The Serpent on the Crown - Elizabeth Peters [38]
“That’s a good name for it.” Ramses leaned back, hands folded. He was devoted to Daoud, but sometimes he was unable to resist egging him on. “But, Daoud, why would the afrit hang about the hotel after it had carried Mrs. Petherick off? She didn’t even have the statue; she had given it to us.”
Daoud considered this. “Once an afrit has been freed to do evil deeds, it will go on doing them until it has finished the task for which it came.”
“That is eminently logical,” Ramses said gravely. “However, we can’t return the statue to its owner, since we don’t know where it came from.”
“The Father of Curses can send the afrit away,” Daoud said. “The villagers wish to know when he will do that. They all want to come and watch.”
“I’ll speak to Father,” Ramses promised.
“No, you will not,” I said. “Daoud, have you and Selim learned anything about where and when the statue was found? He meant to question the dealers and the better-known tomb robbers.”
Daoud shook his head. “No one has admitted to finding such a thing. But we will go on asking.”
After Daoud had departed, Ramses said, “I doubt Selim will come up with anything useful. We’ve a better chance of tracing the thing if we start with Petherick and the dealer from whom he purchased it. Father means to pursue that line of inquiry while he’s in Cairo.”
“That isn’t all he means to do. You know what he’s up to, don’t you?”
“I’m beginning to think I do.”
We sat in silence for a time, and then I said, “How are your translations coming along?”
Ramses’s face lit up, as it always did when someone had the common courtesy to ask about the work that interested him most. “Very well, Mother. I’ve been working on a group of ostraca we found near the temple—prayers for forgiveness, one might call them. They cover a long period of time, and since only a few are dated, one must rely on textual evidence and linguistic changes to sort them into a sequence.”
“Most interesting, my dear. Er—why do you want to do that?”
Ramses leaned forward, hands clasped and eyes bright. “There is a distinct change over time in the attitudes of the penitent—a greater consciousness of wrongdoing, of personal sin. Professor Breasted has lectured on the development of moral standards, as demonstrated in the Wisdom Texts; I see something of the same sort in these simple prayers. Instead of denying guilt, they admit it and ask for forgiveness from the god, whichever one it may be.” He broke off with a self-conscious laugh. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to bore you with my far-fetched theories.”
“I assure you, dear boy, you did not bore me. It sounds as if you have hit upon a most interesting and productive line of inquiry.” I put my hand over his. “I intend to see that you are allowed to pursue it.”
Ramses eyed me askance. “What are you up to now, Mother?”
“Your father will be back tomorrow morning. We will discuss it then. Run along and enjoy your translating.”
I beguiled the rest of the morning watching the activity around the guard post and making one of my little lists. Ramses was probably right in saying that we stood a better chance of tracing the statuette through its recent purchasers, but I saw no harm in speculating a bit. There was a limited number of places from which the object could have originated. I wrote them down in neat order.
1. The tomb of Akhenaton at Amarna. It had been looted and despoiled thousands of years ago. No such artifact—portable and very valuable—would have been overlooked by the original thieves, or by those who transferred the king’s funerary equipment to Thebes, supposing this had been done.
2. A private house at Amarna. This seemed to me most unlikely. Not even the wealthiest of courtiers would honor his king with an object so valuable, and if he had, he would have taken it with him when he left the city.
3. The tomb of Akhenaton at Thebes. No such tomb was known, and it was generally agreed (by everyone except Howard Carter) that the East Valley contained no more royal tombs. The West Valley had also been investigated,