Elisha's Bones (A Jack Hawthorne Adventure Book #1) , livre ebook

Cover
Title Page
Copyright Page
© 2009 by Don Hoesel
Published by Bethany House Publishers 11400 Hampshire Avenue South Bloomington, Minnesota 55438 www.bethanyhouse.com
Bethany House Publishers is a division of Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan. www.bakerpublishinggroup.com
Ebook edition created 2011
Ebook corrections 01.05.2018
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
ISBN 978-1-4412-0817-0
Scripture quotations labeled NIV 1984 are from the Holy Bible, New International Version®. NIV®. Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com
Cover design by John Hamilton Design
Dedication
For Dawn Thank you for the last seventeen years. This book wouldn’t have happened without you.
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Back Ads
Back Cover
C HAPTER 1
KV65, THE VALLEY OF THE KINGS, EGYPT, 2003
I t’s an indescribable sound when a piece of ancient stone finally gives. There’s a subtle pop, like the top of an aspirin bottle coming off to reveal that annoying wad of cotton stuffed into the plastic innards. Except that, in this case, the sound is amplified by whatever magnitude is required to testify to two tons of rock wrenching away from symbiotic stone. I think what I hear is the instant equalization of air pressure—a force that can either ease or enhance whatever stresses time has built into the coupling. It’s the moment when the whole event can result in either expectant silence, or in a violent redistribution of forces. And it all has to be in my imagination, because it’s only a romantic notion to think that the mind could process the event in real time.
Several field technicians are trying to peer into the sarcophagus through the three-inch gap made available courtesy of the removal of the two-ton slab of red granite that hangs suspended on a precarious-looking pulley mechanism. I know the machine is rated for far greater than the stone’s weight, but even that bit of professional knowledge doesn’t alleviate the fear I would have about slipping my fingers into the crack. I place my hand against the stone and press against it to stop its lazy swing. At almost four thousand pounds, even an arc of a few millimeters would put a severe dent into someone’s skull, and having worked with these young men and women for almost a month, I’m not certain that all of them are observant enough to stay out of striking distance.
It’s stifling in here; lines of sweat run down my face and soak my collar. The burial chamber is less than six and a half meters long, and there are a dozen people in it and more machinery than should be allowed at a dig, purely on principle—not to mention the five bright fluorescent lights that make casting a shadow an impossibility. I know one of the supposed benefits of these lights is that they don’t give off heat, but I’m not buying it, no matter what the brochure says.
I lean in, the stone stilled beneath my fingers, and I think that I can almost smell the cumin, thyme, and cinnamon that went into the preparation of the mummy, even through the probable two additional coffins encasing the reposing ancient. I glance around at the assembled junior members of the team, whom Jim has asked me to instruct as most of them pursue doctorates. I’m not much of a teacher—I could never hold down a professorship—yet I take pleasure in seeing the looks on the team’s faces as they enjoy this unprecedented opportunity.
KV65 is one of those rare opportunities granted to someone in my profession—a find that makes careers, that puts one in every serious journal in the field for the next decade. True, this is Jim’s baby, but he brought me in to handle the particulars, and that will yield almost as many peer accolades. It’s virtually another Tutankhamen, even down to the post-Amarna dating.
Before I can call for a flashlight, at least four click on. The mingling beams push back the blackness of the sepulcher. Leaning in close, forgetting the earlier reluctance to place my body in harm’s way, I let my eyes grow accustomed to the alternating splotches of light and shadow against the outer coffin until I can see a deep red that I recognize as ancient cypress. A few moments pass as I ponder why this is peculiar—why the sight of a wood that’s perfectly appropriate for this region, and for the time period that saw this man interred, seems wrong. And when the answer waves its little hand, I find another of those teaching opportunities I so enjoy. I ignore it.
But one of my young acolytes will not see his education shortchanged.
