were buried with the mummy had been placed in this basket. Why had these
been left where he found them? A little reflection made that clear also.
Something had prompted the thief to destroy the desecrated body and its
coffin with fire, probably in the hope of hiding his evil handiwork.
Then he fled with his spoil. But he had forgotten how fiercely mummies
and their trappings can burn. Or perhaps the thing was an accident. He
must have had a lamp, and if its flame chanced to touch this bituminous
tinder!

At any rate, the smoke overtook the man in that narrow place as he began
to climb the slippery slope of clay. In his haste he dropped the basket,
and dared not return to search for it. It could wait till the morrow,
when the fire would be out and the air pure. Only for this desecrator of
the royal dead that morrow never came, as was discovered afterwards.



When at length Smith struggled into the open air the stars were paling
before the dawn. An hour later, after the sky was well up, Mahomet
(recovered from his sickness) and his myrmidons arrived.

"I have been busy while you slept," said Smith, showing them the mummied
hand (but not the rings which he had removed from the shrunk fingers),
and the broken bronze, but not the priceless jewellery which was hidden
in his pockets.

For the next ten days they dug till the tomb and its approach were quite
clear. In the sand, at the head of a flight of steps which led down to
the doorway, they found the skeleton of a man, who evidently had been
buried there in a hurried fashion. His skull was shattered by the blow