Chapter Thirty-Six

London, March 1973

During his constitutional around Regent’s Park, Brograve worried about Eve. She had become obsessed with finding that wretched gold box she brought back from the tomb. It clearly wasn’t in the flat but still she insisted on pulling down every last box from every last cupboard, and moving ornaments from surface to surface as if that might make it magically appear. He had overheard her muttering to herself and realized she thought it had some kind of supernatural power, although she would never say as much to him. She knew his views on the matter.

Back in 1923, he had been astonished at her decision to consult a clairvoyant after Pups died. She was normally a rational woman, and he had thought they saw eye to eye on the absurd notion of “spirits getting in touch,” but it seemed that she had been desperate for any crumbs of comfort.

Of course, contacting spirits was all the rage in the 1920s, with lots of folk providing Ouija boards and Tarot readings as entertainments at parties. Spiritualists had been around long before the war, but they became more respectable after authority figures who should have known better—like Sir Arthur Conan Doyle—gave them credibility. Stories appeared in the papers about some mystical “angels” said to have protected British troops in the Battle of Mons, and clairvoyants sprang up on every street corner pandering to those who had lost husbands and sons in the trenches. Poppycock, all of it!

Growing up with a father who held séances at Highclere must have affected Eve’s thinking somewhat. She had disparaged them as over-the-top theatrical performances, but it was as if the notion of spiritualism had crept into the corners of her mind, the way a religious upbringing still colors the thoughts of those who claim to be atheist as adults. If asked directly, Eve would say that of course she didn’t believe spirits could communicate with us, and of course she didn’t believe there was a curse on Tutankhamun’s tomb, but at gut level she was suggestible.

That’s why he was worried when she became obsessed with finding the gold container from the tomb. It wouldn’t help her recovery. He wished he could think of something to distract her—and then an idea occurred to him.

Over lunch, he made his suggestion. “Did you realize that in April it will be fifty years since Pups died? Fifty whole years! I thought it might be nice if we go to Highclere for a visit around the anniversary, so you can spend time with Porchy, and walk around all the places you and your father used to love. It’s a fitting way to remember him.”

A smile lit up her face and her eyes sparkled. “I would adore that!” she said. She reached over to kiss him.

“I’ll telephone and arrange it,” he promised, pleased to have cheered her up. His primary goal in life was to make her happy.

* * *

Every marriage has its secrets, Eve supposed. Some men had mistresses and she guessed there were women who had lovers too, although she didn’t know any. She and Brograve had no secrets on that scale, but there were a few things she didn’t share with him: the cost of a new dress, sometimes, or the confidences of friends. She hadn’t told him about telephoning Ana Mansour because he seemed to have taken against the woman, whereas Eve felt sorry she hadn’t been able to help her. She was curious too; Ana was a lady archaeologist, just as Eve had always longed to be, and she wondered what it was like.

She telephoned her again, a couple of weeks later, and Ana came to the phone more quickly this time, almost as if expecting the call.

“I hope you’re not lonely in London?” Eve asked. “I think you said you have friends here?”

“I know a few people,” Ana replied. “Thank you for asking. It’s kind of you to take an interest.”

Her Egyptian accent was almost undetectable, Eve thought. Occasionally a vowel sounded vaguely foreign, but she never stumbled on a word or failed to understand anything that was said. “Your English is perfect. Did you learn it at school?”

“I had an English mother,” Ana replied. “She only ever spoke English to me so I became fluent quite young. It’s been useful over the years because many digs are multicultural and English is the common language.”

“Does your mother live in England now?” Eve loved hearing other people’s life stories, and Ana’s sounded exotic, crisscrossing two continents and two cultures.

“She died when I was fifteen.” Ana gave a sad laugh. “A long time ago.”

“Fifteen! I lost my father at twenty-one and thought I should never recover from the grief. It must have been so much harder at fifteen. . . .” Eve remembered feeling as if the bedrock on which her life was built had shifted and she was sliding off the edge and being swallowed up by an abyss. And then Brograve caught her, thank goodness.

“It was a time of great challenges . . .” Ana said. Speaking slowly, she explained that her father had immersed himself in religion after his wife’s death. Ana had grown up with religious freedom till then but suddenly he wanted her to take Quranic lessons from an imam, and wear a veil. “Needless to say, I rebelled. We argued for the next three years, but I managed to persuade him to let me study at university. I had always wanted to be an archaeologist, and he had encouraged me, so he could hardly refuse.”

“Me too!” Eve said. “It was my dearest wish to be a lady archaeologist when I was younger.” A memory came back to her of finding an old coin while digging in the grounds at Highclere. She’d pretended to anyone who would listen that it was the most significant find ever known to mankind, even after Porchy scornfully told her it was just a Victorian farthing. She must have been very young.

“So why didn’t you?” Ana asked. “You clearly enjoyed the time you spent in the Valley. Why weren’t you involved while Howard Carter was dismantling the tomb?”

Eve swallowed. “I couldn’t face going back there after Pups died. Egypt would always have reminded me of him dying.”

