Ron Goulart - The Curse of the Obelisk

84 RON GOULART
"Ought to be."
"Foolish," muttered the safecracker. "Don't know what sort of trap them old Gypsies set."
The baron, hands shaking some, put the casket on a marble-topped table. He took hold of the
lid.
"Could also be," said the safecracker, "they rigged a spring device in the lid to shoot a—"
"There, I've open . . ." Baron Groll stared into the open casket. "There is nothing . . . only this
folded piece of paper."
Harry had moved to the table. He lifted the page from the box and unfolded it. "Well, now."
"Harry," said Jennie, "what is it?"
"I'll read it to everybody," he said. " 'To whom it may concern: Should anyone else ever solve
the cipher, I offer my sympathies. I have already taken the tana drug but left the casket and this
note. The work was done in the hold of the ship bringing this ugly artifact back from Egypt to
Paris. My colleagues, a simpleminded lot, know nothing of this. Quite frankly, I don't believe
anyone else will ever be clever enough to find out, as I have, the secret of the obelisk of Osiris. Yet
my vanity prompts me to write this down and take claim for solving a riddle that eluded all others
for thousands of years. The drug is mine and I am now assured of living forever. Most sincerely
yours, Sir Munson Bellhouse.' " Harry let the note drop to the tabletop.
"Orchardson killed Bellhouse," said Jennie.
"To keep him from learning the secret of the obelisk," said Harry.
"The current whereabouts of the tana drug," said Jennie. "Only Bellhouse knew that and he's
dead now."
Baron Groll glanced from Harry to Jennie and back to Harry again. "I can't follow all this," he
said, "yet I have the uneasy impression I'm not going to live forever or even be rejuvenated."
"That about," said Harry, "sums it up."