Crocodile on the Sandbank (Amelia Peabody, #1)

by Elizabeth Peters

Yet no sooner had we reached Rome than Miss Pritchett succumbed to the typhoid, like the weak-minded female she

He was a stout, red-faced person whose extra layers of flesh should have been enough to keep him warm, without the fur-lined greatcoat he wore.

“Your coat will be returned later this evening. A person of your excessive bulk should not wear such heavy clothing in any case.”

could not endure a man who would let himself be ruled by me, and I would not endure a man who tried to rule me.

I had found, however, that few persons of the male sex were to be trusted,

wanted new curtains for the saloon; their shade clashed horribly with my crimson evening frock.

Men are never of any use in an emergency.

“I really cannot proceed while you struggle so,” Walter complained. “Very well… Miss Peabody will be pleased.” There was a brief silence. “Peabody will be pleased that I retain my beards?” Emerson inquired. “Miss Peabody claims that men grow beards in order to hide weak features. Receding chins, spots on the face…” “Oh, does she? She implies my chin is weak?” “She has never seen it,” Walter pointed out. “Hmph.”

would have done as much for a sick cat.”

“And if Peabody says so,” remarked Emerson, “that is the Word of the Prophet.”

All gone, into the dust to which we must all descend when our hour comes.

On the ledge above us stood the Mummy. The blind, bandaged head was turned toward us; one stubby leg was lifted, as if our sudden appearance had stopped it in midstep. To the crumbling, rotting bandages of its breast, the horror clasped the unconscious form of Evelyn. Her tumbled golden curls hung down over its arm; her little white feet peeped pathetically out of the folds of her nightdress. After the first scream of terror she had fainted dead away, as any girl might, finding herself in the arms of such a suitor.