Dawn Of The Mummy

Chapter 4

Chapter Four

“Please, take the greatest of care with that,” Stanley Unwin, curator of the Clevedon Museum cried out nervously. He removed his glasses for the umpteenth time that morning with shaking hands and, using his sodden handkerchief, wiped away the beads of perspiration that had formed on his forehead.

Ted Casey raised his eyes to heaven, much to the amusement of his team, and turned to face the curator. “Please Mr Unwin, I can assure you that there is absolutely nothing to worry about. My lads have never dropped a consignment in their lives.”

The curator rubbed his wire-framed glasses frantically before replacing them on his head.

He was a small-boned, wiry man of fifty, whose body appeared too small for the three-piece suit that hung shapelessly on his skinny frame.

Unwin was a nervous man at the best of times but the added stress of overseeing the museum’s upcoming exhibition had turned him into a complete wreck.

It had not always been like this. Back in his mid-twenties, Stanley Unwin was one of the youngest lecturers at one of the country’s oldest and most respected universities, with a master’s degree in ancient history and a doctoral thesis that had just been approved and which he was about to commence.

Then, when he stood up on stage before a hall full of undergraduates to deliver his lectures, there was no sign of the bumbling, equivocating parody of an academic that his staff had come to know.

At the time, Unwin firmly believed that his life belonged in the world of academe.

Thoughts about the opposite s*x were, to him, something he saved for bedtime, when he could be alone with his thoughts and those magazines he would buy from the newsagent in the next town. He preferred not to shop locally for such things. After all, he was an up-and-coming member of the community, and he knew that being caught with such pornography would lower his peers’ opinion of him considerably.

He had never sought out the company of women for intimacy and, at the time, he firmly believed that he had no need for physical love, preferring his books and manuscripts as company.

But then, one fateful day, he allowed himself to be dragged out on a blind date by a colleague from the university.

Mildred Howes was the cousin of one of his fellow lecturers, and she had recently moved to the area after her previous fiancé called off their wedding at the last moment.

Mildred was a few years younger than Stanley, although she acted like someone much older. She was an excessive, overbearing kind of woman, who was evidently much put out by the fact that she had been dumped and was determined not to let that humiliation ever be repeated.

Once Mildred had established that Stanley was an honest, hard-working, decent sort of chap, she decided that they would make a lovely couple, and set about moulding him to her way of thinking.

The first time they made love was at Mildred’s insistence.

Up until that time, Stanley was happy to coast along, making time for Mildred whenever she suggested that they go out, but he was never the one who instigated their dates, and Mildred grew concerned that he might be looking elsewhere for female company.

So, to cement their relationship, Mildred dragged Stanley to a party and force-fed him alcohol all night. He had never been a big drinker, and still was not in the habit of enjoying more than an occasional glass of wine with supper. But that night, Mildred managed to get several large cocktails down his throat and afterwards, she took him back to her place and virtually forced herself on him.

Stanley was too drunk to offer any resistance, and Mildred had learned enough about men to know what to do to make them excited, so during the night she managed to bring the hapless Stanley to ejaculation twice.

Once she confirmed she was pregnant, she gave Stanley an ultimatum. Either he made an honest woman of her or else she was going to make sure that everyone in his precious academic circle knew exactly what kind of a man he was.

Reluctantly, Stanley agreed, and watched as the rest of his life was mapped out for him.

During their 30-odd years of marriage, they had two daughters, Felicity and Tamara, both of whom soon realised how easy it was to get their own way with their father.

Stanley often found himself wedged between a rock and a hard place when he had his daughters on one side and his wife on the other, arguing for two different things.

His work had always been his means of escape, and so it was that Stanley threw himself into it, seeking ever-more cunning and astute excuses to spend more time at the university than at home. Evenings, weekends, even bank holidays presented a chance for him to create desperate and inventive reasons why he was needed at work.

As for Mildred and his daughters, they seemed happy enough so long as they were allowed all their selfish indulgences, with him footing the bill.

His diligence, however, did pay off, and when the opening for the job of curator at a major museum caught his eye, he was delighted to discover that several of his esteemed colleagues were on the board.

Now, he no longer needed an excuse to spend more time at work. It was his job to make sure that everything at the museum was running just so and, in order to do that, he had to sacrifice his precious family time to be there, just to keep an eye on things.

But there was another side to that coin that had reared its ugly head over the years.

Whether it was as a result of the constant haranguing by his wife and daughters for every little thing, or the sudden realisation of the significance of the responsibility which came with his post, Stanley Unwin had grown almost petrified of making a mistake at work.

