Aaron Elkins - Dead men’s hearts

And that was it. No yellow jasper head.

He put down the last picture. “These are quite nice, but I was hoping you might be able to find me-”

He paused, frowning, and turned back to the twelve photos spread on the table in two rows. He picked up the third one from the right in the nearest row. The sandstone figure. The headless body.

It was a female dressed in a simply depicted gown and seated on a boxlike support with hieroglyphic symbols carved into its side, her hands resting palms-down on her thighs. It was Amarna style, all right, early Amarna, just beginning to move away from the stiff, conventionalized pose of former times to the more relaxed, natural posture that would be a hallmark of Akhenaten’s reign. Between the shoulders was a square-carved recess to accept the tang that would have projected from the underside of the separate head and neck.

A composite statue.

The hairs on the back of his neck stirred. Was it possible that he had gotten to what he was looking for by the back way? He had come looking for the head that went with the body. Had he found the body that went with the head? He felt his heart pick up its beat.

“I don’t know, this might be fairly interesting,” he said indifferently, flipping it back onto the table. “What can you tell me about-”

“Har, har, har,” said Hassan.

Gideon looked up sharply. “I beg your pardon?”

“Har, har, har,” said Hassan. He was sitting with his hands over his belly, the left wrist clasped in the right hand. His feet were flat on the floor and his shoulders were shaking. As far as Gideon could tell, he was genuinely amused.

Gideon waited.

Hassan used a handkerchief to wipe tears from the corner of his eyes. “I thought that one would get your interest. Oh, yes.” The handkerchief was wadded up and stuffed away somewhere and with it went Hassan’s sudden burst of mirth. “Let’s not mince any more words. It’s what you came for, isn’t it? The statuette that was taken from the Horizon site across the river four years ago. I’m afraid I’m not at liberty,” he added with heavy-handed sarcasm, “to tell you how it came to me.”

He looked keenly at Gideon, awaiting a reaction.

Gideon felt himself floundering. Things had begun to spiral out of his control. No, apparently they’d always been out of his control; he just hadn’t known it.

He spread his hands. “Why would I be particularly interested in that?”

Hassan leaned forward, a thick hand on each knee. “Please. Suddenly, from nowhere, you come to me with a story of a client interested in Amarna statues? And this happens to be, by coincidence, one week after a certain missing Amarna head at Horizon House is found again… and ‘lost’ again? You expect me to believe this?”

Gideon did his best to manifest wounded dignity. The pelt adhering to his upper lip didn’t make it any easier. “I assure you, I don’t know what-”

“Please, Mr. Smith, don’t insult my intelligence. You know everything there is to know about the head. Do I look like a child?”

“I-all right, yes, you’re right, I do have it,” Gideon said, figuring that it had to be easier to put over a sham that Hassan believed in than one that he didn’t. “I have it and I’m willing to make you a more-than-reasonable offer for the body.” What, he wondered nervously, was reasonable?

Hassan sat back with a sigh, shaking his head sadly. “Mr. Smith, Mr. Smith. Really.”

Now what? The safest bet seemed to be to wait him out.

It didn’t take long. “Mr. Smith,” Hassan said, his tone revealing sad disillusionment at Gideon’s prevarication, “I happen to know that you don’t have the head.”

“I assure you-”

“Mr. Smith, I know. Now, I don’t know what your plans are for getting it and I don’t want to know. It’s your business, so why should it concern me? I have the body, you want the body. I’m a businessman. If we can come to an agreement, it’s yours. Very simple.”

Gideon’s mind was buzzing. If Hassan knew-truly knew -that he didn’t have the head, then didn’t that mean that he knew who did? And wasn’t that the information this goofy charade had been designed to ferret out? Whoever had the head had surely killed Clifford Haddon. Or if not, if it had already changed owners, then he or she could certainly direct the police to whoever had.

Gideon smiled indulgently. “Tell me, Mr. Hassan, just who do you think does have it?”

Hassan wouldn’t play along. “No games, please,” he said tartly. “Here is my position. I’ll be frank with you.”

But being frank obviously took some forethought (not that Gideon was in any position to look down his nose over a little equivocation). Hassan got briskly to his feet, pulled a pack of Marlboros from an inside pocket, offered one to Gideon, who shook his head, and lit up. He walked the few steps that the cleared space allowed him to, handed the cigarette to Jalal after a single long draw, and turned to face Gideon, his hands behind his back.

“A certain person, an old business acquaintance, offered me $20,000 for it. I accepted. Now, I don’t like to break an agreement once it’s made, I’m not that kind of man, but the truth is, I still haven’t seen the money. If you can double it, it’s yours. Forty thousand dollars. I can give you two days.”

Well, at last Gideon knew what a reasonable price was: something under $40,000. This was bargaining time, and in Egypt that meant that when you were selling you started out at roughly three times what you thought you might come away with in the end.

He uttered an airy laugh. “Mr. Hassan, all I’ve seen is a photograph. I don’t know that it’s what you say it is, and even if it is, how do I know you have it?”

Hassan grinned mockingly back at him. “You’re not interested? Well, well, maybe I should just put those pictures back in my pocket and-”

“Assuming that it’s what you say, I might be able to go as high as $10,000,” Gideon said.

“Har, har, har,” said Hassan.

“Maybe twelve, if it’s in particularly good condition.”

Hassan’s grin turned sly, not an appealing sight. He came back and sat down again, his heavy thighs flattening under the pressure. “You know what I think? I think you do have, what should we call it, the final element, the last part.” He raised his eyebrows and tapped Gideon conspiratorially on the knee. “Yes? Am I right?”

“Maybe I do, maybe I don’t,” Gideon said. What the hell were they talking about now?

“Oh, I think you do,” Hassan said. The muttering chuckle had started up again, like an idling engine. “So this little item”-his stubby, beringed forefinger came down squarely on the photograph, one, two, three times-“is going to be worth a whole lot of money to you. What’s a measly $40,000? You’re lucky I’m not asking five times as much. Don’t be so stingy, Mr. Smith.”

“All right,” said Gideon, “$40,000 it is.”

Well, why not? Hassan was right: why be stingy? The money didn’t exist anyway. The important thing now was to set up another meeting with Hassan, one that Sergeant Gabra would be in on too. Hassan knew who had the head; he might not be willing to tell Gideon, but he would tell Gabra.

“Well, then, isn’t that more like it?” Hassan said, reaching for Gideon’s hand, grasping it, pumping it up and down. “This way everybody’s happy, right? How will you pay?”

“I-” He caught himself. He’d been about to say he’d pay in cash, but would John Smith really have $40,000 with him? This was no time to blow things with a careless blunder. Besides, did he want Hassan and the Six-Gun Kid thinking he might have all that money on him the next time they met? No, cash was out, and so was a personal check; John Smith wouldn’t be stupid enough to use one for contraband merchandise, and Hassan wouldn’t be stupid enough to accept it.