The Crozier Pharaohs

midstream. Then, as an extra precaution, she picked it up again and pushed it point downwards between two large boulders before she waded ashore.

She was only just in time. Voices could be heard and, putting Amon also in leash, she strode off along the riverside track towards the rustic bridge and the pub.

‘You’ve been a long time. We’re starving,’ said Susan.

‘Luckily it’s only cold ham, new potatoes and peas,’ said Morpeth, ‘and we can steam up the veg. Where on earth have you been?’

‘She got lost on the moor,’ said Susan, ‘or else she stopped at the Whortleberry in Clapbridge and had a couple.’

‘Well, as a matter of fact, I did just that. The bar was crowded with holidaymakers, so it took ages for me to get served and then people were interested in the hounds and that delayed me. One has to be civil.’

‘I thought they didn’t have dogs in the bar at the Whortleberry.’

‘Oh, the hounds weren’t taken inside. I carried my drinks to the only table out of doors where there was a vacant seat, and the other people there made a terrific fuss of the dogs and fed them snacks. I don’t know how I ever got them away. They drooled and dribbled and made friends with everybody.’

‘That was a change for them, then,’ said Susan sceptically. ‘They don’t usually take any too quickly to strangers.’

‘It was the food, of course. Chicken sandwiches, bits of liver sausage, cake, biscuits — you name it, they had it.’

‘Then they’ll probably keep us up all night. We’ll be lucky if we don’t have to call in the vet.’

‘Oh, Susan! A bit of a treat now and again doesn’t hurt them. We hardly spoil them here, do we? Besides, I am sure they digested it all on the long walk home,’ said Morpeth.

‘If you went across the moor as far as the Whortleberry, it certainly was a long walk home,’ said Susan.

Her tone was dry and Morpeth looked at her in some perplexity. Bryony, hoping that her flushed cheeks did not betray that she had been lying, seated herself at the dining-table and demanded to be fed. When Susan had gone home to her cottage in Abbots Bay after supper that night and the dishes had been cleared away and washed up, Morpeth said, ‘What’s up? What really happened while you were out this morning? You didn’t really go to the Whortleberry, did you?’

‘Well, no, but nothing happened, nothing at all.’

‘You might as well tell me. I shan’t give you any peace until you do. Anybody could see you were lying when you talked about the hounds and their sandwiches and things.’

But Bryony, as she began to explain, had not been lying about the sandwiches and other treats which the hounds had enjoyed. The only lie she had told was that these treats had not been given at the Whortleberry inn on the moor, but at the hotel beyond Watersmeet.

Morpeth was silent for a minute when this was made plain. Then she said, ‘So you took Amon and Anubis to Watersmeet. Why? We never take the hounds along the river. Too many summer visitors and boys throwing stones.’

Bryony found difficulty in explaining what had caused her to take the riverside path, since she knew that it had been her own curiosity, after she had heard the verdict at the inquest, which had given her the incentive to go and study the spot where the body had been found. She was torn between an urgent desire to share the news about the blood-stained stone and a fear that she had done a very wrong thing in trying to hide the evidence of what must have been a vicious attack on somebody. She had tried to convince herself that it was unlikely that the stone had had any connection with the death of the so-far unidentified victim, but there could be little doubt that somebody had pushed the stone into the hole in the bank. The only obvious reason for such an action could have been the intention to hide it.

It was not often that Morpeth was in command of any situation which arose between herself and her elder sister. She pressed home her advantage.

‘Come on,’ she said. ‘We don’t have secrets from one another. You went to Watersmeet, goodness knows why, and something happened there, didn’t it?’

‘Nothing happened, I tell you. Stop badgering me. Why shouldn’t I go to Watersmeet? Of course I was interested in seeing the place.’

‘It’s days since Susan found that dead man. If you are morbid enough to visit the spot marked with an X, why have you waited until now?’

‘I don’t know why.’

‘You didn’t run into Ozymandias, did you?’

‘No, of course not.’

‘I was scared of him. He’s quite definitely mad.’

‘I didn’t meet him, I tell you. I didn’t meet anybody until I got to the hotel.’

‘What did happen, then? Tell me.’

‘I had better not. The fewer people who know, the better.’

‘We have never kept secrets from one another. I’ve said so. Anyway, I was always better at keeping them than you were.’

‘Because you’re an introvert and I’m an extrovert, that’s why. Introverts are always secretive. You shouldn’t be proud of the fact.’

‘Be that as it may, you know you can trust me.’