Latitude 38

by Ron Hutchison

  “I imagine everyone does, kid,” Cutbirth said.

  In a faint, husky voice, Adriana said, “Try remembering this, Emily. Stalactites are fastened tight to the…the ceiling. Stalagmites might grow to the ceiling.”

  The milk-white columns were smudged with black soot, and Cutbirth ran his finger through one of the dark stains. “Torches.”

  “Who made them?” Emily asked. She snapped a photo of the sooty remains.

  Taking a big breath, Adriana said, “It’s my guess, that this cavern was once…was once inhabited by people from the last Ice Age.”

  “How long ago was that?” Yong asked.

  “Between ten and twelve thousand years,” Adriana said. “They were tool-makers and some of the first people to demonstrate an interest in art, as we saw yesterday.”

  Diego looked at his wife in the shadowy darkness, his heart swelling with admiration. Adriana Sanchez had received national acclaim following an archaeological dig in northern New Mexico four years earlier. Confirmed by carbon-14 dating, Adriana and her crew of graduate students had unearthed an intact Native American pueblo, one that predated by more than a thousand years the ruins at New Mexico’s Chaco Canyon, which had previously thought to be one of the earliest known settlements in America. Adriana was at the top of her game when she was struck down by the first episode of cancer, and Diego silently reviled the disease for the thousandth time.

  The chamber abruptly narrowed to form a towering canyon. A small stream ran down its gut. Nourished by the numerous wall drippings, the stream grew in size and strength until it found a resting place at a spot on the map called Lake With Dam. They were encouraged that they had found it so quickly.

  It was a diminutive body of water no more than 60 feet across. At the far end rose a dam of sorts, constructed over thousands of years, Cutbirth explained, from the calcite in the water. The small lake spilled over the dam and cascaded down a series of gentle waterfalls.

  Cutbirth looked at Adriana. “How am I doing, Teach?”

  “Calcite,” Adriana flashed a feeble smile, her throaty words resonating with pain. “You’ve got it right.”

  The simple act of speaking had become unmanageable for Adriana, and Diego wanted to wrap her in his arms and kiss her face and tell her how much he loved her. It was going to be a long day without the Z patch.

  Adriana stepped over to the water’s edge, dropped to her knees, and gazed at her image in the water. Diego went over and stood beside her.

  “I’m a fright,” she said, gazing at her dim reflection. She pushed a lock of hair away from her eyes and stared at her own double. “I look like an old woman.”

  “It’s the bad lighting,” he offered.

  “You are far too kind, Diego Sanchez,” Adriana said, gently erasing her likeness with the back of her hand.

  ***

  They left the Lake With Dam, and followed the smooth cave trail that ran parallel to the picturesque string of whispering falls.

  Cutbirth stopped a few yards short of a place in the trail that angled downward. His headlamp illuminated an ugly, dark vein running along the trail wall. He took his knife, cut a small chunk from the black streak and put it to his nose. “Lead,” he said. “A magnificent vein of lead.” His light followed the vein as it descended along the wall.

  Yong said, “I want to know how you can smell lead, Cutbirth. That would be a scientific first.”

  “I can smell cooked cabbage from a dozen miles, the first rose of spring from across the county, a woman’s sweet breath—”

  “—from another room,” Diego said dryly. “You’re having a senior moment, Cutbirth. You’ve spun that yarn—”

  Diego was interrupted by the faint rumble of gunfire. It was the same BOOM! they had been accustomed to hearing. The BOOM! they had heard at the crest of Bear Mountain and the BOOM! they had heard inside the cave. Everyone stopped and listened. A second burst followed, and ten seconds later came a third. The detonations were dim, distant, one echo overlapping the next.

  Yong looked at Cutbirth. “Any theories?”

  Cutbirth offered a thoughtful frown. “Big Bertha, but I can’t imagine what Uno would be shooting at.”

  “I think I know,” Diego said anxiously. He could see it unfolding in his mind. “Uno’s crawling through that tube and clearing the way by spraying it with shotgun pellets. Uno and Mr. Mustache still think you might be stationed at the other end.” Diego recalled his claustrophobic ordeal in the tube and he shuddered visibly.

  Cutbirth nodded. “If that’s true then they haven’t arrived at the pit yet. I would be interested in knowing how they tackle that challenge.” In a relaxed voice he said, “We should be out of this cave by then.”

  Diego wanted to believe Cutbirth. He wanted to, but didn’t. Cutbirth’s earlier predictions were flawed and Diego harbored nagging doubts.

  Quickening their pace, they hiked deeper and deeper into the network of passages, and soon entered a vast, airy room, the largest chamber they had encountered. The ceiling was festooned with dozens of straw-like formations which glistened white in the beams of their headlamps. Cutbirth said the odd formations were the first stages of stalactites.

