The Vandemark Mummy (6 page)

“
CLJ
turned down a paper I offered them,” Ken said. Phineas was afraid he would tell them all about it, but just then Mr. Hall pulled his hands up out of the straw. One hand held something round and flat and wrapped in cloth. The other hand gradually uncovered it. Ken had stopped speaking, to watch. Phineas caught Ken's mood, like measles, and like Ken he fixed his eyes on his father's hands, on what was about to be revealed.

It was only flowers, just some circle of flowery leafy stuff. It looked like a small Christmas wreath, made out of ivy leaves and little berries. Ken, his father, even Althea, they all just stared at it.

It was in good condition. Phineas guessed that made
it different, made it valuable. Besides, the more he looked at the wreath, the more Phineas liked it: The ivy leaves floated as if they were on water, somehow, floating between the clumps of berries that joined the twined leaves, or separated them.

“May I?” Ken asked, holding out his two large hands. “If this is genuine,” Ken said, cradling it in his hands, “you have yourself a treasure.”

“You mean the college does,” Mr. Hall said, in a dreamy and distracted voice.

Phineas looked more carefully. It didn't look like any treasure to him. He wouldn't mind having it in his room, but that didn't make it a treasure. There was lots of stuff in his room nobody would ever call treasure. “What's so special about it?” he asked, figuring that, as usual, there might be something he didn't know that would explain everything.

Ken held the wreath out in front of him. He looked, just for a second—never mind that he was in his gray jogging sweats after his daily six-mile run—he looked like an ancient Viking about to make an offering to his gods. “This is a funerary crown, Phineas. They were used during the Hellenistic period, about five hundred to two hundred
B.C
. The leaves are ivy, see? But they're wrought in bronze, or so I hope, then gilded. The berries are formed from clay. If it's genuine, it's in remarkably fine condition. Museum condition.”

“Why shouldn't it be genuine?” Phineas wondered.

“Often wealthy collectors were sold fakes,” his father said. “They were sitting ducks for anyone who wanted to bilk them, because they didn't often know anything
about what they were buying. This Vandemark man is liable to be a collector like that, in which case all of this may be worthless.”

“That would make Mrs. Batchelor happy,” Phineas said.

Ken rotated the crown around in his hands, looking at it.

“How do you know if something's fake?” Phineas asked.

“The papers, the provenance of each item,” his father told him. “Expert opinion, if there's any question. You sort of get an eye for what's real, experience, knowledge, the same way—you know when you meet someone if he's honest. I mean, usually you know. Or if she is. Never mind that, you know what I mean. The wreath looks good to me, doesn't it to you, Ken? I assume from its condition that the crowns weren't buried with the bodies,” Mr. Hall said.

“No.” Ken couldn't take his eyes off it. Althea got down from her stool to come look more closely at it.

“The Greeks in Egypt cremated their dead, didn't they, Ken?” Althea asked.

“Very good,” Ken said, as if she had answered a tough question in class. “Yes, they did, and the ashes were put into hydra vases, and then these crowns were hung around the necks of the vases. I can't believe I actually have one in my hands. May I have it, Sam?”

“Have it?” Althea sounded shocked. “But—”

“Think, Althea,” Ken scolded. “If you want to be a scholar, you'll have to learn to think before you speak, in order to avoid sounding like a ninny.”

Ken was certainly putting Althea in her place. Phineas wasn't sure how he felt about that. Althea's red cheeks told him how she felt—embarrassed.

“I was about to ask the same question,” Mr. Hall said.

“Oh, I'm sorry, Sam, I meant, have it for a paper.”

“Sure,” Mr. Hall said. “Be my guest.”

“I'm serious,” Ken said. “If anyone else inquires, you'll tell them it's reserved?”

“You have my word,” Mr. Hall said.

“Including—I have to ask—yourself?”

“I'm already too busy. No, listen, you can have it in exchange for the help you're giving me with the collection.”

“Wonderful. That's just—wonderful. I tell you, Sam, it's promising for the mummy, isn't it?”

“Why don't we open the mummy crate now?” Phineas suggested. He'd never seen a mummy up close before, but he'd seen plenty of late-night movies.

