Chapter 3
"It never looks like anything was here," Ed spoke up.
I shone my light over the entire room. It was square, about fifteen feet by fifteen feet, and the floor was covered in a fine layer of dust. The entrance door was situated in the far-left bottom corner of the chamber. Here and there the long roots of the trees that surrounded the meadow had crept through the ceiling blocks and made beautiful but creepy designs above us. Ed was right about nothing ever being there. Unlike most robbed places there was no broken pottery, remnants of jewels, or any clues that would point to a wealth carried off in ancient times.
As I stood to the right of the doorway a breeze swept over me. The strange thing about it was it came from my right and not from the left where stood the opening. I shone my flashlight on the wall to my right and thought I glimpsed a darkness beyond where my light could reach. With my heart beating hard in my chest I stepped over to the wall and passed my hand over the dark area. The stone gave away with my tiny push. That meant it was hollow behind it.
I turned to the moaning professor with Ed beside him. "Professor, I found something!" I yelled at him.
He straightened and pushed off from Ed, sending the young man into the wall close to the entrance. "What? What is it?" he cried out only inches from my face.
I indicated the loose wall. "There's something here. The wall moves," I explained to him.
The professor pushed me aside and pressed one hand against the wall. The stone moved beneath his touch and in his eagerness it toppled backward into what appeared to be a large space. Dust fell from the ceiling above us and coated us in a fine layer of phantom color. Van Sloan ignored the dust, pressed his face into the hole created by the missing slab, and shone his flashlight into the new abyss.
"Eureka!" he exclaimed. He turned to us and his eyes flashed with glee. "The lost treasure! We've found it!"
"Let me see!" Ed pleaded. The professor stepped aside and Ed leaned against the wall to peer through the hole.
Bad idea. The entire facade was unstable, and his weight broke the camel's back. Two dozen stones and Ed leaned forward and toppled into the hidden chamber. The collapse disturbed the dust and swept us into a storm of dirt. We coughed and shone on our flashlights into the mist.
"What's going on down there?" Stacy called from the entrance.
"Don't come in here unless you want to choke to death," I warned her.
"Nonsense, the dust will settle," the professor's voice spoke through the storm.
"Get me out of here!" Ed yelped.
"In a moment. Wait for the settling," the professor insisted. In a moment the dust settled and my flashlight allowed me to see the hidden chamber. It was much larger than the false room, about fifty feet square, and just as we had all hoped the room was full of glittering golden objects and luxurious furniture. Wooden tables with intricate scenes on their surfaces lined the walls and were laden with vases and bowls made of gold and silver. Goblets stood in perfect posterity beside books unread for almost two millenia. High-backed chairs sat beside the tables, and on the floors lay luxurious oriental rugs and chests that I didn't doubt were full of jewels, necklaces, and rings that glittered in the sunlight. A few paintings were hung on the walls and showed off their bright paint even after so many years.
Thankfully the fake wall and Ed had crashed onto empty floor so none of the priceless treasures were damaged. Ed climbed to his feet and back into the first room while the professor stumbled over the rubble into the new room. The professor gingerly touched his hand against the hidden door's frame, and the wall trembled beneath his touch. Our flashlights were the only light, but he flashed it over every inch of the area and raced from one table to the next. His voice and face were filled with excitement that threatened to break his sanity, if not a vase. "I've found it! I've found it!" he repeated over and over.
Ed and I stood at the entrance to the room and watched the madness unfold. "I found it," Ed grumbled beside me.
I would have pointed out my contribution to the discovery, but I was distracted by a strange sensation. The room had a chill to it colder and damper than the walls that made me shiver. I wrapped my arms around myself and noticed the eerie silence in the tomb. Even with the entrance open we heard none of the noise from our fellow students above and behind us. It was like stepping into the threshold of the room trapped you in the hidden chamber with the intention of never letting you go.
My watch and internal fear alarms told me it was time to leave. "Professor, shouldn't we seal this up and get back to camp? It's almost night," I reminded him.
