Lion in the Valley - Elizabeth Peters [9]
I also lowered my voice. “Do you mean that they—that they are . . .”
Baehler leaned forward. “I beg your pardon, Mrs. Emerson. I can’t hear what you are saying.”
“Perhaps that is just as well.” I looked at Ramses, who stared back at me with the owl-eyed blankness that indicated an intense interest in the conversation. I had long since abandoned hope that Ramses was ignorant of matters no eight-year-old boy should concern himself with, but I tried to maintain an appearance, at least, of decorum.
“Emerson,” I said, “take Ramses upstairs and wash him.”
“He doesn’t need washing,” said Emerson.
“He always needs washing. You know we are dining at Mena House this evening, to see the full moon over the pyramids. I would like to get an early start.”
“Oh, very well.” Emerson rose. “Don’t think I am unaware of what you are planning, Peabody. Watch yourself.”
When the two of them had gone off, I turned back to Baehler. “Speak candidly, my friend. Does Kalenischeff share Miss Debenham’s room? You cannot shock me.”
I had shocked Herr Baehler. “Mrs. Emerson, how can you suppose I would allow such a thing in my hotel? The prince has his own room, some distance from Miss Debenham’s suite.”
I permitted myself a small ironic smile, which Baehler pretended not to see. “Be that as it may, I cannot watch unmoved the headlong rush of a fellow creature to destruction, particularly when the fellow creature is a member of my own oppressed sex. We women are constantly taken advantage of by men—I except my husband, of course—and we have a moral obligation to stand by one another. I will speak to Miss Debenham.”
Mr. Baehler appeared to have had a change of heart. That is so typical of men; they are always asking for something and then deciding they don’t want it after all. “I am not sure,” he began.
“But I am.” I smiled and poked him with my parasol. “Have no fear, Herr Baehler. I will approach the subject with the utmost delicacy. I will simply point out that Kalenischeff is a cad, a thief, and possibly a murderer. I fancy that will convince Miss Debenham.”
Baehler’s lips quivered. “You have your mind made up? Nothing I could say would dissuade you?”
“Nothing,” I assured him.
Baehler went off, shaking his head, and I finished my tea. It did not take long, for Ramses had eaten all the sandwiches.
When I returned to our rooms, prepared to assist Emerson in his toilette, a process that is often unnecessarily prolonged because of his extreme reluctance to assume formal evening dress, I found to my annoyance that he and Ramses were gone. So was the cat. How they had eluded me I could not imagine; they must have crept out the back entrance.
They did not return for over an hour. Emerson’s coat and collar had been unbuttoned and the cat Bastet, perched on his shoulder, was nibbling disinterestedly at the dangling ends of his cravat. Ramses’ tumbled curls were gray with dust; his boots left green footprints on the floor.
“You have been in the bazaar of the dyers and fullers,” I exclaimed. “Why, in heaven’s name?”
“Ramses had a fancy for a fez,” Emerson explained, stooping so that the cat could step down onto the bed.
“Where is it?”
Ramses gazed round the room as if he expected to find the headgear in question had moved under its own power and arrived before him. “It appears to have been misplaced,” he said finally.
I groped for words. “Wash,” I said.
“Yes, Mama.”
Followed by the cat, Ramses went into his room, which adjoined ours. Sounds of splashing ensued, accompanied by the tuneless humming with which Ramses enlivens his ablutions. Under cover of the sound I addressed my husband.
“Well, Emerson?”
“Well, Peabody. We must make haste; I had not meant to stay so long in the sûk, but you know how these negotiations go, talking and drinking coffee and exchanging compliments. . . .” He stripped off his coat and tie and shirt as he spoke, flinging them in the general