Return of the Mummy (8 page)
Read Return of the Mummy Online
Authors: R. L. Stine
I reached into my jeans pocket for my little mummy hand. Pressing my back against the wall, I raised my eyes to the chamber doorway — and waited.
Waited for the mummies to appear.
But to my surprise, Dr. Fielding burst into the room, followed by four dark-uniformed police officers, hands at their gun holsters.
“Ben — are you okay?” Dr. Fielding called to my uncle. “Where is the young woman?”
“She … escaped,” Uncle Ben told him.
How could he explain that she had turned into a bug?
The police explored the chamber warily. Their eyes came to rest on the mummy, frozen in place near the doorway.
“I’m so glad you’re okay, Ben,” Dr. Fielding said, placing a hand warmly on Uncle Ben’s shoulder. Then he turned to Sari. “I’m afraid I owe you an apology, Sari,” he said, frowning.
“When I ran out of here, I must have been in shock. I remember seeing you outside the pyramid. But I don’t remember saying anything to you.”
“That’s okay,” Sari replied quietly.
“I’m really sorry if I frightened you,” Dr. Fielding told her. “Your dad had been knocked unconscious by that crazy young woman. And all I could think about was calling the police as fast as possible.”
“Well, the excitement is over,” Uncle Ben said, smiling. “Let’s all get out of here.”
We started toward the doorway, but a police officer interrupted. “Could I just ask one question?” he asked, staring at the upright mummy in the center of the floor. “Did that mummy walk?”
“Of course not!” Uncle Ben replied quickly, a grin spreading over his face. “If it could walk, what would it be doing in
this
dump?”
Well, once again, I turned out to be the hero of the day. And, of course, later in the tent, I wasted no time in bragging about my courage to Sari.
Sari had no choice. She had to sit there and take it. After all,
I
was the one who had stopped the mummy and turned Nila back into a beetle by smashing her pendant.
“At least you’re not too conceited!” Sari shot back, rolling her eyes.
Lame. Really lame.
“Well, that scarab crawled away and disappeared,” she said. An evil smile crossed Sari’s lips. “I’ll bet that bug is waiting for you, Gabe. I’ll bet it’s waiting for you in your cot, waiting to bite you.”
I laughed. “Sari, you’d say anything to try to scare me. You just can’t stand the idea that
I’m
the hero!”
“You’re right,” she replied dryly. “I
can’t
stand the idea. Good night, Gabe.”
A few minutes later, I was in my pajamas and ready for bed. What a night! What an amazing night!
As I slid into the cot and pulled up the covers, I knew it was a night I would never forget.
“Ouch!”
RETURN OF
THE MUMMY
CONTENTS
About the Author
Q & A with R.L. Stine
Top Ten Tomb Jobs
Mummy Matchup
How Much Is That Scarab in the Window?
Dress Like an Egyptian
A Terrifying Peek at
GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND #19:
THE HORROR AT CHILLER HOUSE
and
CLASSIC GOOSEBUMPS #19:
REVENGE Of THE LAWN GNOMES
Bonus material written and compiled
by Gabrielle S. Balkan
R.L. Stine’s books are read all over the world. So far, his books have sold more than 300 million copies, making him one of the most popular children’s authors in history. Besides Goosebumps, R.L. Stine has written the teen series Fear Street, the funny series Rotten School, as well as the Mostly Ghostly series, The Nightmare Room series, and the two-book thriller
Dangerous Girls.
R.L. Stine lives in New York with his wife, Jane, and Minnie, his King Charles spaniel. You can learn more about him at www.RLStine.com.
Return of the Mummy,
like
Revenge of the Living Dummy
and
Creep from the Deep,
is a follow-up to an earlier Goosebumps book. How do you decide which books will have a scary sequel? Do you think any of your other books are begging for a creepy companion?
R.L. Stine (RLS):
The ocean is vast and huge and holds untold mysteries. I guess I could write a hundred sequels to
Deep Trouble.
And everyone loves Slappy the dummy — he’s so rude and evil. So I’ve written a bunch of Slappy books. Recently, I’ve been thinking of writing a sequel to the very first Goosebumps book — Welcome to Dead House. That was actually a zombie book, and these days zombies are very popular. Which book do you think I should write a sequel to?
