Assignment Moon Girl (20 page)

“C-can we move?” Tanya whispered.

“Nothing to do but try.”

They stepped backward into the dark cave. The tiger grumbled
once more, licked its chops, yawned, and remained where he was. So much, Durell
thought, for animal-conditioning.

He considered Tanya as he thought it.

Chapter Sixteen

DURELL wished he had Aladdin’s lamp. Ahead, the evening
light failed to penetrate the gloom of the cave. The cave was a natural one,
hollowed out by ages of dripping water that had helped make their prison
cistern useful to ancient man. There was no sound except the soft slide of
their feet as they edged into the tunnel. There was a curve to the right, then
a length of about forty feet to the iron gateway by which he had entered
before. When he passed the curve, he saw a glimmer of evening dusk through the
bars.

“Open sesame,” he whispered wryly.

But he had no magical powers. He approached the gate with
care, expecting a guard there. But new bolts and padlocks secured the old
barrier tightly. He stood for a moment, breathing cool desert air that swept in
from the tiny valley beyond. It seemed a long time since he had come here to
Iskander’s Garden to get Tanya out the first time. He didn’t think it
would be as easy or lucky as then.

“You see, it is hopeless,” Tanya whispered. “We got past the
cat, but to what purpose?”

“Maybe just to find a pair of pants for myself.”

For the first time, her smile was genuine. He turned
away from the gate barrier and rounded the curve until he could see the cat
again at the opposite end. At this point, the side chambers were just visible.
The first to his left contained the chests of jewels and clothing.
Probably, Durell thought, this was Har-Buri’s political treasury for rebellion,
the scrapings and donations of a thousand sympathizers who had been cajoled and
browbeaten into giving up their pitiful items of value. But he wondered why
Har-Buri had chosen to keep it all down here, in this prison pit. Perhaps it
was the best place to hide it from the greed of his lieutenants. Thieves were
always ready to fall out, he thought, for a quick and easy profit.

The chests were of solid wood, with iron straps on the lids.
He ignored the jewelry that Tanya hadn’t used and turned to the clothing. There
were embroidered, silken women’s robes, which he ignored with a grin at Tanya.
In another, however, he found real treasure. He chose a shirt and trousers that
fitted reasonably well, and felt much more secure beside Tanya. He wished
he could find an arsenal of weapons, but that was too much to hope for.
There was none.

“Why are these uniforms stored here?” Tanya asked.

Durell pinned on a colonel’s pips. “Har-Buri’s real name is
Ramsur Sepah. He’s planning a military coup. He’ll dress his stooges as Army
officers, infiltrate them into Teheran, and take command of strongpoints
before anyone suspects the officers are phony.”

“But where would he get arms, then?”

“From Ta-Po and Madame Hung.”

“Yes. It forms a logical pattern.”

“You fit into it, too. When you were first heard
of, wandering around and announcing your identity, Har-Buri figured you
could bring a. high price from Ta-Po in the form of military and revolutionary
aid. That’s why he wanted you so badly. That’s why he kept you here.”

“But I am of no real value to the Chinese.”

In the darkness, he tried to read the puzzled look on her
face. She bit her lips. He said, “We both know that, and your father knows it,
too. But no one else seems to know it." He paused. “You're coming out of
it, aren’t you?

“My mind is filled with conflicting memories,”
she admitted. I wonder why the experience did not affect you for as long as it
did me?”

Because I guessed the truth before it began. Come along. We
have work to do, and only tonight to do it.”

“Durell —”

He halted. turned back to her. Her pale hair gathered what
little light was left in the cave and shone about her lovely face.

“Durell, I need help . . .”

“I know you do.”

“Only my father can help me.”

“And he’s here. We’ll find him.”

He was not as optimistic as he pretended. There was no way
out of the cave containing the chests of uniforms and jewels. He returned to
the main corridor. At once, the waiting tiger growled and walked toward them
from the cave mouth. Durell ignored the beast. It stood rumbling. tail stiff
and twitching. Then it decided there was no harm in what its fellow-prisoners
were doing, and went back to its accustomed place.