  They moved on, and in a few minutes entered a chamber that they recognized immediately as the next place on the map: Church Organ. There was no mistaking the giant formation, which resembled the cylindrical pipes of an organ. The organ’s longer “pipes” were in the middle—they were ten feet or so tall—and tapered in length toward either end.

  Little escaped the lens of Emily’s camera. It wasn’t the Grand Canyon or Meteor Crater, but she didn’t seem to mind.

  Fifteen minutes later they found themselves in the close quarters of the place on the map designated as the Cave Bear Room.

  There on the jagged cave wall was the crude, yet strangely sophisticated image of a cave bear. The animal was profiled in black, and, as if Mother Cave wanted to verify its authenticity, to confirm its age, a small curtain of flowstone had accumulated over one edge of the ancient drawing. The person who had drawn the cave bear had signed his work with a handprint at the bottom of the ancient pictograph. The handprint was outlined in orange.

  “A true Renoir,” Cutbirth said, his headlamp fixed on the drawing and the flowstone that partially covered it.

  “It looks like a bear,” Emily said.

  “Cave bear, yes,” Adriana said quietly. “But it’s more than that, Emily.”

  Yong looked at Cutbirth. “How long did it take this flowstone to form?”

  Cutbirth studied it closely. “I’d guess about 30,000 years, maybe longer.”

  When Emily started to touch the flowstone, Adriana gently grasped her hand and shook her head.

  “Adriana’s right,” Diego said. “You shouldn’t touch it. This is something special.”

  “Why?”

  “If it took 30,000 years to make this flowstone,” Adriana said in a weak voice, “then the drawing beneath it has to be older.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Adriana’s light traced the outline of the cave bear. “Early man wasn’t supposed to inhabit North America until later,” she said, her words coming now in small, broken pieces. Everyone had to strain to hear her speak. “If the picture was made more than 30,000 years ago”—she paused to draw two breaths—“anthropologists will have to change their calculations.”

  Emily shot a photo of the cave bear. When she wanted to shoot the primitive artwork from different angles, Cutbirth said, “Put it in gear, kid! We don’t have time for this foolishness!”

  “Make nice, Mr. Cutbirth,” Sissy implored.

  Emily managed to sneak in one final shot.

  They pushed on, hiking deeper and deeper into the mountain—Cutbirth studied his map at each juncture—the slope of the tunnel descending gently and taking them to the depths of the rolling Ozark mountain. By mid-morning, the stream that had followed them throughout the day—from chamber to chamber and tunnel to tunnel—began to change. />
  Diego was the first to notice. “Cutbirth, it’s beginning to widen.”

  Cutbirth glanced at the stream with a casual nod.

  26

  It happened without warning.

  They were hiking beside the trickle of water that had originated earlier in the day at the Lake With Dam. They had just stepped around the scattered remains of what had once been a section of ceiling when Cutbirth stopped, turned abruptly, and pointed his headlamp back up the wide corridor. “Listen,” he whispered.

  “What is it?” Diego asked. He hadn’t heard a thing.

  “Why are we stopping?” Yong said.

  Cutbirth raised a finger to his lips. “Shhhh!” he said, twisting his thick neck and listening.

  Eyes locked, Sissy and Emily stood motionless.

  Sensing trouble, Adriana nestled closer to her husband and in a faltering voice whispered, “Do you hear anything?” Diego shook his head.

  Cutbirth’s face contorted into a faint, bitter smile, and he said quite calmly, “Awwwww, damnit!” He began to run. “Follow me! Flood!”

  Then, as everyone strained to hear what Cutbirth had heard, a dim clamor filled the tunnel like the muffled groan of a faraway passenger jet, one that was roaring down the runway toward them.

  Diego pivoted sharply and directed his headlamp up the tunnel. What he saw caused him to shudder with a sick and abject fear. An angry wall of water was rushing down the tunnel—the giant wave was seconds from swallowing them—and an image immediately came to Diego’s mind: He and Adriana slammed against the rock walls, the rock floor, the rock ceiling. They were being battered to death like ragdolls in a washing machine.

  “Diego!” Adriana cried, her eyes fixed on the approaching catastrophe.

  Choking on his heart, Diego grabbed Adriana’s hand, and they began sprinting down the tunnel, a few strides behind Cutbirth, their boots slipping and sliding on the damp and uneven cavern floor.

  Glancing over his shoulder, Diego shouted, “Sissy! Take Emily! Run!”

  Sissy and Emily were already in full stride and they bolted down the tunnel hand in hand. Yong was a step behind. When Emily fell—she uttered a painful shriek and slid a few feet on her knees—Yong scooped her up in his arms, knocking off her headlamp.

  They ran for their lives, trying to outpace the deadly deluge that raced down the tunnel toward them. Cutbirth screamed something over his shoulder, but his words were smothered by the growing explosion of water.

