Lord of the Silent - Elizabeth Peters [66]
“Is that all you intend to say?” I inquired.
“What else is there to say? Anything more would be pure conjecture. Russell thinks he is a detective, let him come and detect.”
The messenger reluctantly tore himself away and the other men stood by, watching avidly as Emerson squatted by the body. I knew what he intended to do, and I was content to leave it to him. Mummies I have become accustomed to, though I never have liked them very much, and I have encountered quite a number of fresh corpses, but this one did not appear to be as fresh as it might have been.
Rather than confess this weakness to Emerson, I found a more practical objection. “If you mean to finish excavating that corpse, Emerson, you ought to follow your own professional standards. You will need more light, to begin with.”
Emerson had to agree. The body lay in the shadow of the wall and a single torch gave limited light. While he was locating his own torch and showing Selim where to point it, I found one of the brushes we used for clearing delicate objects. He was gracious enough to accept this as well. It was not really necessary for him to mention fly larvae.
“But that is rather odd, isn’t it?” I asked, as detective fever overcame my temporary attack of squeamishness. “Surely a body buried in sand would be protected from insects, and it would suffer desiccation rather than decay.”
Emerson did not look up. He had brushed the sand away from the face and was working his way down. “Flies, of which there are a great number in Egypt, gather on a motionless body almost instantly. I would guess that the body was left unburied long enough for a busy insect population to infest it.”
“You need not go into detail, Emerson.”
“Rigor mortis, as I hardly need tell you, has come and gone,” Emerson continued. “Hmmm. The effects of desiccation on top of decomposition are quite fascinating. It’s a pity Nefret isn’t here, she would appreciate this. Are you sure you wouldn’t like a closer look, Peabody?”
“It is most considerate of you, my dear, but I think not.”
“Too much even for you, eh?” Emerson chuckled. “There are no signs of animal attack, which suggests that the murderer did not leave him lying in the open.”
“So you agree it was murder.”
“He didn’t walk out here on his own, dig a hole, lie down, and cover himself with sand,” Emerson said acerbically. “Now why the devil would a killer keep the body of his victim lying round the house instead of burying it in the desert or throwing it into the river?”
“Because he wanted us to find it. He couldn’t carry it here in broad daylight, and the moon has been at the full. Last night was overcast.”
“The past several nights, in fact. He’s been here for a while.” Emerson went on digging carefully around the remains. “I wonder what they did with . . . Ah. Here it is—a sizable piece of canvas. I knew they must have bundled him up in something of the sort in order to facilitate transport and keep bits of him from falling off along the way. Considerate of them to remove it before they buried him, so that the lucky discoverer would get the full effect.” He stood up.
The body lay completely exposed. It was dressed in the ragged and horribly stained remains of a cotton galabeeyah. I will not describe the condition of the face and hands.
“Let’s get him out of here,” Emerson said coolly. “Tell Ibrahim to rig some sort of litter.”
“I don’t think Mr. Russell would approve of that, Emerson. Disturbing the crime scene—”
“The devil with Russell. His CID people are blundering idiots. I won’t have them tramping around in my tomb. However,” Emerson conceded, fingering the cleft in his chin, “we will take a few photographs. Selim!”
“I am here, Father of Curses,” said Selim reproachfully.
“I don’t want you here, I want you to get the camera.”
Watching Emerson’s methodical procedures, and adding a few little suggestions of my own, I agreed that we were quite within our rights to proceed with the investigation. At a location like