Free The 13th Tablet by Alex Mitchell Page A

buddies.’
    The walk was steeper than she thought but they eventually reached the top. He was right, the landscape was breathtaking. As there was no man-made light for miles, the stars shone like beacons in the night sky and the moon illuminated the desert in a mesmerising way. They sat down on his jacket and Jack proceeded to open the bottle of red wine. He poured her a glass, then one for himself.
    â€˜What shall we toast to?’ he asked.
    â€˜To the cleanliness of the desert,’ she answered looking out over the sands.
    He laughed, ‘To the cleanliness of the desert,’ he echoed, smiling.
    â€˜What a place. Do you come here often?’ she asked.
    â€˜Not that much. Sometimes at the end of the day to gather my thoughts.’
    â€˜How did you end up here? I mean, here in Iraq?’ she asked.
    â€˜It’s a long story. What about you?’
    She told him about her despair when the lootings began in the museums in Baghdad and Mosul, how she’d flown out here and had worked at the university ever since.
    â€˜What do you think of the war?’ he asked.
    â€˜I hate war.’
    â€˜Who doesn’t?’ he answered with a sigh.
    â€˜I don’t understand how anyone would want to be a soldier. How could anyone want to learn how to maim and kill other human beings?’
    He remained silent, but pulled out a heavy embroidered shawl with which he covered Mina and himself.
    â€˜Never mind,’ she continued, ‘no-one’s fighting out here. You said you were an engineer, but you seem to me more like a poet, lost in an Arabian tale, far from home.’
    â€˜I thank thee, oh beautiful Princess Scheherazade!’
    They both laughed. As they gazed out into the desert and sipped the wine, Jack felt his attraction to Mina growing, but relied on the wine to help him overcome his unexpected shyness towards the beautiful scholar. He edged his hand ever so slightly towards her and reaching out with the tip of his fingers, gently stroked her leg, but she didn’t respond to his touch. Should he be more forward? He hesitated but eventually decided to keep his hands to himself and just enjoy the moment.
    When the wine was finished they walked back to the village and he introduced her to Muhad’s mother. He parted from her a little reluctantly, and wondered how the night might have turned out had they met in the US instead of this village.
    â€˜What’s wrong with me? I’m acting like a schoolboy,’ Jack thought to himself, unsettled. ‘Maybe it’s the setting, after all, even the fanciest bar in New York couldn’t compare to drinking wine with a beautiful woman in the middle of a desert under the vastness of the starry Iraqi sky.’

    â€˜Miss Mastrani?’ asked Mr Bibuni over the phone.
    â€˜Ah, Mr Bibuni,’ answered a cold voice.
    â€˜I’m sorry to call you at such a late hour,’ said the shifty art dealer.
    â€˜It isn’t late here,’ replied the matter-of-fact voice.
    â€˜Of course, of course,’ he replied, adding ‘what a pleasure to hear the sound of your voice.’
    â€˜Have you found anything interesting?’ she replied curtly, knowing perfectly well that hearing her steely voice brought no pleasure at all.
    â€˜I have come across something that might interest that special client of yours. The flood collector.’
    â€˜What is it?’ she asked, coolly.
    â€˜A very unusual artefact with an inscription relating to the Babylonian flood.’
    â€˜Unusual?’
    â€˜Yes. It is not a clay tablet and I’m told by my young assistant Hassan that this version differs from the canonical version in more ways than one.’
    â€˜Where did it come from?’
    The art dealer winced. This was turning from a business proposal to an interrogation.
    â€˜Somewhere in Mosul.’
    â€˜Email me a photograph of the object.’
    â€˜I am so sorry Miss Mastrani, but I can’t