The second cave was rougher, empty and dark. Durell felt
along the floor and found a small stone and tossed it up against the
invisible wall. He could not see a ceiling.
 
The stone went far up, hit the wall, and bounced down again, dislodging
a small shower of sandy gravel.

"We’re in another cistern,” he said

"But the top is sealed.”

“All we have to do is get up there.
 
Have you explored this place?”

“No. I was afraid of the cat.”

He felt along the sides of this cave with painstaking care.
Very little light penetrated here, and it faded before he was halfway around.
The walls were circular, smaller in diameter than the big pit where he had awakened.
The sandstone was soft and crumbly under his fingertips, and when he used
the chain of hard jewels against it, he found he could scratch it away fairly easily.
But he did not come to what he wanted until he had almost completed the
first circumference. Then his groping fingers found a deep
irregularity, a kind of recess in the wall. He made a soft sound of
satisfaction.

“What is it?” Tanya whispered.

“What I hoped for. Steps, I think. The nomads either used
ladders or the old steps the ancients cut to get down to where the water-level
might be. The women came down to fill their pitchers and water jars.”

“But there are no steps—”

“They’ve been walled up, down here. But if we can remove
some of these blocks . . .”

She became all efficiency and cool mechanical ability, once
she understood the task. He divided the jewels with her, and they set to work
in the darkness, using only their sense of touch, to enlarge the small cavity
he

had found. He worked first at the joints between the stones,
and the old mortar crumbled out easily. But when he had removed as much as he
could from the first block, he could not budge it. He knelt on the sandy
floor and pushed and pulled and twisted. Tanya tried to help. Nothing
happened. He couldn’t pull the stone free. He began to sweat, and he heard the
tiger getting restless in the corridor outside. It was full night now. He fell
back, panting, for another effort.

“Wait,” Tanya said. “We must remove or loosen the block
above first.”

“I don’t see how.”

“The chest of uniforms. It had iron straps. If we could
break one off and use it as a lever . . .”

It took a precious hour, and a dangerous hour because of the
prowling cat, before he succeeded in wrenching the lid of the chest apart. The
splintering of wood seemed abnormally loud over their labored breathing. He
used his weight to snap the small boards free of the bolted iron strap-hinge,
and then he returned to where Tanya had continued to labor at the wall,
scraping diligently at the joints. In a few moments, by touch alone, he wedged
the small strap of leather between the blocks and heaved. There came a distant
grinding sound, higher up in the wall. Sand and pebbles showered down upon
them. Tanya groaned.

“We will raise an alarm.”

“Can’t be helped.”

He gave another heave, and the first and most
difficult block of stone came free of the wall. Quickly, he shoved it toward
the cave entrance, intending to build a kind of barricade with them. Then he returned
to help Tanya clear away the debris.

“You were right,” she whispered. “It feels like a step.”

They lost all track of time as they labored, after that.
Some of the stones came away easily, loosened by age-long water erosion. Others
were stubborn and deadly. Their hands began to bleed as they struggled against
the adamant objects. But they made progress, step by step. The old stone
stairway curved with the walls of the cistern, rising steadily. As they worked their
way up, the stones became easier to dislodge. Fortunately, none was too heavy
to manage, although twice a block slipped from his grip and thudded down into
the darkness below. He tried to get Tanya to rest at times, but she refused.
She was obsessed with the need to escape now, once she accepted his reasoning behind
the effort. He did not mention the problems that waited for them when they got
to the top. There was a stone or wooden cap above that might prove impossible
to remove. And even if they got that open, they might find—anything.

He did not know how many hours of the night passed before he
could reach up and touch the “ceiling” of the cistern. For the first few
groping moments, his heart sank. He touched only smooth stone. When he pressed
up with all his strength, nothing happened. He had to remove one more pile of
rubble on the next curved step before he could stretch farther.

He touched a wooden plank.