“Not until Saturday, Phineas,” his father reminded him. “That's only one more day, and we'll have everything else uncrated by then. I've arranged with President Blight for a viewing Saturday after lunch. He's having a previewing lunch for certain selected guests. I've also promised O'Meara she can be here. The mummy is the big occasion.”

“Phineas doesn't care about the occasion—he's just hoping to be scared out of his wits,” Althea said.

She was making Phineas sound bad. He thought of telling her she was wrong, but he figured she was probably right. When he pictured what the mummy would look like, it was pretty horrible, and he could almost feel
the chills running up and down his spine. He
was
looking forward to that. Almost as good as a really good roller coaster, that's what he was hoping for, like the Devil's Loop. He'd look at the mummy's face, at its empty eye sockets especially, and his stomach would slam up into his heart. . . .

*  *  *

The Halls spent Saturday morning getting the cellar room ready, sweeping—Phineas's job—and setting out labels on index cards by the artifacts lined up along the double shelves—Althea's and their father's. Then they went home to wash up, become presentable. They returned by 1:15 to the room that now looked, to Phineas's eye anyway, more like a hospital operating room than a workroom. The mummy's crate waited like a coffin on the long table in the center of the room. Behind it, odd shapes and colors lined the shelves. The light was bright and the machinery hummed patiently.

After a while, Ken arrived. Mr. Hall greeted him. “You're dressed up.” The Halls wore jeans and sweatshirts. Ken wore white slacks and a long-sleeved knit shirt with a polo player embroidered on its chest.

Ken looked down at himself and you could almost see him deflating. “Do you think I've overdone it? If there's publicity, I wouldn't mind being noticed, and you have to dress for success sometimes.” Mr. Hall tried to say something, but Ken talked on. “All of us here know that what a man looks like is no indication of his abilities, but you have to admit we live in an ivory tower.” Mr. Hall opened his mouth, but Ken gave him no chance to speak. “Not that I don't like the college, don't get me wrong,
but—this isn't Harvard, is it? If I had kids,” he added quickly, with a flash of his teeth for Phineas's father, “I'd seriously consider making Vandemark my life work. So maybe it's lucky I don't. Have kids, I mean. My wife doesn't have time for a family anyway. Not with her career as hot as it is. It's no time for her to be starting a family.”

“What's her career?” Phineas asked. A hot career might be something really cool—like a singer or actress. Phineas had never met a real singer, or actress, or anyone married to one.

“Michelle is a stockbroker, with Merrill Lynch.”

“Oh.”

“She's an incredible woman, Michelle, and charming too—one of the new women, you know. You'd approve of her, Althea, she's impressive. Last year her earnings topped . . .” His voice dribbled off. “I'm sorry, I don't mean to boast, I'm just so proud of her I forget other people might not be interested.”

“She sounds successful,” Althea observed.

“That she is. And she thrives on success. You probably know what I mean. She's probably a lot like your mom.”

None of the Halls had anything to say about that.

“Don't get me wrong, I'm really proud of her.”

Phineas hoped Althea would let that pass, but his sister couldn't, of course.

“Is she proud of you?” Althea asked.

“The kitten has claws, doesn't she?” Ken said. His mouth stretched as if he were smiling. “It's open season on men these days, isn't it, Sam?”

“Well,” Mr. Hall answered, giving Althea
a look
, “it's
not an easy time for marriages. I try to consider it a challenge.”

“Sorry,” Althea muttered.

“Do you really think we've been that hard on them?” Ken asked. He wasn't asking Althea, Phineas noticed. “Seriously, do you?”

Luckily, at that point they heard footsteps and voices in the hall, and the clacking sound of high-heeled shoes, so they all turned to greet whoever was arriving.

It was Mrs. Blight, the president's wife, once again all dressed up for the occasion, and once again in the company of the expensively dressed lady. Mrs. Blight introduced the lady as “Mrs. Prynn, who is, as you've probably heard, one of the most involved members of our board of governors.” Mrs. Prynn wasn't interested in any of them, except for Mr. Hall.

“You've been given quite a responsibility,” she said, as if she doubted his ability to carry it out, especially now that she'd seen him up close.

“Quite an honor,” Mr. Hall agreed, agreeably.

