Elizabeth Peters: The Golden One

Emerson shuddered. “Good Gad, yes. But – but she didn’t mean it, did she?”

“She meant it.”

It is a nice healthy stroll from Shepheard’s to the Khan el Khalili, along the Muski and through the old Fatimite city with its mosques and gateways. Yet how the character of the city had changed! Motorcars and motorbicycles wove hazardous paths among horse-drawn cabs and donkey-drawn carts and caravans of camels. Uniforms were everywhere, the men who wore them as diverse as their insignia: tall rangy Australians and bearded Sikhs, dark-skinned Nubians and pink-cheeked boys fresh from the English countryside.

It was a depressing sight. These men, now so bright-eyed and cheerful, were destined for the battlefields of Palestine and Europe, from which most would never return.

The Khan el Khalili at least had not changed – the same narrow lanes, covered with matting and lined with small shops selling every variety of goods from silks to carpets to silver. Peddlers and sellers of sweetmeats wended their way through the crowds; a waiter, carrying aloft a tray with small cups of Turkish coffee, hastened to the shopkeeper who had ordered it.

Not far from the mosque of the venerated Saint Hosein is the area given over to the stalls of the booksellers, and it was here I hoped to rid myself of the amiable but inconvenient presence of my spouse. Somewhat to my surprise he did not put up much of an argument.

“You are calling on Aslimi, I suppose,” he said.

“And perhaps a few others.”

“Very well.” Emerson took out his watch. “I will give you three hours, Peabody. If you aren’t back by then, I will come looking for you.”

“Anything but that!” I exclaimed jestingly.

Emerson grinned. “Quite. Enjoy yourself, my love, and don’t buy any fakes.”

Aslimi did deal in fake antiquities, as had his father, who had met a very ugly death in his own shop some years before. At first I did not recognize him. He had gained an enormous amount of weight and was almost as fat as his father had been. Seated on the mastaba bench outside his shop, he was importuning passersby in the traditional fashion and in a mixture of languages: “Oh, Howadji, I have beautiful antiquities! Monsieur et madame, écoutez-vous!” and so on. When he saw me he broke off with a gurgle and began wriggling, trying to stand.

“Good morning, Aslimi,” I said. “Stay where you are.”

Aslimi swallowed. “The Father of Curses -”

“Is not with me.”

“Ah.” Aslimi put his hands on the approximate region of his waist and sighed heavily. “He gives me pains in the stomach, Sitt Hakim.”

“It is as God wills,” I said piously. Aslimi shot me a look that indicated he was more inclined to put the blame on Emerson than on Allah, but he rallied enough to go through the prescribed gestures of hospitality, offering me coffee or tea and a seat on the mastaba. Then we got down to business.

I left the shop an hour and a half later, with several parcels. Bargaining takes quite a long time, and the subtle interrogation at which I excel takes even longer. Since I had time to spare, I stopped at a few more stalls, learning little more than I had from Aslimi, but purchasing a number of items that would be needed in our new home: a set of handsome copper cooking vessels, thirty yards of blue-and-silver Damascus silk, and two elegant carpets, all of which I directed to be sent to the hotel.

I found Emerson surrounded by loosely bound volumes and piles of manuscripts and several of the more learned booksellers, with whom he was engaged in heated argument. I had begun to suspect that they enjoyed egging him on, for his views on religion – all varieties of religion – were unorthodox and eloquently expressed. The discussion ended when I appeared, and after an exchange of compliments all round, I led Emerson away.

“Why do you do that?” I scolded. “It is very rude to criticize another individual’s religious beliefs, and there is not the slightest possibility that you will convert them.”

“Who wants to convert them?” Emerson demanded in surprise. “Islam is as good a religion as any other. I don’t approve of Christianity or Judaism or Buddhism either.”

“I am well aware of that, Emerson. I don’t suppose you learned anything of interest?”

“It was very interesting. I raised several unanswerable points…” He noticed my parcels and took them from me. “What have you got there?”

“Don’t unwrap them here,” I cautioned, for Emerson was, in his impetuous fashion, tugging at the strings. “While you were wasting your time debating theology, I went about the business for which we came to the Khan. Aslimi showed me some remarkable things, Emerson. He told me he had never known the supply of merchandise to be so great. He is getting objects from all over Egypt, including Luxor.”

“What the devil!” Emerson came to a dead stop in the middle of the road. He began to unwrap the largest parcel, ignoring the camel advancing ponderously toward him. The driver, recognizing Emerson, managed to stop the recalcitrant animal before it ran into my equally recalcitrant spouse. He turned an outraged glare on the camel, which responded with its usual look of utter disgust. I stifled my laughter, for Emerson would not have found anything amusing about his attempt to stare down a camel.

Somehow the driver got the beast past Emerson, who had not stirred an inch. I took the parcel from him.

“It is not like you to be so careless, Emerson,” I said severely. “Careless with antiquities, I mean. Come out of the middle of the road and let me undo the wrappings enough to give you a peep.”

Care was necessary, since there were two objects in the wrappings, both of them breakable – or at least, chippable. The one I showed Emerson was an alabaster disk with a thin band of gold around the rim.

“No hieroglyphs,” he muttered. “Beautiful piece of work, though. It’s the lid of a pot or jar.”

“A very expensive pot,” I amended. “I have the pot as well – an exquisitely shaped alabaster container, most probably for cosmetics. Now shall we go back to the hotel where we can examine it in private?”

“Hmmm, yes, certainly.” Emerson watched me rewrap the lid. “I beg your pardon, my dear. You were quite right to scold me. What else have you got?”

“Nothing so exciting as the cosmetic jar,” I said, “but I believe they are all from the same tomb – the one Cyrus told us about.”

“So Mohassib didn’t get everything.” Emerson strode along beside me, his hands in his pockets. “How did Aslimi come by these?”

“Not from Sethos.”

“You asked him point-blank, I suppose,” Emerson grumbled. “Aslimi is a congenital liar, Peabody. How do you know he was telling you the truth?”

“He turned pea-green at the very mention of ‘the Master.’ It would have been rather amusing if he had not been in such a state of abject terror; he kept wringing his hands and saying, ‘But he is dead. He is dead, surely. Tell me he is really dead this time, Sitt!’ ”

“Hmmm,” said Emerson.

“Now don’t get any ideas about pretending you are ‘the Master,’ Emerson.”

“I don’t see why I shouldn’t,” said Emerson sulkily. “You are always telling me I cannot disguise myself effectively. It is cursed insulting. So – from whom did Aslimi acquire these objects?”

“He claimed the man was someone he’d never seen before.”

“I trust you extracted a description?”

“Certainly. Tall, heavyset, black beard and mustache.”

“That’s no help. Even if it was true.”

“Aslimi would not lie to me. Emerson, please don’t walk so fast.”

“Ha,” said Emerson. But he slowed his steps and gave me his arm. We had emerged onto the Muski, with its roaring traffic and European shops. “We’ll just have time to tidy up before luncheon,” he added. “Do you suppose the children are back?”