The Trouble with Mummies, page 1
Table of Contents
Title Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Epilogue
About me and history
F. R. Hitchcock’s Story Adventure
Copyright
For Mummies and Daddies,
young and old,
ancient and modern
Chapter 1
Probably the first really noticeable thing was Mum coming back from the hairdresser’s on Friday afternoon, wearing a small black beard.
I sat at the kitchen table, staring.
‘What?’
‘Mum? You’ve got something…’
‘Yes, Sam, dear?’
‘Mum – you’ve got a beard.’
Mum stood in front of the tiny mirror stuck by the back door.
‘Yes, dear – don’t you like it?’
It’s Saturday, and Mum’s beard hasn’t gone away.
She’s up in the bathroom right now, wrapping it in tinfoil.
‘Sam,’ says Dad. He pulls on his jacket. ‘Would you like to come into work with me?’
I nearly choke on my cereal. He knows I can’t stand his work. Dad runs the City Museum. The really boring, really big City Museum stuffed full of stuffed things in dusty boxes; beyond your wildest dreams of boring. It’s so dull that you have to leave your brain behind at the door to stand it for more than a minute. Dad manages to make it even more boring by giving the same tour every time we go round. If I have to listen to it again, I think I might actually be sick.
‘Um …’ I stare at my spoon and hope that this might blow over on its own.
‘I know you hate the museum, but…’ Dad pours himself a cup of coffee, and slurps half of it down, ‘…I thought that just this once, you might like a wander round before we reopen to the public on Monday? It’s changed in there, really. We’ve updated it. I’d love to see what you think.’
I’m still staring at my spoon.
‘I’m driving; you won’t even have to walk,’ says Dad.
I shake my head. ‘No thanks.’
‘Perhaps you could bring Ursula?’ Dad checks his tie in the mirror. ‘We could pick her up on the way. She could bring her camera – go behind the scenes, while it’s all fresh and new? Record it for posterity.’
‘No thanks, really. Dad? Have you noticed that Mum’s got a beard?’
‘Yes, good, isn’t it?’ He glugs down the rest of his coffee. ‘The builders are finally moving out of the museum – they’ve redone everything; they’ve even installed air conditioning. It’s all terribly exciting – it feels like a rebirth.’
I stare at him. Sometimes I worry about someone who can get this excited about dead people and air conditioning.
‘The museum’s just like a new baby – it needs visiting, welcoming. It needs young friends. Friends like you and Ursula.’
Dad really hates to give up.
‘What? When?’ says Ursula, camera bags dangling from her wrists.
‘Now, in a minute – Dad’s outside in the car, he’ll take us round, it won’t take long – I agreed just to keep him happy.’
Ursula raises an eyebrow. ‘Honestly, Sam – don’t you know how to say “no”?’
We walk into the newly cleaned-up hallway of the museum. It’s all very shiny and light. It seems bigger, taller. It used to be crammed with stuffed birds in cases, stuck onto broken twigs and labelled with curly brown scraps of typing. Now there’s a huge TV showing floaty skeletons and cave paintings.
‘Where’s the dodo gone?’ asks Ursula.
‘Sorry – it went to auction – same with the cassowaries and the hummingbirds. We thought we’d get modern, so we’ve got an interactive monitor coming with films of birds in their natural habitat. Good, eh?’ Dad presses a button and a pair of glass doors glides open. ‘This way,’ he says, sweeping us through.
‘Wow!’ says Ursula, snapping away with her camera. ‘Impressive.’
It is impressive, for a museum. There’s a bank of glass cases, glittering with cleaned-up Egyptian relics. It used to be a single dusty case that looked more like a jumble sale than an exhibit, crammed full of sarcophagi and jars. The doors to some of the cases are open, and serious-looking people in white gloves are rearranging the neat white labels. I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a new baby, but they’ve certainly spent some money.
I’m almost tempted to read one of the labels, but I discover the floor’s been polished and that I can skid all the way from one end of the room to the other. ‘Wheeeeeeeeeeee,’ I cry.
