The Messiah Secret - James Becker [76]
Bronson looked beyond the ruined wall at the space beyond it, studded with stones, mud-bricks and bits of masonry. ‘It looks as if this was quite a big building,’ he said.
Angela pulled out a small notebook and flicked rapidly through the pages. ‘Yes, it was. According to the few records that exist, this originally consisted of a brick enclosure and inside that was a temple house nearly twenty yards wide and thirty yards long. Don’t forget, Amun was a really important creator god, who was believed to live inside everything. He could appear as a goose or a ram with curved horns – which showed he had a function as a fertility god – or more commonly as a ram-headed man and sometimes as a man with two tall plumes on his head. Later on he merged with the cult of Re or Ra to form Amun-Re, the sun-god. He was really important to the ancient Egyptians.’
Bronson looked back at the ruined wall. ‘Is there anything here that tells us if Shishaq or Shoshenq did actually seize the Ark of the Covenant?’
‘I can’t be sure. I’ll photograph what there is and translate it later.’
There were a number of surviving pieces of inscription on various bits of wall and even on a few of the fallen stones, and Angela took pictures of every one she could find, checking each image on the screen of her camera to make sure it was clear and legible before moving on to the next.
Finally, she slipped the digital camera back into her handbag and took a last look around the site.
‘Is that it?’ Bronson asked.
‘Yes. It’s a real shame. I was hoping there’d be a few complete walls with intact inscriptions still standing. I certainly didn’t expect the temple to be in as bad a condition as it is.’
‘Did you see anything helpful?’
‘Not really,’ Angela replied. ‘I’ve spotted a couple of cartouches, both with Shoshenq’s name in them, and a few mentions of Amun, but not much else. But obviously I’ve still got to check the pictures I’ve taken.’
‘Amun’s name consists of those three symbols – the feather or leaf or whatever it is and the other two drawings?’
‘That’s the leaf of a reed plant, a draughts-board and a ripple of water, yes.’ Angela sighed, and Chris could see that she was tired. ‘I’ll take a look at the pictures on our way back to Heliopolis, but I’m not hopeful I’ll find anything useful. I had planned to do the work out here, but there’s so little material on the site that I don’t see any point in trying to do that now. And at least our room is air conditioned.’
Bronson nodded and turned away from the ruins of the temple towards the road. As he did so, he caught a fleeting glimpse of a figure wearing a white shirt and light-coloured trousers ducking swiftly out of sight behind a wall on the opposite side of the road.
He felt a warning stab of surprise. Unlike the citizens of Cairo, the residents of el-Hiba clearly didn’t see that many foreign tourists, and he and Angela had been objects of interest ever since they’d arrived there. But most of the people they’d seen had simply stared at them with frank and not unfriendly curiosity. Maybe that man – and Bronson was reasonably certain the figure had been male – was just shy. The only odd thing was that it looked as if he’d been holding a pair of binoculars or perhaps a camera in his hand. Certainly he’d been clutching a small black object. And his Western-style dress was unusual in a place where most people seemed to be wearing the more traditional Egyptian dishdasha or jellabah.
‘What is it?’ Angela asked.
‘I think there’s a man over there watching us.’
‘I don’t see anything.’
‘I know what I saw. You stay here. I’ll go and check.’
But Angela grabbed his arm with both hands to stop him. ‘No, Chris. Let’s just get away from here, right now. It might be that priest again.’
Bronson nodded reluctantly, and looked back up the road to where the car was parked. ‘You start running,’ he said. ‘I’ll be right behind you.’
Angela took to her heels, heading back the way they’d come.
Bronson stared across the road for