Hadassah's letter greatly disturbed Margaret. If it had only come before Freddy was killed, how she would have gloried in it, how delightful it would have been to tell him that even a scientific body of excavators had come to the conclusion that a treasure had been laid up by the religious fanatic—for that was Freddy's summing-up of Akhnaton—that the seer's vision had again proved true!
But now she had no one to rejoice with. Freddy had been taken from her, and Michael was lost, and there was not a creature in all her world who would care one brass farthing about the strange materializing of Michael's spiritualistic theories. All that she cared most about she had to subdue and crush back. Probably Freddy, in his new life, was understanding and sympathizing, for she knew now with a nervous certainty that the veil is very thin.
Hadassah had said in her letter, when referring to the death of the native, "This sounds as if Millicent's servants had played her false. The police report that she never reached the hills, so whether her dragoman deliberately took her off the track, and allowed one of her servants to go to the hills and secure the treasure, remains a mystery which may never be solved. But one thing is pretty clear—that her cavalcade was never seen in that part of the desert, for, as you know, the drifting sand in Egypt carries information; it conceals and reveals many things undreamed of in our Western philosophy."
As Margaret read these lines she cursed her own stupidity with a bitter curse. If she had used a little more tact and shown less jealous rage, she could have learnt from Millicent all which now so baffled them. She could easily have discovered if she had ever reached the hills.
Margaret was rereading the letter in her off-hours. Her first reading of it had been very hurried, for it had arrived by the first post, and she had only found time to devour it with eager eyes, eyes which searched its pages for one precious item of news. She was scarcely conscious of her desire for news of Michael's whereabouts. There was always the hope, unexpressed even to herself, that he had written to the Iretons. If he really was at the Front, surely he would have told them? But the letter contained no such information.
Her disappointment was, however, drowned in surprise and pride. With one fell swoop the letter had obliterated the passion and obsession of war which had held her in its clutches. It made her forget, for a little time, at least, that such a country as Germany existed. Her mind was again vivified with visions of the desert and the various scenes which Hadassah's letter suggested. Flashing before her eyes was the open desert, the unbroken light, and the stumbling donkey, heavily-laden and meekly submissive, with the gleaming gems, betrayed by the rays of Aton. She could visualize the astonished native fingering them and holding them up to the light; the sunlight, Akhnaton's symbol of divinity, was to bear testimony to the fact that the bright objects which had caught the Arab's eyes were beautiful and rich-hued gems, that they were indeed a portion of the treasure which he had hidden from the avarice of the priests of Amon, who set up graven images and worshipped false gods.
For the first time since she had been doing the work of a pantry-maid, Margaret set out the tea-trays and washed up the cups in an automatic, aloof manner. Her material body was busy in the hospital-pantry, while spiritually she was far away. Visions rose and faded before her eyes in rapid succession, but the one which she saw oftenest was the look of surprise and smiling incredulity on Freddy's face. The cry in her heart was for his sympathy, for his knowing, for his congratulations on the wonderful piece of news. Why could he not have been allowed to know it while he was still alive on this earth and able to talk to her? She wanted to be personally and materially close to him while he read the letter.
She longed for that more ardently and whole-heartedly than anything else; she hungered for it even more fiercely than the coming back of Michael, whose return into her life she was convinced would eventually happen. Whether it would be for her happiness or otherwise she was ignorant.
When she thought of his coming and of her first meeting with him, her pride rose up in arms, her mind was devastated with embarrassment. The meeting would open up old wounds, which she had imagined were healed. There she had been mistaken; they were like the wounds of a patient which appear to be healed while he lies at rest in the hospital, but which break out again when he resumes his normal life. The war had drugged Margaret's senses.
She had curiously little fear for Michael as a soldier, for whenever she thought of him as one, as fighting at the Front, she saw the bright light surrounding him, and disarming his amazed opponents.