by John Paulits
“No,” Emery said.
“No, no slaves; no building,” Philip said.
“Okay. Okay. Anyway, the pharaohs filled the pyramids with treasure. We could fill our pyramid with treasure.”
“Fill here?” Philip asked. “Anybody could come in and take it. I read people robbed the pharaoh’s pyramids like ten minutes after everybody went home from the funeral.”
“Not King Tut’s,” Leon argued. “Nobody found it for thousands of years. You never tell anybody about this place, do you?”
Philip recalled they told Leon about it only because Emery’s mother insisted he take his cousin wherever he went.
“No,” Philip answered. “Don’t you, either.”
“Oh, well,” Leon lowered his head.
“Who’d you tell, Leon?” Emery snapped. “You told somebody, didn’t you? Who was it?”
“Cleopatra.”
Philip and Emery moaned together.
“She’ll be here in a few minutes,” Leon said softly.
“Why?” Emery snapped.
“She’s got treasure. She wanted a pyramid, and I thought of here.”
“Oh, great,” Philip said.
“Nice job, Leon,” Emery said.
“I have something else to tell you,” Leon said.
Philip and Emery glared at Leon.
“It’s nothing bad,” he said, waving his hands. “It’s only I changed my mind about the party. I’m not going as Leonubis the pharaoh.”
“Why not?” Philip asked. “Did your mother need the towel to dry the dishes?”
Emery snorted.
“No. I didn’t want to… you know. What you said. Make the gods of Egypt angry. Cleopatra agreed with me.”
“But you’re still going to the party, right?” Emery asked.
“Of course. I’m going to make a…” Leon’s eyes rolled up as he drifted off to Egypt. “…sacred scarab dedicated to the mighty gods of Egypt. Hey, I said it right!” he cried, a big smile lighting up his face. “Scarab. That’s a hard word.”
“You’re going as a scarab!” Emery said.
“You’re not bringing along any scarab babies, are you?” Philip asked quickly.
“You can’t bring hungry scarab babies,” Emery added. “No hungry babies. No sir. Uh uh.”
“What? Babies? No, no babies…”
“Cause if you bring scarab babies,” Philip said, “you’re gonna have to feed them. And then… No! No way!”
“Ewwww!” Emery wailed.
“I’m not bringing any babies, okay?” Leon bawled.
The bushes shook again, and Cleopatra’s head popped into view. She wriggled into the crowded space, dragging a shopping bag behind her. Her black wig had gotten twisted going through the bushes and the bangs now covered her ear while the long hair covered her eyes.
“Hi, Jane,” Emery said coldly.
Jane gave her wig a twist, then extended her arm full length, her palm almost touching Emery’s nose. “No! Not Jane. When we are in Egypt, I am Cleopatra and only Cleopatra. Didn’t you tell them the rules, Leonubis?”
“Uh, a little.”
Cleopatra went on. “You both must pick names. New names. Egyptian names. I have a list.” She searched through the shopping bag and pulled out a white paper. She gave the paper to Emery, and Philip leaned in to inspect it.
Philip said, “Cleopatra printed this from her computer?”
Cleopatra reared back, her eyes widening in anger. “These boys will anger the gods of Egypt, Leonubis.”
“Guys, don’t make the gods angry. Please,” Leon begged. “I already changed my costume ’cause of them. Pick a name, will you?”
“Pick a name,” Cleopatra repeated, speaking slowly.
Philip and Emery studied the list.
“Why don’t you pick Iz-iz?” Leon suggested, breaking the name carefully into two syllables. “That’s a neat name and easy to say.”
Cleopatra turned toward Leonubis. “What do you mean by Iz-iz?”
“I mean Iz-iz is a good name.”
Cleopatra took the paper back from Emery and handed it to Leonubis. “Look at it. Do you see any Iz-iz on the list?”
Leon studied the paper. “Sure, there it is. Right there. I-S-I-S. Iz-iz.”
Cleopatra offered Leonubis an Egyptian eye roll. “That’s not how you say the royal name of Isis.”
“Of who? Why not?” Leon argued. “I-s you say iz. I-s i-s you say Iz-iz.”
