication from my soul-twin as to the whereabouts or state of well-being of her hostess and herself.

The Italian jail cell was a miserable hole in a rather grand historic building in the center of Palermo. The cots were cement, the toilet a hole in the floor, and two other inmates had been looking at Wilhelm as if they wanted to eat him until they saw Gretchen. She looked much tastier to them, or so they eloquently enthused in gutter Italian and, just so she didn't miss the point, with graphic hand gestures.

'Basta!" the constable said, running his nightstick against the bars.

'Those guys are no class act," Duke said, "but at hast they look happy to see us. What's wrong with Wilhelm?"

His inner question was outwardly expressed by Gretchen at the same moment. "What is wrong with him?" she demanded of the constable.

Wilhelm, clad in the filthy remnants of his silk shirt and the even filthier slacks to one of his designer suits, sat on a bunk with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. He looked up dully at the clamor of his cellmates, but his eyes weren't focused. Both Duke, from his police work, and Gretchen, from her medical practice, recognized that he was still suffering from the effects of some sort of drug. "Wilhelm, liebchen," Gretchen said as softly as possible, considering the alarm building within her. "I am here, your Gretchen. Speak to me."

This set up an even ruder stream of verbal filth from the cellmates.

Gretchen turned to the constable. "Out. You will bring him out of there, now. The Interpol inspector did not say he was incarcerated, or that he has been drugged. But I am a doctor, and this, my husband, is an important man."

'Si, signora, si," the constable said placatingly. Though she had not been using it much, Gretchen did speak passable Italian, and the constable explained that Signor Wolfe had been detained by a patrol officer for his own protection after being found staggering drunkenly down a street in a dangerous area of the city.

As he explained, he unlocked the cell and used his nightstick to restrain the other prisoners as Gretchen entered, knelt in front of Wilhelm, and spoke in her kind, firm doctor voice as she examined his pupillary response and reflexes.

'You can walk, liebchen, ja?"

He nodded, and she put one of his arms around her shoulder and slipped one of her arms around his waist while holding on to his limp hand with her own. She registered two things. His wedding ring was missing, and he smelled as if he had never washed in his life.

Once they were outside the cell and it had been locked behind them, the constable assisted. There was paperwork to do, but much as it pained Duke to see it, a healthy contribution to the constable's personal branch of the policeman's benevolent fund rendered the formalities unnecessary. The constable helped Gretchen load Wilhelm into the little sports car she had acquired for the trip, and when they reached their hotel, the doorman and bellman helped her get him to the room. She was very strong, but she wasn't very large, and her husband outweighed her by at least seventy-five pounds.

For a tip large enough to let him buy his own hotel, the bellman helped disrobe Wilhelm and sat him on a chair in the shower. Once the bellman left, Gretchen disrobed and stepped into the shower, too, turning on the water and washing both herself and her husband, rubbing up such a brisk froth of soap bubbles and scrubbing both of them so hard that Duke almost failed to find anything erotic about it. He very carefully did not share his thoughts with Gretchen at that time. It was literally as much as his soul was worth. Gretchen had come a long way, but for a doctor, she could still be a little prissy.

However, Duke was alarmed that Wilhelm, although he seemed to be coming to under the influence of the soap and hot water, followed by the cold rinse Gretchen drenched them with at the end—some masochistic remnant of the Norse side of her heritage, no doubt—registered almost no response to his naked and slippery wife. A damned shame in Duke's opinion. Gretchen was a good-looking woman with a beautiful body she had exerted an uncommon amount of time, energy, and money to acquire and maintain. She and Wilhelm didn't have all that many chances to shower together. What the hell was wrong with the man anyway?

