The Deeds of the Disturber - Elizabeth Peters [157]
‘Obviously a number of people had to be bribed if such an event was to take place. Oldacre was one of them; he was always toadying to the rich and would have given his mean little soul to be a member of such a group. The night watchman in charge of that part of the museum was paid a large sum, and invited to participate, as a means of ensuring his silence. His death was an accident; none of them anticipated the opium would kill him. When they realized he was dead, their first thought was to conceal what had taken place. They gathered up the bottles and glasses and the wreaths of flowers, leaving the body where it lay. The women . . . I fancy Ayesha supplied them. They were no danger, they would not dare speak out against such noble gentlemen.
‘Oldacre was another matter. It wasn’t only money he wanted; he wanted to be one of them, an intimate – a guest at their clubs, and in their homes. His death was in itself the clue to the identity of his killer; for which of those young aristocrats had real cause to fear him? The truth might have caused a scandal, but they were used to scandals, they had seen plenty of them.
‘Eustace Wilson, on the other hand, stood to lose everything if the truth came out. He would never find another position in archaeology; and if he was arrested and disgraced, he would also lose his hold on the young man he was methodically milking of his fortune.’
The Inspector looked doubtful. ‘That’s all well and good, Mrs Emerson, and now that the case is solved, your reasoning makes excellent sense; but I didn’t see it that way at the time. Those who suffer from – from his lordship’s disease are sometimes subject to violent rages. Being threatened by a contemptible creature like Oldacre might well have induced such a homicidal rage.’
Emerson coughed. He no longer attempted to conceal his smile.
‘If you will allow me to continue, Inspector,’ I said coldly, ‘you will find that my assumption concerning the death of Oldacre was confirmed by other evidence.’
‘I beg your pardon, ma’am,’ said the Inspector.
‘I had felt all along that the man we wanted was no dilettante, but an individual who had been trained in Egyptology. His costume was authentic in every meaningful detail, and the quotations he chose were too obscure and too apt to be readily discovered by a casual student of the subject. The paper found in Oldacre’s dead hand contained an invented message, not a quotation – and that was an even stronger indication of expertise in the language, for it is easier to copy a text than compose a new one. The errors of orthography and grammar in that message were of the sort that would be made, not by an amateur, but by a student – particularly by a student of Mr Budge’s.
‘Oldacre was one of Budge’s subordinates. It was barely conceivable (for in the investigation of crime, Ramses and gentlemen, one must consider all possibilities, however unlikely) that he had written the message himself, for purposes unknown, and that its application to his death was purely coincidental. However, Oldacre was dead when the ushebtis and their messages were delivered. Heaven knows there are many of Budge’s students wandering around the world – too many, some might say. But the only other one closely connected with the case was Mr Eustace Wilson. He knew Oldacre, and I do not doubt that the acquaintance was closer than he led me to believe.
‘What threw me off the track for a time was the involvement of Lord Liverpool and his friend, Lord St John. In fact, the Earl’s hideous disease was the ultimate cause of the entire business. There is no cure for it. Death is certain. When people face death, they will try any purported cure, however bizarre and senseless. What have they got to lose? I confess that the full truth did not dawn on me until we discovered, on the night of the affair at the Royal Society, that the mummy had been unwrapped.
‘The wrappings must have been removed while the mummy was still at Mauldy Manor. Certainly the Museum authorities had never authorized such an