I Tried On Your Wedding Dress

Hilary Casey 3

I went up to my room for a nap. The curtains were still drawn from the previous evening; I lay on my side and tried to imagine the conversation between Sir Edward and Aldridge. I slept for two or three hours.

I came down for dinner still half-asleep. As I entered the dining room, I noticed that the tables had been re-arranged. Instead of the usual pattern of square and circular tables, six of the square tables had been lined up centrally. Carragher was already there.

"I think it's a conference, my dear." He said with an amused smile. "You look very tired, would you like a glass of tonic?"

There were six jugs of clear liquid, water and tonic, laid on the table. I drank a glass of sparkling water and immediately felt a little more awake.

"I think this lifestyle is starting to get the better of me, Mr Carragher." I said "too much inaction is taking its toll. I slept for 10 hours last night, but I still felt desperately tired when I woke up this morning."

"I have a feeling this little meeting could well change all that. If I'm right in reading the situation, things could be about to take an interesting turn."

I dearly hoped so. I didn't feel able to handle another year of swimming and short-hand.

In a few minutes Emil appeared from beneath the parasols with the Capurons following. I sat at one corner of the rectangle, Emil sat opposite me. The Capurons took the two spaces to my right, Carragher sat on the end, between me and Emil. There was no sign of Sir Edward, Dr Aldridge or Mesparo. We sat and devoured the casserole of rice and vegetables that was traditionally served on a Sunday, and a light, congenial conversation started up between us as to our respective roots. Capuron gave a one word answer "Boulogne." Mrs Capuron paid no attention whatsoever to the conversation. Carragher was born, he explained, in Dublin, but his family had ties in America. They had taken the reverse of the normal route and gone back to Ireland; he carried a picture of his birthplace round everywhere, which he passed around the table as our dishes were taken away.

"It's in absolutely the middle of nowhere; I carry a picture of it with me on my travels. Of course I have my little place in Putney too. I go back to the motherland now and then to check it's still there. I've a couple of servants keep it tidy."

Mrs Capuron received the picture from her husband; she didn't even glance at it before passing it on to me. She was staring into the space ahead of her, out of the double doors, towards the pool. I studied the picture.

The photograph depicted a lanky, chalky house, its rear looking out over a wide bay, and in the foreground, a donkey decorated with gypsy beads. The sea was calm. The animal had its head turned away from the camera, giving its body the appearance of finishing in a smooth hump at the neck. The house was decorated only with a black wooden arch that was fastened above the door.

"It's beautiful" I said "You must miss it terribly."

Carragher gave me a charming smile, and, taking the picture from my hand, a warm glow seemed to emanate from his whole countenance over the image.

"For a traveller, the home is inside. It has to be. While travelling one is forced to find comfort in diverse things. The moon does it for me. It has a friendly soul. It is like a heartbeat to me. At the old house we had a mantel clock, a little rectangular thing like a shoebox, which had been there when my parents arrived from the United States, and which lived above the fireplace. When I was a boy, I would read beneath it every evening. I would invariably doze off, and my mother would carry me up to bed. Every evening I fell asleep to the sound of that clock, and every morning I would awake in my own room. I would wake feeling completed, as if the absence of that clock's steady heartbeat was due to its purpose having been fulfilled by my protection through the darkness. In the morning, I could do without the clock. In the evening, every last beat drove me deeper into my safe little cubby-hole of sleep."

He rose out of his chair and walked up to the double doors, which had been flung open to let the warm night air in.

"I have a rule. Wherever I stay, in whatever hotel or camp or vehicle I lay my head, I always insist on being able to see the moon." He turned to me, and as he did, caught the eye of Mrs Capuron, who had been staring straight through his midriff. She lifted her eyes in a slow, irritated movement, but when they met his, the look on her face shifted. Normally, the French woman had an amazingly blank complexion, but now something was painted there, light shading beneath the cheeks, at the side of her mouth. Her interest had been roused and, like at the scene of the uncovering of the tip of a huge monument, I could only guess what else lay in the depths.

Mr Capuron broke the silence.

"Resterez-vous ici?"

"Oui"

His wife did not even blink. The Frenchman placed his palms flat on the table, and for a second his head dropped. I saw the pattern of jet black hairs that still remained on his cranium, like the shadows of a ploughed field. They reminded me of the irrigation ditches we had passed on the way to the hotel that first day; choking reeds, alone in a great wilderness. They formed a little island between his ears, at the very pinnacle of what was a quite remarkable pink and white dome. He pushed his chair back and stood up sharply. He left without any further gesture towards his wife.

That evening Emil went up to his room early, complaining of a headache. That left me, Carragher and Mrs Capuron, who soon went to sit by the pool. Carragher poured us each a brandy and offered me a cigarette. I accepted and he lit two and handed me one. It was almost midnight when the servants came to switch off the electric light, lighting the large wax candles that were placed regularly around the room. It was a beautiful night.

Carragher was extremely easy to talk to. I found myself telling him all about how I came to be in Egypt. I told him about how a friend of my father had introduced me to Sir Edward, who had immediately offered me a job. Of all the guests, Carragher was the one I felt closest to. Emil had changed severely since the first few months. He was very quiet. He retired early every night. I intimated my concern to Carragher.

