The Deeds of the Disturber - Elizabeth Peters [0]
Praise for Elizabeth Peters’
Amelia Peabody Novels
‘Dastardly deeds, whirlwind romances, curious mummies and all the fun and intrigue of Egyptian excavations, with a heroine who wields a sturdy parasol rather than a magnum. Accomplished entertainment.’
Guardian
‘Between Amelia Peabody and Indiana Jones, it’s Amelia – in wit and daring – by a landslide.’
The New York Times Book Review
‘The doughtiest, smartest, most appealing female protagonist in mystery fiction.’
Aaron Elkins, author of Make No Bones
‘If Indiana Jones were female, a wife and a mother who lived in Victorian times, he would be Amelia Peabody Emerson.’
Publishers Weekly
‘A writer so popular that the public library has to keep her books under lock and key.’
Washington Post Book World
‘Amelia Peabody Emerson, archaeologist extraordinaire, and arguably the most potent female force to hit Egypt since Cleopatra, is digging in again!’
Philadelphia Enquirer
Photo Credit (opposite): by Osmund Grier © 1997
Titles in this series currently
available from Robinson
Crocodile on the Sandbank
First Amelia Peabody
The Curse of the Pharaohs
Second Amelia Peabody
The Mummy Case
Third Amelia Peabody
Lion in the Valley
Fourth Amelia Peabody
The Deeds of the Disturber
Fifth Amelia Peabody
The Last Camel Died at Noon
Sixth Amelia Peabody
The Snake, the Crocodile and the Dog
Seventh Amelia Peabody
The Hippopotamus Pool
Eighth Amelia Peabody
Seeing a Large Cat
Ninth Amelia Peabody
The Falcon at the Portal
Eleventh Amelia Peabody
Thunder in the Sky
Twelfth Amelia Peabody
Lord of the Silent
Thirteenth Amelia Peabody
The Golden One
Fourteenth Amelia Peabody
Children of the Storm
Fifteenth Amelia Peabody
Guardian of the Horizon
Sixteenth Amelia Peabody
Constable Publishers
3 The Lanchesters
162 Fulham Palace Road
London W6 9ER
www.constablerobinson.com
First published in the UK by Robinson
an imprint of Constable & Robinson Ltd 2001
First published in the USA by
Atheneum 1988
Copyright © Elizabeth Peters 1988
All rights reserved. This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, be way of trade or otherwise, be lent, or re-sold, hired out or otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
A copy of the British Library Cataloguing in Publication data is available from the British Library.
ISBN 1-84119-313-5
eISBN 978-1-78033-447-9
Typeset by Palimpsest Book Production Limited, Polmont, Stirlingshire
Printed and bound in the EC
2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3
To Charlotte MacLeod
My favourite mystery writer
and dainty little lady
His sister was his protector,
She who drives off the foe,
Who foils the deeds of the disturber
By the power of her utterance.
The clever-tongued, whose speech fails not,
Admirable in the words of command.
Mighty Isis!
‘Hymn to Osiris,’ Eighteenth Dynasty
Contents
Chapter I
Chapter II
Chapter III
Chapter IV
Chapter V
Chapter VI
Chapter VII
Chapter VIII
Chapter IX
Chapter X
Chapter XI
Chapter XII
Chapter XIII
Chapter XIV
Chapter XV
I
IN a great many respects I count myself among the most fortunate of women. To be sure, a cynic might point out that this was no great distinction in the nineteenth century of the Christian era, when women were deprived of most of the ‘inalienable rights’ claimed by men. This period of history is often known by the name of the sovereign; and although no one respects the Crown more than Amelia Peabody Emerson, honesty compels me to note that her gracious Majesty’s ignorant remarks about the sex she