Yet he had wanted to reach out and shake her, make her look at him as she had those first few days in Paris, cling to him as she had at Vasaro before she had turned to ice. He wanted only to help her, and she was closing him out, dammit.
He was lying to himself. That wasn’t all he wanted. His motives in trying to shake her out of this cocoon were not nearly as pure as he was trying to convince himself. His body didn’t give a damn about Caitlin’s emotional problems; it wanted only to assuage its own.
The jeep crested the rise and they looked down on the tiny village of Tamkalo. It lay in the valley surrounded by the majestic mountains they’d just driven through. Puffs of white steam spewed from at least twenty hot springs in and around the village. A large, flat-roofed sod hut squatted beside a great trough gouging through the earth at the far end of the village. The house stood out because the other gray-brown huts resembled sod tepees of uniform size marching one after the other across the white-gray sandy earth.
“Dieu, I’ve never seen anything like this,” Caitlin said as she stuffed the pages of the translation back into the envelope and sat up straighter on her seat. “People actually live in those queer houses?”
“Presumably. However, I don’t see anyone.” Alex stopped the jeep and leaned his elbows on the steering wheel. “It looks deserted.”
Caitlin could see no sign of life in the village below her. No people. No livestock. No vehicles. “A ghost town. Didn’t Monsieur Moduhl mention—” She answered her own question. “But he couldn’t have known if he hadn’t been here for five years.”
Alex nodded grimly. “So much for calling Kemal every day. The village must have died when the archeological team pulled out.”
“Look at that earth. They couldn’t have managed to eke out much of a living before the team came.”
“It must be loaded with minerals brought to the surface by the springs.”
“Instead of trying to attract tourists with a museum, they should have made this a health spa. I’ve never seen so many hot springs in one place.” Caitlin shivered as she jumped out of the jeep and started down the street, her boots striking up puffs of dust with each step. “Or maybe we can locate that museum. That looks like the dig over there to the west. Didn’t Monsieur Moduhl mention it was by the—”
A bullet whistled by Caitlin’s head!
Caitlin instinctively fell to her knees. She could hear the echo of the shot ricocheting around her from the surrounding mountains. Where had the shot come from? Her gaze frantically searched the strange dwellings lining the street.
“Stay down,” Alex yelled.
Merde, did he think she was going for a stroll with people shooting at her? She began wriggling, propelling herself forward with knees and elbows toward the shelter of one of the cone-shaped huts on the left side of the street.
Another bullet kicked up the dust in front of her.
She froze. Should she try to make it back to the jeep? She glanced over her shoulder. Alex was gone from the jeep. Where had he—Sweet Mary, it was no time to wonder where he had gone while she was still in the open. The hut was closer than the jeep. She drew a deep breath and rolled sidewise toward the hut, every moment expecting a bullet to tear through her flesh.
A scream of pain echoed shrilly over the valley, followed immediately by a frantic sputtering of Turkish in a high male voice.
Caitlin got to her knees behind the hut and saw Alex coming out of the doorway of the flat sod house by the dig. He carried a rifle in one hand and a pistol in the other. “Are you hurt?” he called.
“No.”
“Then get the hell over here and inside. We don’t know who else may be in those huts.” He turned and went back into the hut.
Another spurt of vitriolic Turkish issued from the hut Alex had entered as Caitlin stood up and moved warily down the street. How had Alex gotten inside the hut? He must have circled around behind the other cone-shaped huts and come in the back door.
“Caitlin!”
“I’m coming.” She quickened her pace and a moment later entered the flat-roofed hut. A hasty glance revealed a large room that looked like a herd of elephants had stampeded through it. Tables and chairs were overturned, curio cabinets together with their contents had been dashed to the floor. The only piece of furniture appearing to have remained intact was a long, crudely crafted table set against the far wall.
