Children of the Storm - Elizabeth Peters [147]
He was holding a crumpled paper—a telegram, by its color. “Is that what got you het up?” I inquired. “Let me guess. Another message from M. Lacau? What does he want now—everything?”
“Not so bad as that.” Cyrus smoothed out the telegram and tried to fan his wife with it. “I don’t know why it got me so mad. The tone of it, I guess. He left Cairo yesterday—took over twenty-four hours for the telegram to be delivered, as usual. He expects to arrive on Thursday, and he wants to load up in one day—can you believe it? Only he didn’t say expect and want and will you please. Do this and do that was more like it.”
“Telegrams are not the medium for polite circumlocutions,” I replied. “What got him so het up?”
“He did say something about that.” Cyrus read the words. “ ‘Rumors unrest alarming. Stop. Safe arrival Cairo artifacts paramount. Stop.’ “
“Wait till he hears about the explosion,” David murmured. “He’ll be all the more determined to leave Luxor in a hurry.”
“He’s got his goldurned gall suggesting the artifacts aren’t safe here,” Cyrus snapped. “They’re safer than they would be in that dodblasted Museum . . . Oh, shucks. You don’t think he found out about the stolen jewelry, do you?”
“I cannot imagine how he could have,” I replied. “He is just being officious and overly fearful. This really doesn’t change anything, Cyrus; we will have his precious artifacts ready for him and he can load up and go to the devil, as Emerson might say. If we make arrangements in advance for bearers he may actually be able to accomplish it in a single day.”
By midday we had run out of straw and cotton wool. We had dealt with most of the smaller objects; there remained only the coffins, the mummies, and the beaded robe.
“I am sure I do not know how we are to pack that,” I declared. “I would be afraid to roll it or fold it again, and if we insert pins to keep it from shifting around as it is moved, the pins may do even more damage. David, have you any suggestions?”
“There isn’t much we can do,” David said regretfully. He brushed straw off his shirt. “Except cover it closely with a clean sheet and wrap bandages round the whole ensemble, with additional layers of padding above. If it is gently handled—”
“It won’t be,” I said with a sigh. “Ah well, what cannot be mended must be endured. We have done our best. I believe we can finish tomorrow if we can find more packing material.”
“I’ll go over to Luxor,” David said. “There must be some seller of fabric we haven’t cleaned out.”
“Shall I come with you?” I asked.
“That isn’t necessary. I’ll try to locate more clean straw too, while I’m about it.”
He picked up his coat and went out before I could reply. His haste and his refusal to meet my eyes made me wonder if he was up to something. David hardly ever did anything underhanded (unless he was egged on by Ramses), but in his own quiet way he was as stubborn as my son. His disclaimers to the contrary, I suspected he had not entirely severed his connection with the Nationalist movement, and this latest outbreak obviously worried him.
I ran after him, calling his name. He pretended he didn’t hear, but I caught him up while he was saddling Asfur. “You are going to the railroad station,” I panted. “Aren’t you?”
David had never been able to lie to me. Moral force, established at an early age, is irresistible. (It had never been completely successful with Ramses, but he was an exceptional case.) David looked down at me with an attempt at sternness and then caved in, as I had known he would. “Confound it, Aunt Amelia, how do you do it?”
“It is well known in Luxor that I am a magician of great power,” I replied with a smile. David did not return it.
“I only want to see the damage for myself.”
“To what purpose? David, please don’t go alone. Get Ramses or Emerson to go with you.”
“Take the Father of Curses away from his excavations to play bodyguard? What can possibly happen that I can’t handle? This is Luxor, not Gallipoli.”
I let out a sigh of exasperation. Masculine ego is a frightful nuisance.