The Mummy Snatcher of Memphis

by Natasha Narayan

  I looked around and found a rope. With all my strength I hurled it in and Ahmed, thank goodness, caught hold of one end of it. The others assisted me, using all our strength we pulled Ahmed out. Finally he was up on the dock, soaked through and stinking of raw sewage. Worse than the smell though, was the despair on his face.

  “That’s it then,” I said, watching the Morning Star recede into the distance, chugging past all the other boats and ships in the port. Ahmed, wet and stinking, was shivering beside me. I would have to find him some clean clothes. We would have to try and find a passage to Egypt. It wouldn’t be easy though, I knew that. Steamship tickets were hard to find. Rachel, meanwhile, sailed away from us.

  “Hold on a minute.” Isaac was gazing at something coughing into port. “NEVER GIVE UP! It was you, Kit, who taught me that.”

  “Not now, Isaac!”

  “Good Lord, what’s that?” Waldo cut in. He was staring at the same object as Isaac, out among the flotilla of boats.

  I followed his gaze. Steaming into harbor was a vessel one could hardly describe as a ship. More of an old tin tub really, with two rusty-looking funnels belching foul smoke. Poonah was written on the side of boat, in cracked green paint.

  “That, my friend,” said Isaac with a smile, “is the rescue party.”

  I scanned the boat. There on the fore-deck was a sight I had never expected to see in this life or any other. Standing side by side, grinning away, the unlikely pair of Aunt Hilda and Gaston Champlon.

  “Explain!” I snapped, turning to Isaac. “What on earth is going on?”

  Part Three

  Each of these maxims should be handed down so they

  never disappear from this land.

  Maxim 38, The Wisdom of Ptah Hotep

  Chapter Twenty-four

  “I admit it. Sometimes I jump to conclusions.”

  “Sometimes, Aunt Hilda?” I asked.

  “Occasionally, then.”

  “I was going to say usually. Take the case of the mummy. You had absolutely no evidence for stomping around town blaming poor Monsieur Champlon for the theft.”

  “Call it gut feeling.”

  “Your gut was wrong, Auntie. That’s the whole point. You should stop listening to your gut and start listening to your brain.”

  Normally I wouldn’t have dared talk to her like this, but Aunt Hilda was being so contrite I just couldn’t resist. It was five days after the terrible scenes at West India Docks and we were aboard the Poonah, chasing the villains on the Morning Star through the high seas.

  “It is ze ledees’ right to be wrong,” interrupted Champlon, who had joined me and my aunt on our stroll around the deck. He favored us with a charming smile and offered his arm to Aunt Hilda, who took it grudgingly. “Ledees are so emotional. I excuse them because ledees are not for ze t’inking. Zey are like ze soft rabbit.”

  It is hard to imagine someone less like a soft rabbit than my aunt. She was about to snap at him, but I silenced her with a frown. She was on her very best behavior these days, the sort of thing that counts as normal everyday manners from you and me. As you may imagine, this enforced courtesy wasn’t easy for her. Isaac had worked a near miracle in bringing her round. It was my clever friend—and his telesphere—who had convinced both Aunt Hilda and Champlon that the Baker Brothers had stolen the mummy. It was Isaac’s doing that we were here at all, aboard the Poona sailing to Egypt to rescue Rachel and the scarab. Isaac had well and truly saved the day.

  “Anyway, madame,” Champlon continued. “Ve must not fight each wiz ze other. Our enemy is ze Baker Brothers. ’Ow strange to think of them taking Ptah Hotep’s mummy back to Egypt.”

  I was not at all sure if the Baker Brothers were taking the mummy back to Egypt. Indeed I believed they would only bother with the scarab. But my aunt and Champlon had no idea of the scarab’s existence, so I held my tongue.

  “We must rescue Ptah Hotep from these villains,” Champlon continued.

  “And of course, young Rebecca,” Aunt Hilda said as an afterthought.

  “Her name is Rachel,” I put in stoutly.

  “Yes. Rachel,” my aunt replied. “That’s what I said.”

  In a frenzy of preparations for our dash to Egypt, Aunt Hilda had hired the Poonah complete with captain and crew. The battered old steamer was the best she could find in a hurry. And off we sped.

