The Falcon at the Portal - Elizabeth Peters [129]
“Quite a lot.” David knew when to stop asking questions. He put his hand on Ramses’s shoulder and they started back toward the boat. “What the deuce has been going on? Murder, assault—”
“The usual sort of thing,” Ramses murmured.
“Yes, quite. Like the forgeries?”
“She told you about that too?”
David grinned reluctantly. “When she stopped for breath, the Professor started in. I felt like a boxer reeling from a series of hard hits to the jaw!”
“Well, you know Mother.” He stopped to greet Reis Hassan, and went on, “When she decides to confide in someone she lets him have it all at once.”
“I prefer it to her former habit of never telling us anything.”
Ramses had not been on the Amelia since they moved. The saloon looked strange without the clutter of books and papers that had always filled it. David hadn’t had time to scatter his drawing materials and reference books about; the place was almost too neat for comfort.
Lia was sitting on the wide curving divan under the windows; the setting sun framed her golden hair like a halo. One of the servants must have delivered the messages and letters that had come for them over the past weeks; a stack of envelopes was on the divan beside her and her head was bent over the letter she held in her hand. He noticed, because he had got in the habit of noticing things, that it was several pages in length, and that it absorbed her to such an extent that she failed to observe his presence until he was actually in the room. Thrusting the letter into the pocket of her skirt, she ran to meet him. When she freed herself from his hearty embrace, he saw there were tears in her eyes.
“I’m glad to have you to ourselves for a bit,” she said, taking his hand and leading him to the divan. “We are dining with the family this evening, and you know what that will be like—everyone talking at once!”
“I’m afraid you are in for several days of exhausting celebration,” Ramses said lightly. “Selim has been organizing a fantasia to which the entire village is invited, and Mother spoke of giving a ball or dinner party in your honor.”
“She can just forget that,” Lia said emphatically. “I refuse—what’s so funny?”
“You look exactly like Aunt Evelyn when she’s in a temper. A nice little domestic cat pretending to be a tiger.”
“She’s not pretending,” David said. The look he gave his wife made Ramses wish he were dead.
“I mean,” Lia went on, “that we haven’t time for balls and dinner parties, and no interest whatever in outfacing Cairo society. I find it hard to forgive you for not telling us, Ramses.”
“About what?”
“Anything!” She gestured emphatically. “It was bad enough concealing the business of the forgeries from us, but you might have mentioned it when people started shooting at you.”
“Mother,” Ramses said meekly. “Not me, Mother.”
“Oh, well, that’s all right then!”
“I’m sorry.”
She turned toward him and took his hand in hers. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be scolding you; you’ve had enough to worry about. Do people really think you were responsible for that girl’s death?”
Ramses blinked. Lia was always taking him by surprise. Like her mother, she looked fluffy and sweet and naive, but she had the same gift for going straight to the heart of the matter regardless of tact.
“I remember her from last year,” Lia went on. “I didn’t know her well and I didn’t like her very much, but she didn’t deserve to die that way, at the hands … Oh, Karima. Yes, thank you, we will have tea now.”
It took a while to arrange the trays and dishes to Karima’s satisfaction. When she had gone, Lia picked up exactly where she had left off. “At the hands of someone she knew and trusted.”
“Did Mother tell you that?” Ramses asked. “We don’t know for certain.”
“It’s obvious! She was a frivolous, overly confident woman, but she wasn’t stupid enough to wander around alone at night. She was meeting someone, and that someone was not a lover.”
“I’m afraid to ask how you arrived at that conclusion,” Ramses murmured.
“She was in love with you,” Lia said coolly. “And it wasn’t