Have you ever been to Egypt? Would you like to go?
RLS:
I’ve written so many books about Egypt and mummies and the pyramids. But I’ve never traveled there. I would love to go. I think it would be fascinating, especially after writing about it so often. Whenever I think about going, something comes up, and I have to cancel. I guess you could call it Curse of the Egyptian Travel Plans.
Do you base any of your characters on people you have known?
RLS:
Not very often. When my son was in school, I used a lot of his friends’ names in the books. In fact, I had his school directory — and just about every kid in his school was in a Goosebumps book! But I usually like to make up my characters’ personalities from my imagination. It’s more fun that way.
Do you ever have trouble coming up with what your characters will do next? If so, what do you do?
RLS:
I spend a lot of time plotting each book before I start to write. I do a chapter-by-chapter outline of all the action — everything that happens in the book. This is where I do all my thinking. So when I start to write the book, I don’t have to think about what my characters will do next. I already know what they are going to do!
Would you ever want to write a book with another author?
RLS:
Yes. I would love to get ALL the scary authors in the US together, and we’d all work on one book. That book would be the scariest in history — no reader would survive it!
The next Goosebumps HorrorLand is called
The Horror at Chiller House.
What kind of terrifying adventure can we expect in the conclusion of the Jonathan Chiller saga?
RLS:
Well, six kids suddenly find themselves back in Chiller’s souvenir store at HorrorLand. How did they get there? Why were they pulled back? Jonathan Chiller turns out to be a very weird dude. He likes to make up games. He brought the kids back to play a game he thought up. I’ll give you a hint about the game: It involves crossbows. Yes, the game is dangerous and deadly. And the six kids find themselves in a terrifying adventure. This may be the scariest HorrorLand book I’ve written.
To find out whether R.L. Stine likes to garden,
check out the special collector’s edition of
REVENGE OF THE LAWN GNOMES.
Dying was a big business in ancient Egypt. From embalmer to professional mourner, these were the top ten weirdest ways to make a paycheck in the tomb.
If your pediatrician traveled back in time to visit with Queen Cleopatra in the first century B.C., the doc might have been an embalmer, a job for the highly trained and highly respected. Instead of wearing a white coat and stethoscope, he’d put on a mask of Anubis, the god of embalming, while he worked.
On the opposite end of the job spectrum was the cutter: a lowly profession usually confined to
CRIMINALS
or people who couldn’t find other, more respectable work. The cutter made incisions in the body so the lungs, liver, stomach, and intestines could be removed. Even though the job needed to be done, people often cursed and stoned the cutters.
If you’ve always been fascinated by papier-mâché piñatas, you might be interested in a job as a mummy mask maker. It was an important job because the mask helped the dead person be recognized in the afterlife. Ritzy types, like members of royalty, had masks made from gold and decorated with jewels.
Doodlers would be good candidates for the mummy case maker because the mummy case was decorated with
HIEROGLYPHIC
messages to help the mummy on its journey into the afterlife. The mummy case was made from old papyrus, which dried into the shape of the body. The case went inside the coffin, made by — you guessed it — the
As far as coffins went, ancient Egyptians thought two dead beds where better than one. In fact, royalty were buried in several cedar coffins that fit one inside the other. Like with all things mummy, the richer the client, the fancier the coffin. The coffins of top customers were inlaid with gold and jewels.
After the paperlike case and a couple of wooden coffins came the stone sarcophagus. And just like the other items, this part of the mummification process involved high artistry: The sarcophagus was carved with pictures and hieroglyphs inside and out.
Another job you’d want to stay away from: Shabti were figurines placed in tombs to do all the dirty work in the afterlife — they were like servants for the dead. Though you wouldn’t want to BE a shabti, making them could be a lot of fun.
Calling all drama queens and theater stars! This long-term job lasted from death until
BURIAL
— that’s more than 70 days! You’d need to bring friends on the interview, because the wealthy hired lots of people to moan, wail, and pound on their chests.
This may be the hardest job yet because tombs were NOT easy to get into. Plus, tomb robbers had to unmummify a mummy to get to the jewelry! If you failed at this job you wouldn’t get fired. Instead, you’d get beaten with a cane, branded with a hot iron, and sent to work in mines, usually after having your nose or hand cut off.
