IT WAS COMPLETELY BLACK. He could not use his light because both hands were working the rope. They lowered him slowly, and he held himself away from the rock surface with his feet but it was a slow, tense business. Occasionally, he would begin to twist on the end of the rope, and he would reach out with his hand to grip the rock; it was sharp, and he cut himself.
“Wait a minute,” he called. His voice sounded odd, muffled. He felt himself stop.
How far down was he? It was impossible to tell—he was suspended in a void, a perfect blackness. He took out his flashlight and clicked it on. It showed the bottom, forty feet below. The rock wall was very near his face.
He needed the light, he needed to see. Something like a miner’s cap was called for. He hesitated, then stuck the flashlight in his mouth. It was heavy, but he could hold it with his teeth. He tugged at the rope, and the descent continued.
The bottom came up toward him, slowly, slowly…
His feet touched the sand, and he stood cautiously. He removed the flashlight from his mouth and said, “Okay. I’m here.”
From above, a light beamed down, and Nikos said, “How does it look?”
Pierce bent to examine the ground. He kept the rope around his waist—it would be good protection if he slipped. The surface was sandy, but not the thin film of eroded sand you expected to find in such crevices. It was yielding, thick, like a beach. He clawed at it with his fingers, and soon came to a lower layer that was harder packed, but still not rock. He broke a fingernail scraping. “Shovel,” he called.
A few minutes later, he saw the shovel being lowered on another rope. It was a weird scene from his vantage point, standing at the bottom of two sloping rock walls illuminated by his own light and the light from above. The shovel came down, slowly spiraling on the rope, and it caught the light scattering it on the walls. He did not look out of the cleft at the sheer drop of the cliff below. As it was, there was barely room to stand. Shoveling would be difficult
He put his foot to the blade and pressed gently, careful to maintain his balance. He scooped up sand and flung it down the cliff. Another scoop, then another. He gained confidence and began to work quickly. The hard-packed layer was thick; he went down a foot, and it showed no sign of ending. An hour passed. He dug a hole two and a half feet deep, and found he could not go on; his muscles ached from working in such an awkward position, his back pressed to the rock, unable to really bend I over.
“It’s getting late,” Nikos called down.
“All right. Pull me up.”
He felt the rope tighten around his waist, and then his feet were lifted off the ground, and he was in the air again.
The following night was better. They had fashioned makeshift miner’s hats from sun helmets and baling wire; the flashlights were held firmly in place, and it was easier to work.
They dug in shifts, each man working for half an hour at a time in rotation. The hole widened and grew deeper. By 2:00 A.M., they had gone down nearly six feet. It was very difficult, now: space was even more restricted, and the sand had to be pitched up out of the hole.
As he dug, Pierce remembered Barnaby’s words when they had reported the first night’s findings.
“It’s promising, I think. Maybe you’re digging through the accumulated erosion of the centuries, but I wonder. There isn’t any reason for sand to collect in a niche like that, and even less reason for it to be firmly packed—the climate is too dry. You may be on to something.”
He dug.
He tried to keep a rhythm. It helped him forget the protests of his muscles. He hummed “Dixie” to himself, until Conway leaned down from above and shouted, “Cut that out!” and laughed. He switched to “Waltzing Matilda.”
His light began to fail. He rapped it sharply, and it flickered more brightly. He continued to dig, hearing only the soft hish as the blade bit into the sand.
“Half an hour,” Nikos called down.
Pierce looked at his watch. This was his last chance for the evening to dig, and he felt he still had something left. “Five more minutes.”
He resumed digging. As he worked, he began to feel a strange sense of foreboding, something he could not define, but it was an anticipation, as if an extra sense were telling him something was about to happen.
The shovel cut into the sand, alternating with his grunts as he flung the earth out of the pit.
Clunk! He stopped cold, then pressed down again on the shovel.
Clunk!
“That’s five minutes,” Nikos said.
“I’ve hit something.”
From above, two lights shone down immediately. There was a moment when Pierce looked up, trying to see behind the two hot circles of light.
Nikos said, “What is it?”
“I don’t know. Something hard. I’m down about seven feet.”
“Well,” Conway said, “what’re you waiting for?”
Pierce bent and scraped the bottom with his shovel. The harsh grating sound was loud in his ears. He worked patiently, exposing a flat surface of rock—too flat to be natural. His heart began to pound in his chest. He brushed the rock with his bruised, aching fingers, whisking away the sand.
A bare, smooth surface. He could see faint chisel marks on it.
He began to dig again, frantically now, not caring if the sand came back down on him, working like a madman, uncovering the limits of the stone slab. It did not take long.
It was rectangular and narrow. He started to dig around it, exposing a distinct lip, a perpendicular surface, and then another flat slab.
Steps.
“What is it?” Nikos called.
“A staircase,” Pierce said softly.
“What?”
He felt suddenly exhausted, drained of every ounce of energy. “Bring me up,” he said. He was lifted, and it seemed to him he was being transported into a dreamworld, a fantastic existence that he could not dare imagine.