“Lead the way. I’m going to let Milo wander freely as long as we keep him in sight. Maybe he’ll find the opening we’re looking for.”
The area where we’d chosen to search was made up of thick forest, rambling brooks and streams, and giant cliffs with sharp drop-offs. It was important to know where you were at all times. Cass and I had both visited the area often when we were children, and Cass had continued to fish here even after I left, so I figured that as long as we kept our location firmly in mind, we wouldn’t run the risk of getting lost.
“The shrubbery growing along the edge of the rocky mountain is going to make it hard to find an opening whether it’s natural or manmade,” I said.
“Finding anything is a long shot,” Cass agreed. “Where does your map say the mine entrance is?”
“On the other side of the mountain. There is no way Austin made it all the way over there. I’m hoping, however, that he knew of an air vent and slipped in that way.”
Cass stopped after we’d been walking for about an hour. “There’s an opening up on the wall of that rock face. It would be hard for anyone to get all the way up there in the dark. From here, it looks like a heck of a climb.”
“Yeah, I don’t think Austin would have headed there.” I looked at the map again. “It was dark. He may or may not have had a flashlight. If he saw a monster and ran, he wouldn’t have gone back to his tent for one, but he may have had one on his person if he’d been sitting around the campfire all night.”
“If he was as terrified as Larry said he was, he would have headed somewhere close. I bet if he did find an entrance to a cave or mine, it would have been within a quarter of a mile from the campsite.”
I unfolded the map and looked at it again. “Let’s look over here.” I pointed to a rocky area, not all that far from the pond. Like the area we were currently searching, there were tall cliffs created from layers of rock that had formed over the years, but the cliffs closest to the lake were less severe, and in my opinion, less likely to be home to a cave or mine system. Still, it made sense that Austin wouldn’t have run very far before looking for a place to hide.
Luckily, Cass had thought to bring a daypack with climbing gloves, a rope, water, granola bars, flashlights, and flares for both of us. I wasn’t sure we’d need all that he’d brought, but the gloves were going to come in handy once we decided to hike up onto the first of several ledges to take a look around. Since I wasn’t quite as stable on my feet as Cass, I found myself grabbing onto rocks and shrubs to balance myself as I made the short climb. Milo, of course, found his own way up and beat both Cass and me to the ledge we were heading for.
Once we’d made it to the destination we’d chosen, we both paused to look around.
“Look over there,” I pointed to a small opening in the face of the cliff.
Cass walked over to it and put his face down, so it was level with the opening. “I can feel air like it’s circulating through a cavern.” He took off his pack, took out his flashlight, and shone it inside. “It’s hard to say without going inside.”
“It looks too small to squeeze through.”
Cass stood up. “I brought a chipping tool. We can dig out the rock a bit more, and we should be able to squeeze through.”
Cass worked on the opening for about thirty minutes before it looked large enough to squeeze through. Just barely. He shone his flashlight inside and then stuck his head through. “There’s definitely an open space behind here. I can’t see how far down the floor is. Might be just a few feet, but it might be more.”
“So, do we go inside?” I asked.
“We, no. You wait here. If something happens, one of us should be out here to go for help. I’ll tie the rope around my waist. If something happens, you can pull me out.”
“I won’t be able to pull you out. I should go in. You have a lot better chance of pulling me out than the other way around.”
He looked uncertain.
“You know that’s the best plan,” I insisted.
“Okay. We’ll try it your way, but only because you are correct in the fact that I can support your weight, but you may not be able to support mine. I’m going to feed the rope in slowly. It’s a high-quality climbing rope, and I brought a harness, so you should be fine. If you can’t see what we came to see by the time you get to the end of the rope, I’m pulling you out and we’ll come back with better equipment and more supplies.”
“Okay. I’m not looking to be a hero. If I get to the end of the rope, I’ll head back.”
Cass attached the harness and the rope. He made sure my flashlight worked, and then he attached it to a line that was attached to my wrist. Once I was all geared up, he instructed me to climb through legs first. I went through on my belly, so I could control the rate of descent. The floor of the cavern was only about eight feet down from the opening, which was about three feet above my head. There was a ledge to my right that looked like it had been carved into the rock. I suspected that at least one kid or very small adult had found this opening and crawled through, only to have the need to carve the ledge to boost themselves out.
Once my feet were firmly planted, I turned on my flashlight and looked around.
“What do you see?” Cass called down to me from the opening.
“There are tunnels in both directions. They look to be tall enough to walk in, at least for a while. It’s really dark, and even with the flashlight, I can only see maybe ten feet in front of me, so it’s hard to tell.”
“You have about two hundred feet of rope. Go ahead and slowly walk in one direction or the other until the rope ends. Then come back to the center, and we’ll do the other side. Remember to look at what’s at your feet and what’s overhead before you take each step. There are likely steep drop-offs, and it’s impossible to know what sort of objects or rock formations might be hanging down from above.”
“Okay. I’ll take it slowly.”
And I did. One terrifying step at a time. Even with the flashlight, it was so dark. And cold. A lot colder than it was outside the mine. I heard something scampering in the dark and jumped. Luckily, I suppressed the scream that seemed to stick in my throat. The last thing I wanted to do was worry Cass, but this lurking around in the dark was not my idea of fun.
“Are you okay?” I heard Cass call from a distance.
“Yes, I’m fine,” I answered. “I’m just taking it slowly, as you suggested.”
“Remember, once you feel the rope pull indicating it is at the end, turn around and come back.”
“I will.”
I took a deep breath and continued, wondering why on earth I’d thought this was a good idea in the first place. When I was up top, it didn’t seem like a big deal to take a quick peek, but now that I was down here, all I could think about were cave-ins, spiders, bats, and cave monsters.
I continued to take each step slowly and deliberately, as Cass suggested. I couldn’t help but imagine spiders in my hair, so it was with a breath of relief that I turned around after coming to the end of the rope and heading back toward the opening where Cass was waiting for me.
“How are you doing?” he asked when I arrived.
“I’m fine,” I lied in an attempt to appear braver than I actually was. “It’s sort of spooky, and my imagination is going crazy even without a hallucinogen, but I’ll be fine.”