The British Museum’s Board of Directors quietly arranges an interview with seasoned curator Dr. Sarpy after the exhibit “Unknown Woman – Tomb KV65” vanishes from the Egyptian Exhibition. The artifact, a loan from the Cairo Museum, had been on display in London for nearly twenty years — long enough to blur the line between guest and possession. With Dr. Sarpy recently diagnosed with stage 4 prostate cancer, and too many of them having known him personally for decades, the board opts for discretion over confrontation. Instead of a formal inquiry, they dispatch Algernon St. James Cranleigh — Algie, the barely graduated Oxford nephew of Lady Isadora Cranleigh, the museum’s founding patron, to ease Dr. Sarpy into retirement. Algie finds him in his office: a floor-to-ceiling, oak-shelved chamber with a large window that surveys the restless tide of Glossveil Street below.
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FOR INTERNAL PURPOSES ONLY:
FILED UNDER:
BOARD MEMORANDUM OF CURATORIAL OVERSIGHT
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Below is the signed account of Curator Dr. William James Sarpy, Ph.D., Chief Curator of Egyptian Antiquities at the British Museum, London, Transcript, July 28, 2000
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Cranleigh: Apologies, my aunt couldn’t be here in person. I’m sure you understand.
Dr. Sarpy: Lady Cranleigh gave me my start, you know – my first excavation grant, told me where to dig, what to display, what to hide – my name on a sterling silver plaque – but respect — never.
Cranleigh: Another time, Sarpy! I’ll start the recording now. (Cranleigh, presses the record button on the Sony cassette tape recorder) I’m not obligated to tell you that; consider it a courtesy… Now, Dr. Sarpy, please explain to us what happened on the night in question, the night that exhibit, “Unknown Woman – Tomb KV65,” vanished.
Dr. Sarpy: Well, I was closing the museum as I do every night, when I heard the rustling of dry cloth and the patter of bare feet against the museum floor. I followed the noise to the Egyptian Exhibition room –the glow of green eyes peered at me from a distance, and a black cat leaped out from the darkness, almost causing me to fall.
Cranleigh: Just the facts, old boy, okay?
Dr. Sarpy pierced his eyes at Cranleigh the way his father looked at him when he knew he was getting close to being smacked in the face.
Dr Sarpy: The cat ran out the open back door. I must’ve forgotten to lock it because it swung back and forth with the outside wind– and that’s where I first saw her, huddled in a corner of the room, draped in what I assumed were rags, but it was linen — the very linen the mummy was wrapped in! Where did she come from? There had been no deviation from my nightly routine of locking and securing all exhibition rooms.
Cranleigh: Dr. Sarpy, you don’t expect me to believe —
Dr. Sarpy: Believe it or not, lad, you all wanted a story, and this is the only one I got. It just so happens to be the truth. (Well, most of it, Sarpy, thought) Now, when I left the Egyptian exhibition room, the door was closed behind me. How could she have gotten in?! At first, I thought she might be a homeless woman looking for shelter for the night. But from her looks, she had never been homeless for a single day in her life. Yes, indeed, her skin was strange, with deep brown and black plaques that seemed to be cracked resin, glistening in a soft amber brown under the low lighting. I know how crazy this must sound. I know, because I am old, you all are looking at me as if I have lost it, but I haven’t. I haven’t.
Cranleigh: And we have been appreciative of your 20 years…
Dr. Sarpy: 50 years. I have been with the British Museum for 50 years.
Cranleigh: Yes, of course, your many years of service to the museum as Chief Curator of … (fumbles with papers to find Dr. Sarpy’s title) Egyptian Antiquity. Fabulous, just fabulous, and I’m sure you want a long rest as well and leave all this museum’s commotion behind. Now, what about the mummy old chap? Can you tell us where it is?
Dr. Sarpy: I carried her home with me, trembling, cold, and scared. I did not know who to call. Who would even believe me? I watched her eyes meander around my home and grow large with fascination at various objects, the tick and sway of a grandfather clock, and the click of the air conditioning unit kicking on. I had to pull her away from this. She touched everything and was delighted at the touch and feel of things, fabrics, and metals.
(Cranleigh stops the recording)
Cranleigh: Now look here, old boy, I’m only here to smooth things over, so I’m stopping the recording for a moment. The cancer – mate, it has your mind all twisted around, not to mention you being the same age as some of these antiquities!
(Cranleigh pats the back of Sarpy and laughs at his own joke, Sarpy offering no reply, only an irritated glance of his wanting to continue the story. Cranleigh presses record again on the cassette player.)
