Children of the Storm - Elizabeth Peters [15]
When Fatima opened the door I took the note from her, since Emerson was rather sticky with jam, Davy having unexpectedly pressed a bit of lavishly spread toast into his hand.
A vehement cry of “Good Gad!” burst from my lips.
“Don’t swear in front of the children,” Emerson said, trying surreptitiously to hide the squashed offering in his napkin. “What is the matter?”
“The jewelry of the God’s Wives. It has disappeared, and so has Signor Martinelli.”
“What?” Emerson bounded up from his chair. “Impossible!”
“Only too true, however. Cyrus always goes up to the display room first thing in the morning—to gloat, I suppose, and who can blame him? Not all of it is missing, I gather, only two or three of the bracelets and a pendant, but—”
“That’s bad enough,” Ramses said. His eyebrows, as heavy and dark as those of his father, tilted up at the corners as they did when he was extremely surprised or concerned. “M. Lacau will hold Cyrus responsible for every item. Has Martinelli left the house?”
“So Cyrus says. He asks us to come at once.”
“We must certainly do so,” Ramses said. “No, thank you, Davy, you eat the rest of your egg, I’ve already had mine.”
“I’ll come too, of course,” Nefret said.
We were not soon under way, since removing the children and settling them in the nursery with their attendants took some time, and Emerson had to change his trousers, and the horses had to be saddled. Sennia wanted to come along, but I fended her off. This occasioned protest from Sennia, who was inclined to forget when thwarted that she was ten years of age and “almost grown up.” In my opinion, the fewer people who knew, the better, at least in our present state of uncertainty.
For once Cyrus did not meet us at the door. He and Katherine and Bertie were in the display room, engaged in a frantic, and I did not doubt repetitive, search. It was also a futile search. There was no way in which the missing objects could have been accidentally misplaced. The emptiness of the spaces where they had reposed was only too conspicuous.
This was apparent to me at a glance, and I immediately set about restoring my agitated friends to a sensible appraisal of the situation.
“We must discuss this calmly,” I declared. “Cyrus, stop rushing around, it won’t get you anywhere and you may damage something. What precisely is missing?”
Bertie replied, since his stepfather could only stare blankly at me. “Three bracelets—the best of the lot—and the pendant with the two crowned cobras.”
“Nothing else?”
“No. That was my first concern, and I assure you, I have been through the entire inventory.”
I gave him an approving smile. “Well done, Bertie. I have always admired your cool head. Then let us retire and have a little council of war.”
Naturally all agreed. We settled down in Katherine’s charmingly appointed sitting room. At my suggestion she ordered tea and coffee to be brought, for, as I pointed out, it was necessary to preserve an appearance of normalcy. The servants were then dismissed and I began my questioning.
I fancy I conducted the investigation as competently as any police officer could have done. My surmise, that Cyrus had discovered the theft early that morning in the course of his customary inspection of the treasure, was correct. Thinking that Martinelli might have removed the jewelry for further consolidation, he had searched the laboratory without result and then, his distress growing, he had rushed to the Italian’s room, only to find that his bed had not been slept in and that he was not in the house.
“Let us not jump to conclusions,” I said. “He may have spent the night in Luxor on—er—business of his own. Are his clothes and other personal belongings still in his room?”
“What the devil difference does that make?” Cyrus cried wildly. “Wherever he is, he has the jewelry. He is the only other person who has a key to that room. I locked it last night—you saw me do it—and it was locked this morning.”
“It is a good thing I sent the servants away,” I said severely. “Cyrus, I hope and trust that in your agitation