The Black Door

Chapter 11

Stanley Unwin sat at the breakfast table blowing on his hot tea. He knew he should not have made a second cup, as he was running late. Not for work – he would still be in plenty of time for that. But he preferred to eat his breakfast alone and be out of the door before his wife and daughters deigned to make their presence known.

Even now it was too late. He could already hear them descending the stairs.

He considered leaving his tea, but he knew even that would instigate a sarcastic response from his wife.

Unwin steeled himself and took a large swallow. The hot liquid scalded his tongue and scorched its way down his gullet, burning a path down to his stomach.

He started coughing and spluttering just as the three women entered the room.

His younger child, Tamara, was the first to comment. “Daddy for goodness sake, if you’re going to cough your guts up, must you do it at the table?”

“He’s swallowed his tea too quickly,” chimed in his wife. “How many times do I have to tell you not to rush your food? Anyone would think you were in a race.”

“Is there any more tea in the pot?” asked Felicity, his elder daughter. “I’m simply gasping.”

Before Unwin managed to catch his breath to answer, Mildred had lifted the lid to check inside.

“No,” she replied, not trying to disguise the exasperation in her voice. “Your father was obviously too busy to put the kettle on for us.”

Unwin finished coughing into his hanky. “I’m sorry, my dear,” he spluttered, “I was just about to refill it…”

“Don’t bother.” She cut him off in mid-sentence. “Thinking about number one, as usual.”

“Sorry.” He put his head down and concentrated on his tea. There was no point in arguing.

While the three women prepared their breakfast, Unwin opened his newspaper and flicked through the pages until he found the article about the upcoming exhibition at the museum.

The reporter had telephoned him a couple of days before and arranged an interview.

Unwin felt that it had gone rather well and, as he read through it; he was happy to see that the interviewer had made precise notes of what he had been saying.

There was even a photograph of him standing in front of the hoarding announcing the forthcoming exhibition.

“Look girls,” he announced proudly, holding up the article. “Your father made the local paper.”

“What as, a peeping tom?” Felicity asked scornfully.

The three women laughed.

“You’ve not been caught soliciting again, have you, Father?” Tamara chimed in.

Unwin slammed his folded newspaper on the table. He could feel his cheeks burning. His daughters had absolutely no respect for him whatsoever, and he knew exactly where that attitude came from.

“Now girls,” stammered Mildred, through her laughter, “that’s no way to speak to your father… Even if it is true.”

The two young women were both bent over with laughter.

Mildred stood there, holding her sides.

It was obvious that they all took great delight in poking fun at him, so Unwin stood up abruptly, almost sending his chair over. “I’m leaving now!” he announced loudly.

Not bothering to wait for an acknowledgement, he turned and marched out of the kitchen. While he straightened his tie in the hall mirror, he could still hear the three women laughing at his expense.

He slammed the front door behind him as he left.

On his drive in to the museum, he could still feel the rage boiling within him.

One day, one day they would push him too far, and then they would know. He did not need them, they needed him. He was the breadwinner. He was the one who kept the roof above their heads and put food on the table. Not to mention their enormous credit-card bills, which he was expected to pay without complaint.

He had insisted that the girls were too young to have their own accounts. After all, neither of them worked. Felicity was just about to go to university, and Tamara was still in the sixth form, so what on earth did they need credit cards for?

Naturally, it was Mildred who insisted that they he allowed them, in order to teach how to handle money responsibly, or so she had argued.

But what responsibility did they demonstrate when they used their cards willy-nilly without having to think about it?

Not that their mother was any better. Her clothes bill alone could feed a small army and, naturally, everything had to have matching accessories. It would not have been so bad if she at least managed to make good use of each outfit. But she would wear each one once, usually to one of her functions, then insist that she could not possibly be seen in it again.

At least the girls would wear their clothes until they were considered out of fashion.

He supposed he should be grateful for small mercies, but right now, he was not feeling in a particularly appreciative mood.

Unwin pulled his car into the staff car park and groaned inwardly when he saw that someone had taken his spot. The sign for the curator’s bay had long since faded with age, but everyone knew that it was his, and they had no right to grab it.

He parked in the space next to it and slid out of his seat.

He looked the vehicle over.

He did not recognise it as belonging to any of his staff, but it appeared to be brand new.

As he walked around, he noticed the rental sticker in the back window. Perhaps one of his staff members was having car trouble and had to hire one while theirs was being repaired.

Even so, that did not excuse their deliberate lack of respect for his authority.

Unwin strode purposefully towards the staff entrance.

Someone was going to regret their careless actions this morning.

As he fumbled in his briefcase, trying to locate his staff pass, Unwin heard the door buzz as someone pressed the release from inside.

The door flew open.

It was Bill Stead. “Morning guv’nor,” he said cheerily.

“Oh, yes, good morning Bill,” Unwin replied. “Did you notice who parked in my space?”

