Mummy Dearest (12 page)

“Help yourself,” I said to him. “There’s ice in the bucket.”

Inez scuttled into her bedroom as Alexander busied himself at the mini-bar. He was still grinning when he joined me. “She’s quite a passionate student of all things Egyptian, isn’t she?” he said.

“Unlike my daughter, who’d rather support the local economy.” I paused for a moment, contemplating how to phrase my next remark. “Did you attend the lecture at the museum earlier today?”

“Unfortunately, I did, and it went on interminably. We just now got back to the hotel.”

“Did everybody go?”

“With the exception of Mrs. McHaver, who is suffering from gout. She prides herself on having only the most aristocratic maladies. Poor Miriam was sent to take notes and report anything that might be considered controversial. However, since no one could understand a word the Swedish chap said, it was impossible to dispute his premises. Miss Portia and Miss Cordelia fluttered around like lavender moths. Lady Emerson and Lewis Ferncliff got into a terrible row over some scrap of papyrus. Wallace kept nipping from a flask and glowering at anyone who came within ten feet of him. Shannon tried to talk to my father, but he was in his typical dyspeptic mood. She finally slunk away in tears.”

“Your father was there the entire time?”

Alexander eyed me over the rim of his glass. “He dozed off during the lecture. I jabbed him whenever he began to snore. Are you regretting that you missed the show? I can promise there’ll be many repeat performances during the season.”

“I thought I saw your father earlier this afternoon,” I said.

“He may have been dreaming that he was elsewhere, but he was in the back row with me. You must have seen someone who resembled him.”

“I suppose so,” I said, still unconvinced. After a moment, I continued, “Why is Shannon so determined to talk to your father? Is she hoping for more financial support for the dig?”

“What she’s hoping for is the position of department head at her cozy little college. Although I have no idea why, she seems to think the position is significant and will enhance her prestige with her colleagues in the field. Academia
is an ugly battlefield in every country. British dons have resorted to murder over committee chairmanships and obscure awards. Scandinavian universities are rife with scandals involving plagiarism. The French prefer accusations of
mauvaise conduite sexuelle.”

“American academics resort to all of those,” I admitted. “So what does Shannon want from your father, if not money?”

“He has an extensive collection of Egyptian antiquities at the house in Kent, the majority of it unavailable to scholars. Shannon wants him to endow a wing at her college and donate some of them to a permanent collection. He prefers to gloat over them in private. He’s turned down every request, including those of the Metropolitan in New York and the British Museum. He sneered when someone asked him if he’d seen the traveling King Tut exhibition. Only Amun-Ra knows what he has locked away on the second floor.”

“You don’t?”

“Good heavens, no. When I was much younger, I used to try to pick the locks with my mother’s hairpins, but I invariably set off the security alarms and was banished to the nursery in disgrace. I finally decided to let the old man wallow in his precious treasures, and dedicated myself to carousing and chasing women.” He gazed at me. “I don’t understand how you’ve been able to resist me.”

“I seem to be the only woman who has,” I said drily.

“Thus far.”

When he’d finished his drink, I sent him away. At sunset, Caron and Inez came out to the balcony and we watched the feluccas gliding on the Nile.

Over breakfast even Caron agreed that we needed to get serious about the must-see sites. With Bakr providing transportation, we returned to the West Bank to admire the two massive statues known as the Colossi of Memnon, all that remained of a temple complex built by Amenhotep III, unfortunately without regard to its position in the floodplain.
When several tour buses parked in the lot, we continued on to the Ramesseum, where Inez chattered happily about Ramses II and I recited “Ozymandias” to an unappreciative audience. We returned to the Valley of the Kings to dutifully visit King Tut’s tomb and a few others, and I sat in the shade of the visitor’s center while Inez scrambled to the top of a hill to view the Temple of Hatshepsut. Caron was noticeably less fervent as she tagged along.

The following day Salima arrived in the van with Bakr, and we toured the half-dozen tombs in the Valley of the Queens. Salima had arranged special passes for us to visit the tomb of Nefertari, often closed to visitors. The spectacular wall paintings of the pharaoh’s wife and a pantheon of gods and goddesses overwhelmed us. Salima provided the standard tourist spiel, but in a soft, lilting tone. Inez was speechless, and periodically pulled off her glasses to wipe her eyes. It was a pleasant respite from her incessant recitation of names and dates.