Dr Sarpy: Where was I? Hmm. Oh yes! I had run the bath water for her. She was no longer afraid of me, and she did not fight. I think she could tell that I would not hurt her. What could an old man like me do to anyone? She was not shy either, stripping the linen rags from her body. I spoke to her in every language I knew: English, French, Spanish, German, even the so-called dead languages, Coptic and Demotic, and Old Egyptian, all of which were a guess as I or anyone alive had heard them spoken. None responded from this woman.
She reached her hand out to me to help her in the tub. It was as if she expected me to assist her – expected my help. So, there was no surprise when she “allowed” me to bathe her. I was then aware that she had never bathed herself, and from the regally stern calmness of her demeanor, she expected nothing less than complete servitude from me. I was to attend to her; I was her servant. She didn’t ask for this; her eyes demanded it from me.
Cranleigh: Dr. Sarpy, there is no need to fabricate stories and lie to us. I mean, a man of your reputation and standing with this museum… (Cranleigh stands up abruptly from his seat and stands at the large bay window, watching the cars pass on the wet night street) Can’t you hear for yourself how absurd it all is? Frankly, I am insulted that you’d think we would buy such rubbish. It does not matter now. What I have come to tell you is that your time here …
Dr. Sarpy: Wait! I am not finished with my story, Algie. Won’t you let an old man finish his story?
Cranleigh: Do not call me Algie. Just finish the damn story. I have an appointment.
Dr. Sarpy: I washed her back, lifting the heavy mass of black hair from her neck, resting it on her shoulder, revealing her markings or tattoos. The first one was centered directly on the back of her neck, the “Eye of Ra,” a potent sign of protection from evil spirits in ancient times. Much like holy water is to demons. The second tattoo, right under the first, was an ankh, symbolizing everlasting life and fertility.
I traced over the markings with the tips of my fingers while I spoke their meanings in the most ancient of tongues, of which I could think. She turned quickly at hearing this and rose to my astonishment, naked, wet, and dripping. She spoke! I could not make it all out, just bits and pieces. Something or another about how she had been locked away for centuries by six others! She was pretty upset! She banged her fist against the tile of the tub’s wall, even breaking some of the tiles into pieces that fell into the water. As she turned, she slipped! I tried catching her, but it was too late; her head hit the side of the tub, knocking her unconscious.
Cranleigh paced the floor, pacing at his watch every few minutes. With his apparent frustration, it was unclear if he had heard anything Dr. Sarpy had said; his focus was on the window and his watch.
Dr. Sarpy continues…
She was unconscious for the entire night and most of the next day. I called a friend, a doctor, someone I knew I could rely on for their discretion, who checked her for contusions. Her bill of health passed, and when she awoke, her eyes widened just the same as when she first saw me in the museum that night. I was back to square one. She seemed even more scared than when I had first found her. She did not even remember me.
And I can honestly say that for the first time in 40 years, I felt a small break in my heart, a feeling I had forgotten could be felt. I tried in vain to speak in the ancient tongue to her, but it was gone. She cried a lot after that, rubbing the bump on the side of her head. I went to the pharmacy on the corner for more bandages, and when I came back, she was gone.
That old feeling of heartache and break pulsed through my chest again so much that I thought I might be having the final attack of my life, but it wasn’t to be. She was lost when I found her, now she was forever gone, and to think how close I had come to my very own Rosetta stone.
Cranleigh: Enough, Sarpy! Look, we’ve already been to your home and searched for the rotten corpse! Your crone of a maid let us in. She hardly knew where she was!
Dr. Sarpy: She’s a charming woman.
Cranleigh: We didn’t find the mummy, Sarpy! Whatever necrophiliac perversions you have, honestly, I don’t give a fuck. That decrepit corpse is on loan from the Museum of Cairo, which doesn’t know it’s missing! Do you know how much money that will cost me, my museum?
Dr. Sarpy: Should I call Dr. El-Sharif and let him know?
Cranleigh: We need it back! Not next week, not tomorrow, RIGHT FUCKING NOW!
Cranleigh pounds both of his fists on the desk at which Dr. Sarpy sits, rising every piece of accouterment an inch or two off its settled place for many decades, creating a small whirlwind of dust.
Dr. Sarpy: Have you considered anger management, Algie? They didn’t have that in my day.
Cranleigh: I TOLD YOU DON’T CALL ME ALGIE…!!
END OF TRANSCRIPT
Signed: William James Sarpy
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And with Cranleigh’s shout, a horn blew a hundred feet below from a yellow Volkswagen on the corner of Glossveil Street. Cranleigh raced to the window like a neglected child waiting for a deadbeat parent. Below the wide bay window of Dr. Sarpy’s office stood a tall red head in white, waving a green scarf back and forth to the man above in the window, Cranleigh.
