In the days that followed I was intensely anxious to visit Lydford Hall
again, but I had received a warning note from Shaw, urging me not to do
so without taking every precaution. I might be followed, for the danger
of detection was not yet at an end.
Therefore I remained in eager expectancy of Guy's visit. He had vaguely
promised to come over "in a day or two." But as a week passed and I
heard nothing from him, I wrote, and by return of post received a reply
that he would motor over and lunch with me on Sunday.
"I have something of greatest importance to tell you," his letter
concluded; "so I hope you can make it convenient to be in on that day."
I received the letter on Thursday morning, and at once replied that I
would be at home. I would await his visit with keenest impatience.
The warm breathless days at Upton End passed but slowly. Truth to tell,
I found life there extremely dull. I had many friends in the
neighbourhood, but they were mostly elderly persons, or angular girls of
superior education. I had little in common with them, and already found
myself longing to travel again.
More than once when smoking my lonely cigar before going to bed, I had
taken out the mysterious cylinder from the big safe built in the wall of
the library and held it in my hand pondering. What could be the Thing
it contained--the thing which would amaze the world!
The weird story told to me by Shaw concerning it haunted me; yet what
evil could its possession bring upon me? I had heard, of course, of
authenticated stories of certain Egyptian mummies which have brought
disaster and death to those who disturbed their long sleep; yet in my
case I had become the unwilling agent of another.
On the night of receiving Nicholson's letter, after every one had
retired, I was sitting as usual smoking, with the long window open to
the verandah, for the air was close and oppressive. Outside the night
was glorious, the moon shone brightly, and not a breath of wind stirred.
I opened the steel door in the wall by the fireplace, and from the safe
took out the dead man's letter to me with the heavy cylinder. It was a
curious fancy of mine to handle and examine it.
I read and re-read that letter traced by the hand of the man whom I had
known as Arnold, but whose real name seemed most probably to have been
Edgcumbe. Then I read that strange letter threatening vengeance, and
held in my hand the old copy of the newspaper which told the curious
story of Lady Lettice Lancaster.
It was all mysterious, but surely most mysterious of all was that bronze
cylinder. Why should the dead man have feared to expose its contents to
the world?
Civilisation would be staggered by the revelation, it was declared.
What terrible secret of ages past could be therein contained? Why had
the dead man called it a Thing? Was it really some living thing
imprisoned in that strong unbreakable casing?
I carried it across to the green-shaded lamp upon my writing-table, and
taking up a strong magnifying glass examined it closely, and at last
determined that the welding by which it had been closed had been done
ages ago. As far as I could detect it had never been opened. How,
therefore, could Arnold have known what it contained?--unless the papyri
that had been discovered with it had given an explanation.
Suddenly it occurred to me that the existence of any papyri of great
interest would probably be known in the Egyptian Department of the
British Museum. Therefore by inquiry there I might perhaps learn
something. So I resolved, after Guy's visit, to run up to London and
see one of the officials. As Arnold was an Egyptologist, he would, no
doubt, be known and his discoveries noted.
I was holding the cylinder in my hand, carrying it across the room to
replace it in the safe, when my eye caught a dark shadow thrown across
the lawn. So quickly, however, did it disappear that I stood half
inclined to believe it to exist only in my imagination. It seemed to be
a long shadow, as though some person had crossed in the moonlight the
high bank on the opposite side. Yet my collie, who would bark at the
slightest sound in the night, lay near and uttered neither bark nor
growl. I went out to the verandah and looked about me; but all was
perfectly still. The world lay asleep beneath the great full moon.
For a few moments I stood puzzled. No intruder should be there at that
hour. Yet the fact that Prince had not been disturbed reassured me, so
I closed the window, locked the cylinder and the correspondence
carefully in the safe, and then went upstairs to bed.
My room was directly over the library, and something prompted me to
watch. So I extinguished my light and sat peering through the chink
between the blind and the window-sash. For nearly half an hour I
waited, my eyes fixed upon the great wide, moonlit lawn.
Suddenly I saw the shadow again, plainly and distinctly--the dark
silhouette passed bay again.
It was probably a poacher from the wood beyond. I knew that my rabbits
were being trapped with wires; therefore resolving to tell Johnson, the
keeper, in the morning, I retired to bed.
