Excavation (8 page)

The tip of his rifle just reached the hoard. Gil nudged a few of the items, searching. He held his breath as he did so. What if there was another booby trap there? His straining ears seemed to pick up a slight change in the cadence of the mechanism's gears. He cringed, but nothing happened.

Gil swore under his breath. The rifle bobbled in his extended grip. He was getting too jumpy. He took a steadying breath, then concentrated on his task, refusing to fail. He ground his teeth and ignored the growing burn from his straining shoulder. Finally, his efforts paid off. A pair of twin goblets was exposed, one gold, one silver, each embedded with rubies and emeralds in a serpent pattern. But the feature that most attracted Gil was the arched handles on the cups.

Something he could hook!

Slipping his rifle's barrel through the handle of one, he lifted it free of the pile. He tilted the weapon, and the silver goblet slid down the barrel to rest against its wooden stock. Gil pulled the weapon back and stood. He shook the treasure off his weapon and passed it to Miguel. “For your bravery,
mi amigo
.”

Miguel held the goblet in trembling fingers. There was enough wealth in that single token to set up the squat man and his family for the rest of their lives. Miguel whispered a prayer of thanks.

Gil frowned and turned away. His companion should be thanking him, not his God. Gil knelt again and stretched his rifle to retrieve the golden cup. The second goblet was soon in his hands. Here was his reward. He knew a dealer in stolen antiquities that would pay triple the price of the gold in the cup for any intact Incan artifacts. Gil shoved the goblet into his jacket and turned his back on the statue.

He plotted what he had to do next. He patted the grenade in his vest. He had to protect the rest of the wealth here until he could bring in a demolitions team to neutralize the booby trap. Once the cursed apparatus was disabled, he and his team could collect the rest of the riches at their leisure. In his mind, he pictured the only other obstacle to his plans: the group of
americanos
sleeping snugly in their tents. He gripped his rifle. They must never see the dawn.

With his plan set, Gil waved Miguel on toward the exit. His companion needed no further coaxing, clearly glad to escape with his single small treasure. Miguel hopped to the next gold square.

It shot up under him with a scream of gears and pulleys. The tile, with Miguel atop it, flew toward the ceiling, borne up by a thick trunk of wood. Overhead, the corresponding silver tile in the ceiling slid back. Silver spikes thrust downward.

Miguel saw his death and tried to roll off the tile, taking his chance on the fall below—but he was not quick enough. His legs, from the knees down, were pinned by the spikes, driven through muscle and bone. Miguel screamed. Bones snapped like broken twigs as he thrashed in the grip of the spikes.

The gold tile then descended, sliding smoothly back to its place in the floor's pattern. Smeared with blood, it was
empty. Gil looked up. Miguel still hung by his spiked legs from the roof.

Blood rained down from Miguel's ruined legs. He thrashed, arms pushing against the stakes. He finally won his freedom and fell the two stories to the metal floor. Again the crack of bones sounded with the impact.

Gil had glanced away when Miguel fell. He turned back. Miguel lay broken upon the tiles. Only one limb was still intact. The man tried to push up on his good right arm, but the pain was too much. He collapsed again. Too weak, too shocked to scream, only a low moan escaped his lips. He stared at Gil with begging eyes.

Gil could not save him.

Raising his rifle, Gil whispered, “I'm sorry,
ese
.” He shot Miguel through the forehead, the rifle's blast deafening in the enclosed space. Miguel's moaning stopped. Blood dribbled from the small hole in his forehead.

Gil studied the tiles once again. A gold one had killed Miguel! Why were they no longer safe? Was his theory wrong to begin with—or had the rules changed? He remembered the shift in the mechanism's cadence as he had fished through the treasure. Something had altered. Gil stared. Miguel had landed on a silver square with no repercussion. Were the silver tiles now the safe ones? Gold when one approached, silver as one left. Could it be that easy?

Gil had no other cohort to bully into taking the risk. He would have to test his theory himself. Cautiously, he reached with his rifle and tapped its butt on the next tile—a silver one. Nothing happened. But did that prove anything? Maybe it would take his full weight to spring the trap. Slowly, he reached a booted foot and placed it on the square. Holding his breath, he leaned his weight onto this leg, ready to leap back with any shift in the tile or change in the gear's timbre. Soon he stood with one leg on the new silver tile and one on the gold tile. Still, nothing changed.

