The Egyptian Coffin (A Lord Ambrose Mystery)
Page 17
I cannot give thanks to any powers of restraint on my part, but rather to my realisation that I had a rival.
“Lord Ambrose, pray tell me if you know anything of Mr. Sholto Lawrence, who is, I believe, a West Country neighbour of ours, in a manner of speaking. Have you heard the name?” enquired Lilian one day, and I could tell by the way that she spoke the name “Sholto Lawrence” that she had an especial interest in its owner.
I answered her with generalities, praising his horsemanship, telling her that he came from a reputable and celebrated old-established Cornish family and so forth (I saw no need to cry up the young whipper-snapper in extravagant terms), and she replied with yet more questions, many that I could not answer, and some that were downright unanswerable, such as Mr. Lawrence’s opinion on the new fashion in small-brimmed bonnets.
I came rapidly to realise that she spoke for the pleasure of hearing his name.
Well, I had a rival, that was clear, a youth in his prime to whom Miss Westmorland was much inclined already. All things carefully considered, Sholto Lawrence would be a most suitable match for Miss Lilian in their shared liveliness and animal spirits as well as their tastes and station in life.
So I fought the temptations of the flesh, like St. Antony before me, but unlike St. Antony, I did not purpose to hold to this chaste attitude for evermore. At any rate, the metaphysical intervention of Mr. Sholto Lawrence, so as to speak, prevented me from pursuing my ardours with Miss Lilian during our sojourn in the desert. I, Ambrose Malfine, failed to press for a conquest, a most remarkable circumstance, perhaps brought about by some unlikelihood of success.
On the fourteenth day of our self-imposed sequestration I gave thanks that good fortune seemed to have prevailed with the young woman. Anyone who reads these words may imagine for themselves the aching slowness of those two weeks, when Times chariot seemed to be standing still. Every morning and evening I said to myself, “One less night to endure,” or “One day fewer,” and I counted off the sunsets with fear and longing, setting long scars in the rock-face to mark their passing; the longing was of course for the time to be up, but the fear was that this was the last day on which she enjoyed her health. I thought with horror of those dreadful pustules that had covered the face of the man I had seen dying in Casterman’s house in Cairo: that the smooth face of this innocent girl should turn into such a mass of encrusted sores seemed too much to bear.
Yet at last my dagger made its fourteenth cut in the soft rock, and she had been spared.
“I will take you to my sister and her husband,” said I, as we sat beside a fire of dried palm-leaves and branches on the last night of her isolation. “You can stay with them on the Zuheida, where they have sealed themselves off from the shore. You will be quite safe with them till the contagion in the city dies down — and protected from the machinations of that demon, Casterman!”
As far as Casterman was concerned, I had but one ambition: to hunt him down. I knew the full extent of the mans devious and cruel spirit and the nature of the wicked business in which he was engaged: I do not mean his purpose towards Lilian alone, but the other reason that had brought him to Egypt, the scheme which connected him with her uncle and made the two of them, Casterman and Micah Overbury, companions in evil-doing.
On that last day of Lilian’s strange isolation I sat in my tent and scrawled a message to my sister, and then walked the some miles through the desert towards the river to where their boat was moored, near a site where some Bedouin were encamped. In my letter I asked Ariadne to take the girl on board. Not myself: I had dealings with Casterman which must be accomplished before I could allow myself the luxury of a safe place of refuge. There is always some obstacle to a quiet life, I find; some quittance that must be satisfied before I rest. Do I truly long for peace?
When I reached the bank of the river, I inserted my letter in a common small pottery vase and wrapped it securely in a piece of scarlet cloth, which was a signal I had arranged with Charles and Ariadne that the missive within came from myself and from no other. I saw their figures moving along the deck; the rais cast a line a shore to which I tied my missive, and I saw it hauled through the water and up into Charles’ waiting hands.
I stood for a few minutes on the bank, while they unwrapped the cloth, a scrap of bright-red which was visible at a great distance, and smashed open the pottery vessel, and waited till I saw one of the little figures waving an arm in acknowledgment. I knew then that I could bring Lilian safely aboard the Zubeida and leave her in the care of those on board.
Then I turned into the great wastes behind me. Night fell. The fire threw up great flickering shadows across the canvas of my tent and the desert air seemed bitterly cold, the stars glittering, hard and remote.
FIFTEEN
On the following day, I strode to the top of a dune, shaded my eyes with my hand, and stared out across the desert in the direction of the river. Long soft crests of yellow sand stretched eastwards and behind me the sun was already starting to sink. Far off, in the distance, a solitary figure detached itself from the distant strip of bright-green vegetation that marked the course of the Nile, and made towards us, loping across the dunes with long strides and casting a long spiky black shadow that jerked behind it.
The figure wore a burnous that fluttered in the breeze, and held one end of the cloth across the face, to protect it from the sand that blew like faint smoke in the wind.
One of the Arabs, coming from the camp near the Zubeida?
