Seventy-six
The next morning
McCauley rented a Kia Rio from the Europcar rental facility on Via Sardegna. He sat next to Father Eccleston, who agreed to drive. Katrina stretched out in the backseat.
“Okay, let’s see. What’s the best route?” Eccleston asked in the parking lot. He looked at a map provided by the rental office and the variety of routes the GPS offered between Rome and Genga, Le Marche.
“It’s pretty much a straight shot on the A24 until we hit the coast.” Eccleston said peering over the map from his angle. “Then we pick up the Autostrada, A14 North. Or instead of the A14 that whole leg, we can go through some of these towns.” He pointed out Orte, Narni, Todi, Perugia and Gubbio.
“That’ll be slower going?” McCauley asked.
“Yes, but it’s pretty,” the priest recalled. “We’ll cross the Apennines that way. It’s an historic route.”
“Pretty and historic we don’t need,” Katrina countered. “Quick and easy. I say let’s get there today, pack in a good night’s sleep and start exploring tomorrow.”
“Agreed.” Eccleston moved into traffic. He didn’t notice the rented Fiat that pulled out behind them.
• • •
“If you discount Galileo’s discovery, which of course isn’t mentioned online, the caverns are actually new to the public,” Quinn explained as they drove north. He was reading an Internet description of the site; the spectacular and now famous Grotte di Frasassi—the Frasassi Caves. “Geologists and cavers really began to explore the ground around Genga in 1948. That’s when the entrance to the River Cave was found. The next major find came in 1966 by a speleological group that followed a branch off the initial cavern. Their exploration led to more. Little discoveries resulted in bigger ones with names like the Great Cave of the Winds and the Grotta Grande del Vento. One labyrinth is some twenty kilometers long. Apparently jaw-dropping.”
“And that’s where we’re going?” Katrina felt her pulse quicken.
“Not exactly. I think we’ll be looking for something off the beaten path based on the more vague descriptions in those later letters. An entrance Galileo uncovered…”
“And the Vatican covered up,” McCauley speculated.
“Not the Vatican,” the priest maintained. “But someone with a purpose.”
• • •
The Fiat followed them up the A24 to the A14 and into Genga. The driver held back as they approached the picturesque Italian town. A medieval castle was perched atop a hill overlooking the Natural Regional Park of Gola della Rossa and Frasassi, and their ultimate destination, Grotte di Frasassi—the Frasassi Caves.
One at a time the cars entered Genga through an ancient archway, the town’s original defensive barriers. The Kia pulled into a space. The Fiat held back.
The priest got out of the car. The other two passengers remained. Eccleston walked from one hotel to another. All were booked. He doubled back to their Kia and drove down the hill to another hotel, a much more modern resort closer to the caves. The Fiat followed.
Here they managed to score rooms, paying more for Hotel Le Grotte and its first class services than they would have in town. McCauley still had cash, thanks to Marli Bellamy.
Meanwhile, the driver of the Fiat hoped there would be another room available. He figured with his identification they’d be fools to turn him away. And if he liked the accommodations, he might even have one of his magazine staff writers do an article.
Seventy-seven
Le Marche region
The next morning
The trio climbed up and down hills, covering hundreds of yards over three hours. They avoided cliffs they felt Galileo would not have attempted even at age thirty-seven. They tried every opening that appeared possible and dug around rocks that might be blocking the way. Mostly it was discouraging until they came across one that really looked promising. However, after fifteen minutes of grueling work the team hit solid rock.
It was now midday. They were tired, hungry, and searching separately. McCauley was about to call a break when, from a distance, the priest shouted, “Hey, give me a hand.”
Quinn and Katrina both converged from different directions about thirty feet apart.
“Remember Galileo’s general descriptions in his letter to Garaldi? It feels pretty similar,” Eccleston explained as they closed in. “But we have to deal with this.” A four-by-five foot boulder was wedged in the way of what might be a point of access. “Looks like it could have been rolled into place.”
“Or just fallen,” McCauley said taking the more pessimistic view.
“Either way, it goes or we move on. I think it’s worth a try.”
McCauley shook his head—not at the challenge now, but at the sight of the surroundings. It was close to Galileo’s description of the white asphodel, orchids, and cyclamen growing wild on the hillside. Below was the valley he wrote about, formed by glaciers and towering limestone gorges. In his mind, McCauley adjusted for some general geological shifts, fauna and flora growth, and the changes that weather brings to land over centuries. Father Eccleston was right. It was worth a try.
“I like it,” McCauley said enthusiastically. “And we’re still close to town. Galileo could have easily walked it.”
“So, who’s up for a hernia?” Eccleston asked.
McCauley stood next to the priest. They quickly surmised that the rock wasn’t going to budge without some serious muscle. There was too much fill around it, a true measure of how things really worked on the face of the earth, how history covered its tracks. Or, as McCauley speculated, how humans could have covered it up.
“Gentlemen, a little science in honor of Signor Galileo. Perhaps you can come up with a lever and a fulcrum?” Katrina proposed.
