He Shall Thunder in the Sky taps-12

by Elizabeth Peters

  “Anything new?” Emerson inquired.

  “No. There was no need for you to come after me.”

  Emerson ignored this churlish remark, but he did change the subject. “I’m worried about your mother.”

  “Mother? Why? Has something happened?”

  “No, no. It’s just that I know her well, and I detected an all-too-familiar glint in her eyes this afternoon. She has not my gift of patience,” said Emerson regretfully. “What was that? Did you say something?”

  “No, sir.” Ramses stifled his laughter. “About Mother—”

  “Oh, yes. I think she is about to take the bit in her teeth and go on the warpath.”

  “I had the same impression. Did she tell you what she’s got in mind? I hope to God she isn’t going to confront General Maxwell and tell him he must call the whole thing off.”

  “No, I’m going to do that.”

  “What? You can’t!”

  “I could, as a matter of fact.” Emerson stopped to refill his pipe. “Calm yourself, my boy, you are becoming as hot-tempered as your sister. Sometimes I think I am the only cool-headed individual in this entire family.” He struck a match, and Ramses managed, with some difficulty, to refrain from pointing out that this might not be such a wise move. If anyone had been following them…

  Apparently no one had. Emerson puffed happily, and then said, “But I shan’t. There is no meeting of the committee tomorrow; that was just my little excuse for calling on him. What the devil, there is too bloody much indirection in this affair. I want to know what Maxwell knows and tell him what I think he ought to hear. Don’t worry; I shall be very discreet.”

  “Yes, sir.” Argument would have been a waste of time; one might as well stand in the path of an avalanche and tell the rocks to stop falling.

  Emerson chuckled. “You don’t believe I can be discreet, do you? Trust me. As for your mother, I think I know what she has in mind. She thinks she has spotted Sethos. I intend to allow her to pursue her innocent investigations, because she is on the wrong track.”

  “How do you know?”

  “Because,” said Emerson, “I know… Er. Because I know the fellow she suspects is not he.”

  “Who is it she suspects?”

  “The Count.” Emerson chuckled.

  “Oh. I agree with you. He’s too obvious.”

  “Quite.”

  They were near the house. “I’ve got to run into Cairo for a while,” Ramses said.

  “I will accompany you.”

  He had expected that and braced himself for another argument. “No. It’s not one of my usual trips, Father. There is someone I must see. I won’t be long. I’ll take one of the horses—not Risha, he’s too well known—and be back in an hour or so.”

  Emerson stopped short, looming like a monolith. “At least tell me where you are going.”

  Just in case. He didn’t have to say it. And he was right.

  “El-Gharbi’s.”

  Emerson’s breath went out in an outraged explosion, and Ramses hastened to explain. “I know, he’s a crawling serpentine trafficker in human flesh and all that; but he’s got connections throughout the Cairo underworld. I saw him once before, when I was trying to find out where that poor devil who was killed outside Shepheard’s got his grenades. He told me… several interesting things. I think he wants to see me again. He didn’t stop by the hospital because he was concerned about that girl.”

  “Not him.” Emerson rubbed his chin. “Hmph. You could be right. It’s worth the time, I suppose. Are you sure you don’t want—”

  “I’m sure. It’ll be all right.”

  “You always say that.”

  “Not always. Anyhow, what would Mother do if she found out you had gone to el Was’a?”

  Ramses left the horse, a placid gelding Emerson had hired for the season, at Shepheard’s and went on foot from there, squelching through the noisome and nameless muck of the alley to the back entrance he’d been shown. His knock was promptly answered, but el-Gharbi kept him waiting for a good quarter of an hour before admitting him to his presence.

  Swathed in his favorite snowy robes, squatting on a pile of brocaded cushions, el-Gharbi was shoving sugared dates into his mouth with one hand and holding out the other to be kissed by the stream of supplicants and admirers who crowded the audience chamber. He gave a theatrical start of surprise when he saw Ramses, who had not bothered to alter his appearance beyond adding a mustache and a pair of glasses. As he had learned, the most effective disguise was a change in one’s posture and mannerisms.