“Dr. Hawthorne?” Brown asks. He’s twenty-four, attached to the Smithsonian, earning a doctorate at Cornell, and might be the smartest person in this room. And I’m only slightly threatened by that. After all, the successful practice of archaeology involves more than knowledge; there’s an equal measure of luck. And after watching Brown over the last few weeks, I’m inclined to think that’s a commodity he has not stockpiled.
I straighten and motion for him to take a look, taking a step back as he crosses in front of me. I’m careful to avoid bumping his cast-encased arm.
“Interesting,” he says after a moment.
“Yep.” A quick glance around reveals that the other people in the room want in on the discussion, so I prompt post-grad Cornell. “Can you share with the rest of the class?”
“The outer coffin is just wood,” Brown says. “There’s no linen, no gold overlay. Nothing to indicate that this is anything but the burial chamber for a minor noble.”
“Which is odd because. . . ?”
“Everything we’ve seen to this point would indicate this is a royal tomb. It’s almost spot-on Tutankhamen.”
For as much as I dislike the whole teaching aspect of this assignment, at least I’ve caught on to one of the tricks practiced by genuine academics: allowing my most-qualified student to teach in my stead.
I’m as intrigued as is he by the incongruity of the barren outer coffin within a sepulcher—indeed an entire tomb—that is patterned after those of the pharaohs. And I have no immediate answer.
I wipe my brow, aware that I’m leaving a film of red dust under my hairline. Now that we’ve found something unexpected, I’m more bothered by the fact that Jim is not here. It’s worse than Will’s absence. At least my brother has a concrete reason for missing an event important enough to earn the presence of two National Geographic photographers. Jim wouldn’t give me a reason that carried any kind of weight; he was merely insistent that the events of the morning proceed. Not that he had to do too much arm-twisting; were he here, I would still be the one walking the Scooby Gang through their paces. Even so, there’s an unspoken rule that something of this magnitude should only take place under the watchful eye of the archaeologist of record. I shake my head, consoling myself with the thought that Jim’s absence means the guys from National Geographic will have to put my face on the cover of their next issue.
I field a sudden urge to light a cigar and my hand moves to my breast pocket, but I let the impulse pass, the dust in the chamber making it hard enough to breathe.
Several members of the team are jockeying for position around the sepulcher, shining their small lights into the crack. For the few moments that I afford myself to watch them, I have to smile at their exuberance. I’m not much older than most of them, but at this moment they seem younger than I ever remember being.
Almost on their own, my eyes find Sarah. She’s a Connecticut girl, with the superior and privileged vocal intonations to prove it. She’s one of the few on the team who has halted her education with a graduate degree.
But I can tell that she loves the work. She is as attentive, detailed, and driven as any of the others working alongside her. And she’s easy on the eyes. I’ve always been a sucker for a brunette, and Sarah has deep brown eyes to go with her lustrous locks.
As if she can sense my gaze, she looks up and, after a pause, gives me a small smile. That’s another thing about northeastern women: a smile can convey a great deal.
I’m the first to look away, and Brown saves me from having to consider what that says about me.
“Dr. Hawthorne?”
The puzzlement in his voice has me at his side in an instant. I crouch and follow the beam of his flashlight as it passes back and forth over a portion of the outer coffin. All I can see is a slight curve, yet it’s enough to hint that it’s at least vaguely anthropoid. I’m about to ask Brown what I’m supposed to be seeing when the light flashes by a faded irregularity in the wood. I’m not certain how long it takes before I recognize the abnormality as script, but when the revelation comes, it adds another mystery to the tally.
“Coptic,” I say, and Brown nods in my periphery.
The find draws me closer, until I’m breathing the stale air, squinting to make sense of the words carved into the wood. There is little that is new in excavations conducted in the Valley of the Kings; everything has a corollary. KV9 is what comes to mind, with its walls decorated with ancient graffiti in a mixture of Coptic and Lycian. But this isn’t graffiti; this is something else entirely. For a brief moment Nag Hammadi passes through my mind, solely for the Coptic element, but I let the thought go before it can find purchase. Playing connect-the-dots without even the most basic evide