The Ape Who Guards the Balance - Elizabeth Peters [28]
“Well?”
“Take Nefret to el Was’a? Have you lost your mind? Not under any circumstances whatever.”
From Letter Collection B
It surely won’t surprise you to learn I had the devil of a time persuading Ramses to let me go with them. The methods I use on the Professor—quivering lips, tear-filled eyes—haven’t the slightest effect on that cold-blooded creature; he simply stalks out of the room, radiating disgust. So I was forced to resort to blackmail and intimidation, irrefutable female logic, and a gentle reminder that without my signature they couldn’t get the money. (I suppose that’s another form of blackmail, isn’t it? How shocking!)
If I do say so, I made a very pretty boy! We bought the clothing that afternoon, after we had stopped by the banker’s—an elegant pale blue wool galabeeyah, gold embroidered slippers, and a long scarf that covered my head and shadowed my face. Ramses darkened my eyebrows and lashes and painted kohl round my eyes. I thought it altered my appearance amazingly, but Ramses wasn’t pleased.
“There’s no way of changing that color,” he muttered. “Keep your head bowed, Nefret, and your eyes modestly lowered. If you look directly at Mahmud or utter a single syllable while we are with him, I will—I will do something both of us might regret.” A fascinating threat, wasn’t it? I was tempted to disobey just to see what he had in mind, but decided not to risk it.
I had never been in that part of the Old City at night. I don’t recommend that you venture there, darling; you are so fastidious you would be put off by the stench of rotting garbage and the rats scuttling past and the intense darkness. The darkness of the countryside is nothing to it; in Upper Egypt there is always starlight, even when the moon is down. Nothing so clean and pure as a star would dare show itself in that place. The tall old houses seemed to lean toward one another, whispering ugly secrets, and their balconies cut off even the clouded night sky. My heart was beating faster than usual, but I wasn’t afraid. I am never frightened when we three are together. It’s when they go off on some harebrained adventure without me that I get into a state of abject panic.
Ramses led the way. He knows every foot of the Old City, including some parts which respectable Egyptians avoid. When we got near the house, Ramses made me stay with him while David went ahead to reconnoiter. When he came back he didn’t speak, but gestured us to go on.
It was a tenement or rooming house of the meanest kind. The hallway smelled of decaying food and hashish and the sweat of too many bodies confined in too small a space. We had to feel our way up the sagging stairs, keeping close to the wall. I couldn’t see a cursed thing, so I followed David as I had been directed to do, my hand on his shoulder for guidance. Ramses was close behind me, gripping my elbow to keep me from falling when I stumbled—which I did do once or twice, because the curly toes of my bee-yoo-tiful slippers kept catching on the splintered boards. I hated this part of it. I could feel crawly, slimy things all around me.
Our destination was a room on the first floor, distinguishable only by the slit of pale light at the bottom of the door. Ramses scratched at the panel. It opened at once.
Yussuf Mahmud gestured us to come in and then barred the door behind us. I supposed it was Yussuf Mahmud, though no one introduced us. He gave me a long look and said something in Arabic I didn’t understand. It must have been something very rude, because David made growling sounds and drew his knife. Ramses just squinted at the fellow and said something else I didn’t understand. He and the man laughed. David didn’t laugh, but he put the knife back in his belt.
The only light in the room came from a lamp on the table, dangerously close to the papyrus, which had been partially unrolled to display a painted vignette. I edged closer. The sheer size of it was enough to take one’s breath away; I could tell, from the