Children of the Storm (19 page)

His mother bore the circus with surprising equanimity. Once or twice Ramses thought he saw a suppressed grin, as she stood at the barred door watching. They were besieged with visitors, not only local people but foreign residents and tourists offering advice and assistance. Emerson ignored the advice and refused the assistance, but he was perfectly willing to stop and talk, answer questions, and generally show off. The children did their best to get out and join in the fun; the only one who managed to elude the watchers was Davy, who was snatched up by Emerson as he was reaching for a spanner. He tucked the child under one arm, a procedure Davy found immensely entertaining, and carried him back to the house.

“Good Gad, Peabody, why did you let him out?” he demanded. “He could hurt himself with those heavy tools, you know.”

His wife raised her eyes heavenward. “Yes, Emerson, I do know. If you had had the elementary good sense to move the motorcar to the stableyard, out of sight of the children—”

“Bah,” said Emerson. “One would suppose that four women could keep track of a few little children.”

Her lips tightened into invisibility, but she said only, “I will take steps, Emerson.”

What she did was pen the children into an area at the far end of the veranda. The barricade consisted of furniture and boxes; any one of them could climb over or squirm under them, but not without alerting an adult. Inside the enclosure she placed their toys, cushions and rugs, and a child-sized table and chairs borrowed from the twins’ room. Their initial indignation faded when she explained that this was their own special place, into which no grown-up could enter without an invitation, and handed over a box of crayons and a pile of blank paper.

“Now we will see who can draw the best picture,” she said.

Ramses thought it would take more than a few boxes to keep Davy penned in, so he volunteered for watch duty and took a chair next to the barricade. After approximately fifteen minutes he wished his mother hadn’t added a challenge to what was otherwise an excellent scheme. Paper after paper was thrust at him, and admiration demanded. Except for Dolly’s, which were very good for a boy that age, he couldn’t even tell what the scribbles were supposed to be. Evvie’s were as unidentifiable as those of his children. He tried not to be glad of that. He hadn’t been much concerned about the twins’ inability to communicate, but having Evvie around chattering like a magpie invited invidious comparisons. Women—mothers—couldn’t help making such comparisons, he supposed. They even counted teeth. He had been informed by Nefret that Charla had two more than Evvie.

Late Thursday afternoon the final bolt was tightened and the entire family was summoned to watch as Emerson, sweating, oil-stained, and blissfully happy, gave the starting handle a vigorous turn. The engine caught with a roar that was echoed by a resounding cheer from the audience and Emerson jumped into the driver’s seat. Ramses saw a spasm cross his mother’s face. She hadn’t the heart to forbid him to try the vehicle out; nothing short of a earthquake could have stopped him anyhow.

“Slowly, Emerson, I beg,” she shouted. “Slowly and carefully, my dear!”

Emerson refused to come in to tea. Grudgingly he allowed Selim his turns behind the wheel; for the next hour they drove back and forth in front of the house. Their offers of rides were enthusiastically received by the children but firmly declined by both mothers and grandmothers. Only the bursting of a tire put an end to the performance; apparently not all the nails had been picked up.

After Emerson had gone off to bathe and change, his wife said wryly, “Let us hope the worst is over. We really ought to get back to our duties. Tomorrow is Friday. I presume, Nefret, that you and Ramses will be paying your weekly visit to Selim? What about you, David?”

“Not this week, though Selim was good enough to ask me. I want to see Grandfather’s tomb.”

“Are you taking the children?”

“Dolly wants to go. He has made something of a hero of his great-grandfather. I suppose we’ll have to take Evvie as well, she always insists on going where Dolly goes.”

Nefret’s raised eyebrows indicated disapproval of some part of the scheme, but she said nothing at the time. The following afternoon, after they had returned from Deir el Medina, Ramses, delayed by a lecture from his father, went to their room to change. Nefret was standing in front of the mirror, so absorbed in what she was doing she didn’t hear him. Her head and shoulders were thrown back and her hands stretched the fabric of her thin undergarment tight across her body, so that it outlined every rounded curve.

“Can I help you with that?” he asked, studying the effect appreciatively.

