The Curse of the Pharaoh #1

by Sir Steve Stevenson

  Agatha squeezed a few drops of juice onto Hasan’s dry lips, then used the peel to remove the spine.

  Like magic, the handler came back to life and stretched. “What happened?” he asked, looking dazed.

  His colleagues cheered, waving their arms in the air and singing a song in Agatha’s honor.

  “What are they saying, Auntie?”

  Patricia Mistery smiled, pleased. “That you have the power to waken the dead. They believe you’re the reincarnation of Isis, queen of the underworld!”

  “Queen of the underworld?” Dash said with a snort. “More like queen of the lemons!”

  “Aunt Patricia is kind of…eccentric,” said Dash, leaning over the railing to stare at the muddy waters of the Nile. Was that a log floating ahead or a crocodile?

  “Big surprise,” countered Agatha. “She’s a Mistery, right? Our whole family’s got a few screws loose.”

  “Yeah, sure…but where did she come up with this tugboat? What do you think?”

  “Stinky, rusty, and slow. My parents would love it.”

  They both laughed, watching the old tugboat’s funnel belch clouds of black smoke. Two long-masted boats with graceful, triangular sails—feluccas, thought Agatha happily—glided past them.

  Before she said good-bye, Aunt Patricia had assured them. “The Duat won’t attract attention from anyone. I’ve instructed the crew to dock at an abandoned pier near the foot of the path on your map. Will this suit you, dear children?”

  At the sound of “abandoned pier,” Dash gave a weak smile.

  But Agatha was more excited than ever. Thumbing through her dictionary of ancient Egyptian, she informed everyone that the name “Duat” meant “afterlife.” This news depressed Dash even more.

  The afterlife tug was no speedboat, but at least it would get them where they had to go. To the abandoned pier. Dash gulped as the dark shape ahead took a sudden dive, flashing its scaly tail. Not a log.

  “I propose we look over those downloads,” said Agatha, popping open her travel umbrella for shade. “Okay with you, cousin?”

  Dash nodded, glad to think about anything besides crocodiles.

  They made themselves comfortable upwind of the camels’ enclosure and pored over the printouts.

  Meanwhile, Chandler was busy chasing Watson around the deck. Quick as lightning, the cat scurried between sailors’ legs, hiding in the most unlikely places.

  “Okay, here’s a file on that Egyptologist from the film clip,” said Agatha.

  “Professor Maigret, right?”

  “Hercule Maigret of the Sorbonne.”

  “The Sore Bun?” Dash echoed.

  She raised her eyebrows. “The Sorbonne? World-famous university in Paris?” Sometimes Agatha wondered if Dash ever studied. “The file says he has two assistants, one Polish and one German, and twenty-one Egyptian laborers,” she continued, licking her finger to flick through the pages.

  Suddenly she spotted a curious photograph. She pulled it out.

  It was a full-length snapshot of four people, looking proud and satisfied. At their feet lay an ancient clay tablet covered in tiny, chiseled hieroglyphs.

  Dash peered at the photo. “Professor Maigret is the guy in the middle. You can tell by the Santa Claus beard,” he laughed. “What are the other two names again?”

  “Let me see…” Agatha pulled back a wisp of hair. “There’s Dr. Paretsky, he’s Polish and an expert in hieroglyphic writing, and Dr. Dortmunder from Germany, he’s a geochemist.”

  “I bet Paretsky is the blond guy, and the chubby one is Dortmunder.”

  “Me too. But who is the fourth man?” she asked, almost talking to herself.

  The man’s tunic was decorated with glyphs, and his long, pointy beard gave him a sinister look. He had the air of an ancient Egyptian priest: someone who might turn you into a mummy.

  “Wow, what hypnotic eyes!” Dash said with a shudder.

  Meanwhile, Agatha flipped through the pages looking for any hint of his identity. “I’m afraid we won’t know who he is until we get to Tomb 66,” she said, disappointed. She drew a large question mark in her notebook and wrote underneath it: FOURTH MAN. “Can you bring that photo back up on your EyeNet?”

  Dash nodded, his thumbs flying over the keypad. “Got it,” he said.

  “Good. Now zoom in on the tablet.”

  He did.

