Who's Your Mummy?

  And in the back room, I heard the mummies start to chant:

  “HAIR! HAIR! HAIR! HAIR!”

  Ancient voices croaking the word from somewhere deep in their throats. An animal sound, like bullfrogs at night.

  “HAIR! HAIR! HAIR! HAIR!”

  Sonja clicked the shears above me. Once. Twice.

  Then she lowered them to my head.

  “NOOOOOOOO!”

  I let out a long scream. I jerked my shoulders up. Twisted hard. Tried to squirm out of Jonathan’s grasp.

  But Annie hurried over to the table to help hold me down.

  “Let me go! You can’t do this!” I shrieked.

  Sonja clicked the heavy shears above my head. “You’d better be holding still, girl,” she said. “Faith, you don’t want to be losing an ear.”

  “You won’t miss your hair for long,” Annie said. “You’ll have many months to grow a new batch for us.”

  “No — stop!” I pleaded.

  Above my head, the shears slid open. Sonja lowered them slowly to my hair.

  And then I saw Peter move.

  He lowered his shoulder — and barreled into Jonathan. He caught Jonathan by surprise. Knocked the wind out of him.

  Jonathan uttered a choked gasp. His hands fell away from me as he staggered back. He bent over, hands on his knees, struggling to breathe.

  I rolled off the table before he could catch his breath.

  Annie made a wild grab for me. Missed.

  I dropped to the floor and took off toward the door.

  “HAIR! HAIR! HAIR! HAIR!”

  The mummies in the back room continued their ugly chant.

  Jonathan stood up again, his face bright red, his eyes wild. He waved both arms frantically, signaling Annie and Sonja to chase after me.

  Then he dove for Peter. Peter ducked away and raced to the door.

  “HAIR! HAIR! HAIR! HAIR!” The weird, low voices rang in my ears.

  We were almost out of the white room when the door swung open.

  “Oh!” I cried out as a man stepped in and blocked our path.

  “You!” Peter shouted.

  The big, evil-looking man with the scar across his forehead. He wore a dark trench coat with the collar turned up to his face. His boots were splattered with mud.

  He was breathing hard, sweating. His chest heaved up and down. His eyes darted furiously around the room.

  Jonathan raised his fists as if preparing for a fight. Annie and Sonja dropped back, shock on their faces.

  “How did you get in here?” Jonathan boomed.

  The man didn’t answer.

  “Out! Get out!” Jonathan screamed.

  “No. I’m taking the kids,” the man said.

  “You’re not taking them,” Jonathan said, stepping forward. “No way.”

  The big man stiffened his back, preparing for a fight.

  Peter and I were stuck between them.

  “Why are you after us?” I cried. “Who ARE you?”

  The man narrowed his eyes at me. “I’m your Uncle Jonathan,” he said.

  “HAIR! HAIR! HAIR! HAIR!”

  “I’m your Uncle Jonathan,” the man repeated. He had to shout over the cry of the mummies. “This man is a fraud!” He took a menacing step toward Jonathan.

  The man we knew as Jonathan backed up to the metal table. “You’ll never take these kids from me,” he said. “I need them.”

  I spun back and forth between them, trying to clear my head. Was the bald man telling the truth? Was he really our uncle?

  “You might as well know the truth,” the first Jonathan said, “since none of you are ever leaving this house.”

  He ran his hand back through his long hair. His eyes moved from the man at the door, back to Peter and me.

  “My name is Tuttan-Rha,” he said. “I told you before, my two friends and I come from the Egypt of two thousand years ago.”

  “You — you’re really not our uncle? Then … how do you know us?” I asked. My voice came out in a trembling whisper. “How did you know to meet us at the train station?”

  A strange smile spread over Tuttan-Rha’s face. The smile pulled his skin tight over his cheekbones. It was like looking at his skull.

  “I saw your uncle in the village a few weeks ago,” he said. “He was showing off pictures of you. Pictures that your Granny Vee had sent him. I saw your long black hair in the pictures. I almost started to drool. I knew that I needed your hair. Needed it to live!”

  Sonja nodded. She still held the shears in her hand. “Yes, we needed you. Such beautiful hair. So perfect.”

