The Falcon at the Portal - Elizabeth Peters [76]
“Yes, sir. You always tell me not to take the slightest risk.”
Especially not where Nefret was concerned, I thought. The wall was beside the scattered bones, which had now been exposed, along with a few rough pots and broken beads. The lower portions of bones and artifacts were still sunk in the matrix of hardened mud and Nefret was trying to get a final photograph of the unsavory ensemble. Selim, atop the wall, held a reflector of polished tin with which he directed the slanting rays of sunlight into the trench.
Emerson glanced uneasily at the bracing beams. They looked to be effective—one plank diagonally across the questionable section, a smaller but sturdy bit of wood propping it, the pointed end of the latter pushed deep into the ground.
“That will do, Nefret,” he said. “Er—you agree, Ramses?”
“Yes, sir,” said Ramses, quite without expression.
I had asked Karl to have supper with us that evening. Emerson made the usual objections; he always objected to company as a matter of principle, though in fact he quite enjoys professional discussions and does not allow the presence of guests to discommode him in the slightest. He was kindness itself to Karl, pressing him to take a whiskey and soda and remarking in his blunt fashion, “You appear rather seedy, von Bork. Something on your conscience, perhaps?”
“Really, Emerson!” I said.
Karl’s mustaches twitched. He might have been trying to smile. “I know the Professor well, Frau Emerson. He is right, in fact; my conscience troubles me that I must leave my Mary und die lieben Kinder so much alone. A letter from her today tells me that meine kleine Maria has been ill—”
“Nothing more than a childish cold, I expect,” I said cheerfully.
“So Mary said in the letter. She would not wish me to worry.” Karl sighed. “How I wish I could have them here with me, where there is no snow or cold rains. But the University does not provide quarters for us and my room in the village would not be suitable. Those who work for Herr Reisner are fortunate to have such a comfortable house.”
Mr. Reisner’s permanent expedition quarters, named Harvard Camp, after one of the institutions that supported his work, was a model of its kind, but I doubted very much that “Herr Reisner” would have welcomed a subordinate’s wife and four small children.
The courtyard had become our favorite place and we retired there after supper for coffee. Before long an explosion of barks burst out. “Visitors,” said Nefret in a pleased voice. “You see how useful Narmer has become.”
“He has given over barking at scorpions and spiders,” Ramses admitted. “But he still howls at other dogs, cats, birds—”
“Who is it?” Emerson demanded. “Peabody, did you invite someone? Curse it, we have work to do.”
“It is probably Geoff,” Nefret said coolly. “He offered to help me develop photographs this evening. Nothing to do with you, Professor darling.”
“Hmph,” said Emerson.
It was Geoffrey, and Jack, and Maude. She was dressed “to the teeth,” as Nefret vulgarly put it, in a very low-cut frock with a skirt so tight she could scarcely walk, and a hair fillet from the center of which a white egret plume rose straight up into the air like a signal flag. Their habit of popping in was becoming something of a nuisance; I really did not blame Emerson for glowering and growling. Maude explained that they had no intention of disturbing us (as if they had not already done so), but had stopped by only to deliver Geoff and ask if Ramses would care to go into Cairo with them, to an evening party and dance at the Semiramis Hotel.
Ramses actually hesitated for a few moments before shaking his head. “Another time, perhaps. As you see, I am not properly dressed and I would not like to detain you.”
He had of course changed clothing after we returned from the dig, but since his father refuses to dress for dinner I cannot insist on Ramses’s doing so. His collarless shirt and unpressed flannels were certainly not appropriate for a stylish hotel.
“You have work to do,” said Emerson firmly.
“All work