It wasn’t just that, she thought. She had loved Egypt so passionately—the baking heat, the vibrant colors, the culture, the sheer foreignness—then that love had turned to horror almost overnight. Suddenly she associated it with danger: the crocodiles floating in the Nile, looking like logs of wood; the cobras that hid in trees, camouflaged against the bark; the whining mosquitoes and strange flying insects that transmitted disease and infection; and the militant nationalists shooting people in the street.

“When I married Brograve, I decided to start a new chapter, being a wife and mother instead of a lady archaeologist.”

“That’s a shame,” Ana said. “There are so few women in our profession, even now. You could have been a trailblazer.”

“I would have loved Patricia to take up archaeology, but she had different interests. You can’t force it, can you? They either take to something or they don’t. Do you have a daughter who could follow in your footsteps one day?”

There was a long pause and Eve thought Ana’s voice sounded shaky when she replied. “I don’t think my daughter, Layla, is interested in archaeology.”

There was something odd about the way she said it. Why didn’t she know her own daughter’s interests? Was it because they’d been separated for so long? “What age is she?” Eve asked. “Maybe she will grow into it.”

“Layla is eleven and my son, Masud, is eight.”

“You’re lucky to have two,” Eve said. “I would have loved a son. You must miss them terribly.”

“Do you think she knows?” said a voice that was neither Ana’s nor Eve’s. It was a crossed line. They often got crossed lines in that apartment block. It unsettled Eve to think that their neighbors might be listening in anytime she was on the phone.

“Hello?” she called into the ether. “If you can hear me, please hang up.” There was no reply and the muffled conversation continued, barely audible. “How annoying! I suppose we’d better say goodbye,” she said to Ana. “But I’ll call you again soon.”

“Before you go, did you remember where the gold unguent container is?” Ana asked.

Her tone sounded as if she knew that Eve had it, and Eve tried to remember if she had admitted that. She didn’t think she had.

“I honestly don’t know,” Eve replied, frustrated with herself. “The truth is that I can’t remember.”

“It was taken out of the tomb, wasn’t it?” Ana persevered. “When did you see it last?”

“If I knew that, I’d know where it was.” It upset her that she couldn’t find it. It was starting to scare her.

Sionead glanced out into the hall and gave her a concerned look. “You OK?” she whispered.

“I’m fine,” Eve said, but she had that funny headache again, like a finger pressing the back of her skull. “Perhaps you could fetch me a paracetamol? Sorry, Ana, I have to go. Goodbye.”

She placed the receiver on the hall table and rested her head in her hands, completely forgetting that Ana was still on the line. It was only half an hour later, when Brograve got home, that he noticed the whining noise and put it back on the hook.

* * *

Sionead’s contract had been for three months and the time was drawing to a close. During Eve’s afternoon nap, she asked Brograve whether he was ready to manage without her. There was another job her agency could put her forward for, now that Eve didn’t need help with personal care. A plumber had come to replace the bath with a walk-in shower so she didn’t need help washing herself anymore. She hadn’t had a choking incident since before Christmas, and the TIA in January had been very mild, so Sionead’s role lay largely in dispensing pills and checking blood pressure.

“You don’t need me,” she said. “Not really.”

Brograve felt tightness in his chest. What if something happened that he couldn’t cope with?

Sionead sensed his uneasiness. “Before I go, I could teach you some techniques to use if the need arises. We can practice together. I’m not going to leave you in the lurch. It’s just that there are other households where I could be of more use.”

“What kind of techniques?” His voice was hoarse, so he cleared his throat.

“You already know what to do in the event of choking,” she said. “I could show you what to do if Eve has a funny turn. Explain when you might need an ambulance, and when you just need a doctor.”

“I’ll talk to Eve about it,” he said, but he already knew her views: she didn’t think she needed Sionead and felt he shouldn’t be wasting all that money. It was expensive. “But I’d be grateful if you could explain the techniques.”

She began with the worst-case scenario—what to do if he found Eve unconscious and not breathing. She demonstrated how to attempt resuscitation while waiting for an ambulance, and he practiced on a long cylindrical sofa cushion. A tear slid from the corner of his eye as he imagined having to do this in real life, and he turned his head so Sionead wouldn’t see.

Next she showed him the recovery position, to be used if Eve was unconscious but still breathing. And finally she explained some tests to perform if Eve was conscious but seemed muddled, or had slurred speech or a drooping face. Brograve was so choked up he could barely speak.

“I could write everything down for you,” Sionead offered, “and leave the list by the phone.”

He nodded and mumbled, “Yes, please do that.”

“You’ve saved her life before,” she told him. “The last stroke would have been much worse if you hadn’t gotten her to hospital so quickly.”

He knew time was of the essence. He hadn’t told Eve in so many words, but that was why they had to leave Framfield. After an incident in 1971, it took over an hour for the ambulance to find them, then another hour to reach St. George’s. That time it was just a TIA, but if it had been a stroke, the damage didn’t bear thinking about.

As soon as Sionead left the room more tears came to his eyes. What if he were the only person there when Eve collapsed and his actions made all the difference between her living or dying, but he failed her? How would he live with himself? It would be like the guilt he’d felt about his friend Oliver, but multiplied many times over.

All elderly couples must live with this fear, he rationalized. Sionead had given him some control over the situation. He would keep the list handy, and if the time came, he would do the very best he could.