‘Sam!’ Dad looks pained.
‘Sorry,’ I say, trying to look serious.
‘We’ve cleaned everything,’ says Dad. ‘Recatalogued. Taken out some of the questionable items.’
‘Like what?’ asks Ursula, filming one of the open cases.
‘Odd things. All impossible to authenticate and not really of archaeological interest.’
‘What did you do with those?’ asks Ursula, her camera trained on his face.
But Dad’s ahead of us now, running his fingers over the gold painting on a sarcophagus. For a moment, in the reflected light, he looks a little mad.
‘Are you meant to do that, Dad?’ I ask. I’ve never been allowed to touch anything – that’s partly why I hate the place so much.
‘What?’ Dad looks surprised and steps back. ‘Sorry, I don’t know what came over me – no, I’m absolutely not.’
I look at the sarcophagus he was stroking. It’s got a beard too, just like Mum’s. I look at the label; it’s not a man, it’s a woman. A pharoah-ess, presumably. How curious. Bearded Egyptian women; something I’ve never noticed before. Perhaps it’s a new fashion?
‘C’mon, Sam.’ Dad whisks us through the rest of the downstairs. Ursula films it all, but then she films almost everything. We wind up at the refurbished gift shop.
It’s the same old tat, but the shelves are shinier. A kit of a catapult that will never work properly; a bent arrow and bow; a plastic Viking sword; a pencil sharpener in the shape of a funerary jar. I pick through the guns in case there’s one I haven’t got.
‘So – did you enjoy that? Record it all?’ Dad asks Ursula. He’s playing with a paper sarcophagus mask; he holds it up over his face. ‘We could do the Americas now, upstairs. It’s been revamped.’
Ursula fiddles with her camera case.
‘Actually, could you take us home?’ I ask. ‘I was thinking of taking my Derf guns onto the common.’
‘Yeah, I could film you,’ says Ursula.
‘I can’t tempt you with the bloodthirsty Aztecs then?’
‘Um, not really, thanks, Dad. I’m kind of museumed out.’
Dad opens his mouth to plead with Ursula, but she interrupts him. ‘Yes, Mr Lloyd, I think we’ve had enough of history. For today.’
Chapter 2
On Sunday night, after we’ve eaten a strange supper mainly made of cucumber, Finn sits on the floor filling up on chocolate, Dad watches Marcus shooting aliens on the games box, and I watch Mum.
She’s been painting on the walls with black poster paint.
She takes the brush and marks out a long rectangle that goes from top to bottom of the wall, running right over the flowery wallpaper that she made Dad put up last summer. She places a small black bird at the top, and an eye beneath it.
‘Dad!’ I say, pointing at Mum.
‘Yes,’ he says mildly, reaching for a building supplies catalogue. ‘A cartouche.’
‘But why’s Mum painting on the walls?’
‘I don’t know,’ he says, examining a page of sand. ‘I expect she feels like it.’
Marcus, my older brother, glances up from the carnage on the screen. He raises an eyebrow, but looks back just in time to shoot an approaching space squid.
Mum fills the rest of the rectangle with symbols: birds, fish, snakes and things I can’t recognise. Mum’s not a very good painter.
‘Hieroglyphics?’ I say.
‘Mm, very good, Sam,’ says Mum, marking out another rectangle on the wall. I look around. There’s not a scrap of flowery wallpaper showing now, nothing but eyes and birds.
I stare at Marcus’s screen aliens. Just for now, they seem more normal.
The next morning on my way to school I worry about Mum. Actually, I’ve been worrying about Mum all night. Perhaps I should call the doctor? But then, Dad would have done that. Wouldn’t he? If he was worried? I’m worried that he’s not worried. I look at everything in a new light as I walk through the estate. I imagine myself as a motherless child, wild, unwashed, having to make my own packed lunches. I pass a woman who looks like Mum’s hairdresser painting a brown deer thing on her front wall; I’d be hanging round at houses like hers, hoping for food, begging a Sunday roast. I’d become one of those kids at school who never have the right PE kit, all because my mum’s gone off to be a fairgro
I decide that when I get home from school, I’ll tackle her, or Dad; whoever seems more likely to listen. I’m just making up my mind which one I’ll go for when I see Ursula. ‘Ursula,’ I whisper. ‘My mum’s got a beard.’