The tall, wiry man kneeling on the dirt floor looked as wild and desolate as his surroundings. He was dressed in a dirty maroon-striped robe and grimy white turban, and she judged he must be somewhere in his early sixties. It was difficult to determine his exact age through the liberal layer of dust and grease coating his shaggy black hair and long, gray-streaked beard. His burning eyes focused on her with a fanatic fervor that reminded her of pictures she had seen of the Ayatollah Khomeini. His mouth was bleeding, but it didn’t prevent the words from spitting from it as he saw her. Caitlin took an involuntary step back. “Who is he? Why was he trying to shoot me?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out. I’m not going to have any trouble. I can’t shut him up.” Alex listened a moment before he turned to Caitlin, raising his voice to be heard above the man’s continuing diatribe. “His name is Abdul Kasmina and he says he owns the entire village. When all the others left, he stayed, and the village is his by the right of possession. We trespassed and therefore must die.”
Caitlin felt a surge of relief. For a moment she had thought by some outlandish chance Ledford had caused this new threat. “He’s mad?”
“Excellent conclusion.”
Caitlin shivered. “Why would he stay here by himself?”
“To be king of all he surveys? Who knows?” Alex glanced around the hut. “Judging by those tables and curio cabinets over there, I’d say this used to be the museum before Abdul made it into his own private pigsty. Why don’t you look around and see if you can find that portion of the tablet Moduhl mentioned while I take Abdul outside and ask him a few questions?”
Caitlin barely heard him as she moved toward the long table set against the wall. Pigsty was a good description. Several pottery bowls and crude knives lay scattered on the table. She made a face as she saw a dozen or more flies hovering over the remains of food in one of the shallow bowls. Antiquity clearly held no reverence for Abdul Kasmina.
The corner of the tablet was lying underneath a broken urn.
She forgot about the flies. She forgot everything but that piece of gray-brown wedge-shaped clay. Carefully, afraid to breathe, Caitlin moved the urn to one side.
“Dear God.” She was scarcely conscious she had murmured the words as she stared down at the ancient script. It was the same.
“Alex! It’s the same,” she shouted. She jerked off the blue cotton bandanna from around her neck, spread it on the table, and placed the portion of the tablet in the center and tied the bandanna carefully around it. She couldn’t believe her luck. The artifact could have been smashed when that child dug it from the earth, or that madman could have dashed it to the ground in a fit of rage. She took another look at the jumble of objects on the table to be certain there was no other tablet bearing similar markings before she turned and ran out of the museum. “Alex, did you hear me. It’s—” She broke off as she saw Abdul Kasmina lying on the ground and Alex standing over him.
Alex had made use of the Turk’s grimy turban to gag him. Now Abdul’s lips were not only split, but his left eye was rapidly blackening.
“You’ve hurt him.”
“I hope so.” Alex turned to face her, and she saw a bruise darkening his cheekbone. “He tried to kill us.”
“He’s not sane. You shouldn’t have—perhaps he was only trying to warn us off.”
Abdul sputtered a barrage of venom at her that caused Alex’s expression to harden even more. “I don’t think so.”
“You still shouldn’t beat a helpless man.”
“He wasn’t helpless. I’ll carry this bruise for a week. And I wasn’t beatin
g him, I was questioning him.” Alex nudged Abdul in the ribs with the toe of his boot. “He just got a little tired and decided to lie down and rest.”
Her lips tightened with disapproval. “Is that how the KGB questions men?”
“Sometimes.” Alex met her gaze. “You wanted to know where that tablet came from. I found out.” He gestured to the mountain closest to the village. “There’s a path leading to a cave halfway up the side of that one.”
“We could have found out some other way. Let him go.”
Alex shook his head. “We don’t know whether or not he’s stashed another rifle in one of those huts.”
“Then tie him up and leave him alone.”
Alex gazed at her a moment before he picked up the kicking and writhing Abdul and slung him over his shoulder in a fireman’s lift. “I’ll be right back.” He disappeared into the museum.
