The Mummy (7 page)

The other result, however, was most unpleasant, and the term “domino effect” should suffice, here. She chose to close her eyes through much of it, and so spared herself the sight of one bookshelf toppling into another, and another, and another. But she did not think to cover her ears, so was privy to the sounds of thousands of precious volumes flinging themselves off shelves and scattering to the floor. When the last bookshelf crashed into the far wall, and emptied its books to the floor like a wagon dumping coal down a chute, the worst was over.

Almost.

When she opened her eyes—one at a time, as if that would lessen the blow—she saw not just a librarian’s worst nightmare in the jumble of fallen shelves and spilled books but the wide-eyed presence of her boss, the museum’s curator, Dr. Bey.

She looked up at him timidly, ventured a tiny smile.

“Oops,” she said.

The curator was a small round man with a small round face in a dark suit with a black string tie; his black hair sat upon his skull like a spreading spider.

“Oops?” he asked, black eyebrows climbing a high forehead, his black mustache lost in his curled-back upper lip.

“I didn’t hear you come in, Dr. Bey.”

“Perhaps it was the books crashing to the floor.”

Quickly, she got to her feet, smoothed out her sweater and skirt, adjusted the scarf at her open collar, and began picking up books, as if implying this was a mess easily cleaned up, when it would obviously require months of her time.

Dr. Bey was shaking his head. “Give me frogs, flies, locusts! Compared to you, Miss Carnahan, the other plagues were a joy.”

“I’m sorry, sir. It was an accident.”

“No. Rameses destroying Syria, that was an accident. This is a catastrophe.” He shook a thick finger at her. “I only put up with you because your parents were our finest patrons . . . Allah rest their souls.”

She had long suspected the curator resented her presence, and knew she had irritated him with various misjudged attempts to offer him “valuable artifacts” her brother, Jonathan, had bought from barroom archaeologists.

“Dr. Bey,” she said, “anyone could have made this mess. But not just anyone could put it right.”

That stopped the fat little man cold.

“If you’d like my resignation,” she said, “I’ll gladly offer it . . . though I doubt you could find anyone within a thousand miles who could put this particular Humpty Dumpty back together.”

Brusquely, he said, “Straighten this up,” and stormed out.

Irritated and embarrassed, but pleased that she’d made her point with Bey, Evelyn surveyed the scene of the disaster. She would have to gather all the books, check them for damage; one of the museum assistants would have to reposition the shelves themselves, they were much too large and bulky for her—

A sound interrupted her planning:
footsteps.

She turned to look, to see if Dr. Bey had returned, but no one was there. The silence became eerie, as it frequently could in this sprawling turn-of-the-century building where room after room was lined with the coffins of kings, their embalmed bodies often exposed to view.

There it was again!

Someone was walking, but it was a slow, ominous shuffle, as if a bad leg were being dragged; it seemed to come from the gallery across the way.

“Dr. Bey?” she called.

Nothing.

“Abdul?”

Still nothing.

“Mohammed? . . . Bob?”

She moved through the connecting room into the area where treasures from the Middle Kingdom were on display; this was after hours, and the gas lighting was subdued, flickery, throwing shadows, making a haunted house of this room filled with the plundered possessions of the ancient dead. She moved down the aisle, past a closed sarcophagus, skirting cases of artifacts.

Another noise!

Was someone was in this room—a prowler? A thief? There certainly were treasures here to steal: great cases of gold and silver ornaments taken from tombs, golden coiled-snake armlets, necklaces, girdles, chains, the sort of jewelry the Israelites had borrowed to melt into the golden calf that had so annoyed Jehovah.

She would get Dr. Bey.

Moving past a statue of Anubis, another of Horus, both staring down at her menacingly in the dim lighting, she headed out. But on her way to the exit, she caught sight of a sarcophagus, leaned against the wall, exposing its hideous, rotted mummy.

Not every one of these mummy cases was meant to stand open; in fact, a room upstairs was dedicated to mummies, in glass cases, and tourists were warned of the disturbing nature of the displays. Grown men had been known to go running out of there, sweating at the sight of grinning mummies.