Residence of Dr. William James Sarpy
Dr. Sarpy was a good liar. He was especially proud of himself for maintaining the secrecy of the mummy – and it was true, he didn’t know where the mummy had gone, but he knew where the woman was – in his bedroom, asleep. Her inability to speak English and her foreign appearance made her disguise as Sarpy’s maid the perfect choice.
Teaching the woman only three words: I AM MAID.
Sarpy knew that those “great minds” on the board of directors would never suspect that the mummy was right in front of them the whole time. Their minds are too unimaginative and humdrum to ever believe in magic or the possibility of the impossible. He could hear the creak of the mattress from his bedroom and the weeping sounds of what could’ve been a wounded animal.
Tea, Sarpy thought, tea – it always makes everything better!
A bit early in the day, but no matter, this was a tea emergency, and all protocol of English manners must be thrown to the winds! And as the kettle brewed, a letter came through the mail slot and dropped into a wicker basket shaped like a duck.
Dr. Sarpy,
Please bring your unknown beauty to #5 Eldon Way, Kensington, London, The House with the Red Door. We know that we can rely on your discretion, as it would not benefit either of us to involve others. You are observed. She is remembered. We are ready.
Sincerely,
Odjita
P.S. Her name is Neva.
“Neva,” he whispered.
There was no postmark or return address on the envelope. Realizing that he had been followed by someone, or worse, being watched, he ran outside to see if he could catch the mysterious letter carrier, but there was only a beautiful ginger tabby that brushed his legs, purring. Sarpy couldn’t believe that he ran. He hadn’t run or moved so fast in years, and his body let him do it too! Surprisingly, the sciatica that went up his leg wasn’t there anymore, and when he made it back inside the house, he could sit in the wooden kitchen chairs with an ease he hadn’t felt in more than a decade. He felt good today, and the constant nausea from his many pain pills had subsided. He had refused chemo and had come to terms with letting the business of life finally be over.
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The Rising of the Nameless Queen
She awakened that morning, looking at her face in the mirror. The mirror that stood tall and dignified, a devoted servant of many years, a once shining brass ornament, the frame now dull with a grey, clouded patina in each of its four corners, and when Neva stood up to see herself, she appeared to be surrounded by clouds. This was a good face, she thought. This face was complete. It had eyes, a nose, lips, and teeth, and she even thought that the face was quite pretty. But whose face was it? To whom did it belong?
How had it come to be that she didn’t know who she was or where she had come from? She felt as if this was day one of life. She had no memory of any days before then. Dr. Sarpy was an older man, but still rather handsome, she thought, with a full head of snow-white hair and good teeth. She would never forget his kindness, after all, it was the first such act she had witnessed. He brought her a hot drink, which she enjoyed immensely, and let her cry for as long as she wanted. He never said a word, just a pat to the hand and a light rub on the back.
“My name is William, ” said Dr. Sarpy, patting his chest many times, allowing her to understand that that was his name.
“Now you, go on,” he said, expecting her to follow his lead.
“My name is Neva.” Again, she said it until the words didn’t sound like rocks in her mouth. Again, she said this one sentence.
“My name is Neva.”
Now she had two English sentences she could speak. ______________________________________________________________________________
#5 Eldon Way, Kensington, London
The House with the Red Door
The house with the Red Door on Eldon Way had recently become occupied by six statuesque beauties. Most notably, Odjita, a tall, freckled, ginger-haired woman with sparkling blue eyes, and the other, a pale lady, Seshafi, with ebony black hair and eyes that glowed a most unusual hue of green. The neighbors speculated that the women were either supermodels or high-class call girls. One could never really tell these days. Inside the townhouse, it smelled of eucalyptus, myrrh, and rose, evoking the spirits.
Sybille mixed the appropriate portions of rose, sandalwood, and lotus. She anointed the others’ heads with the oil mixture: Odjita, Seshafi, Seraphine, Lea, and Mandisa. This was all done in preparation for the Great Lady Neva. The women had been searching for what seemed like an eternity for Neva’s body, her scent becoming fainter as the years went on. Odjita had prepared all the women, advising how Neva had no memory of anything, including Dr. Sarpy and his protection of her. The women hoped the scent would remind Neva of who she was. All measures had to be used now.
Their skin had begun to show the signs of aging —human aging: wrinkles, age spots, and the constant dying of their hair to hide the grey strands breaking through. Sucking the life out of humans no longer sustained them. It was only a temporary fix that lasted a few weeks, and then they would be back to rapid aging. Neva was the key; she was the one who bestowed upon them the gift of immortality and beauty.
Only she could give the women more of the gift. In the living room, on a white sofa, sat Cranleigh, dried of all his vital organs, his skin flattened out as if a bulldozer had run over him. His watch is the only thing left of him with volume.
“What about that?” Seshafi asked, pointing to the grotesquerie formerly known as Algernon “Algie” Cranleigh.