She grabbed the towels and after hurriedly patting most of the damp off herself and wrapping the towel around her hair, rubbed Wilhelm down to the next layer of epidermis, so that his naturally fair skin, no longer artificially tanned as it had been the last time Duke saw him, glowed red under her ministrations. Her bare feet slapped against the cool floor, leaving dark steamy tracks as she padded to the door, grabbing the fluffy white terry robes from it. Slipping one around herself and knotting the tie firmly, she bundled Wilhelm into one, too. Fortunately, he was coming to a little by then and tried to help. Still, they slipped a couple of times, once getting him out of the shower and once on the floor as their wet feet hit the tiles, and Gretchen buckled under his weight.

Between her determination and Wilhelm's increasing cooperation, they made it to the bed, where they collapsed, still entwined. Whereupon Wilhelm fell back into a fairly natural sleep, and Gretchen allowed herself a few tears while she resolutely kept vigil.

'I want to know something," Duke said, figuring the tricky potentially sexy bits were past enough that he could safely remind her of his presence again.

'/ want to know many things," Gretchen replied, still angry at finding her husband in such a state.

' Yeah, well, me, too. But what I most want to know is how they knew at the station that Wilhelm was him. Right now he doesn't look much like the picture we gave the police, and he doesn't have his ring or his wallet, from what I could tell while we were lugging

him around. With no ID, in the shape he was in, he could have rotted in there forever."

'This is very easy," Gretchen said. Reaching into the trash, she extracted the filthy pair of slacks and turned the band up, running her clean finger lightly over a raised cloth tag clearly printed with the name Wilhelm Wolfe.

'You sew his name inside his clothes like he was going to camp or something?" Duke asked incredulously.

'/ am doing this since first we are married, ja. My mama did this for my papa and my brother and me so I do the same for Wilhelm. No one provided such labels for your clothes when you were alive?"

'Not since my mom did it when I went to boot camp," Duke said. "And none of my wives ever did it. I mean, why would they?"

Gretchen tossed the pants back into the trash and nodded at her snoring husband. "For this reason. Here," she said.

'Okay, point taken."

She picked up the phone and called Armani in Rome, telling them to send a courier with clothing in Wilhelm's measurements, which they had in their files. She realized when she finished that since the Interpol detective brought her to Palermo, she had neglected to charge her cell phone. This she did, and got dressed to await the arrival of the Armani courier.

At some point she fell asleep, and was awakened by the musical signal from her phone, which played "Edelweiss" instead of ringing. Instantly she was alert, and snatched it up. "Ja?" she said in German. "This is Frau Doktor Wolfe speaking. What is it?"

'Gretchen! It's Leda. I'm so glad to finally reach you. Where are you? Did you find Wolfie—I mean, Wilhelm?"

'He is here beside me, Leda!"

'That's great. Listen, I'm coming back over to Egypt with a TV crew. Andy—I mean, Sir Andrew McCallum, is a friend of Wilhelm's and on the Helix board. He'd like to consult with Wilhelm on this, too."

'You are arriving when?"

'We're flying nonstop to Alex, so we'll meet you there tomorrow at about two. Okay? Oops, 'scuse me. Gotta run. Love you, Dad, Gretchen."

'Bye, kid," Duke said to a dial tone.

CHAPTER 13

Having already landed in Delhi, Chimera considered traveling on to Dharmsala to meet the lama. But if the monks had not been entirely honest about their destination, the scientist wondered if they were telling the truth about other matters. While pondering whether to continue by ground transport to the Himalayan area that had become Tibet in exile or to board another plane headed back to Athens or to the United States, Chimera fingered the pendant worn ever since their blending. The back came away in the scientist's fingers. Worried lest the tiny storage unit with the information and blueprints fall out, Chimera examined the pendant, the clothing worn at the moment, and the surrounding area. The chip was gone, and with it all of the highly secret information it had contained.

No, Chimera decided, the monks decidedly were not what they seemed.

And, alas, the pleasurable part of the trip would need to be delayed now while Chimera reported the extent of the loss to Helix and retrieved the lost data from them. The scientist needed it as a basis for future work.

