Free The Adventures of Phineas Frakture by Joseph Gatch Page B

science and to have your name emblazoned on history forever!”
    Phineas rolled his eyes and stood up. “A money pitch…I should have known. This is all probably a fabricated get-rich-quick scheme of his. Come on. Let’s get to the door before he oozes over here.”
    “Phineas!” Cavanaugh’s voice boomed from behind him. “Phineas Frakture! My old friend! I am so glad you came!”
       “Oh, lord.” Phineas cringed. He composed himself quickly and turned around, giving his best smile. “Cavanaugh! Wouldn’t have missed it!”
    “Please, stay! I have something to show you. Your friends can stay as well,” he added, looking at Abigail. “I will only be a moment. You know the price of fame.”
    Cavanaugh mingled with the crowd, answering questions and autographing programs. When he was finished, he personally escorted the trio backstage where the mummy had been taken by the stage-hands.
    “You know,” Cavanaugh addressed Abigail and William, “Phinny and I go way back to elementary school! We were the best of friends—practically inseparable!”
    “Really? Phinny has never mentioned you until now,” said William.
    Phineas glared at him. “I didn’t want you to be jealous that I knew someone famous…Willy-boy.”
    Abigail squeezed in between the two and pinched their arms, separating them with muffled yelps. “Mr. Cavanaugh, how do you explain this extraordinary find?”
    “Please, call me Edward, and this baffles me as much as everyone else. That is why I asked my friend here to take a look at him. Phineas was the foremost mechanical expert in our class. If anyone can figure out this conundrum, it’s Phineas.”
    “What do you know about him?” asked Phineas as he prodded the mummy’s clockwork with a pen.
    “There is not much written about Steamhotep in the scrolls that we found. Only that he was a master builder and quite possibly the most intelligent man alive for his time. The tomb that we found him in was very sparse and seemed to be much older than the items within it. Nothing about this find makes sense. But imagine what he could teach us if he were alive today. For someone who kept his life going through clockwork several millennia ago, he could fit right into our society today.”
    “Aside from the very bad complexion,” mentioned Phineas. “Did you find the key?”
    “The key? I have no knowledge of a key being found. Why?”
    “If you look here, at this mechanism where his heart would be, there is a hole for a key. Your curse mentioned one, did it not?”
    “It did. However, we thought that it was a metaphor.”
    Phineas took his program and a pen from his pocket and began drawing out a pattern. “This is what it looks like…at least the key part.”
    “How did you do that just by looking at the hole?” asked William.
    “Clockmaker’s son, possibly?” Phineas returned, cocking his head.
    “Now that you mention it…there was a tool that my assistant, Burke, had found that we assumed was an ornamental brain remover,” said Cavanaugh.
    “A ‘brain remover’?” asked Abigail.
    “Yes, it is quite fascinating how the Egyptians mummified their dead. You see, they took this long hook and jammed it—”
    Phineas held up his hand. “Please, spare us the details. If you don’t mind, I would like to examine our friend a while longer.”
    “Of course! I was hoping that you would be interested enough to take a look. Everything here will be at your disposal,” said Cavanaugh. “I was going to take in some lunch if you two would care to join me? I can regale you with my exploits abroad.”
    “Phineas?” asked Abigail. However, he was already poking around the clockwork and was in a world all his own. “I guess lunch it is,” she said. “Come along, William. Let’s leave the great explorer to his means.”

    Before Phineas realized it, the sun had gone down. Rubbing his eyes, he bundled together all the notes and drawings that he had made during his examination and began