  Well, that was the idea.

  In fact, the Poonah was marooned in the waters of the Mediterranean. It was like being stuck in a giant bath tub. The wind was taking us nowhere fast, but the doughty little steamer persevered, its gallant engines coughing on. I had reason to be grateful to the Poonah. Though it looked like a piece of scrap metal, it was a fighter, as determined as the rest of us to catch our prey. Still, we had seen nothing resembling the Morning Star for days. Then a few minutes before, Ahmed, who spent hours hanging over the deck rails, had seen a white and red blur on the horizon sailing in the direction of Alexandria. You can guess what happened next. Aunt Hilda was all for firing on the ship, though we had just one rusty old cannon, whose balls would have plopped harmlessly into the sea.

  Anyway, the whole debate soon became irrelevant because the Morning Star—i findeed it was our enemy’s ship—disappeared again over the horizon.

  “We’re never going to catch them,” I said, turning away from the sea.

  It was hard not to feel despondent. Rachel was imprisoned somewhere in a fast modern steamship. Try as we might, we couldn’t compete. True, our boat had red and black port and starboard funnels, which belched out more smoke than a bonfire, while the paddle wheels churned furiously. Though I knew it was ungrateful I felt a stab of anger toward the Poonah. All that energy with so little result. We were the tortoise of ocean-going steamers. How could we ever rescue our friend? How would we ever seize back the scarab?

  “Do not worry,” Ahmed said. “I’ll have a few tricks up my sleeve when we reach Egypt.”

  “What do you have in mind?”

  “I have friends,” Ahmed murmured and to my frustration would say no more.

  It was too much. The Poonah had been on the seas for days; sailing from West India docks in London around Italy then on to Athens, where we refueled for the trip across the Mediterranean to Alexandria in Egypt. Sometimes I felt we were on a fool’s errand. Even if we had been able to catch up with the Morning Star how could we—with our half-dozen crew members—take on the Velvet Mob?

  “You may say we’ll have the upper hand in Egypt,” I muttered gloomily. “But they’ve beaten us every time so far.”

  Ahmed merely shrugged, then stalked away. Sullen, I hung over the rail and stared at the sea. Not that there was anything to look at, unless you like watching seagulls. Water, waves, crests of foam and spray around the paddle-wheel. I could never be a sailor. The sight of so much emptiness would drive me to distraction. Rachel would have coped better with seafaring life. She had the patience to endure. Though it was strange, with Rachel gone, I found myself far more cautious than usual. It was almost as if I was listening to an echo of my friend’s voice inside my own head. An echo that stilled my most reckless thoughts.

  “Lunchtime yet?” Isaac emerged from his cabin, blinking.

  “I’m famished. Let’s ask the captain,” I replied.

  The captain and first mate were in the pilot house, a rickety wooden shed on the top deck. Their voices were raised in loud argument, but when I opened the door it stopped abruptly.

  “I was wondering what happened to lunch?” I said. “It is nearly two o’clock.”

  “Better ask Cook,” the captain replied with a sharp glance at the first mate, a man called Simpson who wandered around the boat like gloom personified. “Simpson. Find out what’s happened to lunch.”

  “Aye, aye, sir,” Simpson said, managing to make even those simple words somber.

  The captain and Isaac began a technical discussion about the boiler. Isaac had an idea for cutting down on fuel use which truth to tell I didn’t under
stand, so I decided to go down into the galley and see how lunch was coming on. The kitchen was a low wooden room beneath the quarter-deck. A selection of cheap tin pots and pans hung from beams. It was poorly lit and everything was coated with a layer of soot from the ancient stove. Cook’s white apron and hat loomed out of the murk. He was bending over the stove stirring something—which to be honest did not smell too promising.

  “Hello,” I asked the man’s back. “What’s for luncheon?”

  Cook turned round. With a shock I saw Simpson’s mournful face peering out from under the hat: “’Ash. Always ’ash round ’ere.”

  “Where’s Cook?”

  “You’re looking at ’im.”

  “Pardon?” I spluttered.

  “I’m the bleedin’ cook. This ain’t the Mornin’ Star, you know. We ain’t got a crew of thousands toiling away down here to dish up dainties for yer grub.”

  “How … nice,” I said, lamely. “How long will it be?”

