Children of the Storm - Elizabeth Peters [46]
“Balderdash!” Emerson exclaimed.
Sethos shrugged and became serious. “The alternative isn’t so harmless. Your son hasn’t been idle these past few years; he has annoyed almost as many people as I have—the Turks, the Senussi, the Nationalists, even a few people in our own service. David isn’t in the clear either; he is known to the police as a member of one of the nationalist groups. Civil unrest could break out again at any time, and if it does, he’ll be one of the first to be suspected.”
“Surely not!” I exclaimed. “His services to England during the war—”
“Put him at additional risk. Though his activities are not known to the rank and file, they are known to high-ranking members of the service, and it wouldn’t surprise me to learn they hope to make use of him. Some of the members of his former organization are at large, and they regard him as a traitor to the cause. Is it only a coincidence, do you suppose, that Ramses was abducted the day before David was due back in Egypt?”
“It cannot have been a case of mistaken identity,” Emerson protested.
“I said I couldn’t explain it. There may be no connection. In any case, the boys will be safer in Luxor.”
Emerson fingered the cleft in his chin, and looked enviously at his brother’s beard. He still resented my refusal to allow him to have one. “I sincerely hope so,” he grunted. “But—”
“I will follow you in a few days,” Sethos said.
“Your word on it?” I asked.
“My word on it. Barring unforeseen accidents.”
“What are you—”
“Good night, Amelia. Good night, brother.”
I HAD INDEED ARRIVED AT my conclusion by strictly rational means—for I include in that category the deductions of the unconscious mind, which some persons (I name no names) dismiss as intuition. My occasional dreams about Abdullah, who had sacrificed his life for mine, might have been regarded as products of the unconscious; but they were strange dreams, as vivid and consistent as encounters with a living friend. I had not dreamed of him for some time, but I did so that night.
We met always at the same place—the heights above Deir el Bahri, on the path that leads to the Valley of the Kings—and at the same time—daybreak, as the rising sun drives away the darkness and fills the valley with light.
He had not changed since I began dreaming of him (which I suppose is not surprising). Tall and stalwart, his beard black as that of a man in the prime of life, he greeted me as if we had met only recently, and in the flesh.
“You must go to Luxor at once.”
“I intend to,” I said somewhat irritably. “I would waste my breath, I suppose, by asking you to explain. You enjoy your enigmatic hints too much.”
“Because,” said Abdullah, “there is trouble there.”
“I am well aware of it.”
Abdullah waved this away with an impatient gesture. “Not the theft of Vandergelt Effendi’s treasure. That is part of it, but only the least part. Watch over the children.”
I reached for him, gripping his arms tightly. “Good God, Abdullah, don’t be enigmatic about that, of all things. If the children are in danger, I must know how they are threatened and why.”
He smiled, his teeth white against the blackness of his beard. “If I knew I would tell you, even if it meant breaking the commandments that control me here. I see danger to all of you—there is nothing new in that!—and they are unable to protect themselves. Guard them closely and they will be safe.”
“You may be certain I will. And you—you will watch over them too?”
“Over all of you. You have not visited my tomb recently.”
“Why, no,” I said, surprised at the change of subject. “When we get back to Luxor—”
“Yes, you will go there and bring the others. Take my grandson’s son, my namesake, to pay his