Clive Cussler - Atlantis Found

They struggled across small ledges and narrow crevices, trying to walk upright without resorting to mountain-climbing gear, a skill in which neither was proficient. Giordino seemed impervious to fatigue. His thick, powerful body took the climb over the rocks in stride. Gunn had no problems, either. He was wiry and far tougher than he looked. He began to fall back from the unyielding Giordino, not from weariness but because he had to stop every twenty yards to wipe the moisture from his glasses.

About midway across the west side of the mountain, Giordino came to a halt. "If your reckoning is right, the stone walkway should be a short distance above or below us."

Gunn sat down with his back to a smooth lava rock and peered at his photo, which had become dog-eared and soggy from the damp. "Assuming the colonel took the path of least resistance from the ravine, he should have worked his way across the mountain about a hundred feet below us."

Giordino crouched, placed his hands on slightly bent knees, and stared down the slope. He seemed entranced for several moments before he turned back and looked Gunn full in the face. "I swear to God, I don't know how you do it."

"What do you mean?"

"Not thirty feet below where we sit is a narrow road paved with smooth rocks."

Gunn peered over the edge. Almost within spitting distance, he saw a road, a path really, four feet wide, laid with stones long aged by the weather. The path traveled in both directions, but landslides had carried much of it down the slope. In the cracks between the stones, a strange looking plant was sprouting. It had lettuce-like heads and grew close to the ground. '

"It must be the road described by the British colonel," said Gunn.

"What's that weird stuff growing in it?" asked Giordino.

"Kerguelen cabbage. It produces a pungent oil and can be eaten as a cooked vegetable."

"Now you know why the road was indistinguishable on the photo. It was hidden by cabbages."

"Yes, I can see that now," said Gunn.

"How did it get established on such a godforsaken island?"

"Probably by its pollen that was carried across the water by the wind."

"Which direction do you want to follow the road?"

Gunn's eyes scanned the flat-laid stones as far as he could in both directions until they were lost to view. "The colonel must have stumbled onto the road down to our right. Below that point it must have been destroyed by erosion and slides. Since it makes no sense to start at the top of the mountain and work down, the chamber must be hidden farther up the slope. So we go to the left and climb."

Stepping cautiously on the loose lava rock, they quickly reached the neatly laid stones and began ascending the road. The flat passage was a welcome relief, but landslides were another matter. They had to cross two of them, each nearly thirty or more yards wide. It was slow going. The lava rock was jagged and knifelike. One slip and their bodies would tumble down the slope, gathering momentum until they bounced over the cliffs far below into the sea.

After negotiating the last hurdle, they sat and rested. Giordino idly picked a cabbage and flipped it down the hill, watching it bounce and shred on its erratic journey. He lost sight of it and did not see the splash as it shot into the water like a cannonball. Instead of lessening, the atmosphere chilled and thickened. The wind gusts strengthened and whipped the rain against their faces. Though they were protected by foul-weather gear, the water found ways of seeping in and around their collars, soaking their inner clothing.

Gunn passed him a thermos of coffee that had gone from steaming hot to lukewarm. Their lunch consisted of four granola bars. They weren't quite in the realm of miserable just yet, but they would soon enter it.

"We must be close," said Gunn, gazing through binoculars. "There is no hint of a long scar continuing across the mountain beyond that big rock just ahead."

Giordino stared at the massive boulder that protruded from the side of the slope. "The chamber better be on the other side," he grunted. "I'm not keen to be caught up here when it gets dark."

"Not to worry. We've got almost twelve hours of daylight left in this hemisphere."

"I just thought of something."

"What's that?" asked Gunn.

"We're the only two humans within two thousand miles."

"That's a cheery thought."

"What if we have an accident and injure ourselves and can't fly out of here? Even if we wanted to, I wouldn't dare take off in this wind."

"Sandecker will mount a rescue mission as soon as we notify him of our status." Gunn reached into his pocket and pulled out a Globalstar satellite phone. "He's as close as a dial tone."

"In the meantime, we'd have to subsist on these stupid cabbages. No, thank you."

Gunn shook his head in resignation. Giordino was a chronic complainer, and yet there was no better man to be with in a bad situation. Neither man had a sense of fear. Their only concern was the possibility of failure.

"Once we enter the chamber," Gunn said loudly, his voice carrying above the wind, "we'll be out of the storm and can dry out."

Giordino needed no coaxing. "Then let's move on," he said, rising to his feet. "I'm beginning to feel like a mop in a pail of dirty water."

Without waiting for Gunn, he pushed off toward the rock about fifty yards up the ancient road. The slope steepened and became a cliff towering above them. Part of the road had fallen away, and they were forced to pick their way carefully past the rock. Once around, they encountered the entrance to the chamber under a man-made archway. The opening was smaller than they thought- about six feet high by four feet wide- the same width as the road. It yawned black and portentous from inside.

"There it is, just as the colonel described it," said Gunn.

"One of us is supposed to shout 'Eureka,' " exclaimed Giordino, happy at last to get out of the wind and rain.

"I don't know about you, but I'm getting rid of my rain gear and backpack so I can be comfortable."

"I'm with you."

Within minutes, their backpacks were removed and their foul-weather gear laid out inside the tunnel for the return trip to the aircraft. They removed flashlights from their backpacks, took a final swig of coffee, and stepped deeper into the subterranean vault. The walls were smoothly carved without bumps or indentations. There was a strangeness about the place, heightened by the eerie darkness and cavernous howl of the wind from outside the entrance.

They walked on, half curious, half uneasy, following the beams of their lights, wondering what they were going to find. The tunnel suddenly opened into a square chamber. Giordino tensed and his eyes hardened as his light traced out the skeletal bones of a foot, femur, hip, and then ribs and spinal column, attached to a skull with traces of red hair still visible. The remains of tattered and moldy clothing still clung to the bones.

"I wonder how this poor devil came to be here," said Gunn, feeling numbed.

Giordino swung his flashlight around the room, illuminating a small fire pit and various tools and furniture- all of them looked handmade from wood and lava rock. There were also the remains of seal hides and a pile of bones in the opposite corner.

"Judging from the cut of what's left of his clothes, I'd say he was a marooned sailor, a castaway on the island for God only knows how long before he died."

"Odd the colonel didn't mention him," said Gunn.

"The Madras made an unscheduled stop for water after being blown far off the normal sailing track in 1779. This lost soul must have arrived later. No other ship called on the island for probably another fifty or hundred years."

"I can't begin to imagine how terrible it must have been for him, alone on an ugly rain-cold pile of volcanic rock with no prospects of rescue and the threat of a lonely death hovering over him."