Ch

His muscles meltin g in the scalding water, his body weightless, hel dozed as his feet enclosed Hana’s in slack embrace. It was a cool day for the season, and dense steam billowed, filling the small bathing house.

“You were very tired when you came home last night,” Hana said after a sleepy silence.

“Is that a criticism?” he muttered without moving his lips.

She laughed lightly. “On the contrary. Fatigue is an advantage in our games.”

“True.”

“Was your trip… successful?”

He nodded.

She was never inquisitive about his affairs; her training prohibited it, but her training also taught her to create opportunities for him to speak about his work if he wanted to. “Your business? It was the same sort of thing you did in China when we met?”

“Same genre, different phylum.”

“And those unpleasant men who visited us, were they involved?”

“They weren’t on the ground, but they were the enemy.” His tone changed. “Listen, Hana. I want you to take a little vacation. Go to Paris or the Mediterranean for a few weeks.”

“Back only ten hours and you are already trying to be rid of me?”

“There may be some trouble from those ‘unpleasant men.’ And I want you safely out of the way. Anyway”—he smiled,—”you could probably use the spice of a strong young lad or two.”

“And what of you?”

“Oh, I’ll be out of the enemy’s range. I’m going into the mountains and work that cave Be

“When do you want me to leave, Nikko?”

“Today. As soon as you can.”

“You don’t think I would be safe here with our friends in the mountains protecting me?”

“That chain’s broken. Something happened to Miss Stern. Somebody informed.”

“I see.” She squeezed his foot between hers. “Be careful, Nikko.”

The water had cooled enough to make slow movements possible, and Hel flicked his fingers, sending currents of hotter water toward his stomach. “Hana? You told me that you could not bring up the subject of marriage again, but I said that I could and would. I’m doing that now.”

She smiled and shook her head. “I’ve been thinking about that for the past few days, Nikko. No, not marriage. That would be too silly for such as you and I.”

“Do you want to go away from here?”

“No.”

“What then?”

“Let’s not make plans. Let’s remain together for a month at a time. Perhaps forever—but only a month at a time. Is that all right with you?”

He smiled and nestled his feet into hers. “I have great affection for you, Hana.”

“I have great affection for you, Nicholai.”

“By the Skeptical Balls of Thomas! What’s going on in here?” Le Cagot had snatched open the door of the bathing room and entered, bringing unwelcomed cool air with him. “Are you two making your own private whiteout? Good to see you back, Niko! You must have been lonely without me.” He leaned against the wooden tub, his chin hooked over the rim. “Arid good to see you too, Hana! You know, this is the first time I’ve seen all of you. I shall tell you the truth—you are a desirable woman. And that is praise from the world’s most desirable man, so wear it in health.”

“Get out of here!” Hel growled, not because he was uncomfortable with nudity, but because Le Cagot’s tease would go flat if he didn’t seem to rise to the bait.

“He shouts to hide his delight at seeing me again, Hana. It’s an old trick. Mother in Heaven, you have fine nipples! Are you sure there isn’t a bit of Basque in that genetic stew of yours? Hey, Niko, when do we see if there is light and air at the other end of Le Cagot’s Cave? Everything is in readiness. The air tank is down, the wet suit. Everything.”

“I’m ready to go up today.”

“When today?”

“In a couple of hours. Get out.”

“Good. That gives me time to visit your Portuguese maid. All right, I’m off. You two will have to resign yourselves to getting on without my company.” He slammed the door behind him, swirling the scant steam that remained in the room.

After they had made love and taken breakfast, Hana began her packing. She had derided to go to Paris because in late August that city would be relatively empty of vacationing bourgeois Parisians.

Hel puttered for a time in his garden, which had roughened somewhat in his absence. It was there Pierre found him.

“Oh, M’sieur, the weather signs are all confused.”

“Is that so?”

“It is so. It has rained for two days, and now neither the Eastwind nor the Northwind have dominance, and you know what that means.”

“I’m confident you will tell me.”

“It will be dangerous in the mountains, M’sieur. This is the season of the whiteout.”

“You’re sure of that?”

Pierre tapped the tip of his rubicund drunkard’s nose with his forefinger, signifying that there were things only the Basque knew for certain, and weather was but one of them.

