The Buried Pyramid (6 page)

Periodically, Alphonse made the rounds with water and food. Each time he gave Neville a report of his finds. The ruins were extensive, though thoroughly looted, at least where Alphonse had reached.

“But there is much the vandals did not take,” he said. “Wood, broken furniture, cloth, even mummies destroyed beyond all recognition by those who stripped the amulets from within their wrappings.”

Neville thought about this, and as the boat of the sun began to sink in the west, he came up with a plan.

* * *

“Wrap me so everything is covered,” Neville ordered, “everything but my eyes and mouth—and don’t restrict my movement.”

“I still think,” Alphonse said, ripping a sheet into long strips—the linen from the tombs that had inspired Neville was far too brittle—“that I should take your place. You are a better shot.”

“But you are wounded, and I’m not going to risk anyone else in such a jackass plan.”

“You’re risking Miriam,” Eddie grumbled.

“Miriam is risking herself,” Neville countered.

To be honest, he didn’t feel good about Miriam’s addition to their plan, but he had felt he must accept her suggestion—no matter what danger to which it exposed her. Miriam’s diversion meant his outlandish imposture would have a better chance of succeeding without getting him riddled with bullets.

Miriam’s robes had been dishevelled, the fabric artfully streaked with blood harvested from a protesting camel. She was ignoring Eddie’s displeasure—but Neville had no doubt she was aware of it, and flattered by his concern.

“Right,” Neville said when his mummification had been completed a short time later. “Everyone knows what to do?”

Nods and a sullen “Yes, sir” from Eddie answered him.

“Start shooting.”

Eddie and Alphonse aimed at a sandy patch and let loose a barrage.

“Now, Miriam,” Neville commanded.

The girl let loose a piercing scream and bolted across the desert in the direction of the Arab camp. At the same moment, Derek released three of the camels. They’d guessed that the Arabs might shoot at a woman, but not if they risked hitting a valuable piece of livestock.

Neville pursued the fleeing girl. He moved fairly rapidly, but kept his gait stiff and motions jerky. He must follow close behind the girl, but not too close. Behind him, the shooting had ceased and their besieged camp was as silent as death.

He heard Miriam’s wails and screams as she burst in among her countrymen. Despite himself, Neville held his breath. One word from her would destroy them in an instant.

“It came from the tombs,” Miriam sobbed. “One of the old kings, avenging ancient wrongs. It tore the English to shreds and comes for us! Look!”

She screamed theatrically, collapsing into the arms of the nearest Arab—one who just happened to be among the Bedouin’s best shots.

Neville moaned loudly and made a furious, throwing gesture in the direction of the nearest Arab. The man collapsed as if shot, not surprisingly, for he had been shot. Eddie Bryce had followed Neville, keeping to the shadows and trusting that misdirection and the fire-blinded eyes of the Arabs would keep him from discovery.

The Bedouins’ reaction was all Neville could have desired. Those nearest to the fallen man leapt back, shunning the body. Neville gestured again and a second man fell.

The crack of the rifle was clearly audible, but no one paid attention. They were too busy scrabbling for the nearest mount or—more often—fleeing on foot into the desert. Derek had crept around and untied the horses and camels.

A few of the braver Arabs reached for brands from the fire, but an unearthly wail from the direction of the ruins froze even Neville’s blood. The wail rose again, and Miriam shrieked:

“Another! Another! What demons have we unbound?”

That was more than even the coolest head could take. They hardly paid heed to the fact that the mummy had produced an artfully wrapped pistol and was adding to the death toll. Within minutes the enemy was scattered. Neville didn’t plan to wait for the Arabs to get over their fear. His band could navigate by the stars and Alphonse was holding their camels ready.

Neville offered no protest when Eddie swung Miriam onto the saddle in front of him, only smiled.

When they were safely on a steamer bound for Cairo, Alphonse Liebermann explained that he no longer desired to search for the tomb of Neferankhotep.

“I have found a tomb now,” he said, tenderly cradling his wounded arm. “A good one, if I choose to excavate. However, perhaps playing at pharaonic revenge has ruined me for archeology. It no longer seems so good to disturb the dead.”

Neville nodded. “I understand.”

Alphonse laid a hand on Neville’s arm.

“I will be writing several letters when I return to Cairo: to the museum to register my find, to the Army and diplomatic corps to warn them of the restless Arabs in this part of the desert, and . . .”

He paused and smiled, his eyebrows dancing.

“And to praise a certain valiant Captain Hawthorne. I shall write my cousin, Albert, too. I think ‘Sir Neville’ would sound very fine indeed.”

Neville had to agree.

1

The Arrival

It couldn’t have happened at a worse time, but Neville Hawthorne knew he had no one but himself to blame. He was the one who had stopped reading his letters. He was the one who had fled from grief into obsession. Now the consequences of that obsession were coming to roost, and he still had no idea how he was going to deal with them. At least he’d opened the letter in time.

Cold comfort indeed when one is standing at the dock, watching passengers file off the trans-Atlantic steamer, looking for a single young woman, not knowing if she will be recognizable. Neville thought he might recognize her. He had seen pictures, though the last one had been at least three years ago. Young women changed so much at that age.

Then, like the moment between shadow and sunlight, twenty years vanished, giving Neville his sister back to him as she had been when she had left for the United States with her new husband.

