The Curse of the Pharaohs Read Free

dug them up. I believe many children enjoy digging in the mud, but Ramses' preoccupation with holes in the ground became absolutely ridiculous. It was all Emerson's fault. Mistaking a love of dirt for a budding talent for excavation, he encouraged the child.
    Emerson never admitted that he missed the old life. He had made a successful career lecturing and writing; but now and then I would detect a wistful note in his voice as he read from the Times or the Illustrated London News about new discoveries in the Middle East. To such had we fallen— reading the ILN over tea, and bickering about trivia with county neighbors—we, who had camped in a cave in the Egyptian hills and restored the capital city of a pharaoh!
    On that fateful afternoon—whose significance I was not to appreciate until much later—I prepared myself for the sacrifice. I wore my best gray silk. It was a gown Emerson detested because he said it made me look like a respectable English matron—one of the worst insults in his vocabulary. I decided that if Emerson disapproved, Lady Harold would probably consider the gown suitable. I even allowed Smythe, my maid, to arrange my hair. The ridiculous woman was always trying to fuss over my personal appearance. I seldom allowed her to do more man was absolutely necessary, having neither the time nor the patience for prolonged primping. On this occasion Smythe took full advantage. If I had not had a newspaper to read while she pulled and tugged at my hair and ran pins into my head, I would have screamed with boredom.
    Finally she said sharply, "With all respect, madam, I cannot do this properly while you are waving that paper about. Will it please you to put it down?"
    It did not please me. But time was getting on, and the newspaper story I had been reading—of which more in due course—only made me more discontented with the prospect before me. I therefore abandoned the Times and meekly submitted to Smythe's torture.
    When she had finished the two of us stared at my reflection in the mirror with countenances that displayed our feelings—Smythe's beaming with triumph, mine the gloomy mask of one who had learned to accept the inevitable gracefully.
    My stays were too tight and my new shoes pinched. I creaked downstairs to inspect the drawing room.
    The room was so neat and tidy it made me feel quite depressed. The newspapers and books and periodicals that normally covered most of the flat surfaces had been cleared away. Emerson's prehistoric pots had been removed from the mantel and the what-not. A gleaming silver tea service had replaced Ramses' toys on the tea cart. A bright fire on the hearth helped to dispel the gloom of the gray skies without, but it did very little for the inner gloom that filled me. I do not allow myself to repine about what cannot be helped; but I remembered earlier Decembers, under the cloudless blue skies and brilliant sun of Egypt.
    As I stood morosely contemplating the destruction of our cheerful domestic clutter, and recalling better days, I heard the sound of wheels on the gravel of the drive. The first guest had arrived. Gathering the robes of my martyrdom about me, I made ready to receive her.
    There is no point in describing the tea party. It is not a memory I enjoy recalling and, thank heaven, subsequent events made Lady Harold's attitude quite unimportant. She is not the most stupid person I have ever met; that distinction must go to her husband; but she combines malice and stupidity to a degree I had not encountered until that time.
    Remarks such as, "My dear, what a charming frock! I remember admiring that style when it first came out, two years ago," were wasted on me, for I am unmoved by insult. What did move me, to considerable vexation, was Lady Harold's assumption that my invitation to tea signified apology and capitulation. This assumption was apparent in every condescending word she said and in every expression that passed across her fat, coarse, common face.
    But I