“Listen to me.” Cleopatra stared hard at Leonubis. “Isis is not Iziz. It is eye-sis. Say it.”
“Eye-sis? Oh,” Leonubis said softly. “How come? I thought i-s was iz…”
“Silence,” Cleopatra cried, tilting her head back, yanking the paper back from Leonubis. She gave it to Emery again. “Pick. And don’t pick Isis. She’s a girl.”
“You be a girl,” Philip muttered toward Leon. While he and Emery looked over the list they heard Leon muttering, “I-s is iz…Jeez, I learned that in first grade.”
“Here’s one,” Emery said. “Ramses.” He looked at Cleopatra. “That’s a boy, right?”
“You shall be Ramses the Great.”
Emery smiled and poked Philip. “The Great. Now, you pick.”
“I’ll be the pharaoh with the big golden head; the one I saw in the library. King Tut.”
Cleopatra shook her head.
“What?” Philip asked. “No? Why not? He’s not a girl.”
“Tut was not his name. It was his nickname.” She touched a long name near the bottom of the list. “This is his real name.”
Philip saw TUTANKHAMUN.
“One, two… it’s eleven letters long,” Philip complained. “I can’t say so many letters. How about this shorter one? I’ll be…”
“No!” Cleopatra said. “Repeat after me.” She held up two fingers. “Two.”
Philip said, “Two.”
Cleopatra puffed out her checks and circled her arms in front of her. “Ton.”
“Ton?”
“Ton.”
“Ton,” Philip repeated.
“Now say, two ton.”
“Two ton.”
Cleopatra made a sour face and waved her hand as if brushing dust off a table.
“Common.”
“Common.”
“Two ton common. Say it.”
“Two ton common.”
Cleopatra smiled and dipped her head.
“That’s how you say those letters? Two ton common?”
“You will be the boy king, Tutankhamun.”
“Wow! Cool!” Emery crowed. “Two ton common. Ha! Neat,” he repeated.
“Shhhh,” Cleopatra ordered.
Emery shushed.
“We have one final chore to accomplish before I distribute the cookies.”
“Cookies?” Philip and Emery said.
“Treasure for the pyramid. My mother gave me.” Cleopatra reached into her back and pulled out an unopened package of Oreos.
“Let’s do the chore and get to the Oreos,” Philip said.
Cleopatra said, “Leonubis has buried the mummy. We must bring it back to life.”
“Uh, wait,” Leonubis said. “I don’t know if…”
“Silence. Cleopatra has spoken. Repeat after me.”
“I’m not really sure…”
“Oh, great mummy of Egypt,” Cleopatra said, ignoring Leonubis’s interruption.
Philip, Emery and Leon sat for a moment looking from one to the other.
“Repeat,” Cleopatra ordered again.
Philip and Emery said, “Oh, great mummy of Egypt.”
Cleopatra glared at Leonubis, who swallowed hard and softly repeated, “Oh, great mummy of Egypt.”
“What was buried shall come alive.”
Three voices echoed her. “What was buried shall come alive.”
“The mummy shall live.”
“The mummy shall live.”
“Leonubis,” Cleopatra said patiently. “Not the mum-mum-mummy shall live.
The mummy shall live. Only one mum.”
“The mummy shall live,” Leon whispered.
“All will be well when the mummy walks the earth.”
“All will be well when the mummy walks the earth.” Leonubis included only one mum, and Cleopatra gave him a satisfied nod.
“I will now leave these treasures in our pyramid.” Cleopatra took the things she’d brought from home out of the shopping bag—an old jewelry box her mother planned to throw away; two dolls she no longer played with; a shiny dress with two holes in it where holes shouldn’t be; and a piece of chocolate the size of a large coin, wrapped in gold foil. “Our pyramid is now rich in wealth.”
With a wave of her hand, she swept the black wig from her head and became Jane again. “Who wants some cookies?”
Chapter Six
The next day Tutankhamun, Ramses the Great, Leonubis, and Cleopatra met again in their pyramid. King Tut brought a broken yellow comb that looked a little like gold. Ramses the Great brought three shiny, yellow metal buttons he found in his mother’s sewing box. Leonubis brought the towel he’d decided not to wear to the party. Cleopatra brought an unopened package of Fig Newtons. Having added to the riches of their pyramid, Cleopatra again led them in speaking the words they hoped would bring the buried mummy back to life.
