The gray-haired attendant directed her to an upper floor where in a broad echoing marble corridor she found a double row of office doors. Number nine was ajar, and when she knocked a pleasant, masculine voice bade her enter.
The office was small, with files and glass cases lining the walls above which hung framed sections of parchment, time-frayed and shrunken. The westering sun shone through the single window full upon the desk, behind which sat a boyish-looking young man, with merry twinkling eyes and more than a suspicion of red in his chestnut hair.
Betty had been prepared to confront a sedate philologist of settled age and perhaps stern demeanor, and she came forward rather shyly.
"I am looking for the person who advertised in the current issue of the Literary Digest for an Egyptian translator," she remarked.
The young man rose from the chair, his eyes still fixed on hers, and she observed that they had narrowed swiftly with a keen intensity which lent maturity to his expression.
"Please be seated." His tone was quietly courteous. "I placed the advertisement in the magazine you mention. Do you understand the Mallory method?"
"If you mean the system employed by Professor Mallory, of Cairo, and the form of transliteration used by him so that the ancient phraseology might be retained, I can claim to be thoroughly conversant with it." Betty sank into the chair indicated, her breath ending in a little gasp. For all her self-possession, the young man's impersonal but fixed regard had a disturbing effect, and in the attempt to combat it her manner grew strained. "I have made practical use of it in translations for the Museum at Gizeh—"
She paused, biting her lip, but the young man appeared unobservant of her sudden check.
"You have studied under Professor Mallory?" The question was casually uttered, yet it brought a swift blush to her brow.
"I was a pupil of an associate of his." She spoke slowly as if choosing her words with care. "You mention the later dynastic periods in your advertisement; you refer doubtless to the era of the Persian influence?"