After half an hour, the first of the stones fell into an empty space behind the wall, and Spencer renewed his efforts as Drake took a break, still not fully recovered from the prior day’s blood loss. A second rock tumbled into the cavity, followed by a third and fourth, and Spencer stood back, studying the dark hole he’d bored.
“Looks like a cave to me,” he said.
Drake offered a pained grin. “That’s what we’re looking for. How much longer you figure till it gets dark?”
“Maybe two hours.”
“Plenty of time,” Drake said, pulling his flashlight from his pack and turning it on. Spencer did the same and then invited Drake to lead the way.
“This is your dance. I’m just the window dressing.”
Drake’s calf flared pain as he climbed through the gap and stood in the cavern, the mouth no more than six feet high and ten wide. He took several cautious steps, playing his beam over the stone floor, which dropped below ground level as far as he could see. Spencer stepped in behind him. His boots scraped on the chunks of mortar and rock as he directed his light at the ceiling.
“Looks like plenty of bats, so there’s got to be another entrance,” he whispered.
Squeaking greeted his comment, and then the entire cavern seemed to come alive as the air thickened with hundreds of furry bodies beating tiny wings, screeching as they headed for the new exit. Drake ducked and covered his head as the swarm fluttered over and around him. Spencer did the same, the frenzied squeaks building to a crescendo and then fading as the bats departed, leaving them open-mouthed and shaken.
“You did say there were plenty of them,” Drake said dryly. He took a tentative step farther into the chasm’s gloom. Spencer moved to his side, and their combined lights glowed off the cave walls.
“Feel the temperature change? It’s cooler already.”
“At least that’s a relief. I wonder if there are snakes in here?” Drake asked.
“I think we have to assume the worst.”
“I was afraid you’d say that.”
The area expanded as they traversed the sloping floor. The narrow passage became a large cave with a ceiling at least twenty feet high. Spencer grabbed Drake’s arm and leaned into him, pointing at a far wall, his light moving across the stone.
Pictographs adorned the space, carvings of deities and dignitaries in elaborate gowns and headdresses, riding on carts pulled by jaguars and mythical beasts. In the background, atop a hill framed by two waterfalls, a huge form, part feline, part human, spread its arms heavenward, where an oversized, stylized sun beamed down on the procession.
Drake nudged him and moved forward to where a different scene depicted Inca warriors battling caricatures of bearded men with armor, bodies on both sides piled up, decapitated and otherwise mutilated. His light seemed inadequate to highlight all the carvings, which stretched to the ceiling – a graphical history of the Incas.
“Look at this,” Spencer whispered from another wall. Drake made his way to him, where he was staring at a carving of a large gathering of men and women standing around a lake. A deity hovered over it, arms filled with icons and jewels.
“That could be El Dorado. The legend of the golden man,” Drake said, his voice hushed. He directed his light at the mouth of a dark opening on the far side of the chamber, the squeak of an occasional bat reminding them that they weren’t alone. Water dripped somewhere in the distance, wearing away at the stone as it had for eons to create the cavern. They approached the gap and stopped short at the final image carved into the wall – a grinning skull atop a robed figure, which clutched a snake in one bony hand and a war club in the other.
“Not much of a welcome committee, is it?” Spencer said.
“You can take the point position anytime you want.”
“This is your movie. Lead on, Dr. Livingston.”
Drake moved forward into the new cave and a low moan greeted him from its bowels. His flashlight beam flashed on the floor in front of him, and he hesitated as a large white scorpion faced him, tail raised, its pincers opening and closing furiously, clearly annoyed at having been disturbed. Drake sensed Spencer behind him, but kept his eyes locked on the creature, mesmerized by its menacing dance.
He jumped when Spencer tapped his arm and whispered in his ear.
“Looks like we found the cemetery.”
Drake raised his beam from the creature and slowly played it over the wall, where hundreds of skulls leered at him. Spencer turned slowly, taking in the countless skeletons in the burial vault, and stopped where the oily brown exoskeleton of a centipede was worming through the eyehole of a skull with a feathered helmet on it.