  Clapping his hands, el-Gharbi dismissed his sycophants and offered Ramses a seat beside him.

  “She is a pearl,” he announced. “A gem of rare beauty, a gazelle with dove’s eyes… Now, my dear, don’t glower at me. You don’t like me to praise your lady’s loveliness?”

  “No.”

  “I was curious. So much devotion, from so many admirers! Having seen her, I understand. She has strength and courage as well, that one. Such qualities in a woman—”

  “What did you want to see me about?”

  “I?” The kohl lining his eyes cracked as he opened them wide. “It is you who have come to me.”

  When Ramses left the place a quarter of an hour later, he wasn’t sure what el-Gharbi had wanted him to know. Fishing for facts in the murky waters of the pimp’s innuendoes was a messy job. Once again, Percy had been the main subject—his affairs with various “respectable” women, the secret (except to the all-knowing el-Gharbi) hideaways where he took them, his brutal handling of the girls of the Red Blind District. Ramses thought he would probably never know for certain what Percy had done, or was doing, to annoy el-Gharbi—damaging the merchandise might be a sufficient cause—but one fact was clear. El-Gharbi wanted Percy dead or disgraced, and he wanted Ramses to do the job for him.

  Chapter 10

  I had decided to admit Nefret to my confidence—up to a point. We were finishing the last of the photographic plates when I explained my intentions, and for a moment I feared I had spoken too soon. Nefret managed to catch the plate before it broke, however.

  “Sethos?” she exclaimed. “The Count? Aunt Amelia!”

  “Put that down, my dear. That is right. Come into the other room and I will explain my reasoning.”

  I was not surprised to find Emerson missing. I had known he would go after Ramses to guard him, since if he had not, I would have done it myself. Nefret did not comment on his absence; she assumed that he had also decided to visit the coffee shop.

  I sat Nefret down in a chair and explained my deductions about the statue. I could see that the notion made sense to her; in fact, she tried to tell me she had thought of it herself. Emerson and Ramses do that sort of thing all the time, so I simply raised my voice and proceeded with the next stage of my deductions.

  “I was struck, on the few occasions when I have glimpsed him, by the Count’s resemblance to a villain I once knew named Kalenischeff. He was a member of Sethos’s gang and a thoroughgoing scoundrel; when he attempted to betray his dread master, Sethos had him killed.”

  “Yes, Aunt Amelia, I know.”

  “Oh? I told you about him?”

  “You told us about many of your adventures, and Ramses told David and me about others.” Her face softened in a reminiscent smile. “We would foregather in Ramses’s room or mine, smoking forbidden cigarettes and feeling like little devils, while we discussed your exploits. They were much more exciting than the popular romances.”

  I was gratified, but I felt obliged to add, “With the additional advantage of being true.”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “Sethos has upon occasion mimicked the appearance of a real person,” I continued. “I believe he finds it amusing. The fact that the Count has consistently avoided me is also suspicious. Without wishing to boast, I believe I may claim that many newcomers to Cairo try to strike up an acquaintance with me or with Emerson.”

  “He hasn’t avoided me,” Nefret murmur
ed.

  I gave her a sharp look. She was twisting a lock of hair round her finger; it gleamed like a ring of living gold. “Hmmm. Well, that makes my scheme all the more plausible. I would like you to ask the Count to take you to dine tomorrow night—at one of the hotels, naturally, you must not under any circumstances go off alone with him. You can think of some plausible excuse, such as… er…”

  “I can think of an excuse,” Nefret said. “You are serious about this, aren’t you?”

  “My dear, you can hardly suppose I would ask you to commit such a breach of good manners unless I were. It is not surprising that you should not have suspected the Count; you never met Sethos.”

  Nefret’s lips curved. “I’ve always wanted to.”

  That smile aroused certain forebodings, which I felt obliged to express. “You must abandon your girlish, romantic notions about Sethos. Don’t try to outwit him. Just get him there—I suggest Shepheard’s—so that I can have a good long look at him. Of course I will be disguised.”

  “Ah,” said Nefret. “Disguised. How?”

  “Leave that to me. I hear that wretched dog barking. It must be Emerson and Ramses. Are we agreed?”

