The Khufu Equation by Rail Sharifov Page A

it was a repulsive thought, she continued watching.

    Commissioner Brett Li appeared on the screen. He didn't comment on the event but instead asked the community to provide information about any suspicious men.
     
    The report ended, whereupon Brian turned to Jeanette and, seeming to read her thoughts, said:

    "I think it's most important that you care for the baby. So, don't worry about yesterday's business. You should have a rest." Brian extinguished the cigar in the ashtray.

Chapter 11
    Kreis changed planes in Bangkok and arrived at Phnom Penh, Cambodia, at eleven o'clock. It was about thirty degrees Centigrade in the shade, and his constitution had difficulty with the rainy season, which lasted from May till October. It was the end of May. Morning in the rainy season begins with hard evaporation. By midday, the air becomes unbearably stuffy. The sun floated up from the horizon like a tennis ball, bringing with it scorching heat that would last till sunset. Every afternoon in summer, the monsoons from the Indian Ocean would bring masses of warm, damp air, pouring it onto the continent in torrents of rain. Already an hour after downpour there isn't a trace of water on the streets. Everything that hasn't soaked into the ground and fields rises again instead, thus perpetuating the fierce cycle of humidity and storms. At about twenty minutes past six in the evening, the sun drops behind the horizon and the sky fills with stars. This is repeated till November, when the winter monsoonal flow brings dry air from the continent.

    Phnom Penh, the international airport at Phnom Penh, was once one of the nicest places in the world. It was fashionable and comfortable, with perfect proportions and ideal functionality. Now, however, it met Kreis with disconcerting stuffiness.
     
    It was simply fate that Captain Ven Jhun was seated before the security monitors that day, keeping guard over the goings-on within the terminal. Usually, one of the subordinates did that kind of work, but new equipment had recently been installed and the captain was checking its workability. With a joystick he could rotate any camera nearly 360 degrees, and thanks to sophisticated electronics he could examine every nap in an individual's clothing.

    Ven Jun was forty-six, but he looked seventy. The day he was born, God rested. His broad, Robespierre forehead gave the impression of great intellect, as if all the potential for beauty had been absorbed and subordinated by the brain. However, that broad forehead concealed not intellect but cunning malevolence. This man, once so ordinary, had been victimized by the fate of his own nationality, and now what he had to show for it was a prosthetic left leg. Ven disliked his country's fearsome climate, and he hated its terrible past. He dreamed of settling down in a drier, quieter corner of the world and watching the birds nibble at the cactus pears. He had his reasons for feeling that way, but they had nothing to do with rest and relaxation.
     
    Twenty-three years earlier, Ven Jun had been involved in matters the memory of which brought a chilling itch to his crippled half-leg. Little about the country's present circumstances or appearance seemed very different, and everything was a painful reminder to him. The captain could never sleep through the night, because the stump of his leg was very sensitive to the prolonged hours of contact with the fitting of his prosthetic. The itchiness of it could be unbearable. The previous night he had been up till dawn concocting various lotions, but the past was hurtling toward with the speed of a fighter plane. Thus the past became the present, without deception or mind tricks.

    As he put the new system through its paces, he turned to the camera for the customs station. The arrivals were being checked with regard to documents, bags, etcetera. There, among the passengers, Captain Jun spotted the figure of a man, who was passing documents to the customs officer. His walk, the way