The security guard leaned out, keeping the door ajar with his foot, and glanced along the side to where the space in question was.

“I see,” he replied nonchalantly. “I wonder if it might be your visitor from the museum in Cairo. She arrived about half an hour ago.”

Unwin’s face dropped. “She’s here already?”

Stead nodded.

“But I wasn’t expecting her until tomorrow at the earliest.”

The guard shrugged. “Perhaps she caught an earlier flight,” he suggested.

Unwin did not answer. He merely rushed past the guard and made his way to his office.

“The visitor from Cairo,” as Stead had put it, was actually a forensic specialist on loan from the museum, who had agreed to come to England to carbon-date and authenticate some of the treasures unearthed in Professor Kautz’s secret underground chamber.

She was a visiting dignitary, as far as Unwin was concerned, and not to be here to welcome her when she arrived was an unforgivable oversight on his part.

The curator was breathing heavily by the time he reached his office door. He was about to reach for the handle but instead decided to knock first.

It seemed the right thing to do under the circumstances.

There was no reply to his knock, so he twisted the handle and gently eased the door open.

His office was empty.

It made no sense, Stead had told him the woman had arrived an hour ago, so where else could she be?

“Mr Unwin.”

He almost jumped out of his skin. He turned to see the massive figure of the guard looming over him.

“She’s already with the artefacts,” Stead informed him, anticipating his question. “She said she didn’t want to waste any time. I didn’t think you would mind.”

Unwin dumped his briefcase on a chair just inside his office and composed himself as he strode towards the Egyptian wing where the new exhibition was being constructed.

As he turned the last corner, Unwin saw the person whom he presumed was his special guest, bending down over an open chest, studying the contents through a magnifying glass.

He introduced himself, offering his hand.

The woman removed her plastic glove and face mask and shook his hand. “Good morning, Mr Unwin, I am Doctor Amina Anmali. I hope you have no objection but I took the liberty of starting work before your arrival – there is so much to do.”

The woman looked a good deal younger than Unwin had been expecting.

She spoke perfect English, although with a heavy accent.

Under her white coat, she appeared small and petite in stature and, for the first time in ages, Unwin felt an immediate stirring in his groin when their hands met.

He tried not to blush and hoped that his dark-blue suit trousers covered his protrusion.

“May I offer you some refreshment, a cup of tea perhaps?”

The woman shook her head. “No thank you, I had a lovely breakfast at my hotel before coming here.”

Unwin looked surprised. “I see, then you flew in yesterday, I take it. I wasn’t expecting you until tomorrow.”

“Yes, I had a chance of an early flight and could not wait to come and study this great find.”

Unwin beamed with pride. “Yes indeed, we were very fortunate to be bequeathed these treasures. Of course, the professor was a great friend to the museum. This wing we’re standing in now was actually built and named in his honour.”

“So, I read in one of your pamphlets. He sounds like a very great man.”

“Oh, he was,” agreed Unwin. “Although, as with the collections of many eccentrics, the provenance of some of his treasures cannot always be relied on.”

“Indeed.”

Unwin was careful not to say too much. He was all too aware that there was a great deal of speculation among those in the know about some of the professor’s most treasured finds.

The last thing he wanted was to initiate a legal battle between their two countries over the ownership of their latest acquisition.

In the background, the museum crew were busy setting up the awnings and backgrounds for the upcoming exhibition.

Unwin drew the woman’s attention to it.

“What do you think of our scenery so far?” he asked, pointing out the workers behind her.

The woman smiled. She was not taken in by his clumsy subterfuge.

“It all looks very promising,” she agreed. “But I trust I will be given adequate time to complete my work before it opens?”

“Yes, of course,” Unwin nodded, “and if for any reason you require more time, I’m sure we can work something out. The main feature of our exhibition will be our mummy, naturally. But if you need to work on her once the exhibit is open to the public, you’ll be welcome to come in when the museum is closed.”

“Thank you, that would be most acceptable.” The woman looked directly into Unwin’s eyes as she spoke. Her gaze did not waver, even to blink.

Unwin felt mesmerised. It was as if he was suddenly drifting on an invisible cloud, moving closer towards her.

He did not dare to blink, either. Her eyes became large like swirling pools, cool and refreshing, urging him to dive straight in, and lose himself in them.

“Mr Unwin.”

The booming voice of his head of security brought him out of his daydream.

Unwin shook the image from his mind.

When he looked up, the doctor had already replaced her mask and glove and was intensely studying something from the open chest before her.

“Er, yes,” replied Unwin, still feeling woozy.

“There’s a delivery out back needs your signature,” the guard informed him.

Unwin raised his hand to his forehead.

He hoped this was not the start of a migraine coming on.

“Yes, coming,” he responded, rubbing the bridge of his nose between his thumb and index finger as he followed the large man to the loading dock.