Amelia Peabody Omnibus 1-4 (117 page)

‘You must be right,’ said de Morgan. ‘There is no other explanation that fits the facts.
Mais, quel mélodrama!
You are a true heroine, madame; the murderer seized, the thieves routed… I congratulate you from my heart.’

I stretched out a hand to Emerson. ‘Congratulate us both, monsieur. We work together.’

‘Admirable,’’ said the Frenchman politely. ‘Well, I must return to work. I only hope the thieves have left me something to discover. What a coup it would be if I could find such a cache!’

‘I wish you luck,’ I said politely. Emerson said nothing.

‘Yes, a veritable coup.’ De Morgan sighed. ‘My picture would be in the
Illustrated London News,’
he explained, rather pathetically. ‘I have always wanted to be in the
Illustrated London News.
Schliemann has been in the
Illustrated London News.
Petrie has been in the
Illustrated London News.
Why not de Morgan?’

‘Why not indeed?’ I said. Emerson said nothing.

De Morgan rose and picked up his hat. ‘Oh, but madame, there is one little thing you have not explained. Your escape from the pyramid was truly marvellous. Accept my felicitations on that escape, by the way; I do not believe I expressed them earlier. But I do not understand why the Master – the leader of the gang – should put you there in the first place. It was the evil Hamid and the insane Ezekiel who were responsible for the other attacks on you, searching for the mummy case and the papyrus. Was the Master – the leader of the gang – also looking for the papyrus?’

Ramses stopped swinging his feet and became very still. Emerson cleared his throat. De Morgan looked inquiringly at him. ‘A slight touch of catarrh,’ Emerson explained. ‘Hem.’

De Morgan stood waiting. ‘It seems,’ I said, ‘that the leader – the Master Criminal – was under the impression we had some other valuables.’

‘Ah.’ De Morgan nodded. ‘Even Master Criminals are sometimes wrong. They suspect everyone, the rascals.
Aurevoir, madame. Adieu, professeur.
Come soon to visit me,
mon petit
Ramses.’

After the Frenchman had gone out I turned a critical eye on my son. ‘You must give it back, Ramses.’

‘Yes, Mama. I suppose I must. T’ank you for allowing me to arrange de matter wit’ de least possible embarrassment to myself.’

‘And to me,’ Emerson muttered.

‘I will go and talk to him immediately,’ said Ramses.

He suited the action to the word.

De Morgan had mounted his horse. He smiled at the small figure trotting towards him and waited. Ramses caught hold of the stirrup and began to speak.

De Morgan’s smile faded. He interrupted Ramses with a comment that was clearly audible even at that distance, and reached out for him. Ramses skipped back and went on talking. After a time a curious change came over the Frenchman’s face. He listened a while longer; then he dismounted, and squatted down so that his face was close to Ramses’. An earnest and seemingly amicable dialogue ensued. It went on so long that Emerson, standing beside me, began to mutter. ‘What are they talking about? If he threatens Ramses – ’

‘He has every right to beat him to a jelly,’ I said.

Yet when the conversation ended, de Morgan appeared more puzzled than angry. He mounted. Ramses saluted him courteously and started back towards the house. Instead of riding off, de Morgan sat staring after Ramses. His hand moved in a quick furtive gesture. Had I not known better, I would have sworn the cultured, educated director of the Antiquities Department had made the sign of the evil eye – the protection against diabolic spirits.

What was in the lost gospel of Didymus Thomas? We will never know the answer, although Emerson often engages in ribald and unseemly speculation. ‘Does he describe the trick the disciples played on the Romans, to make them believe a man had risen from the dead? Was Jesus married and the father of children? And what exactly was his relationship with Mary Magdalen?’

Brother Ezekiel, the only living person who actually read part of the lost gospel, will never tell us what it contained. He is a raving lunatic; and I have heard that he wanders the corridors of his home near Boston, Massachusetts, dressed in a simple homespun robe, blessing his attendants. He calls himself the Messiah. He is tended by his devoted sister and his sorrowing disciple, and I suppose that one day – if it has not already occurred – Charity and Brother David will be wed. They have in common not only their devotion to a madman but their invincible stupidity. Some persons cannot be rescued, even by me.

John was sure his heart was broken. He went about for weeks with his large brown hand pressed to the precise centre of his breast, where he erroneously believed that organ was located. However, one of the housemaids is a charming girl, with mouse-brown hair and a dimple in her cheek, and I begin to detect signs of convalescence.

We left Egypt in March and returned to England to greet our newest nephew. Mother and infant survived the ordeal in excellent condition. We had uncovered the substructure of our pyramid before we left, and although no remarkable discoveries were made I became quite attached to the place. I was able to abandon it with equanimity, however, since de Morgan had offered us the firman for Dahshoor the following year. He was not very gracious about it, but that was of small concern to me. That half-submerged chamber in the heart of the Black Pyramid – I felt sure that under the dark water something fascinating awaited us.

