Nefret laughed and slipped her arm through mine. “Don’t sound so hopeful, Mother. They are an oddly matched couple, though.”

“What do you think of young Mr. Albion?”

She answered with another question. “Did Ramses tell you what he said at Cyrus’s soiree – about Jumana?”

“No.”

She repeated the young man’s remark. I shook my head. “Disgusting, but not surprising. I trust Ramses put the young man in his place?”

“Ramses almost put him on the carpet,” Nefret said. “You know that look of his – white around the mouth, and eyes almost closed? I made a leap for him and grabbed his arm, in time to stop him; but he uttered a few well-chosen words. Let’s take a felucca, shall we? It’s such a nice day.”

“It has been a very pleasant day, my dear. I hope the others have had as nice a time as we.”

FROM MANUSCRIPT H

That’s got rid of her,” said Emerson in a satisfied voice, watching his wife and daughter-in-law walk away from the house. He and Ramses had been skulking – there was no other word for it – in a secluded corner of the garden. “We can get our gear together now.”

He had sent Jumana on to Deir el Medina, telling her to warn the others that they might be late. Selim and Daoud were there; they could explain the site as well as he.

Since Emerson did not believe anyone could do anything as well as he, Ramses knew his father was up to something. He didn’t need to ask what it was. As they loaded themselves with knapsacks and several heavy coils of rope, he said only, “We’re going on foot? It’s a long way to the Cemetery of the Monkeys.”

“A brisk hour’s walk,” Emerson declared. “No point in taking the horses, we’d have to leave them somewhere along the way, and I don’t want the poor brutes standing round in the sun.”

“You mean you don’t want to go near Deir el Medina for fear Cyrus will spot us and ask where we’re going. Father, what’s the point of this?”

“I only want to make a preliminary survey.”

The evasive tone would certainly have aroused his wife’s suspicions. Ramses said, “Preliminary to what? You don’t mean to give up Deir el Medina and Medinet Habu in favor of the western wadis, do you? And what about Cyrus? He isn’t going to settle for workmen’s houses while we’re looking for queens’ tombs.”

Emerson’s face took on a look of noble self-righteousness. “Cyrus is not up to the kind of survey we’ll be doing. He might injure himself. Can’t have that.”

“We’re doing him a kindness, really.”

Emerson glanced at his solemn face and burst out laughing. “Glad you agree, my boy. I haven’t made up my mind yet where we will be working. I just want to have another look round. Without,” he added indignantly, “half a dozen people, including your mother, getting in my way.”

Emerson moved at a rapid pace; he had insisted on carrying the heavier load, but it didn’t slow him in the slightest. Though he did not pause, he greeted everyone he met and responded cheerfully to their questions. Several passersby asked where they were going. Emerson told them. Matching his father’s long strides, Ramses realized Emerson didn’t really expect to find Jamil’s tomb by himself. He was hoping Jamil would show himself again.

“Do you think he’ll be there?” he asked.

“Who? Oh. Hmph. He has been. He’s bound to make a mistake sooner or later, and when he does we’ll be ready for him.”

“You don’t know that the masked demon was he.”

“Who else could it have been? The Gurnawis don’t play silly tricks like that.”

“Mother will find out, you know – especially if Jamil succeeds in bashing one of us with a boulder.”

“Unlikely in the extreme,” Emerson declared. “However… No one is a better companion than your mother – when she is in a friendly state of mind – but women do get in the way at times. Especially your mother.”

Ramses grinned but saved his breath. He did not suffer from false modesty about his physical fitness, but keeping up with his father taxed even him. Emerson must have decided to take one of his famous “round-about-ways,” for they were already climbing, along a steep, winding path that would eventually lead them behind Deir el Medina and the Valley of the Queens.

They had got a late start and Emerson was in a hurry. Once they had reached the highest part of the path they made good time over relatively level ground. Absorbed in thought, Ramses followed his father without speaking.

He didn’t want to be here, or at Medinet Habu. If he’d had his way they would settle down for the season at Deir el Medina. He hadn’t explained himself very eloquently, and apparently his father’s fascination with temples prevented him from seeing what Ramses saw: a unique opportunity to learn about the lives of ordinary Egyptians, not pharaohs, not noblemen, but men who worked hard for a living, and their wives and children. The scraps of written material he had found contained work schedules and lists of supplies, and tantalizing hints of family relationships, friendly and not so friendly, extending over many generations. He was certain there were more papyri to be found; one of the men had mentioned coming across a similar cache some years earlier, near the place where this one had turned up. If his father would let him dig there…

He didn’t want to be here, but he’d had no choice. Once Emerson got the bit in his teeth it was impossible to turn him aside, and wandering the western wadis alone was dangerous, even for an old hand like his father. Paths wound all over the place, marked in some places by tumbles of stone that marked the ruins of ancient huts, used by the necropolis guards or by workmen. Ramses could only marvel at his father’s encyclopedic memory of the terrain; he did not pause before turning into a track that led downhill, following the eastern ridge of a deep wadi. When he finally stopped, they were only twenty feet from the valley floor, and Ramses saw a flight of rough stone stairs going down.

“Rest a bit,” Emerson said, unstrapping his knapsack. He removed his coat, tossed it onto the ground, sat on it, and took his pipe from his pocket. Ramses followed his example, except for the pipe. He took advantage of the lull while his father fussed with the pipe to look round and try to get his bearings.

For the past half hour they had been going roughly southwest, and must now be near the mouth of one of the wadis that spread out northward from the plain. It wasn’t the one they had visited twice before; this configuration was quite different from that of the Cemetery of the Monkeys. There was ample evidence of ancient occupation: several deep pits, too obvious to have been overlooked by modern tomb robbers, and more remains of ancient stone huts.

Once he had his pipe going, Emerson opened his knapsack and began fumbling in it. “Hmph,” he said, as if the idea had just struck him. “I suppose I ought to have thought of bringing some water. Are you thirsty, my boy?”

“A little.” It was the understatement of the day; his mouth was so dry it felt like sand. He unstrapped his own knapsack. “I asked Fatima for a few bottles of water. And a packet of sandwiches.”

“Good thinking. No, no -” Emerson waved the bottle away. “You first.”

Ramses took a long pull and watched, with the admiring vexation his father continued to inspire, as Emerson went on rooting round in his knapsack. He had flung his pith helmet aside and the sun beat down on his bare black head. His pipe lay beside him; it was still glowing, and Ramses remembered a story his mother had once told him, about Emerson putting a lighted pipe in his pocket. She had thought it very amusing.

“Ah,” said Emerson, removing a long roll of paper from his knapsack. “Here it is. Hold this end.”

Once the paper was unrolled and held flat by rocks, Emerson said, “I did this some years ago. Very rough, as you can see.”