Hel took some consolation in Pierre’s assurance. At least they would not have to contend with a whiteout.

The Volvo rolled into the village square of Larrau, where they would pick up the Basque lads who operated the pedal winch. They parked near the widow’s bar, and one of the children playing pala against the church wall ran over and did Hel the service of bashing the hood of the car with a stick, as he had seen the man do so often. Hel thanked him, and followed Le Cagot to the bar.

“Why are you bringing your makila along, Be

“I promised myself that I would carry it until I discover which of my people informed on that poor little girl. Then, by the Baby-Killing Balls of Herod, I shall ventilate his chest with it. Come, let’s take a little glass with the widow. I shall give her the pleasure of laying my palm upon her ass.”

The Basque lads who had been awaiting them since morning now joined them over a glass, talking eagerly about the chances of M’sieur Hel being able to swim the underground river to the daylight. Once that air-to-air exploration had been made, the cave system would be officially discovered, and they would be free to go down into the hole themselves and, what is more, to talk about it later.

The widow twice pushed Le Cagot’s hand away; then, her virtue clearly demonstrated, she allowed it to remain on her ample bottom as she stood beside the table, keeping his glass full.

The door to the W.C. in back opened, and Father Xavier entered the low-ceilinged bar, his eyes bright with fortifying wine and the ecstasy of fanaticism. “So?” he said to the young Basque lads. “Now you sit with this outlander and his lecherous friend? Drinking their wine and listening to their lies?”

“You must have drunk deep of His blood this morning, Father Esteka!” Le Cagot said. “You’ve swallowed a bit of courage.”

Father Xavier snarled something under his breath and slumped down in a chair at the most distant table.

“Hol

“Let him be,” Hel muttered. “Let’s go and leave the silly bastard to pickle in his own hate.”

“God’s eyes are everywhere!” the priest snarled, glaring at Hel. “His wrath is inescapable!”

“Shut your mouth, convent girl,” Le Cagot said, “or I shall put this makila where it will inconvenience the Bishop!

Hel put a restraining hand on Le Cagot’s arm; they finished off their wine and left.

Gouffre Porte-de-Larrau

Hel squatted on the flat slab that edged their base camp beside the rubble cone, his helmet light turned off to save the batteries, listening over the field telephone to Le Cagot’s stream of babble, invective, and song as he descended on the cable, constantly bullying and amusing the Basque lads operating the pedal winch above. Le Cagot was taking a breather, braced up in the bottom of the corkscrew before allowing himself to be lowered into the void of Le Cagot’s Cave, down into the waterfall, where he would have to hang, twisting on the line, while the lads locked up and replaced the cable drum.

After ordering them to be quick about the job and not leave him hanging there, dangling like Christ on the tree, or he would come back up and do them exquisite bodily damage, he said, “All right, Niko, I’m coming down!”

“That’s the only way gravity works,” Hel commented, as he looked up for the first glimpse of Le Cagot’s helmet light emerging through the mist of the waterfall.

A few meters below the opening into the principal cave, the descent stopped, and the Basque boy on the phones announced that they were changing drums.

“Get on with it!” Le Cagot ordered. “This cold shower is abusing my manhood!”

Hel was considering the task of carrying the heavy air tank all the way to the Wine Cellar at the end of the system, glad that he could rely on Le Cagot’s bull strength, when a muffled shout came over the earphones. Then a sharp report. His first reaction was that something had snapped. A cable? The tripod? His body instinctively tightened in kinesthetic sympathy for Le Cagot. There were two more crisp reports. Gunfire!

Then silence.

Hel could see Le Cagot’s helmet lamp, blurred through the mist of the waterfall, winking on and off as he turned slowly on the end of the cable.

“What in hell is going on?” Le Cagot asked over the phones.

“I don’t know.”

A voice came over the telephone, thin and distant “I warned you to stay out of this, Mr. Hel.”

“Diamond?” Hel asked, unnecessarily.

“That is correct. The merchant. The one who would not dare meet you face to face.”

“You call this face to face?”

“It’s close enough.”