Ten minutes later he came out of the hut minus his burden. “Trussed up very neatly.”
“You were gone a long time.”
“I didn’t do him any permanent damage.” He started down the street toward the jeep. “And I’m not going to apologize for taking the information I wanted from him. Crazy or not, he’s a vicious son of a bitch who wanted to put us both down.” He shot her a sidewise glance. “Would you like me to translate what he intends to do, when he gets free, to the infidel woman who dares to wear men’s trousers?”
“No.” They had reached the jeep and she tucked the envelope containing the translation she had left there into one of the pockets of the backpack on the backseat. “I don’t want to hear it.”
“No, you don’t want to hear anything that would make you believe I wasn’t—” He shrugged. “To hell with it. Grab your gear and let’s set up camp.”
“We could use one of those huts.”
“Do what you like. I prefer the outdoors to the filth that must have accumulated in those dung holes in the past five years.”
Caitlin remembered the dirt, flies, and scurrying insects in the museum and changed her mind. She turned away from the jeep. “You set up the camp. I’ll find wood for a fire.”
Caitlin turned another page and placed it on top of the other sheets on the blanket beside her.
“Get to sleep,” Alex said from his bedroll across the fire. “You have a mountain to climb tomorrow.”
“Half a mountain,” she corrected him, her attention still on the translation. “Abdul said the cave was halfway up.”
“Whatever.” Alex’s voice was edged with impatience. “I still don’t want to have to drag you.”
She lifted her eyes. “You won’t have to drag me. I’ll keep up.” She suddenly realized the words had a familiar sound. “That’s what Jacinthe said to Andros.”
“What?”
“When they left Troy.” She looked thoughtfully into the fire. “She told him she would match his pace. You know, Andros was of the Shardana, and I think the inscription on the Wind Dancer could also be Shardana. I believe Andros had the inscription engraved on the base after he left Troy.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Nowhere in the first legend is the inscription mentioned. There’s a detailed description of the statue but not one word about the inscription.”
“It could be an oversight.”
“But it was Andros who had this story set down by an Egyptian scribe. Caterina states in the preface that it became tradition for members to set down their family history, starting with Andros.” Caitlin frowned. “Andros . . . I don’t understand it.”
“Why not?”
“Andros was a warrior. He was pragmatic and clever but not the type of man who would want the story of his life set down for posterity. Why did he feel so strongly about having his story written and kept for future generations?”
“You can tell all that from reading the first legend?”
“Read it yourself and see if you don’t agree with me.”
“Maybe tomorrow. Who were the Shardana?”
“No one really knows much about them. They were very secretive and left no records of their own. The ancient Egyptians referred to the Shardana as the sea people. They were greatly feared as fighters and actually attacked the Egyptian coast at one time. Later, they became mercenaries under the pharaohs. No one knows why they changed from enemy to subject.”
“Well, you’re not going to find out tonight.” Alex turned his back to her and zipped up his sleeping bag. “Go to sleep.”
“In a minute.”
“Now.”
His tone carried so much ferocity, it startled her. While she had been reading Andros’s story, she had been oblivious of Alex’s building tension, but now it was obvious in every rigid tendon of the back he had turned to her. She was tempted to tell him to go to hell, but God knows they didn’t need more conflict between them. Besides, he was probably right that she needed her rest for the challenges of the coming day.
The climb proved far more difficult than Caitlin had anticipated, and they did not reach the cave until late afternoon. The rutted path slanted steeply and sometimes disappeared entirely as they were forced to make their way over a landfall of rocks and boulders.
By the time the large opening of the limestone cave came into view, Caitlin felt as if she had been climbing days instead of hours, and the knapsack strapped to her back weighed a ton more than when they had started out.
Alex turned and held out his hand to pull her up the last few feet to the ledge. “All right?”
It was the first time he had spoken to her since they had started to climb.
