Part 23 (1/2)

But not even the mysterious references to the mummy, or the prospect of a revelation by digging, were able to hinder the reaction that followed the intense excitement of the past twelve hours, and I slept the sleep of the dead, dreamless and undisturbed. A touch on the shoulder woke me, and I saw Dr. Silence standing beside the bed, dressed to go out.

”Come,” he said, ”it's tea-time. You've slept the best part of a dozen hours.”

I sprang up and made a hurried toilet, while my companion sat and talked. He looked fresh and rested, and his manner was even quieter than usual.

”Colonel Wragge has provided spades and pickaxes. We're going out to unearth this mummy at once,” he said; ”and there's no reason we should not get away by the morning train.”

”I'm ready to go tonight, if you are,” I said honestly.

But Dr. Silence shook his head.

”I must see this through to the end,” he said gravely, and in a tone that made me think he still antic.i.p.ated serious things, perhaps. He went on talking while I dressed.

”This case is really typical of all stories of mummy-haunting, and none of them are cases to trifle with,” he explained, ”for the mummies of important people--kings, priests, magicians--were laid away with profoundly significant ceremonial, and were very effectively protected, as you have seen, against desecration, and especially against destruction.

”The general belief,” he went on, antic.i.p.ating my questions, ”held, of course, that the perpetuity of the mummy guaranteed that of its Ka,--the owner's spirit,--but it is not improbable that the magical embalming was also used to r.e.t.a.r.d reincarnation, the preservation of the body preventing the return of the spirit to the toil and discipline of earth-life; and, in any case, they knew how to attach powerful guardian-forces to keep off trespa.s.sers. And any one who dared to remove the mummy, or especially to unwind it--well,” he added, with meaning, ”you have seen--and you will see.”

I caught his face in the mirror while I struggled with my collar. It was deeply serious. There could be no question that he spoke of what he believed and knew.

”The traveller-brother who brought it here must have been haunted too,”

he continued, ”for he tried to banish it by burial in the wood, making a magic circle to enclose it. Something of genuine ceremonial he must have known, for the stars the man saw were of course the remains of the still flaming pentagrams he traced at intervals in the circle. Only he did not know enough, or possibly was ignorant that the mummy's guardian was a fire-force. Fire cannot be enclosed by fire, though, as you saw, it can be released by it.”

”Then that awful figure in the laundry?” I asked, thrilled to find him so communicative.

”Undoubtedly the actual Ka of the mummy operating always behind its agent, the elemental, and most likely thousands of years old.”

”And Miss Wragge--?” I ventured once more.

”Ah, Miss Wragge,” he repeated with increased gravity, ”Miss Wragge--”

A knock at the door brought a servant with word that tea was ready, and the Colonel had sent to ask if we were coming down. The thread was broken. Dr. Silence moved to the door and signed to me to follow. But his manner told me that in any case no real answer would have been forthcoming to my question.

”And the place to dig in,” I asked, unable to restrain my curiosity, ”will you find it by some process of divination or--?”

He paused at the door and looked back at me, and with that he left me to finish my dressing.

It was growing dark when the three of us silently made our way to the Twelve Acre Plantation; the sky was overcast, and a black wind came out of the east. Gloom hung about the old house and the air seemed full of sighings. We found the tools ready laid at the edge of the wood, and each shouldering his piece, we followed our leader at once in among the trees. He went straight forward for some twenty yards and then stopped.

At his feet lay the blackened circle of one of the burned places. It was just discernible against the surrounding white gra.s.s.

”There are three of these,” he said, ”and they all lie in a line with one another. Any one of them will tap the tunnel that connects the laundry--the former Museum--with the chamber where the mummy now lies buried.”

He at once cleared away the burnt gra.s.s and began to dig; we all began to dig. While I used the pick, the others shovelled vigorously. No one spoke. Colonel Wragge worked the hardest of the three. The soil was light and sandy, and there were only a few snake-like roots and occasional loose stones to delay us. The pick made short work of these.

And meanwhile the darkness settled about us and the biting wind swept roaring through the trees overhead.

Then, quite suddenly, without a cry, Colonel Wragge disappeared up to his neck.

”The tunnel!” cried the doctor, helping to drag him out, red, breathless, and covered with sand and perspiration. ”Now, let me lead the way.” And he slipped down nimbly into the hole, so that a moment later we heard his voice, m.u.f.fled by sand and distance, rising up to us.

”Hubbard, you come next, and then Colonel Wragge--if he wishes,” we heard.