Why wouldn’t Egypt be eminently civilized?I think. Mama’s comment belies a condescending attitude about a sophisticated culture that thrived when our own illiterate ancestors were likely living in huts. Comments and perspectives that might not have caught my attention at home seem inappropriate here.
Papa downs his Tom Collins, kicking back in his seat a little to take in the room. “When I first started coming to Shepheard’s years ago, I had to elbow my way to the bar. It teemed with tourists, government officials, collectors, explorers, artists, businessmen, you name it. Everyone had been lured here by the promise of riches or history—oftentimes one and the same. Those were heady times.” As he gesturesto the waiter for another drink, he mutters, “Where the hell is everyone these days?”
I had been about to remind him that Egypt, like the rest of the world, is still digging itself out of the wreckage of the war. Prior to the start of the war, the Ottoman Empire had been the official ruler of the country, but the British wielded the actual power. When war broke out, this meant that a million Egyptian men were drafted as soldiers and the country became a staging ground and camp for the military, because it behooved the British. This led, in part, to the revolt over the British occupation that Uncle Aubrey warned us about. But I don’t get the chance to remind Papa of Egypt’s more recent history.
“Motor Carnarvon!” A deep voice bellows across the long bar. “Is that really you?”
Papa swivels in his chair. Bounding toward us is a behemoth of a man, burly and barrel-chested even though he has a full head of white hair and must be in his fifties, like my father. When Papa stands, the man sweeps him up in a bear hug.
Who is this man? Uncle Aubrey once told Porchey and me that “Motor Carnarvon” caught on as Papa’s nickname when he was young. Papa had been one of the first people in England to drive and own cars, and his passion for automobiles and racing them around the countryside is well-known. But I have never heard anyone actually use the moniker. I’d always assumed it faded away when Papa suffered the terrible car crash in Germany nearly twenty years ago that almost killed him. The accident lingers even now, in his lungs, in his limp, in his energy, even though he pretends otherwise.
“My God, Miller, is that really you?” Papa says with a deep, resonant laugh. “It’s been nearly a decade since I’ve seen you! Since before the war.”
The men briefly catch up on the war years, until my mother pointedly clears her throat. Papa introduces him as “Mr. Miller, an old friend from my early days excavating. A man who’s helped me put my hands on some fine antiquities for my collection.”
My father’s description of Mr. Miller is straightforward, but I wonder. Mr. Carter has told me a bit about how museums, institutions,and even individuals come to own Egyptian antiquities. In the past, licensed archaeologists have been permitted by law to keep half of the artifacts they excavate, with the other half going to the Egyptian government. Those archaeologists can keep those items—for display or study—or sell them legally to collectors or institutions. But unlicensed diggers, so-called grave robbers, have been unearthing Egyptian treasures since time immemorial, and those illicit objects also find their way into the marketplace. This sometimes happens through antiquities fences, men who look the part of upstanding dealers but actually operate as middlemen between the grave robbers and the collectors or through shops. Given that all excavations are meant to be licensed by the Egyptian government, this illicit unearthing and subsequent sale of objects is distinctly criminal, and yet seems to be an embedded part of the antiquities business. It is anyone’s guess whether such practices will be tolerated if the Egyptian people take back control, as Uncle Aubrey intimated.
How exactly has Mr. Miller helped Papa “put his hands” on Egyptian artifacts? Something about the way Papa describes him and the demeanor of the man himself gives me pause, especially since I assumed most, if not all, of Papa’s well-regarded collection came from his own excavations or through Mr. Carter. Could Mr. Miller be a fence? As soon as I ask the question, I answer it with a resounding no. Papa’s collection is world-renowned and surely doesn’t have the taint of criminality.
“What do you ladies have planned while you are in Cairo?” Mr. Miller asks collegially.
Papa answers, before either Mama or I can. “We are heading to Luxor straightaway.”
“Please don’t tell me you have come to Cairo but only plan on letting your daughter see the inside of Shepheard’s?” he asks my parents.
Mama’s cheeks flame, and I do believe this gentleman—if, indeed, heisa gentleman—has opened a door for me to visit the souk. “Of course not, Mr. Miller,” she answers.
I turn to meet Mama’s eyes; I want to lock her in. “So we do indeed have a visit to the souk on the schedule?”
“Yes, but—”
Mr. Miller interjects, “No time like the present. We’ve got just enough time for a spin before dinner.” He claps Papa on the back. “I have a new vendor I’d like you to meet.”
