The Mummy Snatcher of Memphis

by Natasha Narayan

  I interrupted: “She had poor Baruch stabbed, because your gang followed him and saw him talking to us. She must be a monster.” Then another thought occurred to me. “Were you there at the omnibus stop?”

  I saw by his reaction that he was.

  “Oh Jabber, you didn’t stab Baruch!”

  “No, miss, I’m not the killing type. Not by a long straw.”

  “Honest?”

  “On me own life, miss.”

  I was forced to believe him. Jabber didn’t strike me as a vicious person. Besides if he was a murderer he wouldn’t be here now, would he? Like as not, I would have my throat slit, instead.

  “Where is the real mummy?”

  Jabber hesitated, thinking up a story no doubt.

  “Remember, Jabber, if you lie to me or try and put me on the wrong track, I’ll go straight to Velvet Nell with this.” I held up the note.

  Jabber groaned. “Yer know the Alhambra?”

  I nodded. It was impossible to miss the famous theater, towering over Leicester Square, with its massive dome and soaring minarets.

  “The Velvet Mob are keeping the mummy there, backstage. In one of them props rooms. We hide things there reg’lar. Our captain, she loves the music hall. You can’t miss ole Velvet Nell.”

  “Slow down, Jabber. I’m guessing the Velvet Mob is your gang?”

  He nodded.

  “But why does the Velvet Mob want an ancient Egyptian mummy? Why do they want this mummy, so much?”

  “Dunno,” Jabber replied frankly. “Me and Bender we took a good look at the mummy when we were takin” it in the carriage from Oxford to London. We thought—’

  “You thought there might be something valuable in it, something you could steal!”

  “Not that, miss.” He grinned, but I didn’t believe him for a moment. “Anyways, we took a look and it was only a dried up old fing, wrapped in these smelly bandages. Course we couldn’t unwrap the bandages but we had a poke round—blimey how they stank.”

  “Natron,” I said absentmindedly. “The salts used for embalming the mummy. But I still don’t understand. There’s a mystery here. What is so special about this mummy to Velvet Nell?”

  He shrugged. “Issa job, innit? I’m only a sergeant. I dunno wot the captain is up to.”

  I believed him. But it also made sense that Velvet Nell, a common East End criminal from what I’d deduced, would have no special interest in mummies. She must be stealing it for someone, a person who lurked in the shadows while her gang undertook the dangerous work.

  “How can I recognize Velvet Nell?”

  “I don’t like no skinny ladies. Like me curves as much as any other man.” Jabber grinned. “Nell is a right ole one, foul temper on her and cruel she can be, but she’s a real beauty.” He leered at me. “Though not as beautiful as you. I tell yer,”

  “Enough,” I snapped. “Tell me about this Nell.”

  “Ye can’t miss her. Built like an omnibus, she is. And she never wears anything but red velvet.”

  “How can I get backstage?”

  He shrugged: “Go as stagehands, so yer won’t attract no attention. Jus” slip the ole guy at the stage door a shilling. He won’t bovver you.’

  “Shush,” I hissed at Jabber. I’d heard footsteps outside. It was only Rachel. She entered the room and stopped short when she saw Jabber. I can read Rachel’s mind and I knew she was shocked that he was still here.

  “I suppose we have you to thank for getting Ahmed out of jail,” she said to him.

  “S’all right, miss.” Jabber turned crimson. He blushed as easily as a debutante. “Happy to help.”

  “I’m grateful to you. Though if it wasn’t for Kit, here, Ahmed wouldn’t have been arrested in the first place.”

  It seemed Rachel still hadn’t forgiven me.

  “Anyway, Kit, I just came to remind you. Your aunt’s back at five.”

  I looked at the clock. Ten minutes to five. Aunt Hilda would be here at any moment.

  “Jabber’s just leaving.”

  “Naw I’m not. I’d like a cuppa tea. My throat’s parched somefink awful.”

  “Jabber, you are leaving. My aunt will be back soon and I don’t think she’ll be much impressed to find you here.”

  Rather grumpily Jabber consented to be shown out. After the shock of finding out I had something against him he had recovered his composure. He sauntered through the place, eyeing the pictures in the hall as if he owned them. As he swaggered down the front steps, I called him back.