"I honestly believe he's hating the whole thing. The dig's in crisis, Edward won't admit it but he's close to finishing it. It appears whatever led them there was miscalculated. Most of the digging in Egypt is carried out around the Valley of the Kings, but there are other areas where treasures can be found. Only last year, the American, Winlock, uncovered the mummified remains of a court steward of Meket-Re, in Thebes. Mesparo is a very famous and secretive man, and Edward respects that, so as to exactly what they have or haven't found I'm not sure. What I will say is Mesparo isn't a man to hang around an empty site, no matter what he's being paid."

As Carragher uttered these last words the door to the hotel lobby was opened and in stepped Mesparo, followed by Sir Edward, and finally Dr Aldridge. Sir Edward ordered one of the servants to fetch him a bottle of port. The three men took their seats at the table, Aldridge in Mr Capuron's place, Mesparo opposite him, with Sir Edward at the end, facing Carragher. There was a brief, awkward silence. Sir Edward broke it.

"I had expected that everyone would have gone to bed by now."

Carragher narrowed his eyes to look at the old man. A number of buttons on Sir Edward's shirt were undone, revealing a red patch of skin. He was dabbing his temples with a handkerchief, and breathing heavily. A servant poured out the remains of the wine.

"Are you alright old man? You look like you've seen a ghost."

Longton didn't replay, but instead passed a hand across his face, as if removing a cobweb.

"What do you say, Gaston?"

"I will have nothing to do with Mr Aldridge's proposition; that is my decision." Mesparo quickly drowned his glass of wine and replaced the glass on the table. Rising, he added:

"The authorities will be informed if you are successful; the department will take half, as is proper." He turned his attention to the rest of the mystified diners. "I am sorry, my friends, if my words are a little mysterious but I am very tired. Good evening."

He had been there for barely a minute. He bowed to the company, and left. In a second I heard his heavy footsteps as he crossed the lobby and climbed the staircase.

Carragher had his eyes wide open, as if impressed. There was still no sound from Sir Edward. Aldridge had taken a napkin and was drawing a diagram on it in charcoal. He sketched out, very roughly, a map with streets and buildings surrounding a market square. He handed this to Carragher.

"This is a map of the El-Qatar Bazaar in Luxor. It deals mostly in rubbish, swindlers selling fake pottery, cheap statuettes and the like to tourists, mostly."

"I know it" replied Carragher.

"As you are aware, I purchased the mummy that you helped me bring into this hotel yesterday afternoon from a trader there. I also revealed to you my suspicion that a number of other mummies were in his possession. It is my wish to explore exactly what else besides this the trader may be able to obtain, and, in that way, to blow open the whole black market in Egyptian antiquities!"

"So you aim to get them all?" I interrupted.

"No my dear!" Dr Aldridge laid the napkin out in front of Sir Edward. He tried to catch the old man's eyes. Sir Edward's eyes moved over the diagram listlessly. I could see a smile developing by the movement of tiny criss-crossed lines at the edges of Aldridge's moustache. He was spurred on by his former employer's silence.

"The Department of Antiquities would of course get half, perhaps more. Where we able to find even a single link in this huge business, it is my belief that a huge amount of material might be uncovered, perhaps too much even for one collector. This is why I am here. Sir Edward has agreed to aid me in uncovering the whereabouts of the trader's suppliers, and from there, to regain perhaps a thousand rare and valuable artefacts of significant historical value."

Sir Edward looked up sharply.

"You had better pray," he said, leaning threateningly across the table towards Aldridge, "that in addition the artefacts have a great monetary value."

"My dear fellow…"

Sir Edward slammed his hand down on the table; Aldridge jumped. There was a brief silence.

"I do not forget, Henry, and I do not forgive."

He pushed back his chair from the table, his two powerful arms levering him like the pillars of a suspension bridge and, taking the bottle of port out of the hand of the servant who had just that second returned with it, he backed out of the room.

"Good evening everyone. I would request your presence at the dig tomorrow. It is my intention to close it down." We all turned, surprised, with the exception of Mrs Capuron, who could be seen standing by the pool, her hands wrapped around herself, swaying languidly like a red flag in the laziest of breezes.

He had become quite a pathetic figure, that old man built to fight and lead, who had reduced himself to digging in foreign sands for… I still don't know what they were looking for. Dead kings? Now he had his chance to capture one of his own; he cut a forlorn figure, hovering there in the dining room in his stained cotton shirt, grasping a bottle of port by the neck in one hand, talking with his pipe clenched between his teeth, his eyes screwed up against the sulphurous tobacco smoke that followed the contours of his face as he spoke. He pulled back a lock of grey-black hair that had fallen across his vision. He wore grease constantly, the hair slotted back into the unploughed field of thick hair that reached back to a bald patch the size of a golf ball.

"I thank you all for your friendship this last year. I am only sorry I could not have provided you with a grander home." His attention wandered a little as another jet of smoke slipped through his clenched teeth. "I shall be returning to England soon. The whole business of searching has well worn me out. There is however, perhaps time for one more little run out." He lifted the bottle of port to eye level and aimed his forehead like a brandished sabre in Aldridge's direction. The doctor shifted in his seat. Sir Edward had only one last thing to say, and he said it as he passed out of sight, disappearing up the great staircase, still issuing smoke like a dirty old train.

"I've been tired for a long time."