Free Ramose and the Tomb Robbers by Carole Wilkinson Page B

said. He snatched the papyrus from Ramose and moved closer to the statue. His eyes were sparkling with the light reflected from the statue. “That will melt down into enough gold ingots to last a lifetime.”
    Seth was so entranced by the shining object that he’d forgotten that Ramose had said there was nothing about the tomb on the papyrus.
    Ramose looked anxiously around the passage. He noticed a dark patch on the ceiling. He realised it was a hole, a black slot about four palm-widths wide cut in the smooth limestone from one side of the passage to the other. Seth dropped his bag and reached out for the statue with both hands. Hapu leaned closer to look at the beautiful patterns made with inlaid jewels.
    “Don’t!” yelled Ramose.
    Seth grasped the statue. There was a sudden rush of air from above. Seth and Hapu stood frozen.
    Seth looked up. A huge slab of stone thundered from out of the slot above him. Ramose grabbed Hapu and pulled him aside. He closed his eyes as the slab crashed to the floor with a deafening thud. Seth didn’t even have time to scream.
    Ramose opened his eyes. Hapu was sprawled on the floor. His foot was a finger-width from where the huge stone had fallen. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.
    Ramose gasped in horror.
    A dismembered arm lay on the floor. Blood was trickling from it. That was all that was left of Seth.
    “The fist of Osiris,” whispered Ramose.
    Clutched in the dead hand was the crumpled papyrus. Ramose reached over, prised open the warm fingers and took the scroll. All three lamps were lying broken on the passage floor. One wick was still burning with a spluttering light in a pool of oil.
    Ramose picked up one of the lamps, which still had some of the bowl intact. He reached for Seth’s bag and took out the flask of oil and filled the lamp as far as he could. He then carefully lifted the burning wick from the floor and put it in the broken lamp. Hapu was shaking uncontrollably. Ramose helped his friend up and together they made their way back to the bottom of the shaft.
    “What’s taking you so long down there?” said Hori as soon as he could see them.
    “There’s been an accident,” said Ramose.
    “Where’s Seth?”
    “He…he’s dead.”
    The boys looked up. It was still dark outside. All they could see were two specks of light coming from Hori and Intef’s lamps.
    “What did you do to him?”
    “We didn’t do anything,” said Hapu, close to tears.
    “Where’s the papyrus?”
    “Seth had it. It’s under the stone with him.” Ramose folded the papyrus and stuffed it into his kilt.
    “What stone?”
    “It was the fist of Osiris. It crushed him.”
    “More like you’ve killed him and hidden the papyrus so you can come back later.”
    “We didn’t! Come down and see for yourself. Seth has been crushed by a stone slab. It was a trap.”
    “Put the papyrus in the bucket.”
    “I can’t, I haven’t got it any more.”
    “Pull up the rope, Intef.”
    “Don’t leave us down here,” Hapu cried out.
    “You were only useful while we had the papyrus. We would have had to get rid of you eventually anyway.”
    The rope was hauled up.
    “No!” yelled Hapu. “Don’t leave us here.”
    Ramose grabbed at the rope but he was too late. It disappeared up the shaft. There was a dull thud as the slab above was lowered into place.

10
UNDERGROUND
    The two boys stood looking up the dark shaft. “They’ll come back for us, won’t they?” asked Hapu. “They won’t leave us to die here.”
    “Yes they will.”
    Hapu turned angrily to Ramose. “Why didn’t you give them the papyrus?”
    “It wouldn’t have made any difference,” said Ramose grimly. “You heard what Hori said. They were planning to kill us anyway. He didn’t want to risk us telling someone about their theft. They’re tomb robbers, Hapu. There’s no worse crime. Leaving a couple of apprentices to die is nothing compared to stealing gold from the body of a pharaoh.” Ramose