The Mummy Case - Elizabeth Peters [136]
“My dear Emerson, you do yourself an injustice,” I said. “Our papyrus was Coptic, not Greek; Christian, not pagan. The baroness’s mummy case obviously belonged to a worshipper of the old gods. It was early Roman in date, and Christianity did not become the official religion of the Empire until 330 A.D., under Constantine the Great. Yet the Coptic Church was established in the first century, and Egyptian Christians survived, though subjected to cruel persecution, until—”
“Until they got the chance to persecute everyone else,” said Emerson.
“I beg you will refrain from expressing your unorthodox religious opinions just now, Emerson. I am endeavoring to explain that Christian writings of the first and second centuries did exist, and that it would be natural for a pagan to consider them waste paper, fit to be used in the construction of a coffin.”
“Granted, granted,” de Morgan said, before Emerson could pursue his argument. “I will grant anything you like, madame, if you will only get on with your story. This business of the twin coffins—”
“It is really very simple,” I said, with a kindly smile. “Abd el Atti gained possession of the two mummy cases; they came, of course, from the same tomb. One, belonging to the wife, may have been damaged to begin with. Abd el Atti realized the papyrus used in its construction contained Coptic writing. Being a shrewd old rascal, he understood the nature of his find—”
“And looked for a customer who would appreciate its value,” Emerson broke in. “Unluckily for him, the clergyman he approached was a religious fanatic. Ezekiel Jones was no mean scholar. His crude manners and speech caused us to underestimate him, but there were, in fact, a number of indications of his intellectual ability, including his knowledge of Greek. He translated the manuscript Abd el Atti sold him, and the startling revelations in the text drove him over the brink into madness. He determined to destroy the blasphemous manuscript. But it was incomplete. He visited Abd el Atti on the night of the murder….”
Emerson’s breath gave out, and I took up the story. “He went there in search of the rest of the manuscript. No doubt he had harassed and threatened Abd el Atti; the old man was in deadly fear—not, as I had supposed, of his criminal associates, but of the unbeliever who was behaving so strangely. On that last night Abd el Atti admitted to Ezekiel that there had been two coffins, one of which had been sold to the baroness. He also told Ezekiel I had a fragment from the first coffin. Ezekiel went berserk. He strangled the old man then and there—”
“And hanged him from the roofbeam,” Emerson said grimly. “There was always a suggestion of ritual murder in that, for why go to the trouble of hanging a man who is already dead? I took it for some ceremony of the gang Abd el Atti had betrayed; but did not Judas, the greatest of traitors, hang himself, and was not David’s treacherous and beloved son Absalom found hanging from a tree? In Ezekiel’s darkening mind it was the proper treatment for a blasphemer.”
“Ezekiel broke into our room at Shepheard’s hoping to retrieve the fragment,” I went on. “He had removed the remaining pieces of the first mummy case from Abd el Atti’s shop the night of the murder. He was not interested in the mummy; along with other items it was knocked over and the painted panel fastened to it was dislodged from the wrappings. That was the painting Emerson—”
“Ahem,” said Emerson loudly. “So much for the first coffin and mummy. The second, that of Thermoutharin, was in the salon of the baroness’s dahabeeyah. Ezekiel knew his holy mission would not be complete until he had obtained and destroyed it. There was a strong possibility that it contained the remainder of the blasphemous manuscript.”
“That clumsy fellow broke into the baroness’s cabin and single-handedly carried off the mummy case?” de Morgan asked incredulously.
Emerson beat me