‘So?’ she says. ‘The headmistress’s got a beard, or at least hairs on her chin – bearded ladies are all the rage around here.’
We dodge through the playground, ignoring the twins who try to trip us up, and Ricky Smetling, who’s galloping around on an invisible horse.
‘It’s not a two hairs kind of beard, it’s an Egyptian beard,’ I say. ‘You have to see it to know what I mean.’ I run along behind Ursula, who seems to be in a hurry this morning. Actually, she’s generally in a hurry. ‘And Mum’s painted the house with Egyptian symbols, big black birds all over the walls. Dad doesn’t seem a bit fussed, only I’m worried about her – apart from anything else, she’s only eating cucumber.’
The twins’ older brother, Henry Waters, lumbers towards us. He’s brick-shaped, and brick-coloured. His hair stands up on his head like a scrubbing brush, and he’s always got bits of food on his sweatshirt. He’s a monster to look at but he’s got the heart of a puppy. He’s really soft, and kind, and always does the right thing. If you were ever looking for someone to play ‘Brick Boy, Superhero’, Henry would be the one, but he can only play a brick. He completely ruined Ursula’s last film, Revenge of the Zombie Tortoises; he played the policeman that got licked to death in the first scene. Ursula can’t stand him.
‘Hi, Sam. Hi, Ursula – cucumber? Sounds good, are you making a film about giant vegetables? Having any ideas? Need any ideas?’ He moves his weight from side to side as if he’s dodging punches. ‘Need any actors?’
‘Henry,’ says Ursula. ‘What do you want? This is a private conversation, go away.’
Henry stops; for a moment his face wavers, like he’s about to cry. ‘Just asking,’ he mumbles, wandering off to the side, like someone pulled the plug.
Sometimes, I really don’t like Ursula.
Chapter 3
In class, Miss Primrose, our form teacher, sits on her desk, nursing a huge mug of coffee.
Miss Primrose is usually lovely. She’s usually fluffy-kittens-in-a-basket lovely. She gives off a faint smell of clean things, and wears peachy-pink nail varnish.
‘Morning, class. Now, this week, we were going to study biodiversity, but d’you know, I think we’ll make a start on cultural diversity instead.’ There’s something about the way she says this that puts me on alert. A vacancy in her eye that reminds me of the way Mum’s behaving. Perhaps her eyes aren’t looking at us so much as over us.
Maria Snetter, the vicar’s daughter, sticks up her hand. ‘Does that mean studying the church, miss?’
‘Possibly,’ says Miss Primrose, drawing a long snake around the edge of the board. ‘But I was thinking of a culture much further away from home.’
‘India?’ asks Harish.
‘India?’ Miss Primrose stares dreamily out of the window. ‘It might be very interesting – but I’m feeling more South American.’ She wanders over to the window and picks up a feather from the making tray. ‘Yes, Mexico in particular.’
I hear a tiny high whine, and I realise that it’s Ursula’s camera. She must be filming from under her book.
Miss Primrose wanders back to the whiteboard and writes: ‘Tenochtitlan.’ She turns to face us. ‘The great city of the Aztec empire. Now, does anyone know anything about them?’
Maria Snetter sticks up her hand. ‘They worshipped the sun?’
‘They did,’ says Miss Primrose. ‘Anyone know anything else?’
‘They made floating gardens, and they had a feathered snake god called Quetz-something,’ says Rani Race.
‘Very good.’
‘Didn’t they drink blood?’ asks Ursula.
‘They probably didn’t drink blood, but they were a highly ritualised society.’
‘What’s “highly ritualised”, miss?’ asks Will Katanga.
‘Killing babies!’ yells Ricky, leaping from his desk and charging round stabbing everyone with a pencil case.