Cringing, Gil pulled his other leg over onto the silver. He
stood motionless. No harm came to him. Safe.

Sighing out his trapped breath, he wiped the sweat from his eyes. Tears ran down his cheeks. He did not know when they had begun to flow.

He stood on the silver tile. The next one would require leaping a gold square. Before he could lose his nerve, he leaped, rifle in hand and landed roughly on the silver tile. He froze but remained safe.

Grinning, he straightened and glanced back to the king. “I beat you, you bastard!”

He turned toward the exit and worked his way cautiously, but more rapidly, across the floor. It was his speed that saved his life. He hopped from one silver tile to its neighbor, just leaping off the first as it opened under him. From the shift in his footing as he jumped, he fell hard to the next tile. Overhead, a spray of water jetted from small openings that appeared in the corresponding roof tile. It showered into the newly opened pit behind him. Gil rolled around. A bit of the mist from the spray struck his exposed cheek; it burned with a touch of fire. Gil shoved away. Acid!

He touched his flaming cheek. His skin already lay blistered and oozing.

Gil shivered at the thought of being trapped in that pit below when the shower of acid struck. His death would have been long and painful.

The burning rain ended and the silver tile slid closed over the pit. Death had come within a breath of claiming him. Trembling, he struggled to his feet.

He stared at the traitorous silver tile. Silver! He had been wrong all along. Only pure luck and chance had carried him this far.

With this horrible realization dawning, he swung to face the exit. Escape lay three rows away—about three meters. He now knew he could trust none of the tiles. He would have to risk jumping. If he dived, he might just make it.

Gil stared at his rifle. He could not chance its weight. He
dropped it along with the ammunition belt slung over his chest to the floor. Taking out the heavy golden goblet, Gil stared at it a moment, then returned it to inside his vest. He would rather die than lose this treasure. He shrugged out of his boots instead. Besides, if he was barefooted, he had a better grip on the tile's silver surface anyway.

Once ready, he backed to the far edge, giving himself as much of a running start as possible. But he had only two short steps at most. Girding himself, Gil closed his eyes, and for the first time in decades, he prayed to his God for strength and luck. Prepared, he opened his eyes and clenched his fist. “Now or never,” he mumbled.

Leaning forward, he dashed two quick steps, then flung himself headfirst with all the strength in his legs. He flew across the rows of tiles and landed hard upon the stone floor, ducking enough to take the brunt of the collision on his left side. Something snapped in his shoulder as he rolled into the short passage and came to rest against the toppled stone door.

With a grimace, Gil shoved to his feet. He ignored the shooting pain in his neck. He had made it! Fingering his shoulder, he realized he had most likely broken his collarbone. Not a big deal. He had once taken three bullets in the chest. In comparison, this was nothing more than a scratch.

Gil pulled free the precious goblet. One of its lips was slightly bent from the weight of his fall. But, like Gil, it had sustained no real harm.

Stepping to the edge of the deadly pattern, Gil raised the chalice and spat toward the distant Incan king, the gold idol bright against the black stone. “I'll come back and rape you yet!” he cursed.

With that promise, he turned on a heel and fled.

 

Maggie knelt by the top of the ladder that led down to the third level of the ruins. “Someone's coming!” she whispered, pushing Sam back from her shoulder.

An instinct told her they needed to hide. Raised on the streets of Belfast, Maggie knew to listen to that inner voice of hers. Surviving among the constant gunfire and bombings between the warring Irish factions and the British military had taught Maggie O'Donnel the value of a good hiding place.

“C'mon,” Maggie urged, pulling Sam with her. Norman and Ralph followed.

Sam resisted, raising his rifle. “Maybe it's looters. We should stop them.”

“And get us all killed, you stupid git? You don't know how many are down there, or how well they're armed. Now let's go!”

Norman agreed. “She's right. The leftist guerrillas around here, the Shining Path, are well equipped. Russian AK-47s and the like. We should leave any investigation to the security team.”

Sam stared back to the ladder, then shook his head and followed Maggie. She led the group to a side chamber. No sodium lamps lit the room. Darkness swallowed them.

