could look into the aperture.
"Beautiful!" she cried. "It's so beautiful."
The men rigged up the heavy-duty electric blower fan which would
circulate the air in the shaft, while Nicholas prepared the chain-saw.
When he was ready, Nicholas handed Royan a pair of goggles and a dust
mask and helped her to adjust them. Then he made her fit a pair of wax
ear plugs.
Before he started the chain-saw, he sent the rest of them back down the
tunnel as far as the causeway over the sinkholes In the confined space
the exhaust fumes from the chain-saw and the dust, together with the
noise of the petrol engine, would be overpowering, but apart from that
he wanted only Royan with him at the moment of the break'in.
When they were alone, Nicholas switched the blower fan to its highest
speed, then donned his own mask and goggles and plugged his ears. He
pulled the starter cord of the chain-saw motor and it burst into life in
a cloud of blue exhaust smoke.
Nicholas braced himself and pressed the spinning chain blade into the
gimlet hole in the plastered doorway.
It cut through the thick white plaster and the laths beneath it like a
knife through the icing on a wedding cake.
Carefully he ran the cutting edge down the line he had marked out.
A cloud of flying white plaster dust filled the air.
Within seconds they could see only a few feet in front of their eyes.
Doggedly Nicholas kept the cut going, down the right -hand side, across
the bottom, then up the left side. Finally he made the last cut across
the top, and when the square trapdoor began to sag forward under its own
weight he killed the engine of the chain'saw and set it aside.
Royan jumped forwards to help him, and together in the eddies of dust
and smoke they steadied the square of plaster and prevented it from
crashing to the paving and shattering into a thousand pieces. Gently
they lifted it out from the opening and, with the seals still intact,
laid it against the side wall of the landing.
The open hatchway they had cut through the plaster was a dark square.
Nicholas adjusted the floodlight to shine through it, but the dust was
still too dense for them to be able to see much of the interior.
Nicholas climbed through the hatch into the space beyond. All was
obscured by a dense fog of dust that not even the lamps could penetrate.
He did not attempt to explore further, but immediately turned back to
help Royan through the opening after him.
He recognized her right to share every moment of this discovery. Beyond
the wall they stood quietly together, waiting for the blower fan to
clear the air. Slowly the dust fog began to dissipate, and the first
thing they became aware of was the floor beneath their feet.
No longer made of stone slabs, it was covered with tiles of yellow agate
that had been polished to a gloss and fitted together so cunningly that
no joints were visible. It was like a single sheet of lovely opaque
glass, dulled only by the film of fine talcum dust that had settled upon
it.
Where their feet had disturbed the layer of dust the agate sparkled
through it, catching the light of the floodlamp.
Then the fog of dust that surrounded them thinned, and gradually a
miraculous blaze of colours and shapes began to appear through the murk.
Royan lifted the dust mask from her face and let it drop to the agate
floor.
Nicholas followed her example, and took a breath of the stagnant air. No
draught had disturbed it for thousands of years and it had the odour of
great antiquity, the musty smell of the linen bandages of an embalmed
corpse.
Now the miasma of dust faded away and before them opened a long straight
passageway, the end of which was hidden in shadow and darkness. Nicholas
turned back to the opening in the sealed door behind them, and reached
through it to bring in the fioodlight on its stand. Quickly he arranged
it to illuminate the full length of the passageway ahead of them.
As they started forward, the images of the old gods hovered around them.
They glowered at the intruders from the walls and hung over them,
watching them with huge and hostile eyes from the ceiling high overhead.
Nicholas and Royan passed on slowly. Their footfalls on the agate tiles
were muted by the thin carpet of dust, and the dust that still hung in
the air reflected the light and cast over them a luminous net that had
an ethereal, dreamlike quality.
Inscriptions covered every inch of space upon the walls and the high
roof. There were long quotations from all the mystical writings, from
the Book of Breathings, the Book of the Pylons and the Book of Wisdom.
Other blocks of hieroglyphics recited the history of Pharaoh Mamose's
existence on this earth, and extolled those virtues that made the gods
love him.
Further along they came to the first of eight shrines set into the walls
of the long funeral gallery. This one was the shrine of Osiris. It was a
circular chamber, the curved wall decorated with texts in praise of the
god, and in its niche a small statue of Osiris in his tall feathered
head-dress, with eyes of onyx and rock crystal which stared at them so
lacably that Royan shivered. Nicholas reached out and gently touched the
foot of the god.
He said one word, "Gold!'
Then he looked up at the towering mural that covered the wall and half
the domed ceiling above and around the shrine. It was another gigantic
figure of the father Osiris, god of the Underworld, with his green face
and false beard, his arms crossed upon his chest, holding the flail and
the crook, wearing his tall feathered head-dress and with the erect
cobra on his brow. They gazed up at him with a sense of awe. As the
lamplight wavered in the shifting dust cloud LEI the god seemed to
become imbued with life, and to move and sway before their eyes.
They did not linger at the first shrine, for beyond it the gallery ran
on, straight as the flight of an arrow to its target. They followed it.
The next shrine set into the wall was dedicated to the goddess. The
golden figure of Isis sat in her niche, upon the throne that was her
symbol. The infant Horus suckled at her breast. Her eyes were ivory and
blue lapis lazuli.
Her murals covered the walls around her niche. There she was, the mother
with great kohl-lined eyes as black as night, wearing the sun disc and
the horns of the sacred cow pon her head. All around her, hieroglyphic
symbols covered the wall, so bright that they glowed like a cloud of
fireflies; for she possessed a hundred diverse names.
Amongst these were Ast and Net and Bast. She was also Ptah and Seker and
Mersekert and Rennut. Each of these names was a word of power, for her
sanctity and her benevolent aura had lived on where most of the old gods
had withered away for lack of worshippers to repeat and keep alive these
mystic names.
In ancient Byzantium and later in Christian Egypt they had bestowed the
old goddess's virtues and attributes upon the Virgin Mary. The image of
her suckling the infant Horus had been perpetuated in the icons of the
Madonna and child. Thus Royan responded to the goddess in all her