The Seventh Sinner - Elizabeth Peters [9]
“Panache is right,” Andy muttered. “The Behistun inscription has been copied a hundred times. Sam only did it to show off.”
“And the workman he rescued from the rock-fall at Tiryns?” Jean demanded. “That was showing off?”
“And the book on pre-Atric pottery,” Dana said.
“All right, so you’re all members of the fan club. I’ll arrange a soirée…. Hey, that’s a goodidea. We’ll have a party and some of you fans can pitch in and keep him entertained. He needs an audience the way some people need insulin. He goes into a coma without it.”
“Don’t mind him,” Ann said, with a nervous smile, “He thinks Sam is great, really. Come on, brother. Work. W-O-R-K. Remember?”
They went off, arm in arm, and Michael, watching them, said lazily, “There’s something allegorical about those two.”
“Beauty and the Beast,” suggested Dana, with a giggle. “Or how about Orestes and Electra? There’s a nice normal brother-sister team for you.”
Michael gave her a smack on the bottom that echoed like a pistol shot. She yelped. Jean, hoping to prevent further horseplay under Jacqueline’s cynical eye, said at random, “How about the Bobbsey twins? I never can remember their names—”
“Nan and Bert,” said Jacqueline. “That’s enough of that. What a nasty-tongued bunch you are…. Michael, let me see that sketch you made of me.”
“Huh?” Michael retreated, clutching his sketch pad. “Be damned if I will.”
“Undoubtedly. Hand it over.”
With a shrug, Michael obeyed. Jacqueline studied the page in grim silence. Jean couldn’t resist. Craning, she looked over Jacqueline’s shoulder.
Michael hadn’t done one sketch; the page was covered with small figures. Jacqueline sprawled on the floor of the Institute, like a marble figure on a somewhat risqué tomb; Jacqueline telling someone off, mouth wide open, finger raised; Jacqueline peering over the top of her glasses, looking quite feeble-minded; Jacqueline wearing the helmet and breastplate of Minerva, and her own horn-rimmed glasses; Jacqueline wearing nothing at all, in the classic pose of the Venus of Cyrene.
Dana was making strangled sounds of stifled amusement, but Jean didn’t find the sketch funny, even though the individual portraits were wonderful caricatures. Michael could have overheard Jacqueline’s remarks about multiple personality; but the sketch had been finished before the conversation took place. At times Michael’s insights verged frighteningly on clairvoyance. He had sketched all his friends at one time or another. Dana was a favorite victim, which explained her delight in another victim’s unveiling.
Finally Jacqueline returned the sketch. She gave Michael a long, steady look. There was no amusement in her face, nor was there resentment. When she spoke, Jean knew she wasn’t joking.
“You’re lucky to be living in this century, Michael. Five hundred years ago they’d have burned you at the stake. And I’d have been in the audience, poking the fire.”
2
THE NEXT DAY JEAN WAS SEIZED BY ONE OF THOSE productive fits which strike only too rarely. She worked in a grim fog, resisting the blandishments of her friends. Since the library of the Institute was one of the few places in Rome that kept American hours, she could work straight through from early morning till eight at night. It was at that hour, a week later, that the attack passed, leaving her blinking blearily at a page covered with words which suddenly looked as meaningless as hieroglyphs. Her stomach was a cavernous complaint, and her head felt as if it were floating several inches away from her neck.
Jean gathered her papers together in an untidy pile and left her office. She was starving, and not only for food; she wanted company, laughter and conversation, a glass of wine, an enormous plate of spaghetti alla bolognese, twelve hours’ sleep, and a bath—not necessarily in that order. None of these reasonable desires seemed to be immediately available. The nearest trattoria was half a mile away, and all her erstwhile friends seemed to have vanished.
As she approached the