  “Your uncle’s house is in the village,” Tuttan-Rha said. “On the day you two arrived, I sent Sonja there to delay him. It was easy. While she kept Jonathan busy, I picked you up in the carriage and brought you here to my house.”

  “I got to the train station, and you weren’t there,” Jonathan said. “I was frantic. I was only twenty minutes late. Someone in the village told me you were taken to the weird house up on the hill.”

  He shook his head sadly. “The village has no police. No one to help me. I’ve been trying to get to you ever since.”

  “HAIR! HAIR! HAIR! HAIR!”

  “Why won’t they stop!” I cried.

  “Let’s get out of here,” Uncle Jonathan said. He put a hand on our backs and started to push Peter and me out the door.

  “Why waste your time? You’ll never get out of this house,” Tuttan-Rha called after us. “You remember the bats — don’t you, Jonathan?”

  Jonathan stopped in the doorway.

  “I watched your first battle with them. It wasn’t pretty. Do you really want to fight them again?” Tuttan-Rha asked. “I have them trained. When I give the signal, they will tear you to pieces.”

  Uncle Jonathan shuddered. I could see the fear on his face. He was thinking hard. Trying to come up with an escape plan.

  Suddenly, I had an idea.

  A crazy idea. But one that might just work.

  “RUN!” I screamed.

  I took off, and Jonathan and Peter followed. The mummies in the front room were chanting, too. We ran through the long aisle of mummy cases, reached the door, and burst through it.

  “Peter —” I said breathlessly as we ran down the long hall. “Your water blaster. Get it.”

  “Huh?” He squinted at me. “Are you joking?”

  “It melted Cleopatra,” I said. “The water. It turned her to dust. Maybe it will do the same thing to Tuttan-Rha and the two women.”

  We ran into Peter’s room.

  “Maybe we should just make a run for it,” Jonathan said. “Maybe the bats won’t follow us. Maybe —”

  “Tuttan-Rha said they would destroy us,” I said. “We can’t take that chance.” I turned to Peter. He was frantically tossing clothes everywhere. “Where’s your blaster?”

  “I don’t know!” he cried. “I can’t find it. I thought I left it here on the floor.”

  I turned to the door. Tuttan-Rha would be here any second.

  Peter crawled under the bed. “It isn’t here!” he cried. “I can’t find it.”

  “Never mind,” I said, running from the room. “I’ll get mine.”

  I darted into my room. Jonathan and Peter followed. The water blaster sat on my bedtable.

  “Yess!” I cried. I grabbed it in both hands. I lifted it off the table.

  Too light.

  I shook it. “Empty,” I muttered. I’d used up the whole tank on Cleopatra.

  I heard heavy, thudding footsteps in the hall. Tuttan-Rha was just outside the door.

  I dove into my bathroom. Spun the cold-water knob on the sink. My hand shook as I struggled to fill the water gun. Water sprayed everywhere.

  I filled the gun almost full. Ran back into the bedroom. Handed it to Uncle Jonathan.

  “Give them all a good blast,” I said. “Maybe —”

  I couldn’t finish my sentence. Tuttan-Rha burst into the room, followed by Annie and Sonja. He came
rushing at us. The two women blocked the doorway.

  “Don’t get your hopes up, kids,” Tuttan-Rha said. “You’re never leaving this house. You will stay and grow your wonderful hair for me and my friends.”

  “Don’t get YOUR hopes up!” Jonathan declared. He raised the water blaster. Aimed it at Tuttan-Rha’s chest.

  I held my breath. Waiting to see what the spray of water would do to the ancient Egyptian.

  But there was no spray of water.

  Tuttan-Rha dove forward — and slapped the water blaster out of Jonathan’s hands.

  The plastic gun hit the wall and bounced onto the rug. I made a grab for it, but Crazy Annie got to it first.

  Tuttan-Rha tackled Jonathan around the waist and dropped him to the floor. They began to wrestle, grunting and rolling around on the carpet.

  The two women kept their eyes on the fight. But they didn’t move from the door.

  We were trapped.

  I stood there helplessly. What could I do to help Jonathan?