“Stay low,” Maggie warned. “But be prepared to run on my signal.”

Sam muttered as he hunkered down beside her, “Maggie O'Donnel, combat archaeologist.”

Maggie could just make out Sam's form as a darker shadow among the others, but she could imagine his sarcastic smile.

“You know,” Ralph added in a whisper, “it's probably just Gil or one of his men.”

“And the scream?” Maggie said.

“I'm sure that—”

Maggie reached a hand to his knee to quiet the large man. She could hear the creaking wood as someone mounted the ladder from below. Whoever climbed was in a hurry. She could hear his panting breath and his scrambled flight. Lowering herself closer to the stone floor, Maggie watched the
climber's head rise from the shaft.

She recognized the lanky black hair and the spidery white scar on his bronze cheek. Guillermo Sala. The ex-policeman frantically crawled from the ladder, his feet almost slipping. Maggie allowed a breath of relief to escape her throat. Ralph was right. It was just the camp's guard.

She started to stand when she spotted the large burn blistered on his cheek. It cracked and bled. Gil swiped a hand to his wounded face and smeared the blood across his shirt. His eyes were wide, the whites of which almost glowed in the lantern near the ladder. His lips were thin with hatred—but she also sensed fear and shock emanating from him.

Maggie knew that expression. A childhood friend, Patrick Dugan, had worn the same shocked face when caught by a stray bullet during a firefight back in Belfast. He had raised his head too soon from their shared hiding place in a roadside drainage ditch. Maggie had known better. Even as Patrick's body collapsed atop her, she hadn't moved. Danger lay in haste. Having learned her lesson, Maggie stayed hidden and kept the others back with a hand.

What had happened below? What could frighten a man as hard and tough as Gil?

As on that noon day in the streets of Belfast, Maggie knew safety still lay in the shadows. She peered from the room's edge as Gil reached to his vest and fingered an object bulging in a pocket. It seemed to center the panicked man, as a crucifix would reassure an old woman.

Then, from another pocket, he pulled free what looked like a green apple with a handle. It took Maggie a heartbeat to recognize the armament, so out of place in an ancient Incan ruin.

Bloody hell! A grenade!

With a final glance at the shaft, Gil scrabbled to his feet and raced down the tunnel.

Listening to his fading footsteps, Maggie found she could not move. In her mind's eye, the grenade still loomed large—a familiar weapon in the war on the streets of her
home. Buried childhood panic swelled, threatening to choke her. Her hands trembled. She clenched her fists, refusing to succumb to the panic attack that verged. Her vision swam slightly as her breath became stilted.

Sam must have sensed her distress. “Maggie…?” He reached to her shoulder.

His touch ignited her. She sprang to her feet. “Och, we need to get out of here,” she said, her words rushed. “Now!”

Sam pulled his Stetson firmer on his head. “Why? It's only Guillermo.”

Her face fierce, Maggie swung toward Sam. The Texan had not seen the grenade. Sam backed a step from whatever he saw in her eyes. She did not have time to explain her fears. “Go, you bloody wanker!” she hollered, the panic thickening the Irish brogue on her tongue. She shoved Sam toward the tunnel and waved the others after him.

Sam's long legs ate up the distance. Maggie followed, keeping one eye on their back trail. Ahead, Ralph kept up with Sam, but Norman, burdened with his cameras, had slipped behind.

“Hurry,” she urged the journalist.

Norman glanced back. His face was stark white in the glow of the lamps. But he fought for more speed and closed the distance as the two quicker men reached the ladder to the next level of the dig.

Ahead, Sam flew up the wooden rungs with Ralph at his heels. Norman went next. Maggie stood at the foot of the ladder, her ears straining for any danger behind them. Far away, echoing up from below, she thought she could just make out a deep ticking, like a large watch winding down.

“Maggie, c'mon!” Sam whispered urgently to her from above.

Maggie turned to find the ladder clear. For a moment, time had slipped away from her. It was one of the signs of a pending attack. Not now! She flew up the ladder. Sam helped her off the last rung, hauling her up with his arms. The ladder to the surface lay only a handful of meters away.
On her feet, Maggie led the way.