Hunt Through Napoleon's Web

Chapter 24

Gabriel went down first. The crude ladder carved into the wall led to a chamber of roughly the same dimensions as the room above except that it was half the height. Gabriel crouched and shined his light up at the low ceiling. There was a rats’ nest of narrow metal pipes, one connected to each hole in the floor above, each tube winding its way back to a central unit that looked like an enormous cast-iron pot-bellied stove. The ceiling was reinforced by wooden beams, after the fashion of a mine shaft, and the air stank of sulfur, like a room in which a thousand matches had been struck.

Next to the foot of the ladder, Gabriel’s flashlight revealed a narrow tunnel leading off into the darkness. He called for Sammi to come.

The tunnel had a different smell, but no less unpleasant: it was dank and smelled of mildew and rot. And at every turn there were spiderwebs. Gabriel cut through them with the blade of the ax. Sammi shuddered as the torn edges of one brushed her cheek.

“So many webs,” she said.

“We’re underground,” Gabriel said. “It’s where spiders like to live.”

“Don’t tell me that,” she said.

“They’re generally harmless,” Gabriel said. “If you don’t bother them.” He brushed away another web that stretched from top to bottom in the narrow tunnel. In the beam of their lights, a few dozen tiny spiders scattered.

“Is it normal for there to be that many?”

“They’re babies,” Gabriel said. “Probably freshly hatched.” He swung the flashlight around from wall to wall. Another few dozen were on either wall. “Nothing to worry about.” Then he swung the light up.

The underside of the tunnel’s roof was a solid mass of crawling spiders, a herd of thousands—maybe tens of thousands—crawling quickly along the ceiling over their heads. They were much larger than the babies. Many were the size of quarters, some as big as half-dollars. They were moving in a way that reminded Gabriel of fire ants, crawling over one another in a desperate chaotic frenzy. And where the light struck them—

They began to drop.

Sammi screamed.

Even Gabriel emitted a startled cry and began slapping at his chest to brush them off.

But they kept coming. They were swarming the tunnel walls, ceiling, and floor.

Gabriel pushed Sammi ahead of him. “Run,” he said through clenched teeth; and they did, batting at their clothes and hair as they went, frantically brushing the spiders away.

The tunnel forked and the branch they took began sloping upward as they ran. The angle increased until they were almost climbing. It took a tremendous amount of strength in their legs to keep ascending at this pace—but if they’d needed an extra incentive, they had one, as some of the spiders had by now worked themselves inside their clothes and begun biting.

Sammi yelped with pain. Gabriel cursed and slapped at his skin.

They continued to climb, as fast as they were able. Gabriel lost track of how far they’d gone; it took him by surprise when they suddenly fetched up against the end of the tunnel. A dead end, sloping directly upward. Packed earth above their heads.

Gabriel struck at the barrier with the pickax. Dirt and rocks crumbled down, covering them. But the material was soft and easy to break through. Sammi continued to brush the spiders off her body and his while Gabriel dug vertically, climbing on the accumulated dirt as it piled up.

A large clod of earth came down, revealing an open hole—and sunlight.

He enlarged the hole with two more swings of the ax, then lifted Sammi bodily out of the hole. He followed and ripped off his shirt, panting from exertion and pain. She’d done the same, and he saw that her chest and back were covered with painful-looking welts and bites. The bugs they’d brought up with them dropped to the ground and fled back to the darkness of the hole.

“Madam! Are you all right?”

Gabriel turned to see the source of the voice—a middle-aged British matron in sandals and sunglasses, with a compact digital camera dangling from a strap around her wrist. A man stood beside her, goggling at Sammi, who grabbed up her shirt and held it in front of her.

“Yes . . . yes, I’m all right,” Sammi said, wincing. “Thank you.”

“Henry! Don’t stare!” The man stopped goggling, though he continued to sneak glances out of the corner of his eye.

Gabriel looked around. They were in the middle of the circle of menhirs—the Western Monument—at Filitosa.

“You were so right, sweetie,” he said, sweeping one arm around Sammi’s shoulders, “we were supposed to turn left. You two be careful—you do not want to get separated from your tour group.”

“Oh, dear,” the woman said as Gabriel led Sammi out of the circle. “Did you hear that, Henry?”

The staff at the Repository Museum dug out a first aid kit and used up two tubes of hydrocortisone cream on their bites. The spiders here were not poisonous, the agent assigned to them assured Gabriel. The bites would itch and be bothersome for a few days, but . . .

Where, the agent wanted to know, had they come across such a large nest of spiders?

Gabriel waved his hands and made up an answer that would send them off in the wrong direction entirely. Let them fumigate some other part of the grounds. Couldn’t hurt.

“Listen,” Gabriel said, “can I use your phone?”

“Of course,” the agent said. “Local call or long distance?”

“Long distance. New York.”

The agent handed over a cordless handset and pushed two buttons on it. The dial tone started buzzing.

Gabriel dialed the Foundation.

“Gabriel!” Michael said. “Where have you been? I’ve been trying to—”

“Not now, Michael. I can’t talk. I’ll tell you more when I can.” He glanced over at the museum agent. She was looking the other way, but it was clear she was still listening. “The object we discussed . . . it’s not there anymore. It’s on its way back to Amun and his crew.”

“In Marrakesh?” Michael said.

“Presumably.”

“I’ll try to reach Arif again—”

“You might not want to do that,” Gabriel said. “He’s the one who took it.”

Michael was silent. “Arif?”

“Yes,” Gabriel said. “Arif. And if you want some even better news, he says Lucy’s about to become a pharaoh’s bride.”

“Gabriel . . . you’ve got to do something.”

“I will. I just need you to do something for me first.”

“Anything.”

“Have Charlie ready to fly at Ajaccio in thirty minutes. Can you do that?”

“Of course.”

“And Michael?”

“Yes?”

“Tell him this one time it’s okay to take any risks he wants.”