Thursday, March 19, 2020

The Diary of Nathanael P. Boone


It was a dismal Wednesday, the date more specifically being April 15, 1885. We had been venturing far, far into the erg, heading west together with that wild and potentially insane Bedouin, Jefet, who had insisted that he had something really good, something unique, to show us. We had been digging up around Luxor for quite some time. Well, at least a couple of weeks, and after ditching any notion of advancing science and preserving culture, we were simply in it for the loot. Clyde Walker really knew several collectors in the States, France and Britain that were interested in anything Egyptian, or even Egyptian-looking. We had been peddling off some samples of Egyptian art over the course of the last year, and we felt pretty cocky about ourselves: just one dig or heist away from a sizeable amount of dollars and lives in luxury, or at least comfort. It was hard work, though. The wretched Egyptians are both unreliable and at times dangerous, and the desert is a harsh and unforgiving workplace. Yet, both Nate Schwartz and Gordon Grissom vacillated between stoicism and enthusiasm while Clyde Walker and myself egged us on. 

We met Jefet al-Bakr in a Cairo coffee house, and he was regarded as an Egyptian maverick and a teller of tall tales. It was perhaps the name-dropping of Clyde around his menagerie of collectors that made Jefet approach us, and although he was polite, his weird manners and strange dress made us a bit uncertain or even concerned. We could see why some of the more traditional and culturally motivated archaeologists shun Jefet. Yet, when he claimed that he had some goods to sell, we were of course genuinely interested, and we finally got rid of Jefet after agreeing to meet him next day close to the souk. We were prepared for everything from an armed robbery to a no-show, and we were marginally disappointed when we actually met Jefet and only Jefet. We all sat down over cups of sweet mint tea, and Jefet looked at us, all of us, with a smug smile on his rather plump features. He pushed his fez forward onto his forehead and leaned forward in an almost theatrical way before reaching into his robe and producing a small item, no more than an inch by two and a half, and wrapped in filthy waxed cloth and string. He beckoned us to unwrap the small package, and Nate Schwarz started fumbling with the string. A glint of gold caught our eyes as the cloth was removed, and a delicate plaque of what seemed to be a Horus with a strange long-beaked bird’s head adored by worshippers was revealed. I myself had never heard of such a thing, but by God, it was magnificent. The details were exquisite, and the bright gold inlays and brightly painted worshippers made the plaque seem like it was made yesterday. The plaque itself seemed to have been part of a presentation, perhaps on a small shrine or a piece of furniture, and it was made of what seemed to be clay with remnants of some form of resin on the back. We had difficulties hiding our excitement, but eventually Clyde sipped his tea, looked at Jefet, shrugged, and said that “it’s nice, real nice, but I’ve seen better”. Clyde knew what he was doing, and the haggling was most intense. You could even notice Jefet’s frustration with Clyde, but at the end a price was agreed upon, and Jefet assured us that there was more to be had, if we had the means.    

We all went back to the house that Nate Schwartz had rented for the season. It was nothing spectacular, but it had a small atrium garden where we typically would sit around between digs, drinking coffee in the morning, tea during the afternoon, and some more powerful beverages after the sun set. Clyde Walker was still holding the plaque, tracing his fingers over the hieroglyphs. Gordon lit his trademark pipe, while Nate peeled a tangerine. I was eagerly waiting for Ali, our man-servant, to carry out refreshments. Clyde eventually looked up, and being the man with contacts, immediately stated that “We should go for it. One more dig, and then back to the US, real food and decent weather”. There were objections, as Nate pointed out that we didn’t know how much this would cost us, and how could we really know that this would be the Big One, the Final Dig? However, in this case Gordon Grissom didn’t side with Nate, as he otherwise tended to do. He re-lit his pipe and simply told Nate that he was wrong: “We need to do this now, while we have the edge. I am not interested in becoming one of those people during the gold rush who would ruin their lives looking for that final vein of gold”. I nodded emphatically, as did Clyde, his waxed moustache bobbing with his head. Nate didn’t even offer a counter-argument, but simply pulled out his notebook and said: “well then, what do we need for this final endeavor?” Ali started pouring drinks as I went to get our collections of maps.   

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