The Seventh Scroll (36 page)

"Leave to our country and our people, he deserves nothing better." But even in his anger and his hatred he did not want Tessay to have to look at that mutilated head. She had been unable to keep pace with the men, but she was coming along the bank towards him now.

One of his men pushed Boris's corpse back into the current, and as it floated away he unstung his AK rifle from his shoulder and let off a burst of automatic fire. The bullets chopped up the surface around Boris's head, and socked heavily into his back. They tore holes in his wet shirt and kicked out lumps of raw flesh. The other men on the bank shouted with laughter and joined in the fusillade, emptying their magazines into the lifeless body. Mek did them. Some of their close relatives not attempt to prevent had died most horribly under the Russian's care. The corpse rolled over in a pink cloud of its own blood, and for a moment Boris's pate bulging eyes stared at the sky. Then he sank away beneath the surface. Mek stood up slowly and went to meet Tessay. He took her in his arms, and as he held her to his chest he whispered to her softly.

"It's all right. He won't ever hurt you again. It's all over. You are my woman now - for ever!'

Since -Boris and Tessay had left the camp there was no longer any reason to maintain security, and Nicholas -and Royan were no longer obliged to skulk in Royan's hut when they discussed their search for the tomb.

Nicholas transferred their headquarters into the dining hut, and had the camp staff build another large table on which they could spread the satellite photographs and all the other maps and material that they had accumulated.

The chef sent a steady supply of coffee from the kitchen, while they pored over the papers and discussed their discoveries in Taita's pool and every theory that either of them dreamed up, no matter how far-fetched.

"We will never be certain if that shaft was made by Taita, or whether it was a natural sink-hole, until we can get back in there with the right equipment."

"What type of equipment are you talking about?" she wanted to know.

"Scuba, not oxygen rebreathers. Although the navy rebreathing outfits are much lighter and more compact, you cannot use them below a'depth of thirty-three feet, the equivalent of one atmosphere of water. After that pure oxygen becomes lethal. Have you ever used an aqualung?"

She nodded. "When Dutaid and I were on honeymoon at a resort on the Red Sea. I had a few lessons and made three or four open-water dives, but let me hasten to add that I am no expert."

"I promise not to send you down there," he smiled, "but I think we can safely say that we have found enough evidence both in Tanus's tomb and Taita's pool to make it imperative that we mount the second phase of this operation."

She nodded agreement. "We will have to return with a much more extensive range of equipment, and some expert help. But you are not going to be able to pose as a-tourist Sportsman next time around. What possible excuse are we going to find for returning that will not set off all the alarm bells in the minds of Ethiopian bureaucracy?"

"You are speaking to the man who has paid unofficial and uninvited visits to both those charming lads Gadaffi and Saddam. Ethiopia should be a Sunday-school picnic in comparison."

"When do the big rains start up in the mountains?" she asked suddenly.

"Yes!" His expression became serious. That is the jackpot question. You only have to look at the high-water mark on the walls of Taita's pool to have some idea what it must be like in there when the river is in full flood." He flipped over the pages of his pocket diary. "Luckily, we still have a bit of time - not a great deal, but'enough. We will need to move pretty smartly. We have to get back home before I can start work on planning phase two."

"We should pack up right away, then."

"Yes, we should. But it seems a damned shame not to take full advantage of every moment we are here, having come all this way. I think we can spare just a few more days to sound out some ideas that I have about Taita's pool and the sink-hole, to try to arrive at some sort of informed guess about what we will need when we return."

"You are the boss."

"My word, how pleasant to hear a lady say that." She smiled sweetly.

"Enjoy the moment," she counselled him, "it may never happen again." And then she became serious again. "What are these ideas that you have?

"What goes up must come down, what goes in must come out," he said mysteriously. "The water going into the sink'hole under such pressure must be going somewhere.

Unless it joins a subterranean water system and makes its way into the Nile that way, then it should come to the surface where we can find it."

"Go on," she invited.

