Free Channeling Cleopatra by Elizabeth Ann Scarborough Page A

allowed Gabriella to show her the sights,
especially the archaeological ones. Welsh didn't fail to make a
remark in her hearing about women professionals who left all the
grunt work to men. But she retorted by saying loudly to her father,
"I know from all those Christmases when you let me help you put
together your new motorcycles, Daddy, that you can handle 'some
assembly required.' And even the most concentration-challenged
individuals who can't seem to remember whose bed they last crawled
out of can be educable with proper supervision and
encouragement."
    "Hey," her dad had said. "Watch it."
    "I didn't mean you, but if the sheet fits,
wear it. After all, there were a lot of Romans in togas here at one
time."
    Before she and Gabriella took off, Leda
said, "I guess I'd better report in, eh? Let them know I'm here,
that sort of thing."
    "With Namid? You did already, didn't you? It
is a courtesy at the most and what courtesy do you owe him now? No,
you cannot work at your assignment until your facility is erected,
and it is not erected. Besides, you need the background I can give
you. Consider this your orientation to Alex. After all, I am the
historical and cultural liaison between the museum and the project.
Namid is on the museum's board of directors, but my cousin Claude
is chairman of the board." She shrugged and grinned
mischievously.
    Still, as laid back and charming—and
young!—as Gabriella was, she had that monied aristocracy
born-to-command way about her, like an officer who'd come from a
long line of Annapolis grads. Might not know his ass from a hole in
the ground but could make you think he did and that it was to your
advantage to follow him to hell and back. Or whatever. Leda had no
doubt that Gabriella knew exactly which way the local cookie
crumbled, or falafel fell, or whatever.
    Besides, the clever girl's plan appealed to
Leda. Of course, Leda knew that later she would need to make nice
with Namid and work with the dig so that she would be privy to any
finds of the sort that interested Nucore. Obviously, the
archaeologist in charge couldn't be trusted to follow through on
his agreements.
    Still, what was one day, more or less, and
there really wasn't any place to park her stuff until the boys had
the beluga up.
    Feeling vaguely that she really ought to
supervise but not much wanting to spend time watching Pete wax all
competent and engineer-ish, she took Gabriella up on the offer.
    Later, she felt that it was fortunate that
the boys had the beluga up in a day's time and sad but also
fortunate that it didn't take too much longer than that to drink in
what was left of the ancient splendors of Alexandria.
    If Leda hadn't already toured Luxor and the
Valley of the Kings while she was in the Navy, she might have
allowed herself to be impressed by the puny splendors of the little
Roman theater and several catacombs and tombs. The Greek cemetery
did make her wish she had an entrenching tool handy; those people
were buried several deep, and the bottom layer could well hold the
remains of some of the scholars whose work had once graced the
great Alexandria Library.
    The truth was, for all her enthusiasm, it
was hot. It was damned hot. And she had been soaking up so much
information in the past few weeks she felt as if her brain was a
soaking wet, swollen sponge. She found it hard to jump up and down
at the sight of Pompey's pillar, which had nothing to do with
Pompey but more to do with the Serapeum, which was originally a
temple to the religion the Greeks made up to blend their beliefs
with those of the Egyptians. It was literally a lot of bull, since
Serapis was a bull. The most interesting thing about it was that it
had once held the overflow from the great library. You couldn't
tell it now. There was nothing but a lot of holes and trenches in
the ground and nary a page nor a scroll in sight. Not that she
expected anything. She knew that the library had been destroyed
some time during or after Cleopatra of movie