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"Ye gods, it's true. He's alive!" Her gasp echoing off the walls. The sun flooding down upon him.
"Ramses, rise!" she cried. "A Queen of Egypt calls you."
He'd felt the tingling in his limbs; felt the suddenly zinging sensation in his hair and skin. Half in sleep still he'd sat up and seen the young woman standing there, rippling black hair loose over her shoulders. And the old priest, shivering, jabbering under his breath, hands clasped as if in prayer, bowing from the waist.
"Ramses the Great," she had said. "A Queen of Egypt needs your counsel."
Soft dusty rays falling down from the twentieth-century world outside. The roar of motor cars on the boulevards of the modern city of Alexandria.
"Ramses!"
He turned. Julie Stratford was looking up at him.
"My beautiful one," he whispered. He took her in his arms, tenderly. Not passion, but love. Yes, love. "My beautiful Julie," he whispered.
In the lobby they took high tea. The whole ritual made him laugh. To eat scones, eggs, cucumber sandwiches, and not call this a meal. But why should he complain? He could eat three times what everyone else was eating and still be hungry for dinner.
He cherished this time alone with her. That Alex and Samir and Elliott were not about.
He sat staring at the parade of plumed hats, frilly umbrellas. And the big shiny open motor cars, chugging up to the side entrance, right along with the open leather carriages.
These were no longer the people of his time. The racial mix was different. She'd said he would see it was the same with the Greeks when they went there. Oh, so many places to go. Was he feeling relief?
"You've been so patient with me," he said, smiling. "You don't ask me to explain anything."
Ah, but she looked radiant; her dress was a pale flowered silk; lace at the wrists and those tiny pearl buttons he was growing to love. Thank God she had not worn an open gown since that first night at sea. The sight of all that flesh drove him mad completely.
"You'll tell me when you want to tell me," she said. "What I can't bear is to see you suffering."
"It's all as you said," he murmured. He drank down the tea, a beverage he didn't much like. It seemed to be half of something. "All gone without a trace. The mausoleum, the library, the lighthouse. All that Alexander built; and Cleopatra built. Tell me, why are the pyramids still standing at Giza? Why is my temple still standing at Luxor?"
"Do you want to see them?" She reached across the little table and took his hand. "Are you ready to leave here now?"
"Yes, it's time to go on, isn't it? And then when we've seen it all, we can leave this land. You and I.... That is, if you want to remain with me."
Such lovely brown eyes with their deep fringe of brown lashes; and the pure sweetness of her mouth as she smiled. And wouldn't you know? The Earl had just come out of the lift, along with his charming nincompoop of a son, and Samir.
"I'll go with you to the ends of the earth," she whispered.
He held her gaze for a long moment. Did she know what she was saying? No. The question was, did he know what she was saying? That she loved him, yes. But the other, the other great question had never been asked, had it?
They had been heading up the Nile for the better part of the afternoon, the sun beating down with full force upon the striped awnings of the small, elegant steamer. The combination of Julie's purse and Elliott's gift for command had provided them with every luxury. The staterooms of the small boat were as fine as those of the P&O liner which had brought them across the sea. The saloon and dining room were more than comfortable. The cook was a European; the servants, with the exception, of course, of Walter and Rita, were Egyptian.
But the greatest luxury of all was that it was their craft. They shared it with no one else. And they had become, much to Julie's surprise, an extremely congenial group of travelers. Now that Henry was gone, that is. And for that she couldn't have been more grateful.
He'd fled like a coward as soon as they landed in Alexandria. And what a preposterous story, that he would prepare things for them in Cairo. Shepheard's Hotel would prepare things for them in Cairo. They had cabled before they ever started the journey south towards Abu Simbel. They did not know how long their cruise would be; but Shepheard's, the old standby of the British abroad, would be waiting.
Opera season was about to begin, they'd been advised. Should the concierge arrange for box seats for all of them? Julie had said yes, though she could not imagine how this trip would end.
She knew only that Ramses was in fine spirits; that he loved being on the Nile. That he had stared for hours from the deck at the palm trees and the golden desert on either side of the broad, gleaming strip of brown water.
No one had to tell Julie that these were the same airy, fanlike palms painted upon the walls of ancient Egyptian tombs. Or that the dark-faced farmers were drawing water from the river by the very same crude means they had used four thousand years ago. No one had to tell her that the many native boats which passed them were little changed since the time of Ramses the Great.
And the wind and the sun changed for no one.
But there was something she had to do, and it could wait no longer. She sat contentedly in the saloon, idly watching Samir and Elliott play chess. And then when Alex rose from his game of solitaire and went out on the deck alone, she followed him.
It was almost evening; the breeze was cool for the first time, and the sky was slowly turning a deep shade of blue which was almost violet.