With the men in the lead, we stroll out of Shepheard’s into the still-bright early evening. Hailing one of the carriages for hire lining the street in front of the hotel, we drive toward the Khan el-Khalili, the best-known souk. I notice that Cairo seems even livelier than it had this afternoon. A certain energy and purpose fills the air and the people we pass, Egyptian and European alike. This continues even in the street approaching the bazaar, which I’d assumed would be winding down for the night. Strange, how an English shop that seems straight from Oxford Street sits right next to a storefront with Arabic lettering that could easily be set in the Middle Ages. We seem to be hovering between times, in this intersection of old and new Cairo.
Stepping under the soaring archway to the souk and onto the market’s interior cobblestoned road, I feel as though I’ve entered an entirely different realm, one punctuated with sounds and smells and sights I’ve never seen before. We duck under wooden balconies jutting out from limestone walls decorated with patterned tiles. We pass stalls overflowing with striking yellow, gold, and red powders spilling out of canisters overseen by purveyors grinding spices with a mortar and pestle.
The market bustles with buyers and sellers alike. A woman at a handloom making silk and cotton offers a sample to me as we weave through the fabric stalls until the road dead-ends. There, we turn right into an alleyway. It is so narrow that the balconies soaring above us on either side practically touch. I hear Mama mutter, “Of all the foolish things,” and just as I think she’s about to demand we return to Shepheards’s, we enter a cramped store, barely a narrow aisle wide.
As Mr. Miller introduces Papa to the store’s owner, Mamouk, I gaze in wonder at the overflowing shelves lining the walls behind racks of souvenir photographs, sheet music of popular songs like “Moonlight on the Nile,” and gleaming miniature obelisks and hieroglyphic-imprinted vases. As I peruse the shelves, I spot a few pottery shardsand fragments of cartouches that, somehow, I know aren’t replicas for tourists. They are real.
Where did these artifacts come from? Were they sold to the store’s owner by licensed excavators who had no need for them? Given how important even the smallest of pottery shards can be to understanding ancient Egypt, I find it difficult to believe that a serious archaeologist would surrender them, but I suppose it’s possible. Could Mamouk have purchased them from one of the grave robbers that Mr. Carter has told me about? If so, are these items being illegally offered for resale? These questions unmoor me momentarily, until I remind myself that I needn’t worry about the untoward activities of others. I’m in Egypt with Papa and Mr. Carter, who have been fully authorized by the Egyptian government to excavate in the Valley of the Kings.
How I long to study the treasures in this store, and ask the proprietor whether an object with one of Hatshepsut’s marks upon it has ever passed through his hands. “I almost wish we weren’t leaving Cairo tomorrow,” I whisper to myself.
“You are in luck, Eve.” I hear Mama’s voice behind me, and it isn’t entirely kind. “You aren’t leaving Cairo tomorrow. At the British High Commission Residency tomorrow evening, there will be a reception in your honor.”
Chapter Fifteen
FEBRUARY 23, 1920
CAIRO,EGYPT
I hum along to the instrumental version of “Swanee,” the popular Al Jolson tune, singing the lyrics in my head. This song about longing could be an anthem for the British people in Cairo. Although the British have been ruling this country in all but name for decades, they live, work, and entertain in neighborhoods and clubs and parks and golf courses meant to simulate home, entirely separate and apart from the Egyptian citizens. While I knew this in theory, it’s been a shock to see the longing for England in practice.
I press my back into the cool marble column in the vast ballroom at the Residency, the lavish mansion that serves as the headquarters of British High Commissioner Allenby. Even though this is the Egyptian winter, the heat of the ballroom, purportedly the largest in Cairo, is overwhelming. I pretend that I’ve lost my dance card so that I might sit out this one dance, and find some air near the open terrace doors.
This is the second event at the Residency I’ve attended in the past ten days. The first reception at the Residency in the district of Adbeen welcomed me into “Egyptian” society and yielded a host of other invitations. We spent the intervening days at lawn tennis parties at the exclusive Gezira Sporting Club and lectures with tea at the insular Turf Club—and the nights at a multicourse dinner party in Heliopolis; the casino in Shepheard’s; and dances at the Mena House overlooking the pyramids; the Savoy; the Semiramis Hotel; and, of course, Shepheard’s. Only the sight of the pyramids brought me anyreal pleasure. And now, we have returned to the Residency, for a ball that Mama has promised will be the last. For now.