Mrs. Prynn looked around the room, not pleased with what she saw. Phineas could see why she might not be. Room 015 was pretty much like a bunker, like the kind of place where Hitler had spent his last days—cement block walls, four bare bulbs hanging down from the ceiling, the metal boxes that were the climate control tucked back into a corner, humming.

“Dear Olivia would never have done it this way,” Mrs. Prynn announced, with pursed lips, to Mrs. Blight, who made agreeing murmurs. “Olivia McPhail and I were lifelong friends, Mr. Hall. Lifelong. She
would never have assigned any collection she'd gathered to a . . . cellar.”

Mrs. Blight murmured excuses.

“Or an entirely inexperienced curator.”

Mrs. Blight murmured apologies.

“But isn't that just the way poor Felix always did things?” Mrs. Prynn asked, suddenly cheerful. “He could never admit that he didn't have Olivia's taste, or judgment.”

“What judgment?” a man inquired from the doorway, a man of about Mrs. Prynn's age, a fringe of white hair around his head, a portly man in a three-piece pinstriped suit, with a walking stick in his hands, its silver handle carved into a duck's head. “What taste?”

“I might have known you'd be here.” Mrs. Prynn's lips were pursed again.

Phineas felt like he was the audience at a tennis match, with his head turning from one to the other of the two.

“You aren't thinking of Olivia's sentimental collection of third-rate watercolors, are you?” the man asked.

Mrs. Prynn sniffed.

“When she could have bought Braque, or Klimt, or Chagall? No, you must be thinking of her investment in the swamplands of northern Florida, another example of her judgment. And business acumen.” The man leaned on his walking stick, folding his hands over the duck's head, and—having quelled Mrs. Prynn—asked Mrs. Blight, “Aren't you going to introduce me to the lucky man?”

“Lucky—? Oh, you mean Mr. Hall. Why yes, of
course. Sam, this is Calvin Fletcher, another board member.”

“Pleased to meet you, Hall, and congratulations. Felix always liked to put his bets on wild cards. You've lucked out on this hand.”

“I certainly feel lucky,” Phineas's father said.

“Dr. Simard of the History Department, Mr. Fletcher,” Ken said, stepping up and holding out his hand. “I don't think we've met. I've been doing what I can to help Sam out down here, using my special knowledge.”

Mr. Fletcher shook the hand. “Pleasure. Well. Well? Shall we take a look at this mummy before any more of the afternoon is lost? I'm a busy man. By the way, I approve of the security measures you've taken, Hall, and you've chosen a good climate control system. I'm on the board of the Museum of Fine Arts so I know something about how to handle antiquities.” This he said with a glance at Mrs. Prynn, to be sure she was still quelled.

“I do have an afternoon engagement,” she answered, as if he had asked. “I have a cocktail party in Kennebunk to get ready for.” She smiled a mysterious, hinting smile.

Mr. Hall took a crowbar and started prying at the lid of the crate. The nails creaked, pulling free. “We're going to take the whole box apart,” he said, “and packing might fall around—I can't predict.” Ken took up another crowbar, to help. The visitors drew back, Mr. Fletcher at the opposite end of the table from Mrs. Prynn, and Mrs. Blight as close to the exact middle point as she could get. As the wooden top creaked free, a voice came out of the corridor—“Wait! Stop!”

O'Meara ran into the room, her dark hair flapping against her cheeks, her sandles flapping against the floor. “I'm sorry. I got lost—this is a real rabbit warren down here.” Her camera was up and she was taking pictures. “Did I miss anything?” She came up to the table and looked into the box. “It's gone! There's nothing but straw here!” She looked slowly from one of them to the other, a complete circle. “Did someone steal it?” she whispered, “Or—”

Mr. Hall cleared his throat, and set the lid down on the floor. “Miss O'Meara—”

“No Miss, no Ms., I
told
you. Just O'Meara. I don't want to run into any more of that sexist garbage than I have to. What's wrong here? What's happened?”

“We were just taking the top off the mummy's crate,” Mr. Hall continued, patiently. “Like everything else in the collection, the mummy is packed in straw. O'Meara,” he explained to the two board members, “is covering this event for the
Post
.”