“Okay. This is officially really creepy,” Drake murmured, and returned his attention to the floor, where the scorpion had scuttled off into the recesses of the massive crypt.
“Agreed. Although the good part is that they’re dead, so they don’t pose much of a threat. I could take ten of ’em with one arm tied behind my back,” Spencer said.
The moaning sound echoed through the cave again, and Drake pointed his light at the ceiling. “Wind’s blowing somewhere above us.”
“Probably where the bats get in.”
“You’re going to tell me to keep going, aren’t you?”
“I don’t see any treasure yet, do you?”
“Did I mention this is freaking me out?” Drake asked.
“Not yet.”
“Okay, then I won’t.” Drake touched the hilt of his knife and felt the odd calming effect flood through him as he made his way through the floor-to-ceiling piles of bleached bones. They pushed thick cobwebs aside, the gossamer strands hanging from the stalactites above like ectoplasm. Rows of skulls fixed him with sightless stares as he put one silent foot in front of the other, and he wondered whether the experience would haunt his dreams forever, like the memory of Palenko’s Saint Vitus dance, and the last light of life in Jack’s eyes before he closed them the final time.
They reached the end of the crypt and entered an even larger one, legions of skeletons observing their progress, mute sentinels in the hall of the dead. The air smelled leaden and damp, with a musty odor of decay. The wind’s moan followed them like a curse as they made their way toward the narrow gap at the far end, the aperture as black as the devil’s heart. A distinct feeling of unease twisted in Drake’s stomach as they neared it, and the odor in the air changed again – this time, a whiff of methane mixed with the unmistakable scent of water.
Drake and Spencer stopped at the threshold together, their lamps illuminating four mummified guardians in full battle gear framing the opening. All of the warriors had copper chest plates and bronze helmets adorned with elaborate multicolored feathers. They stood with round wooden shields and wooden clubs studded with stone spikes, their bodies positioned to give the impression of an attack, their leathery skin, protruding teeth, and gaping eye cavities as menacing in death as in life.
“I’ve had nights like that,” Spencer quipped. The tension in the vault evaporated with the sound of his voice echoing off the stone walls.
“You ready to do this?” Drake asked.
“No time like the present.”
The cavern they entered was smaller than the last but with the highest ceiling yet, and Drake estimated from the slope that they must have traveled forty feet below ground level, if not more. The temperature seemed cool as a wine cellar after the heat of the jungle above, and the endless rows of skulls gave way to bare walls. In the center of the cave was a hole in the floor the size of a truck, the rim around it crusted with small emeralds embedded in the smooth stone.
“It’s a cenote,” Spencer whispered, pronouncing the word see-no-tay. “See how steep the edges are?”
“Forgive my ignorance, but what’s a cenote?”
“A Mexican term. Think of it as a really deep sinkhole filled with water. I’d guess that this one was formed by the roof of a cavern below us eroding away and finally collapsing, creating the hole we’re looking
at.”
“I don’t see any water dripping into it,” Drake said as they approached the edge.
“That could have been fifty thousand years ago. But you can smell water.”
Drake blinked as he looked around the cave. “Am I losing my mind, or do the walls in here seem to be…glowing?”
He extinguished his flashlight. Spencer did the same. A vertiginous disorientation hit Drake, and then his eyes adjusted and he could make out thousands of tiny pinpoints of light.
“What the hell?” He felt his way to one of the walls and examined it, and then pulled away in revulsion. The lights were moving, ever so slightly, and he could see that the neon points were the tips of gelatinous tubes.
Spencer’s voice greeted him from a few feet behind him. “Glow worms. That’s a first. I’ve seen fireflies and beetles with glowing tails, but never these. Apparently we can add them to the discoveries for the record books we’ve made today. The Amazon never fails to surprise, that’s for sure.”
“What do they feed on?”
