But I did take these." She handed over two photographs.

Valerie studied them with a wan smile. "Nefi , looking with great solemnity up into the camera. So adorable. And this must be one of your wedding pictures. Bride and groom. And Derek standing right next to them, as if it were the most natural thing in the world to have two fathers in the family."

"It's a good likeness of both of them, isn't it?"

* 109 *

"A likeness," Valerie repeated. "On that subject, I guess you should take this. It doesn't seem to have worked." She drew the linen-wrapped bundle from her knapsack and held it out. "If nothing else, Nefi can play with it as a doll."

Auset took the statue without unwrapping it and laid it next to her on the bench. "That' s it, then. The sum total of what we have left of him." Her lips began to tremble again and Valerie embraced her. She tried to comfort, but found herself weeping as well, hopelessly , the weak sobs of one who has already cried a great deal.

Something made Auset lift her head from the embrace and look toward the fountain. She gasped audibly and froze.

Feeling her grow rigid, Valerie looked over her shoulder . "No!"

she whispered. "Don't move. Don't frighten it."

"Oh, my God," Auset whimpered softly into the air, not taking her eyes from the horror. "Please, please don't hurt her. Oh, please."

Nefi sat upright on the ground by the fountain, her eyes half closed, as if in infant sleep. Coiled once around her body, with its head hovering next to her face, a full-grown king cobra swayed back and forth. Auset whispered, "Please, oh, please" over and over.

The snake tilted its head downward and for an instant gently touched Nefi 's cheek.

Auset jerked violently and tried to lurch forward, but Valerie held her back. "It's not a bite. Look. She's smiling."

The snake arched over Nefi 's narrow shoulder and slid down her back, then along the ground into the underbrush of the garden. On the stones where it had crossed, a line of pale green light glowed for a moment, then faded.

Auset threw herself toward her and snatched her up. But Nefi curled forward and struggled to be set down again.

"Leave her where she was. Something' s going on." Valerie took hold of Auset's arm and pulled her back onto the bench.

The birds that had been feeding came back. They were joined by others: warblers, doves, and quails. When the fountain rim was covered, they lit on the brush beside the path. They were unperturbed when a cat, slender and sleek, crouched just in front of Nefi 's feet. She sat, as if in * 110 *

Vulture's Kiss a trance, her mouth slightly open, and stared dreamily toward the wall on the south side of the garden where larger birds gathered: kingfi shers, egrets, and ravens.

"What's going on?" Auset's voice had gone from terror to wonderment.

Then on the north side, on the roof above the private apartments, ospreys and gulls landed on the one side; on the other , a small white vulture and a falcon. Last of all, as if all others had prepared the way for him, a splendid male ibis fl ew over the wall and lit on the ground.

Beside it, a smaller yellow bird with a dark head fl ickered briefl y into visibility, then fl ickered out again, like a sputtering fl ame.

"What does it mean?" Auset stood up.

Before she had taken a step, the entire menagerie fell silent. Nefi looked around at them, her face suddenly radiant, as if she had been waiting for an audience. Slowly, she raised one fi st toward them, swept it in an arc, then opened it. On her palm sat a lar ge dung beetle. Its iridescent carapace shone greenish-black in the sunlight. It turned on her palm, as if to look at her fi rst, then extended its little wings and fl ew off, leaving behind a piece of soil it had rolled into a perfect ball.

"Khepre, creator of the world," Valerie murmured. "It's a visitation.

But what are they trying to tell us?"

"Minfadlik, Madam." Suddenly Fahd was on the the garden path rushing toward them. The whole fl ock of winged creatures took fl ight, and the cat too slunk away . The houseman paused a moment, clearly bewildered by the fl urry of wings everywhere, then continued, greatly agitated. "Mahmoud al Fakhir is not home and there is a visitor . The American. Mr. Derek's father, and two others. He says it is important and he insists to come in."

* 111 *

28.

International Law Valerie rushed through the narrow alleys of the souq again, as she had been rushing for a week. She reached the Shari al Badustan, then slowed for a moment, to catch her breath.

Carter had been pale. At least he mourned, she thought. But he had had his lawyer at his side and minced no words when he announced that he was canceling his missionary tour to "take his family home."

By his "family," he meant the mortal remains of his stepson-and his granddaughter.

