The Green Mummy - Page 99/191

"Why should the emeralds be missing?" asked Hope quickly.

Braddock shrugged his shoulders.

"Sidney Bolton was killed," said he in a low voice, "and it was not

likely that any one would commit a murder for the sake of this mummy,

and then leave it stranded in Mrs. Jasher's garden. I have my doubts

about the safety of the emeralds, else I would not have consented to

sell the thing back again."

With this honest speech, the Professor vigorously attacked the lid of

the case, and inserted a steel instrument into the cracks to prize up

the covering. The lid was closed with wooden pegs in an antique but

perfectly safe manner, and apparently had not been opened since the

dead Inca had been laid to rest therein hundreds of years ago among the

Andean mountains. Don Pedro winced at this desecration of the dead, but,

as he had given his consent, there was nothing left to do but to grin

and bear it. In a wonderfully short space of time, considering the

neatness of the workmanship and the holding power of the wooden pegs,

the lid was removed. Then the four on-lookers saw that the mummy had

been tampered with. Swathed in green-stained llama wool, it lay rigid

in its case. But the swathings had been cut; the hands protruded and the

emeralds were gone--torn rudely from the hard grip of the dead.