“Any kind of flying insects. Wanna bet the water attracts mosquitoes, and when they hatch, they buzz around, attracted to the lights, and get stuck in that stringy goop?”
“Nice. I won’t be eating dinner tonight.”
They turned back to the sinkhole and switched on their flashlights again. “This seems like it’s where the treasure would be. Look at the number of emeralds. There’s a small fortune right there,” Drake said.
Spencer nodded. “Promising. But how do we find out for sure?”
Drake pointed his light down the sheer walls of the sinkhole and saw water twenty feet below. He hesitated and then turned to Spencer.
“You have that rope in your backpack?”
“Of course. Why? What are you planning to do?”
“Did you know I was on the swim team in school?” Drake asked as he slipped the straps of his backpack off and set it on the stone floor.
“That’s nice. I always wanted to be a cheerleader. What’s your point?”
“I once won a bet for being able to hold my breath underwater for over three minutes. I mean, that’s nothing compared to some free divers, who can go ten, fifteen minutes, but still, it’s longer than most. It was a while ago, but I bet I could still manage two minutes, even if I was swimming. But this would work way better if I didn’t have to.”
“Didn’t have to swim?”
“Exactly. I’m thinking if I could hold sixty or seventy pounds of rock in my arms, that would help me sink with the least amount of effort.”
“You’re going to dive into…that?”
“Not dive. You’ll lower me down with the rope attached to my belt, and then I’ll drop to the bottom and see what I can feel. My only question is about my wounds. You think that will increase my infection risk?”
“It might. But you’re taking horse pills of antibiotic. And cenote water is supposed to be very clean. I forget why.”
“How do you know so much about them?” Drake asked.
“I read about the famous ones in Mexico, and got curious.” Spencer held up the coil of rope. “A hundred feet of nylon. Hopefully that will be enough.”
“If it isn’t, I can always untie the rope and keep going. Coming up’s way easier than going down.”
“Good to know if I ever have to do hundred-foot free dives.”
“Come on. Let’s go back and get a couple of those rocks at the entrance. Those should do it.”
Spencer shook his head. “You’re in no shape to carry heavy rocks that distance. I’ve got a better suggestion. Those four guards have copper breastplates. Want to bet each one weighs at least ten or fifteen pounds?”
“And a helmet should add some weight, too.”
“Tell you what. You wait here and do breathing exercises or whatever you need to do to prepare, and I’ll go do a little grave robbery.”
Five minutes later Drake was at the edge of the cenote, stripped down to just his shorts, the breastplates slung around his neck and an Inca ceremonial helmet on his head. He tugged at the rope tied to his belt and nodded, his flashlight on the floor throwing light toward the opening.
Drake gave Spencer a thumbs-up. “Let me down easy, and once I’m in the water just feed the rope out until we’re out of line. If I have to disconnect, leave the rope down and brace yourself, because that’s my lifeline out of there.”
“You ready?” Spencer asked, studying Drake. “I do wish I had a camera…”
“You sure you’ll be able to support all this weight?”
“No problem. Just hope the rope holds.”
“You’re not giving me a lot of good vibes.”
“That’s why most people don’t go cenote diving in the middle of the Amazon. Bad vibes.”
“Okay. Here we go.” Drake concentrated on taking deep breaths to oxygenate his blood, and then lowered himself over the edge, his arms straining from supporting himself with the additional burden of the copper. He dropped below the edge and felt himself descending as Spencer, true to his word, controlled his drop.
When his feet touched the water, he was surprised by how cold it was.
“I’m in. Hold me for a minute while I work on my breathing, and when I clap my hands, let the rope drop as fast as I can sink.”
“You’re the boss. Good luck.”
Drake filled his lungs, expanding them as far as he could, held his breath, and then forced more air in using his mouth. He exhaled loudly after ten seconds and repeated the process four times. On the fifth, he clapped, and began to sink as the tension on the rope vanished.
