"The opening in the floor?" Pat asked.
"Blasted by Luis Marquez while excavating for gemstones," replied Ambrose.
"Then how was this chamber created without an entrance and exit?"
Ambrose pointed to the ceiling. "The only hint I could find of an infinitesimal crack around the borders was in the ceiling. I can only assume that whoever constructed this cubicle burrowed down from above and placed a precisely carved slab atop the cubicle."
"For what purpose?"
Ambrose grinned. "The reason why you're here, to find answers."
Pat removed a notepad, a small paintbrush and a magnifying glass from a pack she carried on her belt. She moved close to one wall, gently swept away the dust of centuries from the rock, and peered at the script through the glass. She intently studied the markings for several moments before looking up and staring at the ceiling. Then she looked at Ambrose with a blank expression in her face. "The ceiling appears to be a celestial map of the stars. The symbols are…" She hesitated and stared at Ambrose with a blank expression. "This must be some sort of hoax perpetrated by the miners who dug the tunnel."
"What brought you to that conclusion?" inquired Ambrose.
"The symbols don't bear the slightest resemblance to any ancient writings I've ever studied."
"Can you decipher any of them?"
"All I can tell you is that they are not pictographic like hieroglyphics, or logographic signs that express individual words. Nor do the symbols suggest words or oral syllables. It appears to be alphabetic."
"Then they're a combination of single sounds," offered Ambrose.
Pat nodded in agreement. "This is either some sort of written code or an ingenious system of writing."
Ambrose looked at her intently. "Why do you think this is all a hoax?"
"The inscriptions do not fit any known pattern set down by man throughout recorded history," Pat said in a quiet, authoritative voice.
"You did say ingenious."
Pat handed Ambrose her magnifying glass. "See for yourself. The symbols have a remarkable simplicity. The use of geometric images in combination with single lines is a very efficient system of written communication. That's why I can't believe any of this comes from an ancient culture."
"Can the symbols be deciphered?"
"I'll know after I make tracings and run them through the computer lab at the university. Most ancient inscriptions are not nearly as definite and distinct as these. The symbols appear to have a well-defined structure. The main problem is that we have no other matching epigraphs anywhere else in the world to act as a guide. I'm treading in unknown waters until the computer can make a breakthrough."
"How you doin' up there?" Marquez shouted from the cleft below.
"All done for now," Pat answered. "Do you have a stationer's store in town?"
"Two of them."
"Good. I'll need to buy a ream of tracing paper and some transparent tape to make long sheets I can roll-" She fell silent as a faint rumble issued from the tunnel and the floor of the cubicle trembled beneath their feet.
"An earthquake?" Pat called down to Marquez.
"No," he replied through the hole. "My guess is an avalanche somewhere on the mountain. You and Dr. Ambrose go on about your business. I'll run topside and check it out."
Another tremor shook the chamber with a stronger intensity than the last one.
"Maybe we should go with you," Pat said apprehensively.
"The tunnel support timbers are old, and many are rotten," warned Marquez. "Excessive movement of the rock could cause them to collapse, produce a cave-in. It's safer if you two wait here."
"Don't be long," said Pat. "I feel a touch of claustrophobia coming on."
"Back in ten minutes," Marquez assured her.
As soon as Marquezs footsteps faded from the cleft below, Pat turned to Ambrose. "You didn't tell me your appraisal of the skull. Do you think it ancient or modern?"
Ambrose stared at the skull, a vague look in his eyes. "It would take a laboratory to determine if it was cut and polished by hand or with modern tools. The only fact we know for certain is that this room was not excavated and created by miners. There would have to be an account somewhere of such an extensive project. Marquez assures me that old Paradise Mine records and tunnel maps show nothing indicating a vertical shaft leading to an underground chamber in this particular location. So it must have been excavated prior to 1850."
"Or much later."
Ambrose shrugged his shoulders. "All mining operations were shut down in 1931. A major operation such as this could not have gone unnoticed since then. I'm reluctant to lay my reputation on the line, but I'll state without equivocation that I firmly believe this chamber and the skull are more than a thousand years old, probably much older."
"Perhaps early Indians were responsible," Pat persisted.
Ambrose shook his head. "Not possible. The early Americans built a number of complex stone structures, but an enterprise of this precise magnitude was beyond them. And then you have the inscriptions. Hardly the work of people without a written language."
"This does appear to have the hallmark of a high intelligence," she said softly, her fingertips lightly tracing the symbols in the granite.
With Ambrose at her side, Pat began copying the unusual symbols in a small notebook until she could account for a total of forty-two. Then she measured the depth of the engravings and the distance between the lines and the symbols. The more she examined the apparent wording, the more perplexed she became. There was a mysterious logic about the inscriptions that only a meticulous translation could solve. She was busily taking flash photos of the inscriptions and star symbols in the ceiling when Marquez climbed through the hole in the floor.
"Looks like we're going to be here for a while, folks," he announced. "An avalanche has covered the mine entrance."
"Oh, dear God," muttered Pat.
"Not to fret," Marquez said with a tight grin. "My wife has gone through this before. She'll be aware of our predicament and will have called for help. A rescue unit from town will soon be on its way with heavy equipment to dig us out."
"How long will we be trapped here?" asked Ambrose.
"Hard to say without knowing how much snow is blocking the shaft opening. Could be only a few hours. Might take as long as a day. But they'll work around the clock until they clear away the snow. You can bet on it."
A sense of relief settled over Pat. "Well, then, as long as your lights are still working, I suppose Dr. Ambrose and I can spend the time recording the inscriptions."
The words were barely out of her mouth when a tremendous rumble rose from somewhere deep beneath the chamber. Then the grinding sound of crashing timbers, followed by the deep growl of falling rock, reverberated from the tunnel. A violent rush of air roared through the cleft and into the chamber as they were all pitched headlong onto the rock floor.
Then the lights blinked out.
3
The rumble deep within the mountain echoed ominously from the hidden reaches of the tunnel and slowly faded away into a smothering silence, while unseen in the pitch blackness, dust disturbed by the concussion rolled through the tunnel, into the cleft, and up through the opening of the chamber like an invisible hand. Then came the sounds of coughing as the dust clogged noses and mouths, the grit quickly clinging to their teeth and tongues.