05 - The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb (3 page)

Uncle Ben showed a special permit to the blue-uniformed guard, and we
followed a narrow, private road that curved through the sand behind the pyramid.
We parked beside several other cars and vans in the blue-gray shadow of the
pyramid.

As I stepped out of the car, my chest was thudding with excitement. I stared
up at the enormous, worn stones of the Great Pyramid.

It’s over four thousand years old, I thought. I’m about to go inside
something that was built four thousand years ago!

“Your sneaker’s untied,” Sari said, pointing.

She sure knew how to bring a guy back down to earth.

I bent in the sand to tie my sneaker. For some reason, the left one was
always coming untied, even when I double-knotted it.

“My workers are already inside,” Uncle Ben told us. “Now, stick close
together, okay? Don’t wander off. The tunnels really are like a maze. It’s very
easy to get lost.”

“No problem,” I said, my trembling voice revealing how nervous and excited I
was.

“Don’t worry. I’ll keep an eye on Gabe, Dad,” Sari said.

She was only two months older than me. Why did she have to act like she was
my baby-sitter or something?

Uncle Ben handed us both flashlights. “Clip them onto your jeans as we go
in,” he instructed. He gazed at me. “You don’t believe in curses, do you? You
know—the ancient Egyptian kind.”

I didn’t know how to reply, so I shook my head.

“Good,” Uncle Ben replied, grinning. “Because one of my workers claims we’ve
violated an ancient decree by entering this new tunnel, and that we’ve activated
some curse.”

“We’re not scared,” Sari said, giving him a playful shove toward the
entrance. “Get going, Dad.”

And seconds later, we were stepping into the small, square opening cut into
the stone. Stooping low, I followed them through a narrow tunnel that seemed to slope gradually
down.

Uncle Ben led the way, lighting the ground with a bright halogen flashlight.
The pyramid floor was soft and sandy. The air was cool and damp.

“The walls are granite,” Uncle Ben said, stopping to rub a hand along the low
ceiling. “All of the tunnels were made of limestone.”

The temperature dropped suddenly. The air felt even wetter. I suddenly
realized why Uncle Ben had made us wear our sweatshirts.

“If you’re scared, we can go back,” Sari said.

“I’m fine,” I replied quickly.

The tunnel ended abruptly. A pale yellow wall rose up in front of us. Ben’s
flashlight darted over a small, dark hole in the floor.

“Down we go,” Ben said, groaning as he dropped to his knees. He turned back
to me. “Afraid there are no stairs down to the new tunnel. My workers installed
a rope ladder. Just take your time on it, take it slowly, one rung at a time,
and you’ll be fine.”

“No problem,” I said. But my voice cracked.

“Don’t look down,” Sari advised. “It might make you dizzy, and you’ll fall.”

“Thanks for the encouragement,” I told her. I pushed my way past her. “I’ll
go down first,” I said. I was already tired of her acting so superior. I decided
to show her who was brave and who wasn’t.

“No. Let me go first,” Uncle Ben said, raising a hand to stop me. “Then I’ll
shine the light up at the ladder and help you down.”

With another groan, he maneuvered himself into the hole. He was so big, he
nearly didn’t fit.

Slowly, he began to lower himself down the rope ladder.

Sari and I leaned over the hole and peered down, watching him descend. The
rope ladder wasn’t very steady. It swung back and forth under his weight as he
slowly, carefully, made his way down.

“It’s a long way down,” I said softly.

Sari didn’t reply. In the shadowy light, I could see her worried expression.
She was chewing on her lower lip as her dad reached the tunnel floor.

She was nervous, too.

That cheered me up a lot.

“Okay, I’m down. You’re next, Gabe,” Uncle Ben called up to me.

I turned and swung my feet onto the rope ladder. I grinned at Sari. “See ya.”

I lowered my hands to the sides of the rope ladder—and as I slid them down,
I cried out.

“Ow!”

The rope wasn’t smooth. It was coarse. It cut my hands.

The sharp stab of pain made me lift my hands.

And before I even realized what was happening, I started to fall.

Two hands reached down for mine. They shot through the air and grabbed my
wrists.

“Hold on!” Sari cried.

She had slowed my fall just enough to allow me to grab back onto the sides of
the rope ladder.

