Sonnet of the Sphinx

Chapter 1 " 'Old King Tut was a wise old nut,' " Grace Hollister read aloud, selecting a sheet of music from the stack beside her. She was sitting Indian-style on the floor of Rogue's Gallery, surrounded by neatly sorted books and papers. "Possibly a wise young nut. Though not wise enough to keep himself from getting clipped." As Peter Fox's mocking gaze met hers, Grace was reminded of a line by Thomas Moore: "Eyes of unholy blue." "That's right; some scholars now believe Tutankhamen was murdered, don't they?" She studied the crimson-and-sand-colored illustration of a cigar-smoking pharaoh peeking out from behind a pyramid. This King Tut looked more like a Vegas mob boss than Egyptian royalty. Not that Grace had much experience with Vegas mob bosses -- or any mob bosses. Until recently she had led the life of a sheltered academic, teaching Romantic literature to the privileged young ladies of St. Anne's Academy for Girls in Los Angeles. "They do. A three-thousand-year-old cold case." Peter lifted a wooden writing box out of its wrappings. He opened it, picked out assorted pen nibs, old-fashioned paper clips, and a winged dagger cap badge for the 22nd Special Air Service. Peter studied the badge, set it aside, and made a notation on his clipboard. "Who Dares Wins," he murmured, and his thin mouth curled in an odd smile. "Very nice." Summer was the height of tourist season in the English Lake District, and so naturally the busiest time at Rogue's Gallery. Between customers, they were still working their way through the boxes and crates that had been delivered two weeks ago from Mallow Farm. The new owner, Mr. Matsukado, was a wealthy Japanese businessman. The Shogun, as he was referred to locally, had decreed all of the seventeenth-century farmhouse's original furnishings unsuitable. Peter had bought the lot, much to the chagrin of his local competition. Much of the haul had turned out to be of the pink china roosters and bronzed baby shoes variety. Grace adjusted her reading glasses and brushed back her hair, which had deepened to sorrel while away from the California sun. "Why, Valentino as a sheik, he wouldn't last half a week in old King Tut-Tut-Tut-Tut-Tut-Tut-Tut King Tuttie's day." She checked the date on the music. "Nineteen twenty-three. A year after Carter discovered Tut's tomb. Had they even opened the burial chamber yet?" "February 1923." She selected a faded brochure in red, white, and blue. "The Maid and the Mummy. A musical farce in three acts. This is an oldie -- 1904." "Something of a theme, no?" Peter was making more notes in his own personal hieroglyphs. A thin slip of yellowed paper slid out from the musical brochure Grace held, and she unfolded the paper. It was a letter. The date at the top read October 8, 1943. "Listen to this," she said. Dearest Girl, It's difficult to know what to write. I'm a devil to treat you so. Oh, I know it too well, and to wrap it up in thumping philosophy only cheapens . . . She broke off. "I can't read the next few lines." She squinted at the lines long ago dissolved by . . . a watermark? Tears? Gin? There's a kind of high comedy in our breathless obsession with tetchy old Fen's verdict, while half the youth of Europe is churned to powder in the cogs of this mechanical slaughter of modern warfare. And yet if our little discovery should turn out to be one of Shiloh's poesy, then there is a rightness to it, a queer poetic justice. I must let this go. One day, I suppose we wilKillian, Diana is the author of 'Sonnet of the Sphinx ', published 2006 under ISBN 9780743466806 and ISBN 0743466802.