“Soon,” Cleopatra concluded, “the great mummy will walk among us.”
Leon moaned. “Are you sure?”
“Don’t worry, Leon,” Philip said. “You can always wrap it up in your towel if it gets too close to you.”
“Suppose I don’t have my towel with me?”
“Shhh!” Cleopatra ordered. “Today, we need to work on our Egyptian writing.”
“Oh, I know,” Leon burst out, happy to change the topic. “Herogloofiacs. I know everything about them.”
Cleopatra pressed her lips together and shook her head. “Repeat after me.” Her gaze swept all three boys. She waved one hand as if saying hello. “Hi.”
The boys repeated, “Hi.”
She made believe she held an oar and moved a canoe along.
“Row.”
“Row.
She inhaled loudly through her nose. “Not sniff, but gliff.”
“Not sniff, but gliff,” the boys repeated.
“Hi row not sniff but gliff,” Leon spouted. “Crazy word.”
Cleopatra covered her face with her hand.
“Just say gliff,” Cleopatra said softly. “Don’t say sniff. Sniff was only a clue for gliff. Got it? Ready?”
The boys nodded.
“Hi.”
“Hi.”
“Row.”
“Row.”
“Gliff.” Cleopatra glared hard at Leonubis.
“Gliff.”
Cleopatra made a sour face and pretended to pick up something from the dirt. “Ick.”
“Ick,” the boys repeated.
“Ssssss.”
“Ssssss.”
“Hi row gliff ick s.”
The boys repeated the word until they had it down pat.
“Picture writing,” Cleopatra said. She reached into the shopping bag she’d brought along and took out a pad of paper and a sharpened pencil. “We each must make a hieroglyphic that will be our signature. This is mine.” Cleopatra drew a face and shaded the top and sides with what looked like long black hair.
“Oh, yeah. I see,” Emery mumbled. He took the pencil and pad and drew what appeared to be a sheep with curly horns on its head and added ZZZZZ. “A ram,” he explained, “and some Zs. For Ramses. Get it?”
No one made fun of the picture. Philip, in fact, was impressed. He took the pad and pencil next, thought a moment, and drew a face. He added the best copy of an Egyptian headdress he could make. It looked a little like Cleopatra’s hair, but wasn’t colored in dark like the hair. Finally, he placed a thick icicle hanging from the figure’s chin. “The fancy King Tut face I saw had one of these.” He tapped the false beard with his pencil point.
“Very nice, Tutankhamun,” Cleopatra said. “Leonubis.”
Philip handed the pad and pencil to Leon, who stared blankly at the pad. “I can’t think of anything,” he said. He looked at each of his friends, distress obvious in his eyes.
“Here, give me,” said Emery. He took the pad and pencil and drew on it for a moment. When he showed what he’d drawn, his friends saw a squiggly oval with a lot of tiny U letters on it.
“What’s that?” Leon asked.
Emery said, “It’s a peanut. You can be Leonubis the nut.”
Cleopatra stifled a laugh. King Tut laughed out loud.
Leonubis frowned. “I don’t want to be a nut. I’ll think of something and let you know later.”
Cleopatra regained control of herself and said, “One more hieroglyphic.” She took the pad, drew a triangle, and held it up for the boys to see. “This will be the sign for our pyramid. Easy to remember; easy to draw.”
“Gimme,” Philip said. He took the pad and drew a small rectangle, colored in thickly along each short end.
“What’s that?” Cleopatra asked.
“It’s a fig bar,” Philip said.
Cleopatra frowned for a moment, then laughed, swept her wig from her head, and brought out the fig bars.
~ * ~
On Friday after school, Philip waited inside Emery’s front door.
Emery pounded down the stairs after tossing his book bag into his bedroom. The boys were in a hurry to get to Philip’s house to see whether the costumes had arrived.
“Emery,” Mrs. Wyatt called.
“What mom?” Emery answered, his hand on the doorknob.