Afterward, we returned to the van to swill water from Bakr’s stash of bottles and gaze at the valley, wider than that of the kings and less popular with the tourists. “Shall we call it a day?” I asked.

“I am drenched in perspiration,” Caron said. “If I don’t have a shower soon, my pores will literally shut down.”

Inez, still resolutely dressed in her increasingly sweat-stained khakis, glanced up from one of her guidebooks and nodded.

I looked at Salima. “Can we drop you off somewhere?”

“Well, if you don’t mind terribly, I thought I’d go back to the hotel with you. I’m having dinner at seven with the group from the University of Chicago, but I don’t want to arrive early. I’ll end up having a frightful row with someone. We don’t always agree on restoration and preservation issues, and some of them”—she rolled her eyes—“are appallingly opinionated.”

“Then why are you going?” I asked as Bakr started the van.

“There are times when one needs to have a frightful row
to invigorate oneself. I suspect that’s the best reason for getting married.”

“Perhaps,” I murmured, thinking of some of the disagreements I’d had with Peter in the past. I would never describe them as “frightful rows,” but he had been known to become rather testy when he felt as though I was interfering in an official police investigation. He never seemed to grasp that I was merely doing my civic duty to assist the authorities in their pursuit of justice. Now that I had married him, I would retire to a less stressful life of selling books and flipping through decorator magazines. In two years, Caron would be in college, preferably one that was not within easy driving distance. I looked out the window at the bleak lunar landscape, devoid of any trace of vitality or passion.

Caron poked Salima’s arm. “Are you sure you’re not hoping Alexander might drop by the suite for a cocktail?”

“Alexander?” she said. “Oh, you mean the cheeky bastard from London? I should say not. I ran into too many of his kind at Cambridge. There is a reason behind the cliché about the ne’er-do-well offspring of the peers of the realm. Vapid, spoiled, and insufferably smug. The only calluses on their hands come from wielding a cricket bat.”

“Methinks the lady doth protest too much,” Inez said without looking up.

“Don’t be such a child,” Salima retorted sulkily.

I agreed with Inez, but I wisely remained silent as we drove back across the bridge and through the crowded streets of Luxor. Bakr dropped us off at the hotel entrance. To my dismay, Sittermann waylaid us as soon as we entered the lobby.

“Well, isn’t this a coincidence!” he boomed. “I was just about to leave a message for you, but here you are right in front of me. Who’s this most fetching young lady? Not another one of your fillies, surely.”

I could see Ahmed hovering behind a pillar, wringing his hands. I had no idea why he was agitated, unless he had tipped off Sittermann about the likely time of our return. If he had, I thought grimly, he would need Osiris’s intervention
to save himself. “This is Mr. Sittermann, from Texas,” I said through clenched teeth. “Salima el-Musafira, a noted Egyptologist.”

“I’m tickled pink to meet you, honey,” Sittermann said. “Why don’t you all join us out on the terrace for a drink?”

“I think we’d prefer to go upstairs,” I said quickly.

He beamed at me. “Yeah, that would be a sight nicer, wouldn’t it? I’ll just get my group together and we’ll be on your heels. In fact, I’ll have the restaurant send up some platters of finger food and we can have ourselves a proper party. You don’t have to do a thing, Mrs. Malloy. I’ll take care of ice, glasses, and whiskey. See you in ten minutes, give or take.”

He was gone before I could protest. Ahmed had managed to fade into the decor and, if he had any sense, would continue to stay there for a few days. For his sake, I hoped he’d pocketed a goodly sum.

“It seems that we’re having a party,” I said as we rode the elevator to the second floor.

“Maybe you are,” Caron said. “I’m going to exfoliate my pores. It will take hours.”

Inez took off her canvas hat and tucked it in a pocket. “The hotel has an Internet connection, and I promised my parents that I’d e-mail them once a week. I don’t know how much it costs, but—”

“By all means,” I said as the elevator door opened. “Salima, don’t even think about it. You’ve already mentioned that your invitation is for seven o’clock.”

Her eyes glittered. “No, I shall be Sekmet, the lioness goddess of vengeance and destruction, or better yet, Taweret. She’s the hippopotamus goddess who scares away evil forces and protects women.”

“Need a quick shot of gin?”

“Several.”

We went into the suite, and the girls promptly disappeared into their room. I put on a clean shirt and ran a comb through my hair. When I came into the parlor, I wasn’t surprised to find Salima on the sofa with a glass in her hand.

“Couldn’t wait for ice?” I asked.