The professor stopped at the far corner and took a deep breath. "Perhaps you're right," he agreed. He turned and flashed his light on us, or tried to. There was a large pedestal a half a foot tall in the way, and atop that pedestal was a stone box with high sides and a thin slab of stone for a lid. The professor's eyes lit up and he slowly stepped onto the pedestal to sweep his hand across the lid. "My god. The prince," he whispered.
"Professor!" I scolded him, but this time he ignored me.
"This must be the prince's coffin," the professor murmured to himself. He tilted his head this way and that, and shone his flashlight over the point where the lid met the coffin. "There might be a hole in which to glimpse him."
I frowned and marched around the coffin to stand by the professor. He was so absorbed in trying to find a hole that he didn't notice me. "Professor, we need to leave," I insisted.
"In a moment. Just one moment," he absently replied.
I was not staying in this cavernous room any time after dark. "No, now," I ordered him.
I marched onto the pedestal and around the head of the coffin, grabbing the lid as I went to stabilize myself. The lid was flimsier than it looked and gave way beneath my delicate, meager weight. I fell forward across the top-corner of the coffin and my traitorous hand that caused this mess slipped against the stone lid and cut its palm. A neat trail of blood flowed from the jagged wound and spilled into the coffin. I yelped, lost my grip, and tumbled onto the floor and onto something bony.
"Mary!" the professor gasped, and I heard Ed race toward me.
The pair shone their flashlights on me and I blinked into their blinding light. The men stood stiffly over me and had strange, horrified expressions on their faces. "What? Do I look like a ghost?" I asked them. I was covered in the dust from the floor.
Van Sloan held out his hand to me. "Mary, don't look beneath you and get up very slowly," the professor whispered to me.
I frowned and, of course, looked beneath me. I lay over a dusty, dry skeleton covered in the ragged remains of its clothes. I did what any sensible woman would do and screamed loud and clear. The noise echoed off the walls as I scrambled to my feet, scattering rib cage and limb bones in my wake. I jumped into Ed's arms and clung to him like a drowning woman. Ed awkwardly patted me on the shoulders.
"It's fine. You're okay," he told me.
The professor stooped and examined my new dead friend. "Very interesting. The door was sealed, so we must assume this person was buried in the tomb with the prince," he murmured.
"Professor, could we get out of here?" Ed pleaded.
Our supervisor shook himself and stood. "Of course, of course. It's getting late and we need to close the tomb before we can hardly see what we're doing," he agreed.
"A-and my hand," I reminded the men. I'd left a nice smear of blood on Ed's shirt from clinging to him.
"Ed, would you take her back to the camp and treat her while I have the others close the tomb?" Van Sloan requested.
"Sure, no problem," Ed agreed.
Ed guided my shaky self out of the tomb area. His shoulder scuffed the side of the frame and more dust fell. We paused when a groaning noise emanated from the ceiling. The professor flashed his light over the frame and frowned. "The dirt and rocks above the tomb have made the frame unstable. We must be careful when coming in her
e," he commented.
We hurried through the false room and into the open, fresh air of twilight. Everyone was gathered around the hole and Stacy gaped when she saw our dusty, pale faces. "What in the world happened down there?" she asked us.
"I fell on a skeleton," I told her.
Gasps of horror erupted from our peers and eyebrows shot up. They were all atwitter with excitement and questions. The professor came up behind us and held his hands up for quiet. "We have found the tomb, but the time is too late for any more inspection. Tomorrow everyone will get a chance to look at the treasures there, but for right now please assist me in closing up the hole so no animals can get inside," he commanded them.
Stacy followed Ed and me toward the path. Her eyes fell on my bloody hand. "Did it cut you?" she wondered.
"No, the coffin lid did that," I replied.
"Coffin lid?" Stacy gasped.
"If you're going to follow us could you help me out here?" Ed requested. My knees still shook violently, so I leaned heavily on Ed. He nearly collapsed beneath my weight.