The Alexander Cipher Page 0,90

everyone else. You’re her last hope.”

Nicolas stood and backed away. Talk of disease was always uncomfortable to him. The books Ibrahim had collected for Gaille were perched on the corner of his desk. He picked one up and flipped idly through the pages.

“I suppose I can ask around,” Ibrahim was saying. “But I don’t know anyone at the hospital.”

“I beg you. You must do something.”

The book was filled with black-and-white sketches. Nicolas turned to one of a hill and a lake called Bir al-Hammam. There was something strangely familiar about it. He put the book down and picked up another. It, too, had a picture of Bir al-Hammam, a photograph this time. He stared and stared at it, and finally he realized why the images were familiar, and a great orgasmic shudder ran through him.

“Nicolas? Nicolas?” asked Ibrahim anxiously. “Are you all right?”

Nicolas shook himself back to his senses. Ibrahim was looking strangely at him. He smiled and said, “Forgive me. Miles away, that’s all.” He looked around to see that Mohammed had gone. “Where’s your friend?” he asked.

“He had to leave,” said Ibrahim. “His wife’s in a dreadful state, apparently. I promised to do what I could. But what can I do? That poor girl!”

Nicolas frowned thoughtfully. “If I could help her, you’d be grateful, yes?”

“Of course,” said Ibrahim. “But I really—”

“Good,” said Nicolas, tucking Gaille’s books under his arm. “Then come with me. Let’s see what we can arrange.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

THE ORACLE OF AMMON proved to be a hump of rock some four kilometers out of Siwa Town. Despite its onetime fame, there was no parking lot, no concession stand, and no entry charge. When Gaille, Elena, and their guides arrived early the next morning, they were alone except for a wizened old man sitting against a wall opposite the entrance, holding out a trembling hand in hope of alms. Gaille reached for her purse. “You’ll only encourage them,” warned Elena. Gaille hesitated, then gave him a banknote anyway. He smiled gratefully.

Two young girls with plaited waist-length black hair came forward, hoping to sell them some of the homemade bracelets around their wrists. Zayn scowled at them and they ran away giggling.

Gaille had been a little uncertain at first of Mustafa and Zayn, but she quickly warmed to them. Their knowledge of Siwa was impressive. And there was something touching about their friendship: an ancient tradition of homosexual marriage was dying hard in Siwa; local song and poetry still celebrated such close relationships, and she couldn’t help but wonder.

Mustafa was big, with bark-rough skin darkened by sun as much as genetics, to judge from the paler bands around his neck and beneath his watchband. He was absurdly fit and nimble despite smoking incessantly. He had a special relationship with his ancient and temperamental truck. No gauges or dials worked anymore, and every frill was long gone, from the ball of the gearshift to the rubber of the pedals and the carpet beneath, but he could still make it run.

Zayn was a whip of a man, no more than forty, though his hair and beard were streaked with silver. While Mustafa drove, Zayn obsessively oiled and polished a thin-bladed ivory-handled knife that he kept folded beneath his robes. Each time he put it away, the slick and spotless blade would scrape against the sheath, so that instantly it needed cleaning again, and he’d draw it back out and examine it and mutter Siwan obscenities.

A short but steep flight of steps led up beneath a lintel into the main body of the oracle, a skeleton of walls like a wooden ship that had rotted in estuary mud and later dried out. Gaille felt a moment’s quiet awe as she stood there. There weren’t many places in the world where you could be certain that Alexander himself had once occupied that exact space, but this was one of them. The oracle had been esteemed throughout the Mediterranean during Alexander’s time—a rival to Delphi, perhaps even its superior. Legend had it that Heracles had visited, and Alexander had claimed Heracles as his direct ancestor. Perseus was reputed to have made the trek, too, and Perseus had been associated with the Persian Empire, which Alexander intended to make his own. Cimon, an Athenian general, had famously sent a deputation to Siwa to ask whether his siege of Cyprus would succeed. The oracle had refused to answer, except to say that the person who asked the question was already with him. And when his emissaries