First, however, Wolfe should be told of the theft. Chimera understood Wolfe's attitude toward the project but could not say as much for the current administration. However, dialing Wolfe's number yielded a recording saying that it was out of order. So Chimera next tried Gretchen Wolfe's number.

Gretchen was very mysterious but said that she and Wilhelm would be on their way to Alexandria as soon as her husband was able to travel, probably the next day. She urged Chimera to join them.

Finally, Chimera found a phone and dialed the number of the Padma Lama's monastery. The monk who answered was very surprised to learn that the monastery in which he was standing had been destroyed by an avalanche.

Chimera caught the next plane to Athens and on to Alexandria.

"Come on, man, this is cool. Think of it like we're in theultimate buddy movie together." Mike said this aloud to Marc Antony after the latter finished complaining about coming down in the world to a tee totaling, cross-worshiping soldier whose loyalty was sold to the highest bidder. Mike was trying to be conciliatory, a fairly unusual role for him.

Mike's image of a buddy movie confused Marc Antony further. The general failed to understand the full meaning of images involving two men on horses plunging over a cliff, two women in a car plunging over a cliff, a black man and a white man blowing things up and escaping explosions caused by others, an Asian man and a white man doing something similar, and other unconventional pairings engaging in other stimulating but seemingly meaningless activities. Possibly these were like the Centurion lovers who would fight to the death for each other, but somehow Marc didn't quite believe it.

'Okay, forget the buddy movie," Mike said, sensing his confusion.

By that time they were in the little courtyard at the villa where the Contessa Dumont was lodged. The Contessa, a woman whose slender elegance was edged with fragility, waved at him to sit in the white iron chair opposite her own, across the green-striped-umbrella-shaded table.

She extended her hand. Mike would have reached for it but found himself giving her a short, almost Japanese bow instead. She smiled. "Ah yes, your new guest must not be in the habit of shaking ladies' hands. I am Virginie Dumont, but please call me Ginia. I feel we are destined to be friends."

'Are we?" Mike asked. He was a little puzzled. Maybe he had come up in the world already by blending with the Roman general. Contessas did not normally seek him out as a social equal.

'I believe so. You have already met my niece, Gabriella, before your blending. It was I who warned her of the attack on her villa. In fact, that is why I have come to stay on Kefalos for a time. My own home was besieged by black-masked men angry over my choice of houseguests. Gabriella spoke to me of you when she called me back after her own attackers had fled. She said you saved her life twice in one day. And this, I understand, was before your blending. I very much hope that we shall be friends, therefore. My niece is very precious to me. And yet"—she smiled and waved him to the other chair—"I betrayed her most cruelly during my own blending with Pandora Blades. Which brings us to your present state, does it not?"

Mike nodded. As a support group, this was a little too intimate for his taste. "Doc Amain says that you got yourself unblended. Was it because of what happened between you and your niece when you had whatsemame on board?"

'That was part of it. I—we—behaved very badly and because of certain aspects of Pandora's personality were vulnerable to unscrupulous people I would normally have guarded against. In her own time, among her own associates, she was brilliant, tragic, passionately devoted to art and her love. But blended with me, shall we say, she lost the focus that made her great? Hers was an obsessive personality, and she fastened on another magnetic man to worship, one even less worthy than her original lover. I had hoped that by blending with her, I would acquire some of that fire and creative genius I have always longed for, and she might acquire some peace, a lesser pain than that she suffered during her brief life, and could use my wealth to fully realize her potential. Obviously, the combination didn't work that way. And so we parted."

'Did she mind? I mean, she'd be dead again, right?" Mike asked. Although the newly conscious part of him that belonged to Marc Antony stayed silent, it was alert and paying close attention.

'I'm not sure. I think perhaps she felt she would be in total control, and I would be the one banished, but it didn't work out that way. Her code was wiped from my brain, is how I think Chimera phrased it. I suppose someone else could blend with her if they wished, but I would personally advise them against it."

