Amelia Peabody Omnibus 1-4 (8 page)

I stepped back; silently I motioned him in; gently I closed the door behind him. I wanted to slam it. Alberto rushed toward Evelyn.

‘Ah, my lost darling, my heart’s beloved! How can you desert me? How can you leave me with agony for your fate?’

Evelyn raised her hand. Alberto stopped, a few feet away from her. I really believe the rascal would have taken her into his arms if she had not moved. Now he cocked his head on one side and said, in tones of deep reproach, ‘You push me! You crush me! Ah, I understand. You have found a rich protectress. She gave you gifts and you abandon the poor lover who give only love.’

My parasol was standing in the corner. I went and got it. Evelyn was silent throughout; I think she was too thunderstruck at the man’s insolence to speak. I approached Alberto and jabbed him in the waistcoat with my parasol. He jumped back.

‘That will do,’ I said briskly. ‘You abandoned this lady; she did not abandon you, although she would have been wise to do so. How dare you come here after writing that abominable message to her, after taking all her possessions – ’

‘Message?’ Alberto rolled his eyes. ‘I leave no message. Going out, to seek employment, so I buy food for my beloved, I was strike by a horse while I cross the street. Weeks I lie in the terrible hospital, in delirious, crying out for my Evelyn. When I recover, I stagger to the room which was my paradise. But she is gone! My angel has flown away. I leave no message! If there is message my enemy must leave it. I have many enemy. Many who hate me, who try to steal my happiness, who envy me my angel.’

He looked meaningfully at me.

I have rarely seen such an unconvincing dramatic performance. Yet I was not sure it might not convince Evelyn; love has a most unfortunate effect on the brain, and I feared some lingering fondness for the rascal might still move her.

I need not have feared. Evelyn’s colour had returned; indeed, her cheeks were flushed becomingly with an emotion that I recognized to be anger.

‘How dare you?’ she said in a low voice. ‘Have you not done me enough harm? Oh, you are right to reproach me; I deserve your contempt. Not for having left you, but for ever coming away with you in the first place. But how dare you come here and insinuate such things about this lady? You are not worthy to occupy the same room with her. Begone, and never trouble my sight again!’

Alberto staggered back a few paces. He was counterfeiting shock and anguish, but the ferrule of the umbrella, which I had against his stomach, might have assisted his retreat.

‘You cannot speak with true meaning. You are sick. No – you do not understand. I come to marry you. I offer you my hand and name. There is no other way for you. No other man marry you now, not when he know – ’

He was an agile fellow; he jumped nimbly back as I tried to bring the parasol down on his head, and when I raised it for a second attempt, Evelyn caught at my arm.

‘Pray don’t break a good parasol,’ she said, with a curling lip. ‘He is not worth it.’

‘But he is trying to blackmail you,’ I said, panting with rage. ‘He is threatening you with exposure unless you agree – ’

‘He may publish my infamy to the world,’ Evelyn said coldly. ‘Believe me, Amelia, he has no more power over me. If any lingering trace of fondness had remained, this would have ended it.’

Smoothing down his hair, which had been disarranged by his rapid movement, Alberto stared at us in affected horror.

‘Blackmail? Threat?
Dio mio,
how you do not understand me? I would not – ’

‘You had better not,’ I interrupted. ‘The first sign of trouble from you, you rascal, and I’ll have you put in prison. Egyptian prisons are vastly uncomfortable, I am told, and I have a good deal more influence with the present government than you do.’

Alberto drew himself up.

‘Now you threaten me,’ he said with satisfaction. ‘No need for threat. If the lady do not want me, I go. I come only for honour. I see now. I understand. There is another! It is true, no? Who is he, this villain who steal my darling’s heart?’

Evelyn, who had born up magnificently, now showed signs of breaking – which was no wonder.

‘I can’t stand any more of this,’ she whispered. ‘Amelia, can we not make him go away? Can we call for help?’

‘Certainly,’ I said.

I passed Alberto – who drew back nervously – and threw open the door. There is usually a floor attendant on duty, and I meant to summon him. But there was no need. Sitting on the floor, across the hall from our door, was our dragoman, Michael. I did not stop to ask why he was there. He leaped to his feet when he saw me, and I beckoned him in.