It was not until after we had returned to England that we learned of de Morgan’s remarkable discovery of the jewels of the princesses, near the pyramid of Senusret III. It was featured in the
Illustrated London News,
with a flattering engraving of de Morgan, moustache and all, holding up the crown of Princess Khnumit before the audience he had invited to admire his discovery. I could not but agree with Emerson when he flung the paper aside with a critical ‘These Frenchmen will do anything to get in the newspaper.’

One of the necklaces on the mummy of the princess bore striking resemblance to the one Ramses had found. I remembered the long conversation between Ramses and de Morgan, the sudden concession of the Frenchman to our wishes; and I wondered…

The lion seems to have settled in very nicely at Chalfont. Walter has suggested we bring back a young female next time.

Lord of fear, great of fame,
In the hearts of all the lands.
Great of awe, rich in glory,
As is Set upon his mountain…
Like a wild lion in a valley of goats.

I
N
this, the fourth volume of the memoirs of Amelia Peabody Emerson (Mrs Radcliffe Emerson), the editor once again deems it expedient to explain certain anomalies and obscurities in the text. Mrs Emerson was not as careful as she might have been about noting the dates of her entries. She seems to have picked up the current volume of her journal and scribbled away until something happened to distract her. However, from certain internal evidence, it seems likely that the current volume concerns events of the 1895–96 season. (Egyptologists tend to use this method of dating, since the archaeological ‘year’ runs from late fall until early spring, the climate of Egypt making summer excavations extremely difficult.)

As the editor has had occasion to mention, the names of most of the persons involved have been changed, in order to spare the feelings of descendants of said individuals. The informed reader will recognize some names as those of well-known archaeologists, who appear only peripherally. Mrs Emerson seems to have been fairly accurate in describing their activities; however, it would be a serious error to assume that she was equally accurate in reporting their conversations with her, for, like her distinguished husband, she had a decided tendency to attribute to other people opinions of her own.

Another obscurity in the ur-text (if the editor may so describe the journals themselves) arises from the fact that at some point Mrs Emerson apparently decided to edit them for eventual publication. (See her remarks on p. 70–1) Since she was as inconsistent about her revision as she was about dating her pages, the result is sometimes a peculiar blend of journalistic and novelistic styles.

In other words, none of the eccentricities of the present volume are the responsibility of the editor. She has done the best she could and would suggest that complaints, criticisms, and other pejorative comments be addressed to the heirs of Professor and Mrs Emerson, not to her.

‘M
Y
dear Peabody,’ said Emerson, ‘pray correct me if I am mistaken; but I sense a diminution of that restless ardour for living that is so noted a characteristic of yours, particularly upon occasions such as this. Since that happy day that saw us united, never a cloud has dimmed the beaming orb of matrimonial bliss; and that remarkable circumstance derives, I am certain, from the perfect communion that marks our union. Confide, I implore, in the fortunate man whose designated role is to support and shelter you, and whose greatest happiness is to share your own.’

I felt certain Emerson must have worked this speech out in advance. No one talks like that in the course of ordinary conversation.

I knew, however, that the formality of his speech failed adequately to express the sincere devotion that had inspired it. My dear Emerson and I have been of one mind and one heart ever since the day we met in the Egyptian Museum of Bouaq. (In actual fact, our first meeting was distinctly acrimonious. I was a mere tourist at that time, on my maiden visit to the land of the pharaohs; and yet, scarcely had I set foot on that fabled soil that the bright flame of Egyptology fervour was kindled in my bosom, a flame that soon became a roaring conflagration. Little did I suspect, that day in the museum, as I energetically defended myself against the unwarranted criticisms hurled at me by the fascinating stranger, that we would soon meet again, under even more romantic circumstances, in an abandoned tomb at El Amarna. The setting, at least, was romantic. Emerson, I confess, was not. However, a subtle instinct told me that beneath Emerson’s caustic remarks and black scowls his heart beat only for me, and, as events proved, I was correct.)

His tender discernment was not at fault. A dark foreboding did indeed shadow the joy that would normally have flooded my being at such a time. We stood on the deck of the vessel that had borne us swiftly across the broad Mediterranean; the breeze of its passage across the blue waters ruffled our hair and tugged at our garments. Ahead we could see the Egyptian coast, where we would land before the day was over. We were about to enter upon another season of archaeological investigation, the most recent of many we had shared. Soon we would be exploring the stifling, bat-infested corridors of one pyramid and the muddy, flooded burial chamber of another – scenes that would under ordinary circumstances have inspired in me a shiver of rapturous anticipation. How many other women – particularly in that final decade of the nineteenth century – had so many reasons to rejoice?