The tomb police didn’t worry much about collecting evidence to bring to court because they got to punish lawbreakers on the spot. Usually with a big stick.
Sure, you may know how to remove a mummy’s brain with a hook, but can you correctly answer these Goosebumps mummy questions?
1. Abby and Peter discover a room full of half-living mummies in which book?
a. THE CURSE OF THE MUMMY’S TOMB
b. THE MUMMY AT THE DOOR
c. GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND: WHO’S YOUR MUMMY?
2. Where does THE CURSE OF THE MUMMY’S TOMB take place?
a. Alexandria
b. Vermont
c. Cairo
3. Gabe gets trapped in an underground chamber full of scorpions in which book?
a. THE CURSE OF THE MUMMY’S TOMB
b. RETURN OF THE MUMMY
c. GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND: WHO’S YOUR MUMMY?
4. What does Abby have that Tuttan-Rha wants in GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND: WHO’S YOUR MUMMY?
a. Liver
b. Hair
c. Blood
5. Uncle Ben is forced into a stone mummy case in which book?
a. WELCOME TO THE MUMMY’S TOMB
b. RETURN OF THE MUMMY
c. GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND: MUMMY GOT YOUR TONGUE?
6. What happens to Nila at the end of RETURN OF THE MUMMY?
a. She turns into a scarab beetle.
b. She is choked by a mummy.
c. She marries Uncle Ben.
7. What is supposed to happen when Granny Vee eats the liver from Tuttan-Rha’s house?
a. She will not be hungry.
b. She will die.
c. She will live forever.
8. What does Ahmed try to do to Gabe and Sari?
a. Kidnap them
b. Throw them in a tar pit
c. Embalm them for mummification
9. What did Nila steal from Gabe?
a. A mummy hand
b. An amber necklace
c. An ancient amulet
10. Which mummy book did R.L. Stine write first?
a. THE CURSE OF THE MUMMY’S TOMB
b. RETURN OF THE MUMMY
c. GOOSEBUMPS HORRORLAND: WHO’S YOUR MUMMY?
ANSWERS: 1: C, 2: C, 3: A, 4: B, 5: B, 6: A, 7: C, 8: A, 9: A, 10: A
If you were an animal lover in ancient Egypt, you’d know all the habits of these strange creatures, both real and unreal.
This
JACKAL-HEADED
god was very important to the dead; he helped with the burial and the difficult transition into the afterlife. Some say his name means “to rot,” while others go with the more pleasant-sounding “king’s son.”
also known as
APOPHIS, THE DESTROYER
Not just any old garden snake, Apep was thought to be a demon from the underworld who battled against the sun god, Ra, in the form of a 48-foot water serpent — that’s nearly as wide as a basketball court! In Apep’s battles against Ra, the evil god was thought to eat the sun each night.
A major god whose name means “to come into being” is associated with the real-life dung beetle, a type of scarab beetle. Since scarab beetles lay their eggs in the bodies of
DE AD ANIMALS,
ancient Egyptians believed they were created from dead matter. Rather than be creeped out by this, they instead connected Kephri with rebirth, renewal, and resurrection.
This goddess, called “she who is great,” had a hippopotamus head, lion limbs, and a big belly, and was a fierce protector of pregnant women and babies.
Thanks to lice infestations, bad hair days were common along the Nile. But since baseball caps were still thousands of years away, our friends in ancient Egypt had to come up with a few other tricks.
Here’s a hair dye you won’t find in your local drug store: Women sometimes enhanced their natural hair color with a mixture of oil and
BOILED BLOOD.
Whether they shaved their heads or cut their hair short, both men and women were happy with wigs. The wigs never turned gray, and thanks to small risers underneath, which allowed for a nice breeze on the scalp, were perfect for hot days, of which there were many!
Have any extra lard on hand? If so you are halfway to making your very own scented hair cone, which is just the thing to put atop your head on the way to an ancient Egyptian party. With the scented hair cone in place, ladies and gentlemen merely waited for the mixture of perfumed oil and wax or rendered animal fat to melt and release the wonderful scent. It was like a time-release air freshener for the head!