She sighed. Was this a prank, or the careless action of some assistant curator? In either case, the footsteps she’d heard might have belonged to whoever had opened the sarcophagus; she leaned forward, peeking in at the decayed mummy, which really was quite nasty, thinking,
This one won’t do for display,
and the mummy seemed to lurch at her, accompanied by an unearthly screech that sent her reeling back, and screaming!

“Quiet, Sis,” Jonathan Carnahan said, slipping out from behind the sarcophagus, “or you’ll attract that dreadful little man back here again.”

“Jonathan! You bloody idiot!”

“Such language, sis.” Dapper, dissipated, Jonathan had strong eyes and a weak chin; he was thirty, but looked closer to forty, a cheerfully indolent individual barely getting by on his yearly stipend from the family trust fund, mostly spent on bourbon, a flask of which he removed from his cream-colored jacket and sipped.

She closed the sarcophagus lid, resisting the urge to slam it. “Have you no respect for the dead?”

“Have you no respect for the dead drunk?”

Steaming, she paced. “What are you doing here? I’m already in trouble. I just made a mess of the library . . .”

“I heard. And I heard Dr. Bey scold you.” He sipped from his flask. “Pity.”

She faced him, hands on hips. “Do you really want to ruin my career, the way you’ve ruined yours?”

“Now that’s unfair, Sis.” He belched, excused himself, and added, “I’ll have you know that my career is thriving, at this very moment.”

Evelyn smirked. “You haven’t been out on a dig for six months.”

“Not true! I’ve been digging, my dear. Digging away.”

“What, in bars again? Please, Jonathan, I’m just in no mood for your capering. The Bembridge Scholars . . .”

He sat down heavily on the edge of a display. “Don’t tell me those fools had the bad sense to turn you down again.”

She sat next to him. “They say I lack experience.”

“Well, you’re getting it here, aren’t you?”

“Fine. Just fine. I’ll stay on another year or two and try again . . . and what sort of reference do you think Dr. Bey will give me?”

He beamed at her. “I’ve got just the thing to get you back in his good graces.” Jonathan began scrounging in his other jacket pocket.

Shaking her head, Evelyn said, “Oh, no, no, not another worthless trinket, Jonathan. If I bring one more piece of junk to Dr. Bey, on your behalf—”

But Jonathan had withdrawn a small octagonal golden box, obviously ancient—New Kingdom, she’d say.

She grabbed it from him; he made no attempt to stop her. “Where did you find this, Jonathan?”

“On a dig . . . near Luxor.”

Evelyn rolled the box around her in hands, examining it carefully, appreciating its carved surface, mumbling to herself as she translated the hieratics and hieroglyphs decorating it.

They began tapping their feet together in nervous unison as she inspected the box.

“I’ve been such a poor excuse for the son of Howard Carnahan, Evy . . . never came across a damn thing worth finding. Is it . . . is it something? Please tell me I’ve finally found something, old dear.”

The box had tiny little slats on it, which she began to shift this way and that.

“What is it, Evy? Is that a puzzle box?”

As if in reply, the thing seemed to unfold itself, blossoming into an eight-sided key; and sitting within the open box was a folded piece of papyrus. Carefully, Evelyn unfolded it into what was clearly an ancient map: the Nile was obvious, as was a representation of the jackal-headed Anubis; an eagle and various other drawings, and hieroglyphs, indeed dated it to the New Kingdom.

“Jonathan?”

“Yes, Sis?”

“You’ve found something.”

Seated behind his desk in his cluttered, cubbyhole office, the curator used a jeweler’s eyepiece to examine the box. Evelyn, standing alongside Dr. Bey, demonstrated how to open and close the object, and pointed out the cartouche on its surface.

“That’s the royal seal of Seti the First,” she said.

The curator shrugged. “Perhaps.”

“No ‘perhaps’ about it, Dr. Bey.”

