Stepping once more through the mirror we were propelled into an ornately furnished living room. All around us were signs that the occupant had spent some years in the middle east.
Water colours of Egyptian scenes covered the walls, while a pair of crossed Arabian scimiters occupied the oak panelling immediately above the fire. The mantle piece and every available surface were littered with curios and antiquities looted from inumerable ancient tombs.
Immediately before us sat a swathy individual in a high backed winged chair, wearing a puculiar combination of conventional evening dress and a red tarboosh, smoking a hookah. My immediate thought that this gentlman must be either an Egyptian or a Turk was confirmed by his first utterance.
"Welcome to my humble home gentlemen, I am Kerim Bey, what can I do to help such an illustrious gathering of slueths?" the water bubbled through his pipe as he puffed away.
"Ah mon ami I am most pleased to meet you again" the little Belgian said "I understand that you were recently on flight from Edinburgh to London?"
Bey nodded "yes it was necessary to return here in order to revive my colleague." Laying aside his pipe and stepping out of the chair Bey crossed the room to a brightly painted Pharonic sarcophagus.
"Behold! he cried as he opened the door to reveal the wizened form of a man long dead.
"Kharis was entombed many ceturies ago for daring to love a Princess above his caste, now only that rare conjunction of the stars last night combined with a reading from the ancient Book of the Dead and an infusionn of the sacred tanna leaves can revive him to exact revenge on those who so recklessly plundered her tomb."
"But surely he should be out of his jolly old casket then?" added Broadstairs.
"Curse me for a fool, but I entrusted my Scrolls to Bumsted Airport's baggage handlers and could not retrieve them in time to cast the spell to revive him"
"But what about the tanna leaves?" Holmes asked
"Sod that, have you seen how much they charge for a cup of tea there."