Chapter IV.

I blinked.

The full force of the idea didn't immediately register. I repeated it in my head several times- missing... missing... missing- until the word detached from its meaning, becoming merely a handful of letters, a string of phonemes with no literal context. I blinked again and my mind snapped back to attention, like a camera lens focusing on the subject of a photograph.

"Missing?" I repeated out loud. James looked grim. "What kind of missing, like he went on vacation and just didn't tell anyone? Or... ?" I trailed off, not wanting to complete the thought.

"I don't know," he said slowly. "He telephoned me Sunday evening and asked me to teach the class on Monday. He didn't explain why. On Monday evening I went over to his flat to return a book I had borrowed and... he wasn't there."

James shrugged and let out a deep sigh, then continued. "The front door was unlocked. In fact, I believe I recall that it was even opened a crack. His desk looked as if it had been rummaged through." He gave a strange little laugh, and said, "The papers on top of it were in far better order than he keeps them himself."

A beat of silence passed before I wondered, "Was anything missing?"

James looked at me sharply, as if he had forgotten I was listening, then shook his head. "I couldn't tell. I didn't bother to look too closely."

He was silent again; this time I was, too, until he said, almost whispering, "It's been five days. I've had no message, no telephone call, nothing. I'm beginning to fear the worst."

I furrowed my brow. "What about Dr. Ashraf's family? Do they know where he is?"

One corner of James's mouth lifted ruefully. "I am his only family here. He's my uncle."

"Your uncle?" I said, surprised.

"Yes, my mother's brother."

"Oh." I had a new crop of questions already forming in my mind, but I turned my focus to the immediate problem. "Are you going to call the police?"

"I am... hesitant... to rely on the police."

"Then..." What are you supposed to do again when someone is missing in a foreign country? But, of course, to Dr. Ashraf, Egypt was not foreign. "The Embassy?" I offered anyway.

"What embassy?" James looked almost helpless, just for a second. Then he shook his head. "I have dual British and Egyptian citizenship, but Uncle is an Egyptian national. The British Embassy can't help, nor the American."

A seed of determination was growing steadily in my gut, and now it burst forth. "Well, we have to do something!" I exclaimed. "What if he's in danger?"

"'We'?" he repeated quietly, one eyebrow raised. Then his expression drooped and his head sank into his hand, rubbing his forehead.

"The... collective, ambiguous 'we'... I mean," I explained, though I wasn't sure that was really what I had meant. "Unless... there's anything I can do...?"

James was shaking his head again. "I shouldn't have told you. I didn't mean to get you involved."

Typical male. "You said you haven't told anyone else, right? Not even the University?"

"Yes, I suppose the University should know, though they won't be able to help," he said thoughtfully. "But, really, I'm dreadfully sorry I even told you about this. I don't want you worrying needlessly."

"Needlessly?" I was incredulous. "Uh, if ever there was a need for worry, I'd say a missing person would be at the top of the list!" I huffed, then continued more calmly, "And since you don't want anyone else to know, I'm the only one who can worry."

I glanced at his face to see if my logic was having any affect on him. He only looked a teensy bit skeptical, so I kept going. "You're going to search for him yourself, aren't you?" He nodded jerkily. "Let me help. Two heads are better than one." I smiled, I hoped reassuringly. "Kind of cliché, I know, but it's true, alright?"

A ghost of a smile crossed James's face. "You-" he stopped abruptly, then seemed to change his train of thought and resign himself to saying, "Yes, you do have a point."

... ... ... ... ...

Dr. Ashraf's apartment was only a five minute walk from the campus. James had decided to take me there when I was done with classes for the day to show me how he had found it. He also thought it would be a good starting point for our search. As we left the University, I pulled on my long-sleeved white shirt and straw hat and re-adjusted the strap of my book bag over my shoulder.

I was shocked to hear James laugh, and turned to him sharply. "What?"

"Are you allergic to sunlight?" he said, still laughing.

I rolled my eyes. "Pretty much, yeah. At least, this harsh of sunlight." James shook his head. "Hey, you should consider yourself lucky. These freckles," I said, pointing to my face, "not even close to the worst damage the sun can do to my pasty white skin."

"But I like your freckles." He smiled at my wary expression. "Really, they're charming."

"Nice save," I muttered, and was met with another chuckle.

We were silent for a minute or two before I asked, "So, what book was it?"

"Book?" He was genuinely puzzled.

"The book you were returning when you found... you know." I didn't want to say what he had found.

"Oh, that book. It was a Bonaparte biography."

That was not what I had expected from a professor of Egyptology. When I said as much, James explained, "Well, quite a lot of this book was devoted to Napoleon's Egyptian Campaign."

"The Rosetta Stone," I murmured, remembering my classes in hieroglyphics.