“Which pharaoh was Seti again?” Jonathan asked, smiling, seated across the desk from the curator. “Afraid I’ve forgotten. Was he rich, by any chance?”

Evelyn could never be sure when Jonathan was joking. “He was the second pharaoh of the nineteenth dynasty. Some historians speculate he may have been the wealthiest of all rulers.”

“What a splendid fellow, this Seti. I like him very much.” Jonathan’s grin, as he leaned into the dramatic glow of a candle on Bey’s desk, was rather mummylike; though the museum had electric lighting, the curator often kept an aromatic candle burning.

On the curator’s desk lay the golden map, stretched out as if the trio were planning a trip. Dr. Bey lifted it nearer the candlelight for a better look.

“This map is almost three thousand years old, Doctor,” she told him. “And the hieratics over here indicate exactly what is being charted . . .”

Dr. Bey looked up at her.

With a nervous grin and a little shrug, she ventured into dangerous waters. “It shows the way to Hamanaptra.”

The map trembled, or rather Dr. Bey’s hands holding it did; he seemed rather shaken by her statement, but only for a moment. Then he smiled and laughed, shaking his head.

“My dear girl, don’t be ridiculous,” Bey said. “I’m surprised at you, a scholar of your qualities, of your seriousness. That’s a myth, Hamanaptra—told by ancient Arabs to amuse Greek and Roman tourists.”

“Let’s not confuse the myth of Hamanaptra, Doctor,” she said, “with the very real possibility that the temple, and its necropolis, may have existed. Of course, I don’t take that silly blather seriously—a mummy’s curse, a place of evil—pure nonsense, obviously.”

“Hold on, there,” Jonathan said, candlelight flickering on his suddenly keenly interested face, “you’re not talking about
the
Hamanaptra? City of the Dead sort of thing? Hiding place for the wealth of the early pharaohs?”

Evelyn was amused. “Amazing how your Egyptology has improved.”

“Where treasure is concerned, dear girl, I’m a bloody expert. Anyway, every schoolchild knows of Hamanaptra and its wonderful big underground treasure chamber. You suppose it’s true that the pharaohs had it rigged so the whole place could disappear under the dunes, flick o’ the switch?”

“None of it’s true,” Bey said, chuckling, but still examining the map, holding it closer to the light. “As the Americans would say, it’s bunk . . . hooey . . . hokum.”

“Are you sure that’s English, old man? Say! Watch it!”

The corner of the map had touched the candle’s flame . . . and now the map was on fire! Bey bolted to his feet and tossed the burning papyrus off the desk, onto the floor, where Jonathan dropped to his knees and patted it quickly out with his hands. Then Jonathan held the smoldering papyrus up and the left third of the map was gone.

“Oh dear,” Evelyn said, fingers touching her lips.

Jonathan’s frown was more like a pout. “You burned it! You bloody fool, you burned off the best part!”

“I am sorry.” Bey bowed. “It was an accident.”

“Rameses destroying Syria,” Evelyn said coldly, “that was an accident.”

“Perhaps it’s for the best.” Bey sat back down, shrugging. “We are scholars, not treasure hunters, after all. Many men have wasted their lives in pursuit of foolishness like this. No one has ever found Hamanaptra, and many who’ve tried failed even to return.”

Evelyn arched an eyebrow. “My research indicates the temple city may have existed.”

Jonathan was holding up the map, staring at its charred edge with the expression of a child who has just broken his first toy, Christmas morning. “You burned off the lost city,” he said accusingly to the curator, who merely shrugged again.

“I’m sure it was a forgery, a fake. Really, Miss Carnahan, I thought better of you than to be fooled so easily . . . However, as for this box . . .”

And the curator reached toward the golden octagonal artifact on his desk.

“. . . I may be able to offer a modest sum.”

Jonathan’s expression perked up, but Evelyn snatched the box from Dr. Bey’s grasp and glared at him.

“No thank you, Doctor,” she said. “Suddenly, it is not for sale.”

And she quickly exited, with Jonathan—scorched map in hand—trailing bemusedly after.

 
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