  The two men rolled around and around. They punched each other and drove their elbows into each other’s chests.

  Jonathan fought desperately. He was twice as big as Tuttan-Rha. But the ancient Egyptian had amazing strength.

  He pinned Jonathan’s shoulders to the floor. Then he took his arm and pressed it over Jonathan’s throat.

  Jonathan struggled to squirm out from under the Egyptian’s hold. But he wasn’t strong enough.

  Tuttan-Rha pressed his arm down harder. I could see that Jonathan couldn’t breathe. He made horrible choking sounds, and his face turned bright purple.

  I couldn’t bear to watch. How could I help?

  I knew I had to act fast.

  I ran back to the bathroom.

  A weak gurgle escaped Jonathan’s throat. Then he was silent.

  Tuttan-Rha raised his arm from Jonathan’s throat and sat up. He had a broad smile on his face.

  “You lose, Jonathan,” he said. “Say good-bye to your niece and nephew.”

  Tuttan-Rha flashed Sonja and Annie a victory smile. His face was red, and his mustache was drenched with sweat.

  Jonathan lay still on his back, eyes closed tightly. His arms lay limply on the floor at his sides.

  Was he breathing? I couldn’t tell.

  Peter stood with his hands shoved deep in his jeans pockets. He pressed his back against the wall. His eyes were wide with fright.

  I strode quickly from the bathroom, my eyes on Tuttan-Rha.

  He turned to me. “Where were you, Abby? Did you think you could hide in the bathroom? Or were you too afraid to watch me defeat your uncle?”

  I didn’t reply.

  Instead, I emptied my mouth. I’d filled it up in the bathroom sink. And now I did one of my champion, gold-medal water spits.

  I spewed a hard stream of water from my mouth — and sprayed the ancient Egyptian in the face.

  The water splashed onto his cheeks, his nose, his mustache. Then it ran down his chin onto his neck.

  His mouth dropped open and he moaned.

  His eyes bulged.

  He let out a cry. But it was drowned out by a loud sizzling. It sounded like hamburgers frying on a grill.

  Smoke poured off Tuttan-Rha’s face as his skin started to burn. His hair crumbled to ashes. The whole front of his face peeled off, revealing gray bone underneath.

  His ears fell off and dropped silently to the floor.

  “Unh … unh …” He uttered two groans, the last sounds he’d ever make.

  His skull crumbled to powder. And then, the rest of his body started falling apart, crumbling, disappearing into his clothes.

  In seconds, I stared at a crumpled suit of clothes, covered in black and gray ashes.

  Two eyeballs rolled off the jacket collar and came to rest on the carpet. They gazed up at me blankly. Then they, too, crumbled to powder.

  “Abby — you were awesome!” Peter cried. “You did it!”

  But I knew it was too soon to celebrate. I spun around to see what Sonja and Annie would do.

  Would we have to fight them next?

  No.

  To my shock, their clothes lay in a heap on the bedroom floor. The two women had also crumbled to ashes. The ashes formed small pyramids on top of their clothes.

  “All three of them must have been connected somehow,” I said. “They shared a life force or something.”

  “Or something,” a voice repeated. From the floor.

  Tuttan-Rha? Had he come back to life?

  I gasped and turned to the sound. And saw Uncle Jonathan struggling to sit up.

  He shook his bald head, blinking his eyes. “I think I’m alive,” he said groggily.

  And then he saw the crumpled clothes, the piles of ashes. He squinted at me. “Abby?”

  “They’re gone,” I said. “Please — let’s get out of this creepy place.”

  Peter and I helped pull Jonathan to his feet. We stepped around the two ash pyramids and hurried into the hall.

  “Which way?” Jonathan asked, gazing in one direction, then the other. “We’ll have to walk down the hill. I parked my car at the bottom, and —”

  “Wait!” I cried. “One more thing. We’re forgetting the mummies.”

  I turned and started to jog toward Tuttan-Rha’s private quarters. Peter and Jonathan followed.

  “He kept the mummies alive all these years,” I said. “They’ve been moaning and groaning in pain. What do we do with them now?”