‘Take this man by the collar and throw him out,’ I said, gesturing at Alberto.

Michael looked surprised, but he did not hesitate. As he reached out for Alberto, the latter stepped back.

‘No need, I go, I go,’ he exclaimed. ‘I leave Egypt. My heart is broke, my life is – ’

‘Never mind that,’ I said. ‘One question before you go. How did you find us here, and how did you get the money to follow us?’

‘But I go to the British consul at Rome, what else? I work way on boat – I am seasick, I am cold, but I work to follow my heart’s – ’

‘Enough of that. Go, now, or Michael will – ’

‘I go.’ Alberto drew himself up. He rolled his eyes one last time at Evelyn; then Michael took a step forward, and Alberto bolted out the door with more speed than dignity.

‘I follow, to be sure he is gone,’ said Michael.

‘Thank you,’ Evelyn said gratefully. ‘Your little girl, Michael – how is she? Did you want us to come to her again?’

‘No,’ Michael said. ‘No, lady. I come to tell you she is better. She wakes up, she asks for food. I come to thank you; to tell you when you want anything from Michael, you ask, even if it is his life. Now I will follow the evil man.’

With a gesture that oddly combined humility and dignity, he departed; and as the door closed, Evelyn broke into a storm of weeping.

The storm was soon over. While I rushed around searching for smelling salts and handkerchiefs, Evelyn recovered herself and insisted that I sit down. She relieved me of my parasol, which I was still holding.

‘You are more upset than you will admit,’ she said. ‘Let me order you a glass of wine.’

‘No, there is no need. But perhaps you – ’

‘No.’ Evelyn sat down and looked at me steadily. ‘My predominant emotion, strangely, is one of relief. I feel as if I had exorcised some evil spirit.’

‘It was Alberto you saw in the lounge, when you fainted.’

‘Yes. You will not believe me, Amelia; but when I saw him standing there, watching me with that insolent sneering smile, I thought him a demon of the mind, conjured up to remind me of my past. I was so happy just then, with – with – ’

‘With Walter. Why do you shrink from speaking his name? Do you love him?’

‘I cannot use that word; not after…. But, yes; I could love him, if I had the right to love any decent man.’

‘Oh, come, you are being absurdly melodramatic! We are almost in the twentieth century; abandon your old-fashioned morality.’

‘Do you think Walter would ask me to marry him if he knew of my past?’

‘Well…’ I shrugged uncomfortably. ‘He seems a nice young man, but he is a man, after all. But why should he ever know?’

There was no need for Evelyn to answer. He would know because she would tell him. Candour was an integral part of her nature. She smiled sadly at me.

‘Let us change the subject, Amelia. All I meant to say was that I was foolishly relieved to find Alberto mere flesh and blood. We have finished with him now; but how amazing that he should actually follow me here!’

‘Yes. I wonder…’

‘What?’

‘If perhaps your grandfather had not recovered after all.’ Evelyn gasped. ‘Heavens, Amelia, how cynical! And how clever of you. Oh, how I hope it may be so!’

‘Do not hope too much. I daresay there are other, equally cynical reasons that may explain Alberto’s appearance here. I shall take steps, tomorrow, to see what I can find out. I must also go to Boulaq and hurry Reis Hassan. The sooner we leave Cairo, the better for both of us.’

‘Yes,’ Evelyn said, smiling wistfully. ‘It is becoming crowded with people whom I do not wish to see. But Walter will not be here much longer. He and Mr Emerson are leaving in two days.’

‘Where do they go?’

‘I cannot remember the name. It is several hundred miles to the south; the remains of the city of the heretic pharaoh.’

‘Amarna,’ I said. ‘Yes. Well, child, let us go to bed. It has been a tiring day.’

But the day was not yet over.

Evelyn dropped off to sleep almost at once. She was worn out, poor girl, by her emotional experiences. I could hear her quiet breathing as I lay sleepless under my canopy of white netting. Her bed and canopy were across the room from mine, which stood near the window. There was a small balcony outside. I had left the shutters open, as I always did; the netting protected us from insects, and the night air was particularly sweet and cool. Moonlight streamed in through the window, illumining the objects in its path but leaving the corners of the large room deep in shadow. A ray of silver light shone distractingly on my bed.

