Page 6 of The Stolen Queen

“I understand Grayson is offering you a chance to get your hands dirty,” said Henry, cutting into her thoughts.

“He is. Do you think he’ll make good on his promise?”

“He’s a good man. I would bet on it. Just don’t get your hopes up. Not everyone can be a Howard Carter.”

The last of the sun faded into the horizon. Called Ra, the sun was the ultimate god to the ancient Egyptians, the king of the other deities and the father of all creation.

“Maybe so,” she answered. “But not everyone can be a Charlotte Cross, either.”

Four weeks later, Charlotte was still waiting for her chance to excavate. However, after finishing up their work at the village, the team was given permission to relocate three miles away at the final resting place of the pharaohs of Egypt, including Tutankhamun: the Valley of the Kings. But Mr. Zimmerman had put off Charlotte’s entreaty, saying that logging everyone’s findings was a more valuable activity for her than taking over a man’s spot. It didn’t help that this was the final dig site for everyone involved—not only Charlotte—as funding issues connected with the Great Depression meant that the Met Museum would be withdrawing its presence from Egypt.

With only a couple months left on the site, the members of the dig team were feeling peevish at the thought of having to return home. The one bright spot was that they were no longer living in caves, but had taken up residence at the swanky Metropolitan House, the home base for the museum’s expeditions in the Valley of the Kings. The long, pale building, tucked into the hillside, boasted several domes and a spacious veranda behind thick arches. Its decor was spare but comfortable, with a library, a dining room with a long oak table, and dozens of bedrooms. The air inside was cool and the furniture modern.

One evening at the Metropolitan House, after a hearty dinner and multiple rounds of drinks, Charlotte and Henry slipped away at the same time.

“Can I ask you a favor, Charlotte?” asked Henry, one hand on the doorknob to his room.

“Of course.”

“I need a haircut, badly. Any chance you can lop off the long bits?”

“I have absolutely no experience as a barber. You might regret it.”

“I’ll take that chance.”

In his room, Henry pulled the chair from the small desk and placed a towel around his shoulders as Charlotte stood awkwardly in the entranceway, hands clutched together as if she were in church, unused to being alone in a man’s bedroom. Once Henry was seated, he handed her a pair of scissors. Gingerly, she pulled out a curl at the back of his neck and clipped off a couple of inches, the only sound their breaths and the metallic slice of the blades.

As she worked, the silence stretched on. Henry had gone very still and the air felt strangely electric.

“Are you worried I’ll take off your ear?” she said, attempting to alleviate whatever weirdness had descended upon them. “I promise to avoid any bloodshed.”

He laughed. “No. It’s not that. It just reminds me of my mum. When I was a very small child, she’d cut my hair. I’d completely forgotten that until just now. She was lovely. Died when I was seven. From then on, I was at the mercy of the school barber.”

“I’m sorry about your mother,” said Charlotte.

“Thank you. She always said it was easy to cut my hair because we had the exact same curls.”

“My mother and I share the same silver streak.” She pointed to her right temple, where a stripe of gray had appeared a year ago, justas it had when her mother was eighteen, and her grandmother before that. Charlotte’s mother covered hers with hair dye, but Charlotte refused. “I overheard one of the boys at college say it reminded him of a skunk.” She hadn’t told anyone that before.

“He should be shot. It lends you an air of gravitas and fierceness, which is required for anyone crazy enough to dig in this infernal Egyptian sandbox.”

She turned pink from the compliment and quickly changed the subject. “I overheard Leon saying you attended the same boarding school. Sounded quite fancy.”

“It was, but I certainly wasn’t. My father was the school’s maintenance man, and I attended on a scholarship. The rest of the students were the sons of the aristocracy, like Leon.”

That explained a lot. Out in the field, Henry stood out from the other archaeologists, winning the local Egyptian workers’ respect by addressing them without condescension, or charming the upper-crust wife of some duke who’d insisted on viewing a dig as part of their around-the-world itinerary. He was a chameleon in many ways, and she found him intriguing, drawn in by his authentic charm as well as his unerring knowledge when it came to the field of ancient Egyptology. Not to mention the fact that he was near fluent in Arabic.

When she was finished with his haircut, Henry examined the results in the mirror. Charlotte had gotten carried away trying to make both sides even, which meant his large ears stuck out even more than they had before.

“Oh, God, I’m so sorry,” she said, barely holding back her laughter. “I warned you.”

“I’m sure it will improve my hearing greatly, not having those pesky curls in the way.”

“Oh, you hate it, don’t you? I’m sure you’re sorry you ever asked.”

“I wouldn’t go that far, but perhaps some form of punishment is in order.” He gazed at her in the mirror, a look that made her stomach flip.

“Now you have me worried.”

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