I opened my mouth to protest, but she laid a hand on my arm.
“Listen to me before you dismiss the idea outright. Removing yourself from the situation might help matters. Your uncle might calm down, and distance from Whit might give you perspective. Without means, how effective will you be against our mother?”
My conversation with Whit came back to me. Spoken softly in a moment of vulnerability. I’d never put myself in that position with him ever again. But I held on to what he had communicated—I didn’t need money to move against my mother. To track her down and force her to confront me.
I only needed to know the right people.
“I have first-class tickets,” I said slowly. At Isadora’s confused expression, I elaborated. “One is a train ticket, the other a passage to Argentina on a luxury liner,” I explained.
“I’m not following,” Isadora said.
“I can return both tickets,” I said. “And I’ll still have some money left over. Enough for food and perhaps a couple of nights of accommodations.” The driver pulled up at Shepheard’s entrance, the terrace overflowing with tables and chairs filled with hotel guests, surrounded by potted plants and large trees. “Though, perhaps nothere.”
“All right,” she said in her cool voice. “And then what?”
“I have no idea,” I admitted, my mind spinning as I tossed one idea over another. “But there must be some trace of her. Someone must know where she lived, who she spoke with, where she frequented. Mamá isn’t a phantom. She had contacts, friends. She traded artifacts. There has to be—” An idea slammed into me. “Isadora!The artifacts. We need to think about the items she stole.”
Isadora stared, her lips parting in surprise. “I beg your pardon?”
“Mamá can’t hold on to them for too long—it isn’t safe, and word willonly spread that Cleopatra and her cache have been located. People will find out. It’s the discovery of the century.”
“This is sheer idiocy,” Isadora protested. “If we don’t know where Mother is, then it follows we have no idea where the relics are, or where to look for them.”
A square card printed with the image of a gate leapt into my mind. That card was an invitation to Tradesman’s Gate. “She’d fence the items.” I nodded, buzzing with excitement as a plan formed in my mind. Finally, a way forward. “And she’d do that by attending the next auction.”
“And do you know when that will be?”
“No,” I muttered in frustration. “But someone has to. Maybe we can sneak into one of the clubs in Cairo?”
Isadora narrowed her eyes at me. “You like to rush headlong into situations before really thinking them through, don’t you?”
“I’m told it’s one of my more exasperating traits,” I admitted.
“And you have a habit of doing things on your own.” Isadora studied me frankly, her eyes seeming to miss nothing. They didn’t match the softness of her face. They were too old for someone who was so young. “I was their child, too.”
A part of me had known she would offer to help me, and I recoiled at the thought. It was Isadora who stared at me expectantly, but all I saw was Elvira’s destroyed face.
There’d been so much blood.
“We ought to work together,” Isadora insisted.
“You’d see your father in prison?”
She pulled at her lip, and for the briefest moment, her eyes watered with genuine regret. “I can’t believe he’d do such a thing.” She shook her head, as if to clear it from any doubts. “He’ll end up dead if he continues on this road—I’m sure of it. I’d rather visit him in prison than at his grave.”
I opened my mouth to tell her that I’d manage this alone. It was too dangerous, and I’d only just found her. I had every reason to forbid her from doing this with me—but the words stayed put. Past conversations with Tío Ricardo swept through my mind. He, too, had tried to tell me what to do, to send me away, to not participate. It struck me how much I’dsound like my uncle or Whit, and everyone else who wanted me to leave Egypt, if I told her to stay away.
I couldn’t do that to Isadora.
In one act, her father had upended her life and made her an accomplice to his criminal activities. At least, that’s what everyone would think. I only had to think of Whit—that was his first conclusion, too. Could Isadora’s reputation survive the gossip? The implied accusations?
I didn’t think so.
“What are you thinking?”
“I’m having second thoughts on how to proceed,” I said slowly. “It’s not like me to feel so undecided. Usually, I can make up my mind quickly—but there are too many unknowns. I’m not a soldier; I can barely shoot. I’ve slapped someone exactly one time. Even if I were to discover the location of the next auction, what can I do to defend myself against any of these people?”
“I know how to shoot,” she said.