  “Five minutes. Just got to get the hash warmed up.”

  I stared at the pot a moment; something brown and lumpy coated in lashings of brown gloop lurked in the depths.

  “I’ll go and ring the lunch bell.”

  When I reached the upper deck to round everyone up for lunch, I heard several loud bangs. Waldo was starboard, leaning over the side of the railings, firing his dueling pistol at an imaginary target out at sea.

  “Isn’t it time you hung up your pistols, Waldo?”

  “Not till I can hit a shark at half a furlong,” he replied, sending another bullet scudding into the waves.

  “Oh for goodness” sake, you’d better ask Champlon if you want shark for luncheon.’

  “Why don’t you ever have faith in me?” he snapped, glaring at me.

  While Waldo and I were bickering, Gaston Champlon and Aunt Hilda rounded the deck, apparently in perfect harmony. The pair of explorers might have patched up their differences but Waldo still remained sulky around the Frenchman. Not that Champlon noticed. He spied Waldo’s gun and a smile wreathed his face.

  “I will show you ’ow,” he said, trying to wrest the pistol from Waldo’s hands. “You are ’olding ’er wrong. A pistol is like a lady. You woo ’er, win ’er, handle ’er in ze graceful manner.”

  Waldo snarled and I placed myself between them to stop a fight.

  “Lunchtime,” I reminded them. “Cook’s whipped up something special.”

  “Special?” Aunt Hilda burst out, throwing down her spoon in disgust. “I expect the mongrel dogs prowling outside my house would turn their noses up at this.”

  We were in the dining room, a cabin that in its heyday must have been rather elegant. Now the chandelier was missing most of its crystal drops and the mahogany table was battered. Like the rest of the boat the room needed a good lick of paint. Isaac, who was so absentminded he could eat boiled earwigs without turning a hair, was guzzling the food, but the rest of us were pushing the stuff around our plates.

  “We’ve got to economize on the food,” said Isaac, who took a great interest in the practicalities of the voyage. “We can’t risk running out of grub before we reach Alexandria.”

  “I’ve never lived on such mush,” Aunt Hilda said. “Even on my expedition to Tanganyika we had pemmican.”

  “What on earth is pemmican?”

  “Five ninths of pounded dry meat to four ninths of melted grease. Boiled up in some water with a little mashed yam it is perfectly nutritious. If my old explorer friends Burke and Wills had some pemmican in their foolish dash over Australia they wouldn’t have starved to death. They should have come to me for advice, I’m always ready to help.”

  “The hash has some vegetables in it today,” I said, though I wasn’t sure the lumps under the brown gravy had any natural origin.

  “It’s worth it, for Rachel’s sake,” Ahmed said and bravely gulped down a spoonful.

  “No one could be more concerned for the safety of young Rebecca than I,” Aunt Hilda protested. No one bothered to correct her misnomer this time. It was impossible to shift an idea that had become lodged in her head. “However, I do believe we are paying rather too heavy a price.”

  “I agree with madame,” said Champlon. “No ledee should ’ave to eat zis muck. And for a Frenchman from the land of haute cuisine it is insupportable.”

  “You’re grown men and women but you’re acting like children! You couldn’t care less about Rachel. All you’re worried about is that stupid scarab!” Isaac burst out furiously. His face was all scrunched up and he looked as though he might burst into tears at any moment. I realized his show of calm over his sister was just a front. Inside a torrent had been building up.

  “Scarab?” Monsieur Champlon looked alert as a mustached bloodhound on a new trail. “What scarab?”

  Silence fell on the room as Isaac flushed, realizing his gaffe. It had been impressed on Isaac time and again that Champlon and Aunt Hilda must not be told of the scarab. A sudden gust of wind swept up a flurry of dust and set the broken chandelier tinkling.

  “Goodness! This is very interesting.” My aunt turned to me, her face so alive with suspicion I already felt the lameness of any excuse I could come up with. When, oh, when would this interminable voyage come to an end? It seemed like some imp of discontent was abroad on the boat, making fools of us all.

  “My dear Kit, what is this? You never mentioned a scarab!” Hilda continued. “Are you keeping things from me?”

  At that very moment a joyful cry sliced through the air:

  “LAND AHOY! LAND AHOY!”

