Amelia Peabody Omnibus 1-4 (144 page)

As the news spread through the crowd, a scene of utter pandemonium broke out. People wept, shouted, sang, and embraced one another. They also embraced Emerson, a favour he endured without enthusiasm. ‘Ridiculous,’ he grunted at me over the head of a very fat lady, whose veiled face was pressed against his chest. She was, I believe, raining kisses on that region, while holding him in a grip he could not escape.

‘You see, Peabody,’ he went on, ‘the degrading effect of superstition. These people are carrying on as if we had conferred health and immortality upon them instead of fetching back a few tarnished pots. I will never understand – er – awk –’ He broke off, sputtering, as the lady raised herself on tiptoe and planted a fervent kiss upon his chin.

Eventually we quieted the crowd and, escorted by the mayor, proceeded to the church. On the step, hands raised in thanksgiving, was the priest, and very odd it seemed to behold his stout figure and genial face in the place of the great (in all but the moral sense) Father Girgis. Everybody trooped into the church, including the donkeys, and when the precious vessels had been restored to the altar, such a shout broke out that the very rafters shook – which was not surprising, since they were extremely old and brittle. Tears of joy streaming down his face, the priest announced there would be a service of thanks the following day. He then invited us and the mayor to join him in his house.

So again we entered the edifice where once we had been welcomed by the Master Criminal himself. So pervasive were the presence and the memory of that great and evil man that I half-expected to see him in the shadows, stroking his enormous black beard and smiling his enigmatic smile. It is a strange and disquieting fact that evil can sometimes appear more impressive than virtue. Certainly the Master Criminal had made a more imposing man of God than his successor. Father Todorus was a foot shorter and several feet wider round the middle; his beard was scanty, and streaked with grey.

He was a pleasant host, however. We settled ourselves on the divan with its faded chintz cushions, and the priest offered us refreshment, which of course we accepted, for to refuse would have been rude in the extreme. I was expecting the thick, sweet coffee which is the common drink; imagine my surprise when the priest returned from an inner room with a tray on which rested a glass bottle and several clay cups. After Emerson had taken a cautious sip of the liquid his eyebrows soared.

I followed suit. ‘It is French cognac,’ I exclaimed.

‘The best French cognac,’ Emerson said. ‘Father, where did you get this?’

The priest had already emptied his cup. He poured another generous measure and replied innocently, ‘It was here in my house when I returned.’

‘We have been anxious to hear of your adventure, Father,’ Emerson said. ‘How well I recall the anger of my distinguished chief wife, the Sitt Hakim here, upon learning that the priest of Dronkeh was not who he pretended to be. “What have you done with the real priest, you son of a camel?” she cried. “If you have injured that good, that excellent man, I will cut out your heart!”’

Emerson’s version was not a very accurate rendering of what I had said, but I had indeed inquired about the missing priest, and well I remembered the M.C.’s cynical reply: ‘He is enjoying the worldly pleasures he has eschewed, and the only danger is to his soul.’

After thanking me for my concern, Father Todorus launched into his story. It was clear that he had only been waiting for us to ask, and that constant repetition had shaped his account into a well-rehearsed narrative of the sort to which Egyptians can listen over and over again. Unfortunately, there was less information than stylistic elegance in the long, rambling tale; stripped of unnecessary verbiage, it could have been told in a few sentences.

Father Todorus had gone to bed one night as usual, and had awakened in a strange place, with no notion of how he had arrived there. The room was elegantly, indeed luxuriously furnished (the description of its silken curtains and soft couch, its tinkling fountain and marble floors occupied the bulk of the speech). But he saw no one save the attendants who brought him rich food and rare liquors at frequent intervals, and since the windows were barred and shuttered, he could see nothing that would give him the slightest clue as to his whereabouts.

His return was accomplished in the same eerie fashion; he awoke one morning in the same narrow cot from which he had been spirited away, and at first he could hardly believe the entire episode had not been a long and vivid dream. The astonished cries of his parishioners upon his reappearance, and the accounts they gave him of what had transpired during his absence, proved that his experience had been real. But the innocent man frankly admitted he was inclined to attribute the whole thing to evil spirits, who were known to torture holy men by tempting them with the goods of this world.