Le Cagot’s voice was tight with the strain on his chest and diaphragm from hanging in the harness. “What is going on?”

“Diamond?” Hel was forcing himself to remain calm. “What happened to the boys at the winch?”

“They’re dead.”

“I see. Listen. It’s me you want, and I’m at the bottom of the shaft. I’m not the one hanging from the cable. It is my friend. I can instruct you how to lower him.”

“Why on earth should I do that?”

From the background, Hel heard Darryl Starr’s voice. “That’s the son of a bitch that took my piece. Let him hang there, turning slowly in the wind, the mammy-jammer!”

There was the sound of a childish giggle—the PLO scab they called Haman.

“What makes you think I involved myself in your business?” Hel asked, his voice conversational, although he was frantically playing for time to think.

“The Mother Company keeps sources close to our friends in England—just to confirm their allegiance. I believe you met our Miss Biffen, the young model?”

“If I get out of here, Diamond…”

“Save your breath, Hel. I happen to know that is a ‘bottomless pit from which there is no exit.’”

Hel took a slow breath. Those were Le Cagot’s words in the widow’s bar that afternoon.

“I warned you,” Diamond continued, “that we would have to take counteraction of a kind that would satisfy the vicious tastes of our Arab friends. You will be a while dying, and that will please them. And I have arranged a more visible monument to your punishment. That ch

“Diamond…” Hel had nothing to say, but he wanted to keep Diamond on the other end of the line. “Le Cagot is nothing to you. Why let him hang there?”

“It’s a detail sure to amuse our Arab friends.”

“Listen, Diamond—there are men coming to relieve those lads. They’ll find us and get us out.”

“That isn’t true. In fact, it’s a disappointingly pallid lie. But to forestall the possibility of someone stumbling upon this place accidentally, I intend to send men up to bury your Basque friends here, dismantle all this bric-abrac, and roll boulders into the pit to conceal the entrance. I tell you this as an act of kindness—so you won’t waste yourself on fruitless hope.”

Hel did not respond.

“Do you remember what my brother looked like, Hel?”

“Vaguely.”

“Good. Keep him in mind.”

There was a rattling over the headphones, as they were taken off and tossed aside.

“Diamond? Diamond?” Hel squeezed the phone line in his fingers. The only sound over the phone was Le Cagot’s labored breathing.

Hel turned on his helmet light and the ten-watt bulb connected to battery, so Le Cagot could see something below him and not feel deserted.

“Well, what about that old friend?” Le Cagot’s half-strangled voice came over the line. “Not exactly the denouement I would have chosen for this colorful character I have created for myself.”

For a desperate moment, Hel considered attempting to scale the walls of the cave, maybe get above Le Cagot and let a line down to him.

Impossible. It would take hours of work with drill and expansion bolts to move up that featureless, overhanging face; and long before that, Le Cagot would be dead, strangled in the harness webbing that was even now crushing the breath out of him.

Could Le Cagot get out of this harness and up the cable to the mouth of the corkscrew? From there it was barely conceivable that he might work his way up to the surface by free climbing.

He suggested this to Be

Le Cagot’s voice was a weak rasp. “Can’t… ribs… weight of… water…”

“Be

“What, for the love of God?”

A last slim possibility had occurred to Hel. The telephone line. It wasn’t tied off firmly, and the chances that it would take a man’s weight were slight; but it was just possible that it had fouled somewhere above, perhaps tangled with the descent cable.

“Be

Le Cagot hadn’t breath enough left to answer, but from the vibration in the phone line, Hel knew he was trying to follow instructions. A minute passed. Two. The mist-blurred helmet lamp was dancing jerkily up near the roof of the cave. Le Cagot was clinging to the phone line, using his last strength before unconsciousness to hack away at the web straps of his harness with his knife.

He gripped the wet phone line with all his force and sawed through the last strap. His weight jerked onto the phone line… snatching it loose.

“Christ!” he cried.

His helmet light rushed down toward Hel. For a fraction of a second, the coiling phone line puddled at Hel’s feet. With a fleshy slap, Le Cagot’s body hit the tip of the rubble cone, bounced, tumbled in a clatter of rock and debris, then lodged head-downward not ten meters from Hel.

