Night Train to Memphis - Elizabeth Peters [104]
‘Thanks.’ I was in no mood to be fussy. I was only sorry the taxi driver hadn’t packed an Uzi.
I didn’t get to use my pretty new bag after all. I filled my pockets with as many useful items as they would hold and fastened them securely with safety pins. Schmidt was talking – something about Cairo – but I cut him off. ‘Let’s go.’
I assumed my disguise in the taxi. Watching in the rearview mirror, the driver was so interested he almost ran over a bicycle and two Swedish tourists. Schmidt told him some story – something indecent, probably, because the driver howled with laughter and Schmidt blushed when I asked him what he had said.
He dropped me off and I waved bye-bye to him as the taxi headed back along the corniche. The arrangements had taken longer than I would have liked. The sun was sinking towards the cliffs of the west bank and the river reflected the glow of gathering sunset. It might have been more sensible to wait until after dark before I made the attempt. In fact, there was no question about it; it would have been more sensible.
Carrying my shopping bag, I shuffled along the broken sidewalk in my backless leather slippers. For once I was grateful I had feet as big as a man’s. The women’s slippers were gaudy affairs with turned-up toes and gilt trim. By the time I’d gone a few hundred yards my footwear was dusty and scuffed, like the shoes of the other pedestrians.
What I saw at the entrance to the institute made me duck into the first street leading away from the corniche. I had expected guards. I had not expected they would be wearing black uniforms. It was depressing confirmation of the doubts Schmidt and I had had earlier. Larry must have convinced the police he needed protection. If they were stationed all around the perimeter, I was in deep trouble.
By the time I had worked my way around to the back of the estate, blue shadows were gathering and my nerves were ready to snap. I had been warned away from the wall by one guy carrying a rifle and wearing a uniform, and there were apartment buildings facing it across a narrow street. Finally I reached a place where the buildings were replaced by a vacant lot, filled with weeds and tumbled masonry. The base of the wall was in deepening shadow and the mud plaster had flaked, leaving crevices between the underlying bricks. Nobody was around. It was now or never, and by that time I was about ready to whip out my gun and shoot anybody who tried to stop me. If, that is, there were any bullets in the gun. I couldn’t remember how many shots I’d fired. Several.
I’ve never climbed anything as fast as I did that wall. At any second I expected to hear a shout or a shot. Hanging on by my toenails and one hand, I reached into the shopping bag slung onto my back and pulled out the pillow I had taken from Schmidt’s bed. It helped some, but the barbed wire ripped a gash in my long skirts as I swung my leg over. It didn’t do my shin any good either. I didn’t try climbing down, I just let go.
The ten-foot drop knocked the breath. out of me and the shrub through which I fell had lots of thorns. It was a nice thick shrub, though. I blessed Larry’s landscaper for wanting to hide that ugly wall.
I had left my Nefertiti bag with Schmidt and was wearing my own clothes under the galabiya. After gathering up the odds and ends that had fallen out of my pockets I peered through the branches and tried to figure out where I was. The swimming pool – or, to be more precise, the surrounding fence – oriented me. I pinned my turban back on and headed for the house, skulking along in the shrubbery when I could, dashing across the open spaces when I couldn’t. It would be dark before long, but if the movers had quit for the day . . . Apparently the gardeners were about to do so. I spotted a couple of them heading for a shed, rakes and spades over their shoulders. Some of the others – the ones I particularly didn’t want to meet – must be away from the house, not heading for another hideout as Max had tried to make me believe, but searching for poor little me. They needed me. Not