Nefret let out her breath in a little scream and whirled round. “I wish you wouldn’t creep up on me like that!”

“I wasn’t . . . Sorry. What were you doing?”

“Nothing.” She let the fabric fall into its normal folds and went to her dressing table. “I was surprised to hear David say they are taking the children to the cemetery. We’ve never taken the twins.”

“Do you want to?”

“I was attempting,” said his wife, with uncharacteristic sarcasm, “to induce your opinion, not a question about mine.”

“Oh. I don’t think I really have one. It’s entirely up to you.” Her expression told him this wasn’t what she wanted to hear, so he tried again. “They never knew Abdullah; he is as remote to them, at their age, as—well, as one of the heroes in the books you read to them. It can’t hurt, surely, to tell children about the brave deeds of their friends and ancestors.”

“That’s one way of looking at it.”

“Do you want to go with them?”

“Some other time, perhaps. Selim is expecting us, and Kadija would be disappointed if we didn’t go. Do you mind?”

“Of course not.” He added with a smile, “Fond as I am of our family, it will be good to be with you and the twins.”

“Ramses . . .”

“What is it, dear?”

She had been playing with the objects on her dressing table, shifting them back and forth. Turning, she put her hands on his shoulders. “Did Mother tell you . . .”

“Tell me what?”

Her hands cradled the back of his head and bent it down to meet her upturned face. Her mouth was soft and yet urgent, and as he held her close he began to think of other things he’d rather do than pay social calls.

“I love you very much,” she whispered.

“I love you too. What brought this on? Not that I really care,” he added. “Let’s do that again.”

He tried to hold her, but she slipped away, laughing. Her face was unclouded. “Darling, you know the children will be pounding on the door if we don’t come.”

She was right, of course. Children were a blessing, no doubt of that, but there were times . . . With nostalgia not unmixed with guilt he remembered the days when their embraces hadn’t had to be calculated, and the only interruptions came from criminals—and, occasionally, his father.

He kept thinking about it all afternoon, abnormally conscious of his wife’s presence. She’d started to ask him something and then changed her mind. Did she know something he didn’t—something his mother had told her—that caused her to fear for him? Was that what had prompted that spontaneous, passionate kiss? It would be just like the two of them to decide they needed to protect him . . .

Selim had to speak to him twice before he responded. “Sorry, I was thinking of something else.”

Selim hadn’t missed his fixed stare at Nefret. He murmured, “And a happy thing it is to think of. But when will you all come to us? Daoud wants to have a fantasia, here at Gurneh.”

“Talk to Mother,” Ramses said. “Where is Daoud? He usually joins us.”

“A scorpion stung him.”

Scorpion stings were seldom fatal, but they were extremely painful and often debilitating, even for a man of Daoud’s strength. “When did this happen?” Ramses asked. “Why didn’t he come to Nefret?”

“This morning. There was a meeting of the creatures in his sleeping room, it seems,” Selim said with a grin. “The sting is on his foot and he cannot walk. But Kadija has taken care of it. He will be ready for work tomorrow.”

“The famous green ointment,” Ramses murmured. It probably would have the desired effect; Daoud was a firm believer in its efficacy, and the stuff did seem to work. “Tell him to stay at home if it is not better.”

Selim nodded and went on to speak of something else. Scorpions were only too common in Egypt, but it was unusual for them to be found indoors.

When they took their departure Ramses promised to speak to his mother about a date for the fantasia. The children had spent the entire time playing some incomprehensible game that involved running, hopping or rolling back and forth across the courtyard, and the twins were characteristically filthy and uncharacteristically limp with fatigue. Ramses looked down at the curly black head that rested against his chest.

“They should drop off to sleep right away,” he said hopefully.

Nefret chuckled. “Don’t count on it. The Vandergelts are dining, you know.”

“All the more reason to hurry.”

There was no hurrying the horses on the hillside, among the clustered houses of the village. They reached the level floor of the desert and he was about to let Risha run when he heard something.

“Listen,” he said, reining the horse in.

“I don’t—” It came again, and now Nefret heard it too—a high-pitched, wavering scream.

