“WELL, PROFESSOR.”
“Well, Doctor. We meet again, and under such auspicious circumstances. I am afraid I need your help.”
“You won’t get it.”
“You’re mistaken.”
There were two whooshing, spitting sounds, and the dirt in front of Ross was kicked up in tiny chunks.
“You see, I am not joking about the gun. Nor am I joking about your help. I need it.”
“What for?”
“The gas,” the professor said. “You must handle the gas.”
“Why don’t you have one of your friends help you?”
“Because,” the professor said, “they are busy with other matters. This is a complex problem; I warned you before. Besides, I knew I could count on you. Please walk off to your right, and follow the path.”
He directed them through the palaces, the ghostly moonlit rooms, to a small shack in a corner of a garden. It was obviously a workman’s toolshed.
“Now then. Stand back.”
They did. The professor took aim and fired the gun. The lock was shattered, and the doors creaked open.
“Look inside,” he said. “You will find a tank, a pair of gas masks, and several large flashlights.”
Ross looked. He found everything. The tank was fitted with a harness so it could strap over your back; there was a hose leading to a nozzle, like a flamethrower.
“I suppose you had this brought in specially?”
“Heavens no. You give me too much credit. This is all the property of the Spanish government.”
“Oh? What’s the gas?”
“A chlorothion derivative of some sort. Nerve gas, essentially. They spray most of the buildings here once a month, during the evenings.”
“For the rats?”
“Yes. A serious problem. Can’t have rats showing up in Spain’s largest tourist attraction, can we?”
“And you’re going to use this gas underneath, in the hole?”
The professor smiled. “No,” he said. “You are.”
Standing in the courtyard of the fortress, staring down at the hole, he felt like a visitor from another planet. The tank was strapped on his back; he wore heavy gloves to protect his hands from the concentrated spray near the nozzle; over his face, the mask was fitted, black and snoutlike.
“Whenever you’re ready,” the professor said. He pulled on a second mask, and it muffled his voice. “I fear we have only two masks, so Angela will wait up here. You will go down first, Doctor. I will follow some distance behind, with an extra light, and the gun.”
He turned to Angela. “I shall expect you to wait here patiently, my dear. I don’t need to tell you that if we come back up and you are not here, I will shoot the good doctor. Immediately.”
Angela nodded, bit her lip, said nothing.
“All right then. Let’s get started. Down you go, Doctor.”
Ross clambered to the edge of the hole and jumped into the darkness.
He landed, clanging the tank on the stone floor, and got up. He switched on the electric torch; it gave a reassuringly bright light. Behind him, he heard the professor clambering down, breathing heavily through the mask, his breath hissing into the canister in front of the nosepiece.
“Lead on,” the professor said, switching his own light on.
Ross set out.
In a sense, it was better at night. Wearing the mask, he smelled nothing but rubber and metal, none of the dank smells of the cellar. And at night, the darkness was somehow less terrifying. He went forward quickly and only slowed when he heard the clicking and chattering. It made his skin crawl.
“I hear it,” the professor said. “Keep going.”
They did, and the sounds grew louder, until finally they rounded the corner and saw the body, covered with squirming furry bodies.
“Now,” said the professor, his voice tense. “Do it now!”
Ross turned on the gas.
It jetted out with a sizzling, sputtering sound, a thin white mist that ran along the floor. The rats responded instantly. The gas caught the first animals unaware, and as the vapors reached them, they went into twitching, spastic convulsions, flopping onto their backs, baring their teeth, urinating and defecating in the final moments. The other rats panicked and fled, chattering as they went.
“Spray everything. The corpse, the whole room. We don’t want them back.”
Ross moved forward, kicking aside the fallen bodies on the floor. He fought his nausea: Christ, it wouldn’t do to vomit in the mask. He sprayed as quickly as he could, and then stepped back.
“All right,” the professor said. “Good enough.”
He moved forward, toward the corpse. Now Ross could see clearly the extent of damage. In many places the shroud had been eaten away. The professor took out a knife and opened the shroud in a single smooth movement. The body was not pretty, and he turned aside for a moment before continuing.
Ross moved closer and concentrated on the incision he had made several days before. But before he had a good look, the professor had sliced down the sutures and peeled back the skin to expose the heart.
“Ah.”
His hands reached forward and came up with the box. It was the same one Ross had originally inserted.
“At last,” the professor said. He held the box in his hand, feeling its weight. “At last.”
He motioned to Ross. “We can leave now. After you, Doctor.”
Ross looked back at the body. “You’re leaving now? Like this?”
“Exactly.”
“It’s—”
“Now, Doctor.” He wagged the gun.
Ross walked back toward the entrance to the hole. The professor, with the gun, followed behind. A few minutes later, they scrambled up to the surface. Angela was there.
The professor pulled off his mask and said, “You can take all that off now.”
Ross removed his mask but left the tank on. He turned to Angela. “You all right?”
She nodded.
“Sure?”
She nodded again, rather nervously, he thought.
Ross looked around. The square was brightly lit; the moon overhead was round and full. Suddenly, a dark shadow passed over them.
“What was that?”
The professor looked up irritably. “Just some bird, I expect.”
Ross looked up and saw it, slowly circling in the sky.
“Damned big bird,” he said.
“Doesn’t matter,” the professor said. He looked at the box and sighed.
“Well now,” the professor said. “Since you’ve both gone to so much trouble, I suppose it’s only fair I give you a look, eh?”
He bent over and placed the package on the ground. He removed the cloth and exposed a metal box. There was a small hinged lid.
“Well now,” he said. In the torchlight, his fingers trembled. “Here we go.”
He lifted the lid. For a moment, all they saw was white cotton. The professor removed this, exposing the green peak of a stone.
“That’s it,” the professor said, sucking in his breath. He removed the rest of the cotton packing and lifted the emerald from the metal box.
It was huge, larger than a softball. It gleamed in the torchlight, reflecting its colors. The professor held it delicately.
“The Emerald of Cortez,” he said. “At last.”
And then he frowned.
“Just a minute,” he said. “Just a minute, just a minute …”
He peered closely at the stone.
“Something wrong?”
“Shut up.”
He turned the glass in his hand, very slowly, staring at it. Then he set it on the ground.
“Son of a bitch!” he said.
He raised his heavy torch and swung it down hard on the pyramid. There was a shattering crunch as it struck.
“Hey! What are you doing?”
The professor stepped back and shone his light down on the splintered fragments.
“Just as I thought,” he said. “Glass. A glass pyramid.”