The Akhenaten Adventure

desert floor in a great curve of dust, rock, boulders, and sand. Batsheesh sat down abruptly, simply to avoid falling down again. He'd never experienced an earthquake before, and yet he felt the terrifying motion of the earth could hardly be mistaken for anything else. By contrast, his father seemed more delighted than frightened by the earthquake, and began to laugh hysterically as he tried, unsuccessfully, to regain his feet. At last, he cried, at last, apparently convinced that the quake was happening to his own advantage. Even as the shocks became more and more violent, horizontal thrusts mixed with a few vertical jolts, as if nature intended to confound all those like Hussain Hussout, who were clever enough to pretend that they were walking on the deck of a ship in a storm, it seemed to an astonished Batsheesh that his father had gone crazy. "'Ten years!' Hussain shouted loudly above the ground's thunderous roar. "'Ten years I've waited for this!' To Batsheesh's amazement, his father's good humor and excitement showed no sign of abatement, not even when an explosive upheaval of rock and earth lifted the land-robe almost six feet above his head and tipped it on to its roof. "'Father, stop!' yelled the boy, and grabbed hold of Effendi, who was yowling and trembling with fear. "'You're mad! Stop it, please, or you'll be killed!' In truth, Hussain Hussout was in no more danger while trying to stand on the shaking ground than his son and dog, who were clinging to it. But the boy felt that there was almost something irreverent about his father's behaviour, as if the spirits of the earth might see in the man's good humor and apparently fearless demeanour a lack of proper respect and destroy all three of them accordingly. And then, just as suddenly as it had started, the underground rumblings faded away, the terrifying motion ended, the dust and sand settled, the searing stillness returned, as if nature was holding her breath to see what would happen next, and all was quiet again —all, that is, except Hussain Hussout. "'Isn't it wonderful!' he cried, and only now that the ground had finally stopped moving did he fall to his knees and, still grinning like a madman, put his hands together as if in prayer. Batsheesh turned to look at the Land Rover, now lying on its roof, and shook his head. "'It looks like we're going to have to walk back to the road and get help,' he said. "'I don't see what's so wonderful about that.' "'No, it's wonderful!' insisted his father, and held up a piece of stone, not much smaller than a CD. "'Look! I saw it as soon as the earth shifted. For thousands of years the wind and sand have been the guardians of the Pharaoh's treasure. But every so often the earth shifts, and what was buried may now be seen.' To Batsheesh the piece of stone looked nothing like treasure. In truth, almost anyone else would probably have ignored the square piece of smooth, grey, basaltic stone covered in chiseled grooves that Hussain held up for him to see. But Hussain had recognized it immediately for what it was —an Egyptian stele. "'It's a stone tablet upon which is written an ancient inscription in the hieroglyphic writing of the eighteenth dynasty,' explained the boy's father. "'If this stone is what I think it is, then we have found the key that will help us to unlock a mystery that has endured for thousands of years. This might very well turn out to be the greatest day of our lives. A man like me waits all his life for an opportunity such as this. That is what is so wonderful, my son. That is why I am happy.'" Chapter 1 The Naming of Dogs Mr. and Mrs. Edward Gaunt lived in New York at No. 7, East 77th Street, in an old townhouse with seven floors. They had two children, John and Philippa, who, despite being twelve-year-old twins, were the least identical twins imaginable, which was much to their own relief and satisfaction. People found it hard to believe that they could be twins at all, they were so different. John, who was older by ten minutes, was tall and thin, with straight brown hair, and liked to wear black. Philippa was smaller, with wavy red hair and horn-rimmed glasses that made her look like the more intelligent of the two. She liked to wear pink. They both felt a little sorry for identical twins, and believed that they had had the lucky escape, although it could be annoying when people remarked on how they didn't look alike, as if no one had ever noticed that before. In their heads, however, it was a very different story. John and Philippa often thought very similar thoughts. Sometimes in school, when the teacher asked a question, they would each put up a hand to answer at exactly the same moment. When they watched TV game shows, they would speak the answers in unison, and it was impossible to beat them at Pictionary when they played as a team. Their father, Mr. Gaunt, was an investment banker, which is another way of saying that he was rich. Mrs. Gaunt, who was better known to New York society as Layla, was a very beautiful woman, and did a great deal of charity work, for which she was in much demand, since everything she touched was successful. She gave lots of dinner parties, her conversations sparkled like a crystal chandelier, and she was glamorous, which is to say she was clever and beautiful, with a cherry on top. It couldn't be denied, however, that Mr. and Mrs. Edward Gaunt made an unlikely couple, almost as unlikely as the idea that their children could be twins. Layla, dark-haired, with the magnificent physique of an athlete, stood more than six feet tall in her bare feet, while her husband, Edward, was barely five feet tall in his malooty shoes, with longish grey hair and tinted spectacles. People noticed when Layla entered the room, but they seldom noticed Edward, who fortunately preferred it that way, being the shy and retiring type, and quite content to let his wife and his seventy-seventh street home occupy the limelight. The Gaunt's house on the Upper East Side of New York looked more like a temple than a home, and was frequently featured in all sorts of glossy magazines. The front door was protected by an enormous arch-shaped wrought-iron gate, and all the walls of the house were panelled with the choicest mahogany. There were lots of fine French paintings, antique English furniture, rare Persian rugs, and expensive Chinese vases. Sometimes Philippa said she thought her parents cared more about their furniture than they did about their children, but she knew this wasn't true, and she just said it for effect, in the same way that her twin brother John was fond of telling his father that Number Seven felt more like an art gallery than a house that was fit to have two twelve-year-old children living in it. Whenever John said this, which was usually when Mr. Gaunt came home with yet another stuffy old picture, Mr. Gaunt would laugh and tell his son that, if Number Seven had been an art gallery, it would certainly not have permitted dogs, not even the two dogs that the Gaunts kept as family pets. Alan and Neil were two large rottweilers, and they were remarkable animals, not least because they seemed to understand everything that was said to them. Once, John, too lazy to get up and look for the TV remote control, had commanded Alan to change the channel, and, to his surprise, Alan had done it. Neil was no less intelligent than Alan. Both dogs could tell the difference between Fox Kids, the Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, and CNN. The two dogs often accompanied the twins on their travels around New York, and John and Philippa were probably the only two children in the city who ever felt safe enough to walk in nearby Central Park after dark. But the fact that two such intelligent dogs should have such ordinary names was a source of great irritation to John. Rottweilers were first bred by the ancient Romans, he complained to his parents one morning at breakfast, close to the beginning of the summer school vacation. As guard dogs, they're about the only family that can be trusted.