Next day, among my letters, I found one from my solicitors, which made
it necessary for me to go at once to London; and after doing my business
in Bedford Row, I strolled along to the British Museum.
I had but little difficulty in discovering Professor Stewart, whose
knowledge of Egyptology is probably the widest of any living man.
Without telling him too many details, I related the story I had heard of
the finding of a bronze cylinder in the tomb of King Merenptah, and that
certain papyri were discovered with it. Could he give me any
information upon the subject.
"Well--a little," replied the tall, grey-bearded, bald-headed man,
looking at me through his spectacles with great deliberation. "It is
true, I believe, that an interesting cylinder of metal was found in the
tomb of Merenptah, coeval with Moses, and with it were some fragments of
papyri fairly well-preserved, but on examination they were found not to
be of the nineteenth dynasty, as would have been expected."
"Who examined them?" I asked eagerly.
"I did myself, about two years ago, if I recollect aright," replied the
Professor. "They were brought to me one day for my opinion by a man
whose name I now forget. He was elderly, grey-bearded, and apparently
possessed considerable knowledge of Egyptian subjects. He left them
with me, so that I might decipher them, as he wished to compare his own
decipher with mine. But, curiously enough, I have never seen him since.
The papyri I have still locked away, awaiting his return."
"Then they are here?" I cried eagerly.
"Certainly. Would you like to see them?"
I replied eagerly in the affirmative, and he left me for some minutes,
returning with a big cardboard portfolio, which he opened, showing half
a dozen pieces of brown crumbling paper-like substance covered with
puzzling hieroglyphics. With them were several sheets of blue foolscap,
upon which he had written his translation.
"Here is what the record contains," he said.
"Perhaps, if you are interested in such matters, you would like to read
it. It is a curious piece of literature of apparently the Pharaonic
dynasty of the Ptolemies--or 323-30 B.C., which ended with Cleopatra."
I took the folios of modern paper in my hand and from them read as
follows, written in the Professor's own crabbed writing:--
"...For of a Verity death, sickness, and sorrow, who knoweth which, may
fall upon thee. Therefore, beware of the wrath of Ra, beware lest this
cylinder of bronze be opened and its secret be revealed to men, for
therein lieth the Thing that shall not speak until the Day of Awakening.
"For:
"He that seeketh knowledge of that which is hidden is accursed of Amon
with the ten plagues and doeth so at his own risk, and must meet his
fate being cursed of the wolf-god Osiris, ruler of the underworld.
Truly, cutting off the head of, or the forsaking life is better than the
satisfaction of curiosity of what is therein contained.
"Touch not the cylinder with thine hand, for if...
"Let it remain here in the tomb of the Great Merenptah, King of Kings,
Lord... wherein it has been placed to slumber until released by Osiris,
to whom all kings and princes bow the knee and to whom...
"Observe, He is all-glorious, on whose pleasure fortune waiteth, in
whose valour victory, and in whose anger death.
"Since:
"...a gem be tied at the feet and a piece of glass be worn upon the
head, yet still glass is glass, and gems are gems.
"It is said:
"Wisdom is of more consequence than strength. The want of it is a state
of misery. And as in the night darkness is kept at a distance by the
lord of shades (the moon) thus love by seeing and being seen delights
the young. The woman...
"Again:
"Women are never to be rendered faithful and obedient; no, not by gifts,
nor by honours, nor by sincerity, nor by services, nor by severity, nor
by precept!... What women eat is twofold; their cunning fourfold; their
perseverance sixfold; their passions eightfold; and their patience
tenfold. Wherefore the understanding which upon unexpected occurrences
remaineth unaffected, may pass through the greatest difficulties. He
who hath sense and worshippeth the Sun-God hath strength. Where hath he
strength who wanteth judgment? Where hath...
"To the unkind the ruin of the worthy bringeth delight, and...
"It is not proper to be alarmed at a mere sound when the cause of that
sound is unknown.
"For:
"Upon the great river the city of Thebes there was in the days of
Sekhomab a city where... called Aa-tenen, the inhabitants of which used
to believe that a certain giant crocodile, whom they called Nefer-biu,
infested the waters. The fact was this: a thief, as he was swimming
away with a bell he had stolen, was overcome and devoured by a
crocodile, and the bell, falling from his hand, was washed upon the
river-bank there and picked up by some apes, who every now and then used
to ring it in the trees by the river... The people of the town, finding
a man had been killed there, and hearing continually the noise of the
bell, used to declare that the giant Nefer-biu, being enraged, was
devouring a man and ringing a bell, so that the city was abandoned by
all the principal inhabitants.
