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He chuckled. “Still, you have to be impressed that another monolith is still standing here,” he said, his attention on the Obelisk of Hatshepsut. The base of it appeared to have been protected by a series of walls around it that had partly crumbled.

Meanwhile, the base of its mate stood nearby. The top half of it lay on the debris of a temple dedicated to Wadjyt, or the Eye of Horus. Noting the pyramidal shape at the end of the monolith and where it had landed, David chuckled. “It poked out the Eye of Horus,” he jested.

Mahmood was not amused, and Diana seemed ready to scold her cousin-by-marriage for his comment.

Despite his height, Will couldn’t see over the top of the downed monolith. “This is solid granite,” he remarked in surprise.

“Pink granite,” Mahmood affirmed.

“It must weigh...” He shook his head, about to say ‘a ton’ when he realized it would have weighed more.

Far more.

“Over three-hundred tons,” Mahmood stated. “Quarried and brought here by boat.”

“Is that possible?” Stella asked, her query addressed to Harry.

The earl shrugged. “You’ve seen enough pyramids to know that it is,” he replied.

She was about to argue and realized he had a point. The blocks for those structures might have been limestone, but they were sometimes larger than the monolith.

Mahmood continued the tour, pointing in the direction they had been going. “The farther we go, the more treacherous our journey, so please be careful.”

Seeing she wasn’t currently clinging to David’s arm, Tom hurried to offer his arm to Helen. She gave him a passing glance before placing her hand on it.

“Do you find it interesting?” he asked.

“Very much so,” she replied. “And you?”

“Well worth the trip and a few mosquito bites, I think.”

The two of them picked their way among the rubble, Helen occasionally having to grip his forearm when her half boots threatened to slip on the smoother rocks.

“Diana must be thrilled by all this,” she said.

“I think she and David memorized everything they could,” he remarked. “If someone decides to excavate this temple, my brother may lose her,” he added, although his self-conscious grin betrayed his tease.

“What will she do when you return to England?”

He shrugged. “Probably look for Roman ruins,” he replied. “We certainly have evidence enough of them on our property.”

“You do?” she asked in surprise.

“Coins, mostly,” he replied. “We find them when we till the soil for planting in the spring. Not many, but it can be like a scavenger hunt when we find one or two. We never find more than that, but who knows what she’ll unearth?

” He paused before the top half of a statue.

“She probably wishes she had her shovel so she could dig this out,” he remarked.

“Would you help her?” Helen asked.

Tom nodded. “If I had a shovel, yes,” he replied. From the look on her face at hearing his response, he knew he had answered correctly. “I apologize for not coming out of my cabin in time to escort you this morning,” he added.

“Oh, it’s quite all right. Penton saw to escorting me,” she replied.

“Has he already proposed marriage?”

Helen blinked as she turned to stare up at him. “No,” she hedged.

Tom displayed a look of relief. “He made quite a spectacle of himself in Greece with his pretend betrothal to Miss Jane Fitzsimmons,” he murmured. “Now Mrs. Michael Henley.”

Her eyes widened despite the viscount having admitted to being part of a fake betrothal. “Did he throw her over?” she asked with worry.

He shook his head. “Broke it off so she could wed Diana’s brother, Michael,” he replied. “They arranged the betrothal during the Morganfield ball,” he added, arching a brow as if to emphasize his point.

Helen inhaled softly. “The night you kissed me,” she said, her attention on her mind’s eye.

“Indeed,” he responded.

He was about to say more, but Mahmood called out, “We have just gone past what was the fifth and sixth pylons. In this courtyard, there are ruins of several small temples. I will take you into a special one.”

The group followed him to the remains of a granite-walled structure located past a pair of granite pillars. Although the sides of the doorway and most of the walls were standing, the lintel and part of the roof were missing.

“This chapel was built by Philip Arrhidaeus,” Mahmood said as he led them into the two-room structure. An opening at one end and a few openings in the roof provided plenty of light for them to see the interior.

“Who?” Tom asked.

“He said Philip Arrhidaeus,” Helen whispered.

At Tom’s blank expression, David sighed. “Philip the Third,” he clarified.

“Who?” Tom pressed, his query meant for his brother.

“Of Macedonia,” Randy whispered.

“Alexander the Great’s half-brother,” Diana stated from the other side of Randy.

“Shh,” Barbara scolded.

Will grinned when he noted how Diana had a leather-gloved hand covering her mouth in an attempt to stifle a grin at the expense of her brother-by-marriage.

“Note the ceiling,” Mahmood stated, his gaze lifting.

They glanced up to where the ceiling was still intact to discover a field of carved white stars with red centers on a background of blue.

“And this was the altar,” Mahmood said, his hand resting on a misshapen rock. The corners had broken off, but carvings were still evident on some of the surfaces.

“Wasn’t he the one who wasn’t very bright?” Tom asked. “Suffered seizures and was executed?”

Three of their party turned to look at him in surprise. “There is some writing to suggest he was mentally deficient,” Diana confirmed.

“Unstable, don’t you mean?” David countered.

“But he is recognized as having ruled after Alexander’s death,” Diana said.

“Probably had some help,” Tom mused.

Mahmood sighed. “Let us continue our tour. We are nearly finished.”

“We are?” Helen asked in surprise.

Their guide chuckled. “You will wish to have your luncheon somewhere in the shade of a column or statue,” he said.

“Unfortunately, the site of the Sacred Lake does not have water in it, or I would recommend it.” He pointed in the direction of a square, flat area, the outline made evident by the foundations of a temple on one side and rubble along two of the other edges.

“When you have finished eating, I will take you to the Khonsu Temple and then back to the ship.” He pointed in the direction from which they had come and then to the west.

“Let’s head back to the hypostyle,” Will suggested. Exposed as they were to the sun, he knew most in the group were growing uncomfortably warm.

Pairing up, they picked their way back over the rubble and sandy terrain, past statues half-buried and columns that no longer held up roofs to smaller temples jutting from their sandy base.

Once they were back in the hypostyle, they settled next to one of the largest columns where a basket containing their luncheon had been left by one of the crew.

Tom made sure he was seated next to Helen.