Part 3 (2/2)
”Wave back and keep walking,” said Emerson. ”You may indulge in gossip to your heart's content, Peabody, but on your own time. I have no patience with such stuff.”
He put his hand over mine and pulled me with him. We had almost reached the foot of the stairs when I saw a little eddy, so to speak, in the crowd. Raised voices and a flurry of rapid movement betokened a disturbance of some kind. Owing to my lack of inches, I could not make out the cause, but Ramses, who had gone ahead with Nefret, obviously beheld something that provoked him into action. He dropped his wife's arm and ran forward.
Needless to say, the rest of us were not far behind him. Emerson thrust through the ring of gaping spectators. They had prudently backed away from the two princ.i.p.al performers, who were grappling with each other. The struggle was brief; with an abrupt movement Ramses (for as the Reader must have surmised, one of the combatants was my son) caught the other man in a hard grip and twisted his arm behind him. His opponent was a burly, dark-haired fellow whose teeth were bared in a grimace of pain or rage. The third partic.i.p.ant lay on the ground, apparently unconscious.
He was no more than a boy, slender and frail, dressed in a suit that could only have been cut by a British tailor. His cap had fallen off. Golden lashes fanned his smooth cheeks, and golden curls crowned his bare head. His gentle countenance and slight form suggested a fallen angel, struck down by some diabolical adversary. The other man looked devilish enough, his face dark with choler and his muscles bulging as he continued to writhe in Ramses's grasp.
”Let me go, you fool,” he cried. ”Let me go to him.”
”Hold on to him, Ramses,” I ordered.
”I have every intention of doing so, Mother. They were struggling when I first saw them, and then this fellow struck the boy. Is he badly hurt?”
”I can't see any wounds or bruises,” Nefret said. She bent over the youth and was about to loosen his collar when his golden lashes fluttered and lifted, framing eyes of a soft, celestial blue. A dreamy smile curved the delicate lips. ”You are very beautiful,” he said, catching hold of Nefret's hand. ”Are you an angel or a G.o.ddess? The Egyptian G.o.ddesses had dark hair . . .”
”A friend,” Nefret said gently. ”I will take care of you.”
”Francois will take care of me.” His eyes moved in innocent curiosity around the circle of staring faces. ”Where is he? Where is my good Francois?”
”Here, young master, here.” Francois, for so the boy's smile of recognition proved him to be, had accepted the futility of struggle. His body relaxed and his features lost their ferocity. They were no more pleasant in repose; his nose was crooked and a seamed scar twisted his mouth. He had the shallow, retreating brow that some authorities consider evidence of a criminal nature, and the lower portion of his face was out of proportion, with a long jaw and large cheekbones. ”Let me go to him,” he begged. ”Monsieur, s'il vous plait-je vous en prie-”
”It appears,” I remarked, ”that we may have misjudged the situation. Release him, Ramses.”
The man knelt beside the boy and lifted him gently to his feet, the tenderness of his manner in striking contrast to his former ferocity. ”We will go home now,” he murmured. ”Come, young master. Come with Francois.”
”Yes.” The boy nodded. ”But first I must know the names of these new friends, and I must tell them mine. I am Justin Fitzroyce. And you, beautiful lady?”
The sad truth had dawned on Nefret, as it had on me. She spoke to him as she would have spoken to a child, and like a well-trained child he gave each of us his hand as Nefret p.r.o.nounced our names. ”I will see you again, I hope,” he said sweetly. ”You will come to visit me?”
”Thank you,” I said. ”Where do you live?”
Francois, his arm supporting the slim frame of his ”young master,” nodded toward the river. ”The dahabeeyah Isis. You may speak to my mistress if you still doubt me.” The face that had been so benevolent when he spoke to the boy darkened again, and he turned blazing eyes on Ramses.
”There is no need,” I said.
”No! You must come. My honor has been questioned. She will tell you.”
”I am sorry,” my son began.
”There is no need to apologize,” I said firmly. ”Francois surely understands that a stranger might have misinterpreted his behavior and acted in what he believed to be the boy's defense.”
A curt nod was the only response from Francois, but the boy continued to smile and wave as his servant led him away.
”What a sad state of affairs,” said my dear, soft-hearted Emerson. ”The lad must be subject to fits. It was necessary for his manservant to subdue him lest he harm himself.”
”Possibly,” Nefret said. ”Persons in a state of mania can have extraordinary strength. Frenzy is not typical of epilepsy, however.”
”No,” I agreed. ”And one would have supposed that if Francois was aware of his master's condition he would have learned how to deal with it less forcibly. Goodness gracious, he is twice the boy's size.”