  I pulled open the door and burst into the huge mummy chamber. Pale sunlight from the tall windows poured over the rows of mummy cases.

  I stopped. And listened for their sighs and groans.

  No.

  Silence. The room stood silent and still.

  I turned to Peter and Jonathan. “Their life force must have been connected to Tuttan-Rha’s, too,” I said. “After two thousand years, these ancient mummies are finally at rest.”

  I couldn’t resist. I walked up to the nearest mummy case. I leaned over the side and peered down at the mummy. Its arms were crossed. Its coverings were ragged and stained.

  Leaning farther, I stared into its hidden face.

  And its hands shot up. And grabbed my arms — and tugged me down on top of it!

  I was too shocked and terrified to scream.

  I felt its dry, bony arms wrap around my waist. I could smell the mold and mildew from thousands of years ago. So strong and sour, I choked.

  I struggled to twist out of its grip.

  Holding on to me tightly, it pulled itself up. It raised its head … and uttered a hoarse whisper in my ear:

  “Thank you … Thank you.”

  Then I felt the strength fade from its body. It sank back into the case with a final sigh. Its arms fell limply to its sides.

  My whole body shook and itched from its dry, scratchy touch. Choking on the foul odor, I gripped the sides of the case with both hands — and pushed myself out.

  Peter and Jonathan grabbed my shoulders and stood me on my feet.

  “Are you okay?” Jonathan asked.

  I nodded. “He said thank you,” I told him. “He only wanted to thank me for letting him die.”

  “Now can we go home?” Peter asked. “I want to go somewhere BORING!”

  * * *

  The next day at the Cranford train station, Jonathan apologized a thousand times. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t there to meet you when you arrived,” he said. “I’m so sorry you had to have such a horrifying time.”

  “I can’t even tell my friends about it,” Peter said. “Who would believe it?”

  “Well, we had an adventure we’ll never forget!” I said.

  “Awesome, Abby,” Peter said, rolling his eyes. “Always look on the bright side.”

  Jonathan helped us hoist our bags into the train car. “At least you’re both safe and sound,” he said.

  He hugged us both. “Please give my warmest regards to Granny Vee,” he said. “I hope she’s okay.”


  “Me, too,” I murmured.

  The train started to move. Jonathan ran down the aisle and jumped off. He waved to us from the platform as we rolled past.

  Peter and I settled back into our seats. It was going to be a long train trip back to Boston. But we’d never been happier to go home.

  * * *

  We lugged our bags into the front hall and ran into the living room.

  “Granny Vee! Granny Vee?”

  “Upstairs,” she called. Her voice sounded light. Weak.

  We found her tucked in bed. “You’re back,” she whispered.

  She pulled herself to a sitting position.

  I tried not to show how upset I was. But Granny Vee looked so weak and frail and tired. All the life had faded from her eyes. Her arms were as thin as toothpicks. And her face was as pale as flour.

  She squeezed my hand. Peter and I hugged her and kissed her.

  Our greeting seemed to tire her. She slumped back onto the pillow.

  “I see you staring at me,” she said with a thin smile. “Well, I guess I can’t hide the truth from you two. I’m not doing well. Not doing well at all.”

  “We’ll help you,” Peter said. “We’ll help you get better.”

  I started to pull her up. “Don’t worry, Granny Vee,” I said. “I brought something home with me to make you feel better.”

  Peter took one hand and I took the other. We guided her out of the bedroom.

  “Where are you taking me?” Granny Vee asked.

  “You’ll see,” I said. “Come sit down.”

  “You’re being very mysterious,” Granny Vee said.

  “Don’t ask questions,” I said.

  We sat her down at the kitchen table. I unpacked the parcel I’d brought from the village.

  I brought it to the table and started to unwrap the paper around it.

  “What is it?” Granny Vee asked. She sniffed the air. “Oh. What a strong smell.”

  I spread out the paper and set it down in front of her.

  She gazed at it, blinking hard. “What is that, Abby? Some kind of liver?” She made a face. “I don’t like the smell of it.”

  “Don’t pay attention to the smell,” I said. I picked it up and put it in her hand. “Just eat a nice chunk. It will do you a world of good!”