The Falcon at the Portal: An Amelia Peabody Mystery Read Online Free PDF

David knew it.
    Conquering his irritation, he took out a clean shirt and faced his friend. "Tell Mother I'll be down shortly."
David gave Ramses a long, level look before going out. It was rather like seeing one's reflection in a mirror, Ramses thought. No close observer would have mistaken one for the other, but a superficial description would have fit either—height six feet, hair and eyes black, face long, skin olive, nose prominent, build... slight?
Smiling, he slipped into his shirt and began doing up the buttons. Percy was a joke—a bad joke, a braggart and coward and sneak. No, a knife between the ribs wasn't his style, but there were other ways of damaging an enemy—methods a decent man like David could never understand. Ramses's smile faded and a little shiver ran through him, as if someone had walked over the spot that would one day be his grave.
                                                                
The rest of us were already at breakfast when Ramses entered the room. I had felt it necessary to give him a little lecture the previous night, about working too hard and not getting enough sleep, and I was pleased to observe that he had apparently taken it to heart—something I could not always count upon his doing— for the unmistakable (to a mother) signs of fatigue were not apparent. Like the Egyptians he so closely resembles, Ramses has black eyes and long thick lashes. When he is tired, drooping lids hood his orbs and dark circles underline them. He pretended not to notice my intent regard and began consuming eggs and bacon, toast and muffins.
The others had been arguing about who would go to meet our Egyptian friends, whose boat was due to dock in London that day.
    It would have been unthinkable to have the wedding without those members of David's family who were closest to him and to us. Now that dear Abdullah was gone, there were only three of them. Selim, Abdullah's youngest son, had replaced his father as our reis; Daoud, one of David's innumerable cousins, was deeply attached to Lia, and she to him; Fatima, who looked after our house in Egypt, had become a trusted friend.
    Everyone wanted to go to meet them, including Gargery. Voices were raised. Emerson's language became increasingly intemperate. Rose, our devoted housekeeper, kept buttering muffins for Ramses and urging him to stay at home and have a nice rest. Really, I thought, in mounting exasperation, there never was a household in which so many people felt free to offer their unsolicited opinions! I am bound to confess that our relationship with certain of our servants is somewhat unusual, owing in part to the criminal encounters that have so often disturbed the even tenor of domestic life. A butler who wields a cudgel as handily as he carves a roast is entitled to certain privileges, and Rose had been Ramses's loyal defender since he was three years of age, her affection unshaken by the mummified mice, the explosions of various chemicals, and the square acres of mud he had tracked through the house.
"Rose is right, Ramses," I said, nodding at her. "The weather looks unsettled, and you should not risk catching a cold."
Ramses raised his eyes from his plate. "As you like, Mother."
"Now what are you up to?" I demanded.
"I cannot imagine," said my son, "why you should suppose that my ready agreement with your thoughtful suggestion should be taken as an indication of—"
"Quite right," said Emerson, who knew that Ramses was capable of continuing the sentence until subject and verb were buried under an avalanche of subordinate clauses. "I will go in your place."
I had been afraid he would say that. Emerson's accompanying the welcoming committee was one thing; Emerson driving the motorcar, which he would insist upon doing, was quite another. The locals had become used to him, and promptly cleared off the road whenever he took the automobile out. One could not count on the