  “Egypt!” I gasped, jumping to my feet.

  The ship gave a mighty lurch as we all rushed on to deck for the first, thrilling glimpse of Africa. I had got away with it! Our secret was safe, for the sight of Egypt had made Aunt Hilda forget all about the scarab. And what a sight! The sea stretched in a dull greenish bowl ending in a line of froth and there on the horizon the markings of shore. Brown, flat, bare; the harshness relieved only by the thrusting spires of minarets. Egypt, the ancient land of the Pharaohs!

  Chapter Twenty-five

  “You’re totally muddled, my boy. I always stay at Shepheard’s when I am in Cairo,” my aunt barked at the receptionist. “Good heavens, I’m doing you a favor. I’m told people travel to this hotel just for a chance of glimpsing me.”

  “Gaston Champlon is also famous ’ere,” the Frenchman put in, unwilling to be outshone by my aunt.

  “We are honored to have your custom but at the moment we are fully booked,” the receptionist murmured. “Please may I suggest the New Hotel?”

  “That hovel? A place for tradesmen and spies. Remember, boy, you are speaking to the Hilda Salter.”

  While my aunt and Champlon argued with the receptionist I turned away to the splendid lobby of Shepheard’s Hotel; acres of marble resplendent with gleaming ebony paneling and date palms in massive pots. My aunt had informed me that it was the place to stay in Cairo. Here flitted waiters in the small bucket-shaped red hats the locals call tarbooshes, tiny braided jackets and puffy white trousers. There stalked missionaries off to convert the heathen, sweating in their starched white suits and palm-leaf hats. Was that man followed by porter weighed down with bags a collector in search of mummies or a invalid taking a cruise down the Nile for his health? Among the Westerners who thronged Shepheard’s were Frenchmen, Americans and Greeks—surely spies, treasure-hunters and those who sought their fortune at the court of the Pasha?

  Dozens of idlers lounged on the sun-soaked terraces outside Shepheard’s watching life on Cairo’s busiest boulevard. A street bustling with laden donkeys, Turkish carpet dealers, veiled women carrying water jugs on their heads, Bedouin tribesmen in billowing cream tunics. How can I give a feeling for the true wonder of Cairo? The domes of the pyramids rising in the desert-fringed distance. The sizzling kebabs on the street side stalls, the scent of spicy curries and sweet rosewater, the swelling, swaying mass of folk of all shades and manner of dress. It was strange and fascinat
ing to me. How I wished we were free to wander awhile in the exotic streets; with their teetering fretwork upper-stories, like vast bird cages on the point of collapse. Alas, we weren’t here for sightseeing. Like a drumbeat in my head was Rachel, Rachel, Rachel.

  I didn’t care where we stayed. All that mattered was that we find my best friend. When I turned back to impress this on my aunt, the owner had been called, a deferential Swiss gentleman. He informed my aunt in soothing tones that he had been able to find a suite of rooms for her party. Typically she had won her battle! Soon after, bellboys arrived to take our luggage to our rooms—though I had just one small bag and protested I could manage myself. We were installed in rooms with a balcony overlooking the green oasis of the Ezbekiya Gardens opposite the hotel, one of the best suites in the hotel. I was weary and travel-stained. I freshened up with the jug of water on the marble washstand, then went to find Ahmed.

  He was outside on the verandah, huddled with Isaac and Waldo. Tumblers of fresh lime juice stood on the table in front of them. It was so tangy it made the teeth at the back of my mouth sting. Just what I needed to slough off the dust of travel.

  “So?” I asked Ahmed.

  He looked very grave: “I have some bad news, Kit.”

  “Don’t spare me.”

  “I made inquiries and found a friendly bellboy. At least he became friendly after I paid him a few dinar. He told me there was a party of Europeans staying here. A couple of men, blond hair, very pale. They ate in their bedroom. Did not appear in the dining room at all. With them was a party of a different type, not the usual customers at Shepheard’s at all. The boy said they were rough. There was a beautiful woman with them. He went into raptures over her. Enormously fat, with the whitest skin and bluest eyes our bellboy had ever seen.”

  I took a sip of lime water, choking a little as it went down to fast: “Velvet Nell.”