Page 8 of The Devil in Oxford
Leona’s fingers squeezed mine even tighter as she froze in place.
Reaver looked her over much as he’d inspected me in the street. “I thought I’d left you in the reading room?”
Leona stiffened, slipping her hand from mine and folding herarms across her lithe chest. “I came to find you. I… I was having trouble with a text.”
Professor Reaver’s jaw relaxed, visibly relieved by her lies. His brows drew up in confusion. “But were you not working on theSaqqarascrolls when I left you earlier? You should not need me for those.” The emphasis he placed onSaqqarastruck me as odd, but I didn’t have time to think on it, as the crowd’s roar died to a hush.
A short, round man came out onto the stage, saving Leona from fabricating yet another excuse for her presence. He dabbed at the perspiration on his brow with a freshly pressed white handkerchief. A second, younger man joined him, and the two drew back the deep green curtains, revealing a sheer inner veil obscuring the cache. The four torches flickered as the overhead gaslights were dimmed. Only the shadowy outlines of a sarcophagus, or perhaps a funerary box, along with some jars were visible through the gauzy inner curtain.
“Is that fellow Julius Harker?” I whispered.
Leona’s lips were pressed into a thin line. “No. That’s Mr. Mueller, his business partner. Mueller handles the books. This isn’t like Julius at all.” She craned her neck again, scouring the crowd. “Where can hebe?”
“Evidently hell bent on destroying what’s left of his reputation,” Reaver muttered.
Leona’s body tensed.
Mr. Mueller blotted his brow with the handkerchief and began to address the increasingly restless crowd. Leona’s concerns were echoed by the disorderly audience.
“Where is he?”
“Harker’s done it again!”
“Perhaps he’s late.”
“Harker’s never late.”
All the confused voices crashed into an angry sea of confusion and anticipation.
Reaver leaned close to Leona, whispering something into her ear. His voice low enough I couldn’t hear, though her spine straightened and a faint bit of color rose to her cheeks. His hand rested possessively on her other elbow, fingers curled around the exposed flesh there. She did not pull away—not at all fazed by his familiar gesture.
Leona eyed Mr. Mueller’s anxious form on the stage for a second too long before turning to me. “I have to go.” She turned and made her way deeper into the crowd with Reaver at her side. I was right to mistrust the fellow when we first met. I didn’t know what was happening between Leona and him, but I didn’t like it. Not one bit.
I watched after the pair, perplexed by their interplay. She had appeared almost afraid of him at first, but now? She went along with nary a word. She didn’t flinch at his touch, did not even move away from him. She simply obeyed. In the time we’d been reunited here in Oxford, she’d scarcely mentioned this man—or Julius Harker for that matter—yet it was clear as day that she was very familiar with them both.
Chalk that up to another thing we’d be discussing at the Artemis Club when we met in the morning. I blew out an irritated breath, wishing that Mr. Owen had left me to my book and biscuits for the evening.
“If I could have your attention!” Mr. Mueller cried out over the noisy crowd. He and his young assistant tugged the filmy shroud back, revealing the cache at long last. A great canopic box sat in the center. The goddess Nephthys with her kite wings spread high was carved on the side nearest to me. Her sister, Isis, was presumably depicted in a similar position on the far side. Dozens of canopic jars and small statues surrounded the box, all lit by small glass luminaries giving the subtle illusion of movement among the artifacts. A neat trick, but this was a rather disappointing cache all told.Only a handful of artifacts, and nothing particularly rare. Certainly not rare enough to warrant such fanfare.
And wherewasMr. Owen? I turned from Mr. Mueller and his accomplice, looking for a familiar tuft of white hair amongst the crowd. The low, barely lit gaslights flickered overhead as I spied two of his antiquarian friends from last night. They’d cornered some poor soul in the shadows behind a curio case full of enormous ammonites, excitedly nattering away at the fellow. Better him than me.
“Blood! There’s blood!”
A woman let out a loud shriek from my left.
I whipped my attention back to Mr. Mueller’s sturdy young assistant, now retching out the contents of his stomach onto the wooden floor below. The shouts and flickering lights slowed my thoughts. Mind unable to keep up with what I was seeing.
Blood? Blood from where?
I stepped around the tide of people scrambling to get away from the dais and edged closer. Mr. Mueller was frozen in place with the top of the funerary box clutched in his blood-stained hands. He stared in horror at whatever lay within the box.
A sickening sensation settled in my gut as I hiked my skirt to my knee, and took the big step up onto the raised platform. I gingerly maneuvered between the canopic jars and glanced down into the great stone box.
I found Julius Harker.
He hadn’t been late after all.
He’d simply been dead.
