Oh, that bloody son of a bitch, she thought miserably. She wished he was dead. She'd worked for Sharpies before Henry Stratford had rescued her. And Sharpies was a mean one, plain and simple. He had left his scar on her, a tiny half-moon on the back of her neck.
"I told you I'd pay you when I got back, didn't I? Suppose you give me time to unpack my trunk!" He jammed down the little cone of a receiver into the hook. She pushed the phone back out of the way on the marble-top table.
"Come here to me, sweetheart," she said as she sat on the bed.
But her eyes dulled slightly as she watched him staring at the telephone. He was broke still, wasn't he? Stone broke.
Strange. There had been no wake in this house for her father. And now the painted coffin of Ramses the Great was being carried carefully through the double drawing rooms as if by pallbearers, and into the library, which he had always called the Egyptian room. A wake for the mummy; and the chief mourner was not here.
Julie watched as Samir directed the men from the museum to
place the coffin carefully upright in the southeast corner, to the left of the open conservatory doors. A perfect position. Anyone entering the house could see it immediately. All those in the drawing rooms would have a good view of it; and the mummy himself would appear to have a view of all assembled to pay him homage when the lid was lifted and the body itself was revealed. The scrolls and alabaster jars would be arranged on the long marble table beneath the mirror to the left of the upright coffin, along the east wall. The bust of Cleopatra was already being placed on a stand in the centre of the room. The gold coins would go in a special display case beside the marble table. And other miscellaneous treasures could now be arranged any way that Samir saw fit.
The soft afternoon sunlight poured in from the conservatory, throwing its intricate dancing patterns over the golden mask of the King's face and his folded arms.
Gorgeous it was, authentic obviously. Only a fool would question such a treasure. But what did the whole story mean?
Oh, if only they were all gone, Julie thought, and she could be alone now to study it. But the men would be here forever examining the exhibit. And Alex, what to do about Alex, who stood beside her, and gave her not a moment to herself?
Of course she'd been glad to see Samir, though it had stirred her own pain to see the pain in him.
And he looked stiff and uncomfortable in his black Western suit and starched white shirt. In the silks of his native dress, he was a dark-eyed prince, quite removed from the dreary routines of this noisy century and its bludgeoning drive to progress. Here he looked foreign, and almost servile in spite of the imperious manner in which he ordered the workmen about.
Alex stared at the workmen and their relics with the strangest expression. What was it? These things meant nothing to him; they had to do with some other world. But did he not find them beautiful? Ah, it was so difficult for her to understand." I wonder if there is a curse," he whispered softly." Oh, please, don't be ridiculous," Julie answered." Now, they're going to be working for some time. Why don't we go on ? back into the conservatory and have tea?"
"Yes, we should do that," he said. It was dislike in his face, wasn't it? Not confusion. He felt nothing for these treasures. They were alien to him; they did not matter one way or the other. She might have felt the same way gazing at a modern machine she did not understand.
It saddened her. But everything saddened her now - and most of all the fact that her father had had so little time with these many treasures, that he had died on the very day of his greatest discovery. And that she was the one who must savour each and every article that he had uncovered in this mysterious and controversial grave.
Perhaps after tea, Alex would understand that she wanted to be alone. She led him down the hall now, past the double doors of me drawing rooms, past the