“Ah, leave him there. I like him better this way.”
Odjita and Seshafi laughed, knowing that it would only take a light breeze from the ceiling fan, or a closed door, to crumble into ash what remained of poor Cranleigh.
“Where is she?! Lea asked impatiently, pacing back and forth, her claws retracting into the wooden planks.
“She is coming up the stairs now! Change back quickly, Lea!” Mandisa shouted. “She’s brought the old man too.”
Mandisa was right. Neva was coming up the stairs outside. An instant migraine pierced her forehead upon seeing the red door. She held on to the railing and Dr. Sarpy’s elbow. Her head swooned as if she were drunk. That scent, that aroma, overwhelmed her senses, making her dizzy. She was drawn to it; her feet now on white sand, a great island temple with magnificent colonnades and palms was now in her eyesight, floating along the sand in white linen.
The door opens, and Odjita steps in. Neva is back now in this plane, her arm still clutching Dr. Sarpy. The sight of Odjita took Neva back; it had been centuries since she had laid eyes on her. Her high priestess Odjita. With the force of a sledgehammer, Neva’s life came back to her, all her memories, all her lives, all her loves. Neva remembered.
Inside the house are the other women, more of her priestesses, more memories coming back, allowing Odjita to sit her and Dr. Sarpy down on the sofa right where Cranleigh sat, whose ashes had long been swept into the bin. Sarpy noticed Cranleigh’s watch on the mantel but said nothing of it. She never removed her arm from being hooked with the doctors, even while Odjita began to speak in the old language, the only language she knew.
“My Lady Neva, we have been on many journeys searching for you. Our devotion and love for you have never diminished. We are so happy to have you back with us. Now we can be together again.”
Seshafi stood quickly and irritably,
“Stop calling her that, Odjita! That is not her name! She shouted.
Seshafi went face down and lay prostrate before Neva’s feet.
“You are Isis!” Seshafi declared loudly.
“YES!” The other women exclaimed in unison.
“The giver of life!” Said Sybille.
“The Mistress Queen of Philae!” Said Mandisa.
“She who breathes fire!” Said Seraphine.
Isis stands up from the sofa, releasing her tight embrace on the doctor’s fragile arm, examining each woman, remembering them in those last days, tracing her fingers along the fine lines and wrinkles of the women’s aged faces.
“We need you, Isis. We need your help. Restore the gift that you have given us. Give us back its full power, we beg you.” Odjita cried.
As Isis pressed her lips to Odjita’s, a glow pulsed from Isis’s mouth into Odjita’s, impossibly bright and blinding. The light spilled over her skin into radiant waves to the bottoms of her feet. Her hands and face smoothing out into a beautiful, youthful glow, her red hair a thick, gingery mass with plump lips and breasts once again! The other women jumped with excitement at the sight of Odjita’s transformation. Isis took every woman’s face in her hands again, giving them a kiss of life, their bodies all becoming masterpieces of perfection and envy once again.
They crowded the mirrors, posing and positioning themselves in seductive positions until Odjita let out a blood-curdling cry. The golden glow that pooled at her feet moved back, not as a gift but as a gentle theft, rising to her mouth, slipping out over lips that dripped onto the carpet in globs of illuminated gold.
“NO!!!” Odjita screamed, her mouth to the carpet in a desperate attempt to suck up any of the life that had fallen out of her. In reverse, her cheeks sank in, and she spat out teeth and blood, her skin dried up as a dehydrated prune, the remaining light going straight up into her hair that was now like a dry bale of hay caught fire.
Odjita was screaming, but too weak to run. The remaining women’s golden light slides through their veins like a slow fire, curling into their joints, tightening them, and finally snapping like dried tree limbs, their once-shimmering hair now filled with ash and ember. A gurgled cry leaped out; the goddess could no longer differentiate who from whom now.
“You said you’d help us, you said you’d help us!”
“Yes, and I did help you; I helped you die. You all helped me remember everything, even how I got thrown in the tomb behind the large red stone. It took many of you to push it and close me in. For centuries, I rotted and waited, hoping that at least one of you would show that you loved me.
You swore yourself to me, and in exchange, I gave you immortality, beauty, and status. That was not enough for you; you wanted my position to take over my temples. You thought you no longer needed me, so you put me away. My body was violated by tomb raiders, stripping my body of gold and jewels. An unknown woman, in KV65! I sentence you to perpetual darkness, unworthy of the afterlife.”
The goddess’s massive wings sprang from her back, ripping her clothes, and a bright light covered her body. Dr. Sarpy was paralyzed with fear, so much so that he could not move.
“William, I help.”
The goddess approached him, reaching out her arms to him. Her wings tucked him into her body, and the two became one, flying away in a burst of light into the dark blue night sky.
