The Labyrinth of Osiris by Paul Sussman Page A

silence, then he turned towards Ben-Roi. His stare was unusually intense.
    ‘We have met, I think.’
    Ben-Roi was still holding the bra in his hand.
    ‘Two years ago,’ he said, stuffing the undergarment back in the bag. ‘The seminary students.’
    ‘Ah yes, of course.’ The archbishop nodded. ‘Not the Israel Police’s finest hour. I hope in this case you will be able to show a little more –’ he paused, choosing his words – ‘balance.’
    He made his way back across the room.
    ‘Find whoever did this,’ he said when he reached the door. ‘I beg you, find them, and find them quickly. Before they bring any more misery into the world.’
    He met Ben-Roi’s eyes again, then turned and stepped down into the cathedral.
    ‘Do you know who she is?’ Ben-Roi called after him.
    The archbishop was already walking away.
    ‘I have no idea,’ came his voice. ‘But you can rest assured I will pray for her. Pray with all my heart.’
    T HE E ASTERN D ESERT , E GYPT
    Inspector Yusuf Ezz el-Din Khalifa of the Luxor Police stared down at the dead water buffalo, its mouth choked with flies, its eyes dull and mucousy. I know how you feel , he thought.
    ‘Three months it took me to dig that waterhole,’ the buffalo’s owner was saying. ‘Three months with nothing but a shovel, a touria and my own sweat. Twenty metres through this shit –’ he kicked at the rocky ground – ‘and now it’s poisoned. Useless. God have mercy on me!’
    He sank to his knees, fists clenched, arms raised to the sky. A pitiful gesture from a broken man. Again the thought crossed Khalifa’s mind: I know how you feel . And also: We might have had a revolution, but for most of us life’s still a bitch.
    He stood gazing at the muddy pool and the corpse slumped beside it, the only sounds the hum of flies and the farmer’s sobs. Then, pulling out his Cleopatras, he dropped to his haunches and proffered the pack. The man swiped a djellaba -sleeve across his nose and took one of the cigarettes.
    ‘ Shukran ,’ he mumbled.
    ‘ Afwan ,’ replied Khalifa, lighting the cigarette and firing up another for himself. He took a drag, then reached over and slipped the pack into the man’s pocket.
    ‘Keep them,’ he said.
    ‘You don’t have to . . .’
    ‘Please, keep them. You’re doing my lungs a favour.’
    The man gave a weak smile. ‘ Shukran ,’ he said again.
    ‘ Afwan ,’ repeated Khalifa.
    They smoked in silence, the desert undulating all around them, barren and rock-strewn. It wasn’t even mid-morning and the heat was already fierce, the landscape seeming to throb and shimmer as though gasping for breath. It was hot in Luxor, but at least the Nile breeze brought some small measure of relief. Here there was none. Just sun and sand and stone. A vast, open-air furnace where even the camel thorns and acacia bushes struggled for life.
    ‘How long have you been out here?’ Khalifa asked.
    ‘Eighteen months,’ replied the man, sniffing. ‘My cousin was already here, a few kilometres –’ he waved a hand to the north. ‘He told us you could just about make a living. There’s water if you dig deep enough. It comes out of the mountains.’ He waved a hand again, east this time, further out into the desert, where a brownish blur of high gebel loomed on the horizon. As he did so, Khalifa noticed a small green cross tattooed on the upper side of his hand, just below the thumb joint, very faint. The man was a Copt.
    ‘There are flash floods,’ he was saying. ‘The water soaks down through the rocks, forms underground channels. Deep. Run for miles. Like pipes. If you can get to them you can grow some corn and bersiim , support a few cattle. There’s alabaster in the hills and I dig that as well, sell it to a guy from El-Shaghab. You can just about make a living. But now . . .’
    He puffed on his cigarette and gave another sob. Khalifa reached out and squeezed his shoulder, then stood, shielding his eyes against the sun’s