Descendants of the Scythians - Страница 15

Then the rows of somber high stalagmites emerged from the darkness again. They stood like an immobile army of limestone troops, whimsically reflecting the light from the lamps and casting pitch-black shadows. For thousands of years they had been standing there, and they would remain standing for thousands of years into the future, watching the millenia pass. The enigmatic Pronis, prior to writing his testament, drawing his map, and carving it into the lid of the chest to be hidden behind a stone wall, must have passed through these majestic chambers, descending deeper and deeper into the subterranean world. For whom had he hidden the chest? He must have been a courageous man to have wandered all alone through such somber and menacing places.

“How beautiful and how unusual!” uttered Lida under her breath in excitement. “To think that all this has been created by no more than dripping water and limestone! Tiny drops falling from the ceiling, leaving imperceptible deposits of dissolved limestone… How long it must have taken for those giants to grow to their present size and form all these fantastic shapes!”

Artem understood Lida’s feelings very well, because he himself was impressed: he had never seen anything like it before!

“Rockslide ahead!” Dmitro Borisovich called out. “The way is blocked.”

Another barrier? Would they have to turn back without reaching their destination?

The path, meandering among the stalagmites, had taken them to the opposite wall of the cave and ended there.

Everybody stood in gloomy silence, eyeing the new hindrance. How thick was it? Would it be possible to get through? No one could provide an answer. Huge pieces of rock and earth seemed to have been tossed just at that spot on purpose by a hostile monster.

“Diana, what’s the matter?” Ivan Semenovich asked the dog.

The boxer, who had so far been running quietly at her master’s side — it was not her first trip underground with him, after all — barked fiercely and sharply again and again. She was standing before the rockfall, her muscles taut, her body straining forward, and seemed to be trembling with rage. She was staring at the rocks and earth blocking their way as if they were something alive and hostile. Another bark — worried and aggressive at the same time! Then the dog began to move away slowly.

The people exchanged worried glances: the dog’s reaction to the obstacle had puzzled them greatly as Diana had always been vivacious and friendly. What had come over her? Ivan Semenovich spoke in an attempt to dispell the gloom:

“Well, my friends,” he said as though nothing unusual had taken place. “It seems to me that Diana has expressed the feeling we all share: the rockfall is our common enemy! She doesn’t have any other means of expressing her reaction to a potential enemy except for barking…”

A well-presented and timely joke can work wonders. It can dispell a bad mood, cheer a body, make someone smile. And the transition from a smile to laughter, to more funny jokes, and even to genuine cheerfulness is an easy one. Ivan Semenovich knew all this very well. So he noted with satisfaction that even Lida who had been affected by the incident more than anyone else, smiled in response to his words.

“Let’s discuss what we can do in the present situation,” the geologist said. “Artem, what does your friend Pronis’s map suggest?”

“Unfortunately, nothing, Ivan Semenovich. Apparently, Pronis could not have foreseen a rockfall at this spot. According to the map, a narrowing of the passage should occur, or perhaps the beginning of another corridor where we have this blockage now. Then, there should be two forks, one after the other, further along the way. And then the passage seems to come to an end. If it weren’t for this obstacle, we would be very close to our destination… What a bad stroke of luck!”

“Well, it’s here and we can’t do anything about it!” Dmitro Borisovich muttered in annoyance. “It can ignore you, but you can’t ignore it, my over-confident young man!”

“Restrain yourselves, my friends! Show some restraint. We have not yet decided what’s to be done. Here are the facts: beyond the obstacle lies the route we should follow; the obstacle, to put it mildly, is a major one,” Ivan Semenovich remarked, raising the lamp to light up the huge pieces of rock and earth in front of them as if to size them up. “It’d be rather difficult to move all this. Hence, the solution to the problem. A very simple and reasonable solution. The only acceptable solution for anyone who doesn’t suffer from explorer’s itch.”

The silence that followed was pregnant with meaning.

“What solution do you have in mind?’ Artem asked impatiently.

