Star of Egypt Read Online Free PDF

Willis, “considering that incompetent Groth, out there.”
    “He’s beefing about the hours, mainly, Professor. His boys are up to it if he’s not. Let me worry about him, too.”
    Willis sighed, as though done with the matter. “A relief, to be sure. Shall we continue the tour?”
    He nodded to himself, “Yes.” To the women, he added, “I hope we’ll have time to dine and talk later, but now those damnable
     obligations of duty must hold sway. Being British—”
    “We understand such obligations too well!” laughed Maggie. “Forever the victims of stereotyping, I suppose.”
    “After you, Professor,” Slayton offered. “Until later, then, ladies,” he added. The cabin door swung shut with a solid
thunk
.
    “
Ciao,
” said Maggie.
    “Good evening,” said Shauna.
    Both women turned and regarded each other, pointedly, as soon as the hatch was closed.
    The secondary hold on the
Star of Egypt
was a huge and dank affair, glutted with shapeless cargo, all lashed and crated and padded against the jostling of shipment.
     The smells were of dust, salt water, light lubricants, canvas, and hemp. Professor Willis led Slayton through the badly lit
     maze of cargo, wielding a large emergency flashlight.
    “All this has yet to be moved to the warehouse,” he said. “Then another checklist, another inventory; we take stock almost
     daily sometimes. Some of the crating material we use is constructed very much like those Oriental boxes-within-boxes-within-boxes.
     We transport the dead of Egypt in the same fashion the Egyptians themselves used to entomb them, in multiple coffins.”
    When the two men were alone in the thick of the stacked and labelled incunabula, Willis stopped and shone the light directly
     in Slayton’s face. Slayton’s heart jumped, but his body tensed.
    “Just who are you, Mr. Rademacher, I mean
really
, and what is your purpose here?” The voice was direct, clinical, and humorless. The change itself was unnerving.
    Slayton’s business, however, was dealing with unnerving situations, and he didn’t miss a beat. “Top level and top secret,
     Professor. You mentioned the political burlesques that governments are so fond of. I’m here to insure such a thing does not
     happen. Surely you’ve guessed that by now.” He had his hands out before him in honest entreaty.
    The Professor’s lamp did not waver, and for all the difference it made, they might have been deep inside the twists and turns
     of a pyramid in the Nile Valley, Slayton’s life in the Professor’s hands. “Flattering my intellect is not exactly a direct
     answer, Mr. Rademacher.”
    “If any of these relics around us were to be damaged, or destroyed, there would be political reverberations, I’m sure. Professor,
     the only reason I’m here is to see that that doesn’t happen.” Slayton did not gild his cover story any further. To become
     talkative on such short notice would give him away.
    Still Willis remained immobile. Finally, he said, “Hm.” He turned away and continued leading Slayton through the maze, as
     though nothing had happened.
    By touring the remaining holds in sequence, Slayton was for the first time able to get an estimate of the sheer size of the
     articles that made up the Seth-Olet tour. There were over a thousand major pieces, and the tour was to differ from the Tutankhamen
     show in that the setups for Seth-Olet and his burial trappings were to sport local color, that is, the items from the tomb
     would be presented in a surrogate tomb, the better to present the traditional arrangements of such items to the lay public
     and simultaneously spice the proceedings a bit, should it look too much like a dusty history lesson. There were some canny
     PR minds at work on this project, as well as eccentric scientists, beautiful women, and a lone terrorist or two.
    Slayton heaved an exasperated breath. Sometimes he preferred the straightforward honesty of a fight in a darkened alley, with
     broken bottles