‘No snakes around here,’ Ben said. ‘Isn’t that what you told me, Kirby?’ He felt bad about having killed the creature. He stepped over to the limp body and bent down to pick it up and fling it away.

That was when he noticed that his bullet had chipped a piece out of the stone column behind Kirby, and removed some of the carved markings on it. Ben sighed. A few history books were out of date now.

He stood up, holding the dead snake in his hands.

Then he stopped. Let the snake drop, and crouched back down in the warm sand next to the pillar.

‘My heart, my heart. Jesus.’ Then Kirby looked down at Ben. ‘What are you doing now?’

Ben didn’t reply. He ran his fingers over the weathered stone, down from the bullet-chip to the strange carving he’d noticed near the column’s base. It was a little distinct from the other markings on the column, and seemed to be done in a different style.

There was no doubt about it. ‘I think you need to look at this, Kirby.’

‘What?’

‘Look.’ Ben pointed at the markings on the stone.

‘I see,’ Kirby said, puzzled. ‘But that’s-’

‘Not those, this one. The one lower down, away from the rest.’

Kirby stared.

‘It’s the seal you showed me,’ Ben said. ‘The temple, with the palm trees and the crowned bird.’

Kirby dropped to his knees next to him. ‘Shit, yes, I see it.’ He carefully brushed sand out of the markings with his finger. Studied them for a few seconds, and turned excitedly to Ben. The snake was forgotten now. ‘You’re right. It’s the seal of Wenkaura. He was here. This is what Morgan must have found.’

‘What’s that marking underneath the seal?’ Ben asked.

Kirby moved closer. ‘It’s pretty worn with age. Looks like a hieroglyph, though.’ He flattened his portly shape out on the sand to inspect it, tracing his finger along the symbols. ‘I’m pretty sure that’s the glyph for a chair, or a seat.’ He looked up. ‘But what does it mean?’

‘You tell me. You’re the expert, apparently.’

‘There has to be more,’ Kirby said. ‘We should scour the whole place.’

‘I thought you’d already done that,’ Ben said. ‘Let’s go. We’ve wasted enough time here.’

‘But-’

‘Move it, expert. You can figure it out.’

They climbed back in the Shogun. The seat was burning hot against Ben’s back as he fired up the engine and spun the wheels in the sand, bumping away from the pyramid site. They hit the road, windows open, cool air blasting in, and soon the Shogun was speeding northwards between green fields.

‘It’s a metaphor,’ Kirby said.

‘A metaphor.’

‘Got to be. Wenkaura is trying to communicate an idea through that symbol. Something that’s going to lead us to a specific place. Chair. Seat.’ He frowned, pressing his fingers to his temples. ‘Got it. It’s a symbol of authority. Position. You know, like our use of the expression “country seat”. Obvious, really.’

‘You’re just grasping at straws, Kirby,’ Ben said as he overtook a slow-moving truck and gunned the big car up the road.

‘You have any better ideas?’

‘Not yet. But you’re not doing so great yourself. You’re talking bullshit. And I don’t think the ancient Egyptians went in for metaphors.’

‘No, listen,’ Kirby insisted. ‘It makes complete sense. We know that Wenkaura, like all High Priests, was a man of very high position and privilege until Akhenaten started demolishing the religious order. He had an estate near Thebes, which is now the city of Luxor. Maybe that’s what Morgan had sussed out. Perhaps he was heading for Luxor.’

‘So what do you propose we do, professor?’

‘I wish you wouldn’t call me that,’ Kirby said testily. ‘I think we need to go to check out Wenkaura’s estate, or what’s left of it. Maybe we’ll find something.’

‘Like what?’

‘I don’t know until we get there, do I?’ Kirby snapped.

Ben was clutching the wheel so tightly that he felt he could almost rip it off the steering column. ‘Seat,’ he muttered to himself. ‘Chair.’ He thought about it.

And stamped hard on the brake. The Shogun pitched on its suspension and Kirby flopped forwards against his safety belt. The car ground to a halt in the middle of the dusty, empty road.

‘What the hell did you do that for?’ Kirby yelled.

‘It’s not land or estate,’ Ben said. ‘It’s not a place. It’s not a metaphor.’

‘What?’

‘You’re making this more complicated than it is. The answer is simple.’

‘Then what is it?’

‘A seat. An actual seat. As in a chair. As in a throne.’

Kirby stared for a moment, and burst out laughing. ‘A throne? You mean the king’s throne? You think Wenkaura left a clue on the throne of Akhenaten-his enemy, the heretic? Why would he do such a thing? It would be insane.’

‘His own, you idiot. He was a High Priest. He was an important guy, and all through history it’s been traditional that important guys have big chairs to sit in. Plus he would have had all the time in the world to have whatever inscriptions he wanted engraved on it. We need to look for the throne that sat in the temple where Wenkaura presided.’

Kirby scratched his chin and thought about it. ‘Shit, you know what? You might even be right.’

‘I might.’

‘So where to now?’

‘Somewhere they have a lot of old chairs,’ Ben said.

Chapter Forty-Three

The Egyptian Museum, central Cairo

2.45 p.m.

A short throw from the east bank of the Nile, right in the heart of the city, the grand museum housed Egypt’s largest single collection of priceless artefacts. The sun was beating down on the lawns and palm trees and clipped hedges of Tahrir Square as Ben and Kirby approached the building’s neo-classical façade and walked up the steps to the tall entrance. It was cool and quiet inside, with the hushed solemnity of a cathedral.

Their footsteps echoed as they walked across the atrium. Giant statues towered up to the high ceiling. All around them were stunning displays of Egypt’s ancient heritage.

‘I haven’t been here for years,’ Kirby whispered, gazing in awe around him. ‘You forget just how mind-blowing it is.’

Under different circumstances, Ben might have agreed with him. But time was pressing. Leaving the historian to wander around, he walked up to the main desk. The attendant sitting behind it was a somber-looking man in his late forties, balding and gaunt. ‘Can I help you?’ he asked softly in English as Ben approached.

‘I hope so,’ Ben said. ‘I’m interested in ancient ceremonial chairs, thrones, things like that. Do you have a special exhibit for those?’

The desk attendant pursed his lips, considering the odd request. ‘We house over one hundred and twenty thousand artefacts in the museum, including many thrones and ceremonial chairs. The Tutankhamun exhibit fills the upper floor, east and north wings. His throne is there. You may be interested to view it.’

‘Thanks, but I’m not interested in Tutankhamun. I’m interested in a High Priest from a few years before that, called Wenkaura.’

The man thought for a moment. ‘We have a chair and other furniture belonging to Queen Hetepheres.’

‘I’m not interested in her either.’

‘Then I’m afraid I can’t be of much assistance,’ the man replied, a little hotly. ‘The item you wish to view must be elsewhere.’

Wonderful, Ben thought as he walked away from the desk. He could see Kirby at the far end of the room, hopping excitedly from display to display. He wanted to wring his neck.

He wandered around the lower floor of the museum, deep in thought, hardly noticing the archaeological treasures that he passed by. Where to now? It seemed like a complete dead end. They had a clue, but no way to follow it up.

At the back of the room, Ben suddenly stopped dead and realised that he’d wandered into the Amarna exhibit, the home of the relics dating from the brief, troubled reign of Akhenaten and the city in the sands that his successors had tried so hard to erase forever.