Below are two indexed tales for "The Mummy Walks" series, both of which feature Arthur Lemming, a.k.a., the Were-Mummy, following the end of the "Curse of the Werewolf" series and continuing directly from there...the Mummy's series was therefore pluralized to "The Mummies Walk" for these two installments. They are provided for those fans or researchers who want to read the final fate of Arthur Lemming without having to skip over to the Index to "The Mummy Walks" or to read any of the Mummy stories that does not feature Arthur Lemming.
"A Battle of Bandaged Beasts"
Story: Steve Skeates
Art: Joaquin Blazquez
This story begins with a recap of both the ending of the last story of the Curry-Mummy in EERIE #54 and the ending of the story "…There Was A Were-Mummy," the last entry in the "Curse of the Werewolf" series, from EERIE #56, which depicted how the now doubly cursed Arthur Lemming (who suffered both the curse of the lycanthrope under the full moon and now also found his psyche trapped within the cursed form of a re-animated mummy) discovered that his human form was taken over by the consciousness of the unscrupulous dwarf William Benson Throgmore, who had taken a horse and was riding across the Massachusetts countryside planning on taking full advantage of the fact that he now had a handsome young body at his disposal.
The Lemming-Mummy retained a mystical psychic link to his original body, however, and was now roaming the same area searching both for his physical body and the Amulet of Transference that would allow him to restore his psyche to his original body [in this story, for who knows what reason, author Skeates began referring to the enchanted bauble as the 'Amulet of Power'; I have indexed the "Curse of the Werewolf" series, whose storyline involving Arthur Lemming leads up to this point, elsewhere on this site...see the stories "To Cure This Curse" and "...There Was A Were-Mummy" from my Index to "Curse of the Werewolf" for the full skinny on how Arthur Lemming, a cursed lycanthrope, ended up having his consciousness trapped in the decaying body of a reanimated cursed mummy].
As Throgmore, in the human form of Arthur Lemming, rode across the rural landscape of Massachusetts, he mused to himself that he now had everything he ever wanted, save for money, and he needed to take care of that as quickly as possible. Spotting a horse and carriage carrying several passengers coming his way, Throgmore, who had a gun with him, held up the vehicle and robbed the people of their valuables. At the same time, however, he noticed that one of the occupants of that carriage was a woman whom he recalled meeting before (and who happened to be the same criminally-inclined woman who was wearing the amulet that both the Lemming-Mummy and the Curry-Mummy were searching for). Thinking back, Throgmore recalled that about a year earlier, when his psyche was still within the body of the deformed dwarf that it had lived within his entire life up to now, this woman came calling upon the now deceased occult expert whom Throgmore was previously employed by [and who met his end in the Werewolf story "…There Was A Were-Mummy" from EERIE #56]. When the woman arrived at the occultist's home, the latter wasn't there, and had left Throgmore in charge, who was utterly smitten by the attractive woman who had just entered the premises. However, having no interest in discussing anything with the dwarf standing before her, she treated him condescendingly [see Classic Dialogue below] and then promptly left, leaving Throgmore bitter and angry, as he had been all his life over his physical condition and the negative responses from the female sex that he endured as a result of it.
Deciding to take his revenge while having some fun in the process, Throgmore demanded that the woman leave with him on his horse, promising her a "bit of adventure," to which she claimed to be looking forward to in her usual haughty manner.
Meanwhile, trailing Throgmore via the mystical link he still had with his human body, the Lemming-Mummy began approaching the general area where the dwarf-made-perfect and his wily female companion were now residing, extremely worried that the dwarf would end up somehow getting his human form damaged or killed, and this after Lemming endured so much hardship to travel from his native England to America in order to locate the amulet.
Throgmore and his female companion entered a motel/restaurant called the Fox Inn, which was tended by an elderly Native American gentleman who provided their request for a private place to dine. While sharing their repast, Throgmore pugnaciously revealed to the woman who he really was, something that she found difficult to believe regarding the handsome man before her, but was still taken aback by the fact that he had information that he was very unlikely to have acquired from any other source. Throgmore then brandished a dagger to appear more unsettling to his dinner companion as he continued to elucidate the matter of his actual identity to her.