"And so...
"At length, guided by the god Horus... of Stars of Sopdu, a certain poor
woman, having considered the subject, discovered that the bell was rung
by the apes. She accordingly went unto King Sekhomab, loved of Ra,
favourite of Mentu, and before the priests of Amon, and said: `If, O
King. Lord of both Lands, I may expect a very great reward, I will
engage to silence this Nefer-biu.' The King was exceedingly well
pleased, and gave her some silver. So having described some circles and
exhibited the worship of strange gods in a conspicuous manner, she
secretly provided such fruits as she conceived the apes were fond of and
went unto the river; where, strewing them about, they presently quitted
the bell and attached themselves to the fruit. The poor woman, in the
meantime, took away the bell and carried it into Sekhomab, who honoured
her and gave her great reward. And in the city of Aa-tenen she became
an object of adoration to its inhabitants, and her cartouche was
inscribed upon the Temple of Amon-Ra... and of the Sun-God...
"Wherefore I say that it is not proper to be alarmed at a mere sound
when the cause of that sound is unknown.
"And wherefore, I repeat that, for fear of great disaster to thyself,
let not thine hand touch this brazen cylinder which containeth the Thing
which shall remain imprisoned therein in the realms of Tuat (the
underworld) until released by Osiris on the Day of Awakening... this
25th of the month Tybi.
"Be ye therefore warned, for by disobedience assuredly the anger of the
Sun-God and of Osiris the Eternal will fall heavily upon thee. And
Harnekht shall smite them.
"May disaster happen but in the house of thine enemies. May traitors,
day by day, be led by Time to their destruction, and may they remain for
ever in Amentet, the place of gloom..."
"Curious," I said, looking up to the Professor's grave bearded face as
he peered over to me through his glasses.
"Yes. The fable is very interesting. I have not yet decided the actual
date of the papyri. But it is certainly much later than King
Merenptah," he said. "We have many cartouches of his time here in the
Museum, and there are many others about Europe, as St Petersburg and
Darmstadt. But in certain ways the hieroglyphics are different. Hence
I am of opinion that the bronze cylinder referred to--if it has been
found and still exists--was placed with these papyri in the tomb at a
much later date."
"You have no knowledge of the person who brought this to you?" I asked.
"Only that his name was Arnold--I see that I made a note at the time--
and that he was staying at the Savoy Hotel."
"Strange that he did not return to claim his find."
"Very. My own idea is that he may have been called abroad suddenly, and
will return one day. He seemed extremely intelligent."
"And the cylinder. What do you think it could have contained--what is
the Thing to which the papyri refers!"
The old professor shrugged his shoulders.
"How can we tell if the cylinder is non-existent? Probably it was
rifled from the royal tomb a thousand years ago and broken open by
sacrilegious persons who were unable to decipher these writings, and who
cared nothing for the curse of the ten plagues placed upon them," he
laughed.
Then Mr Arnold had evidently not revealed to the Professor the
existence of the cylinder. Why? Because he had already again hidden it
in fear.
"We have many records of objects concealed, but most of the things
referred to in the papyri have disappeared ages ago," added the great
Egyptologist, who, taking me along the gallery, showed me the mummy of
the great Pharaoh Merenptah himself, in whose tomb the fragments of
papyri were found.
The Professor was extremely kind, and lent me his decipher to copy them.
After finding that I could obtain nothing further concerning the man
Arnold, and that he was not known as an Egyptologist, I thanked him and
left without telling him of the existence of the cylinder.
That same night, I returned to Upton End with intention to show Guy
Nicholson the curious record when he visited me on Sunday.
Next morning--which was Saturday--I opened my newspaper, which, as
usual, I found on the library table after breakfast, when my eyes fell
upon a heading which caused my heart to stand still.
The printed words danced before my bewildered eyes. For a second I
stood like a man in a dream. I held my breath and eagerly read the
half a dozen lines of brief announcement--a report which caused me to
clap my hand to my fevered brow, and to involuntarily ejaculate the
words--
"My God! It can't be true--_it can't be true_!"