  It’s not going to end like this! Diego thought angrily. I won’t allow it to end like this! But he knew he had little choice in the matter, and he lengthened his strides. Fear driving him forward, Diego slipped on the wet cave floor, caught himself, then slipped again, but managed to stay on his feet.

  The wall of water was nearly upon them when the corridor in which they were running funneled into a tiny chamber no larger than a double-car garage. A narrow ledge overlooked the diminutive hollow from a height of three feet or so, and everyone followed Cutbirth, scampering up onto the tapered shelf at the very moment the water rushed into the cave with a thunderous bawl. Yong set Emily down beside Sissy as the frothing giant filled the chamber. The water surged into the tiny dugout at an incredible speed and exited down another tunnel.

  “Big rain up top!” Cutbirth shouted above the din.

  “So much for your weather forecast, Cutbirth!” Diego yelled, panting, his face drawn into a frightened, exhausted frown. “You’ve officially lost your role as alpha male of this tribe!” Diego looked at his wife. Adriana nodded and squeezed his hand, as if to say, I’m fine. But Diego knew better. She wasn’t fine. She had difficulty in drawing a clean breath. Adriana’s eyes showed her fear and she was panting in harried spurts.

  In the next moment, the clamor of the flood subsided and the lathering whitecaps disappeared. In a few seconds the water was flowing through the chamber as gentle as the Meramec River.

  Sissy looked at Yong, and mouthed the words, “Thank you.”

  Yong appeared stunned by what had just happened and gave an anxious nod.

  “I can feel my heart beating, Mom,” Emily said, hand over her chest.

  “Better put your camera away,” Sissy panted.

  Emily removed the camera from around her neck and stowed it in her backpack.

  “Is it over?” Diego asked, his light on Cutbirth.

  Before Cutbirth could answer, another cascading roar was upon them, and a second ferocious rush of water entered the small chamber.

  “Hold on!” Cutbirth warned, the level of the underground flood lapping at the bottom of the ledge on which they stood.

  They made a human chain with their hands.

  “If worst comes to worst,” Cutbirth yelled, “use your backpacks as lifejackets! They’re waterproof and they’ll float!”

  Diego had a sinking feeling. He hoped worst didn’t come to worst. Adriana’s breathing had not improved. He could see it plainly. It came in jerky, painful gushes.

  No, it is not going to end like this!

  Cutbirth slipped out of his backpack and held it at his chest, looping his arms through the straps. Each of them followed Cutbirth’s example, the swell of water sweeping over the ledge to the tops of their boots.

  “Keep your heads raised!” Cutbirth shouted. “Don’t get your headlamps wet!”

  “Stay close, Adriana!” Diego yelled.

  Adriana nodded with a wince of alarm.

  The swirling creature was at their knees now, its undercurrent pulling at them. When Adriana’s spindly body started to slip away, Diego grabbed a strap on her backpack and pulled her back onto the ledge.

  Diego glanced at Yong. His eyes were closed and he was moving his lips. The words, however, were suffocated by the unruly sound of the water. He’s praying, Diego thought. Diego wondered if Yong was a Buddhist. Then he wondered if Buddhists prayed. Of course, they pray, he thought. Then he wondered why in God’s name he was thinking about something so unimportant. I must be in shock. Only a person in shock would think of something so utterly irrelevant.

  A gummy mass of debris floated in and out of the small chamber.

  Diego next glanced over at Cutbirth. There was something in Cutbirth’s eyes Diego had not seen before. Doubt. Diego remembered Cutbirth’s admission that night on the river. Cutbirth had said he didn’t relish the thought of drowning in a cave. “I have an unnatural fear of that,” he had confessed.

  The fury of the flood suddenly intensified and a third angry wall of water poured into the cave, sweeping over them like a giant tidal wave. The sudden swell blinded Diego for a moment—the water was at his hips and had splashed into his face—and when his eyes cleared, Yong was gone. Twisting his head and the headlamp it held, Diego searched the patchy shadows for any sign of him, but Yong was nowhere to be seen. Diego tightened his grip on Adriana as the rush of water rose above their waists.

  Emily screamed. The convulsive onslaught had snatched her from Sissy’s grip and dragged her into the powerful current. Emily’s tomato-red hair swirled across her face. Sissy lunged for Emily in the spotty darkness, throwing herself into the deluge, but the explosion of water separated mother and daughter like fragile matchsticks.

  Diego and Adriana watched in horror, helpless.

  The spin of the water took Emily to the entrance of the tunnel leading out of the chamber, and then spun her around like a top, thrusting her back into the chamber. The whirlpool of water was erratic, however, and it immediately sucked Sissy out of the chamber and down the tunnel. Powerless, Diego watched Sissy raise her arms to swim—it was awkward with the backpack at her chest—but she was no match for the muscle of the water, and she screamed Emily’s name as the onslaught of water carried her away.