What was it exactly that was strange about the picture before me? Had I not seen this a hundred times before: the figure of a lone Bedouin ranging across the sands, making for camp before nightfall?
So what was wrong on this occasion?
I stared for a few more moments. The figure continued to move rapidly up and down the sand-dunes, now steadily climbing, now descending, sometimes vanishing from sight for a few minutes, always reappearing.
There was something about the way the man walked. Something out of keeping.
The Arabs whose tents lay near the Zubeida wore a flat, broad type of sandal — the almost universal footwear for those whose life is spent walking over burning sands.
There is a difference between the walk of men who habitually wear such sandals — and have worn them from childhood — and the walk of Westerners, used to the rigid confinement of boots and shoes. When a Westerner walks across the desert, even if he is wearing flapping Bedouin sandals, he walks in a different way, conditioned by a lifetime of bringing his hard-shod feet down on solid ground, with a firm stamp of the heel that will not do amid the shifting element of the sand-dunes. The desert is not his element: he moves stiffly there.
This man was moving in the manner of a Westerner.
And why was he following his particular path? Every few minutes, he seemed to stop and check ahead.
With a sinking heart, I realised that the still desert air had conspired against me. Oh, for a sand-storm, a raging khamsin, that whirled the very grains of sand through the air and deposited them in different sweeping patterns and undulations, like the very waves of the sea, obliterating all previous traces.
All traces, such as the trail my footsteps had made in the sand between our hiding place and the bank where the Zubeida was moored.
I had been so confident we were safe! I cursed myself, for my relief that the painful suspense of Lilian’s quarantine was so great that I had been blind to other dangers.
Casterman, I realised, would have found it easier to track us down during a time of pestilence. His contacts in that house in Cairo where Lilian had been imprisoned would have seen us flee together, and once it was known she was in my company, Casterman would eventually get on to the trail. I am, after all, a fairly distinctive creature, even in London or Paris. And here, we were isolated indeed; many Europeans had fled Cairo and there were no other houseboats now on the river — all had fled downstream to escape infection. The Zubeida was conspicuous, faithfully remaining at her moorings.
Turning round, I saw that Lilian, unaware anything was wrong and wanting to know what message the stranger might bring, had followed me. She was some twenty yards behind me. I ran towards her, ducked down, running parallel with the dunes.
“Lilian, get back into the tomb — quickly! Go into the passage at the entrance!”
There was little time now. The figure moving across the sands was getting very close. There were a few minutes remaining before he came close enough to see what we were doing. With Lilian safely inside the tunnel that led down to the tomb, I dragged back the planks over the shaft just inside the entrance. Lilian watched me from the other side of the pit, understanding quickly what I was doing. She would be safe further inside, at any rate; even if he had a firearm, the twisting and turning of the passageway would make it impossible for him to shoot accurately.
In my tent, I found my pistol, checked it was loaded. The tent was partly concealed in the shadows from the rock behind the tomb.
Events now happened very quickly.
As he descended the last slope towards the cave, the man, the non-Arab in Arab clothes, began to run.
Casterman!
He was running directly to Lilian, who was still close to the entrance of the tomb, just on the other side of the mouth of the shaft. As he had come over the crest of the slope he could see her plainly, her white dress fluttering in the tomb entrance as distinctly as if it had been a flag.
Lilian retreated further into the tomb, and Casterman gave a cry of satisfaction as he flung himself the last few yards towards the entrance. He was so fixed upon her that he did not even look aside in my direction.
“Miss Lilian! Come out, Miss Lilian!”
He held something in one hand, behind his back.
A long, gleaming curve.
He had a knife.
At the mouth of the tomb, he paused, to let his eyes adjust to the darkness. I ran towards them; my footsteps were silent on the sand.
Then Lilian called out. “You tried to kill me once! Well, come on then, murderer!”
She was actually taunting him, with a courage that seemed madness.
He was at the threshold of the tomb now. I saw Lilian’s white dress retreating down the dark tunnel behind. I heard her call again.
“Come on then, if you dare!”
It seemed an absurd, forlorn, childish cry.
So Casterman must have thought, for he dashed forward.
His eyes must have been still unaccustomed, still blinded by the transition from brilliant sunshine to the black world within the tomb. So that he could not distinguish shades of grey, could not see the black rectangle, a darker patch amid the darkness of the tomb, that lay between himself and the fluttering patch of white that represented his prey. Nor could he have seen the outline of the planks that were now propped up against the wall instead of bridging the mouth of the pit.
He and I both were taken by surprise at that moment.
We had underestimated something — through lack of observation, or arrogance, or what you will.
That something was the depth of Miss Lilian’s hatred towards him.
We had both thought, Casterman and I, and I confess that in this respect I was no better than he, that because she was a young and inexperienced girl, who had seen little of the world, that her feelings and actions would did not weigh significantly in the balance.
He had behaved with contempt and cruelty towards her; he had deceived her and he had not cared how much she suffered.
She hated him, as she later told me, in a way that she had never experienced hatred before.
“It was almost like love, Lord Ambrose,” she said. “So strong!”