What a coup, she thought. If the Aton was a conscious and deliberate adversary, and it appeared now that he was, then he had achieved a brilliant masterstroke. In a single week his mysterious agents had eliminated the guardian ancestor and the two fathers and had brought a fanatical cleric to claim the Child of the gods, to be raised in a God-fearing monotheist home away from Egyptian infl uence.

The irony was exquisite. The prophecy was indeed fulfi lling itself, and the Sun Disk Aton, in his Christian form, was "rising in the West."

But if the Egyptian gods were powerless to defend their own messenger against monotheist fanaticism, one thing still protected them: the secular law. She hoped.

The Blue Nile hotel was located at the end of the Shari al Badustan. A notch above Sammed' s place, it had a front desk rather than the counter of a coffee house. There was no air conditioning, and everywhere she heard the whirring of fans. A word with the man on duty and she went upstairs.

Najya Khoury stood in the doorway , and her expression of confusion lasted only a moment before it evolved into warmth. She had obviously just washed her face in cold water. Ringlets of hair still held droplets, and her partially open shirt showed a V of moisture from the middle button up to both shoulders.

"I'm sorry to just appear this way , but you did say that I should look you up if I needed anything. I do, and it's sort of urgent."

* 112 *

Vulture's Kiss "What's happened? Forgive me, but you look terrible." Najya led her into a hotel room only slightly lar ger than the room at Sammed' s, but better furnished. "Can I of fer you something? A cold beer?" She nodded toward an ice chest in the corner of the room. "Harry always has a supply."

"No. No, thank you. I just need to talk, ask a few things." She half smiled. "And who better to turn to than a complete stranger you met in a hammam, right?"

"For God's sake, talk to me then. Come, sit down. Tell me what's going on."

Valerie looked around. The one chair in the room was piled with photographic equipment. The only free surface in the room was the bed.

She sat, smoothing out the bedcover on both sides of her . Her throat was dry, and for a moment she couldn' t think of a suitable opening remark. She coughed. "Can I have a glass of water?"

"Of course." Najya took the bottle of water from the nightstand and poured some into a paper cup." Sorry, paper is all you get here."

Valerie drank it and held the empty cup tapping it nervously on the bottom.

Najya took the cup from her and waited patiently, still standing.

Valerie rubbed the side of her mouth to keep her lips from trembling and spoke, fi nally, when she was composed. "A...uh...a close friend of mine...a sort of brother...an American...opera singer..." She felt suddenly foolish trying to establish the details of his identity before she even began. "He was killed a few days ago in a sort of religious riot."

"You mean the shooting at the Evangelical Church? I reported on that. That young man was your friend? Oh, I'm so sorry ." She was silent for a moment, obviously drawing connections. "But didn' t you also know one of the victims in the Luxor train wreck?"

Najya sat down next to her on the bed. The ringlets of hair were dry now.

"Yes. The fi rst one was Yussif Nabil and the American was Derek Ragin. They were part of the same family . That is, they were the adoptive and natural father of a child, the child that I need to get your advice about."

Najya leaned in solicitously. "Of course, but-"

"It was unusual, I know ," Valerie continued, "that the two men * 113 *

should be friends that way, but that's not why I'm here."

"Yes, I understand. But I'm wondering how you're connected with them."

Valerie closed her eyes. This wasn' t where she wanted the conversation to go. "Through Derek, the natural father with whom I was very close."

Najya was already elsewhere. "Two sudden violent deaths in one 'family,' as you call it, just weeks apart. That's more than suspicious.

Are the police involved?"

"Yes, of course. But what I came about is the baby . I need to ask about international law. You said you studied-"

"I did. Many years ago. What do you want to know?"

The frown of concern that settled on Najya's face was comforting.

The look of someone who understood life' s complexities and who could be confi ded in.

"Well, Derek' s father-stepfather actually-is an American preacher, and he arrived in Cairo with him. He' s still here. Now that his stepson is dead, he wants to take his grandchild back to the United States, to be raised as a Christian. And he has a lawyer with him."

"A lawyer? A man's son is killed in a melee, and the fi rst thing he does is set his lawyer on a custody claim?"

"Well, he's investigating the death, of course, but it was clear even when he arrived that he wanted the little girl back in the US. Since Derek was shot, he's claiming that the child is in danger here and would be safer with him outside of Egypt."

"He sounds dreadful."

"He is, and I can usually stand up to men like him. But when it involves the law and the courts, I don' t know. And after everything else that has happened in just a few days, I'm sort of at the end of my rope."