I am not often unable to sleep, but the events of the day had given considerable food for thought. Oddly enough, I found myself principally preoccupied with the exasperating Mr Emerson and his peculiar ideas. Peculiar – but stimulating. I thought about them for some time; and then forcibly turned my thoughts to more important matters.

Walter and Evelyn…. Now there was a worrying subject. If she had been what she pretended to be, an impoverished gentlewoman serving as my companion, a marriage between the two might have been eminently suitable. But I suspected that the elder Mr Emerson controlled his young brother; that there was not sufficient income to support a wife for Walter and an archaeological expedition for Emerson, and that, if a choice had to be made, Emerson would have the deciding vote. And poor Evelyn was right; she would have to tell Walter the truth, and I doubted that any man would take it in the proper way. He might marry her and then spend the rest of his life nobly forgiving her. Nothing can be more infuriating than being forgiven over and over again.

I turned restlessly in my bed. The springs squeaked and something outside the window – a night bird, or an insect – squeaked as if in answer. I turned over on my side, with my back to the brilliant moonlight, and lay still, determined to woo sleep. Instead, my thoughts turned to Alberto, and I began to speculate about his motive for following Evelyn. I could not credit the creature with the slightest degree of altruism or love; he must have another reason for pursuing her. I thought of several possible answers. No doubt he had other prospects in mind when he deserted her. Perhaps one such scheme had brought him to Egypt, the destination of so many travellers from Italy, and, finding Evelyn under the protection of a wealthy woman – for so I must seem to him – he had decided to see what could be got from me.

With such thoughts churning around in my mind I was no nearer sleep than I had been. They distracted me from the usual night noises, however; I was unaware of extraneous sounds until one sudden noise, close at hand, struck my ear. It was a squeaking sound from one of the boards of the floor. I knew it well; the faulty plank was between my bed and the window, and my foot had pressed it several times that day.

I turned onto my back. I was not alarmed; I assumed that either I had been mistaken about the origin of the sound or that Evelyn had woken up and crept to the window for a view of the moonlit garden.

Standing over the bed, so close that its body brushed the folds of white netting, was an incredible apparition.

It appeared to be swathed in a white mist, like an emanation of fog. This blurred the features, but the general outline of the figure was plain enough. It might have walked out of the main hall of the Boulaq museum, where Maspero kept his prized, life-sized statues of ancient Egyptian ladies and gentlemen. Like the painted statues, this apparition had the hues of life, though they were faded by the cold moonlight. The bronzed body, bare to the waist; the broad collar of orange and blue beads; the folded linen headdress, striped in red and white.

I was thunderstruck. But not by fear – no, never suppose for a moment that I was afraid! I was simply paralysed by surprise. The figure stood utterly motionless. I could not even detect the rise and fall of its breast. It lifted an arm, then, in a gesture of unmistakable menace.

I sat up and, with a shout, reached out for the thing. I do not believe in apparitions. I wanted to get my hands on it, to feel the warmth and solidity of human flesh. Unfortunately, I had forgotten the confounded mosquito netting.

(My Critic reminds me that ‘confounded’ is not a word a lady should use. I reply that some strong expression is called for, and that I have avoided others far stronger.)

It was the netting, of course, that had given the apparition its ghostly aura, and it fitted so well with the presumed supernatural appearance of the thing that I had forgotten its existence. I plunged head foremost into a muffling cloud of fabric; the bed sheet and the skirts of my nightgown wound about my limbs. By the time I had fought my way out of these encumbrances I was gasping for breath – and the room was empty. I had succeeded only in waking Evelyn, who was calling out agitatedly and trying to escape her own netting.

We met at the window; Evelyn caught me by the shoulders and tried to shake me. I must have looked like a wild woman with my hair breaking loose from its night braids and streaming over my shoulders. My determined rush toward the window had persuaded Evelyn, as she later confessed, that I was bent upon self-destruction.

After I had assured myself that there was no trace of the visitant on the balcony or in the garden below, I explained to Evelyn what had happened. She had lighted a candle. By its flame I saw her expression, and knew what she was about to say.

‘It was no dream,’ I insisted. ‘It would not be surprising that I should dream of ancient Egyptian ghosts; but I believe I know the difference between reality and sleep.’