“To turn back and return with workers and all the necessary equipment to dig through the rockfall in accordance with the regulations for conducting subterranean work. That’s the most reasonable thing to do — provided, I reiterate, the people involved do not suffer from explorer’s itch.”

“Oh no!” Lida and Artem cried out simultaneously. Dmitro Borisovich shook his head disapprovingly. It was clear no one wanted to postpone the attempt to get through.

Ivan Semenovich laughed happily.

“I must admit I expected just such a response,” he said, his tone filled with intrigue. “What a powerful thing this explorer’s itch is! I have to confess I’m not entirely free of it myself. So, to cut short any further argument over the retreat, let’s come up with a second solution to our problem.”

Everybody looked at him in expectation. Even the dog raised her head, looking at the geologist as if in proof of Lida’s conviction that she understood everything perfectly well but lacked only the ability to speak.

“The second solution is the following: to try to make our way through right now,” Ivan Semenovich said quietly.

“But how?” Dmitro Borisovich flashed a bespectacled glance at him. “What can we actually do with this rockfall pow?”

“Dig through.”

“Dig through without any help? There are thousands of tons of earth and limestone in front of us blocking our way. How can we get through without any heavy tools? Without many strong hands to help? With only our light pickaxes? I must say that your suggestion is, at best, groundless optimism,” fumed Dmitro Borisovich, his indignation mostly for effect. “I would never have expected such flippancy from you, Ivan Semenovich.”

“As a matter of fact, Dmitro Borisovich, optimism, as far as I’m concerned, can never do any harm,” the geologist retorted merrily. “Especially, when it is not so groundless as you assume, as you’ll have a chance to learn in a short while. Your impulsiveness, on the contrary, can hardly do any good. That’s the way it is, my dear archeologist! And I am not suggesting that we move all these thousands of tons of rocks with our rather weak hands. Now take a look, and tell me what you think of my preliminary calculations, or rather my ideas.”

He raised his lamp to light up the huge pile of rocks. The two giant stalagmites, standing like gateposts, were almost completely buried under the earth and rocks.

“I think we could attempt a breakthrough at this section. According to Pronis’s map, here, between these two stalagmites, another subterranean corridor or narrowing of the cave should begin. Is that so, Artem?”

“Yes, that’s correct, Ivan Semenovich.”

“So I think that at this spot it’s not thousands, or even hundreds tons of rock and earth that block our way but much less. Look: it’s mostly earth, a lot of it, true, but if you train your eyes upward, you’ll see that between the stalactites and tips of the stalagmites there sits a huge piece of rock, that looks like a pentagon. It was this rock which blocked the earth that was pouring down during the rock- fall. So, I would hazard a guess that in this section of the infall between these two stalagmites, only a thin wall of mostly soft earth has built up. It should be no more than a meter or so thick. So a mere meter of earth separates us from the passage we want to explore. You seem to be very sceptical, Dmitro Borisovich, so let’s see if I’m right.”

The geologist struck the wall of the rockfall to the right of the stalagmite, half buried in earth, which formed the right-hand post of their imaginary gate, watched as he did so by the distrustful archeologist. The sound of the impact was dull. Artem glanced at Lida surreptitiously: such a sound indicated that the wall was of considerable thickness. But Ivan Semenovich moved on, listening to the sound of the pickaxe striking the wall. When he hit the stalagmite itself, the sound was of a different, ringing quality.

“Isn’t it natural for crystallized limestone to ring when struck?” asked the mistrustful archeologist. “That doesn’t mean a thing yet, Ivan Semenovich, since the limestone…” He stopped short as the geologist struck the wall between the two stalagmites. There was definite change in the sound, suggesting there was a hollow space beyond the wall of earth. The indistinct echo died out only several seconds later.

“What do you say now?”

Ivan Semenovich lowered his pickaxe.

“It seems… it seems…” Dmitro Borisovich was hesitant. It was difficult to say for sure whether the blockage was too big or not — but now there was at least hope of getting through and moving forward. The archeologist grabbed his friend’s hand in a gesture of appreciation and said enthusiastically:

“I believe you’re right! No further proof is necessary!”