His phobia, which seemed to grow worse with each passing year, not only ensured that he spent more time at the museum than was necessary, but also developed to the stage where it denied him sleep, making him wake several times during the night in a cold sweat, convinced that he had made some horrendous blunder that would cost the museum a fortune.

On occasion, he had actually jumped out of bed and driven to the museum in his dressing gown just to satisfy his paranoia.

Deep down, Unwin knew that his unhealthy obsession was having a detrimental effect on his wellbeing. But by the same token, as happens with most mental conditions, he was powerless to reason with himself.

All of which made the installation for the display of the museum’s latest acquisition a nightmare of epic proportions for him.

Ever since the estate of the late Professor Erland Kautz had cleared the probate process and the contents of his secret underground Egyptian chamber of treasures became the property of the museum, Unwin had slept barely a wink.

The late professor’s collection included some priceless antiquities, which, although their provenance could not be ascertained, were now legally owned by the museum.

Because of the uncertainty over the origin of the artefacts, the museum had taken the unusual step of inviting a specialist from the museum in Cairo, who specialised in carbon-dating rare and ancient relics. It was hoped that, once these treasures had been authenticated, the museum’s visitor numbers would go up and its revenue would thrive as a result.

The most important and magnificent find among the professor’s treasures was, without doubt, the mummy of Anlet-Un-Ri, for which a special exhibition was being prepared in part of the wing built in the professor’s honour years earlier.

Unwin watched with bated breath, as the sarcophagus that housed the mummy’s remains, was slowly lowered onto a purpose-built gurney, guided by Casey’s men.

As the hoist that held the immense casket came down, one of the straps gave way, causing the ancient structure to swing wildly from side to side.

Unwin could feel his heart exploding in his chest. He leapt forward, waving his hands in the air in a frantic effort to stop the sarcophagus from slipping out of its straps, missing the gurney and crashing to the concrete floor.

But his fear was unfounded.

Casey’s team was quick to react and, within seconds, they had managed to guide the casket directly above the gurney. They waited until the natural motion of the hoist had eased, then signalled for their colleague to continue to lower it to safety.

“Oh, my good God in heaven,” Unwin called out, his breathing laboured as if he had just run a marathon. “Look what you’re doing, please.”

Ted Casey had to admit that the hoist strap snapping had been a foreseeable accident, and he intended to take it up with whoever on his team had been responsible for checking the equipment before leaving the depot. But he knew that even if two or even three of the straps had gone, the others were still capable of holding the structure, so there was no real danger.

Convincing the curator, however, would be another matter.

As he walked over to try to calm the man down and reassure him that everything was going to be all right, one of the museum security guards strode out of his office and made his way over to the him.

“Is everything all right Mr Unwin?” he asked, eyeing the approaching Casey suspiciously.

Bill Stead was a huge man, by any standards. At six foot six, he towered above most of his fellow human beings and, although he had a spare tyre around his middle, nature had given him shoulders that were as broad as he was tall.

The museum curator looked positively dainty next to the massive security guard.

By the time Casey reached them, Stanley Unwin was visibly shaking and obsessively cleaning his glasses yet again.

Casey nodded at the security guard but did not wait for an acknowledgement.

“Look, Mr Unwin, I’ve told you there’s nothing for you to worry about. My team will handle this.”

“But did you see what just happened?” Unwin screeched, his voice rising several octaves.

Casey held out his hands. “Rest assured, we calculate risks like that very carefully. Your display is in no danger whatsoever.”

He could see that the curator was unconvinced, and to be fair, he could not blame him after what he had just witnessed.

Casey looked up at Stead, who had taken a protective stance behind his boss.

“Listen, how about taking Mr Unwin for a nice cup of tea, help to soothe his nerves?”

“My nerves are perfectly calm and well, thank you, Mr Casey,” Unwin replied, his whole body shaking with rage.

Ted Casey scratched his head. There was obviously no placating the man and he was out of ideas.

Stead placed one of his enormous hands on Unwin’s shoulder. “Perhaps a nice cup of tea ain’t such a bad idea, after all,” he offered sympathetically.

Unwin turned his head and glanced up at the huge man unsteadily.

The sight of the pair of them reminded Casey of the story of David and Goliath.

Eventually, Unwin nodded. “Yes, perhaps you’re right, I have been feeling a little stressed today,” he confessed.

Before he had a chance to change his mind, the big security guard turned him around and steered him back to his office.

Casey heaved a sigh of relief and went back to his crew.

“Come on,” he called out. “That thing isn’t going to move itself into place.”

“You never know, boss,” replied one of his men, “perhaps it will come back to life and walk in on its own, like they do in the horror films.”

The rest of the crew laughed at their colleague’s flight of fancy.

“All right, all right,” said Casey. “Until you can convince it to do your job for you, get on with it.”