As this continued, the Lemming-Mummy finally found both of his quarry, watching the two outside of the window, both of whom respectively possessed something that he needed beyond measure…his physical body and the amulet that would allow him to return to it.
However, as Lemming was contemplating how to render Throgmore unconscious without damaging his physical body, the Curry-Mummy also arrived on the scene, as he had spotted, much to his amazement, another re-animated mummy skulking about the general area, and correctly deduced that he, too, must be searching for the amulet, and that it must be within close proximity. Upon noticing that he had at last located the woman who had the precious amulet, the Curry-Mummy prepared to strike at the other mummy before him to prevent his fellow walking corpse from absconding with the amulet himself. Suddenly turning around to discover, with commensurate amazement, another re-animated mummy behind him, the Lemming-Mummy attempted to speak and articulate to his fellow bandaged creature that he was no threat…but all his ancient and atrophied vocal apparatus could utter was a dry, raspy sound that appeared to be the equivalent of a hostile battle cry to the Curry-Mummy.
As Throgmore was distracted by the sudden sound outside the window of the dining area, his female companion took this as the opportunity to act and escape from her strange cohort by hitting him on the head with a metal pitcher and rendering him unconscious, remarking to herself, "Well, too bad I can't stay[,] old chum! I'll take the loot from your fancy robbery for my trouble!"
In the meantime, outside, the two bandaged beasts engaged in battle, each of them equally powerful, and equally determined to defeat the other. The two traded mighty blows with inconclusive results for several minutes…until the full moon began to rise above them as the evening hours continued. As soon as the glowing orb appeared in the sky, the Lemming-Mummy's other curse was triggered, and in the middle of the battle, he metamorphosed into his (now bandaged) lupine form. As the text stated, "If there were ever such a creature before[,] or if there were even a word for him[,] he would be called Were-Mummy!" [That was bad etymology, but what the hell!]
The battle raged on for another few minutes, until the superior strength, agility, and animal-like ferocity of the Were-Mummy began to gain the upper hand, and the Curry-Mummy was defeated. Thinking rationally in his lupine form [something that Lemming could now do with a nearly full degree of his former intellect, presumably thanks to a combination of Mother Eva's spell (see the Werewolf story "Darkling Revelation" from EERIE #52) and the accompanying psyche of the original, ancient mind sharing his bandaged form who was simultaneously enhancing Lemming's own psychic faculties], the Were-Mummy was in a state of extreme consternation that he had been forced to waste his time battling a fellow mummy, telling himself, "I don't know what you had against me, friend. It would seem that we would be sympathetic to each other…! For, we were both cursed! You had no way of knowing that it was I, who was twice cursed! Who knows where his body is…? Mine is just a few yards away…!"
Smashing into the Fox Inn to locate his physical body and the amulet, the Were-Mummy discovered, to his further profound regret, that neither Throgmore in his human body, nor the woman wearing the amulet, were present (Throgmore had obviously recovered and departed soon after the woman did, as was shown in the next installment of the series). As enumerated by the text: "Again the frustration floods the mind, and Arthur Lemming, who has come far…endured so much…seems no closer to peace than he was in the beginning!"
Moments later, the Curry-Mummy recovers from his defeat and he also realizes that the woman bearing the precious bauble he was searching for was no longer present. With that realization, the cursed being rose from the ground and strode away from the area, determined to continue his quest for the amulet at all costs.
Comments: This story, the penultimate chapter in the quest of the Curry-Mummy, also featured the very similar quest of the Lemming-Mummy, a.k.a., the Were-Mummy, whose saga continued here from the final entry in the "Curse of the Werewolf" series, his last appearance prior to this one being the Werewolf story "…There Was A Were-Mummy" from EERIE #56. The entire "Curse of the Werewolf" series is Indexed by this author elsewhere on this site, and should be read by anyone who is curious to know about the entire available history of the incessantly tragic life of Arthur Lemming, a man who had to endure a double monstrous curse by this point, which makes him a relatively unique and utterly intriguing monster character in the annals of horrordom.
