Path Of The Assassin

Hours passed, and finally Hashim Nidal and his accomplice felt themselves moving. A forklift removed the crate from the cargo hold and transferred it to a flatbed trailer with several other matching containers. Everything was being done under strict military supervision. Though armed teams had swept the cargo bay repeatedly once all of the passengers were off the plane, they were still leaving nothing to chance. The crates were driven to a customs warehouse adjacent to the terminal along with all of the passenger luggage from flight 7755.

Customs broker Farouk Negim was waiting in the warehouse, flanked by one of his company’s most important clients, Dr. Abdel Mandour, curator of Cairo’s Egyptian Museum, and Dr. Kamal el Aziz, Egypt’s government minister of antiquities. They had been camped out in the warehouse manager’s office since the hijacking had been announced the previous afternoon. As part of the cultural exchange between Chicago and Cairo, Chicago’s Field Museum was loaning the Egyptian Museum a pair of mummies that had been removed from Egypt over a hundred years ago. The Egyptian Museum planned to study the mummies and then put them on display.

The fact that all of the containers had been sitting in the cargo hold of the 747-400 since yesterday afternoon troubled all but one of the men, who now exited the warehouse manager’s office and quickly made their way toward the incoming airport trailer truck.

The truck was met by Egyptian soldiers and a blond man, an obvious westerner, in a pin-striped business suit.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” said the blond man as the three Egyptians approached the trailer. “This area is off-limits. No one gets in here.”

“Who are you?” demanded Dr. el Aziz.

“Who am I? I’m Tom Ellis of the United States Embassy and this is a crime-scene investigation involving American property.”

“Well, I am Dr. Kamal el Aziz, Egypt’s government minister of antiquities, and this crime, which happened on Egyptian soil, also involves priceless Egyptian property, which has been languishing in unacceptable conditions. We are here to remove those containers in particular and get them back to the Egyptian Museum as soon as possible.”

“We? Who’s ‘we’?” asked Ellis.

“This is our customs broker, Farouk Negim, and Dr. Abdel Mandour, curator of the Egyptian Museum.”

“Gentlemen, I am sorry, but those containers are not going anywhere until we have had a chance to thoroughly investigate them.”

“You will pardon my asking, Mr. Ellis,” began Dr. Mandour, “but what is it exactly you wish to investigate?”

“We want to make sure that no one has stowed away in them and that they don’t contain any evidence that might have to do with the hijacking.”

“That is impossible,” replied the museum’s curator, who was completely unaware of what the containers truly held.

“So you say, but until I’m convinced, those crates are not going anywhere.”

Dr. el Aziz did not like the man’s tone and stepped away from the group to place a call on his cell phone.

“Mr. Ellis, do you wish to know what is in those crates?” asked Dr. Mandour, who was just as ignorant as his colleague, Dr. el Aziz.

“You betcha, and I plan to find out.”

“Let me save you the trouble. The crates contain two ancient mummies, their two wooden boxes, and two rather extraordinary sarcophagi.”

“Let’s hope, Doctor, that that’s all they contain.”

“Surely, Mr. Ellis, you do not intend to open them here.”

“Yes, I do.”

“That simply cannot happen,” said Dr. Mandour.

“Really. And why not?”

Dr. Mandour did not have the energy for this. He had been waiting since yesterday afternoon to claim the containers and had not gotten a wink of sleep all night. His wife had called him incessantly, believing he was using the hijacking as an excuse to see another woman. Finally, the poor man had to turn off his cell phone. No, the curator definitely had neither the energy, nor the patience for any of this.

“Mr. Ellis, let me show you something, if I may,” said Dr. Mandour, taking the clipboard from the customs broker and guiding Ellis toward the crates. “These crates, as you can plainly see, have all been stamped and stenciled as ‘Enviromentally Controlled.’ The top of each one has been locked with a rubber seal under the strictest of conditions at Chicago’s Field Museum. Inside, a substance called silica gel has been added to temporarily maintain the proper balance of humidity. The key word here, Mr. Ellis, is temporarily. Because of the risk to the artifacts from our modern-day air, we can only open these containers within a special facility at the Egyptian Museum-”

“And that is exactly what is going to happen,” said el Aziz, the minister of antiquities, who flipped the top down on his cell phone and returned to the group.

“What are you talking about?” said Ellis.

“Mr. Ellis, I know it is very early, but if you would kindly call your ambassador at his residence, you will find that not only has he already spoken with my government, but that he will instruct you to impede us no further.”