The Seventh Mountain (7 page)

The sun crested the top of the mountain and
there it was. The path, curving back and forth on itself, formed an
almost straight shadow down the side of the mountain, disappearing
behind the brush dead ahead.

Mark sat up and pointed. “There it is!”

Steve led the family through the brush and a
little ways up the base of the mountain. The Decalogue Stone was
right where it was supposed to be at the bottom of the path.

Over the many years it had settled sideways,
skewed and eroded by time. It marked the entrance to the only
footpath that led up the side of the mountain to the top.

It was rocky and slow going, but everyone
made it to the top without incident. The view was breathtaking.
Mark could see the road miles away. Every now and then a tiny dot
moved along its surface. The top wasn’t really flat as it had
appeared from the ground; it was kind of bowl shaped.

Mark and James started to explore. It didn’t
take them long to find the rock that must have been the altar. It
was on the highest point on the edge of the bowl, right where you
might expect it to be. Steve and Shirley walked over to where the
boys were.

“I can’t find a star anywhere.” Mark had
remembered what the note in the Bible had said. He was to place one
finger on each point of the star, the altar would slide back to
reveal his legacy, only there was no star to be found.

Mark looked around. “Maybe it’s not on the
altar. Maybe this isn’t the altar. It’s probably somewhere else. I
noticed that there are some carvings of different things all over
the place. Keep looking.”

Steve said to Shirley, “Well, everything
that we have seen so far has been accurate. There has to be a star
here somewhere.”

Shirley forced a smile. “You’re probably
right.”

The boys went off to investigate some more.
Steve looked around. He couldn’t help thinking that this
mountaintop was an excellent defensive position. There was only one
way up. You could see everything for miles around. There were even
depressions scattered around. They could have been primeval
foxholes. He looked over the side. It looked to him as if some
ancient army had built a stone battlement around the top perimeter
of the mountain. That’s when he saw them. The boys had discovered a
large stone with all kinds of carvings on it. He climbed over and
down for a closer look. Sure enough, there was a large star on the
end of it. There were pictures of other things on it too. It looked
like a scorpion, an elk, and other animals. He climbed back up to
tell Shirley.

Steve pointed over the side. “I think that
is what we’re looking for. The boys have found it.”

A few moments later, Steve and Shirley were
startled when the altar stone slid open. Beneath it was a narrow,
steep incline leading into the blackness below.

Steve yelled to the boys, “That’s it! Come
back up and have a look!”

“Whoa! Check it out.” Mark shouted when he
saw the cavern. “Let’s go in.”

Mark made a break for the hole. Steve
grabbed him by the collar. “Don’t you think that we’re going to
need a flashlight?”

“Yeah! I’ll go get it.” Mark was held back
by his father’s grip on his collar. “I just want to see it
closer.”

Steve released his collar.

“You and James rest for a minute. Then you
can go and get the flashlight and the knife and the rope… after you
rest. That incline looks pretty steep. We need to be careful.”
Steve was anxious to explore too, but he knew that it was best to
be prepared.

Mark lay on his belly with his face in the
hole. “Hello…”

The first echo returned,
sharp and distinct, followed by fading hellos. “Hello…
Hello
…
Hello
…
Hello
.”

About fifteen minutes passed. “All right
boys, go get the stuff, and be careful on that path. You can’t
explore much with a broken leg.”

It wasn’t long before the boys had returned
with the things they needed.

Steve tied one end of the rope to the altar
stone. He tossed the rest of the coil down the incline. “I’ll go in
first. You boys follow me, one at a time, when I say it’s okay.
Take your time and do it nice and easy. We don’t know what it’s
like down there, and you won’t be able to see much.”

Both boys nodded that they understood.

“Honey, don’t you think that it would be
better if the boys stayed up here? I mean, we don’t know what’s
down there. It could be dangerous.”

“Hon, recon is what I do. This is a cinch.
You stay up here in case we get into trouble. If we do, then you
can go for help.”

“You be very careful down there. Don’t take
any chances.”

Mark watched his dad grab the rope, wrap it
once around his wrist for better control and then ease onto the
sloping path. He carried the flashlight in his free hand, stopping
every few feet down and looking around. Lying on his belly, Mark
watched his dad descend. It seemed as if there was nothing for his
flash light beam to hit. Everything looked black. After about forty
feet the slope leveled out.

The coolness escaping from the hole was a
refreshing break from the heat topside. His dad was down there, but
the light from the flashlight was all that he could see. He heard
his dad call back up.

“Okay, just one of you. It’s about forty
feet down. Take it slow and easy.”

Mark went slowly down the rope and once he
reached the bottom, Steve gave the okay for James to follow.

Both boys made it down and Steve shined the
flashlight around, but there wasn’t anything to see except the near
wall.

“We can’t see much, so we’re going to follow
the wall around and see what we can find. Follow me and stay close
to me and up next to the wall. There could be a pit anywhere and it
would be very easy to find it the hard way. Know what I mean?”

Mark said, “Yes sir.” There was a touch of
excitement in his voice.

Mark took the lead and edged his way around
the wall with his dad and brother directly behind. They made their
way around the perimeter of the cavern. The wall was glassy and
featureless just like the floor. They stopped every few feet to
examine the path ahead. He estimated that they had gone over a
thousand feet and had found nothing. He looked at his dad’s watch
and saw that it was getting close to 2 o’clock.

He looked back at the way that they had
come. It looked like they had gone less than an eighth of the way
around the wall based on what he could see from the light coming
from the entrance. That, too, was based on the assumption that the
cavern was essentially round. His eyes had grown somewhat more
accustomed to the dark and he could see further than he could when
they had first entered. They hadn’t gone more than ten more feet
when he noticed the increased light. He looked back at the
opening.

