Channeling Cleopatra by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough

say, closing the barn door once the horses have
made good their escape. And it is also true that in the last half
of the twentieth century, many of the great museums that housed
collections rightfully belonging to Egypt but plundered from us
returned many artifacts and remains. This was during a period of
politically correct fervor which was ultimately abandoned as
unprofitable and stopped short of returning the greatest treasures
of intrinsic value. Our own countrymen learned from that lesson.
Until the plan was formed to raise ancient Alexandria rather than
raze it, as has been done so often in the past, sites were quickly
excavated and sifted for items of interest, data recorded, and then
some new office building or theater was erected on the site. My own
museum is thought to occupy the site where Cleopatra's great
library once stood."
    "There's not much left, for sure," Leda
said, looking around at the ruins, which seemingly could have been
simulated in a day or two by a couple of energetic kids with pails
and shovels.
    Gabriella looked very sad. "Alexandria was
in its heyday the most beautiful and cosmopolitan city in the
world. Books for the library were commandeered from the many ships
docking here. Copies were hastily made and returned to the ships,
but the real scrolls remained with us, and many of the scholars as
well. The other great cities could not stand it, and when Egypt
fell, they destroyed their rival city without regard for the loss
to civilization." She sighed. "Of course, that's really only part
of it. Most scientists now say that earthquakes caused most of the
damage such as that to the structures that are being raised from
the harbor.
    The Pharos Lighthouse, the palaces, the
Caesarium, whole little suburbs, actually. Our environment has been
no less tempestuous than other elements of our history. Myself, I
am so grateful to Nucore for funding the restoration of these
ruins. The government would never have done it without that money.
And it will give new life to the city."
    "Yes," Leda said. "It would be a real hoot
to go back downtown to the corner of Daniel and Canopic or whatever
and see all those columns and pillars you were talking about
someday instead of the garbage heaps and graffiti."
    On their way back to the villa, she got a
call on the cell phone from her dad telling her the beluga was up
and ready for business.
    So the next day, with the
help of Gabriella and the cousins, she removed her equipment to her
new air-conditioned lab complete with its own generator. Her dad
and some of the security staff he had already appropriated to erect
the beluga, four young Egyptian men who acted like he was the
president of the country instead of just the head of security,
finished installing plugs and switches, cabinets and flooring. Pete
popped his head in and flirted briefly with Gabriella, who was,
Leda noticed to her pleasure, the reason the flirtation was brief.
Gabriella didn't act as if she wanted much to do with old
Pete. Tough luck, fella.
    Good as it was to have a loyal friend and
colleague so early in the game, Leda followed the move into the lab
with a move of her personal stuff to the Cecil Hotel. This was over
the protests of Gabriella and her aunts, who reminded Leda
uncomfortably of a sort of summit conference of her dad's ex-wives,
had her stepmoms all chosen to wear designer clothes and quite a
lot of jewelry in the privacy of their own garden. Dinner with the
aunts the night before had been noisy and funny. Gabriella didn't
realize Leda spoke Arabic, and Leda was too unsure of her skill to
admit to it. But some of Gabriella's translations and the aunts'
comments were very funny, and Leda had to suppress her giggles
until Gabriella told her what was allegedly being said.
    Gabriella's Western-isms were generally
frowned upon by the aunts, according to her, though they seemed
extremely indulgent and even deferential, from what Leda could see.
However, their attitude toward Leda as a genuine