“Be

Hel rushed to him. He wasn’t dead. The chest was crushed; it convulsed in heaving gasps that spewed bloody foam from the mouth. The helmet had taken the initial impact but had come off during the bouncing down the rubble. He was bleeding from his nose and ears. Hanging head down, he was choking on his own blood.

As gently as possible, Hel lifted Le Cagot’s torso in his arms and settled it more comfortably. The damage he might do by moving him did not matter; the man was dying. Indeed, Hel resented the powerful Basque constitution that denied his friend immediate release into death.

Le Cagot’s breath was rapid and shallow; his open eyes were slowly dilating. He coughed, and the motion brought him racking pain.

Hel caressed the bearded cheek, slick with blood.

“How…” Le Cagot choked on the word.

“Rest, Be

“How… do I look?”

“You look fine.”

“They didn’t get my face?”

“Handsome as a god.”

“Good.” Le Cagot’s teeth clenched against a surge of pain. The bottom ones had been broken off in the fall. “The priest…”

“Rest, my friend. Don’t fight it. Let it take you.”

“The priest!” The blood froth at the corner of his mouth was already sticky.

“I know.” Diamond had quoted Le Cagot’s description of the cave as a bottomless pit. The only person he could have heard it from was the fanatic, Father Xavier. And it must have been the priest who gave away Hannah’s place of refuge as well. The confessional was his source of information, his Fat Boy.

For an endless three minutes, Le Cagot’s gurgling rasps were the only sound. The blood pulsing from his ears began to thicken.

“Niko?”

“Rest. Sleep.”

“How do I look?”

“Magnificent, Be

Suddenly Le Cagot’s body stiffened and a thin whine came from the back of his throat. “Christ!”

“Pain?” Hel asked stupidly, not knowing what to say. The crisis of agony passed, and Le Cagot’s body seemed to slump into itself. He swallowed blood and asked, “What did you say?”

“Pain?” Hel repeated.

“No… thanks… I have all I need.”

“Fool,” Hel said softly.

“Not a bad exit line, though.”

“No, not bad.”

“I bet that you won’t make so fine a one when you go.”

Hel closed his eyes tightly, squeezing the tears out, as he caressed his friend’s cheek.

Le Cagot’s breath snagged and stopped. His legs began to jerk in spasms. The breath came back, rapid gasps rattling in the back of his throat. His broken body contorted in final agony and he cried, “Argh! By the Four Balls of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph…”

Pink lung blood gushed from his mouth, and he was dead.

Hel grunted with relief from pain as he slipped off the straps of the air cylinder and wedged it into an angle between two slabs of raw rock that had fallen in from the roof of the Climbing Cave, He sat heavily, his chin hanging to his chest, as he sucked in great gulps of air with quivering inhalations, and exhalations that scoured his lungs and made him cough. Sweat ran from his hair, despite the damp cold of the cave. He crossed his arms over his chest and gingerly fingered the raw bands on his shoulders where the air tank straps had rubbed away the skin, even through three sweaters under his parachutist’s overalls. An air tank is an awkward pack through rough squeezes and hard climbs. If drawn up tight, it constricts movement and numbs the arms and fingers; if slackened, it chafes the skin and swings, dangerously threatening balance.

When his breathing calmed, he took a long drink of water-wine from his xahako, then lay back on a slab of rock, not even bothering to take off his helmet. He was carrying as little as possible: the tank, all the rope he could handle, minimal hardware, two flares, his xahako, the diving mask in a rubberized pouch which also contained a watertight flashlight, and a pocketful of glucose cubes for rapid energy. Even stripped down to necessities, it was too much for his body weight. He was used to moving through caves freely, leading and carrying minimal weight, while the powerful Le Cagot bore the brunt of their gear. He missed his friend’s strength; he missed the emotional support of his constant flow of wit and invective and song.