40the thing is certain. Nobody is going to get into the sink-hole from the pool. The pressure is lethal. But if we can find the outlet, we may be able to explore it from the other end."

"That's a fascinating possibility." She looked impressed, and turned to the satellite photograph. Nicholas had identified the monastery and ringed it on the photograph.

He had marked in the approximate course of the river through the chasm, although the gorge itself was too narrow and covered with bush to show up on the smallscale picture, even under the high-powered magnifying lens.

"Here is the point where the river enters the chasm." She pointed it out to him. "And here is the side valley down which the trail detours. Okay?"

"Okay," he nodded. "What are you driving at?"

"On our approach march, we remarked that this valley might at one time have been the original course of the Dandera river, and that it seemed to have cut a new bed for itself through the chasm."

"That's right,'Nicholas agreed. "I am still listening."

"The fall of the land towards the Nile is very steep at this point, isn't it?

Well, do you recall we crossed another smaller, but still pretty substantial, stream on our way down the dry valley? That stream seemed to emerge from somewhere on the eastern side of the valley."

All right, I am with you now. You are suggesting that this may be the overflow from the sinkholes Clever little devil, aren't you?"

"Just capitalizing on your genius." She cast down her eyes modestly, and looked up at him from under her lashes.

She was clowning, but her lashes were long and dense and curling, and her eyes were the colour of burnt honey with tiny golden highlights in their depths. At this close range he found them disturbing.

He stood up and suggested, "Why don't we go and take a look?" Nicholas went to fetch his camera bag and the light day'pack from his hut, and when he returned he found Royan ready to go. But she was not alone. I see that you are bringing your chaperon with you," he remarked with resignation.

"Unless you are tough enough to send him away." Royan smiled encouragement at Tamre who stood at her side, grinning and bobbing and hugging his shoulders in the ecstasy of being in the presence of his idol.

"Oh, very well." Nicholas gave in without a struggle.

"Let the little devil come along."

Tamre lolloped away up the path ahead of them, his grubby shamma flapping around his long skinny legs, chanting the repetitive chorus of an Amharic psalm, and every few minutes looking back to make certain that Royan was still following him. It was a hard pull up the valley, and the noonday heat was debilitating. Although Tamre seemed totally unaffected, the other two were both sweating in dark patches through their shirts by the time they reached the point where the stream debauched into the valley. Gratefully, they sought the shade of a patch of acacia trees, and while they rested Nicholas glassed the side of the valley through his binoculars.

"How are they after the dunking I gave them?" she asked.

"Waterproof," he grunted, "full marks to Herr Zeiss."

"What do you see up there?"

"Not much. The bush is too thick. We will have to foot'slog up the side. Sorry."

They left the shade and made their way up the side of the valley in the direct burning sunlight. The stream tumbled down a series of cascades, each with a pool at its foot. The bush crowded the banks, lush and green where the roots had been able to reach the water. Clouds of black and yellow butterflies danced over the Pools, and a black and white wagtail patrolled the moss-green rocks along the edge, its long tail gyrating back and forth like the needle of a metronome.

Halfway up the slope they paused beside one of the pools to rest, and Nicholas used his hat like a fly-swatter to stun a brown and yellow grasshopper. He tossed the insect on to the surface of the pool, and as it kicked weakly and floated towards the exit a long dark shadow rose from the bottom. There was a swirl and a mirrorlike flash of a scaly silver belly, and the grasshopper disappeared.

"Ten'pounder,'Nicholas lamented. "Why didn't I bring my rod?"

Tamre was crouched near Nicholas on the pool bank, and suddenly he lifted his hand and held it out. Almost at once one of the circling butterflies settled upon his finger.

It perched there with its velvety black and yellow wings fanning gently. They stared at him in astonishment, for it was as though the insect had come to his bidding. Tamre giggled and offered the butterfly to Royan. When she held out her hand, he gently transferred the gorgeous insect to her palm.

"Thank you, Tamre. That is a wonderful gift. Now my gift to you is to set it free again." She pursed her lips and blew it softly into flight. They watched the butterfly climb high above the pool, and Tamre clapped his hands and laughed with delight.

