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“Professor Cranleigh’s daughter and my one-time pupil. In fact the only one I ever had.”
    “This is so exciting,” he said.
    “I have met your father … a brilliant man.”
    Felicity left us to talk together. He did most of the talking. He told me how helpful my father had been and how grateful he was to have had so much of the important gentleman’s time.
    Then he wanted to know about me. I confessed that I was still at school, that this was my holiday and I had another two or three terms to come.
    “And then what shall you do?”
    I lifted my shoulders.
     
    “You’ll be married before long, I dare say,” he said, implying that my charms were such that husbands would be vying with each other to win me.
    “One never knows what will happen to us.”
    “How very true,” he remarked as though my trite remark made a sage of me.
    Felicity was right. He set out to please. It was rather transparent when one had been warned, but pleasant, I had to admit.
    I found myself seated beside him at dinner. He was very easy to talk to. He told me about the find in the garden, and how to a certain extent it had changed his life.
    “The family have always been connected with the Army and I have broken the tradition. My uncle was a colonel of the regiment, hardly ever in England, always doing his duty at some outpost of Empire. I discovered it wasn’t the life for me so I got out.”
    “It must have been very exciting, finding this relic.”
    “It was. When I was in the Army I spent some time in Egypt. That made it rather specially interesting. I just saw it lying there. The soil was damp and one of the gardeners was doing some planting. It was covered in hieroglyphics.”
    “You needed the Rosetta Stone.”
    He laughed.
    “Oh, not quite so obscure as that. Your father translated it.”
    “I’m glad of that. I was named after the stone, you know.”
    “Yes, I did know. Felicity told me. How proud you must be.”
    “I used to be. When I first went to the Museum I gazed at it in wonder.”
    He laughed.
    “Names are important. You would never! guess what my first name is.” S Tell me. ” | ” Hadrian. Just imagine being burdened with such a name. I People would constantly be asking how you were getting on with
    the wall. Hadrian Edward Lucas Lorimer. Hadrian was out for reasons I’ve mentioned. Edward . well, there are a great number of Edwards in the world. Lucas is less used . so I became Lucas. But you realize what my initials make? It’s rather extraordinary.
    HELL.
     
    ”
     
    “I am sure it is most inappropriate,” I said with a laugh.
    “Ah, but you do not know me. Have you another name?”
    “No, just Rosetta Cranleigh.”
    “R.C.”
    “Not nearly so amusing as yours.”
    “Yours suggests someone very devout, whereas I could be an imp of Satan. It’s significant, don’t you think … the suggestion of people in opposite spheres? I am sure it means something concerning our friendship to come. You are going to turn me from my evil ways and be a good influence on my life. I’d like to think it meant that.”
    I laughed and we were silent for a while, then he said:
    “You are interested in the mysteries of Egypt, I dare say. As your parents’ daughter you must be.”
    “Well, in a mild way. At school one doesn’t have much time to be interested in what isn’t going on there.”
    “I’d like to know what the words on my stone really meant.”
    “I thought you said they had been translated.”
    “Yes … in a way. All these things are so cryptic. The meaning is couched in words which are not quite clear.”
    “Why do people have to be so obscure?”
    “To bring in an element of mystery, don’t you think? It adds to the interest. It’s the same with people. When you discover subtleties in their characters you become more interested.”
    He smiled at me, his eyes saying something which I did not understand.
    “You will eventually discover that I am right,” he said.
    “You mean when