The Alexander Cipher Page 0,10

not yours. This site is mine. If one word of this gets out, you’ll answer to me. Understand?” He faced them down, one by one, until they broke and stalked away. He watched them uneasily. Entrusting secrets to such men was like entrusting water to a sieve. Alexandria’s slums writhed with villains who would cut twenty throats on the mere rumor of such a prize. But he wasn’t going to back down because of that. Though he had striven to be good all his life, since Layla had fallen ill, he cared only for making her better. The question was how to turn this find to that end. Looting it was impractical. For all Ahmed’s optimism, there wasn’t enough to go around; and if he tried to cut out the others, they would sneak on him to his bosses, maybe even to the police, and that would go hard for him. As site manager, he was legally bound to report this find to the Supreme Council for Antiquities. If they learned he had kept it quiet, he’d lose his job, his license to operate, and almost certainly his liberty, too. He couldn’t risk that. His salary was pitiful, but it was all that stood between Layla and the abyss.

The solution, when it finally came to him, was so simple that he couldn’t believe he hadn’t thought of it at once.

“EXCUSE ME. You please will help me with this?”

Knox looked up to see Roland Hinz holding up his huge black wet suit. “Of course,” he smiled. “Forgive me. I was miles away.”

He stood behind the big German to make sure he didn’t tumble as he tried to pull on the neoprene leggings—that wouldn’t go down well. Roland was a Stuttgart banker considering investing in Hassan’s latest Sinai venture. Today’s outing was largely in his honor, and he was making the most of it, too, giggly with champagne, more than a little coked, getting on everyone’s nerves. In truth, he shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near the water, but Hassan paid well to have the rules stretched. And not just rules. Getting Roland into his wet suit was like trying to stuff a duvet into its cover: he kept plopping out in unexpected places. Roland found this intensely funny, but then, he found everything funny and seemed to think people found him charming. He tripped over his own feet and laughed hysterically as he and Knox spilled inelegantly onto the deck, then looked around at the other guests as though expecting rapturous applause.

With a strained smile, Knox helped him back up, then knelt down to pull on his booties for him. He had bloated, pinkish-yellow feet with dirt caked between his toes, which looked as though he hadn’t washed between them for years. Knox distracted himself with thoughts of the quest he and Rick had embarked on. The afternoon when he’d shared his ideas about Alexander’s catafalque had been just the beginning, though the big Australian’s initial euphoria hadn’t lasted long. “So this procession came through Sinai, did it?” he had asked.

“No,” said Knox. “Not according to any of our sources.”

“Oh, ballocks, mate,” protested Rick, sitting back in his chair. “You had me all excited for a minute.”

“You want me to tell you what we know?”

“Sure,” he said, still annoyed. “Why not?”

“Okay,” said Knox. “The first thing you need to understand is that our sources are unreliable. We don’t have any eyewitness accounts of Alexander’s life or campaigns. Everything we have, we have from later historians citing earlier ones—second-, third-, even fourthhand accounts.”

“Chinese whispers,” suggested Rick.

“Exactly, but it’s even worse than that. When Alexander’s empire split up, each of the various factions wanted to paint themselves in the best light, and all the others in the worst, so there was a lot of propaganda written. Then the Romans came along, and while the Caesars worshipped Alexander, the Republicans loathed him. Historians were selective in their stories, depending on which camp they belonged to. One way or another, most of what we have is very badly slanted. Working out the truth is a nightmare.”

“Duly noted.”

“But we’re pretty sure that the catafalque traveled along the Euphrates from Babylon to Opis, then northwest along the Tigris. A magnificent procession, as you can imagine. People trekked hundreds of miles just to see it. And, sometime in 322 or 321 BC, it reached Syria. After that, it’s hard to know. Bear in mind that we’re talking about two things here. The first is Alexander’s embalmed body, lying in