She nodded breathlessly as she wiped the perspiration from her forehead and the nape of her neck with her scarf.
“Stay here. I’m going to take a look inside.”
He disappeared inside the cave.
She waited a moment until her breathing steadied again and then followed him.
The only light poured in from the opening. The roof appeared to be some thirty feet above her, but it didn’t feel cool or drafty. It was almost hot in there. She could see shadowy rocks and boulders back in the cave and the shifting glow of Alex’s flashlight as he walked toward her.
“I see you’re obeying instructions as usual.”
“How far back does it go?”
“About four hundred yards. The reason it’s so warm in here is that there’s another hot spring at the end of the cave.” He smiled crookedly. “And no, I didn’t see any symbols or writing on the walls.”
“I didn’t expect you would.” Caitlin unstrapped her knapsack and dropped it on the ground. “I didn’t see any wood on the trail. I guess we’ll have to use the camp stove. At least we won’t need a fire for heat tonight. Let’s make camp now and start searching at daybreak.”
“I’m surprised you don’t want to start looking now.”
She ignored the caustic note in his voice. “If the cave is as small as you say, it’s not going to be a monumental task. We should be able to search the entire cave thoroughly by tomorrow evening.” She knelt on the ground and undid the fastening of the knapsack. “And I want to read the second legend in the journal while the light still holds.” She could feel his gaze on her back, but she avoided looking at him as she continued. “I fixed our meal last night. It’s your turn tonight.”
She took the translation out of the knapsack and carried it toward the entrance to the cave. She settled down just outside the opening and leaned back against the craggy limestone wall.
The valley was spread out before her, stark, pale, eerie in the late afternoon sunlight.
She could hear Alex moving in the cave behind her, but she firmly closed him out as she removed the pages of the second legend and began to read them. She had read only three pages when Alex came out of the cave.
“Let me read the first legend.”
She looked up to see Alex standing beside her. “Now?”
“You said I should read it.” He sat down beside her and took the pages from her. “What else do I have to do
?”
He settled himself back against the cliff and picked up the first page.
The typewritten pages flew through his fingers with incredible speed, and she remembered he had told her that night in the perfumery that he had taught himself speed-reading.
She tried to concentrate on the second legend concerning Andros and Jacinthe settling in Alexandria and starting their family but found it impossible to concentrate. She was too acutely conscious of Alex sitting next to her absorbing, drinking in, the story of Andros and Jacinthe meeting that last day in Troy. She had read it only twice herself, but she could see it before her as if projected on a movie screen, embellished by imagination until it came vividly alive.
Andros, Jacinthe, and Paradignes . . .
And the Wind Dancer.
15
The golden statue of Pegasus stood eighteen inches tall, every radiant inch commanding the eye and riveting the attention. Two perfectly matched almond-shaped emeralds served as the horse’s eyes, and its lacy filigree wings folded back against its graceful body as if buffeted by a strong wind. Lustrous white pearls shimmered on the filigree clouds on which the Pegasus ran, and four hundred and forty-seven diamonds encrusted the base of the statue.
“What do you think, Andros?” Paradignes rubbed a soft cloth gently over the filigreed wings of the statue on the table. “Is the Wind Dancer a prize worth dying for?”
“What do I think? I think you’re mad,” Andros said bluntly. “The king ordered you to burn the statue until it was no more than a shapeless mass of metal. What if he finds you’ve disobeyed him?”
“Then he’ll probably order me burned in its stead.” Paradignes’s gaze was still on the statue. “Pour yourself a cup of wine. I have a proposition to make to you.”
Andros crossed the chamber to the table and picked up the graceful blue ewer on which was depicted a beautifully painted Apollo pulling the sun across the heavens. The ewer was as exquisite as everything else in Paradignes’s chamber, and Andros had often admired it. He poured wine into the cup. “Then make your proposition. Needless to say, I’ll listen. As a prisoner in your city, I have not been offered many choices of late.”