  “I will do anything you ask, Aunt Amelia. Anything. If this will help…” She let the sentence trail off into silence.

  “I knew I could count on you. Pray do not mention our little scheme.”

  “Aren’t you going to tell the Professor, at least?”

  “That will depend on… Ah, there you are, my dears. Did you enjoy your evening out? We have accomplished a great deal of work while you were amusing yourselves.”

  By rousting us out at the crack of dawn, Emerson managed to get in several hours at the site before he left to attend his meeting with General Maxwell. He had repeated to me what Ramses had told him about his conversation with David; nothing new had been learned, but at least I had the comfort of knowing that as of ten o’clock last night, David was still alive and well.

  It was not comfort enough. Every passing day increased the danger, and I was all the more determined to put an end to the nasty business. Having worked out a course of action which I felt certain would achieve this goal, I was able to concentrate more or less successfully on our archaeological activities. With Emerson gone, I was the person in charge. I explained my intentions to Nefret, Ramses, and Selim. I never had to explain anything to Daoud, since he always did exactly what I told him to do.

  “No one admires Emerson’s methodology more than I, but in my opinion we have been dawdling over this mastaba longer than we ought. Selim, I want that second chamber completely cleared today.”

  Ramses said, “Mother—”

  Selim said, “But, Sitt Hakim—”

  Nefret grinned.

  Her grin vanished when I went on, raising my voice loud enough to silence Ramses and Selim. “Nefret and I will both examine the fill. Ramses, you can help Selim label the baskets as they are filled. Make certain you identify the precise square and level from which each is taken. In that way—”

  “I believe, Mother, that Selim and I are both familiar with the technique,” Ramses said. His eyebrows had taken on a remarkable angle.

  Selim’s beard parted just a slit. “Yes, Sitt Hakim.”

  I smiled at Daoud, whose large countenance bore its customary expression of placid affability. “Then let us get at it!”

  I daresay my words spurred them all to even greater energy. Daoud kept the Deucaville cars moving. Nefret and I sifted basket after basket, finding very little. Since I wanted to impress Emerson with our efficiency, I kept everyone at it till long past the hour at which we ordinarily stopped for luncheon. Not until Ramses came to join us did a belated realization of other responsibilities strike me.

  He had, of course, misplaced his hat. Though he feels the heat less than most, his luxuriant black locks had tightened into curls, and his wet shirt stuck rather too closely to his chest and shoulders. The well-developed muscles it molded were somewhat asymmetrical, despite my effort to reduce the size of the bandages. I could only hope Nefret’s eyes were not as keen as mine. She had not commented on Ramses’s recent habit of always wearing a shirt on the dig.

  “We’ve come across something rather interesting,” he announced. “You will need to get photographs, Nefret.”

  She jumped up, her face brightening, and Ramses offered me his hand to help me rise. I would have waved it away, but truth compels me to admit I was a trifle stiff. Sitting in the same position for several hours has that effect even on a woman in excellent physical condition.

  The chamber had been emptied almost to floor level. There were some fine reliefs and another false door, but that was not what caught my eye. Beyond the south wall the men had exposed the walls of another, smaller chamber, whose existence none of us had suspected. I realized at once that it must be a serdab, a room containing a statue of the deceased. Through a narrow slit in the wall between the serdab and the chapel, the soul of the dead man or woman could communicate with the outer world and partake of offerings.

  “How did you find it?” I asked, scrambling along the surface to a point where I could look down into the chamber. Enough of the fill had been removed to define the inner side of the walls. Only one of the original roofing stones remained. A scattering of chips on the surface of the rubble inside the room suggested that the others had fallen and shattered.

  “I happened to notice that what had appeared to be only a crack in the wall was suspiciously regular, so I dug outside it and found stonework.” Running his fingers through his hair, he went on, “The plan of the mastaba is more complex than we realized; there is an extension of as yet indeterminate size to the south. As for the serdab, you can see why I want photographs before we continue emptying it.”

  “You think there is a statue down there?”

  “One can only hope.”

  “Yes, yes,” I exclaimed. “Hurry, Nefret, get the camera.”