"Strange," Nicholas murmured. "He seems to have a special empathy with all the creatures of the wilderness. I think that Jali Hora, the abbot, does not try to control him, but lets him do very much as his simple fancy dictates.

Special treatment for a fey soul, one that hears a different tune and dances to it. I must admit that, despite myself, I am becoming quite fond of the lad."

It was only another fifty feet higher that they came to the source. There was a low cliff of red sandstone, from a grotto at whose foot the stream gushed. The entrance was screened by a heavy growth of ferns, and Nicholas went down on his knees to pull them aside and peer into the low opening.

"What can you see?" Royan demanded behind him.

"Not much. It's dark in there, but it seems to go in for quite some way."

"You are too big to get in there. You had better let me go in."

"Good place for water cobra," he remarked. "Lots of frogs for them to eat. Are you sure you want to go?"

"I never said that I wanted to." She sat on the bank while she unlaced her shoes, then lowered herself into the stream. It came halfway up her thighs, and she waded forward against the flow with difficulty.

She was forced to bend almost double to creep under the overhanging roof of the grotto. As she moved deeper in, her voice came back to him.

"The roof gets lower."

"Be careful, dear girl. Don't take any chances."

"I do wish you wouldn't call me "dear girl"." Her voice resonated strangely from the cave entrance.

"Well, you are both those things, a girl and dear. How about if I call you

"young lady?

"Not that either. My name is Royan."There was silence for a while, then she called again. "This is as far as I can go. It all narrows down into a shaft of some sort."

"A shaft?" he demanded.

"Well, at least a roughly rectangular opening."

"Do you think it is the work of humans?"

"Impossible to tell. The water is coming out of it like the spout of a bath tap. A solid jet."

"No evidence of any excavation? No marks of tools on the rock?"

"Nothing. It's slick and water-worn, covered with moss and algae."

"Could a man get into the opening, I mean if it were not for the water pressure?"

"If he was a pygmy or a dwarf."

"Or a childT he suggested.

"Or a child," she agreed. "But who would send a child in there?"

"The ancients often used child-slaves. Taita might have done the same."

"Don't suggest it. You are destroying my high opinion of Taita," she told him as she backed out of the entrance of the grotto. There were pieces of fern and moss in her hair, and she was soaked from the waist downwards. He gave her a hand and boosted her back on to the bank. The curve of her bottom was clearly visible through her wet trousers. He forced himself not to dwell upon the view.

"So we have to conclude that the shaft is a natural flaw in the limestone, and not a man-made tunnel?"

"I didn't say that. No. I said that I couldn't be sure.

You might be correct. Children might have been used to dig it. After all, they were used in the coalmines during the industrial revolution."

"But there is no way that we would be able to explore the tunnel from this end?"

"Impossible." She was vehement. "The water is pouring out under enormous pressure. I tried to push my arrn up the shaft, but I did not have the strength."

"Pity! I was hoping for some more irrefutable evidence, or at least another lead." He sat down beside her on the bank, and ferreted in his pack. She looked at him quizzically when he brought out a small black anodized instrument and opened the lid.

"Aneroid barometer," he explained. "Every good navigator should have one." He studied it for a moment and then made a note of the reading.

"Explain," she invited.

"I want to know if this spring is below the level of the entrance to the sinkhole in Taita's pool. If it is not, then we can cross it off our list of possibilities."

He stood up. "If you are ready, we can move on."

"Where to?"

"Why, Taita's pool, of course. We need a reading up there to establish the difference in altitude between the two points."

nce Tamre knew where they were headed he showed them a shortcuts so it took them just under two hours from the fountain head to the top of the cliff face above Taita's pool.

While they rested, Royan remarked, "Tamre seems to spend most of his days wandering around in the bush. He knows every path and game trail. He is an excellent guide."

"Better than Boris, at least," Nicholas agreed, as he fished out his barometer and took another reading.