together.
A piece goes flying as I pry it open with a nail file and bangs against the wall, breaking into pieces. In a cavity between the two sides is a key, one that has a familiar look to me.
My father had a similar key that he used to remove the big metal cover from a piece of machinery at the mill he operated in Cochran’s Mills when I was a child. When he bought a new machine, he gave the key to me because I loved the bulky, odd shape of it. I still have it, safely tucked away in my jewelry box at home.
The mill was started by my father and named for him, Elizabeth Cochran being my true name. Those who have followed my career know that when I got a job as a reporter I was forced to take the pen name of Nellie Bly to hide my identity because news reporting is considered immodest employment for a woman.
A key that belongs perhaps in a factory, around machinery, is my feeling about the one in my hand. Nothing about it strikes me as Egyptian. It’s definitely the product of an industrialized country.
My world has taken another flip. That was no dispute between locals in the marketplace, but something smacking of intrigue. But why had the key been slipped into my pocket?
The man on the bike that exposed white skin, the man whose dying words were spoken with a British accent, a man with a face I’m sure I’d passed in the corridor—it had to be Mr. Cleveland. Lord Warton taking charge of his luggage, sending it ashore … it can not be a coincidence.
A Brit named John Cleveland died in the marketplace in a dispute over a key hidden in a cheap scarab. I’d stake my life on it.
Staring at the key, I wonder if I have done exactly that.
I push the thought aside. I’m on a British ship. No one can harm me. I hope.
Still, I had no clue as to why he gave me the key. Or why the key was important to the dying man. What would it mean to Amelia? Assets he wanted his family to receive?
It all sounds very logical and reasonable except for some other unanswered questions: Why was Mr. Cleveland running around Port Said disguised as an Egyptian? Why was the key concealed in the scarab? Why was Lord Warton hiding the fact that the man was British?
Finally, of greatest significance at the moment: How could Frederick Selous believe he’d spoken to Mr. Cleveland if the man had died in my arms?
Is there an intrigue that involves the British and the religious radicals trying to drive them from Egypt? But Warton doesn’t strike me as a spy. Not that I have met any, but I do have a reasonable notion that spies are clever and devious. Warton is stuffy and arrogant, rudely so, and my impression is that he is more force-fed educated than bright and scheming.
And his insufferable wife—that mean-spirited woman doesn’t fit my romanticized notion of how a spy’s wife would act.
It seems to me Lord Warton is much more likely to have stumbled accidentally into a murderous situation at the bazaar than being involved in some intrigue. If so, why hide that the murdered man is British?
Protecting the precarious British situation in Egypt would be the obvious motive. Having served in the diplomatic corps, Lord Warton would be sensitive to the fact that Egypt is a tinderbox really to explode. His first instinct might have been to hide the fact that Mr. Cleveland was British. It might serve as fuel for the radicals in their campaign to win converts.
I slip back on my dress because none of this makes any sense if Mr. Cleveland is still alive. And there’s a man down the corridor who says he is.
* * *
F REDERICK S ELOUS ANSWERS the door only after I have knocked several times. The door is jerked open to reveal that he is a bit disheveled and not in good temper. I suspect he had already dozed off.
“I need to talk to you.”
“Miss Bly, it is—”
I make a frontal assault again, stepping in, with him making hasty steps backward. Being caught standing at a man’s door at a late hour would be scandalous.
He backs up,
A piece goes flying as I pry it open with a nail file and bangs against the wall, breaking into pieces. In a cavity between the two sides is a key, one that has a familiar look to me.
My father had a similar key that he used to remove the big metal cover from a piece of machinery at the mill he operated in Cochran’s Mills when I was a child. When he bought a new machine, he gave the key to me because I loved the bulky, odd shape of it. I still have it, safely tucked away in my jewelry box at home.
The mill was started by my father and named for him, Elizabeth Cochran being my true name. Those who have followed my career know that when I got a job as a reporter I was forced to take the pen name of Nellie Bly to hide my identity because news reporting is considered immodest employment for a woman.
A key that belongs perhaps in a factory, around machinery, is my feeling about the one in my hand. Nothing about it strikes me as Egyptian. It’s definitely the product of an industrialized country.
My world has taken another flip. That was no dispute between locals in the marketplace, but something smacking of intrigue. But why had the key been slipped into my pocket?
The man on the bike that exposed white skin, the man whose dying words were spoken with a British accent, a man with a face I’m sure I’d passed in the corridor—it had to be Mr. Cleveland. Lord Warton taking charge of his luggage, sending it ashore … it can not be a coincidence.
A Brit named John Cleveland died in the marketplace in a dispute over a key hidden in a cheap scarab. I’d stake my life on it.
Staring at the key, I wonder if I have done exactly that.
I push the thought aside. I’m on a British ship. No one can harm me. I hope.
Still, I had no clue as to why he gave me the key. Or why the key was important to the dying man. What would it mean to Amelia? Assets he wanted his family to receive?
It all sounds very logical and reasonable except for some other unanswered questions: Why was Mr. Cleveland running around Port Said disguised as an Egyptian? Why was the key concealed in the scarab? Why was Lord Warton hiding the fact that the man was British?
Finally, of greatest significance at the moment: How could Frederick Selous believe he’d spoken to Mr. Cleveland if the man had died in my arms?
Is there an intrigue that involves the British and the religious radicals trying to drive them from Egypt? But Warton doesn’t strike me as a spy. Not that I have met any, but I do have a reasonable notion that spies are clever and devious. Warton is stuffy and arrogant, rudely so, and my impression is that he is more force-fed educated than bright and scheming.
And his insufferable wife—that mean-spirited woman doesn’t fit my romanticized notion of how a spy’s wife would act.
It seems to me Lord Warton is much more likely to have stumbled accidentally into a murderous situation at the bazaar than being involved in some intrigue. If so, why hide that the murdered man is British?
Protecting the precarious British situation in Egypt would be the obvious motive. Having served in the diplomatic corps, Lord Warton would be sensitive to the fact that Egypt is a tinderbox really to explode. His first instinct might have been to hide the fact that Mr. Cleveland was British. It might serve as fuel for the radicals in their campaign to win converts.
I slip back on my dress because none of this makes any sense if Mr. Cleveland is still alive. And there’s a man down the corridor who says he is.
* * *
F REDERICK S ELOUS ANSWERS the door only after I have knocked several times. The door is jerked open to reveal that he is a bit disheveled and not in good temper. I suspect he had already dozed off.
“I need to talk to you.”
“Miss Bly, it is—”
I make a frontal assault again, stepping in, with him making hasty steps backward. Being caught standing at a man’s door at a late hour would be scandalous.
He backs up,
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