Opening the front door, I stumbled and fell, banging my knee upon the edge of a trunk. I groaned and looked around in bewilderment. Piles of luggage were strewn all over the hall, battered portmanteaux with rusty hinges and the labels of exotic destinations from Morocco to New York, leather handbags and carpet bags and bashed-about dressing cases and goodness knows what else. A foreign wind was blowing through our home. Our hallway looked less like an ordinary Oxford residence than some dusty way station in the African savannah.
“At once, Theo! I want it done yesterday!” my aunt’s voice boomed and she swept into the hall, my father tagging behind her. Her frilly frock was gone, instead she was dressed in traveling clothes: serviceable tweed skirt and jacket, along with stout boots. Father was talking in so low a voice. I couldn’t make out what he was saying, but from the nervous expression on his face, the gist was clear. He was pleading with Aunt Hilda. Begging her not to do something. But from the expression on my aunt’s pug face she wasn’t having any of it.
“Here’s Kit and her pack of hangers-on,” Aunt Hilda said, spotting us. “Well, my dear, I’m off. Going to take the train down to Portsmouth and away to India, on the boat tomorrow morning.”
“Pardon?” I stared at her. India again! It was becoming positively uncanny how strong the signs were pointing east.
“Are you a nitwit, girl? Can you not understand plain speaking?”
“But you haven’t got the provisions for your expedition. You haven’t even got a ticket!”
“Such trifles have never bothered Hilda Salter.”
“But, Aunt. How are you going to—”
“If you think I’m going to let Champlon steal all my best ideas and then rush to India before me, think again,” she interrupted. “The rotter was stringing me along, Kit. Playing me like a blooming pianoforte. All that flattery, saying mauve really brought out my complexion,” she stopped abruptly, her hurt plainly showing on her face.
“It does,” I lied, gently.
“What?”
“Mauve does suit you.”
“Piffle. The man was using me. And I, Hilda Salter, Pride of the Zambezi, the only woman to ever conquer the Northwestern Frontier, fell for it.”
I put my hand on Aunt Hilda’s arm and gently drew her into the living room. Unhelpfully, father followed us. Though she was chuntering away in the familiar Hilda Salter style, underneath she was unusually unsure. I could feel it in the way she let me guide her. I propelled her to a comfortable armchair and almost pushed her down into it. She needed to hear what I had to say.
“I’ve something to tell you, Aunt Hilda, something about Monsieur Champlon.”
“Get to the point, girl.”
“I’ve got to ask you something first. What makes you think Champlon has gone to India?”
“He was seen. At the station with some Indian thug he has hired. He directed all the luggage to be sent to Portsmouth, for the Himalaya. It’s a P & O steamer sailing for Bombay tomorrow.”
It was my turn to stare: “It can’t be true!”
“He gave the order himself. My groom happened to be at the station and saw him. Directed the porters to handle the trunks and supervise them on to the Himalaya. I know all about her. A fine steamer with the latest twin-cylinder engine. As sleek a boat as any in the Empire, blast it!”
“Language, Hilda,” my father tutted, while I reeled at her words.
All my certainties were collapsing around me. I’d been so sure Champlon was being blackmailed—or had been kidnapped by the strange Indian. But here was the Frenchman, by all accounts, ordering the luggage to be taken to India. It very much looked like he was in command of the whole operation and the man in the turban and the monkey, his minions. It didn’t make sense. Why would Champlon desert my aunt? What did he have to gain by this strange behavior?
I told my aunt my news, the strange story of the monkey and the stolen piece of the ankh. She gasped at the sight of the ankh fragment.
“I’ve seen that somewhere before,” she mused, gazing at the ancient metal.
“We think it was stolen from Amelia Edwards … you know, the famous explorer.”
“Poppycock.” My aunt’s face set at the mention of her rival. “That woman’s no explorer. Tourist is a more accurate description.”
With that she turned her back on me and rang for the maid. With much muttering about how Champlon was clearly a thief as well as “a bolter!,” she ordered the girl to fetch the police. Sometimes I cannot follow my aunt’s thinking. How could she blame Champlon for the theft of Miss Edward’s treasure? The ankh fragment had been found on the barge, not in his rooms. But then again, it did look as though he’d bolted. Perhaps he had been using my aunt, discovering all her secrets, milking all her wealthy patrons and then leaving her slap-bang in the lurch. Perhaps he really was a member of a gang that stole antiquities. If so—and I really wasn’t sure either way—what a villain the man was!
But I had made up my mind about something. “I’m coming to India with you, Aunt Hilda,” I announced.
For the first time a smile crossed my aunt’s face. “Very well,” she said. “S’pose you might be some help.”
I held out my hand to hers and we shook on it. In the background I heard spluttering. It was Father: his face red, his woolly hair in agitated disarray. He appeared to be dancing from foot to foot.
“Absolutely not, Kit,” he squealed. “The dangers: cholera, typhoid, the heat, bandits.”
“I’m going, Father.”
“No. I must insist on this. There’s is no way you are going to India. You will stay here and continue your studies with Miss Minchin.”
“Papa, do not be under any illusions. I’m going to India.”
“India is no place for a young lady.” My father halted and looked at me His eyes were pleading, soft with emotion. “Dear Kit, please understand. You are the most precious thing in the world to me.”
Embarrassed, I tried to make a joke of it: “More precious than your library?”
“What?”
“Your books,” I explained “Do you really love me more than your books.”
“Yes, certainly.”
I laid a hand on his arm: “Listen to me, Father. I am not being stubborn. I love adventures.”
“You know I never insist on anything,” he pleaded. “This time I must. No father would let their child sail into danger.”
“Papa.”
“Do not attempt to tug my heartstrings, Kit,” he muttered as the bell rang and we heard the tramp of boots in the hall. The police had arrived to collect the stolen piece of ankh.
“Hilda will sail alone. You are most definitely staying behind.”