Ramses plucked his drowsy daughter off his shirtfront and held her out. “Take her. Quick.”

Nefret obeyed instantly and instinctively, cradling both small bodies tight in her arms. He thanked God she was a superb horsewoman and that Moonlight was responsive to her slightest word or gesture. The scream came again; this time it was followed by a cry for help. The words were English, the voice was a woman’s. Nefret’s eyes opened wide.

“Ramses, what—”

“Get the children home. Right now.”

He didn’t wait for a response. Glancing back as he headed Risha toward the hills, he saw that Moonlight had broken into her long, smooth gallop. If they had been alone, Nefret would have insisted on accompanying him, but the children’s safety came first, even though it was unlikely that the agitated female was in serious trouble.

The woman continued to call out; her voice was weakening and broken by long gasping sobs. He found her at last, backed up against a rock outcropping. The man who confronted her was laughing as she struck at him with what appeared to be a fly whisk. It wasn’t much of a weapon compared with his knife. He was deliberately playing with her, easily avoiding her feeble blows and cutting at her arms and face. He was enjoying the game so much he failed to hear the hoofbeats until Ramses was almost on top of them. He had to pull Risha up to avoid running both down. The man let out a bleat of alarm and ran. Ramses was about to go after him when the woman sank to the ground.

Not knowing how badly she was hurt, he abandoned the idea of pursuit. He’d recognized her immediately, from her clothing. It was the same she had worn the day Justin and his grandmother had been at Deir el Medina—a drab, dark gown and a hat that even he recognized as a hand-me-down. Mrs. Fitzroyce’s companion. What the hell was she doing here, alone and under attack? The Gurnawis didn’t attack tourists.

There was blood on the ground—not much, but it was still flowing. He turned her carefully onto her back. The blood came from a cut on her arm. He couldn’t see any other wounds on her body. Gently he untied the ribbons of her atrocious hat and removed it.

Her eyes were open. They were hazel, fringed with long lashes. Tears and a peculiar grayish film smeared her cheeks. Under it her skin was smooth, her cheeks dotted with freckles.

He remembered those hazel eyes.

“My God,” he whispered. “It can’t be . . . Molly?”

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

CHAPTER FIVE Our little expedition to the cemetery did not get off until later in the afternoon. Emerson had decided to accompany us, and it always takes him a while to turn his mind from his work to more mundane activities (if one can call a visit to a saint’s tomb mundane). His suggestion that we all drive in the motorcar was doomed from the start; he only did it to stir me up. In my opinion it was not really a useful method of transportation. Like the one we had used in Palestine, it had seats for only two people, with a sort of platform behind on which goods or persons could ride. Someone, most probably Selim, had fitted that other car with a canopy and relatively comfortable seats; crammed into this “tonneau,” as it might loosely be called, Nefret and I had suffered the long tiring journey across the Sinai. What final modifications Emerson and Selim meant to make to this one I did not know, and I rather doubted that they did themselves. They were always taking parts off and putting them back on.

With the natural ingratitude of the young, all the children preferred Emerson to everyone else, including the mothers who had nurtured them and the devoted souls who kept them safe, clean, and healthy. His unorthodox notions of entertainment and his uncriticial admiration no doubt explain this. Children are not noted for rational discrimination. After Evvie had made her desires plain, he took her up with him. I had hired several donkeys for the season, since Evelyn candidly admitted she preferred their plodding pace. To his great delight I assigned one of them to Dolly.

We did not take the animals into the cemetery. I don’t know that there was any particular prohibition against it, but it seemed disrespectful. When Emerson put her down, Evvie tried to squirm away from him, but he held her firmly.

“This is like a church,” he explained. “You must be quiet and not run over the graves.”

“Are there dead people down under the ground?” Evvie asked curiously.

“Yes. And there—” I pointed. “There is your great-grandfather’s tomb.”

David had not seen the completed monument. While the others attempted to restrain Evvie (and tried to get her off the subject of dead people), he and I went on ahead. “It is odd, you know, to think of my grandfather as a saint,” he said. “He was the bravest, truest man I ever knew, but . . .”