The Cave
As soon as Chris had provided him with the collapsible spade he’d purchased in Cairo, Michael put the only plan he could think of into action.
‘You’re not going to dig us out,’ Chris protested as Michael snapped the spade into its open position. ‘Not through solid limestone.’
‘I don’t intend to. Digging isn’t the only thing this can be used for.’
Emily’s breathing continued in short, rapid breaths nearby, the effects of claustrophobia not growing any weaker. She watched Michael, his apparent possession of an idea the only thing allowing her to keep her breathing under control.
‘The handle isn’t long,’ Michael said to Chris, ‘but it ought to be enough to give us a bit of a fulcrum.’
Taking up the shovel without further explanation, Michael gripped it firmly in both hands. Aiming the metal edge at the thin crack in the stone, he rammed it forward with his full strength. The spade’s edge caught the fragmented divide and sunk a full two centimetres into the crack in the wall. Michael pulled back, but the stone gripped the spade and wouldn’t release it.
Looking around him, Michael grabbed a fist-sized rock from the debris and used it to pound the spade further into the crack.
Once it had jammed as far into the rock as it was going to go, Michael set down the stone. Taking a deep breath to gather his strength, he pulled sideways on the handle, then pushed forward with his full force.
Emily’s breathing began to steady as she watched. She still didn’t fully understand Michael’s plan, but he was in action and the simple conviction of his movements calmed her nerves.
Michael swung his weight back, pulling on the spade’s handle, then thrust forward again. Using the shovel’s entry in the stone as the fulcrum point, he repeated the motion, prising it from side to side.
The movements seemed to yield no results for at least the first fifteen or twenty swings on the handle. But suddenly, as Michael pushed his weight forward with a grunt, sweat dripping from his forehead, the crack in the wall began to yield more light.
‘My god, it’s starting to give,’ Chris announced.
‘Emily,’ he said, motioning to her, ‘give him some help. I’ll be useless at that with this gash in my shoulder.’
Regaining her confidence rapidly as the daylight beamed more strongly into the dusty chamber, Emily moved to a position opposite Michael and placed her hands on the spade’s handle along with his. Together they heaved at the stone with their combined strength.
With each sway, the thin crack in the wall began to grow. The soft sandstone had been weakened by the explosion, and the alternating tension and thrust of the spade caused its remaining strength to falter. After a few moments of hesitation it cleaved with a sharp snap, and portions of the stone began to fall away.
Emily and Michael pushed again, fiercely. Three large segments of rock broke free from the wall and fell inwards.
‘We’re almost through,’ Michael announced, his breath heavy. ‘Here, let me get in there.’ Setting aside the spade, he sat down before the weakest point in the wall, leaning back on his elbows with his feet at the base of the stone surface. ‘Watch out,’ he said to Emily. Then, pulling back his knees to his chest, he shot forth his legs at the wall.
The impact caused the wall to buckle, but not fall.
‘Once more, Mike,’ Emily encouraged, shielding her face from the small debris that flaked away from the stone.
Michael gathered together his breath, pulled up his legs once more, and kicked for all he was worth.
This time, the stone buckled. Large pieces of ancient rock fell outwards, breaking free from the wall and rolling down the steep face of the bluff.
The light poured into the cave unabated.