  “Notice anything?”

  “It looks thin and fragile, like pastry crust,” Dash observed. “How could someone steal it without it crumbling to bits?”

  “Excellent analysis, cousin!”

  Agatha wrote down TRANSPORTATION OF TABLET? in her notebook. “Anything else?” she asked.

  “Umm, don’t think so…”

  “Look harder, Dash.”

  He zoomed in even closer. He rubbed his chin and narrowed his eyes. “Is it something about the hieroglyphs?” he murmured doubtfully.

  “Way to go, Dash! I pulled open one of the little drawers in my memory, and realized…” Agatha paused for dramatic effect.

  Dash hung on her words: his cousin’s prodigious photographic memory was legendary in the Mistery family.

  “In the hieroglyphs compendium I studied last spring…,” she said, squinting at the screen. “Yes, I’m quite sure.”

  “Sure of what?”

  “Don’t quote me on this, but I think every hieroglyph on that tablet is carved in reverse!”

  Reaching into her saddlebag, Agatha pulled out a makeup case.

  Dash’s jaw dropped. “So that means you’re putting on lip gloss?”

  “Don’t be silly,” Agatha winked. “A woman’s purse is a useful tool kit. Check it out!”

  She popped open a mirrored compact and set it in front of the screen.

  In the mirror image, each hieroglyph seemed to be written the right way.

  “Remember, they only had simple bronze mirrors back then, and no zoom key,” said Agatha, resting her chin on her intertwined fingers. “Whoever carved these hieroglyphs wanted to make sure they were a challenge to read.”

  Dash jumped to his feet, excited. “Of course!” he said. “That explains why Professor Maigret sounded so vague in the film…”

  “He never had time to translate the tablet!” Agatha said, finishing his thought. She scrawled hieroglyphs reversed in her notebook.

  “What else?” she pressed.

  But just at that moment, the Duat’s crew all started talking at once as the engine shut down with a groan and a shrill, metallic squawk. “Is it broken?” cried Dash.

  He and Agatha were joined by Chandler, who had Watson tucked under one arm. “Looks like some trouble, Miss Agatha,” he said.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “It seems to be a police checkpoint.”

  A patrol boat sped toward them, water spraying from the propeller. Then it pulled up alongside with machine guns pointing at the Duat.

  Dash went as white as a sheet. “Aunt Patricia promised we wouldn’t get any attention!” he screeched. “I call this a lot of attention!”

  “Well, yelling won’t help,” said Agatha. “And we’re not doing anything wrong.”

  “Right. Just pretending to be a TV crew to get to a tomb that’s not opened yet. No problem there.”

  Agatha shushed him. In the tense moments that followed, a uniformed officer boarded the Duat with one hand on his gun belt. The captain came out of the cabin and met him on deck. The tugboat captain looked tough, with a grizzled face, hooked nose, and no-nonsense manner. He sent the crew away with a snap of his fingers, speaking quietly with the imposing policeman.

  “I wish I spoke better Arabic,” Agatha whispered.

  “I wish I spoke any,” said Dash. “Or maybe it’s best not to know.”

  The policeman checked the tugboat’s registration, took a quick glance at the cargo, including the camels, then pointed at Agatha and her companions.

  “Where did we put those press passes?” muttered Dash. “Without them, our
cover is blown!”

  The captain continued to speak in low tones, then beckoned to them with an eloquent wave of his hand.

  “We’re done for!” Dash panicked. “They’re going to arrest us!”

  Agatha grabbed him by the front of his shirt. “Get a grip, Dash! Man up!”

  She had to forcefully haul him in front of the policeman, who greeted them with a toothy smile.

  “He wants to be filmed by the BBC,” the captain explained. “Do what he asks and keep your mouths shut. He doesn’t speak very much English.”

  “Um, great. Good to know,” said Dash awkwardly. He picked up his video camera and said, “Action! I think.” Raising her microphone, Agatha signaled to the policeman, who furrowed his brow and moved through a series of Hollywood action-star poses.

  “Bond, James Bond.” He grinned, flashing two thumbs-up. “Shaken, no stir, yes?” He bounded dramatically back onto the patrol boat, which raced away, roaring.