It caused her now to call out to him, almost like a girl to her lover.
I saw him hesitate for a moment.
I can still hear that young voice ringing in my ears.
“If you dare ... if you dare ... Here I am!”
He leapt forward.
There was a scream, a dull thudding sound as something struck the soft debris that had accumulated in the bottom of the shaft over the millennia.
“Stay there,” I called to Lilian. “Keep well back!”
I had in mind that he could still be deadly, a wounded serpent in the pit below.
As I peered into the depths of the shaft, all I could see was a glimmer of light-coloured clothing.
I took no chances. I simply took aim and fired straight down into the pit, that trap where he had been caught. I cared not that it was like shooting a rat in a barrel: I wanted this creature dead.
The niceties of conscience are for those gentlemen who sit in their libraries and make fine judgements: I have fought men who would cut my throat with less pause for reflection than when they killed a hare.
I survived.
I cut their throats first. There was no time for anything else, as there was no time there in the desert for enquiring how many angels may dance on the head of a pin, or other delicate problems that moral philosophers may set before us.
Now the sound of my shot echoed round the rocky cliff.
I ran to my tent, grasped a rope, and lowered myself into the pit. I fired another shot; the ensurance of death for this scorpion. Then Lilian began to sob — the reaction from stress and fear.
Later, when I had ascended, I pulled the planks down over the mouth of the shaft, put my arms around the girl, who was shaking uncontrollably, and got her to my tent, where I wrapped her in a blanket.
I fetched the Arabs from their encampment and we hauled him up, after I had got down into the pit on a rope and tied it under his arms. I was glad that, for Lilian’s sake, there was not much blood to be seen. His eyes were open and staring as the body juddered up the shaft.
SIXTEEN
“Oh, Lord Ambrose! I’m that glad to see your lordship!”
It was Jennet, whom I encountered outside the office of the British Consul in Alexandria, and great was my surprise when that lady fairly rushed into my arms, those very arms which she had clearly thought would embrace all the wicked temptations of the devil himself.
But she was far from home and in a terrible fright. I was at least familiar, and English, and a gentleman.
“I’ve been coming here every day to try to make them search for Miss Lilian — I’m sure as eggs is eggs — Casterman’s done something terrible, the wicked critter. Oh, whatever can we do?”
“Don’t be afraid, Mrs. Jennet. I’ve just arrived from Cairo and I can assure you that Miss Lilian is quite safe.”
“Lord be blessed! What’s happened to her, the poor chick? And where is she now? Is she with you?”
“No, Jennet, but she is with my sister and her husband, on board their houseboat, and I am going to make arrangements for you to join them at the earliest possible opportunity.”
“Oh, your lordship — with Miss Ariadne — well, that’s all right then, and I’m that grateful I can hardly speak — and it was a sad, sad day I ever said anything against your worship and I say now I was utterly wrong and foolish ...”
“Nonsense, Jennet, you were quite right — I am a terrible reprobate, you know — I just happen to have been of service in this matter.”
“Your lordship jests with me! But when can I see my mistress?”
“Very soon, for you can leave for Cairo today if you wish. The epidemic is dying down, and I’ll help you get there as fast as possible. Why don’t you return to the hotel and pack your things in the meantime?”
And Mrs. Jennet actually flung her arms around me and embraced me then and there, before picking up her skirts and whirling down the street like a small black storm.
“All I know about him is that his name was Casterman,” I was saying to the Consul a few minutes later, “that he was in in the employ of a certain Mr. Micah Overbury
of Westmorland Park, and that he put Mr. Overbury’s ward in the most deadly peril of infection from the smallpox, with which, as anyone may see, he was himself afflicted at some stage in his life. As for his ill intentions towards Miss Westmorland, I believe a certain young Mr. Sholto Lawrence would testify to that, for he rescued Miss Westmorland from a most perilous situation on a previous occasion, where she had been led into a dangerously decayed tower. And that was on a sight-seeing expedition in Alexandria which had been organised by Casterman. I freely admit that I shot the man, but I was convinced that in doing so I was saving Miss Westmorland from a fellow who purposed no good towards her. I am quite willing to make a statement to that effect and I am sure that Miss Westmorland will support my testimony.”
“There is a bullet-wound on his breast — it’s all very dirty and torn, of course, but I could see the powder-mark on his shirt when I had a look at the fellow. Still, you assure me that was necessary to save the life of the young lady?” said the Consul.
“Or her honour, sir, her honour! I would plead that in any court of law!”
I could see that this semi-official jargon was greeted with relief. The Consul, to whom I had desired to make a statement concerning the body which lay in the next room, and which was at present causing His Britannic Majesty’s Government a very considerable headache, gave a sigh — of relief, I thought — and then scratched away steadily with the nib of his pen. There were sticky marks of perspiration on the foolscap. Outside, in the streets of Alexandria, the cries and traffic of the Egyptian streets echoed relentlessly; in the room, the drawn shutters provided shade and a young boy pulled rhythmically at a punkah-style fan.