Miss Primrose ignores him, slicing the top from an old pillow with a craft knife. Thousands of feathers burst out of the cut and drift across the classroom, clustering under the desks, but Miss Primrose doesn’t seem to mind. ‘Now, I’d like some of you to find out some more about the Aztecs; what they ate, how they lived.’ She pulls a large black rubber thing and a tub of PVA glue from behind the desk. ‘Ursula, Sam and Henry, you can go to the library and look up the Aztecs, and the rest of you can help me stick feathers on this wetsuit to make a priest’s costume.’
Henry lags behind on the way to the library, and I do my best to lag behind with him.
‘C’mon, Sam,’ says Ursula. ‘Hurry up.’ She swings into the library, letting the door slam behind her.
I wish it wasn’t the three of us together. It’s difficult being with Henry and Ursula: if I side too much with Henry then Ursula gets prickly; the other way, and Henry looks like I’ve slapped him.
And I’m stuck in the middle.
I push open the library door. Ursula’s slumped over the desk, drawing vampires on the back of her hand. Henry and I stand in awkward silence next to the history section. He pulls out a book about South America. I find another, and open it on the desk, well clear of Ursula’s sprawling arms. Henry flicks through the books. ‘Here they are.’ He points at some pictures. ‘Shall I photocopy these bits?’
Ursula waves her arm at him as if he could photocopy the whole library if he wanted. ‘I’m bored,’ she announces. ‘This is the most boring place in the whole world, and the library’s probably the most boring part of it.’
‘Well, my house isn’t,’ I say. ‘Boring, that is. And I don’t think Miss Primrose is boring today – in fact, I think she’s gone weird, like Mum.’ I hold the photocopier lid open for Henry.
‘She’s just like normal – Miss Primrose is normal, she’s the essence of normal. Nothing more normal and ordinary than Miss Primrose could possibly exist,’ spits Ursula, pushing the photocopies to one side. ‘Too much time spent here makes you imagine things, Sam. I bet Mary Shelley was having a really boring time when she wrote Frankenstein.’
I watch the machine spit sheets of copied paper into the tray and think back to Miss Primrose in the classroom. The way she let those feathers spread all over the place. Adults never do anything like that – they’re always rushing around with dustpans. ‘I think she’s gone mad, like my mum.’
‘Hey,’ says Henry. ‘Look at this.’ He points to a pile of carefully arranged books, two candles balanced on top and a green lump of plasticine in the middle. The candles are lit.
‘What is that?’ I say. ‘And why haven’t the smoke detectors gone off?’
‘Because,’ says Henry, pointing at the empty battery compartment of the overhead smoke detector.
‘It looks,’ says Ursula, ‘like a shrine.’ She focuses her camera on one of the candles.
‘To what?’ asks Henry, picking up the plasticine lump and pulling it into the shape of a snail.
‘Plasticine, of course, stupid,’ says Ursula.
‘Now you’ve got to admit something’s going on,’ I say, backing away from the shrine.
Ursula slumps back at the table, and looks through the pictures on her camera. ‘Sam – I really think you’re getting in a twit about this. Miss Primrose is reconstructing something because we’re studying it. If you remember, we built a grass hut and tried eating custard apples when we did Captain Cook, and I expect another class is studying…shrines.’ She glares up at me as if I’m wasting her time.
‘To be fair to Sam,’ says Henry, after a considered pause, ‘that business with the feathers is unusual; I’ve never seen her behave like that. I’ve never seen any adult behave like that.’
‘And my mum, with the beard?’ I ask.
‘Oh, honestly,’ says Ursula.
‘Beard?’ asks Henry, sitting down too close to me. ‘Your mum’s got a beard?’
I walk home with Henry. He’s all bouncy and keen, but I feel faintly sick, partly because I’m sure something’s going on and the only person who believes me is Henry, and partly because I’m exhausted by trying to keep the peace between him and Ursula.
I’m quite cross with Ursula; not that I’d ever tell her.