  The tugboat captain eyed Dash. “The police were looking for a gang of smugglers. That’s not you three, is it?”

  “Absolutely not!” Dash said with a gulp.

  “Good,” rasped the captain. “Next time, remember to take off the lens cap.” Pulling down the brim of his cap, he strode back to the cabin.

  Dash hit himself in the forehead. “Lens cap. Duh!” While he put the camera back into its case, Agatha filled Chandler in on their findings. He listened attentively, turning the photos in his giant hands.

  Finally, late in the afternoon, they reached their destination.

  The Duat had already chugged past great temples and riverside villages, heading for the barren hills to the north. The clusters of palm trees and farmland gave way to rougher terrain. Finally they docked at a rotting wooden pier, covered with wild vegetation.

  Clearly no one had used it for years. The three adventurers (plus camels and cat) quickly disembarked and found themselves on a scrub-covered plain, crisscrossed by muddy streams.

  “I thought Egypt was all sand dunes and desert,” said Dash, a little confused.

  “The desert begins after you pass the mountains,” Agatha told him. “Here, on the banks of the Nile, the land is fertile, especially during the summer flood season.”

  “How do you know that?” Dash demanded. “Wait, don’t tell me. Because you’re the rebooted queen of the underworld.”

  “Cut it out,” she laughed. “All I did was memorize a few maps of this region.”

  “You and your famous memory drawers!” Dash said with a snort. “All right, open one up. Where’s the trail? I can’t get a GPS read on my EyeNet; no signal.”

  Agatha craned her neck, scanning the marshland. “It all looks like mud to me,” she had to admit.

  Chandler, who was twice her height and had better eyesight, pointed at a sloping hill in the distance.

  “Dirt path up that hillside, Miss,” he said quietly.

  “Excellent, Chandler.” Agatha smiled. “That must be where we need to go.”

  “Are you sure, cousin?” Dash asked.

  She didn’t respond: she was already clambering onto her camel with the skill of a born rider. Dash moaned, eyeing his camel. “No spitting this time, okay, dude?” Somehow he and Chandler got onto their camels in one piece. Agatha was already riding ahead, urging her camel forward as fast as it would go. Dash and Chandler struggled to catch up.

  They rode through the back country for a good half hour and then took a dirt path that wound upward between the jagged peaks fringing the Valley of the Kings.

  Agatha had to stop every few minutes to wait for her saddle-sore friends, and each time she took the chance to survey the landscape with a small pair of high-powered binoculars.

  The path was rocky and steep, full of dangerous turns and unmarked intersections.

  “The bad news is we could get lost,” said Agatha, tapping her nose.

  “And the good news?” Dash panted behind her.

  Agatha put the binoculars back in the pocket of her khaki shirt. “No guards to get in our way,” she said, getting back on the path.

  But she was wrong.

  Big-time.

  Just before sunset, they stopped in a narrow gulch to recheck their coordinates. Suddenly they heard echoing noises. Raising their heads from the map, they saw gun barrels poking out from between the rocks.

  “Don’t move!” a man shouted in English.

  At the sound of his bass voice, Dash started to shake. “This is serious business,” he mumbled in terror. “This time we’re really in trouble!”

  A dozen men swarmed into the gulch. They were armed, but no one was wearing a police or military uniform.

  Who were they? Smugglers? Or tomb robbers?

  “I have a very bad feeling about this,” Agatha whispered. “Let’s just stay calm and find out what they want.”

  Dash and Chandler nodded in silence.

  In the dim glow of dusk, a flashlight beam cut through the air like a blade. When the light hit Dash, he jerked on his camel’s reins and raised both arms high in the air. “We’re innocent!” he cried. “We surrender!”

  His sudden movement spooked his camel, which kicked and bucked, trying to shake off its saddle and rider.

  The attackers watched as Dash twisted around, frantically trying to free his legs from the saddlebags, and they burst out laughing.

  “Oh, this is just perfect!” groaned Dash. “I get to be mocked while I die!”

  The rippling laughter was interrupted by a French-accented voice: “You there! Give the boy some assistance!”

  The sentence was uttered by a wiry, bald man with a white beard. It was Professor Maigret, the Egyptologist from the film clip.