But he was alone now. His reserves of strength were sapped; his hands were torn and stiff. The thought of sleep was delicious, seductive… deadly. He knew that if he slept, the cold would seep in, the attractive, narcotic cold. Mustn’t sleep. Sleep is death. Rest, but don’t close your eyes. Close your eyes, but don’t sleep. No. Mustn’t close your eyes! His eyebrows arched with the effort to keep the lids open over the upward-rolling eyes. Mustn’t sleep. Just rest for a moment. Not sleep. Just close your eyes for a moment. Just close… eyes…

He had left Le Cagot on the side of the rubble heap where he died. There was no way to bury him; the cave itself would be a vast mausoleum, now that they had rolled stones in over the opening. Le Cagot would lie forever in the heart of his Basque mountains.

When at last the blood had stopped oozing, Hel had gently wiped the face clean before covering the body with a sleeping bag.

After covering the body, Hel had squatted beside it, seeking middle-density meditation to clear his mind and tame his emotions. He had achieved only fleeting wisps of peace, but when he tugged his mind back to the present, he was able to consider his situation. Decision was simple; all alternatives were closed off. His chance of making it, alone and overloaded, all the way down that long shaft and around Hel’s Knob, through the gargantuan chaos of the Climbing Cave, through the waterfall into the Crystal Cavern, then down that foul marl chute to the Wine Cellar sump—his chances of negotiating all these obstacles without belaying and help from Le Cagot were slim. But it was a kind of Pascal’s Bet. Slim or not, his only hope lay in making the effort. He would not think about the task of swimming out through the pipe at the bottom of the Wine Cellar, that pipe through which water rushed with such volume that it pulled the surface of the pool tight and bowed. He would face one problem at a time.

Negotiating Hel’s Knob had come close to ending his problems. He had tied a line to the air tank and balanced it on the narrow ledge beside the stream rushing through that wedge-shaped cut, then he undertook the knob with a strenuous heel-and-shoulder scramble, lying back at almost full length, his knees quivering with the strain and the extra weight of rope crosscoiled bandolier style over his chest. Once past the obstacle, he faced the task of getting the tank around. There was no Le Cagot to feed the line out to him. There was nothing for it but to tug the tank into the water and take up slack rapidly as it bounced along the bottom of the stream. He was not able to take line in quickly enough; the tank passed his stance underwater and continued on, the line jerking and bobbing. He had no point of belay; when the slack snapped out, he was pulled from his thin ledge. He couldn’t let go. To lose the tank was to lose everything. He straddled the narrow shaft, one boot on the ledge, the cleats of the other flat against the smooth opposite wall where there was no purchase. All the strength of his legs pressed into the stance, the cords of his crotch stood out, stretched and vulnerable. The line ran rapidly through his hands. He clenched his jaw and squeezed his fists closed over the rope. The pain seared as his palms took the friction of the wet line that cut into them. Water ran behind his fists, blood before. To handle the pain, he roared, his scream echoing unheard through the narrow diaclose.

The tank was stopped.

He hauled it back against the current, hand over hand, the rope molten iron in his raw palms, the cords of his crotch knotting and throbbing. When his hand touched the web strap of the tank, he pulled it up and hooked it behind his neck. With that weight dangling at his chest, the move back to the ledge was dicy. Twice he pushed off the smooth wall, and twice he tottered and fell back, catching himself again with the flat of his sole, his crotch feeling like it would tear with the stretch. On the third try he made it over and stood panting against the wall, only his heels on the ledge, his toes over the roaring stream.

He moved the last short distance to the scree wall that blocked the way to the Climbing Cave, and he slumped down in the book corner, exhausted, the tank against his chest, his palms pulsing with pain.

He couldn’t stay there long. His hands would stiffen up and become useless.

He rerigged the tank to his back and checked the fittings and faceplate of the mask. If they were damaged, that was it. The mask had somehow survived banging against the tank. Now he began the slow climb up the corner between the side of the shaft, and the boulder wall under which the river had disappeared. As before, there were many foot— and handholds, but it was all friable rottenrock, chunks of which came off in his hands, and grains of stone worked their way into his skinless palms. His heart thumped convulsively in his chest, squirting throbs of blood into his temples. When at last he made the fiat ledge between two counterbalanced boulders that was the keyhole to the Climbing Cave, he lay out flat on his stomach and rested, his cheek against the rock and saliva dripping from the corner of his mouth.

