The Falcon at the Portal - Elizabeth Peters [37]
“Selim?” Emerson had been talking with Jack Reynolds. He whirled round. “I cannot spare Selim, Peabody. I want him at the site tomorrow.”
“You cannot begin excavating tomorrow, Emerson.”
“Why the devil not? That is why I am here,” said Emerson, teeth bared and brows lowering. “To excavate. Not to sweep floors or help you select curtains and pots and pans and furniture.”
The sight of Emerson in one of his little tempers, his shoulders thrown back, his blue eyes blazing and the cleft in his chin vibrating, never fails to thrill me. I replied, “I don’t expect you to do anything of the sort, my dear. You may prowl the site to your heart’s content, but you will have to do it without Selim. I need him.” Turning to Geoffrey, who, like the others, had followed our exchange with considerable interest, I explained, “Selim is our reis, you see. The members of his family have worked for us for many years. Many of them reside in Atiyah, a village just south of here.”
“Oh, yes,” Geoffrey said, nodding. “Professor Emerson’s trained men are the envy of all other excavators. David Todros, whom I met last year, is one of them, I believe.”
“Not exactly,” Ramses said. “David is a fully qualified archaeologist. He is now a member of our family as well, having recently married my cousin.”
“So that is settled,” I announced.
“No, it isn’t,” Emerson announced. “I’ll tell you what, Peabody; we will compromise, eh? Compromise,” he explained to the young people, “is essential to domestic as well as international peace. Mrs. Emerson and I are almost always of one mind, but compromise smooths over those little differences that occasionally occur. We will have a look at the site tomorrow and after that you can clean and scrub to your heart’s content! How’s that, my dear?”
It is impossible to resist Emerson when he thinks he is being clever, and anyhow, domestic discussions are best not conducted in public. “Very well,” I said. “We had better be going. I am indebted to you, Miss Reynolds, for your help in this matter, and for a delightful luncheon.”
We parted on the most amiable terms, and as we boarded the tram I said, “It will be nice to have such agreeable young persons as neighbors.”
“Just so you don’t expect me to spend all my time drinking tea and gossiping with Maude,” Nefret said. “Goodness, how boring she is! She was quite rude to Mr. Lawrence, I thought. You weren’t very polite either, Ramses; don’t you like him?”
“I find him frightfully public-school, but I don’t know him well enough to like or dislike him. I ran into him when I was in Palestine with Reisner. He had been working at Carchemish.”
“He’s not an Egyptologist?” Nefret asked.
“No.”
“He can’t be a suspect, then.”
“The least likely suspect, I should say,” Ramses replied with a faint smile.
“What are you talking about?” Emerson demanded.
“The forger, of course,” said Nefret. “Surely you hadn’t forgot about that little matter, Professor. If we are to track him down—”
“We won’t do it by suspecting every Egyptologist we happen to run into,” Emerson said in exasperation. “Order and method—”
“Don’t seem to be getting us anywhere,” Nefret declared. “Are we going to the suk this evening, Aunt Amelia?”
“Yes. We must begin shopping for”—I glanced at Emerson—“curtains and pots and pans and furniture.”
Emerson’s well-cut lips curved in an expression that was only distantly related to a smile. “Don’t think you can put me off that way, Peabody, I am too familiar with your underhanded methods. Shopping for pots and pans is not your main purpose. You plan to question the antiquities dealers—to interrogate them, badger them, and bully them. Not without me, my dear. You have a bad habit of annoying the wrong people.”
“A nose for crime, rather,” said Nefret, smiling. “You were planning to let me go with you, weren’t you, Aunt Amelia?”
“Certainly. I need your advice about the curtains.”
We enjoyed a hearty chuckle over this little joke. At least Nefret and I did.
When we reached the dahabeeyah I told Fatima about the new house and