The Curse by Harold Robbins

site. One of the laborers actually observed Sir Jacob Radcliff with the scarab. The laborer’s story changed when he suddenly found himself in possession of more money than he would have otherwise earned in a lifetime.”
    More facts about the controversy were coming back to me. “Wasn’t there also a dispute between Carter and his British financiers, Lord Carnarvon, Sir Jacob Radcliff, and the Egyptian government over the division of the treasures?”
    â€œA bitter dispute. During that era, because my country was so desperately poor and under foreign influence, it entered into contracts with wealthy foreigners, mostly French, British, and German, to excavate archaeological sites.”
    â€œFifty percent was the standard terms at the time,” I said. “Half to the discoverers and half to the museum in Cairo.”
    â€œYes, it depended on how intact the tomb or site was when the foreign excavators found it. If evidence showed that the site had been previously invaded by looters, the foreigners were allowed to keep half of any artifacts found. If there had been no previous entry, my country had the right to keep everything.”
    â€œAnd Carter claimed there was evidence that King Tut’s tomb had been entered twice before by looters, so they had a right to half the treasures.”
    â€œYes, the outer area of the burial site had been entered in the distant past, but obviously King Tutankhamen’s burial chamber had not been discovered and entered by thieves because the incredible treasures in it were all still intact.”
    I remembered now why the controversy about the heart scarab and other artifacts arose.
    â€œCarter and the wealthy men who financed the dig,” I said, “were angry about the government’s refusal to accept the fact that the site had been previously robbed.”
    â€œThey were greedy. They didn’t want to help uncover my people’s history. They were thieves of history who coveted our treasures.”
    I didn’t agree with him that foreigners who legitimately obtained artifacts from poor nations in the past were all a bunch of thieves. They were operating under what the rules were at the time, not to mention that the artifacts ended up well preserved in museums for the most part, rather than being left to the elements and in careless hands.
    Much of what we have from antiquity would have been destroyed long ago if museums in the wealthier nations had not preserved them.
    In a way, financing archaeological digs in search of buried treasures had about the same risks as the wildcatters had drilling for oil in the early days—most of the holes turned out to be dry because the site was chosen based upon a wing, a prayer, and a lot of guesswork.
    A small opening often no bigger than a doorway had to be found in thousands of square miles of desert landscape. More often than not, even when a tomb was found, it had already been looted.
    My own objection was that so much looting was still taking place because there were private collectors and museums willing to look the other way in order to get prize pieces.
    I felt all artifacts acquired illegally should be returned to the countries of origin.
    Since Kaseem was such a fierce advocate of his country and his version of history, I refrained from giving him my opinion.
    â€œSo a witness claimed, at least initially, that he saw Radcliff with the heart scarab,” I said. “I take it Radcliff wanted something nice from the site before it all got shipped off to the museum in Cairo.”
    â€œExactly. He simply put the scarab in his pocket and returned to Britain. There was no law, no customs inspections as there are today.”
    â€œYour article mentioned the midnight visit and the belief that other items were taken.”
    â€œYes, but the most valuable piece of all the Tutankhamen treasures was the scarab.”
    â€œWhy? There have to be many more dazzling objets d’art in