  “See you at the Alhambra,” I said and my left eye closed in a very Jabber-like wink.

  “I’d buy yer a drink. ’Cept it’s not good for me health to be seen wiv yer.”

  “I’d pass on the gin, anyway,” I replied and hesitated. I wanted to say something more to him and didn’t quite know how to put it: “Jabber …”

  “Yeah?”

  “I want you to know, I’ll keep my side of the bargain. I won’t tell your captain anything …” I paused, searching for the right phrase. “I really appreciate your help. You’ve been a gent.”

  “That’s nicely put, miss,” he said awkwardly.

  “Please … call me Kit.”

  Jabber flushed with pleasure, his mouth opening in a grin that showed all his rotten teeth. He came toward me and for a horrified moment I thought he was going to embrace me. But instead he was pressing my hand. Placing something in it. Something hard and smooth. Surprised I looked down. Three of my aunt’s best silver teaspoons glinted in my palm.

  “Sorry, Kit,” Jabber muttered, turning his back on me and drawing up the collar of his coat. “Force of habit.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  A tightrope stretched across the dome of the Alhambra, way above the fug of cigar smoke, the clink of champagne glasses, the chatter of pretty painted women and their escorts. London’s grandest music hall was packed. There were rumors that the Prince of Wales himself was here. He had been an admirer of tonight’s star performer, the Great Blondin, since he had seen him walk a rope stretching over the chasm of the Niagara Falls.

  Most of the crowd paid no attention to the tattered children who wandered through the great room. Rachel had flatly refused to sneak out in the middle of the night and Ahmed had stayed behind with her. So it was just Waldo, Isaac and me, disguised as stagehands. My stay-at-home friends were missing a treat: the sawdust underfoot, the great crystal chandeliers glimmering above us, the excited diners clustered around their circular tables. Though Waldo claimed to be a regular at the music hall, I had never been anywhere so brash before. So thrilling!

  As we sneaked about the Alhambra we searched for a huge lady dressed in blazing scarlet. There were plenty of customers who might have passed for Velvet Nell. No one quite striking enough, though. Then I saw a woman, sitting in the midst of a group of men at a circular table, who made me stop dead in my tracks. She was super-colossal, taking up several chairs, oozing pale, soft flesh in every direction. Her fists were like hams, her boots as big as cricket bats. I have strong hands, but they would have looked puny in this woman’s palms. To top it all she was swathed in several yards of red velvet, as rich and glossy as blood.

  She should have been gross, but she wasn’t. She was lovely. Her eyes were sparkling blue, her skin fresh as milk, her lips in the middle of all that flesh like the prettiest pink rosebuds. To top it all, she had thick curls of a particularly vivid shade of red. She glimmered and twinkled, speckled as she was with diamonds and pearls. Even from our position at the promenade at the side of the auditorium I could tell that the tough-looking men around her were half terrified and half in love with her. Velvet Nell sat in the midst of them; a big, beautiful spider, spinning her web. The scoundrels who did her bidding were her flies.

  She frightened me. Instinctively, I knew this woman would stop at nothing to get her way. Gathering up my courage, I whispered to the others to wait at the side of the room. Then cautiously I sneaked by Velvet Nell’s table. Luckily there was a wai
ter, serving the next table who hid most of me, though I was but a few inches from the lady’s pillowy white shoulders.

  “More bubbly,” I heard Velvet Nell drawl, something Irish in the lazy sound of her vowels. “I’ve got a thirst on me tonight.”

  The man addressed snapped his fingers at the wine waiter, who indicated he would be over as soon as he finished serving his table.

  “All set for tonight’s lark then?” Nell said, in the same lazy drawl.

  The man nodded.

  “Make sure you are, sugar,” Velvet Nell said, menace in the very sweetness of her tone. “This is a big un, this is.”

  “I ain’t never let you down, Nell,” her thug replied.

  “This ain’t the time to start, I’m telling you that for free.”

  The conversation was just getting interesting but the wine waiter had moved over to Velvet Nell’s table to take her order. I couldn’t risk being noticed so I slid back to the side of the crowded room, keen to let the others know that the gang planned something—tonight. Waldo, however, had other things on his mind.