  We arranged measuring sticks along the walls and against them, and Nefret took several exposures. I was all for continuing, but a general outcry overruled me.

  “We ought to wait for Father,” Ramses said, and Nefret added, in a fair imitation of Miss Molly’s best whine, “I’m hungry!”

  An explosive sigh from Selim expressed his opinion, so I gave in. Scarcely had we begun unpacking our picnic baskets when I beheld Emerson approaching.

  There was something very strange about his appearance. For one thing, he was still wearing the tweed coat and trousers I had made him put on. To see Emerson in a coat at that time of day, on the dig, indicated a state of mental preoccupation so extreme as to be virtually unprecedented. Further evidence of preoccupation was provided by his blank stare and his frequent stumbles. He looked like a sleepwalker, and it appeared to me that he was in serious danger of falling into a tomb, so I shouted at him.

  His eyes came back into focus. “Oh, there you are,” he said. “Lunch? Good.”

  “We have found the serdab, Emerson,” I announced.

  “The what? Oh.” Emerson took a sandwich. “Very good.”

  Visibly alarmed, Nefret took him by the sleeve and tried to shake him. The monumental form of Emerson was not to be moved thus, but the gesture and her exclamation did succeed in getting his attention.

  “Professor, didn’t you hear? A serdab! Statues! At least we hope so. Is something wrong? Did the General have bad news?”

  “I cannot imagine,” said Emerson stiffly, “what makes you suppose I am not listening, or what leads you to surmise that there is bad news. A serdab. Excellent. As for the General, he was no more annoying than usual.” He put the rest of his sandwich in his mouth and chewed. I had the impression he was employing mastication to give him time to invent a story. Inspiration came; he swallowed noisily, and went on, “The damned fools are talking about a corvйe—forced-labor battalions.”

  Ramses, who had not taken his eyes off his father, said, “That would be disastrous, especially at the present time.”

>   “And a direct violation of Maxwell’s assurance that Great Britain would not demand aid from the Egyptian people in this war,” Emerson agreed. “I hope I persuaded them to give up the idea.”

  “That is all?” Nefret demanded.

  “It is enough, isn’t it? An entire morning wasted on a piece of bureaucratic bombast.” Emerson pulled off his coat, tie, waistcoat, and shirt. I picked them up from the ground and collected several scattered buttons. “Back to work,” Emerson went on. “Have you taken photographs? Ramses, let me see your field notes. Peabody , get back to your rubble!”

  Emerson’s exasperation at discovering he had been in error about the plan of the mastaba was so extreme I was unable to get a private word with him for some time. After further excavation had exposed the head of a statue, and Nefret was taking her photographs, I finally managed to remove Emerson to a little distance.

  “What happened, curse it?” I demanded.

  “What happened where?” Emerson tried to free himself from my grasp.

  “You know where,” I hissed—or would have done, had that phrase contained any sibilants. “Something about Ramses? Tell me, Emerson, I can bear anything but ignorance!”

  “Oh.” Emerson’s heavy brows drew apart and his eyes softened. “You are on the wrong track entirely, my dear. The situation is no worse than it was; in fact it has been made safer by the removal of that wretched man. Maxwell assured me that the police will act within a fortnight, as soon as the final shipment of arms is delivered.”

  “A fortnight! Two more weeks of this?”

  “Perhaps we can shorten it.”

  I waited for him to go on. Instead he put his arm round me and pressed his lips to my temple, the end of my nose, and my mouth.

  Yes, Professor, I thought—perhaps we can. And if you think you can distract me you are sadly in error.

  However, I am not childish enough to reciprocate in kind when someone tries to deceive me. I bided my time until we stopped work for the day. The serdab contained not one but four statues, all crammed together in that confined space. They were of private individuals—the tomb owner and his family—so they were not of the same superb quality as the statue of Khafre we had found in the shaft, but they had a naive charm of their own, and all were in excellent condition. Leaving them half-buried for their own protection, we started for home, while several of our trustiest men remained on guard. Ramses also remained, ostensibly to discuss security measures with the men. He would go directly from Giza to his assignation.