Footprints in the Sand by Pam Lecky

Author:Pam Lecky [Lecky, Pam]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2020-03-14T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

A gateway from the museum garden brought Lucy through to the river. She sat down on a large flat-topped boulder and removed her hat with unsteady hands. Out mid-stream, a solitary ibis stood on a half-submerged branch waiting to catch its dinner. Near the bank the waterside reeds bent their heads, rustling and shaking in a light breeze, and the distant song of a bird was all that was to be heard. Glancing upstream, Lucy saw the moored dahabeeyahs, their sails tied up, waiting to carry their parties of tourists up the Nile on great adventures. The scene barely registered.

How was she to mourn Armand Moreau?

The question had echoed in her mind as she made her way down through the museum garden, almost blinded by tears. But here seemed the most appropriate place to grieve.

Moreau dead!

And in such a manner. Stunned into silence, Lucy had listened aghast as Joubert and Japp questioned the inspector, whose answers revealed grisly details she would rather not have known. The scene Vauquelin described in the Great Pyramid was nauseating, and she escaped the room to seek fresh air, refusing offers of accompaniment. At the door Lucy hesitated for one brief moment. Joubert was sitting with his head in his hands. Her instinct was to comfort him, but her own needs won out. She needed to escape; to make sense of it. And most of all, to cry.

The gruesome details brought Lucy back to the bleak day she identified Charlie in the morgue in London. At first that appeared to be an unfortunate accident, and it was only later, through Phineas’s investigations, they discovered he had been murdered. But this was different. In this case, there could be no mistake, and there was cruelty and vindictiveness behind it. The manner of Moreau’s death suggested someone hated him and wanted him to be found in a position that mocked everything his life stood for.

After the Whitmores’ departure and the breaking-up of the dinner party the previous evening, Moreau had lingered for about half an hour but refused to discuss what had happened. If only she had insisted on an explanation, but instead she had pinned her hopes on seeing Moreau the next day, when hopefully he would be more forthcoming. In anguish, Lucy sucked in a sharp breath as the realisation dawned: she would never see him again.

“Madame?”

Lucy turned and spied Vauquelin coming through the gate. She should have anticipated he would want to ask her questions. Turning away, Lucy wiped her tears and tried to gather her thoughts. But there were fireworks going off in her head, and her stomach was twisting like a Catherine wheel.

Vauquelin stopped beside her, giving her a look filled with concern. “Are you well, madame? I am sorry you had to learn of M. Moreau’s murder in such a way … but—”

“Yes, I know, Inspector, I would insist on staying. It has been a terrible shock. He did not deserve to die like that.”

The inspector walked past her to the edge of the bank and stood looking out over the water.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.