The Hippopotamus Pool - Elizabeth Peters [8]
It had been Nefret I sought on that terrible June morning, after the call came from Walter. We had had the telephone installed only the month before; little did I imagine that it would be a source of such shocking news.
I left Rose, my invaluable and tenderhearted parlourmaid, sobbing into her apron, while our butler Gargery, his own eyes moist, tried to comfort her. Nefret was not in the house. After I had searched the stables and the gardens, I knew where she must have gone.
Some might think it a strange sort of monument to find in the grounds of a quiet English country house. In point of fact, fake ruins and pyramids had been quite the mode, and many a wealthy traveller to Egypt had brought back stelae and sarcophagi with which to adorn his property. The small brick pyramid, located in a quiet woodland glade, was not a modish ornament, however. It stood over the remains of a prince of Cush. He had lost his life in a vain but heroic attempt to restore Nefret to her family, and at the request of his brother, who had carried the quest to its triumphant culmination, we had given the gallant youth honourable burial in the manner of his own people. A little chapel, its lintel carved with the sun disk and the name and titles of the dead boy, stood at the base of the monument. Nefret went there from time to time; she had known Tabirka well, for he had been her playfellow in her youth. I myself occasionally spent a quiet hour near the pyramid; it was a pleasant place, surrounded by trees and wildflowers.
I found Nefret seated on the stone bench near the chapel, weaving flowers into a garland. She looked up when she heard me approach; I suppose my face must have betrayed the shock I felt, for she at once rose and led me to the seat.
‘I am going to Chalfont Castle,’ I said distractedly. ‘I have tried to reach Emerson and Ramses; they were not at the house in London or at the Museum, so I was forced to leave a message for them. I dare not delay, I must go to Evelyn at once. Will you come with me?’
‘Of course, if you want me.’
‘It may comfort Evelyn,’ I said. ‘How is she to bear it? It was with Walter that I spoke . . .’
I would have gone on sitting there, in a stupor of disbelief and grief, if Nefret had not raised me to my feet and led me towards the house.
‘I will help you pack, Aunt Amelia. And accompany you, of course. How did it happen?’
‘Suddenly and – thank God – peacefully,’ I said. ‘She was perfectly well last night when Evelyn tucked her into her cot. This morning the nurserymaid found her . . .’
I began weeping, I believe. Nefret’s slender arm went round my waist. ‘Don’t grieve, Aunt Amelia. I have asked Tabirka to look after her. His courage is as high as his heart is gentle; he will protect her from the perils of the darkness and carry her safely to the arms of the god.’
I had paid scant attention to Nefret’s little speech at the time, hearing only the comfort it was meant to convey. When it came back to me some time later, it gave me a queer feeling. Had I told her of the baby’s death? I could not remember having done so, and yet she had known – known before ever I spoke. Even more alarming was her reference to the ancient (and of course erroneous) religion she had supposedly abjured. Was that why she crept away to her foster brother’s chapel – to whisper prayers and make offerings to the old gods she secretly worshipped?
(The little offerings I occasionally left on the altar were simply tokens of respect, as I am sure I need not explain. And I am sure the bottles of Bickle’s Best Brown Stout I once found arranged in a neat row had been intended in the same way. They could not have come from Nefret, since the purchase of spirituous liquors was impossible for her. It was legally impossible for Ramses too, but Ramses had his methods – most probably Gargery, his devoted admirer.)
Evelyn and her husband Walter, Emerson’s younger brother and a distinguished Egyptologist in his own right, were our dearest friends as well as our closest kin. They were devoted to their children,