‘So you were tempted, were you?’ Emerson asked. ‘With rich food and fine wines and liquors–’

‘They are not forbidden by our faith,’ Father Todorus hastened to remark.

‘No, but other temptations are forbidden, at least to the clergy. Were the attendants who waited upon your reverence men or women?’

The guilt on the poor man’s face was answer enough. Emerson, chuckling, would have pursued the subject had I not intervened. ‘It would be more to the point, Emerson, were we to ask Father Todorus for a more detailed description of the place in which he was imprisoned. He may have heard or seen something that would give us a hint as to its location.’

I spoke in English, and Emerson answered in the same language. ‘If that swine Sethos is as clever as you seem to think he is, he will have abandoned that place long ago. Oh, very well, it will do no harm to ask.’

Father Todorus was visibly relieved when, instead of returning to the awkward subject of his temptations, Emerson asked about his prison. Like so many people, the priest was a poor observer; specific questions brought out facts he had suppressed, not intentionally but because he had never thought about them. He had not been able to see out the windows, but he had heard sounds, though muffled and faraway. When added one to another, the noises he mentioned made it evident that he had been, not in a village or isolated villa, but in the heart of a city.

‘Cairo, Emerson,’ I cried.

‘I assumed that from the first,’ said Emerson repressively. ‘But where in that teeming hive of humanity?’

Further questioning failed to answer that important question. When we rose to take our leave, we were hardly wiser than when we had come. Father Todorus, who had consumed two cups of brandy, accompanied us to the door, reiterating his thanks and assuring us he would mention us in his prayers – a compliment Emerson received with a grimace and a growl.

As we walked toward the donkeys I said, ‘Father Todorus is certainly generous with his cognac. I suppose Sethos left in such haste, he could not carry away the comforts with which he had provided himself, but to judge from the rate at which it is being consumed he must have left a considerable quantity.’

Emerson came to a stop. ‘Ha!’ he cried. ‘I knew some detail was nagging at my mind, but I could not imagine what it was. Good thinking, Peabody.’

Whereupon he ran back to the priest’s house, with, I hardly need say, me following. When Father Todorus responded to his peremptory knock, he was still holding his cup. Seeing Emerson, he smiled beatifically. ‘You have returned, O Father of Curses. Come in, with the honoured sitt your wife, and have – hic! – more brandy.’

‘I would not deprive you, Father,’ said Emerson with a grin. ‘For surely your supply must be limited.’

The little man’s face lengthened. One might have thought Emerson had accused him of robbery and worse, and Emerson said aside, in English, ‘Really, Peabody, it is too easy to confound this fellow; he has no more talent for dissimulation than a child.’

‘Less,’ I said meaningfully, ‘than some children.’

‘Humph,’ said Emerson. Returning to Arabic, he addressed the priest. ‘Your supply has been replenished, Father – is that not true? How often and in what manner?’

The priest groaned. He started to wring his hands; remembering that he still held the cup, he quickly drained it. With a glance at the curious onlookers, he muttered, ‘It was the devils, O Father of Curses. I beg you will not let these people know; they might appeal to the patriarch for help against the powers of evil, and I assure you, I swear to you, that I can conquer the devils, I am constantly at prayer–’

Emerson reassured him and the little man found courage to speak. There had been two deliveries of cognac by the demons since his miraculous return from imprisonment. On both occasions he had found the boxes at his bedside when he woke in the morning. He had not bothered to look for signs of intrusion, since it was well known that devils, being bodiless, do not leave footprints.

With further assurances of our good will, we took our leave. The priest disappeared into his house, no doubt in order to rid himself of the demonic gift in the most appropriate manner.

‘What a curious thing,’ I exclaimed, as we trotted out of the village. ‘This man, this unknown genius of crime, is a strange mixture of cruelty and compassion. Cases of French cognac would not be my notion of apology and compensation for such rude handling, but–’

‘Oh, do use your head, Peabody,’ Emerson shouted, his face reddening. ‘Apology and compensation indeed! I never heard such balderdash.’

