“Did you find their bodies?” Maybe they spotted them but they were too deep to recover, he hoped. But both men shook their heads while one answered.
“Negative, sir. We searched both the water column and the bottom of the blue hole and we saw no sign of them or their gear.”
“But,” the other diver interjected, pulling off his mask and grinning, “they may have gone inside the pyramid.”
Daedalus’ expression changed to a rare mixture of confusion, delight and concern. “Pyramid?”
The same diver — a bearded Middle-eastern man in his late twenties — continued. “Yes sir, there is a large pyramid, similar in size to some of the smaller Egyptian ones, at the bottom of this blue hole, in about 200 feet of water. It has an entrance corridor that looks like it might lead to an interior.”
“You went inside?”
“We couldn’t because there is a stone door that is shut, but the rest of the dive team is trying to open it right now. We came back to let you know the status.”
“Something else, sir,” the first diver added. “The pyramid appears to be made of gold tiles or bricks. Solid gold!”
Daedalus nodded slowly, connecting the precious metal to the lost city in his mind. “Interesting. You will go back down to help with the pyramid investigation, no?”
“Yes sir. We’re going to change for fresh tanks now and dive again.”
“Excellent. I suspect you will find the bodies of our friends inside that pyramid. Fitting that Carter Hunt meets his end inside a tomb. Now hurry, do not keep me waiting!”
Down at the base of the pyramid, the team of six Treasure, Inc. divers examined the stone slab that seemed to block what should be the entrance to inside of the pyramid. All of these men had been to the Egyptian pyramids and knew that they usually had rooms, tunnels and chambers inside. The exotic gas mixtures ands double-tanks they carried gave them much longer bottom times than Carter, Jayden and Maddy had, so they took their time to investigate the structure with bright, halogen headlamps and handheld dive lights.
The stone block was immovable, but an astute diver found a grouping of tiles to the left of the entrance that were not gold like the rest, but composed of ordinary limestone, like the Bimini Road stones above and indeed the entire blue hole itself. He called over a couple of his divers and three of them tapped on the incongruous tiles with the butts of their dive knives. Upon hearing a hollow knocking sound, they nodded to each other and proceeded to fracture the tiles with their knives, breaking them away until their was a small passage to the interior of the pyramid.
One of the divers peered inside with his flashlight, then backed out of the opening. He nodded to his fellow dive team members and pointed inside. It’s the way in! The only problem was that whoever had built this pyramid had not envisioned scuba gear, since it was just wide enough to allow a human adult male to pass through without any sort of encumbering equipment. But the men had a solution for that.
The first diver removed his scuba tanks and handed them to one of his dive buddies, who held the gear for him while maintaining position next to the opening. Then, holding his breath after taking a deep pull from his rig, the diver swam headfirst through the smashed tile opening into the pyramid. He then turned around and pulled his scuba rig through after himself, taking a breath from it before putting it back on his person. The process was repeated for four of the other divers, with one man remaining outside.
Inside the pyramid, the group of five divers were stunned to discover what was a large air pocket. Or at least, they noted, it would be until it filled with water from the incoming stream now pouring through the group of smashed tiles. They quickly found the opposite side of the stone door and noted the same mechanism that Hunt had used to activate the airlock. They walked, not swam, for a time around the main chamber, but kept their masks on out of fear that the atmosphere inside the pyramid was somehow contaminated. Initially disenchanted to find neither artifacts or dead bodies, that feeling dissipated when they came across the open chute down into a dry tunnel.
Curiosity piqued, the team leader instructed one man to inform the diver left outside the pyramid that they would be penetrating deeper inside the structure. Then he aimed his powerful dive lights down into the chamber, saw that it was dry, and dropped down into it.
Chapter 26
Jayden had made it about halfway around the island when he spotted the boat. An old fishing trawler, it plowed through the waves looking like it had all the time in the world. And in fact, it would take some time to reach their little isle yet, but that was a good thing, since he still had to gain its attention. Jayden thought about Hunt’s larger dive light — even though it no longer worked, it had a larger reflecting mirror behind its bulb. Maybe that could be used as a signal mirror to reflect sunlight to the passing boat?
But first he had to reach Hunt. He decided to walk directly across the little island rather than continue all the way around by the beach. He’d already found what they needed, why risk losing it by taking the long way back? With a last look back at the approaching vessel, he stepped off of the sand onto the scrubby vegetation that covered most of the island’s interior. The plant life grew denser the more toward the middle of the islet he went, culminating in the profusion of vegetation and small trees that shrouded the small hillock that concealed the chute entrance by which they had entered the island.
Jayden took a path to the right of the hillock, not wanting to scale it and pass through the thicket of foliage. As he passed by he thought he heard voices, then figured it must be Hunt’s voice carrying over the wind from the beach. But then he heard the rustling of branches coming from the hillock. His first thoughts were that maybe a search party had come looking for them, and he was about to call out to them, when he saw a man wearing scuba gear, including a snub-nosed spear-gun strapped to a thigh, step out of the trees. That could mean only one thing.
Treasure, Inc. found the pyramid tunnel and followed it to the island. He had no idea how they got inside the pyramid, since they had closed the stone door over the opening, but somehow they found a way. Now it was a matter of minutes before they came across Hunt and Maddy with their noses in yet another priceless treasure probably related to Atlantis. Jayden flattened himself to the tall scrub-grass before the newcomers could look in his direction. He had little doubt as to his fate should he be discovered.
As he, Hunt and Maddy had done, Daedalus’ divers stood atop the highest point on the islet and surveyed the small spit of land. Could they see Hunt and Maddy from here? Jayden wasn’t sure, but he was about to find out. He watched from his concealed position among a cluster of scrubby foliage as the interlopers glanced about in all directions. Apparently not, for they made no decisive moves.
As he watched, they stepped down from the hillock, six men in all, Jayden counted, registering the fact that they were badly outnumbered should this come to a fight, which looked likely given the close confines of the islet. The black market treasure hunters headed off in three different directions in pairs of two. One of the groups headed away from Jayden and Hunt, toward the beach where Jayden had sighted the fishing boat. Another pair headed almost directly toward Hunt and Maddy’s location, while the third moved off on a course that would put them to within twenty feet or so of Jayden.