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“I don’t like that,” Ankhesenpaaten said softly, “and I don’t like Aye. Not a bit. He’s angry, and he’s rude to Mother.”
“We also need to watch out for Meri-Re, the high priest,” warned Tut.
“Why him?”
“He’s afraid that when I become pharaoh I will no longer worship Aten.”
“He would lose all his power and wealth if that happened.”
“Right. You’re a smart girl. Almost too smart somehow.”
“And General Horemheb is a sneaky one. Keep an eye on him also.”
“I will be wary of them all,” said Tut. Then he did something he really hadn’t expected to do. He leaned in close and kissed Ankhe. And perhaps even more surprising, she didn’t protest.
Then, confident that they had avoided capture, the two children rose from their hiding place and sprinted toward the river, laughing. They were less afraid of the crocodiles lurking there than of the powerful men crawling about the palace.
Chapter 37
Thebes
1908
HOWARD CARTER had been summoned.
His old friend and Antiquities Service boss, Gaston Maspero, wanted to meet and discuss Carter’s “future.” In the four years since Carter had left his post, there hadn’t been much talk like that-more a hand-to-mouth existence that barely kept Carter’s dreams alive and often made him look foolish for having them.
So Gaston Maspero’s request for a meeting was more than welcome. It could be a lifesaver.
The distance from the Winter Palace Hotel to the Valley of the Kings was roughly five miles. If one stood on the great marble steps leading up to the hotel’s main lobby, it was possible to gaze across the Nile toward the distant cliffs that formed the backside of the valley. When there was no wind and the desert dust was not clouding the air, those cliffs seemed almost close enough to touch.
That’s the way Howard Carter felt every day of his exile. A man less passionate about Egyptology would never have debased himself the way Carter had, standing out on the streets to hawk his wares to tourists, no different from the hordes of carriage drivers, ferryboat captains, and beggars who lined the dirt road at the river’s edge.
Like them, he existed on the most meager of handouts. His serviceable watercolors would probably have been completely overlooked and ignored were he Egyptian rather than European.
To say that Howard Carter’s life had fallen into disarray would be an understatement. He’d become a shadowy version of himself: at once haughty and pe
To supplement his modest living as a watercolorist, he also sold antiquities on the black market, thus sinking to the level of the men he’d once prosecuted for tomb robbery.
Carter dressed well enough, even though his clothes were worn, and still had a taste for fine food and expensive hotels, but he’d become dependent on wealthy patrons to make his way. Adding insult to injury, his most beloved patrons of all, Lord and Lady Amherst, had fallen on difficult times. They’d been forced to sell Didlington Hall in 1907, and Lord Amherst was in poor health. At the age of thirty-four, Howard Carter had become little more than a self-educated sycophant.
Enter, thanks to Maspero, the inimitable Lord Carnarvon.
George Edward Stanhope Molyneux Herbert, better known as the Fifth Earl of Carnarvon-or, more simply, His Lordship-was a pale, thin man with a hound’s face pitted by smallpox. He smoked incessantly, despite damaged lungs; raced cars; owned horses; and otherwise reveled in living the life of a wealthy, self-absorbed bon vivant. Even the 1901 car crash that had almost killed him didn’t stop Carnarvon from spending his money recklessly and living a life of entitled leisure that no one deserved-at least not in Carter’s opinion.
His Lordship had first come to Egypt in December 1905, thinking that the warm weather and dry air might help him recuperate. That visit and subsequent other “tours” whet his appetite for all things Egyptian.
In winter he maintained a luxurious and spacious suite at the Winter Palace Hotel. Little by little, Carnarvon was transformed from a man consumed by the here and now into a man consumed by the past-the ancient past.
Chapter 38
Thebes
1908
NOW, LIKE MANY WEALTHY MEN who’d become smitten by Egypt and treasure hunting, Lord Carnarvon wanted to fund his own excavation.
The successes of Carnarvon and Theodore Davis were well known, and Carnarvon could easily see Davis ’s yacht Bedouin moored across the street from his hotel. British acquaintances Robert Mond and the Marquis of Northampton also had minor concessions, and Carnarvon began to believe he would enjoy digging up an important bit of history. He thought it should be great fun indeed.
Unfortunately, his first season’s results weren’t promising. Or much fun. Arthur Weigall-who now held Carter’s former job as chief inspector for Upper Egypt -had dismissed Carnarvon for the rank amateur that he was. He assigned Carnarvon to a rubbish heap known as Sheikh abd el-Qurna, with predictably dismal results.
The sole find during that first six-week season was a mummifiedcat contained inside a wooden cat coffin.
Carnarvon, while disappointed, actually treasured the discovery. It was his first, after all. Egyptology was now officially in his blood.
The only problem, it seemed, was Carnarvon. Rather than hire an experienced professional, he led the digs himself. Each day he would sit inside a screened box that kept away flies, and smoke cigarette after cigarette, as his men, and not a top-notch crew, worked in the heat and dust.
What Carnarvon needed-he was told repeatedly-was a seasoned professional to guide his digs.
And Howard Carter needed a wealthy patron with a concession to get him back in the game.
Between seasons, Carnarvon wrote Weigall from England, asking for “a learned man, as I have not time to learn up all the requisite data.”
The common thread in all of this was Maspero, who had arranged Carnarvon’s concession in the first place.
So it was that Carter was summoned to the Winter Palace to stand before Carnarvon and Maspero to discuss the possibility of once again leading a full-scale excavation. His clothes were nearing the point of no return, and his ever-present portfolio was tucked under his arm, as if he had been called to sketch the moment, which, he believed, was a depressing possibility.
Did Carter want back in the game? he was asked.
The disgraced Egyptologist, thrilled that fate was giving him a second chance, hastily answered yes.
He even managed to keep his famous arrogance and temper in check-for the first meeting anyway.