As noted in the previous indexed entry for "The Mummy Walks" series, the artwork changed hands with this story, moving from the eminently competent pen of Jaime Brocal into the sometimes bizarre renditions of Joaquin Blazquez [did the editors and letterers of the EERIE mag spell the man's name correctly? I wouldn't put it past them if they didn't]. As also noted in my previous indexed entry, I do not think that Blazquez's artwork was as suited for the demands of rendering the two chapters of this series featuring the two mummies, including the battle sequence in this story, as well as Brocal would have. Believe it or not, the battle of the mummies depicted in this story was actually boring, rather than exciting, to view under the penmanship of Blazquez, and was an utter disappointment overall. I fully believe that had Brocal still been handling the art chores, the battle would have been cool to see, as he rendered the battle scenes between the Curry-Mummy and both the 'Mr. Hyde' entity and the demon in the two previous entries of this series in a very brutal and realistically enthralling fashion. The battle between the titular bandaged beasts in this story, under the pen of Blazquez, required much more of the imagination of the reader to fill in the gaps and to make the monstrous donnybrook seem more exciting than the previous two monster battles from this series. I'm not saying that Blazquez was a bad artist per se, mind you…he was simply unsuitable for the two final chapters of this series featuring both mummies, considering what those stories consisted of. I think his artwork, which sometimes takes a strange turn towards the surreal, especially when rendered in black and white, would be more suited for stand-alone horror stories featuring psychological terrors rather than action-oriented stories featuring battle sequences.
For example, though his artwork was very wrong, IMO, for the two final stories featuring Jerome Curry and Arthur Lemming for all the reasons I pointed out above, his artwork was excellent for the final story in "The Mummy Walks" series, "Insanity" [from EERIE #63, indexed below], which read much like a stand-alone horror story, and involved a primarily psychologically oriented horror tale (note the Comments section for "Insanity" below, where I praise the art of Blazquez in that story with all due nostalgic fervor).
I believe that Brocal may have been originally intended to continue the art chores on this series, because though the "next issue" caption at the end of the previous story made it clear that Arthur Lemming was indeed slated to appear in this story from the onset, it was several issues before "The Mummy Walks" series was picked up again for its final three installments.
In accordance with the fact that two mummies appeared in this story and in the next entry, the series title was pluralized to "And The Mummies Walk" for its installments in EERIE #61 & 62.
WNU Connections: This story, along with the next, features a major crossover between this series and the defunct "Curse of the Werewolf" series, and can even be considered an official merging of the two series. As such, this tale effectively brings the character of Arthur Lemming, both a wolf-man and a re-animated mummy, into the WNU.
Classic Dialogue: In the flashback sequence to Throgmore's first meeting with the female criminal from this story, when the former was still in his original dwarfish body, as the smitten little man informs her that his master is away but "I'll be glad to help you," she snips back, "Look, little man. There's nothing you could ever do…for me!" Now that had to hurt!
Time Frame: This story took place shortly following the Lemming-Mummy's arrival in America in the Werewolf story from EERIE #56, which took place, at most, a few days afterwards, and shortly after (no more than a few days) the last installment of "The Mummy Walks." Hence, I would opine that this story takes place in mid-November, 1902. It was already shown that the "Curse of the Werewolf" and "The Mummy Walks" series were running concurrently with each other. This story also features, I believe, the third night of the full moon for this particular month, and the third lycanthropic metamorphosis of the Were-Mummy that month.
"Death Be Proud"
Story: Steve Skeates
Art: Joaquin Blazquez
As the climactic events of the previous story are recapped and augmented, Throgmore [his name is spelled 'Trogmore' in this story], who was still within the human body of Arthur Lemming, awakened in a dining area of the Fox Inn after being rendered unconscious by the unnamed female thief who cold-cocked him on the head with a metal pitcher. He also noticed that the woman made off with all of his stolen loot. Looking out the window, he witnessed the battle between the Curry-Mummy and the Were-Mummy, and recognized the latter creature as the original owner of the body who had now come to reclaim it from him [see their original meeting in the Werewolf story from EERIE #56]. Recovering his gun, Throgmore quickly fled the area as the Were-Mummy was distracted by his battle with the Curry-Mummy outside.
