Lord of the Silent - Elizabeth Peters [150]
“You didn’t tell me your Syrian friend could throw a knife,” Ramses snapped.
“I thought that was implicit in my description of his skills.”
Nefret’s jaw was set. “Shirt off,” she said.
“It’s nothing. Honestly.”
“Take it off.” Her medical bag was on the floor by the bed. Fumbling a little, she took out various items while Ramses tugged the wet fabric over his head and tossed it into a corner.
“You got off lightly,” said Sethos, inspecting him.
“I was running like hell.”
“Wise move. Well?”
Ramses sat down, rather squashily, and recounted his adventures while Nefret splashed antiseptic all over him. Her hands were still shaking.
“It seems to have been an effective performance,” Sethos conceded. “You were somewhat careless—”
A wordless snarl from Nefret stopped him. She slapped a final bit of sticking plaster onto Ramses’s shoulder, reached into her bag, and took out a hypodermic needle and a small bottle.
“Hold out your arm,” she ordered, advancing on Sethos.
“What’s that?”
“Something to help you sleep.”
“I don’t need—”
“But I,” said Nefret, “need to stick something sharp into you. If I hadn’t taken the Hippocratic oath this would be a knife. Ramses, go to bed, you must be absolutely exhausted.”
“I want to watch,” Ramses said.
As he knew from personal experience, Nefret had a light hand with a hypodermic needle. She jabbed this one into Sethos’s arm with almost as much force as if it had been a knife.
She had left a lamp burning in their room. He had barely time to close the door before she flung herself at him, winding her arms tightly round his neck and hiding her face against his breast. “I’m going to kill him,” she mumbled. “Not you, me. After what you went through today . . . He didn’t even thank you!”
Watching his uncle cringe away from Nefret and her needle had made Ramses feel more tolerant. “He resents accepting favors. I expect he hasn’t had much practice at it.”
“Don’t try to make me feel sorry for him.”
“Nothing you could do would annoy him more.” He slid his fingers into her hair and tilted her head back, and was about to kiss her when his jaws parted in a huge, involuntary yawn. “Sorry, darling.”
“Bed,” Nefret ordered. “This instant.”
He hadn’t realized how tired he was until his aching body came to rest on the mattress, but his mind wouldn’t stop churning. “I hope we aren’t shopping for sites with Cyrus tomorrow.”
“I put him off.” Nefret removed the pins and combs from her hair and began brushing it. “The arrival of the family was a sufficient excuse.”
“Oh, God, yes. What are we going to do about them?”
The long waving locks fell over her shoulders in a golden shower. She smiled at him and extinguished the lamp. “Don’t worry about it tonight, darling. I’ve got a plan.”
• • •
Fourteen
• • •
From Manuscript H (CONTINUED)
“Tell them everything?” Ramses said doubtfully.
“Tell everyone everything!” Nefret gestured extravagantly with a slice of buttered toast. Her eyes were bluer than the morning sky and bright as the sun over the eastern cliffs.
The knowledge that his exasperating kinsman was deep in drugged slumber had allowed Ramses to have the best night’s sleep he had enjoyed for days. What with one thing and another, he had been in an excellent mood when they went up to breakfast. Until then.
“That’s your famous plan?”
“It solves the major difficulties, doesn’t it? We’re getting so tangled up in lies and omissions, we won’t be able to keep track of what we’ve told whom.” She planted her elbows firmly on the table and leaned forward. “We agreed last year that we would stop playing these games because it’s caused a lot of trouble in the past. And here we are, at it again! The parents have been hiding things from us and we’ve been hiding things from them. I say we put an end to it once and for all.”
She bit into her toast, and watched him think it over, weighing all the pros and cons in his methodical fashion. At least he was thinking, not raising indignant objections. To her the argument was logical