“Oh, wow!” I managed to utter. That was the best I could do. I gripped the
rope for dear life, waiting for my heart to stop pounding. I closed my eyes and
didn’t move. I squeezed the ropes so hard, my hands ached.

“Saved your life,” Sari called down to me, leaning into the opening, her face
inches from mine.

I opened my eyes and stared up at her. “Thanks,” I said gratefully.

“No problem,” she replied and burst out laughing, laughing from relief, I
guess.

Why couldn’t I save
her
life? I asked myself angrily. Why can’t
I
ever
be the big hero?

“What happened, Gabe?” Uncle Ben called from the tunnel floor below. His
booming voice echoed loudly through the chamber. The wide circle of light from his flashlight
danced across the granite wall.

“The rope cut my hands,” I explained. “I wasn’t expecting—”

“Just take your time,” he said patiently. “One rung at a time, remember?”

“Lower your hands. Don’t slide them,” Sari advised, her face poking through
the hole above me.

“Okay, okay,” I said, starting to breathe normally.

I took a deep breath and held it. Then, slowly, carefully, I made my way down
the long rope ladder.

A short while later, all three of us were standing on the tunnel floor,
holding our lighted flashlights, our eyes following the circles of light. “This
way,” Uncle Ben said quietly, and he headed off to the right, walking slowly,
stooping because of the low ceiling.

Our sneakers crunched on the sandy floor. I saw another tunnel leading off to
the right, then another tunnel on the left.

“We’re breathing air that is four thousand years old,” Ben said, keeping his
light aimed on the floor ahead of him.

“Smells like it,” I whispered to Sari. She laughed.

The air really did smell old. Kind of heavy and musty. Like someone’s attic.

The tunnel widened a little as it curved to the right.

“We’re going deeper into the earth,” Ben said. “Does it feel like you’re
going downhill?”

Sari and I both muttered that it did.

“Dad and I explored one of the side tunnels yesterday,” Sari told me. “We
found a mummy case inside a tiny room. A beautiful one in perfect condition.”

“Was there a mummy inside it?” I asked eagerly. I was dying to see a mummy.
The museum back home had only one. I’d stared at it and studied it all my life.

“No. It was empty,” Sari replied.

“Why didn’t the mummy have any hobbies?” Uncle Ben asked, stopping suddenly.

“I don’t know,” I answered.

“He was too wrapped up in his work!” Uncle Ben exclaimed. He laughed at his
own joke. Sari and I could only muster weak smiles.

“Don’t encourage him,” Sari told me, loud enough for her dad to hear. “He
knows a million mummy jokes, and they’re all just as bad.”

“Wait up. Just a sec,” I said. I bent down to tie my sneaker, which had come
undone again.

The tunnel curved, then divided into two tunnels. Uncle Ben led us through
the one on the left, which was so narrow we had to squeeze through it, making
our way sideways, heads bent, until it widened into a large, high-ceilinged
chamber.

I stood up straight and stretched. It felt so good not to be scrunched down.
I stared around the large room.

Several people came into view at the far wall, working with digging tools.
Bright spotlights had been hung above them on the wall, attached to a portable
generator.

Uncle Ben brought us over to them and introduced us. There were four workers,
two men and two women.

Another man stood off to the side, a clipboard in his hand. He was an
Egyptian, dressed all in white except for a red bandanna around his neck. He had
straight black hair, slicked down and tied in a ponytail behind his head. He
stared at Sari and me, but didn’t come over. He seemed to be studying us.

“Ahmed, you met my daughter yesterday. This is Gabe, my nephew,” Uncle Ben
called to him.

Ahmed nodded, but didn’t smile or say anything.

“Ahmed is from the university,” Uncle Ben explained to me in a low voice. “He
requested permission to observe us, and I said okay. He’s very quiet. But don’t
get him started on ancient curses. He’s the one who keeps warning me that I’m in
deadly danger.”

Ahmed nodded, but didn’t reply. He stared at me for a long while.

Weird guy, I thought.

I wondered if he’d tell me about the ancient curses. I loved stories about
ancient curses.

Uncle Ben turned to his workers. “So? Any progress today?” he asked.

“We think we’re getting real close,” a young, red-haired man wearing faded
jeans and a blue denim work shirt replied. And then he added, “Just a hunch.”

Ben frowned. “Thanks, Quasimodo,” he said.

The workers all laughed. I guess they liked Uncle Ben’s jokes.

