Lord of the Silent - Elizabeth Peters [17]
At least that was the way it was supposed to work. It had always been impossible to control illegal digging and the smuggling of antiquities, but of late there had been a dramatic increase in these activities. With the Germans gone and French and English archaeologists in the army or preoccupied with war work, many of the sites had been left unguarded. According to Selim, whose family and professional connections extended all over Egypt, there was hardly a site that had not suffered.
It was a relief to find no evidence of disturbance in our work area, but of course the situation was not so bad at Giza, where our loyal men kept watch over our concession and Mr. Reisner’s American expedition had its permanent headquarters. The Giza cemeteries were so extensive that the area had been divided between several different expeditions. The Americans had got the lion’s share. I do not complain of this, I simply mention the fact. Mr. Reisner was a fine excavator and a good friend.
We had taken over one of the areas that had been assigned to the Austro-German group under Herr Professor Junker. It was a temporary arrangement; God willing, our German friends would return when the war was over. (Friends they were, and friends I would always consider them, despite the artificial definitions of governments.) I prayed that day would come soon, but I must confess it was a thrill to be working near the mightiest pyramid of Egypt.
Every cultured reader must be familiar with the Great Pyramid, so I will not remind him of its remarkable features. Its builder was known to the Greeks as Cheops; Emerson preferred the more accurate rendering, from the Egyptian, of Khufu. In addition to the pyramid itself, there were a number of subsidiary structures—temples at the base of the pyramid and at the river, connected by a long causeway; three smaller pyramids meant for the burials of queens, and several cemeteries of private tombs, to the south and west. I have nothing against private tombs; some of the rock-cut variety have nice deep burial chambers and long passageways choked with rubble and full of bats. The mastabas unfortunately lack these attractive features. Their burial chambers consist of a perpendicular shaft with a single small room at the bottom. It was particularly frustrating to work at tombs like these when Egypt’s greatest pyramid was within a stone’s throw of our dig. However, my attempt to interest Emerson in investigating it was met with indignant rebuttal.
“What do you expect to find? The damned place has been explored by dozens of people—thousands, if you include all the cursed tourists. Every foot of every corridor has been seen and mapped, and our contemptible predecessors even blasted their way into the relieving chambers over the King’s Chamber.”
“I haven’t been up there for years, Emerson. I would like to have another look.”
“Curse it, Peabody,” Emerson shouted. “I cannot allow you to putter around in pyramids, especially in that part of that pyramid. How the devil you made it up the ladders in the first place, with all those petticoats and bustles and—”
“It would be much easier now that I have taken to wearing trousers. It is very selfish of you to attempt to prevent me from doing it this season. I say ‘attempt’ because, as you know perfectly well—”
“I do know.” We were in Emerson’s study, collecting his notebooks and the other supplies we would be using that day on the dig. He took me