Free Whispers in the Sand by Barbara Erskine

unnoticed. Staring round, she let her eyes become accustomed to the low level of lighting. Ben had moved on, and for a moment she was alone. Then she realised what it was that was so strange. This tomb was cold.
    She shivered, conscious of the goosepimples on her bare arms. “Ben?” She couldn’t see him. A crowd of visitors were making their way into the inner chamber. She turned round, half expecting to find someone standing behind her. There was no one there. “Ben?” Her voice was muffled in the silence.
    Confused, she put her hand to her head, conscious suddenly of a group of tourists speaking Italian loudly, happily, as they filled the entrance behind her; in a moment they were all around her, and she found herself being swept on in their wake.
    She frowned. The tomb was no longer cold; it was as hot as the other they had visited, and she could hardly breathe. Suddenly panic-stricken, she pushed her way forward. She still couldn’t see Ben. She wasn’t usually claustrophobic, but the walls seemed to be closing in on her.
    The people near her were anonymous black shadows, faceless in the dark. Her mouth had gone dry.
    She stared round frantically, and diving for the next entrance, she abruptly found herself standing in the burial chamber itself, looking down at the open eyes of the young king Tutankhamen. He lay gazing up at the ceiling of his dark, hot tomb, disdaining the presence of the peasants who had come to stare at him, divested of the riches which had bolstered his royalty, but still he was awe-inspiring. How many of the people standing round him, she wondered, were as suddenly and as intensely aware as she was of the emaciated, broken body of the young king lying inside that gilded wooden coffin? She shivered again, but this time not with cold.
    “Anna?” Ben appeared beside her, his camera in his hand. “Isn’t he amazing?”
    She nodded. The bag on her shoulder had grown very heavy. Why had she not taken out her own camera? She swung the soft leather holdall to the floor and was pulling open the zip when a strange wave of dizziness hit her. With a gasp, she straightened, leaving the bag to subside into the dust at her feet, spilling its contents over the ground.
    “Are you OK?” Ben had caught sight of her out of the corner of his eye. He stooped and hastily began pushing everything back into the bag for her. She saw a flash of scarlet as the silk-wrapped scent bottle was scooped out of sight, then his arm was round her shoulders.
    “I felt weird suddenly.” She pressed her hands to her face. “I’m all right. I must have bent over too quickly to get my camera. Too much excitement and too early a start, I expect.” She forced herself to smile.
    “Perhaps that is a sign that it’s time to go and have a rest up in the fresh air.” He took her arm, glancing over his shoulder. These tombs are a bit overpowering, to my mind.”
    “There’s something down here, isn’t there?” Anna could feel the perspiration on her back icing over. She was shivering again. “I thought all that business about the ‘curse of the mummy’s tomb’ was rubbish, but there is an atmosphere. I don’t like it.”
    A shout of laughter near her from a party of Germans and the earnest mumble from a group of Japanese photographers in the treasury beyond the burial chamber seemed to contradict her words, but it made no difference. “I do want to leave. I’m sorry.”
    “No problem. Come on.”
    Grateful for the strength of his arm, she stumbled after him, back towards the entrance corridor and the blinding sunlight outside.
    Once sitting in the shade of the visitors’ resting area, she felt better. They both drank some bottled water, but she could see Ben was longing to move on. “Go without me, please. I will be all right soon. I shall just sit for a few minutes longer, then I’ll follow.”
    He gave her a searching look. “Are you sure?”
    “Of course.”
    She couldn’t see where it was that Hassan had