Chapter 7 - THE CAR THAT NEVER REACHED ALEXANDRIA
Khalid arrived at the conservation facility the next morning looking furious.
When I showed him the message, he read it twice.
Then he closed his eyes.
“Maryam's last journey.”
I watched him.
“What does that mean?”
He took a breath.
“She was traveling to meet an outside auditor.”
“Who arranged the car?”
Khalid didn't answer.
My stomach tightened.
“Khalid.”
He looked toward the window.
“My father.”
Silence.
Then he continued.
“That's what I was told. He arranged transportation because he wanted her to stop using unapproved drivers.”
I stared.
“Who was driving?”
“A company chauffeur.”
“Which company?”
Khalid swallowed.
“The foundation's administrative office.”
I looked at him.
“Who supervised that office?”
His face became pale.
“Farouk.”
We met with an attorney named Eleanor Price, who specialized in complex civil investigations and cultural property disputes.
She warned us that an old suspicious death could not be resolved through assumptions drawn from one note.
We needed contemporaneous records, witness accounts, and coordination with authorities in the relevant jurisdiction.
Khalid listened.
Then asked, “Can the investigation be reopened?”
Eleanor answered carefully.
“That depends on the available evidence and the procedures governing the original case. We can present the new material to appropriate officials and ask what review is possible.”
I watched Khalid.
He looked frustrated.
For decades, he had purchased solutions.
Buildings.
Companies.
Collections.
Now the one thing he wanted couldn't be bought.
The truth would have to be established.
Three days later, we received a call from an elderly man named Hassan Darwish.
He had worked as a driver for the Al-Masri Foundation in the 1990s.
He'd seen news coverage about the manuscript assessment.
When he learned that Maryam's death was being discussed again, he contacted a lawyer.
His statement was extraordinary.
He claimed he had originally been assigned to drive Maryam to a meeting.
At the last minute, he was removed from the schedule.
Another driver took his place.
The change came from Farouk's office.
Hassan had kept a copy of the revised schedule because he'd been angry about losing the assignment.
The document had a date.
A signature.
And a handwritten instruction.
Khalid stared at it.
The signature appeared to belong to Nabil Farouk.
For the first time, there was a specific record contradicting the story he'd been told about Maryam's final trip.
That evening, Khalid and I walked through a quiet courtyard outside the laboratory.
He looked exhausted.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
He laughed without humor.
“No.”
I waited.
He stopped near a stone bench.
“I spent thirty-one years believing my sister was reckless.”
My chest tightened.
He continued.
“That's what everyone said. That she was too stubborn. Too emotional. Too determined to prove people wrong.”
He looked toward me.
“And I believed them because it was easier than admitting I abandoned her when she asked me to help.”
I sat beside him.
“You were young.”
“I was twenty-three.”
“Still young.”
He shook his head.
“Old enough to listen.”
I didn't argue.
He looked toward the courtyard fountain.
“Do you know why I offered a hundred dollars for the answer?”
I thought I knew.
But I waited.
Khalid smiled sadly.
“Because I was angry that nobody could tell me what my sister's last letter meant.”
My eyes filled.
He continued.
“I convinced myself the question was a test of intelligence. That scholars were incompetent. That anyone who failed deserved embarrassment.”
He looked at me.
“But I was the one who didn't understand it.”
I smiled faintly.
“Grandpa would've told you that pride makes a terrible translator.”
Khalid laughed.
For the first time that evening, it sounded genuine.
Then he turned toward me.
“Hannah, I'm sorry I humiliated everyone in that room. Including you.”
I nodded.
“Thank you.”
He hesitated.
“And I'm sorry your employer fired you.”
I looked down.
“I miss the work less than the paycheck.”
He smiled.
“You're being paid fairly for the research now?”
“Through an independent grant, yes.”
“Good.”
I studied him.
For a moment, we looked at each other in silence.
Then he asked a question I hadn't expected.
“Would you have dinner with me sometime?”
I blinked.
“As a research meeting?”
He looked nervous.
“No.”
I stared.
The billionaire who had once commanded a room full of diplomats was suddenly having trouble asking a waitress to dinner.
I almost laughed.
“Khalid, we have a complicated professional relationship.”
“I know.”
“And your family is connected to a potentially serious investigation.”
“I know that too.”
I considered.
“Then ask me after the current research contract ends.”
He smiled faintly.
May you like
“I can do that.”
For the first time, I wondered whether the man behind the hundred-dollar challenge might be capable of learning something that had nothing to do with languages.
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