The steps they had uncovered were too narrow to permit Tanya
to work beside him. He judged they had climbed over twenty feet above the
bottom of the cave. A slip and a fall now could end everything. His perch was
precarious as he stretched again for the plank. Yes, there were several of
them, bound by a crossbeam that felt dry and brittle. He could not judge how big
the lid was, or how heavy.

“We’ll rest a bit,” he whispered to Tanya.

She sank down on the step below and leaned her head against
his knee. It was the first sign of weakness she had allowed herself. He
felt his muscles tremble with fatigue. He wished he could see her, but the darkness
was complete, even though they touched one another. When she spoke, her voice
was tight, as if it took all her effort to keep from sobbing.

“I am so tired, Durell.”

“You’ve been wonderful,” he said, and he touched her long,
silken hair.

“No, I have been a cold, inhuman bitch. Perhaps I deserve
this whole nightmare that has happened to me. And yet, why did my father, and
all the others, do this to me, Durell? All the drills and tests and exercises,
to get to the moon. It was so hard, so hard! I told myself I was a scientist,
and could not afford to be a woman. But I—I want to be a woman, Durell. But now
it is too late for me.”

“Let’s not give up now,” he said gently.

“To what purpose do we struggle? Let them have me. Let them
know the truth. Why do you fight on?”

“I don’t know. I must, that’s all.”

“You are not a bad man, for an American.”

He laughed softly. “No better or worse than most.”

“I want to cry,” she said after a moment, “but I cannot. I
have never wept, that I can remember. Always, Papa said I must be adult and use
my mind to serve the state. I thought this was the greatest happiness one could
achieve. But now the tears come.”

“It won’t hurt to cry,” he said.

She shivered suddenly. “Oh, I feel so cold.”

He felt it, too. He had been aware of the cold air current
that swept his neck and down his back. Tanya lifted her head from his knee as
he suddenly straightened on their precarious perch. He looked down into the
black pit. He could not see the floor, but he thought he could see two
glowing green emeralds down there, very faint, luminescent, balefully staring
up at them. It was the tiger’s eyes. He told Tanya to sit still, then crouched
on the narrow step and wet his fingers and moved them in the darkness.
Yes, there was a cold current of night air coming in. Hope lifted in him again.
He took the iron bar and shoved it against the planked cap of the cistern.
Nothing happened, for a moment. He used his strength until his body screamed in
protest and he almost lost his balance. He paused, rested.

“What is it?” Tanya said, below him.

“I think we can get out.”

He tried again. There came a faint creak and a pop as a nail
gave way in the dry wood. Cold air suddenly struck his begrimed face. Dust made
him cough, then he made a last effort. This time Tanya reached past his shoulders
to help with the prize against the planking. There came a long screech and a
breaking sound and one of the planks came loose and tumbled down into the
darkness where the cat stood, watching them.

At once, he reached out, gained a grip on the edge of the
opening, and pulled himself forward and up. His legs swung free over the black
emptiness below. A rush of icy air washed over him. His body swung, he gathered
himself up, and pulled himself up and over and out of the pit, rolling over
twice before he could check himself.

He lay for another moment after that, staring up at the
night sky. A crescent moon sailed over him.

Chapter Seventeen

IT TOOK a few moments to regain his strength. He did not
move. He watched the sky turn over him When he turned his head, he saw a
grayish pallor on the horizon. It was almost dawn. They had worked all night to
clear the ancient steps and get out of the cistern.

A cold wind blew dust over him and mourned among the leaning
columns of ancient ruins all about. He turned back to the cistern cap and
peered through the hole, lying on his stomach.

“Tanya?” he called softly.

“I am here. But I cannot do as you did. I am not strong
enough.” Her voice came as if from an infinite depth, although she was only a
few feet from him. It might be best if you leave me. I will wait.”

“No. Reach out your arm as far as you can.”

Her pale hand appeared in the dark hole. He stretched, could
not reach her fingers, stretched again, and locked his hand about her
wrist.