‘Why else would he–’

‘To complete the corruption of the priest, of course. A bizarre and evil sense of humour, not compassion, is the motive for these gifts.’

‘Oh,’ I said. ‘I had not thought of that, Emerson. Good Gad, it is no wonder, such consummate depths of depravity are beyond the comprehension of any normal person.’

‘They are not beyond my comprehension,’ said Emerson, with a vicious snap of his teeth. ‘Ordinary assault, abduction, and attempted murder I can put up with; but this villain has gone too far.’

‘I quite agree, Emerson. To play such a trick on poor Father Todorus–’

‘Grr,’ said Emerson, ‘Peabody, you astonish me.’

‘I don’t know what you mean, Emerson. Do you think there is any hope of waylaying the deliverers of the cognac?’

‘No, I do not. Sethos may tire of his joke and stop delivery, and if he continues, we have no idea when the next visit will take place. It would be a waste of time to keep the priest’s house under observation, if that is what you were about to propose.’

‘I was not. I had reached the same conclusion.’

‘I am happy to hear it, Peabody.’

We reached the house at teatime, and I at once set about preparing that repast, assisted by Enid. Ramses and Donald had not returned; I caught myself listening for sounds of riot and furious pursuit, such as often accompanied Ramses’ departure from home. Aside from the normal noises of awakening village life, however, the only untoward sounds were those of distant gunshots. Even these were not unusual, for shooting was a favourite amusement of the more ignorant tourists, and the swampy areas between the canal and the river harboured great flocks of unfortunate birds whom these ‘sportsmen’ liked to massacre.

The shadows lengthened, and still the wanderers had not returned. Emerson was pacing up and down the courtyard glancing alternately at his watch and at the closed gates, when at last a shout announced the long-awaited event. Abdullah opened the gates and they rode into the compound, Donald close behind Ramses.

Ramses immediately slid off his donkey and started for the back of the house, trying, I suppose, to appear as if he were anxious to wash. Donald’s hand shot out and caught him by the collar. Holding him by that uncomfortable but convenient handle, he marched the boy toward us.

‘Professor and Mrs Emerson, I deliver to you your son. He has achieved a degree of dirtiness I once thought impossible, even after my own youthful experiments along that line, but he is intact, as I received him. I assure you that to keep him in that condition was no small feat.’

It was evident that they had been near the river, for the substance that covered Ramses was dried mud. Parts of it had flaked off, giving him a peculiarly antique appearance, like a rotted mummy.

‘I will wash immediately, Mama,’ he wheezed. ‘If you will be so good as to direct this – this person to unhand me.’

But by that time I had observed the little detail Ramses was so intent on concealing from me. It was little indeed – a hole a half inch in diameter drilled neatly into the side of his pith helmet. Moving a step to the side, I observed a second hole, slightly larger, opposite the first.

Emerson observed these unusual features at the same time, and, with a shout of consternation, he snatched the hat off Ramses’ head. He threw it to the ground and began running his fingers through the boy’s hair, completing the total dishevelment of that area.

‘It is the mark of a bullet, Peabody,’ he cried. ‘A bullet has gone completely through Ramses’ hat! Ramses, dear boy, where are you wounded?’

‘Oh, do stop it, Emerson,’ I said. ‘If Ramses had been wearing the hat when the shot was fired, the bullet would have gone straight through his cranium and you would have no difficulty in noting the result.’

‘He was not wearing the hat,’ Donald said. ‘He was holding it in his hand. That may relieve your apprehension, Professor, but in my opinion it still calls for punishment. If this young man were my son, I would turn him over my knee and give him a good hiding.’

Ramses slowly turned his head and gave Donald a look that would have made a wiser man retract his threat. The boy’s raven curls stood up in a bush like that of a Masai warrior, and his expression was no more affable.

Emerson ignored Donald’s remark – it was not the first time he had heard suggestions of that nature – but Enid gave an indignant cry. ‘I am not surprised at hearing so cruel a sentiment from
that
source,’ she exclaimed, putting a protective arm around Ramses. ‘Poor child! After such a frightening experience, to be manhandled and cursed–’

‘Confound it, Enid, I didn’t swear,’ Donald protested. ‘I was tempted to, but I didn’t.’