John Schettler - Touchstone

How will I get through there? He wondered how deep the water was, and whether he could walk upright through the entrance and yet keep his breath. Gingerly, he stood and advanced into the stream, feeling the cool water rushing past his lower legs until he was in well above his knees. When he reached the cleft he had to stoop low to pass inside, but thankfully, there was plenty of open space between the water and the stony roof of the underground passage. How long was it? What if the cave roof lowered?

Only his feet, and the quite determination that drove him forward, could give answer. He surged forward, finding the passage ever deeper, until the dark flowing water was chest high, then shoulder high, the rough ceiling very close to his head now. Then came the moment of truth.

He had been walking carefully, with one arm extended overhead to brace himself against the roof. The cool water chilled him, and he could feel his muscles tightening with involuntary shivers. It was so dark that he could barely see anything at all. Then the low ceiling descended abruptly and he came up short, nearly bumping his head against the jagged roof. He could hear the water frothing against the stony lip of the overhang, and he knew there would be no room to breathe if he went further. The only option was to completely submerge himself !

He passed a moment of fear, wondering how long he would have to hold his breath beneath the stream. What if it went on for a hundred feet like this? His fear seemed magnified by the sound of the cool black water as it rushed away. He could not come all this way without at least trying, he knew, so he shored up his will and took several deep breaths. Do you swim? LeGrand had asked him. He would soon find out.

A second later he took the plunge, ducking under the lip of the overhand and pressing forward. Five, then ten seconds passed, and he pushed forward, his hand groping on the rough upper throat of the cave. Fifteen seconds… twenty… He would soon have no choice but to turn about and retreat to catch his breath. He took three more steps, then his ankle wrenched hard on a slippery stone and his feet gave way beneath him. The force of the stream took him, and dragged him on. In a moment of panic he flailed about, disoriented, and desperate to gain some hold, but the water dragged him along the narrow underground channel at a speed he could never have achieved on his own. A moment later he came sputtering to the surface of a wide inner pool, gasping in the air, strangely sweet and warm here.

He thanked any god who would listen to his prayer just then. If he had kept on walking, his breath would have given out long before he could reach this place. It was only the fall, and the force of the stream, that enable him to gain the safe air of this chamber. He wondered if he had just stumbled on a Pushpoint, a silent stone in the bed of the stream that would change all Time from this moment forward.

He was surprised to see the faint glow of light ahead, wavering yellow and orange on the surface of this underground pool. As his eyes adjusted, he could see he was in a great cavern. Here the water was chin high, and he could still bob along on his toes, the soaked robes of his Arabic garb trailing after him as he moved. He made for the light, which now registered as torchlight in his mind. Ahead he saw the smooth dark shape of a barrier, something spanning the far edge of the cavern like an immense wall.

At once he realized that he must be looking at the hidden lock on the stream—the first lock, built to control and moderate the flow of the water beyond this point. He leaned forward and began to swim, making steady, even strokes until he reached the lock. His hand probed and he felt the telltale texture of wet wood. Yes, there was no mistaking this now. He saw that there were several openings in the lock that allowed the stream water to pass through, and kept the chamber from filling completely. It was a carefully regulated flow, but the recollection of the lightning he had seen in the night sky when he arrived made him shiver with the thought of what a torrential flash flood would do if it reached this chamber.

A distant rumble reverberated in the chamber, the hollow sound of thunder emanating through the earth. It seemed to him that the great lion of the sphinx was growling awake. Dawn was coming above the earth, and the beast was waking to greet it.

Kelly studied the lock carefully, wondering how he would get on the other side. He moved to one end, close by the edge of the pool, and ran his hands along the thick wood beams, until he felt something irregular in the face of the barrier. It was a lever of sorts, attached to a trap door! There was a thick coil of woven rope tied about the lever, giving him a good place to make a firm grip. He leaned down on it and. The door gave way with a wet squeak that echoed through the chamber, and it opened inward, moved easily by the rushing water.

Kelly wasted little time slipping through the opening to a much smaller pool on the other side. The chamber then narrowed, lapping up on sandy banks on either side where there were several large wooden beams, possibly leftovers from the construction of the lock itself. At the far end it ascended up a steep embankment where the way was dimly lit, and he felt the urge to get out of this damp, dark place and reach the warmth of the torchlight. Then he remembered that this was his mission—this very place. He stared at the lock, wondering how it operated. What was he to do? Should he merely leave the hatchway open? Would that be enough to cause the flood LeGrand was hoping for?

He spied a line of thick pegs, the thickness of his leg, jutting from the lock at intervals, just a foot above the water. Each one had a coil of rope about it. As he puzzled over them, he noticed that the water was slowly rising from the increased water flow of the open hatchway. The pegs had a purpose, he knew, but what? He waded over, feeling about one of the pegs until he noticed the depression of a seam in the wood below it. He groped about and was soon satisfied that the peg was attached to yet another hatch… a whole series of hatchways built into the lock. Is that what he had to do? Open all these hatches? He tested one, but for all his straining effort, he could not make it budge.

The great bass drum of thunder sounded again, as he thought what to do. Then an idea came to him as he looked at the rough wood beams cast up on the far embankment. He made his way over to them, taking hold of a thick log and dragging it off the embankment into the pool of water. It had an amazing buoyancy for its weight, and bobbed easily on the surface of the water once he had it afloat. Perhaps he could use the thing as a great ram to strike the wooden pegs and force open the hatchways on the lock. Could that be the reason these logs were kept here?

He was getting ready to thrust the log ahead of him as a ram, but paused a moment. Studying the pegs again closely. There was something he was missing. The log could not strike the pegs, for it was still well below them… but that would change as the water continued to rise in this pool in the minutes ahead. It suddenly occurred to him that the hatches might not open like doorways, but rather like windows, sliding upward. He squinted at the overhead ceiling and saw a series of depressions in the stony roof, each aligned with one of the pegs. Yes! The hatches slid upward, he was sure if it now, but how to move them?

The log had something to do with it all, but what? The log… the log… the log! The answer came to him and he quickly repositioned the log until it was parallel to the face of the lock. Now he guided it into place, just below the horizontal line of pegs, taking the rope coiled about the pegs and lashing it to the beam. Could it be this simple, he thought? The water would rise, and the log would rise with it, until it struck the pegs and slowly raised them. The hatches would open, sliding upward, ever so slowly, and more water would be added to the pool, increasing the upward pressure.