James had switched into teacher-mode. "Yes, very good. And do you know who the chief translator of the Stone was?"

I gave him what I hoped was a withering glance. "Champollion. Do I get a gold star now?"

He laughed, but didn't answer, for we had stopped walking and were standing in front of a sterile concrete apartment building. "This is it," said James.

I gazed up at the huge stone block in disbelief, then spun to look across the street. During our walk I had been so preoccupied that I hadn't noticed where we were heading. The building on the other side of the unusually quiet road from Dr. Ashraf's place of residence was where I lived.

James noticed my expression and sounded concerned when he said, "What's wrong?"

I shook my head. Probably just coincidence. "Nothing, I just... had one of those moments. You know, like, when you're thinking about something and your brain is going and it's like 'enhhh,' but then it just like goes 'eh,' and it stops and you forget what you were thinking about?"

I was babbling. I glanced up into James's bemused face, then shook my head again. "Anyway, this is his apartment?"

For a minute I thought he wasn't going to let it go, but then he collected himself (more subtly than I had) and said, "Yes. Third floor." Then he pushed open the glass door and motioned for me to go in.

The building's elevator was out of order, so we had to take the stairs. I counted two flights of stairs, then stepped onto the third floor landing and started down the hall. It took me a couple of steps to realize James wasn't behind me.

"Where are you going?" he called from the stairs.

"You said third floor," I called back, then remembered that silly British habit of calling the first floor the "ground floor," and the second floor the "first floor," and so on. Before he could respond, I said, "Oh, but you meant fourth floor, didn't you?" and met him half-way up the third flight of stairs.

From his position two steps above me, James's height seemed particularly imposing. He grinned down at me. "No, I meant the third floor." He turned and started up the stairs again, talking over his shoulder. "It's at the top of the third flight of steps, so it's the third floor."

I let out an exaggerated sigh. "But it's the fourth floor!"

He laughed. "You and your logic."

We had reached the landing, now (the fourth floor landing), and James lead me to the end of the hall, stopping at the very last door on the right. He pulled a brass key from his trouser pocket and fitted it into the lock, turned, and gently pushed the door open.

The apartment looked pretty much as I had expected it to: smallish, shabby yet comfortable, a bit messy, with a few antiques and pieces of art here and there, and absolutely bursting with books. I stood in the center of the round oriental rug and turned slowly, taking them all in. Nearly every available wall space was occupied by shelves, stacked two-deep, and piles of books seemed to sprout from the floor.

James searched the desk under the window quickly but thoroughly. "I don't think there's anything missing," he said, mostly to the air, since I wasn't really paying attention.

I was too busy looking at all the books. Behind the worn leather arm chair I had discovered a smaller bookcase, the kind with glass doors on the front. I gingerly touched the tarnished knob of the right door and tugged gently, breathing in the smell of aged paper. This must be Dr. Ashraf's antique book collection. My eyes took them in greedily.

"I'm going to check the bedroom," James said, and turned down the microscopic hallway.

"Okay," I called absently, pulling one of the ragged cloth-bound volumes out with infinite care. The title had faded from its cover, but the title page indicated that it was the first volume of Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo. I leafed through the pages slowly, glancing at the publication date, then did a double-take. That couldn't be right, could it? If it was, then this book was a first edition!

I was pulled out of my reverie by James calling my name. "Marianne!" He sounded agitated. I looked up as he emerged from the hallway holding a scrap of paper and sat down at the desk again. "I found something!"

I hauled myself to my feet, Dumas forgotten, and looked over James's shoulder at the paper he was poring over. "A note?" I wondered.

"Yes, I think so." He had pulled out a blank sheet of paper and a pen and was scribbling furiously.

I took a closer look at the note. "Is that hieratic?"

"Yes," he murmured, and kept writing. I barely remembered even the little hieratic I had learned, but I had deciphered three or four of the symbols by the time James was done translating the whole note.

"There!" he said triumphantly. Then he read his translation, and his shoulders began to sag. "Oh, no," he breathed. "No."

"What is it?" I was more than a little scared of his answer, but instead of speaking, he simply handed me the translation to read for myself.

James-

If you are reading this note, I have been taken. Don't worry, they won't kill me. But they want information that only you and I know. I will do my best to stall them, but they will most likely come for you next. Don't try to find me. Run.

I read it three times before looking up. James was watching me, his face inscrutable. I shoved the note back into his hand and demanded, "Explain."

Okay, I know this took forever. I'm sorry! This quarter really kicked my butt, so there's no need for all you have been waiting patiently to do that. In fact, I only finished this chapter because I'm putting off finishing my final paper for my poetry class. Spring Break is approaching, so I'm hoping I'll be able to get a few more chapters in. Again, sorry! And thank you for being patient, or, if you weren't patient, for liking my story enough to want to read more!