The Golden One - Elizabeth Peters [48]
I could have shaken the girl. Bertie flushed painfully, and I believe Cyrus was about to express his fatherly concern when Ramses cut him off.
“Right, then. Here you go.” He handed Bertie the rope and gave Daoud an almost imperceptible nod. They started off, Daoud sticking close to Bertie, Hassan trailing at a slight distance.
“Ramses,” I said. “Was that wise?”
“He’ll be all right, Mother.” Hands on hips, he watched the men climb up out of sight.
“He’s got that bad leg,” Cyrus said anxiously.
“What’s needed for this job is strength in the arms and shoulders,” Ramses said. “And nerve. He’s got them. Daoud knows what to do.”
We went on to the end of the valley and the cliff in which the tomb lay hidden. The rope Ramses had descended the previous day was still there, but we had concluded it would be safer for the men to approach from above rather than climb the sheer face. They would then lower the remains down, and descend themselves.
The first part of the procedure went as planned. His white handkerchief pressed to his face, Cyrus watched every move made by the small forms atop the cliff with a concern he was not unwilling to express. He had taken Katherine’s children for his own, and Bertie had repaid his affection, even adopting Cyrus’s name. “Have they got something to cover their faces?” he demanded, his voice muffled by the linen. “And gloves? And—”
“Daoud knows what to do,” Ramses said again. He was watching, too, his brow furrowed. Jumana was the least concerned; having found a rock on which to sit, she was refreshing herself from a water bottle and humming under her breath.
Bertie was the first to descend, and I was relieved to observe that he was being lowered by Daoud instead of going down hand over hand as Ramses had done. He disappeared into the cleft and was followed by Hassan, who was carrying a folded piece of canvas and a length of rope.
I suppose it did not take more than ten minutes for them to finish what they had come to do, but it seemed longer. The first thing I saw was the neat white turban of Hassan. Emerging with some haste, he caught hold of the rope and slid to the ground.
“Hell and damnation,” Emerson remarked, in a voice that echoed between the cliffs. “Did you leave him alone up there?”
“It’s all right,” Bertie called. “Look out below.”
The canvas-wrapped bundle swung as he lowered it, and kept banging against the rock face in a grisly fashion. The stench was really quite horrid, but not even Cyrus backed away. He was watching Bertie, who stood with feet braced, paying out the rope. Ramses’s assessment had been correct; he had strength enough for this. The bundle was not very large.
It settled onto the rock-strewn ground with a flexibility I prefer not to describe, and Bertie immediately began to descend. Drawing his knife, Ramses cut the rope and would have lifted the body out of Bertie’s way had not Selim intervened. Hassan hastened to help him lift it onto a rough litter and carry it away.
“Well!” I said, drawing the first deep breath I had taken for several minutes. “Thank goodness that is safely accomplished. Now let us . . . Nefret? Nefret, where are you going?”
She had followed after Selim and Hassan and stopped them, far enough away so that the horrible smell did not reach us.
“Hell and damnation,” Emerson ejaculated. “She isn’t . . . She surely won’t . . .”
The men lowered the litter to the ground. Emerson emitted an even more blistering oath and started toward them.
“No, Father,” Ramses said.
“But—did she tell you she—aren’t you going to stop her?”
Ramses shook his head. “She didn’t tell me, but I suspected she would, and no, I am not going to stop her. I played the masterful husband before. I ought not have done so. It is her decision and her right. Please don’t interfere.”
He went to join Nefret and stood watching, his hands in his pockets. She looked up at him and spoke, briefly, before returning to her grisly task. “What is he doing?” Emerson demanded.
“Just being with her,” I said. “Sharing the unpleasantness in the only way he can. It is really very sweet,