He cursed himself for resting there too long. His palms were growing sticky with scab fluid, and they hinged awkwardly, like lobster claws. He got to his feet and stood there, opening and closing his hands, breaking through the crusts of pain, until they articulated smoothly again.

For an immeasurable time, he stumbled forward through the Climbing Cave, feeling his way around the house-sized boulders that dwarfed him, squeezing between counterbalanced slabs of recent infall from the scarred roof far above the throw of his helmet light, edging his way along precariously perched rocks that would long ago have surrendered to gravity, had they been subjected to the weather erosion of the outside. The river was no guide, lost far below the jumble of infall, ravelled into thousands of threads as it found its way along the schist floor of the cavern. Three times, in his fatigue and stress, he lost his way, and the terror of it was that he was wasting precious energy stumbling around blindly. Each time, he forced himself to stop and calm himself, until his proximity sense suggested the path toward open space.

At last, there was sound to guide him. As he approached the end of the Climbing Cave, the threads of water far below wove themselves together, and slowly he became aware of the roar and tympani of the great waterfall that led down to the Crystal Cave. Ahead, the roof of the cave sloped down and was joined by a blocking wall of jagged, fresh infall. Making it up that wall, through the insane network of cracks and chimneys, then down the other side through the roaring waterfall without the safety of a belay from Le Cagot would be the most dangerous and difficult part of the cave. He would have to rest before that.

It was then that Hel had slipped off the straps of his air tank and sat down heavily on a rock, his chin hanging to his chest as he gasped for air and sweat ran from his hair into his eyes.

He had taken a long drink from his xahako, then had lain back on the slab of rock, not bothering to take off his helmet.

His body whimpered for rest. But he mustn’t sleep. Sleep is death. Just rest for a moment. Not sleep. Just close your eyes for a moment. Just close… eyes…

“Ahgh!” He started awake, driven from his shallow, tormented sleep by the image of Le Cagot’s helmet light rushing down toward him from the roof of the cave! He sat up, shivering and sweating. The thin sleep had not rested him; fatigue wastes in his body were thickening up; his hands were a pair of stiff paddles; his shoulders were knotted; the nausea of repeated adrenaline shock was clogging his throat.

He sat there, slumped over, not caring if he went on or not. Then, for the first time, the staggering implications of what Diamond had said over the phones burst upon his consciousness. His ch

Concern for her, and the need to avenge Le Cagot, did for his body what food and rest might have done. He clawed his remaining glucose cubes from the pouch and chewed them, washing them down with the last of his water-wine. It would take the sugar several minutes to work its way into his bloodstream. Meanwhile, he set his jaw and began the task of limbering up his bands, breaking up the fresh scabbing, accepting the gritty sting of movement.

When he could handle it, he slung the air tank on and began the hard climb up the jumble of infall that blocked off the mouth of the Crystal Cave. He recalled Le Cagot telling him to try a bit to the left, because he was sitting in the line of fall and was too comfortable to move.

Twice, he had to struggle out of the tank harness while clinging to scant points of purchase because the crack he had to wriggle through was too tight for a man and tank at once without risking damage to the mask slung from his chest. Each time, he took care to tie the tank securely, because a fall might knock off its fitting, exploding the cylinder and leaving him with no air to make the final cave swim and making all this work and torture futile.

When he achieved the thin ledge directly above the roaring waterfall, he directed his lamp down tire long drop, up which mist rose and billowed in the windless air. He paused only long enough to catch his breath and slow his heartbeat. There could be no long rests from now on, no chances for his body and hands to stiffen up, or for his imagination to cripple his determination.

The deafening roar of the falls and the roiling 40° mist insulated his mind from any thoughts of wider scope than the immediate task. He edged along the slimy, worn ledge that had once been the lip of the waterfall until be found the outcrop of rock from which Le Cagot had belayed him during his first descent along the glistening sheet of falling water. There would be no protecting belay this time. As he inched down, he came upon the first of the pitons he had driven in before, snapped a carabiner into the first and tied off a doubled line, threading and snapping in another at each piton, to shorten his fall, should he come off the face. Again, as before, it was not long before the combined friction of the line passing through these snap links made pulling it through difficult and dangerous, as the effort tended to lift him from the scant boot jams and fingerholds the face provided.