The paleontologist and the Vatican scientist looked at one another.
“Right,” they said simultaneously.
McCauley thought. A simple tree branch would break under the strain. “Find some rocks we could use for the fulcrum. I’ll go to check the car for a tire iron. That might work. And break out the sandwiches. We’ll need the energy.”
McCauley walked back down to the flats where they’d parked their Kia. Going down was assuredly easier. He made it in twelve minutes.
Inside the trunk was a good enough tire iron to change a tire. But it was barely two feet long, which meant they’d have to dig down more to get an effective angle to move the boulder—if it were even possible. On his way back, but before he hit the hill, he saw something better: the international Do Not Enter traffic sign atop a long metal pole. “Perfect!”
The bit of vandalism would not be easy until he decided what he couldn’t do by hand, he could do with a ton-and-a-half car.
He backed into the pole, uprooting it to the cost of the rental car deductible. McCauley laughed to himself. This was becoming a habit.
• • •
Katrina and Fr. Eccleston had finished their sandwiches.
“What took you so…”
Katrina caught herself. “Ah, good thinking, Dr. McCauley.”
“Thank you, Dr. Alpert.”
“We’ll start digging around the boulder. But history can wait,” she implored. “Grab a bite first.”
McCauley couldn’t argue with that. He ate the remaining prosciutto, lettuce and tomato sandwich and polished off the quart water bottle that Katrina had left for him.
While he relaxed, the priest got to work scrapping, digging and scooping out the dirt on one side of the boulder while Katrina cleared a path in front. Once dislodged, they hoped the obstacle would roll down the hill. Even a few feet would make the difference, enough for them to squeeze past to see if they had come to the right place.
It was slow going. The rock had stood in one place for decades if not centuries. The effort hardly speeded up with McCauley’s help. However, after ninety minutes they believed they’d dug enough.
The priest had picked out a triangular rock, just the right size and shape for the fulcrum. Now for a p
ractical test of the physics.
All three of them grabbed hold of the pole wedged under the boulder and over the fulcrum. In success, their full weight would start it moving. McCauley calculated they’d exert a combined 560 pounds against the load.
Back to the science of it all, he knew the standard equation that calculated the effort and the load in relation to the fulcrum. McCauley’s real problem was over the force it would really take since they didn’t know the weight of the load – the boulder.
“On the count of three,” McCauley announced. They were ready to move part of the mountain. However, three came and went five times. “Back to digging.”
“This better be the place,” Katrina said with real hope.
“We won’t know unless we get this mother, sorry Father, Mother Earth out of the way.”
“Clever, my love,” Katrina added. “It’s still staggering to think that we may be standing within Galileo’s own footsteps.”
“I can take you to a few dozen places I know for sure where you can accurately say that,” the priest responded.
After digging deeper and adjusting the placement of the fulcrum, they were ready to try again.
“Okay—on three?”
“Okay.”
This time, one-two-three brought results. The boulder slowly inched forward, enough to put it on a downward course. It gained speed and rolled for nearly fifteen feet before hitting an olive tree that shook but did not break.
“Roots win!” Katrina proclaimed.
The team let out grateful cheers. However, their work was not yet done.
“Now let’s see if we hit pay dirt,” McCauley joked. He dropped to his knees and started scooping away the soft soil that had been behind the huge rock.
Katrina and Fr. Eccleston joined in. The dirt flew between their legs. Two feet in, McCauley, leading the pack, felt a rush of cooler air. “Here! Right here!” he exclaimed. “Faster!”
Minutes later, they broke through, refreshed by the cooler temperature.
“Amen!” the priest said.
• • •
With the way cleared, they cautiously moved forward on their knees, pushing their backpacks. Each held powerful flashlights, illuminating the narrow corridor, defining the size of the space and the safety of proceeding.
“So far, so good,” McCauley headed the single file. Katrina was behind him, Father Eccleston, last.
So far didn’t last long. Soon they were reduced to crawling.
As the ceiling dropped, their angst heightened. “If this gets too dicey, we’re turning back,” McCauley said. He recalled saying the exact same thing not long ago in Montana.
Katrina allowed herself a momentary joke. “No room to turn.”
“Onward it is, then.” But, McCauley was apprehensive. So much could have changed in four-plus centuries.
One thing would tell them if they were taking the right step back into history, McCauley thought. The electrical anomalies.
He felt another dip in temperature. “Cooling more.” As he told Alpert and Eccleston, he heard his voice echo. “Hold it for a second.”
McCauley shined his flashlight above and beyond. The roof was rising and further on he could see that the cave was widening.
He turned his head back to his cohorts. “Looking okay, We’ll be able to walk again, soon.”
Another twenty meters they were upright and gazing upon a sight more magnificent than any of them had witnessed: magical colors enhanced and embellished by their flashlights; brilliant hues that defied description in any language; indescribable geological shapes that would inspire any artist’s imagination; a slowly flowing subterranean river that mirrored the wonders and reflected the experience. All of this was part of the Grotte di Frasassi cave system. None of it was in any tour guides.
