Emily and the Lost City of Urgup Read Online Free PDF Page B

the well. They were relieved and so grateful that she was safe and that the parchment had been returned without any harm to its inscriptions or its map.
    “Wait,” said Emily, “halfway down, the sides of the well are made of a different form of rock and there are rows of hieroglyphic inscriptions around the sides. If you will give me paper and pencil and a good flashlight, I can go back down and copy them.”
    How could the professors say no? Here she had already risked her life to retrieve the bucket and wanted to go back down to further the research into this ancient place. Emily was given sheaves of paper which she tucked down her blouse. A large flashlight was tied around her waist with enough extra string so that she could hold it in either hand.
    Lowering herself carefully, Emily signaled when she sighted the changing tone of the rocks. She turned on the flashlight. Before her and on every side has writing. Shapes of animals and birds, slashes of designs were dug into the stone. Carefully she tied the flashlight against her neck so that she could free her hands to copy the inscriptions.
    It seemed that hours had flown by to the three men holding the rope. They became worried. They wanted to pull Emily up out of the well. Yet she had not signaled them and they could tell by the weight of the rope that she had not fallen out. “We’ll give her fifteen more minutes,” said Professor Witherspoon, “and then we’ll haul her out, like it or not.” The other two agreed.
    Ten minutes later they felt three tugs and with a look of quiet joy and relieved apprehension they pulled her, almost too quickly, out of the well. Emily looked so tired, Panwar picked her up and carried her straight to her tent. Professor Dasam took her some tea and sweet cakes made from dates and honey while Professor Witherspoon sat quietly by her side holding one hand and promising himself that he would never let this wonderful young lady endanger herself like that again.
    Suddenly he took her in his arms and cried. That this shy private man could lose himself like this overwhelmed Emily and she gave him a hug and kiss on his forehead. It seemed to jar the professor who stepped back and apologized to Emily for his emotional outburst. “Professor, next to my mother and father you are the person I love most,” Emily told him. And this just seemed to confound the professor more as his face reddened and his hands shook and he said in a very quiet voice, “Thank you.”
    “This time,” said Professor Dasam, “ you shall translate the inscriptions you have copied from the well.” “If you will help me, I shall be glad to,” Emily replied. The two of them worked for almost a week, often rewriting whole passages, trying out different words and translations, for the text was not like any other the professor had seen. “It doesn’t make sense,” he said one day. “There must be a key we are missing. One symbol that stands for something very different from what it means in other texts.”
    Emily thought about this. “We know that this well is not too far away from the lost city. Suppose that the bottom of the well once was where I found the inscriptions. Suppose that the well was built by the citizens of Urgup.” She told this to the professor. “You may have found the key. Let’s look at symbols that repeat themselves quite often. Let’s translate them as “the people of Ugup or the city of Urgup or …”
    “The reign of Hotemhotem,” interrupted Emily.
    There it was, the key to the translation. The professor started reading out loud, “Let the peoples know of the reign of Hotemhotem. Of his great love of peace. Of his palace and comely wife Nefertutti. Of his son, Hotemhotem II. Of the city of Urgup and its one thousand camels. Of the spices and barley and wheat that gathers in its stores. Praise be to Hotemhotem, living one hundred leagues from this water from the heavens as the sun rises in its zenith. Praise to …” and the