The Hippopotamus Pool - Elizabeth Peters [60]
The telegraph office was located near the Luxor Hotel, and Emerson suggested we have coffee in the hotel garden. This leisurely attitude was so unlike him I knew he was up to something – several somethings, as it turned out.
‘Not many people here at this hour,’ he remarked, surveying the scattering of tourists at the other tables.
‘Most have already gone out to Karnak or across to the West Bank,’ I said, hooking my parasol over the back of my chair. ‘Only the lazy visitors, who are more interested in dissipation than improvement, would rise so late.’
‘It is a beautiful spot,’ Gertrude said dreamily. ‘What are those purple blossoms cascading over the wall behind us, Mrs Emerson?’
‘Bougainvillea,’ I replied (for botany is a favourite hobby of mine). ‘The climate is tropical; it permits the cultivation of such exotic blooms, as well as flowers familiar to us from our English gardens.’
Emerson was watching people come and go. Becoming impatient, he interrupted my lecture. ‘Do you mind, Peabody? It is time we told Miss Marmaduke and the children of our plans.’
‘Proceed, my dear,’ I said, wondering what the deuce ‘our’ plans might be.
Beating around the bush is not a habit of Emerson’s. ‘I know the precise location of the tomb,’ he said.
Nefret and Gertrude responded with the exclamations of admiration a gentlemen expects from females when he has done something to impress them. Ramses responded with a question.
‘And how did you ascertain that information, Father, if I may ask?’
‘I have my methods,’ said Emerson, trying to look mysterious. ‘As to where . . . You will discover the answer to that tomorrow morning, when I lead you to the site. Thus far, Miss Marmaduke, I am the only person who knows the precise location. Even Mrs Emerson has not been taken into my confidence, for the simple reason that the knowledge might endanger her. Inexperienced as you are, you cannot comprehend how far the local thieves will go in order to learn such a secret.’
Gertrude leaned forwards, her hands clasped as if in prayer. ‘But surely, the more people who have the information –’
‘I prefer to be the only one at risk,’ said Emerson heroically. ‘You cannot suppose I would endanger my wife or my innocent young children by sharing such deadly information.’
No one who knew anything about me could possibly believe such an idiotic speech, and Ramses’ attempt to look innocent was far from convincing. Gertrude might have persisted had not an exclamation from Nefret distracted her. It was only a stifled ‘Oh!’ but it was pronounced in tones sufficiently intense to draw my eyes to the individual whose appearance had prompted it.
He had observed us; he was advancing, hat in hand, face wreathed in smiles. ‘What an unexpected pleasure!’ he exclaimed. ‘Good morning, Professor and Mrs Emerson – Miss Forth – Master Emerson. I dare not hope you will remember me –’
‘Good morning, Sir Edward,’ I replied, stamping heavily on Ramses’ foot. The impact jolted a gruff ‘Sir,’ out of him, which was as much as I could reasonably expect. Nefret’s greeting had consisted of a smile and a dimple.
Emerson looked him up and down, from his fair head to his polished boots. ‘Good morning. We met last year, I believe. You were with the Northampton Expedition.’
‘I am flattered, sir, that you should recall such a fleeting encounter.’
‘You, an archaeologist?’ I exclaimed in surprise.
The young man laughed good-naturedly. ‘I don’t merit that honourable designation, Mrs Emerson, though I am keen. Lord Northampton is a distant relation of my mother’s – or, to put it another way, I am a very distant poor relation of his. He was good enough to employ me as a photographer last season.’
How bitterly I regretted having spared her doting guardian the knowledge of Nefret’s scandalous behaviour with this person! It was too late now; the look of calculation on Emerson’s face made his intentions clear to me. In fact, I wondered if he had come to the garden