“I spent five years at Cambridge. The only ice I ever saw was on the sidewalks. It was highly entertaining to watch the fellows step on a slick spot and kersplat on their bums like giant bats dropping out of the sky.”

I was visualizing the scene with some amusement when the parlor door opened and in came, in no particular order, Sittermann, Lord Bledrock, Miriam and Rose McHaver, Shannon King, Alexander, Samuel Berry, Buffy Franz, Wallace Laxenby, the Misses Portia and Cordelia, Lord and Lady Fitzwillie, and a couple of unknowns. They were all babbling with boundless vivacity, bumping into one another, and clearly expecting a well-laid bar and a grand spread of food.

“Hello,” I said weakly.

Abdullah and several uniformed waiters wheeled in linen-draped tables and began to set up a bar and a buffet. Sittermann took charge and drawled orders in Arabic, while my purported guests rearranged furniture. Chairs were fetched from the balcony, my bedroom, and Caron and Inez’s bedroom (despite the muffled shrieks).

“How do you do,” said a formidable woman with jet-black hair. “I am Lady Amanda Peabody Emerson. You must be this Malloy woman of whom I’ve heard so much these last few weeks. Fancy yourself to be a detective, do you?”

“Give her a break, Mandy,” Sittermann said as he sat down on the arm of the sofa and winked at me.

“She seems ill equipped,” Lady Emerson pronounced firmly, then headed for the bar.

Alexander managed to squeeze himself between Salima and me. “I think you’re very well equipped, my dear Claire. The old girl’s jealous. She made a fortune off some deceased relative’s fanciful memoirs of murder and intrigue a hundred years ago. Rumor has it she still collects royalties. Lady Emerson herself would never be caught dead within spitting distance of a camel.”

“Nor would I,” I said. I unwedged myself and went to circulate, making sure everyone had a drink. Samuel and Buffy
seemed delighted to see me and gushed over the decor and view. Rose McHaver sat in one of the more comfortable chairs, thumping a lethal-looking walking stick as she waited for Miriam to fetch her a drink. Queen Victoria could not have looked more imperious. Wallace had retreated to a corner, martinis in both hands. Shannon was doing her best to interrupt Lord Bledrock’s conversation with a pasty woman drooping under the weight of her diamonds. Miss Portia and Miss Cordelia were out on the balcony, lobbing ice cubes at unwary pedestrians crossing the terrace. Abdullah watched me with a faint grimace of reproof.

“Hope you’ve been having a good time,” Sittermann said, clutching my elbow. “Been out exploring the West Bank, I hear.”

“From whom do you hear this? I hardly consider myself a worthy topic of conversation.”

“Word gets around.”

“I have no idea what that word might be.”

“Let’s just say I’m concerned about you, Mrs. Malloy. A woman like yourself could find herself stumbling into trouble, especially if she pokes around the wrong places and asks too many questions.”

“I beg your pardon!” I tried to remove his hand, but he tightened his grip. “The question in my mind at this moment has to do with why I shouldn’t stomp down on your foot hard enough to turn your toes into bloody pulp.”

“Spirited little thing, ain’t you?”

“Who the hell do you think you are?” I said, struggling to keep my voice low.

He released my arm and stepped back. “Just someone who thinks you need to be warned against snooping around while your so-called husband is off in Cairo.”

“How dare you—” I began, then stopped as he went out to the balcony. I forced myself to breathe evenly until my body stopped quivering with outrage. To my dismay, Samuel and Buffy joined me.

“Are you okay?” asked Buffy. “You look awfully pale,
like one of those albino fish that live in caves. They are so creepy.”

Samuel nudged her aside. “Are you and Sittermann close friends?”

His question startled me. “Hardly,” I said. “Why would you think we were?”

He flushed. “He acts pretty interested in you, that’s all. I had the impression that you and he… well, I don’t know. I mean, your husband’s away and …”

“You men are all alike,” Buffy said with the arrogant wisdom of youth. “If I hadn’t been like totally bored in Rome, I would never have come with you. I could have gone skiing, you know, or taken off for a Greek island with fabulous beaches and hunky fishermen who know how to utilize their manly talents. All you do is take photographs of ruins in the blistering sun and hang out half the night with illiterate camel drivers. You told me we were going to see the pyramids, but all we’ve seen so far are pitiful villages in the middle of nowhere. I’m absolutely covered in flea bites. If I get lice, I’ll track you down to the last sand dune in this filthy country and make you sorry.”