The Ape Who Guards the Balance - Elizabeth Peters [172]
“Oh dear,” I murmured. “Poor Daoud, out in this weather . . . You shouldn’t have sent him, Abdullah.”
“I did not send him. It was his choice. Sleep now. You are safe and I will keep you safe until Emerson comes.”
I looked from his resolute, bearded face to the strong brown fingers of Kadija, holding the bowl and the spoon. Yes. I was safe with them, safe, and suddenly as limp and sleepy as a swaddled baby. My heavy lids fell. I felt Kadija’s hands straighten the blanket and another hand, gentle as a woman’s, stroking my hair, before sleep overcame me.
Day had come before I woke, to see Kadija beside me. She rose at once and helped me to sit up.
“Were you there all night?” I asked. “Kadija, you should not have—”
“Where else should I be? It rains hard, Sitt Hakim; stay there and I will bring food. And,” she added, her face breaking into a smile, “something you will like even better.”
But he had been listening for the sound of voices and came before she could bring him, pushing through the curtain at the doorway and dropping to one knee beside the bed. The joy of that meeting was so intense it was some time before I could speak. In fact, it was Emerson who spoke first.
“Just as well I came without the children,” he said, wrapping me again in the blanket. “You are in a scandalous and delightful state of undress, Peabody. What happened to your clothes?”
“You know perfectly well that it was Kadija who removed them, Emerson. How long have you been here? What has Abdullah told you? What—”
Emerson stopped my mouth with his. After a brief interval he sat back on his heels and remarked, “When you badger me with questions I know you are yourself again. I believe Kadija is hovering tactfully outside the door; would you like coffee before you continue the interrogation?”
The room was warm and rather dark, since the shutters had been closed against the rain and there was only one lamp. It felt quite cozy as we sipped our coffee together and answered one another’s questions. Emerson’s tale was the shortest. He had no reason to suspect Sayyida Amin’s veracity when she insisted I had never entered the house; the other ladies, Miss Buchanan and her teacher, and the false Mrs. Ferncliffe, had verified the statement and expressed alarm which, in the former case, was entirely genuine. He concluded that I had been seized by someone waiting in the closed carriage, for it was not there when he returned.
In fact, it must have been in that vehicle that I was removed, disguised as a roll of rugs. After a period of agitated inquiry, Emerson had found a witness who had seen such a carriage at the quay. He had hastened back to the school to collect Ramses and David, who were conducting a search of the place. Sayyida Amin had not only agreed to a search, she had insisted upon it.
“I was a damned fool not to recognize her,” Emerson declared. “She was veiled, of course, and she had darkened her face and hands, and—”
“And you believed she was dead. Small blame to you, Emerson. Your persistence prevented her from following me across the river.”
“We barely made it ourselves. The wind was blowing a gale and it had begun to rain heavily. We came back to the house and tended to the horses—poor creatures, they had been waiting in the open for hours—and changed clothing and tried to think what to do next. Since I believed it was Sethos who had abducted you, I had no idea where to begin looking. But I would have found you, my darling, if it meant demolishing every house on the West Bank.”
I expressed my appreciation. “But surely,” I inquired, “you were not under the misapprehension that Sir Edward was Sethos?”
“I wouldn’t put anything past that bastard,” Emerson said darkly. “And I never entirely trusted Sir Edward. He was too damned noble to be true. Wasn’t it you who said everyone has an ulterior motive?”
“I thought his ulterior motive was Nefret,” I admitted. “It appears I was mistaken. I—I have been mistaken about quite a number of things these past weeks, Emerson.”