Najya touched her lightly on the shoulder , as if considering an embrace, then stood up. She walked away for a moment, then returned with the paper cup, this time containing a shot of whiskey. "Here, drink this. I know it' s a cliche, but it does take the edge of f. I want to hear more."

Najya was next to her again, wonderfully close.

Valerie could smell the soap she had just washed with. She nodded silently and downed the whiskey in a single gulp. She coughed from the fi rst shock, then felt the warmth spread through her chest. Najya was right; it blurred the pain.

* 114 *

Vulture's Kiss "He was all I had for family, for almost ten years. He saved my life once, brought me back to life, at the risk of his own. He was the purest soul I ever knew."

Najya brushed a strand of hair out of Valerie's face, her deep brown eyes sweeping over her like velvet. "I know what you're feeling.

My brother was killed in the street during the fi rst intifada for the crime of throwing rocks at a tank. I know the hole it rips in your chest, and I'm so sorry. If it's any consolation, the pain is all yours, not his. And you can do a lot for him-in his memory. What do you think he would have wanted?"

Valerie tried to chuckle, but it came out a brief snort. "He would have wanted a full chorus and orchestra, at least. And an opera if I could manage it." She wiped her nose again. "But I know for sure he would have wanted his daughter to be raised in Egypt with her own mother .

Right now both of them are living here with Auset's parents."

Najya took the cup and set it aside. "Under any law I know , a mother has the right to raise her own child as long as she' s competent. She is competent, isn't she? I mean she doesn't talk to ghosts, does she?"

"No, of course not." Valerie looked away, thinking not any longer, anyhow. "So what should she do?"

"Well, I never actually practiced law , and international treaties generally deal with states, not individuals, except as to what state an individual belongs. The child could be considered a US citizen due to her father , but she' s also, of course, an Egyptian. It will be very diffi cult for a stepgrandfather to claim custody of a child in the care of her mother and real grandparents. I think this man is all bluster . Still, stranger things have happened, so you'd better check with someone who's actually a practicing lawyer."

She sifted through objects in a lar ge canvas shoulder bag at the foot of the bed and fi shed out a thick calendar . From a pocket at the back of it she shook out several business cards. "Here. Try this guy .

Nitzan. He's good. A Jew, so he'll be a disinterested third party . Plus he's smart." She copied the information onto a scrap of paper.

Noting two numbers on the paper , and only one of them with a Cairo area code, Valerie folded the paper into her shirt pocket.

"If I were staying in Cairo, I'd go with you to see him, but I have to leave tonight for my home offi ce. I'd like to follow the case from there, though, so please keep me informed. My telephone number is * 115 *

also on the paper."

Valerie studied the splendid Arab face. The narrow, forward-set nose, the slightly oval eyes from Mongol genes that fl oated through the northern Arab population, warm black-brown eyes lined by thick lashes.

A fi ne line of dark hair also grew down in front of her ear . Details she hadn't noticed when Najya was half naked. "I'm grateful for your help.

I don't know what I would have done-"

"Please, it's nothing." Najya said quietly and extended a slender hand toward her, slowly.

It seemed to take minutes, but fi nally the errant hand was at Valerie's face, and the fi ngertips brushed lightly along her chin line until her thumb touched the corner of her mouth and rested there. All she had to do was move her head the tiniest bit and the thumb would sweep over her lips.

Keys clattered behind the door; one slid into the lock. Najya'

s hand jerked away as if scorched. She stood up as the handle turned and the door opened.

"Hello, Harry." Najya was composed. "We've got a visitor, but I believe you've already met."

Valerie saw a smile fl icker over his face for an instant, though it could also have been disdain. Or maybe he was one of those men who got excited at seeing women together.

He set his backpack down on the bed and hooked his thumb over the edge of his pocket. "Good afternoon, Ms. Foret. Have you come to claim this room too?"

Valerie stood up calmly and focused on him for the fi rst time. He was well muscled, like a man who worked out obsessively , but his manner and bulk seemed at odds with his pale face and too-pretty almond eyes.

Something about the overall man was off-putting, not the least of which was the knowledge that he was having sex with Najya Khoury.

Valerie glanced around as she moved toward the still open door .

Her sweep took in his camera equipment, beer chest, their luggage, and fi nally Najya herself. "No, I know that all this belongs to you."