05 - The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb Read Free Page B

Khufu.”
    “Gesundheit,” Sari said. Another lame joke.
    Her father chuckled. I made a face at her.
    “It was the biggest structure of its time,” Uncle Ben said. “Do you know how
wide the base of the pyramid is?”
    Sari shook her head. “No. How wide?” she asked with a mouthful of hamburger.
    “I know,” I said, grinning. “It’s thirteen acres wide.”
    “Hey—that’s right!” Uncle Ben exclaimed, obviously impressed.
    Sari flashed me a surprised look.
    That’s one for me! I thought happily, sticking my tongue out at her.
    And one for my dad’s guidebooks.
    “The pyramid was built as a royal burial place,” Uncle Ben continued, his
expression turning serious. “The Pharaoh made it really enormous so that the
burial chamber could be hidden. The Egyptians worried about tomb robbers. They
knew that people would try to break in and take all of the valuable jewels and
treasures that were buried alongside their owners. So they built dozens of
tunnels and chambers inside, a confusing maze to keep robbers from finding the
real burial room.”
    “Pass the ketchup, please,” Sari interrupted. I passed her the ketchup.
    “Sari’s heard all this before,” Uncle Ben said, dipping the pita bread into
the dark gravy on his plate. “Anyway, we archaeologists thought we’d uncovered
all of the tunnels and rooms inside this pyramid. But a few days ago, my workers
and I discovered a tunnel that isn’t on any of the charts. An unexplored,
undiscovered tunnel. And we think this tunnel may lead us to the actual burial
chamber of Khufu himself!”
    “Outstanding!” I exclaimed. “And Sari and I will be there when you discover
it?”
    Uncle Ben chuckled. “I don’t know about that, Gabe. It may take us years of
careful exploration. But I’ll take you down into the tunnel tomorrow. Then you
can tell your friends you were actually inside the ancient pyramid of Khufu.”
    “I’ve already been in it,” Sari bragged. She turned her eyes to me. “It’s very dark. You might get scared.”
    “No, I won’t,” I insisted. “No way.”
     
    The three of us spent the night in my parents’ hotel room. It took me hours
to get to sleep. I guess I was excited about going into the pyramid. I kept
imagining that we found mummies and big chests of ancient jewels and treasure.
    Uncle Ben woke us up early the next morning, and we drove out to the pyramid
outside al-Jizah. The air was already hot and sticky. The sun seemed to hang low
over the desert like an orange balloon.
    “There it is!” Sari declared, pointing out the window. And I saw the Great
Pyramid rising up from the yellow sand like some kind of mirage.
    Uncle Ben showed a special permit to the blue-uniformed guard, and we
followed a narrow, private road that curved through the sand behind the pyramid.
We parked beside several other cars and vans in the blue-gray shadow of the
pyramid.
    As I stepped out of the car, my chest was thudding with excitement. I stared
up at the enormous, worn stones of the Great Pyramid.
    It’s over four thousand years old, I thought. I’m about to go inside
something that was built four thousand years ago!
    “Your sneaker’s untied,” Sari said, pointing.
    She sure knew how to bring a guy back down to earth.
    I bent in the sand to tie my sneaker. For some reason, the left one was
always coming untied, even when I double-knotted it.
    “My workers are already inside,” Uncle Ben told us. “Now, stick close
together, okay? Don’t wander off. The tunnels really are like a maze. It’s very
easy to get lost.”
    “No problem,” I said, my trembling voice revealing how nervous and excited I
was.
    “Don’t worry. I’ll keep an eye on Gabe, Dad,” Sari said.
    She was only two months older than me. Why did she have to act like she was
my baby-sitter or something?
    Uncle Ben handed us both flashlights. “Clip them onto your jeans as we go
in,” he instructed. He gazed at me. “You don’t believe in curses,