Making his way into the Massachusetts town surrounding the Fox Inn, he noticed a young black boy [his race is fairly significant to note due to a later event in this story; read on] who was hired to tend the horse of a man named Mr.Joe. Seeing the horse as his transport out of the area, Throgmore demanded that the boy turn the animal over to him. The boy refused, exclaiming that Mr. Joe would "kill" him if he lost his horse. Coldly telling the youth, "Looks like your days are up either way, kid!", Throgmore kills the boy by bashing his skull in with the butt of his gun. Taking the horse and riding off with it, Throgmore noted to himself that he needed to acquire more money, which he could then use to "buy the best of food, the best of women!"
To conclude the recap, we saw the victorious Were-Mummy, whose lupine consciousness was now controlled effectively by the sentient mind of Arthur Lemming, notice that Throgmore had again escaped with his physical body…but due to the psychic link he retained with the body, he would still be able to trail the dwarf-made-perfect, and he was determined to do so.
In the meantime, Throgmore robbed a local bank for all of its money in order to achieve instant wealth, striking one of the customer's in the face with the butt of his gun in a display of his new-found ruthlessness and exuberance.
Now able to afford expensive clothing, Throgmore subsequently entered a fancy bordello on the outskirts of town, and looked at the large amount of nude women laying about the place. When the owner asked him if he had anything "special" in mind, Throgmore, within his new young and strong body, replied, "Yes! I have something very special in mind…! I believe I shall sample everything!" Wallowing in his new-found youth, attractiveness, and (illicit) wealth, Throgmore engaged in a lengthy orgy with the female employees of the bordello, indulging himself in the pleasure that he had been denied in all the decades he lived in the body of a deformed dwarf [then again, don't ask me how in the blue hell he knew what he was doing with those women!].
Over the next two weeks, Throgmore, in Arthur Lemming's body, lived his new life to the fullest, i.e., one of total hedonism and debauchery, which included fine food, attractive women…and murder.
Riding on horseback in one of the wooded areas of Massachusetts, Throgmore was slaveringly counting the eight hundred dollars he had just robbed from an unnamed elderly man, only to find himself under sudden assault by the Lemming-Mummy, who had tracked him there via the psychic link he retained with his human body [artist Blazquez rendered the bandaged creature in his Were-Mummy form, but this was likely just artistic license, unless we are to assume that this story occurred during the first full moon of the following month…either way, since Lemming now possessed more or less his full sentience when in lupine form if he exercised enough will power, the matter is largely moot, since the precise form of the Lemming-Mummy in no way factored into this story; see the Comments and Time Frame sections below]. Knocking Throgmore from his horse and insuring that he didn't draw his gun, the Lemming-Mummy dragged his original human body to a nearby lake, and held it under the water for a sufficient period of time to drown it.
It was here revealed that before leaving the occultist's home back in Boston, Lemming took care to read the scrolls in which the mage had utilized to conduct the original mystical ceremony of transference, and he had by now come to the conclusion that he should be able to use the enhanced psychic faculties he possessed due to his sharing a psyche with the other mind in the mummy to conduct the spell of transference without the need for the amulet [the second part of the last sentence being this author's personal conjecture]. The scrolls had also told him that the only way to slay his original human body without damaging it to the point that his own mind couldn't transfer back into it was by drowning it. The act of doing so caused the soul of Throgmore to vacate the body and pass on to the hereafter, thus leaving the body mindless but intact, and able to hold the consciousness of Lemming once more, after he performed the sufficient rites. Thus, the Lemming-Mummy carried his now insensate physical body, with the consciousness of the murderous William Benson Throgmore now expunged from it (and from the material plane itself), back to the occultist's home in Boston to perform the rite of transference.
Elsewhere, the Curry-Mummy had once again begun traveling about the state of Massachusetts in the horse and carriage he had previously absconded from the tiny village he recently visited, and noted that he still could not find any sign of the woman who had possession of his amulet. Nevertheless, he mused to himself that he at least knew where her ultimate destination was, and he resolved to reach that area and find her.