  “Pssst.” Waldo nudged me, excitedly. “It’s really him!”

  Sitting at a table laden with oysters and champagne, in the right corner of the room, was a stout, whiskered man. He was surrounded by merry, bejeweled ladies, hearty gents dressed in the height of fashion. I took a second look. If I was not mistaken, Edward, the Prince of Wales, was visiting the Alhambra incognito.

  “To think I’m in the presence of royalty,” Waldo gushed. “Why, I’ve practically met the future king of England. Mama will be over the moon.”

  “Surely your mama is already great friends with the Prince,” I said sarcastically.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “She must have visited Buckingham Palace during one of her séances.” Waldo’s mother spent half her money on séances, where a so-called “medium” would contact the “spirits” for her. She really was quite foolish on the subject, which I thought was all a sham. Waldo, the adoring son, was far more gullible. I loved to tease him about it.

  “Mediums only contact dead people,” he snapped. “Don’t you know anything!”

  “Anyway you can’t tell her about the Prince,” I said, changing the subject. “We are here in secret, remember.” Americans love our royal family. I suppose not having one of their own they envy us our gracious Queen and all the pomp and glitter of a court. Though I must admit, Edward Albert in the flesh was certainly no Prince Charming. The Prince of Wales had a reputation for loving the pleasures of the table as much as the company of pretty women I could see, now, how he had got the unflattering nickname “Tum-Tum.”

  I just had time to point out Velvet Nell and her entourage of four men to Isaac and Waldo before there was a great roll of thunder. A beam of limelight flared, illuminating the Great Blondin balancing on the high wire. He was a trim little man, with his hair parted slickly on one side, dressed in tight-fitting short trousers worn over pale stockings. His feet were shod in embroidered satin slippers. They stood daintily on the high wire—which the posters boasted was just three inches wide. He bowed to the crowd, paying special attention to the Prince of Wales. Then, with a flourish, he put on a blindfold and picked up a balancing pole. Blondin was off!

  The wire was at least fifty feet above the floor and he had no safety net. If he fell he would surely be smashed to smithereens. I hoped that Blondin was not called “The Great” for nothing. But we had no time to stand about worrying about the tightrope walker’s health. We had to get moving while all eyes were on the show.

  Swiftly the three of us made our way to the stage door. There was an old man guarding the exit, probably to make sure that no drunken or overenthusiastic gentlemen got through to pester the ballet girls backstage. As Jabber had told us, he wasn’t the type to ask too many questions. We slipped him a couple of shillings and he let us through.

  Backstage was as hot and crowded as the music hall. A haze of cigarette smoke lit by the flare of gaslights. A half-dressed ballet girl ran past me, her pink tutu sticking out over slim legs in pale tights. She was followed by a flock of others, like flamingos about to descend on a watering hole. A plaster dolphin was abandoned on the edge of the wings, its glass eye regarding us fishily. Everywhere there was a litter of props and prop men, scene-shifters and muscled acrobats limbering up. And above it all, the director barking orders. What a strange combination of backstage chaos and onstage perfection the music hall was.

  Finding the mummy was not going to be easy. Luckily everyone was so busy with their own concerns they took no notice of three young stagehands. I was just about to suggest heading for the stairs leading away from the wings, when a great gasp went through the auditorium. Isaac and Waldo poked their heads round the edge of the curtain. I followed suit. The Great Blondin had finished his blindfold walk to a storm of applause. An acrobat brought a wheelbarrow to Blondin, who was balanced on a ledge at the edge of the Alhambra’s great dome. Blondin was proposing to push it along the tightrope! That couldn’t be possible, surely? Why, the wheels themselves must be thicker than the wire. With a low bow, gently placing one foot on the tightrope, Blondin addressed a gentleman in the crowd.

  “Do you believe I can walk the wire pushing this wheelbarrow?” he asked.

  “I think so,” the man answered.

  A ripple went through the audience, a flurry of necks craning to see whom the acrobat had picked out. What audacity! He was speaking to the Prince of Wales himself.

  “Are you sure?”

  “Why not?” the Prince answered.

