Death on Tour - Janice Hamrick [72]
She leaned out of line, saw Alan, and waved. “Come up here with us,” she shouted, earning disapproving glares from a dozen Germans.
“Thanks, I’m good here,” he declined.
She turned back with a little pout. “You know, sometimes I think that man is completely antisocial. Or gay. Do you think he’s gay?”
I did not. “Maybe he just didn’t want to cut into the line.”
“We could go back and join him,” she suggested, but I grabbed her arm.
“No! Just leave it alone. He’s a big boy. He can stand in line by himself.”
“Do you think he’s following us around?” she asked thoughtfully.
I looked at her in exasperation. “Is it hard carrying around that big an ego? I mean, do you have trouble getting through doors or does it fold up for traveling?”
She just grinned. “I have a healthy amount of self-respect and I’m not ashamed of it. But I didn’t actually mean that for a change. I meant, literally, do you think he’s following us around. He’s sort of … there, every time we turn around.”
“All of us are there, every time we turn around. We’re on a fucking tour, for God’s sake.”
She raised her eyebrows. “What kind of language is that in a cemetery? Anyway, you’re so busy trying not to have the hots for him that you’re not paying attention. Look around. No one else from the group is in line here. They probably figured out shorter lines were better.”
“Fiona and Flora are up there ahead of the Japanese.” I pointed to a pair of garish floral polyester shirts. “Besides, this tomb will be worth it,” I promised, although I had no idea whether it would be or not.
“That’s not the point. We have to stand in line for some creepy hole in the ground. It might as well be this one. What is the point is that ever since Millie got murdered, neither of us can swing a dead cat without hitting Alan Stratton. Which would be okay, except I don’t think he’s interested in hitting on me. Us, I mean,” she added hastily.
I had a hard time choosing which statement to be most outraged over. “Creepy hole in the ground?” But was she right about Alan? Ordinarily, I’d have to say Kyla’s instincts were spot on when it came to men. I thought about the few moments we’d shared on Elephantine Island and my little gold pyramid. Had the small spark I’d felt then been only on my side? Probably.
The line inched forward until we could see the entrance, a rough rectangle cut almost horizontally into the gentle slope of the hill. A steep stairway descended into blackness and I felt a shiver of excitement. I wished I could push all these pesky Germans aside and rush down the steps.
However, we eventually reached the doorway, and once inside, our eyes adjusted to the dim lighting. The stairway transitioned from modern concrete to ancient stone, cut and smoothed by hand and now a little worn, not by sandaled feet, but by the Nikes of countless tourists. A steep corridor followed the steps, walls lined with paintings of red-and-black vultures holding large feathers in their claws beneath cartouches and glyphs that offered protections and instructions for the dead. The cryptic and beautiful symbols had existed in darkness for over three thousand years until the early 1800s, when an Italian archeologist named Giovanni Belzoni made a discovery that was as famous in its time as the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamen would be a century later. Of course, archaeology wasn’t quite as sophisticated back then, and many of the friezes had been damaged by water and smoke. Some were even cut off the walls and sent to museums across Europe. Nevertheless, what remained was breathtakingly beautiful.
The tomb grew hotter and stuffier the farther we went. Did the fierce Egyptian sun make its presence felt even through yards of limestone and sand, or was it the body heat and breath of countless tourists that gave the air the humid, unpleasant feel of a cheap sauna? We moved on. I wished my memory were better. I’d studied what I was going to see, but now, confronted by the fading paintings,