The story then proceeded to display a [very unnecessary] recap of the events of "Stranger In A Village of the Insane," revisiting the Curry-Mummy's battle with the demon who controlled all of the people in that town, and culminating with the collapse of the stone temple that killed everyone within…except for the bandaged form now housing the psyche of Jerome Curry [and at this point, I suppose all the readers were supposed to forget about the mysterious woman in that village who witnessed the Mummy's presence after the death of everyone else living there, and who resolved to follow him and learn more about him].
Back in Boston, the police chief was discussing with his officers all of the clues they had so far pieced together about the mysterious murderer who had killed nine people over the course of the previous month [actually the number was ten, but I guess they, and author Skeates, didn't feel that the 'ghoul' woman from the story "Ghoulish Encounter" should be counted (assuming the delinquent caretakers of the cemetery in question even found her body impaled on the spiked iron gates of the crypt by this point!)…I guess Mr. Skeates has a prejudice against insane people with a fetish for eating corpses, or something like that]. The police chief mentioned that the only clues they had found thus far were the strange gray dust that was discovered on the throats of each of the victims, as well as several pages that appeared to have been ripped out of a young woman's diary. The chief also noted that the murders had since apparently stopped, and this made finding the killer even more difficult. He then suggested that they needed extra help, and for that, he opined that they call in a personage named Richard Hunter. When one of his officers mentioned that Hunter had retired "years ago," the chief replied, "I know! I know! But he said he'd come back if we ever really needed him! Hunter's a man who never gives up! If anyone can solve this case, he can!" [See the Comments section below.]
Unaware of this turn of events, the Curry-Mummy was continuing his quest across the countryside of Massachusetts…unaware that he was also being followed by yet another person, this time a mysterious man on a horse, who harbored the following thoughts to himself: "It's now or never! I've been following him for some time! Time to make my move! Show myself…confront him!" [The text then notes that we will have to wait "later" to find out about the nature of this confrontation…see Comments below].
Finally, the Lemming-Mummy brings his own insensate body back into the chambers of the mage whom he encountered in Boston soon after first arriving in America. Placing his human body on the stone altar before him, amidst the rotting corpses of all of the people whom the Were-Mummy killed here during his rampage a month earlier [I guess no one checks up on that old mage very much!], the Lemming-Mummy began concentrating and reciting the mystical incantations found in the mage's scrolls [evidently, the other psyche that inhabits the body of this cursed mummy along with the consciousness of Arthur Lemming was less malicious and willful than other such cursed prisoners trapped within their bandaged corpses, including the one that formerly shared such a fetid form with the consciousness of Jerome Curry, as the other mind co-habiting the Lemming-Mummy made no attempt to obstruct Lemming's actions towards leaving that body, nor attempted to influence him very much unduly].
Within moments, the consciousness of Arthur Lemming departed the rotting form of the bandaged mummy and returned to his own human body [this lends further credence to my conjecture that this did not occur on the night of a full moon, otherwise Lemming's physical body would have transformed into his wolf-man form as soon as his mind returned to it, as his curse appeared to be meta-genetically connected to his soul]. Lemming was overjoyed to find himself restored to his human body and freed from one of his two curses, the far more pervasive of the two, and now "only" had to contend with the curse of lycanthropy (which only affected him during the three nights of the full moon each month). At least now, he was human again most of the time.
However, his extreme sense of elation was interrupted as he found himself confronted by a large, heavily-muscled black man wielding a knife…who announced that he was the father of the boy whom he saw "Lemming" murder two weeks earlier [don't ask me how the man managed to locate Lemming in the mage's sanctorum at this precise time…did he actually see the Lemming-Mummy carrying the body there, and recognize it slumped over the bandaged creature's shoulder like that? And of all times for Lemming to be bereft of the power of either the mummy or the wolf-man!] Though Lemming tried to explain that it wasn't truly him who killed the angry and powerful-looking man's son, he obviously simply came off as a loon with his explanation, and the large man accused Lemming of caring nothing for his son's life simply because he was "a black horse boy" [racism was indeed very rampant and very socially acceptable in America a century ago, thus making the man's conjecture quite sensible, even though it was incorrect in this particular instance]. Now in total shock at this turn of events, Lemming stated aloud to himself that he could not believe that this was happening [the "Lemming luck," as he mentioned earlier, does indeed suck big time!]; the large man before him simply replied, "You better believe it's happening, killer," and then proceeded to fatally stab the now human were-mummy to death.