"Hah! You see how it works, General, sir? I can get rid of you, but you can't do without me."

'I did not ask to be here," Marc Antony reminded him. "Death does not frighten me. I fell on my own sword as honor demanded when the time came."

'Or when you thought it came. But you goofed. Don't write this life off too quickly until you see what it has to offer, ^.specially with the help of that treasure of yours—ours."

Ginia continued, "Would it be too intrusive of me to ask with whom you blended?"

'Would it be real rude of me to decline to answer right now, ma'am?" Mike asked. "I'd sort of like to get used to

the whole thing and to this—uh—person—before I talk about it too much. I appreciate you sharing your experiences with me, though." On impulse he added, "You know, I got the impression that maybe your niece had been blended herself."

'I hope you won't think me rude if I decline to answer that, Mr. Kronos."

Mike blinked for a moment, then remembered he was known there by Galen's name.

'Such information should be disclosed only by the party involved," Ginia continued.

'That makes sense," he said. "I just wondered, since she seems to have some pretty powerful enemies for a librarian."

'Gabriella is far more than a librarian, Mr. Kronos. She is the head of the antiquities department for the Biblioteca Alexandrina and one of the discoverers of the tomb of the great Queen Cleopatra. At present, she is the highest-ranking woman archaeologist in Egypt."

'I'm impressed, but I can't see why someone would send a private army after her. Especially when the library had just been looted."

'We are involved in a—charity—shall we say, that, while it helps many deserving individuals, apparently angers others, those who have a vested interest in oppressing the— people—we assist. At times our work can be rather thankless. Recently we attempted to help someone who had a change of heart and returned to the situation from which we were trying to extract her."

'It was a woman? What do you do? Run some kind of international women's shelter?" He was being facetious and was a little surprised to see dismay wash over the contessa's face.

She quickly hid it with a smile and a brief nod. "How perceptive you are. It is something like that, yes. But we do not wish it to be generally known. I'm sure, having been at Gabriella's during the invasion of those who did not appreciate her intervention, you can understand why."

'Yeah, I can see where in this part of the world it wouldn't be a popular cause. But I say good for you, lady." He said this so heartily she again appeared startled. Well, he was glad his ex and daughter had had a shelter to go to when he went ballistic. He was glad now, anyway. "Speaking of invasions, excuse me, but I need to be getting back to Egypt and seeing a man about a mummy."

By the time the police had finished questioning Gabriella, she felt she would rather have continued dealing with the terrorists. The questions were relentless, interminable, and repetitive, the same ones asked over and over again as if to trip her up. They seemed to think, despite the courtesy they accorded her because of her high position (unnatural for a woman), that she had somehow had something to do with the vandalization of the library. They left and returned no fewer than four times during the day, apparently hoping to trap her into contradicting her own story. She was so weary that she feared she would do so through misspeaking rather than the lies they would assume she was telling. In between she had tried to work, tried to record the damage done, tried to translate a bit more of the manuscripts, but now it was once more long after midnight and into the morning of the following day, and still she had not been to bed. Nor, in fact, was she sure where she would be making her bed that night.

About the time the police finally left her alone, she received the first telephone call. One word: "Whore." In Arabic, but pronounced with malicious relish.

Others followed for the next three hours. Heavy breathing mostly, whispered threats and obscenities. She stopped answering the phone.

As the midday break came, she packed up her purse and pockets with the maps, a compass, a small hatchet and collapsible shovel, a headband with a miner's light attached to it as well as an extra handheld flashlight with extra batteries, candles, and a gas clicker to back those up, a bottle of water, and a Snickers. She also took a sweater and a fold-up rain slicker. And her expandable clear plastic galoshes.

'A clever enemy would kill us for the maps alone," Cleopatra observed. "They would be invaluable in carrying out clandestine plots. Is your cousin meeting us outside?"

"No, he's still helping the family evacuate the compound."

"Then what is to keep our enemies from abducting us as we leave the building?"

