The Serpent on the Crown - Elizabeth Peters [56]
A small rebellion occurred that afternoon. With my tacit support (emphatic nods), Nefret declared she and Ramses would stop work early—that is to say, at the same hour most excavators quit for the day. “We promised the children we would take tea with them this afternoon,” she announced. “You won’t finish with those fragments today anyhow, Father.”
“Yes, I will,” Emerson declared. “But—er—if you promised the children…”
Emerson is the most stubborn man of my acquaintance. Having made that dogmatic claim, he kept us at it until gathering dusk made careful work impossible, and even then only my insistence made him stop. I was quite out of temper with him. We had missed tea and would barely have time enough to bathe and change before dinner.
However, when we dismounted in front of the house, we saw Sethos, Ramses and Nefret, and a fourth individual on the veranda, and Fatima just clearing away the tea things. The stranger, a shabby, undersized individual with gray-white hair, jumped to his feet when we entered. “Good evening, Professor and Mrs. Emerson. Your son was good enough to invite me to stay, but if I intrude—”
“Who the devil are you?” Emerson asked.
Ramses said, with a defiant look at his father, “This is Mikhail Katchenovsky, of whose work in demotic I told you. I took the liberty of asking him to stay for dinner. I told Fatima.”
“My dear boy, this is your home,” I said. “You are free to invite anyone you choose. Good evening, Mr. Katchenovsky. Have you two been having a jolly time gossiping about demotic?”
“It has been an honor,” Katchenovsky exclaimed. “To see the very working room where the great translations of texts were made, the papyri themselves.”
Emerson’s expression indicated his opinion of people who would wax ecstatic over crumbling papyri and obscure texts, but since this group included his son he refrained from stating that opinion. My little reminder, that Ramses had a perfect right to invite guests, had had a humbling effect. “Well, well,” he said, with forced geniality. “Good to meet you, Karchenovsky. Ramses tells me you have done good work. Not for me to judge. Demotic is more or less Greek to me.”
Uncertain as to whether this was a joke, Katchenovsky smiled, sobered, and smiled again. “I am honored that he should be familiar with my work, Professor. I have not published for a good many years, owing to…to circumstances over which I had no control.”
Another casualty of the War? I wondered. It had ended four years ago, but some of the survivors of that awful conflict had been slow to recover from physical injury and mental anguish. Close inspection indicated that he was younger than his gray hair and lined face had led me to believe. Perhaps he had resisted the Bolsheviks and suffered imprisonment and privation.
Emerson would have said I was letting my imagination run away with me. Imagination, as I always say, is only another word for sympathetic intelligence.
Nefret said, “Dinner will be a little late, Mother. You have time for a whiskey and soda if you like.”
“Excellent,” I said. “It was thoughtful of you to tell Maaman to put it back.”
Nefret chuckled. “I didn’t. I think it’s his new method of punishing us for being late so often.”
“Better than burned food and salty soup,” Emerson said.
He pushed emphatically on the lever of the gasogene. Soda spurted. Emerson wiped the table with his sleeve and handed me the glass.
“Any news of Mrs. Petherick?” I asked.
Nefret shook her head. “Not that we’ve heard. Nor any word from Miss Petherick. I’ve been expecting her to make another demand for the statue.”
“It is a strange story,” Katchenovsky said. “What will become of the statue?”
“I will return it to the legal owners, whoever they may be,” Emerson replied. “That has yet to be determined.”
“You are an honest man, Professor,” Katchenovsky exclaimed. “But I would have expected