The Golden One - Elizabeth Peters [122]
“I beg your pardon, Mother,” Ramses said. He was still holding Nefret’s hand, running his fingers lightly over her wrist. “Such inquiries would take too long and would probably be inconclusive. There is one sure way of learning the truth. Ismail Pasha is now in Gaza. I’m going there to try and find him.”
I was conscious of a sinking feeling at the pit of my stomach. “I thoroughly disapprove, Ramses. You are too well known to the enemy. Let them find someone else.”
“I must go, Mother. I can’t leave it to someone else. You don’t understand.” He looked from me to Nefret; and on her face I saw the same dawning horror that I felt on my own.
“They ordered you to kill him,” she whispered. “Is that it?”
“That is how the Great Game is played.” Ramses’s voice was hard, his expression withdrawn. “Assassination, deception, corruption—nothing is too vile if it can be labeled patriotism. Whether he is guilty or under duress, he can give away vital information. Cartright wouldn’t tell me what that information is, but it is obviously enough to make him extremely dangerous.”
I cleared my throat. “You agreed, of course.”
Ramses came to me with his long strides and bent to kiss my cheek. It was a rare gesture for him, and I took it as the compliment he intended. “I would have done, Mother, if I had supposed they’d believe me. Murray would have; he hasn’t imagination enough to suppose anyone would dare disregard his orders, and he doesn’t know the man he wants me to assassinate is my uncle. Not that that little matter would bother him.”
“ ‘If thy hand offend thee, cut it off,’ ” I murmured.
I ought to have known better than to quote Scripture when Emerson was already in a vile humor. His heavy brows drew together, but before he could bellow, Ramses spoke again. “Cartright knows me well enough to suspect I would balk at assassination, so we arrived at a compromise. I will get a look at Ismail Pasha and ascertain whether he is Sethos, and whether he is being used by the Turks against his will.”
“Rather a tall order, that,” I remarked.
“The first part shouldn’t be difficult. He’ll be showing himself in public, as he did in Constantinople. I only hope he hasn’t altered his appearance so much I can’t recognize him.”
“And then what?” Nefret demanded.
Ramses shrugged. “One can’t plan very far ahead when there are so many unknowns in the equation. I’m not counting on anything except making a preliminary reconnaissance. Depending on what I learn, if anything, we’ll decide what to do next.”
“Can you get in and out of the city undetected?” I asked, endeavoring to conceal my concern.
“Oh, I think so. The trouble is, Cartright insisted I take someone else with me.”
“It’s safer for two than for one,” Nefret said hopefully.
“Not when one of the two is fresh out of the nursery,” Emerson growled. “Fair, young, speaks Arabic like a textbook, stammering with excitement at the prospect of playing spy . . .” Emerson summed it up with an emphatic “Damnation!” and went back to filling his pipe.
“He can’t be that bad,” Nefret protested.
“Ha! D’you remember Lieutenant Chetwode?”
“Oh dear,” I said. “Not that ingenuous baby-faced young man who came to Deir el Medina with Cartright?”
“Cartright claims he is his best man,” Ramses said. “He must be older and less ingenuous than he looks, since he has been in intelligence for over two years.”
“Doing what?” Nefret demanded. “Sitting behind a desk filing reports?”
“What does it matter?” Emerson said. “His assignment is not to assist Ramses but to make sure he does what he has said he will do. That bastard Cartright doesn’t trust him.”
Nefret let out an indignant expletive. I said judiciously, “He does have a nasty suspicious mind. To be sure, a sensible individual, which Ramses is not, would go into hiding for a few days and then report that he had determined that Ismail Pasha was not the man they are after. Perhaps if I were to have a little chat with General Murray—”
“No, Mother,” Ramses said, politely but emphatically. “He wouldn