Anne Rice: The Mummy or Ramses the Damned

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He knew it was no good as soon as he had reached the box. They were gone. At least three exits opened on iron stairways down the side of the building. And people were using all of them. He rushed along the mezzanine, scanning those who descended the grand stairway. Not a chance of finding them now. He was at the front doors when Elliott, Samir and Julie came down the stairs. Julie looked like the ghost of herself, clinging to Samir. Elliott was clearly drawing upon the very last of his stamina, and his face had turned a deathly white.

"It's no use," Ramses explained. "They are lost again." "Our only chance then is the ball," Elliott said. "It's a game, don't you see! Alex doesn't understand what's happening. He said he would meet us here, or at the ball."

9

THEY HAD followed the flow of the guests, streaming out of the Opera House, and walking across the broad square towards the hotel.

There was no doubt in her mind that Ramses was following them. Undoubtedly Lord Rutherford would come in the hope of rescuing his son.

She made no decision as to what she should do. The meeting was inevitable. Words must be spoken; and beyond that? She saw only freedom, but she did not know where she must go or what she must do to be free.

Killing the other, that was not the answer. A great revulsion rose in her against all the lives she'd thoughtlessly taken-even the life of the man who had fired the gun at her, whoever he had been.

Solving the riddle of why Ramses had resurrected her; of how precisely he'd done it-that must be part of what she had to do. But maybe she should run from that and run from him.

She glanced at the motor cars nosing their way up the circular drive before the entrance of Shepheard's. Why couldn't they run away, she and Alex, right now? There was time enough, wasn't there, for her to seek her old teacher, this man who had dominated all of her mortal life, and had now re-created her for reasons she couldn't understand?

And for one second a dreadful foreboding shook her. She clasped Alex's hand all the more tightly. There came his reassuring smile again. She said nothing. Her mind was confusion as they entered the bright hotel lobby and followed the crowds up another grand stairway.

The ballroom opened before them on the second floor, a vast space far larger than the ballroom she had seen last night below. Linen-draped tables lined the walls on either side; and the room itself seemed to go on forever, music surging from an orchestra now hidden by the milling crowd.

Gold draperies hung from the high-paneled ceiling. How these people loved plaster ornament; doors and windows were covered with it, as if with carefully sculpted whipped cream. Couples had already begun to dance to the music. Light appeared to drip from the great tinkling glass fixtures. Young servants moved about offering white wine in exquisite glasses from silver trays.

"How are we going to find them?" Alex said. "Oh, I'm so eager for them to meet you.''

"Are you?" she whispered. "And if they fail to approve your choice, Lord Alex, what will you do?"

"What a strange thing to say," he said with characteristic innocence. "They can't fail. And it doesn't matter finally whether or not they do.''

"I love you, Lord Alex. I didn't think that I would when I first saw you. I thought you were pretty and young and that it would be lovely to have you in my arms. But I love you."

"I know perfectly what you are saying," he whispered, with a strange look in his eyes. "Does that surprise you?" It seemed he wanted desperately to say something else to her but could not find the words. That sadness came; the little shadow of sadness she'd seen in him from the beginning, and for the first time she realized it was something in her which aroused it; it was a response to something he saw in her face.

Someone called his name. His father calling. She knew the voice before she turned to see for herself. "Remember, I love you, Alex," she said again. She had the strangest feeling that she was saying farewell. Too innocent, those were the only words that came clear to her.

Turning, she saw them all moving towards her from the open doors.

"Father, and Ramsey! Ramsey, old man," Alex said, "I'm so glad to see you."

In a dream she watched them, Alex pumping Ramses' hand and Ramses staring at her.

"My darling." Alex's voice sought to reach her. "Let me present my father, and my dearest friends. Why, Your Highness-" He broke off suddenly. And in a low whisper he confided, "I don't even know your real name."

"Yes, you do, my beloved," she said. "I told you when first we met. It's Cleopatra. Your father knows me and so does your good friend Ramsey, as you call him. And I have met your friend Julie Stratford as well."

She fixed her gaze on Lord Rutherford; the music and the noise of the crowd was a roar in her ears.

"Allow me to thank you, Lord Rutherford, for your recent kindness to me. What would I have done without you? And I was so unkind in return.''

The feeling of foreboding grew stronger. She was doomed if she remained in this room. Yet she stood there, her hand trembling as she held on to Alex, who looked from her to his father in complete confusion. "Why, I don't understand; you mean you've met?"

Ramses stepped forward suddenly. He took her arm roughly, and pulled her away from Alex.

"I must speak to you," he said, glaring down at her, "now, alone."

"Ramsey, what in the world are you doing?"

Others had turned to stare at them.

"Alex, stay here!" said his father.

Ramses pulled her farther away. She turned her ankle in the high shoes. "Let me go!" she whispered.

In a blur, she saw pale Julie Stratford turning desperately to the dark-faced Egyptian, and old Lord Rutherford physically restraining his son.

In a rage, she drew back from Ramses, startling him, freeing herself at once. Gasps from all these strange modern people, who looked as they pretended not to look. A hush had fallen around them, though the music roared over it.

"We will speak when I say, my beloved teacher! You interfere just now with my pleasures, just as you always did in the past."

Alex rushed to her side. She slipped her arm around him as once again Ramses advanced on her.

"What in God's name is the matter with you, Ramsey!" Alex protested.

"I tell you now, we are to speak, you and I, alone," Ramses said to her, ignoring her lover.

Her anger went before her words and her words went before her thoughts.

"You think you can force me to do your will! I'll pay you out for what you've done to me! I'll pay you in kind!"

He grabbed her, swinging her away from Alex, whose father moved in again to take his arm. She glanced back to see Alex vanishing as the crowds closed in front of him, Ramses forcing her deeper into the dancers, refusing to let her go, though she struggled, his right hand clutching her left wrist, his left hand locked on her waist.

All about them couples whirled to the deafening music and its deep throbbing rhythmic beat. He forced her into the dance as he towered over her, lifting her off her feet as he turned her about.

"Let go of me!" she hissed. "You think I'm the same mad creature you left in that hovel in old Cairo. You think I am your slave!"

"No, no, I can see you are different," dropping into the old Latin. "But who are you, really?"

"Your magic has restored my mind, my memory. All that I suffered-it is there, and I hate you now more truly than I did before."

How stunned he was; how he suffered. Was she supposed to pity him?

"You have always been magnificent at suffering!" She spat the words at him. "And in your judgments! But I am not your slave or your property. What you have brought back to life would be free to live."