“Look at the opening. It’s getting
brighter.”

Steve and James turned to
look. The entrance was
indeed
getting brighter. The sun must have been getting
high enough to shine directly into the opening. The entrance kept
getting brighter and brighter until all at once sunlight started
reflecting off every surface in the cavern. It was dim, but they
could see pretty well and there it was, a column, not a hundred
feet straight out from the entrance. There was something gleaming
beside it.

Steve said, “Okay, let’s go. Remember, stay
alert.”

Mark took the lead, heading back almost the
way they had come. He was careful to keep a sharp eye out for
hidden dangers.

The group made it to the column. There, on
its side hung a short shepherd’s crook. It was decorated, but in
the dim light it was hard to tell how. There was also a leather
pouch hanging from a leather strap. Mark scanned the cavern again,
thinking that there might be something else. There wasn’t anything
else that he could see.

Mark said, “Let’s get back to the entrance
before we lose the light.” The light was fading rapidly and they
had what they had come for.

Everyone made it back up to the top all
right. Mark carried the pouch over his shoulder and the staff slid
neatly into the back of his belt, poking up over his back.

The staff was about four or five feet long.
It was bent into a hook shape at one end. Its surface had been
polished to a glossy sheen. It had inlaid blue and gold decorations
all over it. It was simply a beautiful piece of craftsmanship.

The pouch was leather and simple, something
like a pony express rider might have carried.

Mark opened the pouch. Inside was something
wrapped in a brownish-orange tinted, waxy paper. He removed the
paper and carefully unfolded it. He found three documents. The
first document was a will of sorts. It read:

Young Mister Young, fourth generation great
grandson, you will find here a deed and a lease. You, being my
descendant, are its rightful heir. The deed is to a piece of
property that you now own. The lease is for the family that has
acted as keepers of this property. Show them the staff and they
will know that you are the rightful heir.

The lease was a simple document allowing the
Newsom family to use the property and to harvest the timber until
the rightful owner, with the staff, came to claim it. The lease was
to be kept in the Newsom family and passed down from generation to
generation.

The deed was for a parcel of land in Halifax
County, Virginia. It said that it was about six hundred and sixty
acres, more or less.

Mark sat down on the ground. The rest of the
family looked over the papers. When they had finished reading, Mark
looked at his dad and said, “Virginia?”

“That’s what the deed says. You guys want to
go and have a look at it? We still have another few days left
before I have to be back on base.” Steve felt dubious about this.
After all, it had been more than a hundred years since the deed had
been drawn up. The date on the deed was 1888. Surely the property
taxes hadn’t been paid for all that time. But miracles had been
happening with the things surrounding the events that were
unfolding. The thing that stuck in his mind was the altar stone
sliding away.

“Mark, go touch that star again. See if the
altar closes.”

Mark and James went back over the side
again. A few seconds later the stone slid back over the opening. It
looked as if the stone had never been moved.

Just then, a shadow crossed over Steve and
Shirley. They looked up. The balloons were back again. This time
they had a much better view. The tennis shoe balloon passed close
to the mountaintop. A bearded fellow was leaning over the basket,
waving at them. They all waved back.

Mark watched the man in the balloon float
off toward the distance. He knew that there was something very
significant about the man in the balloon. He felt it deep inside,
like the feeling you get when you do something and just know beyond
all doubt that it is incredibly right.

There was something else
tugging at his mind too,
What’s
next
?

The past is the seed of
fate
.

Mark examined the staff in the late
afternoon light that filtered through the hotel window. The blue
decorations seemed to be some sort of writing. They spiraled around
the staff like a thin blue ribbon. He had the feeling that the
writing was very old. There were gold colored decorations of thin
bands and small circles. The gold bands were about eight inches
apart. They divided the blue decorations and the staff into
sections. The small gold circles were on opposite sides of each
other as if a pin might cross through the wood, one each above and
below every band. They formed a straight line on either side of the
staff. The wood of the staff was light, yellowish colored, and
shiny like it had been polished with something. Mark couldn’t
detect any wax or lacquer or anything like that. It looked like the
wood itself had been polished to a high sheen.

Mark was lying on the bed, examining the
staff, when the bathing trunks that James threw hit him in the
head. James said, “Suit up! Let’s go to the pool.”

Startled, Mark jumped. He looked at James
and grinned. He laid the staff on the bed and went to the bathroom
to change.

Steve and Shirley had been planning the trip
to Virginia. They set the maps aside and walked to the pool with
the boys. The pool, surrounded by a high chain link fence with
privacy slats inserted in the links, was bustling with activity.
They found one unoccupied table near the shallow end of the pool.
Mark and James went straight to the diving board.

Mr. and Mrs. Young sat at
the
cheap, glass-topped
table, in plastic
patio
chairs, relaxing in the late
afternoon sun while the boys played in the pool. Steve nudged
Shirley and pointed toward the deep end of the pool.

“See that man sitting down there. Every now
and then he will toss a coin in the deep end when he thinks no one
is looking. He smiles when a kid finds the treasure.”

Shirley looked at the man. He was probably
in his late thirties or early forties. His hair was dark and full,
streaked with silver. His pot-belly partially obscured his bright
red bathing suit. Even at twenty yards away, his eyes looked bright
and inviting.

“Why do you think he’s doing it?”

“I don’t know. He can’t mean any harm. I
think that must be his wife sitting with him.”

The lady with him was slender and her dark
blond hair showed no signs of gray. She watched casually as the
kids went diving for the treasure.

“Just the same, I’m keeping an eye on him.
You never know these days.”