  Agatha dismounted and stepped forward to join him. “We’re here about the stolen tablet, Professor,” she informed him.

  He looked momentarily startled. “What did you say?” he asked anxiously. “Is agent DM14 here?”

  Agatha pointed at Chandler.

  “At your service,” the butler said, giving Agatha a knowing nod and clambering down from his camel.

  Still flailing around in the saddlebag straps, Dash protested, “What? Um, no, there must be a mistake! This is my mission.” But Professor Maigret was already shaking Chandler’s huge hand.

  “I’m happy you’re here, Agent DM14,” the scholar said, relieved. “Please pardon my crew for the unfriendly reception. There have been many strange things going on in these parts.”

  “You don’t say,” Chandler said stiffly.

  “By the way, this is my hieroglyphs specialist, Doc—”

  “A pleasure to meet you, Dr. Paretsky,” Chandler said, recognizing the young scholar from the photograph. In real life, he appeared even paler, his thin shoulders hunched, his eyes watery.

  “The pleasure is mine,” the scholar replied in a low voice, intimidated by the butler’s bulk.

  Then he looked at Agatha and Dash. “But who are these children?” he asked, perplexed.

  “Even master detectives need clever assistants,” Chandler said gravely.

  “C’est vrai, this is true,” interjected Maigret, happily rubbing his hands together. Then he turned to a handful of aides. “You will please escort our guests to base camp,” he ordered.

  As the group began to move, Dash sidled up behind Agatha, protesting. “I don’t get it. I’m the master detective!”

  “Lower your voice, please,” Agatha said in a hushed tone.

  “Tell me why you lied to them,” Dash insisted.

  “Simple,” she said. “If they’re focused on Chandler, we can move around more freely.”

  Dash thought about this for a moment, turning his gaze upward to the first stars of the night. “That makes sense,” he admitted grudgingly. “Keep their eyes off us…”

  “Let’s run a quick check,” Agatha suggested.

  “A quick check of what?”

  “Can your EyeNet detect heat sources?”

  “Yes, of course. Why?”

/>   “Activate the scanner when we get to base camp,” she said. “According to our information, there should be three scholars and twenty-one laborers, plus the fourth man from the photo, for a total of twenty-five people…”

  Dash pulled out the EyeNet and punched in a sequence of keys. “Got it. You want to find out whether anyone’s missing,” he whispered.

  “If the tablet was taken somewhere outside the main camp, the thieves will be with it as well. Am I right?” Agatha smiled and Dash nodded, impressed.

  It was practically dark by the time they reached their destination, descending a long, sandy hill into base camp. Now that the sun had gone down, the desert air quickly grew cooler, and Agatha shivered.

  They found themselves in a funnel-shaped valley surrounded by cliffs. In the silvery moonlight, the laborers’ tents looked like floating ghosts.

  Professor Maigret led his guests into the pavilion reserved for the heads of the expedition.

  Just outside the kitchen, they came across the third Egyptologist, a rotund young German with his mouth smeared with chocolate ice cream.

  “Nice to meet you, Dr. Dortmunder.” Chandler spoke without hesitation, easing into the role of a master detective.

  The geologist appeared stunned to be recognized. He quickly swallowed the last of his chocolate-cherry ice-cream pop. “Is anyone hungry?” he mumbled with his mouth full. “I was just having a predinner snack…”

  While the two assistants cleared the table of papers and tools, Maigret took the butler’s arm, planning to show the lab tent to the master detective.

  Agatha drew close to her cousin’s ear. “What’s the head count?” she whispered.

  “Some of the heat spots are blurry,” he murmured. “I count twenty-three. Looks like there are two people missing!”

  “Interesting. Extremely interesting.” Agatha nodded.

  Soon after, the pavilion filled with the smell of sizzling sausage and crispy potatoes, served on tin plates. It was a far cry from Aunt Patricia’s exotic feast, but it was hearty and filling.

  Everyone wolfed down their food in silence, even Maigret and Chandler. The bony Paretsky pushed his potatoes aside, but Dr. Dortmunder ate seconds and thirds. Watson sat in Agatha’s lap and, with a swipe of his paw, stole a whole sausage right off Dash’s plate.