But these robbers have not been careful. Clocks did not yet exist, and in the darkness of the tomb a sundial was useless. They have no way of keeping track of time. And little do they know that, outside the tomb, the sun is already setting…
Once again, the robbers flung themselves into an orgy of violence, smashing the canopic jars, scattering Senef’s mummified organs, breaking open baskets of grains and breads, tossing about mummified foodstuffs and pets, decapitating statues. Then they set to work on the great stone sarcophagus itself, jamming cedar poles under one side, slowly dislodging the one-ton lid and wedging it back, millimeter by millimeter, until it toppled from the sarcophagus and broke in two on the floor. Through the magic of holographic projection, the effect was again remarkably real.
Nora felt somebody touch her elbow, and she glanced down to see the mayor smiling at her. “This is utterly fantastic,” he whispered with a wink. “It looks like the curse of Senef has finally been lifted.”
Looking at his bald pate and round, shiny face, Nora had to smile to herself. He was eating it up, just like an overgrown kid. They all were.
There was no longer any doubt in her mind: the show was a huge—a monster—success.
58
D’Agosta watched in sick disbelief as the technicians, both of them now working frantically, continued to type commands on their keyboards.
“What’s wrong?” Hayward demanded.
Enderby wiped his forehead nervously. “I don’t know. The terminal isn’t accepting my commands.”
“Manual override?” Hayward asked.
“Tried that already.”
Hayward turned to Manetti. “Notify the guards in the tomb. Tell them we’re shutting down the show.” She pulled out her radio, preparing to talk to her own officers on the inside. Then she paused, staring at Manetti, who had gone pale. “What is it?”
“That’s just it. I’m trying to contact my men in the tomb. There’s no communication. None.”
“How can that be? They’re less than fifty yards away!”
“The tomb has been shielded against radio frequencies,” said Pendergast quietly.
Hayward put down her radio. “Use the P.A. system. It’s hardwired, right?”
More furious typing from Enderby. “That’s down, too.”
Hayward stared at him. “Cut power to the doors. In the event of a total power failure, they can be levered open by hand.”
Enderby typed some more, then raised his hands in a gesture of futility.
Suddenly, Pendergast pointed at one of the monitors displaying a live feed of the hall. “Did you see that? Rewind it, please.”
One of the technicians digitally rewound the image.
“There.” And Pendergast indicated the blurry outline of a figure, off to one side in the shadows.
“Can you sharpen the image?” he asked urgently. “Magnify it?”
D’Agosta stared as the feed jumped into clearer focus. They all watched as the man slipped a hand inside his dinner jacket, casually extracted a black eye-mask, and put it on. A pair of earplugs followed.
“Menzies,” Hayward murmured.
“Diogenes,” Pendergast said, almost to himself, his voice as cold as ice.
“We need to call for backup,” said Manetti. “Get a SWAT team in here, and—”
“No!” Pendergast broke in. “We don’t have time. That will delay everything—they’ll want to set up a mobile command unit, there will be rules of engagement to follow. We’ve got ten minutes—at the outside.”
“I can’t believe these doors won’t open!” Enderby said, banging at the keyboard. “We programmed two completely independent backups. This doesn’t make sense. Nothing’s responding—”
“And nothing will respond,” said Pendergast. “Those doors aren’t going to open no matter what you do. Menzies—Diogenes—has no doubt hijacked the systems controlling both the show and the hall.” Pendergast turned back to Enderby. “Can you get a list of all running processes?”
“Yes.” Enderby typed a series of commands. D’Agosta glanced over: a small window had opened on the screen, filled with a list of mysterious lowercase words like asmcomp, rutil, syslog, kcron.
“Examine all the process names,” Pendergast said. “Especially the system processes. See anything unusual?”
“No.” Enderby peered at the screen. “Yes. This one called kernel_con_fund_o.”
“Any idea what it’s for?”
Enderby blinked. “Judging by the name, it’s some kind of console file that accesses the system kernel. That zero at the end also implies it’s a beta version.”