Once fully submerged he dropped less rapidly than he would have liked, and focused on keeping his heart rate slow so that he would consume minimal oxygen. His leg wound stung as he sank, and he mentally counted off ten seconds, then twenty, then thirty, as he continued to drift lower while clearing his ears every ten feet. The water grew colder as he plumbed the depths, and then at sixty seconds, his feet touched something.
Drake opened his eyes, but couldn’t see anything. He looked up and saw a faint glow from the surface – Spencer’s flashlight playing over the water. His bare feet rubbed against a sharp edge and he almost exhaled, but forced himself to remain calm and concentrated on turning so he could feel around with his hands.
His fingers sank into the muck at the bottom, which was slimy and thick, and grasped a shape that had the hard edges of metal. It was heavy, and when he tried to pull it free, it wouldn’t budge. He groped along next to it and grabbed the next shape, this one slimmer and smaller. He wrenched it from the mud, and even underwater he could tell it was extremely heavy. Holding it with his left arm, he reached down with his right and drew his knife, then carefully slipped it beneath the leather ties that secured the first breastplate to his chest and sliced upward. The copper plate slipped free and dropped to the bottom.
Drake repeated the process until he was free of the weight, and removed the helmet, leaving it to sink. He began kicking to the surface, his lungs starting to burn as he ascended, his muscles placing an instant demand for oxygen that wasn’t available. The statuette was harder to maneuver with than the copper breastplates had been. The light on the surface beckoned to him like a distant mirage, and he kicked with all his might, ignoring the searing pain from his brutalized calf as he neared the sweet relief of air.
When he broke the surface he gasped, splashing, gulping in as much oxygen as he could as he treaded water. Spencer’s head appeared at the rim and his voice echoed from the steep walls.
“Took you long enough.”
“You going to haul me up, or am I going for an endurance test here?”
The rope slid by him as Spencer wound it up. He felt his belt tighten, and then he was inching higher at a snail’s pace. When he reached the lip, he heaved the object he’d pulled from the bottom over the side and grappled for a hold, his arms shaking as he hoisted himself over the edge, cushioned by the glass-like facets of the emeralds as he lay on his back, brea
thing deeply, his vision blurry in the gloom. He turned his head and saw a deep orange glint in the dim light.
Spencer’s boots crunched against the hard stone floor.
“I’d say you hit the jackpot with that, Drake.”
Drake turned the statue over in his hands, a highly stylized llama cast from solid gold, eighteen inches tall, its expression a cross between a pout and a smile. “That was the smallest I felt down there. It must weigh thirty pounds.”
Spencer hefted it and set it back on the ground. “More like fifty.”
“What’s that worth, you reckon?”
“Just the gold alone, for melt value, is probably over a mil. As a historical artifact? Sky’s the limit. It’s priceless. A collector would probably pay five million, easy. I’ve never seen anything like it, even in a museum.”
“I’d say that should establish that we found the treasure, then.”
“Oh yeah.” Spencer grinned. “How was the swim?”
“Cold.”
“Don’t worry. You’re going to be so rich you can afford to have your blood heated by burning hundred-dollar bills.”
“Still got to pull off some pretty big stunts to get paid, though.”
Spencer eyed the llama again and shrugged. “Like I said. Now that we know we hit the mother lode, I’ll carry the heavy end of the log.” He paused. “But this still doesn’t solve your CIA problem.”
Drake coughed and then smiled.
“Our CIA problem.”
Chapter Forty-Two
Spencer and Drake moved Allie and the rest of the camp just inside the cavern mouth, seeing no reason to pitch tents outside as yet more rain drizzled at the opening. The three of them sat out of the rain and dined on a celebratory slab of fish Spencer returned with on the end of his spear after a twenty-minute hiatus. They sat with full stomachs, watching the last of the day’s light drain from the ashen sky, minds racing over the successful conclusion of the quest of a lifetime. Drake had changed his dressing and was relieved to see that he was still clear of infection, and decided that he might just make it after all. Allie’s shoulder looked battered but was also free of the redness and puffiness that would have signaled a problem, for which they were all grateful.
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