'They will not see us leave the building because we will leave from beneath it. This complex was built on the site of your great library—or at least one of the annexes. Naturally, an institution with the reverence for the past this one has did not destroy the site upon which it is built. The foundations were laid to surround it. It still lies below this level."

"I'm glad to hear that. Are people studying it?"

'No, that happened before this was built. But it's been preserved for future study. One of the less well known discoveries was the cistern that lay beneath it—access was discovered by some workmen, but since it was just another cistern, little attention was paid to it at the time. In the late twentieth and early part of this century, Isabelle Hairy made an exhaustive study of the cisterns either found or rumored to exist. After she departed, the maps she made were mislaid, and no one else took much interest. The emphasis has been on the exploration in the harbor. My family has had a long-standing interest in the city's underworld, however. Our home is on the site of an older compound with its own cistern."

Carrying on the internal dialogue, Gabriella checked the hallway, then opened a narrow door that seemed to lead to a broom closet. However, it contained a rather plain inner sarcophagus, which was locked. Gabriella unlocked it and opened it. Inside it was hollow and led to a flight of stairs. "One of my predecessors had an overdeveloped sense of drama," she explained. "He was also addicted to very bad movies from the 1940s."

'Yes?" Cleopatra was puzzled.

"About mummies and the tombs on their curses and how they came back to life. They were very silly horror films."

"I see nothing horrible about having been a mummy, then coming back to life. It's what we were all promised would happen someday."

"Yes, well. When we have the time we will view some of them, and you'll understand why this doorway is a bit of a joke."

The staircase leading down was industrial metal formed into an elongated spiral. At one point it pierced a plywood ceiling and continued to the stone beneath. Gabriella kept her flashlight in motion, on the lookout for snakes or scorpions or even large stones that might trip her up. Once she stepped off the last stair, she made her way to a corner of the vast area that had once contained the wisdom of the known world. A slab of stone was set with a metal ring. Gabriella hauled on this until she managed to move the stone aside. Her flashlight beam caught the cheerful yellow of a painted metal ladder's top. The rest of the ladder was lost in darkness.

Fitting the band with the miner's light onto her head, she switched on the light, took a deep breath, turned sideways, and stepped cautiously down onto the top rung. It wobbled but held. Before each step she inclined her head to light the way.

'You are not afraid to do this alone?" Cleopatra asked.

"It's part of how I make my living, and, besides, I'm not alone. Now I have you. Actually, I've never minded tunnels and caves. Our cistern has a hole high in the upper part of the wall. It connects not to the next house, because in the old days there were no other houses beyond ours. Instead, it was apparently dug by grave robbers as a way to escape undetected from the necropolis. My cousins explored that and many of the other cisterns and necropolis beneath thecity when they were youngsters. Back when we had an ancestor who was a king—not a direct ancestor, mind you, but with the same family name—he was deposed by a revolutionary government. Our family hid in the cisterns and necropolis until they knew how they might fare under the new regime, long before that, one of the early saints was said to have hidden out in them, also using the connections the thieves made among the systems. In places they're blocked, but my cousins and I have done some extracurricular exploration and excavations to make routes down here. Only I'm not very sure about this one. According to Hairy, it is part of the great grid that connected with the mideastern branch of the Canopic Channel."

"That is quite true. We should be able to follow the grid all the way to the southernmost wall of the city."

"The walls aren't there anymore, but neither, I suspect, is most of the grid. Parts of it were blocked off and reinforced to act as air raid shelters, and parts of it were blocked with silt and debris from natural cave-ins. The original channels have been destroyed as the city was built. But some of this still connects to the storm drains we use during monsoon season."

'What of the floods?" Cleopatra asked. "What time of the year is it? We might drown!"

'Oh, we have to discuss that yet. The Nile no longer floods. A great dam has been built—more than one actually, far upstream, where it makes an enormous lake. Many of the ancient sacred temples you knew and most of Nubia now lie underwater."