  “Are you absolutely certain?”

  “Yes, I’m absolutely certain.”

  “Absolutely?”

  “Absolutely.”

  “Then why don’t you hop into the wheelbarrow and I’ll push you along the tightrope.”

  There was utter silence. Waiters, in the midst of pouring glasses of champagne, turned to statues. Gentlemen about to puff on their cigars, stopped stone-dead. The very smoke in the air seemed to freeze. The Prince uttered a genial laugh, and a sigh went through the hall. He wouldn’t take the bet. He couldn’t be so reckless. Queen Victoria herself would be outraged.

  “Is this a good idea?” the Prince asked.

  “I’ll guarantee your safety with my life,” Blondin replied.

  “You put a lower value on your life than most. But I don’t want to spoil your fun. Sir, you’re on!”

  The Prince rose from the supper table, a smile on his whiskered face. I could see that his friends and attendants were arguing with him, trying to persuade him not to be so foolish. He pushed them off impatiently and walked to the stage. We watched, scarcely believing our eyes, while circus boys helped the portly prince up the ladder to the ledge at the side of the dome. Low murmurings spread through the room. He was prepared to do it. To risk his life and the future of the monarchy for the sake of a silly music-hall stunt!

  “Let’s go,” I hissed to Isaac and Waldo, who were watching, spellbound. So was every other man, woman and child backstage. “This is a perfect time. No one will pay any attention to us.”

  “You go,” they replied in unison. “I’m not missing this.”

  But I couldn’t pull myself away either, as the Prince ascended the steps of a ladder to the top where Blondin was waiting. There was utter silence as he climbed heavily into the wheelbarrow—which I must say looked a very tight squeeze. The front wheel of the barrow was balanced on the tightrope and how it wobbled. Even from way down below I could imagine how queasy the Prince must feel. The Great Blondin made one more bow to the audience. Then he set off, the wheelbarrow with the Prince in front of him. Blondin took a step, and then another. Gosh, it must be impossible to control such a weight on the fragile wire. The wheel of the barrow itself, was bigger, clumsier, than the thin wire. One slip—but it didn’t bear thinking about.

  On his tenth step Blondin wobbled and a great big aaaah went through the crowd. From among the crowd came a single, hyste
rical shriek, from someone who could no longer bear this. My own nerves were pitched to breaking point. He righted himself swiftly and went on, pushing the wheelbarrow with great skill.

  Then, just a few inches from the end of the wire, another wobble. The wheelbarrow steered fractionally wrong, tilted. Blondin’s left hand rose in the air. Inside the barrow, the Prince pitched to the right and managed to grab the tightrope. The barrow fell with the speed of a boulder, clanging horribly as it hit the ground. The Prince lost his grip on the rope, he was slipping, slipping… Only Blondin could save him now. The tightrope walker was back on the wire, he held out his hand to the lurching prince. It was going to be all right. Blondin closed on the Prince’s collar, he reached out strong arms to him. Our royal heir was going to be, must be, safe.

  Down below the screams stopped, as for an instant, we all gave thanks. Then the collar ripped and appallingly the whole thing spun out of control and the Prince was spiraling downward through the air. A large dark blob. It was impossible to take it in, it happened so fast. Hysteria overtook the crowd, screams and wails mingling with sobs. Gallant gentlemen rushed forward. An acrobat leapt off the stage to try and catch the Prince, while next to me a ballet girl fainted.

  But then something swung out of nowhere, making for the Prince so fast it was a mere blur.

  I didn’t understand. What was going on?

  With a sudden smile the Prince grabbed at the flying object. It was a piece of wood fixed to thick rope. A trapeze! Mid-air, the Prince somersaulted. He tumbled, righted himself. A moment later he had landed firmly on the ground, his chubby body as graceful as a ballet girl.

  Incredible! Dumbfounded, the crowd was silent. We watched our acrobat Prince not knowing what to think! Where had he learned to fly on a trapeze?

  One by one, the diners rose, holding their arms aloft, as they clapped and clapped. The ovation of a lifetime for a prince in a million. Modestly, the Prince acknowledged the applause with a smile. As casual as if he took a tumble on the trapeze every day at Buckingham Palace.