Emery’s mother entered the living room holding a coffee cup. She put it down on an end table and sat on the sofa. “Not so fast. Come. There.” She pointed to a folded piece of paper.
“What is it?” Emery asked.
“Open it and see,” his mother said. “Leon left it.”
“He was here already?” Emery asked.
“His mother picked him up from school an hour early to take him to the dentist.”
Emery unfolded the paper and stared at it. He handed it to Philip.
On the paper, drawn in pencil, were two triangles, one with a big X running across it. Next to the Xed triangle was the sketch of a round bug with a leg at each corner, two antennas, and two dots for eyes. A small arrow pointed to the bug, and above the arrow it read, “Me—a scarab.”
“He’s not supposed to put letters in his hieroglyphics,” Philip said.
Emery shrugged. “He picked to be a bug? Figures. What’s it mean?”
“Mrs. Wyatt, did you say Leon went to the dentist?” Philip asked.
“I did.” She sipped her coffee.
“Let’s go to my house,” Philip said.
“I’m going to Philip’s, Mom.”
“Be home by five,” his mother ordered. “You want to take my phone?”
“No, I’ll be home.”
The boys left the house.
Philip waggled the paper. “I think Leon means he’s not going to the pyramid today. You see the triangle’s crossed out next to his bug.”
“Oh, yeah. I guess. What about the other one?”
Next to the second triangle was a drawing of Jane’s Cleopatra hieroglyphic.
“I guess it means she will be at the pyramid,” Philip explained.
“Great! Cookies.”
When they entered the house, Philip called to his mother. “Mom, did we get a package from Amazon today?”
“I put it upstairs on your bed,” his mother’s voice came back. The boys dashed upstairs. Philip ripped open the cardboard box and dumped three costumes wrapped in plastic bags onto his bed.
“Nuts,” Emery said.
“What?”
“None of those little poppy things they fill boxes with. You know, pop pop pop.” Emery banged his thumb and index finger together three times. “They wrap stuff in them. I like popping them.”
Philip ignored Emery’s disappoin
tment and grabbed a pair of scissors from his desk. He opened the first plastic bag and held up a long black gown, neckpiece, headdress, and belt of an Egyptian pharaoh.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“Yeah, not bad. Is the other one the same? We’ll look like twins. Ramses and Bamses.”
“Tutankhamun and one-ton-common,” Philip responded.
The boys laughed as Philip left the second pharaoh suit unopened and grabbed the mummy costume. He wielded his scissors and a moment later held up the costume.
“Wow!” Emery said, giving it a thorough inspection.
“You hold it.”
Emery took the costume.
“Yeah,” Philip said. “It’s neat the way the bandages hang off in spots. Gimme back.” Philip carefully folded the mummy costume and returned it to the plastic bag. “We’ll take all three costumes to the party. Don’t tell anybody about the mummy suit.”
“No, I won’t. You can change from a pharaoh to a mummy when no one expects it. Leon will think all of Egypt is chasing him.”
Philip assumed a pose, stiff-legged with arms extended. In a spooky voice he said, “Leonubis, you have offended the gods of Egypt. Prepare for punishment.”
Emery burst out laughing, and Philip joined in.
“Let’s go to the pyramid,” Philip said.
“Right. Cleopatra better be bringing more cookies.
~ * ~
Cleopatra already sat in the pyramid when the boys crawled through the bushes.
“What took you so long?” she asked. “Where’s Leonubis?”
“Leon had to go to the dentist,” Philip said.
“Oh, so that’s why his mother came to school to get him. And he’s Leonubis, not Leon,” Cleopatra corrected. “We’re in Egypt, remember.”
“Right, Leonubis,” Philip said, making sure Cleopatra did not see him roll his eyes.
“We will speak to the mummy again today,” Cleopatra said, and she went through the entire ritual once more.
Philip and Emery followed along, but without Leon shaking in his boots and stuttering the magic words, it wasn’t as much fun. When they finished trying to raise the mummy from the dead, the boys’ eyes went to the small plastic bag Cleopatra had brought along. Cleopatra sat in what looked like a deep trance for a few moments. Then she whipped her wig off and said, “I can’t think of anything else. I guess that’s enough Egypt for today.”