As Lemming's bloody body fell to the ground, in his last few seconds of life, he was beset by images of the past several weeks, where his lycanthropic alter-ego was responsible for much bloodshed and carnage, including the brutal murders of both his beloved daughter Miriam and his wife Angela.
As the text lamented:
"And Arthur Lemming falls for the last time…! He watches his life drain away! The blood gushing from his wounds…and he remembers…! He sees vividly the daughter whose death he caused long ago…! He remembers the wife he loved so much…the wife he murdered…!
"…and the clarity of all the others he has slain…slaughtered[…] [t]hough he had no desire to slaughter…come to him in this last moment of life. They beckon him into their world…welcome him to the world of the dead! And though he is dying, Arthur Lemming is happy! He knows that the werewolf who has senselessly massacred so many, will kill no more…!
"…that the pitiful creature known as the Were-Mummy will never kill again…!
"Arthur Lemming is happy to be sharing death with his wife…his little girl! He is happy his curse is at long last ended! He dies as a man…not as a monster…!"
Thus ends the tragic saga of Arthur Lemming [and also, that of Jerome Curry…see Comments below].
Comments: This story featured the end of Arthur Lemming's story, as described in the synopsis above. This was his final appearance to date. One must wonder, however, if there was or is any possibility of a revival for Lemming, as it has been observed many times before that those in the WNU who are afflicted with the seemingly meta-genetic curse of the 'wolf-man' (i.e., the "Glabro", furry and fanged humanoid phenotype) variant of the lycanthrope are notoriously difficult to destroy, even in their human form. Granted, in human form, Lemming (and other wolf-men, such as Larry Talbot, Waldemar Daninsky, and Jack Russell), were every bit as vulnerable to harm as a normal human being (strictly speaking, that is), if they were killed in a manner that did not include silver, but they could still be revived when exposed to the rays of a full moon (this was proven in the case of Larry Talbot and Waldemar Daninsky numerous times each in the past).
It seemed like the police of Boston were surprisingly lax in following up on the murders of the people within the occultist's home, which you think they would have been doing in lieu of the fact that they had just recently had a killer running rampant in the city (i.e., the Curry-Mummy). It can be presumed, of course, that this house was eventually located by the police soon after this story, and the corpse of Arthur Lemming was found and interred like all the others discovered there. If he was positively identified as a citizen of Great Britain, it may be surmised that his body was shipped home, and he was buried on English soil, possibly even near or within the town of Dwarves Bay (where he was residing during the initial days of his lyanthropic curse; see the "Curse of the Werewolf" series, indexed elsewhere on this web site). If this aforementioned scenario was indeed the case (and please note that it's nothing more than pure speculation on my part), then he has remained interred, but in a non-decayed, catatonic state to this day, because his human body was shielded from the rays of any subsequent full moon.
But should his grave be opened for any reason, and if his body was exposed to the rays of the full moon (as happened to Larry Talbot and Waldemar Daninsky on more than one occasion each), it stands to reason that Arthur Lemming, wolf-man, could indeed rise again.
Of course, it appears that the latter hasn't occurred (at least not at this writing). Nevertheless, it will be interesting to see what may happen in the future if the Warren characters other than Vampirella are ever given a proper revival, and also to see what any creative mythographer who specializes in therionthrophy (such as my colleague Crazy Ivan Schablotski) has to say about the apparent final fate of Arthur Lemming.
Strangely, despite all of the teasers regarding the future of the Curry-Mummy (who appeared only briefly in this story), this was his last appearance in Warren Comics, and he has yet to appear in the chronicles of Harris Comics at this writing, and to my knowledge no such revival is planned (there is some speculation that Harris abdicated its right to all of the Warren characters not directly connected to Vampirella following Jim Warren's late 1990's lawsuit against Stanely Harris's company). It was obvious that author Steve Skeates and the editorship of Warren Comics were planning to continue the saga of the Curry-Mummy in future installments of this series in the pages of EERIE when this particular story was published, but for reasons unknown, these plans were evidently discarded, and abruptly at that.
