'I do, I do. But I do not take it as final. No, my dear cousin, Egypt is a splendid place in which to spend the winter; I have always wanted to come here. If I cannot convince you of my sincerity by spring, I will abandon my hopes. Come, Miss Peabody, you are our Minerva, our font of wisdom; what do you say?'
'Oh, I am to be allowed to say something? Well, my dear Lord Ellesmere, then I must confess you have some justice on your side; and you, Evelyn, cannot refuse your cousin's desire to assist you. If you will not accept all the money he wants to give you, you can in clear conscience accept a respectable annuity. If you wish to go home- '
'Oh, Amelia, how can you say so?'
'Very well,' I said, sniffing to conceal my pleasure.
'Then we will carry out our trip down the Nile. When it is over, you will consider your cousin's offer. Does that seem fair to both of you?'
Lucas snatched my hand and shook it enthusiastically. Evelyn nodded. She was not favorable to theidea, but was far too fairminded to object.
'However,' I continued, 'Mr. Lucas will have to conduct his courtship from a distance. I can hardly offer him a room on our dehabeeyah. It would not be proper.'
'I had not thought you the sort of lady who worried about propriety,' Lucas said, with a meaningful look. 'However, I shall hire my own dehabeeyah and be on your trail as soon as possible. You shan't escape me so easily, ladies. I shall sail where you sail and moor where you moor!'
'That sounds very romantic,' I said coolly. 'I hope you will not be disappointed; it is not so easy to arrange these things in Egypt.'
'So I have been informed.' Lucas rose, squaring his shoulders. 'Therefore I must get at the business immediately.'
'You can do nothing tonight,' I said.
'Ah, you underestimate me, dear lady! Tomorrow, when I accompany you to your boat, I will hire one for myself. Nor is it too late, tonight, to acquire a dragoman. The lobby still teems with the wretched fellows, and I am told they are essential to travelers. Perhaps you could recommend a good one.'
'No,' I said.
'Michael might know of someone,' Evelyn said, with a smiling glance at me.
'He has gone home,' I said.
'He is sure to be somewhere about,' Evelyn said gently. 'He never leaves until we have retired. Indeed,I think the fellow sleeps here, he's so devoted to you since you saved the life of his child. He would do anything for you.'
'You are the one he is devoted to,' I said. 'I cannot imagine where you get these notions, Evelyn.'
Michael had taken quite a fancy to Evelyn and was, as she had thought, still in the hotel. We found him and, taking our leave of his lordship, left the two of them in conversation.
I was really vexed with Evelyn for helping her cousin to further his plans; if I had not known her so well, I would have imagined she wanted to encourage him. But that was Evelyn's weakness. She was too kind, and too truthful. Both, I have found, are inconvenient character traits.
4
I HAD thought to avoid Mr. Lucas by making an outrageously early departure next morning. I underestimated him. The rosy streaks of dawn were scarcely brushing the sky when we descended into the lobby of the hotel, to find Lucas waiting, with an armful of flowers for Evelyn and a knowing smile for me. He insisted on accompanying us to Boulaq, and as the little boat carried us across to the waiting dahabeeyah he stood on the shore waving both arms like a semaphore and showing all his teeth in a smile.
With much bustle and a babble of cheerful voices the men took their places. The mooring ropes were loosed; the oarsmen pushed off from the bank; the great sail swelled as it took the wind; and we were off, with a six-gun salute from our crew, answered by other boats along the bank.
We sat on the high upper deck, with an awning to protect us from the sun. Rugs, lounge chairs, and tables had transformed this area into a comfortable drawing room, and the waiter, young Habib, at once appeared with mint tea and cakes. Evelyn lost her thoughtful look and sat up, pointing and exclaiming at the sights. The worst pessimist in the world must have responded to the happiness of such an excursion on such a day. The sun was well up, beaming down from a cloudless sky. The gentle breeze fanned our cheeks.
The palaces and gardens on the riverbank glided by as smoothly as in a dream, and with every passing minute new beauties of scenery and architecture were displayed to our eager eyes. In the distance the shapes of the pyramids were etched against the sky, the air was so clear that they seemed like miniature monuments, only yards away.
We sat on the deck the whole of that day; the experience was so new and so enchanting it was impossible to tear ourselves away. At dinner time delectable smells wafted up from the kitchen near the prow. Evelyn ate with a better appetite than I had seen her display for days; and when we retired to the saloon as the evening fell, she performed Chopin beautifully on the pianoforte. I sat by the window watching the exquisite sunset and listening to the tender strains; it is a moment that will always remain in my memory.
We had many such moments as the days went on; but I must curtail my enthusiasm, for I could write another of those repetitious travel books about the trip- the eerie singing of the crewmen as we lay moored at night; the exchanges of salutes with the Cook's steamers plying the river; the visits to the monuments of Dashoor (pyramids) and Abusir (more pyramids).
Most travelers hurry up the river as fast as possible, planning to stop at various historic sites on the return voyage. The voyage upstream is the difficult one, against the current, which, as the reader knows, flows from south to north; one is dependent upon the prevailing northerly wind, and, when this fails, as it often does, upon the brawny arms of the men. After we watched them tow the heavy boat through an area of sandbanks in a dead calm, we could not bear to inflict this labor on them any more often than was absolutely necessary. To see the poor fellows harnessed to a rope, like ancient slaves, was positively painful.
I had private reasons for wishing to push on as quickly as possible. The energetic Mr. Lucas would find difficulty in hiring a dahabeeyah as promptly as he hoped, but I did not underestimate his stubbornness, and I fancied a few weeks of peace and quiet before he caught us up.
However, my study of history had told me that the common method of travel is the wrong way. The monuments near Cairo are among the oldest; in order to see Egyptian history unroll before us in the proper sequence, we must stop on our way south instead of waiting till the return voyage. I wanted to see Twelfth Dynasty tombs and Eighteenth Dynasty temples before viewing the remains of the later Greek and Roman periods. I had therefore made out an itinerary before we left Cairo and presented it to Reis Hassan.
You would have thought I had suggested a revolution, the way that man carried on. I was informed, through Michael, that we must take advantage of the wind, and sail where, and as, it permitted.
I was beginning to understand a little Arabic by then, and I comprehended a few of the comments Michael did not translate. According to the reis I was a woman, and therefore no better than a fool. I knew nothing about boats, or wind, or sailing, or the Nile; who was I, to tell an experienced captain how to run his boat?
I was the person who had hired the boat. I pointed this out to Reis Hassan. I hope I need not say who won the argument. Like all men, of all colors and all nations, he was unable to accept an unpalatable fact, however; and I bad to argue with him every time I proposed to stop.
Except for running aground on sandbanks, which is a common-enough occurrence, we made admirable time. The wind was good. I therefore encountered some stiff resistance from the reis when I told him we would stop at Bern Hassan, which is some 167 miles south of Cairo. Brandishing my copy of M. Maspero's history, I explained to him that the tombs at Beni Hassan are of the time of Usertsen of the Twelfth Dynasty; chronologically they follow the pyramid of Gizeh, where we had been, and precede the antiquities of Luxor, where we proposed to go. I doubt that he understood my argument. However, we stopped at Beni Hassan.
