Night Train to Memphis - Elizabeth Peters [140]
‘Uh – right,’ John said. ‘If you don’t mind, Schmidt, we ought to turn our attention to more pressing matters than my vital forces. What’s been going on in the great outside world? I seem to have wasted the day in slothful slumber.’
‘It was not wasted,’ Schmidt assured him. ‘You needed to recover your strength. Perhaps we will be able to go on tomorrow morning. Assuming, of course, that you and Vicky do not – ’
‘Shut up, Schmidt,’ I said automatically.
I would have liked to give John a hand with his toilette (without engaging in any of the debilitating activities Schmidt had mentioned) but the only way I could get Schmidt out of the room was to take him out.
It was later than I had realized. Schmidt had the right idea; John needed another night’s rest before we could continue our journey and we needed clothes, nourishment and, above all, more information before we decided how to proceed.
Feisal had gone out in search of the last. Keith was brewing something on a two-burner hot plate; when he asked if I was hungry I said I’d wait for the others.
‘I’m sorry we descended on you like this,’ I added. ‘We’ll try to make it up to you.’
Keith turned down the burner and squatted beside my chair. I remembered now where I had seen him – talking to Schmidt, the day the tour visited Amarna. Schmidt would, of course, view that brief encounter as the beginning of a beautiful friendship. What were friends for if not to help their friends in an emergency? Maybe this development would cure Keith of talking to strangers.
‘I have to admit I thought Dr Schmidt had lost his marbles when he turned up with a wild story about robbing the Cairo Museum.’ Keith glanced at Schmidt, who was sitting on the floor next to the rug where the dog lay. The dog’s tail was flopping up and down and Schmidt was talking to him in German. ‘But when he said Mr Tregarth was meeting him, I figured it was all right. I hope I didn’t offend Mr Tregarth when I mentioned his generosity, he asked to remain anonymous when he offered to support my work here for an additional month.’
‘He’s a very modest man,’ I said. ‘When did he do that?’
‘About six weeks ago. I had permission to work here, but I only had enough funding for a month, with strict economy. Now I can finish my survey.’
I let him tell me about the survey, nodding and smiling at appropriate moments. I don’t believe in coincidences; it was reassuring to know that this wasn’t one. John’s ‘generosity’ had been nothing of the sort. Having been informed of Blenkiron’s plans he had realized he would need all the allies he could find, and he had had to pick someone who already had the EAO’s permission to work at a given site, since official permission wasn’t easily or quickly achieved. He must have planned to leave the cruise at Amarna, and he had undoubtedly prepared a plausible story to win Keith’s cooperation. My arrival had put an end to that scheme; he hadn’t even bothered to approach Keith during our visit. But Schmidt had, and nice indiscreet Keith must have told Schmidt about his generous patron, and Schmidt had assumed that when he indicated Amarna as our meeting place, John would go to Keith.
As he had. So far Schmidt was way ahead of the rest of us. He had known exactly what he was doing. I still didn’t know what I was doing.
Tiring of Schmidt’s attentions, the dog wandered over to inspect me. He was a nondescript creature, like all the other pathetic strays, except that his ribs weren’t showing and he seemed to trust people.
‘What happens to him when you leave?’ I asked, scratching Fido behind his ear.
‘He’s not mine. One of the Egypt Exploration Society people adopted him a couple of years ago – they come out for a few months every winter – and the custodian looks after him when they’re away. He must prefer Boston baked beans to rice, though, because he’s been hanging around me since I got here. I’m afraid that’s the