Hence, at this point, we have no idea who that woman was at the end of the story "Stranger In A Village of the Insane" who resolved to follow the Curry-Mummy; the identity of the strange man following him on horseback in this story who announced he would be confronting the Mummy was likewise never revealed [was this supposed to be the aforementioned woman? I swear that the mysterious rider on horseback looked like a man in this story!]; or who the mysterious personage of Richard Hunter, whom the Boston police were calling in to resolve the case, actually was. It also makes me wonder if Richard Hunter was perhaps related to Demian Hunter from the "Hunter" series that also ran in the pages of EERIE, featuring a hero indigenous to a future dystopian time track of the 22nd century. "Hunter" is indexed elsewhere on this site (Karas Hunter, of the series "Hunter 2," also indexed elsewhere on this site, did live on the same time track as Demian Hunter, but wasn't really related to him).
All of these promised future occurrences in the (no longer) continuing saga of the Curry-Mummy were left unresolved, showing yet another very frustrating aspect of the editorship of EERIE at the time, who presided over similar abrupt terminations regarding the previously promised continuation of other well-received series in that mag, such as "Dracula" and "Marvin the Dead-Thing."
As such, what happened to the Mummy whose mind was inhabited by the psyche of Jerome Curry, what ultimately became of his quest for the Amulet of Transference, and what ultimately occurred during his confrontations with the mysterious woman in the "village of the insane," the strange man following him on horseback in this story, and with the (presumed) bounty hunter/detective Richard Hunter, remains a major unsolved mystery of the WNU at this writing.
This series continued for one more entry (indexed below), but that was largely a stand-alone story set in the then present of the early 1970's, and had nothing to do with the Curry-Mummy (though it was made clear that it took place in-continuity). Hence, all that can be discerned about the final fate of the Curry-Mummy and his quest for the amulet at this writing (based upon the Mummy story "Insanity" from EERIE #63, the last in the series) was that by the year 1974, the amulet had traded many hands since being returned to the museum in Boston, and Jerome Curry's quest, whatever became of it, was definitively ended by that time.
The fact that the Curry-Mummy was given such short shrift in this story, the last in which he appeared, made the above situation all the more frustrating to the fans of this series. He was given a definitive ending to his saga in the reprint issue EERIE #78 (also indexed below), but I believe that these altered reprints were not part of the "consensus" WNU canon, and must be relegated to an AU (see my entry on EERIE #78 below for my explanations on this).
I must point out that artist Joaquin Blazquez's art was improved somewhat in this story, as this tale didn't involve any creature battles (nor any further interactions between the Curry-Mummy and the Lemming-Mummy), and much of it concentrated on the surrealistic, psychological aspects of Throgmore's hedonistic indulgences whilst inhabiting Arthur Lemming's form, and the aspects of the tale revolving around the restoration of the Lemming-Mummy's psyche to his own body, along with the latter's retrospective of his carnage as the wolf-man just before his demise.
Curiously, Cousin Eerie hosted this tale, something he rarely did for series stories.
WNU Connections: As noted above in the Comments section, this story, the last of both Jerome Curry and Arthur Lemming to be published, left several mysteries in the WNU canon for further creative mythographers to explore.
These include the final fate of the Curry-Mummy and his quest for the Amulet of Transference, whether or not this story was truly the final and lasting fate of the Arthur Lemming Wolf-Man, and the mystery regarding the identity of the obviously formidable but ultimately unseen Richard Hunter, and whether or not he had any connection to the many other prominent personages bearing the surname of "Hunter" in the "consensus" WNU.
Time Frame: This story took place two weeks after the previous entry, and I believe this to be sometime in early December of 1902. From the available evidence, I do not believe that this story occurred during a full moon, and that the Lemming-Mummy's depiction in this story of being in his Were-Mummy form was strictly an instance of artistic license (and a sloppy instance, at that) on the part of artist Blazquez.
