The Falcon at the Portal - Elizabeth Peters [176]
“Off?” Geoffrey exclaimed. “To the dig? But, sir, shouldn’t we look for Jack? If he is out there somewhere with a rifle, he could be dangerous!”
“Where would we look?” Ramses asked, for Emerson’s look of mild exasperation indicated he did not mean to waste time pointing out the obvious.
“At least you will go armed,” Geoffrey persisted.
“Armed?” Emerson appeared to notice for the first time that he was carrying Jack’s weapons. He dropped them with a clatter. “None of them is loaded.”
“I know where he keeps the ammunition,” Geoffrey said eagerly. “Let me go and—”
“In his desk,” Emerson interrupted. “The damned fool didn’t even lock the drawers. I do not carry firearms, Geoffrey. Mrs. Emerson does; I do not object, since to the best of my knowledge she has never hit anything yet. Kindly refrain from arguing with me and do as I say.”
No one else had argued with him. They knew better. However, conversation cannot be restrained for long among us, and after we had taken our places at the table the inevitable speculation began.
“Perhaps he only went hunting,” Lia suggested. “Don’t sportsmen like to get out early?”
She looked so sweet and so worried, no one wanted to dispel this optimistic fantasy. Ramses, who had scarcely spoken since we returned, smiled at her. “That may well be the case.”
Emerson put an end to the conversation by ordering us all to work. I was of course fully armed, for I pay no attention to Emerson’s little foibles. Pistol, knife, belt of tools were all in their proper places, and as I went out the door I took my parasol from its hook.
When we reached Zawaiet the men were already there. Under Selim’s direction several of them were removing the tarpaulin from over the shaft and Emerson dashed off to make sure no damage had been done. A little water had seeped in, but not much.
It cannot be said that my full attention was on the work. I had thought of the terrain as relatively flat, and so it was, compared with the broken cliffs and irregular contours of the Theban mountains where we had worked before; still, there were enough ridges to provide cover for any number of determined assassins. I took Selim aside. His young face lengthened and grew grim as he listened to what I told him. Before long there were men posted at various vantage points around the pyramid, and atop that structure.
By mid-morning another layer of animal bones had been photographed and removed. Mixed in with them were scraps of papyrus, on which Ramses pounced. “Demotic,” he announced, after a brief look. “You were right about the late date of the deposits, Father. Here is the name of Amasis the Second.”
The pit was by now over six feet deep and we had apparently reached the bottom of the deposit. No more bones appeared, only a thick layer of sand. Emerson, poised on the edge of the drop, suddenly called to the men below to stop digging and come up.
“What is wrong?” I asked, hastening to his side. “Is there evidence of imminent collapse?”
“One is seldom given warning of imminent collapse,” said Emerson sarcastically. He rubbed his chin. “We’ve reached the bottom of the intrusive pit. If you look closely you can see the top of one of the original filling blocks. There cannot be more than a few layers of them; we’ve already gone down seven or eight feet and I calculated that the lowest part of the fill was less than twelve feet from the surface.”
“We will need ropes,” Selim said. “To pull the stones up.”
“I want the men roped too,” said Emerson. “No more than three down there at a time, Selim. Two men holding on to each rope, and tell them if they let go I will break their arms.”
Emerson would have been one of the three in the pit had I not convinced him his strength and skill would be more useful elsewhere. So the task began, slowly and carefully. The stones were not the massive blocks employed at Giza, but each of them must have weighed several hundred pounds, and it took the men a long time to raise