“Quasimodo was the Hunchback of Notre Dame,” Sari explained to me in her
superior tone.

“I know, I know,” I replied irritably. “I get it.”

“We could be heading in the wrong direction altogether,” Uncle Ben told the
workers, scratching the bald spot on the back of his head. “The tunnel might be
over there.” He pointed to the wall on the right.

“No, I think we’re getting warm, Ben,” a young woman, her face smudged with
dust, said. “Come over here. I want to show you something.”

She led him over to a large pile of stones and debris. He shined his light
where she was pointing. Then he leaned closer to examine what she was showing
him.

“That’s very interesting, Christy,” Uncle Ben said, rubbing his chin. They
fell into a long discussion.

After a while, three other workers entered the chamber, carrying shovels and picks. One of them was carrying some kind of
electronic equipment in a flat metal case. It looked a little like a laptop
computer.

I wanted to ask Uncle Ben what it was, but he was still in the corner,
involved in his discussion with the worker named Christy.

Sari and I wandered back toward the tunnel entrance. “I think he’s forgotten
about us,” Sari said sullenly.

I agreed, shining my flashlight up at the high, cracked ceiling.

“Once he gets down here with the workers, he forgets everything but his
work,” she said, sighing.

“I can’t believe we’re actually inside a pyramid!” I exclaimed.

Sari laughed. She kicked at the floor with one sneaker. “Look—ancient
dirt,” she said.

“Yeah.” I kicked up some of the sandy dirt, too. “I wonder who walked here
last. Maybe an Egyptian priestess. Maybe a pharaoh. They might have stood right
here on this spot.”

“Let’s go exploring,” Sari said suddenly.

“Huh?”

Her dark eyes gleamed, and she had a really devilish look on her face. “Let’s
go, Gabey—let’s check out some tunnels or something.”

“Don’t call me Gabey,” I said. “Come on, Sari, you know I hate that.”

“Sorry,” she apologized, giggling. “You coming?”

“We can’t,” I insisted, watching Uncle Ben. He was having some kind of
argument with the worker carrying the thing that looked like a laptop. “Your dad
said we had to stick together. He said—”

“He’ll be busy here for hours,” she interrupted, glancing back at him. “He
won’t even notice we’re gone. Really.”

“But, Sari—” I started.

“Besides,” she continued, putting her hands on my shoulders and pushing me
backwards toward the chamber door, “he doesn’t want us hanging around. We’ll
only get in the way.”

“Sari—”

“I went exploring yesterday,” she said, pushing me with both hands. “We won’t
go far. You can’t get lost. All the tunnels lead back to this big room. Really.”

“I just don’t think we should,” I said, my eyes on Uncle Ben. He was down on
his hands and knees now, digging against the wall with some kind of a pick.

“Let go of me,” I told her. “Really. I—”

And then she said what I knew she’d say. What she
always
says when she
wants to get her way.

“Are you chicken?”

“No,” I insisted. “You know your dad said—”

“Chicken? Chicken? Chicken?” She began clucking like a chicken. Really obnoxious.

“Stop it, Sari.” I tried to sound tough and menacing.

“Are you chicken,
Gabey
?” she repeated, grinning at me as if she’d just
won some big victory. “Huh,
Gabey
?”

“Stop calling me that!” I insisted.

She just stared at me.

I made a disgusted face. “Okay, okay. Let’s go exploring,” I told her.

I mean, what else could I say?

“But not far,” I added.

“Don’t worry,” she said, grinning. “We won’t get lost. I’ll just show you
some of the tunnels I looked at yesterday. One of them has a strange animal
picture carved on the wall. I think it’s some kind of a cat. I’m not sure.”

“Really?” I cried, instantly excited. “I’ve seen pictures of relief carvings,
but I’ve never—”

“It may be a cat,” Sari said. “Or maybe a person with an animal head. It’s
really weird.”

“Where is it?” I asked.

“Follow me.”

We both gave one last glance back to Uncle Ben, who was down on his hands and
knees, picking away at the stone wall.

Then I followed Sari out of the chamber.

We squeezed through the narrow tunnel, then turned and followed a slightly
wider tunnel to the right. I hesitated, a few steps behind her. “Are you sure we’ll be able to get back?” I asked, keeping my voice low so she
couldn’t accuse me of sounding frightened.