There stood a graceful figure, high-held head crowned with thick chestnut hair that defied a fashionable hat’s attempt to tame it. There flashed the violet eyes beneath the shadow of the jet-trimmed brim. There in a tidy mourning black frock was the womanly form that had made Alice one of the acclaimed beauties of her debutante season.

Here again posed the loveliness that had stolen the heart of Pierre Benet—Pierre who had stolen Alice’s heart in turn. When the senior Hawthornes would not consent to their daughter’s marrying a penniless French physician, Alice had eloped with her Pierre. Soon thereafter the newlyweds had departed for the United States. Neville had not seen Alice since.

Recollection hit Neville as solidly as a physical blow. He would never again see Alice, not even if he made that long-postponed trip to the United States. A letter had arrived six months ago reporting that Alice and Pierre had died in a conflagration that had also destroyed their home. The fire had reportedly been set by savage Indians who had left nothing behind them but charred wood and the arrow-riddled body of the family dog.

The young woman who could not be Alice walked down the gangplank and made her way through the crowd, coming directly to Neville with perfect confidence. Clearly, she had recognized him.

“Jenny?” Neville said, and heard his own voice emerge hoarse and unfamiliar. “Little Jenny?”

“Uncle Neville,” she replied, and her voice, sweet, but decidedly American in accent, broke the spell. “It’s me, Jenny Benet.”

She pronounced the surname English style, not the French “Ben-nay,” but Neville heard traces of a French accent incongruously interwoven with the American. Jenny seemed about to say more, but she paused, studying him. Neville wondered what had caught her attention.

He had long ago recovered from the assault that had forced him to retire from the military, but the scars remained. Those on his head were mostly hidden by thick hair not unlike Jenny’s own in color and luxuriance, but nothing would hide the ugly slash that began at the bridge of his nose and carried across his left cheek. Although in his mid-forties, Neville had taken care to remain active, and was not dissatisfied with his form. His father had gone to fat long before he reached this age. The limp remained, of course, and the slight unevenness of his shoulders, but these could not account for the strange expression spreading across Jenny’s features.

“Uncle Neville,” she said at last, “what’s wrong?”

“You look,” he managed to reply, giving only part of the truth, “so much like Alice. Those portraits your parents sent never did you credit.”

Jenny grinned, a wide, open smile that nonetheless held traces of sorrow too fresh to be forgotten.

“I’m glad to hear you say it,” she replied. “I always thought Mama was the prettiest lady I’d ever seen.”

There was the trace of the French again, on the word “Mama,” and hearing itNeville could imagine Pierre bending over his daughter’s infant cradle: “Say Mama, little Genevieve. Say Papa.”

Now that Neville could separate his niece from that momentary transformation into her mother, he could see something of Pierre in Jenny as well. These traits were less physical: a confidence he’d never seen in Alice until she’d defied everyone for her Pierre, an alert watchfulness that was a far cry from Alice’s missish shyness, that disturbing tendency to assess her surroundings and make instant diagnosis. But then, except through her letters, Neville hadn’t really known Alice these past twenty years. Maybe Jenny was like her mother in these ways too.

Neville would have been hard pressed to say what was more unsettling, this sudden onrush of memories, or what he knew he must confess in the near future. Neville settled for focusing on the immediate present, knowing even as he did so that he was delaying the inevitable.

“Are you tired, Jenny?” he asked. “I have a suite ready for you at my house, but if you are hungry we can send the luggage ahead, and stop for cakes and tea.”

“Cakes and tea,” Jenny replied promptly. “I’m too excited to sleep, and scared stiff that once I see a bed I’ll drop off and miss my first day in England.”

“Very well,” Neville said with an amused smile.

Needless to say, they couldn’t leave immediately. Jenny had left her traveling companions rather abruptly when she glimpsed Neville in the crowd on the dock. Now she had to return, make her apologies, introduce Neville, and all the rest. Happily, her companion—a married woman, coming to visit her brother and his wife—was eager to be away with them, so beyond making vague promises to call, there was no added impediment.

Neville thought this was a good thing. Given what he had to tell his niece, an audience would be rather awkward.

A few words to his footman, and arrangements were made for Jenny’s luggage. Then Neville hailed a cab, and gave the address of a hotel whose tea room was very popular with locals and visitors alike. He thought it would be easier to tell Jenny what he must there, away from his house and its current uproar.

At least, he hoped it would be. Looking at Jenny, and noticing the lively curiosity with which she was regarding every aspect of London traffic, he wasn’t at all certain.

Once they were seated in a private corner overlooking the room, with tea and iced cakes set before them, Neville felt he must begin his confession.

“Jenny,” he began, but fate wasn’t going to make this easy for him. There was a rustle of heavy silk skirts, and a throaty, melodious voice addressed him.

“Sir Neville, how delightful to see you. I thought you had already departed.”

Without conscious volition, Neville rose to his feet.

“Lady Cheshire,” he said, bowing over her hand. “May I present my ward, my late sister’s daughter, Genevieve Benet? She has only just now arrived from Boston. Jenny, this is Lady Audrey Cheshire.”

Lady Cheshire was a handsome woman in her late twenties. She wore her raven locks drawn up into a complicated arrangement that drew attention to her green eyes. The green of those eyes was echoed in the pale silk of her gown, a fashionably lace-trimmed creation in the French style, with a heavy bustle and a rather daring neckline.

Jenny made her curtsey as neatly as could be wished, but the quick glance she darted toward her uncle left Neville quite certain that she had not been so awed by this introduction that Lady Cheshire’s reference to Neville’s departure had escaped her.