The Mummy Hand
by
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“What is it?” Stevie asked. He squeezed his head through the opening and gasped. “Oh...Do you think it’s real?” he whispered. “I...I don’t know,” Amber stuttered. “But that stuff wrapped around the wrist looks like linen...really old linen.” “Linen?” he questioned. “What’s that?” “It’s what the ancient Egyptians used to wrap up their mummies.” “So...it’s a mummy hand?” Stevie asked. He tried to get a better look, but while fighting Amber for space, the jewel was knocked out of his hand. It landed inside the dark box where it made a faint metallic clink. “Amber!” he scolded. “Stop pushing!” “You stop pushing!” Amber snapped back. Stevie gave her a nudge, then reached down for the jewel, but stopped short. “Whoa...,” he whispered. “Look at that.” The mummified hand was now much more visible, and Stevie could clearly see that it was shriveled up like something old...very old...and on its index finger, stuck between two knobby knuckles was a thick gold ring. On top of the ring, where a diamond would normally go, was the jewel, and it was glowing...just like a tiny red light bulb. “Look out!” Amber shrieked when the mummified hand sprang upward in a blur of movement. “It’s alive!” Stevie tried to pull back, but it was too late. The hand attached itself to his right arm, and actually appeared to take the place of his own forearm and hand in the process. A wave of panic washed over him as he watched the index finger, the one with the ring and glowing jewel, begin to move all on its own. He pulled himself out of the secret doorway and took a few steps backward, frightened and staring in disbelief. “Get it off!” He shouted. “Get this thing off!” He spun around, looking for a way to escape what was happening, but as he turned, the wiggling mummy finger brushed up against Grandpa’s championship basketball. Another wave of panic hit as he watched the basketball...disappear. “Where did it go?” he muttered, staggering backward and staring at the empty space on the shelf. He bumped into something and spun around. It was Grandpa’s NBA Fastbreak pinball machine. He reached out, trying to stop the world around him from pitching and rolling. Then it happened again. One second he was staring at the pinball machine, and the next...it was gone. Vanished! “That...That’s impossible...” He grabbed his arm just above the wrist and tried to roll the mummified hand off like a rubber glove, but it wouldn’t budge. It was as if it had truly become part of him. “It won’t come off,” he said, his eyes wide with panic. “What should I do?”
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About the Book
While Amber and her younger brother Stevie are playing in their grandparents’ basement, they find an ancient mummified hand hidden behind a false wall. They learn quite by accident that this hand can make items like Grandpa’s championship basketball and pinball machine disappear. While trying to make them reappear before Grandma discovers what they have done, Amber and Stevie realize the hand can make them disappear as well and reappear in a strange Egyptian world where statues come to life and where a handful of ruthless pirates have been stranded for hundreds of years. When a snooping neighbor boy gets hold of the gruesome hand, he panics and accidentally sends Amber and Stevie to this strange world with no possible way of getting back home.
About the Author
Steven Clark Waiters, a sixth-grade teacher for the past twenty-seven years, holds both a bachelor’s degree and master’s degree from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. He previously published The Lost Treasure of Grandpa Jingle-Wingle in 2004. He lives in rural California with his wife and two children. Steven and his family enjoy exploring local areas…and beyond, always searching for adventure. When he began writing The Mummy Hand, Steven approached it like the beginning of a new family adventure. He explored ideas, from the ordinary to the extraordinary, then let his imagination twist and turn them into an out-of-this-world story.