The Mummy (Ramses the Damned 1)

"Well, when are you going home? You're staying for the opera, aren't you? Seems everybody in this place talks of nothing else. It's very funny, you know, to come all the way to Egypt to see an opera."

"But it's Aida, my dear."

"I know, I know...."

"And yes, we are going, as a matter of fact, it's all been arranged. And you'll be there, of course. Ah, what about the ball afterwards?"

What an adorable smile. "Well, I didn't know about the ball, you see. I didn't really want to go with Mummy and Daddy and--"

"Well, perhaps you'd go with me."

Oh, what lovely white teeth.

"Why, Lord Rutherford, I'd simply love it."

"Please call me Alex, Miss Barrington. Lord Rutherford's my father."

"But you're a Viscount yourself," she said with stunning American frankness and the same ingratiating smile. "That's what they told me."

"Yes, I guess that's true. Viscount Summerfield, actually ..."

"What is a Viscount?" she asked.

Such lovely eyes, and the way she laughed as she looked at him. Suddenly he was no longer angry with Henry for being holed up with that dancer, Malenka. Better that Henry should be altogether out of sight with his drinking and gambling, rather than hanging about the public rooms of the hotel.

Oh, what would Julie think of Miss Barrington? Well, he knew what he thought!

High noon. The dining room. Ramses sat back laughing.

"Now, I insist you do it. Pick up the fork and the knife," Julie said. "Just try."

"Julie, it's not that I can't do it! It's that it seems absolutely barbaric to thrust food in one's mouth with pieces of silver!"

"Your trouble is, you know how perfectly handsome you are, and how you charm everyone."

"I learned a little tact over the centuries." He picked up the fork, deliberately gripping the handle in his fist.

"Stop that," she said under her breath.

He laughed. He laid down the fork, and took a morsel of chicken with his fingers again. She grabbed his hand.

"Ramses, eat properly."

"Darling dear," he said, "I'm eating in the manner of Adam and Eve, Osiris and Isis, Moses, Aristotle and Alexander."

She dissolved with laughter. He stole a kiss from her quickly. Then his face darkened.

"What about your cousin?" he whispered.

It caught her completely off guard. "Must we speak of him?"

"Are we to leave him here in Cairo? Are we to leave the murder of your father unavenged?"

Tears sprang to her eyes. Angrily, she searched in her bag for her handkerchief. She had not seen Henry since their return, and she didn't want to see him. In her letter to Randolph she had not mentioned him. And it was the thought of her uncle as much as anything else that made her cry now.

"Pass the burden to me," Ramses whispered. "I shall bear it easily. Let justice be done."

She put her hand up suddenly to his lips.