'I understand,' she said. But she was thinking something else quite different. You wrote the whole story in the scrolls. You left them there. And that was because you could not bear this secret any longer. 'You don't understand these times,' she said again. 'Miracles aren't believed, even by those to whom they happen.'
'What a strange thing to say!'
'Were I to shout it from the rooftops no one would believe. Your elixir is safe, with or without these poisons.'
It seemed a shock of pain went through him. She saw it. She felt it. She regretted her words. What madness to think this creature is all powerful, that his ready smile doesn't conceal a
vulnerability as vast as his strength. She was at a loss. She waited. And then his smile, once again, came to her rescue.
'What can we do but wait and see, Julie Stratford?'
He sighed. He removed his frock coat, and walked away from her into the Egyptian room. He stared at the coffin, his coffin, and then at the row of jars. He reached down and carefully switched on the electric lamp, as he had seen her do, and then looked up at the rows and rows of books rising over Lawrence's desk to the ceiling.
'Surely you need to sleep,' she said. 'Let me take you upstairs to Father's room.'
'No, my darling dear, I do not sleep, except when I mean to take leave of life for the time being.''
'You mean . . . day in and day out, you need no sleep whatsoever!'
'That is correct,' he said, flashing her another little smile. 'I shall tell you another wicked secret too. I do not need the food or the drink I take, I merely crave it. And my body enjoys it.' He laughed softly at her shock. 'But what I do need now is to read in your father's books, if you will allow me.'
'Of course, you needn't ask me for such a thing,' she said. 'You must take what you need and what you want. Go to his room when you wish. Put on his robe. I want you to have every comfort.' She laughed. 'I'm beginning to speak the way you speak.'
They looked at each other. Only a few feet separated them, and she was grateful for them.
'I'll leave you now,' she said, but instantly he caught her hand, and closed the distance and locked her in his arms, and kissed her again. Then, almost roughly he let her go.
'Julie is Queen in her own domain,' he said, a little apologetically.
'And your words to Samir, let us remember them. 'But for now, I shall protect Julie Stratford from anyone or anything that would hurt her.' '
'I did not He. And I should like to lie at your side, the better to protect you.'
She laughed softly. Better escape now while it was still morally and physically possible. 'Oh, but there is one other thing,' she said. She went to the far northeast corner of the room, and opened the cabinet gramophone. She cranked the thing, and looked at the RCA Victor records. Verdi's Ai'da. 'Ah, the very thing,' she said. And no appalling picture on the front of the album to repel him. She put the heavy, brittle black disk on the velvet turntable. She set the arm in place. And then turned to watch his face as the triumphal march from the opera began, a low, faraway chorus of lovely voices.
'Oooh, but what is this magic! The machine is making music!'
'Just wind and play. And I shall sleep as mortal women do, dreaming, though real life has become all I ever dreamed it would be.'
She glanced back once to see him rocking to the music, his arms folded, his head bowed. He was singing with it, very low, under his breath. And even the simple sight of the white shirt stretched taut over his broad back and powerful arms sent the shivers through her.
8
AS MIDNIGHT struck, Elliott closed the notebook.
He had spent the evening reading Lawrence's translations through and through, and reexamining his dusty old biographies of the King called Ramses the Great, and the Queen known as Cleopatra. There was nothing in these historical tomes that could not accommodate the assertions of the mummy's preposterous story.
A man who ruled Egypt for sixty years might damn well have been immortal. And the reign of Cleopatra VI had been by any standards utterly remarkable.
But what intrigued him more than anything at the moment was a paragraph Lawrence had written in Latin and in Egyptian-the very last of his notes. Elliott had had no trouble reading this. He had kept his diary in Latin when he was in Oxford; and he had studied Egyptian for years along with Lawrence, and then on his own.
This was not a transcript of the material in Ramses' scrolls. Rather the paragraph contained Lawrence's private comments on what he'd read.
'Claims to have taken this elixir once and once only. No further infusion was required. Brewed the mix for Cleopatra, but felt it was unsafe to discard it. Reluctant to take it into his body for fear of adverse results. What if all chemicals in this tomb are properly tested? What if there is some chemical here which has a rejuvenating effect upon the human body, and can substantially prolong life?''
The two lines in Egyptian were incoherent. They said something about magic, secrets, natural ingredients combined to wholly new effect.
So that is what Lawrence had believed, more or less. And he had taken pains to conceal it in the ancient languages. Now what did Elliott really believe about this situation? Especially in light of Henry's story of the mummy coming to life?
It occurred to him again that he was playing a very dramatic little game; that belief is a word we seldom thoroughly examine. For example, he had all his life 'believed' in the teaching of the Church of England. But he did not really for a moment expect to enter a Christian heaven when he died, and certainly not a Christian hell. He would not have gambled one farthing on the existence of either.
One thing was most certain. If he had actually seen the thing climb out of the coffin, as Henry claimed to have done, he would not be behaving like Henry. A man of no imagination, that was Henry. Perhaps the lack of imagination had always been the tragic flaw. It occurred to him that Henry was a man who did not grasp the implications of things.
Far from running from this mystery, as Henry had chosen to do, Elliott had become obsessed with it. If only he had stayed longer in the Stratford house, been a little more clever. He could have examined those alabaster jars; he could have taken one of the scrolls. That poor little Rita would have settled for just about any explanation.
He wished he had tried.
He also wished that his son, Alex, were not suffering. For that was the only unpleasant aspect of this entertaining mystery so far.
Alex had been calling Julie all day. He was in a great state of alarm over the guest in Julie's house, whom he had only glimpsed through the conservatory doors-'an enormous man, well, very tall, anyhow, with blue eyes. Quite a ... a good-looking fellow, but certainly too old to be courting Julie!'
Then at eight this evening, there had come a call from one of those well-meaning friends who make a point of circulating rumors relentlessly. Julie had been seen dancing at the Victoria Hotel with a handsome and imposing stranger. Were not Alex and Julie engaged? Alex was now beside himself with worry.
Though he had called Julie every hour upon the hour all afternoon, there had been no response from her. Finally he had begged his father to intervene. Could not Elliott get to the bottom of this?
Yes. Elliott would get to the bottom of this. In fact, Elliott felt curiously enlivened by this entire development. Elliott felt almost young, daydreaming about Ramses the Great and his elixir hidden among poisons.
He rose now from his comfortable chair by the fire, ignoring the familiar pain in his legs, and went to his desk to write a letter.
Dearest Julie,
It has come to my attention that you are entertaining a guest, a friend of your father's, I believe. It would give me great pleasure to meet this gentleman. Perhaps I can be of some service to you during his stay, and certainly would not wish to miss such an opportunity.
May I ask you to join us here tomorrow night for family dinner. . . .
In a few moments he had finished this note. He put it in an envelope, sealed it, and took it into the front hall, where he laid it in a silver tray for his man, Walter, to deliver in the morning. Then he paused. Of course it was what Alex wanted him to do. But he knew that he was not doing it for Alex. And he knew that if any such dinner