“This has to be it,” McCauley stated. “The earth at its grandest.”
“Oh, so much more,” Fr. Eccleston said sharing his true beliefs. “God at his best.”
They had all seen awe-inspiring caverns. Nothing on this level. Katrina was the first to take pictures with her disposable mechanical camera, one of three they bought along the way. They had also purchased basic match-lit carbide lamps.
“Use the cam on your cell for now. You might not be able to later.”
“Got it.”
Katrina lingered a few minutes. No one could fault her. Before they continued, they put on sweaters, lightening their load and warming their bodies.
• • •
Pushing on, they entered another cavern, which fed into tighter quarters again. They weren’t worried now. Their sense of discovery, more accurately re-discovery, drove them until… .
“There’s a damned fork. Two tunnels. Galileo probably described it in his July letters. But they’re missing.”
Eccleston stepped forward. He shined his light down both passageways. Nothing ahead gave him a clue. Then he laughed. “We’re going left.”
“How do you know?” Katrina asked.
“Well, let me rephrase that. I have faith in the direction Galileo took.” Then he corrected himself. “No, I’m convinced. This way.” He pointed to the left.
“Why there?” she still wondered.
“It would have been natural for Galileo. He was left-handed.”
“You know he was left-handed?” McCauley was amazed.
“I do.”
“But in those days,” Quinn recalled, “wasn’t a dominant left hand considered the mark of the devil? A negative trait the church knuckle-thwacked out of people?”
“More schools than the Catholic Church. Okay, some of them religious schools. But the pejorative connotation really goes back to the Greek word, meaning weak and the Latin synonym for left which is sinister, sinistra/sinistrum. Right-handed in Latin is dexter, like in dexterity or skill. So you can see how language led to habitual thinking.”
“But you’re convinced he would have unconsciously veered left?”
“Completely convinced, Katrina.”
“What if left didn’t lead anywhere and he came back to this point and went down the right fork?”
“Well then, we’ll be doing the same thing. But first, left it is.”
And left it was. At the fourth narrow passageway, McCauley’s flashlight flickered. It was the signal he had anticipated.
He twisted around in the cramped space. Katrina’s light was also fluttering. The last thing she saw before it went out was McCauley smiling.
“What’s the matter?” Eccleston asked.
“This is it,” she replied.
“How do you know?”
“Come a few feet closer. Watch your flashlight.”
“What?”
“The electronics,” she explained. “Galileo didn’t have that problem. We do. But it means we’re close. Really close. Time for the lamps. I’ll do mine. Just follow until we get more room to work in, then light yours.”
The passageway brightened and widened. Soon they were able to stand side-by-side. Now all three lamps were illuminated and focused forward, revealing the opening to another more remarkable cavern.
The entrance expanded into a space too large for their lights to fully flood, more magnificent than imaginable.
“In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places,” Eccleston said.
“What’s that from?” McCauley said raising his torch.
The priest explained as McCauley examined the ceiling. “John 14:2. From The Holy Gospel According to John. ‘In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may also be.’ ”
“Well, if this is God’s house, Father, he’s a phenomenal architect.”
“None more creative, Quinn.”
The lamp lights revealed a ceiling that appeared to be two stories high with glistening crystals and colors that had no names.
McCauley strained to get a sense of the true size. He took a few steps to the side. “More light.”
Katrina and Eccleston lifted their torches.
“Higher.”
The priest had the height advantage. Alpert did the best she could.
“Come closer.”
Combined, the lights brightened the ceiling enough to detect a curvature. “Higher than I thought. Thirty feet? Forty?” He wasn’t sure. “Let’s keep walking. Looks like the cavern closes in again up ahead,” he said.
They took twenty cautious steps around golden formations of stalagmites. Then darkness.
“Watch your head. The ceiling’s dropping fast,” McCauley warned. “And the passage looks narrower. Can’t see much.”
But it wasn’t that the ceiling was lower or the walkway was narrowing. No matter how McCauley held his lamp or focused the beam, the approaching section of the cavern was in pitch black.
He held his hand out in front, groping for obstructions, yet touching nothing. “Stop.”
Alpert and Eccleston huddled close. They could see one another, but nothing ahead, to the sides or above.
“Like Montana,” Katrina whispered, almost afraid to speak louder.
“And Denisova,” Father Eccleston added.
“This is it. But if there are more spurs, we could get lost,” McCauley realized.
“Galileo was inquisitive, but he wasn’t crazy,” Eccleston explained. “I’m sure he found something otherwise he would have turned back with the same worry.”
“So one step at a time?” McCauley proposed.
“Yes, but together,” Katrina said.
McCauley took the lead. “I’ll cover the front. Katrina, you keep feeling for the sides. Father, you’re the tallest. Make sure the ceiling’s not closing in on us.”
They proceeded. Three walking as one. A minute later McCauley called a halt.
“Dead end.” He felt a surface, but it wasn’t rock, not even igneous It was smooth to the touch; polished. Neither hot nor cold. It was just there.
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