”And built like a prizefighter,” Ramses said, absently rubbing his wrist. ”He knows a few dirty moves too.”
”It is not our affair,” Emerson declared. ”You heard me, Peabody; you are not to call on his family and pry into their affairs and lecture them about medical treatment. You always-”
”No, Emerson, I do not 'always,' and I have no intention of interfering in this case. We have other matters to attend to.”
”Too true,” said Cyrus, sighing.
FROM Ma.n.u.sCRIPT H.
They stopped by the Castle in the forlorn hope that the missing Italian had turned up after all. He had not. Emerson persuaded Cyrus and Bertie to go to Deir el Medina with him, and Katherine emphatically seconded the suggestion. They could not expect to hear from Russell until late that night and, as Katherine candidly admitted, ”To be honest, my dear, if you search that room one more time, I shall scream.”
Ramses helped Nefret collect his vociferous offspring and their paraphernalia. His mother marched off to Emerson's study, with a glint in her eyes that made Ramses wonder what she was up to now. He decided it was more than likely that Emerson would stroll in that evening to find she had finished the article for him. Then there would be a row. About time, he thought. They hadn't had a first-cla.s.s argument in days.
They rode the horses, since the distance was too great for short legs. Ramses took his daughter up with him on Risha and Nefret held Davy, who was a fraction less wriggly than his sister. They loved riding with their parents and Charla told Ramses so at length. He a.s.sumed from her chuckles and gestures that was what she was talking about; he didn't understand a word.
They were eagerly awaited, especially by Selim's four youngest children, who ranged in age from a staggering one-year-old to the big sister of six. Daoud and his wife Kadija had stopped by, too. Ramses knew he wouldn't see much of Nefret for the rest of the afternoon; she and Kadija were close friends, and Kadija, a woman of majestic proportions and the owner of a famous green ointment whose recipe she had inherited from her Nubian foremothers, was still shy of him and his father. She and Nefret went off with Selim's wives and the children, leaving the men to smoke and drink coffee under the shady arcade of the courtyard.
Daoud planted his huge hands on his large knees and beamed at Ramses. His beard was grizzled now, but his strength was unimpaired. It was equaled only by his large heart. ”Is there news?” he asked hopefully.
There was plenty of news. Ordinarily Ramses would have taken Selim into his confidence, but although he was extremely fond of Daoud, he was well aware of the latter's weakness for gossip. ”Nothing you don't know,” he said. ”We go to Cairo on the Sunday, and will bring the family back with us a few days later.”
”Sooner than later,” said Daoud firmly. ”It has been too long since they have been here, and to think I have never set eyes on the namesake and great-grandson of my honored uncle Abdullah!”
”They call him Dolly,” Ramses said. ”They plan to stay the entire season, so you will see a great deal of him.”
Selim's fine dark eyes had moved from speaker to speaker. Now he cleared his throat. ”This time it is Daoud who has news to tell. He has found out why Ha.s.san left the Father of Curses.”
Daoud looked reproachful. He enjoyed his reputation as the family's official storyteller, and he would have worked up to the disclosure with proper rhetoric. However, he rallied promptly. ”It is surprising news, Ramses. You would never have imagined it. Even I, when he told me, was struck dumb with amazement. My eyes opened wide and my voice failed me.”
”But not for long,” said Selim, grinning. He sobered almost at once; Ramses had the impression that something was troubling him. ”So, Daoud, do not draw the tale out. Tell Ramses what Ha.s.san said.”
”I will show him,” Daoud declared, rising ponderously to his feet. ”Come, Ramses. It is not far.”
Ramses waved Selim's protest aside. Daoud had been deprived of his great announcement; he was ent.i.tled to prolong the suspense. ”Where?” he asked, rising in his turn.
”Follow me.” Selim went to the door of the house and called out, raising his voice to be heard over the bedlam within. ”We are going out. We will come back soon.”
”So you have to report to the ladies, do you?” Ramses asked as they followed Daoud along the street, if it could be called that. The village had grown like Topsy, without any coherent plan, and the paths wound around and sometimes through modern houses and ancient tombs. ”And I hear from Daoud that you are contemplating taking a third wife. Remember the advice I pa.s.sed on to you last year. Three women are six times as much trouble as two.”
Selim smiled and stroked his beard. ”I tell them what I choose and I do as I like.”
”Of course. And the third wife?”
”They cannot agree whether I should do it.”
He glanced at Ramses's carefully controlled face and burst into a hearty laugh. ”So. Am I-what is the word?-henpecked?”
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