Guardian of the Horizon - Elizabeth Peters [72]
“I am not certain I do, Emerson.” Her husband gave an exaggerated start of surprise, and she went on, with less than her usual assurance. “Neither alternative is ideal. Showing him the way to the Holy Mountain is precisely what we wanted to prevent and what he hoped to achieve. On the other hand, providing an adequate escort would mean divesting ourselves of at least half a dozen men and camels. That would leave us dangerously short-handed.”
“There is a third alternative,” said Emerson, puffing thoughtfully.
“Not alternative, Emerson. There can only be two. The derivation of the word—”
“Never mind the confounded grammar lesson, Peabody. We could take them as far as the first oasis and leave them there, along with the slowest and most timid of our drivers.”
After a moment Ramses said, “I think you’ve hit on the only possible solution, Father. From the oasis we will be escorted by Tarek’s men.”
And, he added to himself, we’ll have fewer deaths on our conscience if something goes wrong. If only they could persuade his mother and Nefret to stay too.
“Are we agreed, then?” Emerson asked. “Good. Get some rest, Peabody.”
“You too, Emerson.”
“Shortly, shortly. Ramses and I want to do a bit of excavating, isn’t that right, my boy? You too, Selim.”
“Yes, sir,” said Ramses.
“Yes, Father of Curses,” said Selim resignedly.
From that point on, Emerson changed the routine of our march. The bitter cold of the night and the steaming heat of midday were equally unbearable, so he broke the trek into two parts, the first from around midnight until nine or ten A.M., the second from late afternoon until men and camels both gave out, which usually happened around eight.
As we went on, day after steaming day and night after starry night, there were fewer bones and other evidences of life along the trail. The men were tired. More and more frequently they dropped out of line to snatch half an hour’s sleep before running to catch us up. We were delayed for several hours when one of them failed to return; he had “walked to his fate,” as the desert men put it, losing his head and his sense of direction after unremitting hours of sand and heat. Emerson finally located him, wandering aimlessly at right angles to the trail, and brought him back.
Emerson kept riding back, looking for signs of pursuit. He returned from one such foray with a furrowed brow, and I inquired apprehensively, “Did you see anything suspicious?”
Emerson shook his head, and Ramses, who was walking with me, said, “That’s good.”
“I’m not so sure,” Emerson replied. “We’ve had encounters with the slavers and Newbold. We have yet to hear from the military and the Egyptological community.”
“Surely not now,” I protested. “We are too far from the river.”
“I’m not so sure,” Emerson repeated. “And what about Merasen and his confederates, whoever they may be?”
“They have the map,” Ramses said. “They wouldn’t have to keep close on our trail.”
Newbold plodded along in sullen silence. Nefret had kept Daria with her, and Emerson had refused Newbold’s demand that she be returned to him with such eloquence that the request was not repeated. The girl now shrank from Newbold, hurrying to whichever one of them was closest to her when he approached. I wondered what the fellow had done to her. She had claimed she wasn’t afraid of him.
Forth’s second landmark, the dead tree, had fallen at last. Its bleached white branches looked like the skeleton of a mythical monster. As we sat round the campfire that night, Emerson said, “Only three more days to the oasis. I wonder what we will find there.”
“Water, I trust,” I said. “The stopper came out of one of the fatasses today and several gallons were lost before anyone noticed.”
“There is plenty of water,” Emerson replied. “I was wondering whether Tarek has sent an escort to meet us.”
“He surely will,” Nefret said eagerly. “He must be as anxious to see us as we are to see him.”
Ramses, who had been