Make No Bones About It ( a Dig Site Mystery--Book 2)

by Ann Charles

  With the flashlight aimed deeper down the dark throat of the mine again, Quint called out, “How far am I going?”

  “That depends on how that ceiling looks.”

  “Like the sky will be falling any minute now.”

  “Have any pebbles fallen on your hard hat?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Then it’s stable enough, Chicken Little.”

  Stable enough? Famous last words. Quint swore under his breath while adjusting the lighting settings on his camera. “I’m a photojournalist, remember. Not an obsessed history nut with a bunch of capital letters after my name.”

  A snickering sound came through the hole. “You’ll be fine. Trust me. Now hurry up and take some pictures, Mr. Big-Time Photojournalist, before I shrivel up and turn to dust out here and become another part of Maya history.”

  “Shouldn’t we be concerned about me messing up something important by just being here?” It was a desperate last-ditch effort on Quint’s part, but worth a shot because several feet deeper into the tunnel, the walls narrowed. He tugged at the neck of his shirt, gulping as a wave of sweat washed over him.

  “You mean in regard to your future with my daughter or with whatever is on the other side of this wall?”

  “In here, smartass.” He doubted there was much Juan could do to fix any screwups he made with Angélica, both in the past and future.

  “You’ll most likely be fine when it’s all said and done with maybe a lasting twitch for a day or two. Just don’t touch anything, be sure to check the meter often, and keep that mask on your face.”

  “If I come across any Maya ghosts, I’m sending them your way.”

  “Good, I have a lot of questions for them. If you run into the Lord of Death, get his autograph for me. I’ve been a big fan of his for decades.”

  “Got it, Dr. Diablo.”

  Fake evil laughter came through the hole. “Now go take some pictures and then get your superhero buns back out here. If anything were to happen to you, my daughter will kill me, for starters.”

  Lowering the flashlight, Quint focused on the floor just beyond the altar. The white granules of rock he’d noticed previously were scattered here and there in small groupings, like someone had spread them via a pepper grinder. He squatted to take a closer look, scooping up a handful mixed with dirt. Up close, they didn’t look like limestone granules, more like fragments. Some were sharp edged, reminding him of shale flakes. All were a pale gray that looked almost white under the flashlight’s beam. He sifted the dirt away through his fingers and dumped the remaining dirt and flakes in a sandwich bag Juan had given him for show-and-tell later.

  Securing his mask, he took a deep breath.

  Knock-knock, Underworld. Anyone home?

  Gearing up mentally for the task before him, he edged deeper into the mine. His breathing sounded loud and harsh through the mask, reminding him of something out of a science fiction horror movie. Rounding a sharp bend, he lost sight of the wall that divided the present from the past.

  The boot prints in the thick layer of dust on the rock floor were still visible here and there, heading both ways as he wound deeper into the earth. Quint knelt and lifted his camera, taking a few more closeups of them to make sure they matched the prints back near the wall.

  Another bend farther into the mine, the boot prints stopped. Whoever had snuck in must have chickened out and turned around.

  Aiming the light up at the ceiling and then down over the walls, Quint saw no reason for the visitor to turn tail. With a shrug, he continued onward and downward. Maybe he’d see the paw prints of a big cat further up, or some other critter that had caused the owner of the boot prints to scurry away.

  For a few more turns, there was nothing besides rock and dirt all around him. No paw prints, no petroglyphs, no figurines, nothing.

  He was about to head back to Juan when he came across a grouping of petroglyphs on one wall.

  Raising his camera, he snapped several shots. As he moved further along the wall, he noticed a dark cavity up ahead on the right. The top of the small opening was at waist level and went clear to the floor. Was it a shallow cave? An animal den? He bent over and directed the flashlight into the dark cavity.

  It wasn’t a cave or a den, but rather a side tunnel.

  He eased down onto his knees, wincing as a small pebble dug into his kneecap.

  The side tunnel walls looked the same as those in the main adit of the mine. There were more flakes of larger pieces of limestone, lining the base of the wall like they’d been swept to the side. When he aimed the flashlight deeper into the tunnel, his beam met darkness. Either the tunnel was long, or there was an opening on the other side—maybe a small chamber or another tunnel leading to a separate limestone-laden section of the mine. That would explain the grayish-white flakes lining the tunnel’s floor.

  After taking a look at Juan’s meter to make sure the air was safe, he lowered his mask. He sniffed a few times, checking to see if there was a musky, urine-heavy odor in the air or some other sign of an animal holing up somewhere back in the shadows, but he smelled nothing other than the musty cave scent that had been with him since entering the mine.

  He paused for a moment, listening for any sounds coming from the other end of the tunnel. Other than his own breathing, nothing but silence filled his ears. He tossed a pebble along the tunnel floor into the darkness. When it stilled, silence followed.

  Shining the light back in the direction he’d come, he cursed. The words were especially loud in the quiet darkness.

  He wiped his face with his shirt hem, exchanging sweat for more dust and grit. Jesus, what in the hell was he doing in here? Was a woman really worth crawling through overgrown wormholes into the Maya Underworld?

  As much as he wanted to leave, he knew he had to crawl through the damned tunnel and see what was on the other side. There was no doubt in his mind that when Angélica saw his photographs, she’d probably want to come through the wall and see it all for herself—the boot prints, the petroglyphs, the figurines, and whatever was at the other end of this tunnel. Unlike him, she wouldn’t think twice about following the path of that pebble.

  “Fuck.” A tunnel within a tunnel deep in the earth—this was the seed of long-term insanity. Angélica was going to owe him big for this.

  He checked the air quality one more time and then donned his mask even though no dangerous gases registered. After tucking his camera inside his shirt to protect it from the rocky floor, he dropped to his hands and knees. He tried not to think about the weight of the world above him as he crawled along, or about how long it would take Juan to go get help and dig out his body if the ceiling crashed down on top of him. Sweat dripped into his eyes.

  At what appeared to be the end of the tunnel, he paused, once again listening for any sounds of life. He aimed his light through the dark exit, wincing in anticipation. If a pair of eyes glowed back at him, his poor heart was going to blow a gasket.

  All was silent and dark ahead. No signs of a large cat, a small mouse, or a gold-loving dragon to be found.

  Slowly, he crawled out of the tunnel. He stood, dusting his hands off on his pants, and shining his flashlight around an oval-shaped cavern not much bigger than his living room back home. The ceiling was higher, though, probably twelve feet at the highest point. All it was missing was his sectional couch, flat-screen television, and coffee table laden with cold beer and María’s panuchos.

  Shit, he was getting delusional.

  Forcing himself to move deeper into the cavern, he approached what looked like a small pile of broken sticks—one of many such piles in the room. On the other side of the sticks was another slightly bigger pile consisting of what looked like round rocks.

  He started to move his flashlight beam over to the far wall, but then stopped, returning to that last pile.

  Those weren’t rocks.

  His mouth suddenly dry, he took a step toward them, stepping onto one of the sticks.

  His
beam lowered to his boot.

  That wasn’t a stick.

  The hair rose on the back of his neck.

  He lifted his boot, planting it on solid ground. Fumbling, he pulled out the gas meter, making sure he was still in the clear. The air was stable, but his breath was erratic. If he kept this up he’d hyperventilate.

  Closing his eyes, he imagined blue sky and sunshine, taking several deep breaths. When he opened his eyes, he extracted his camera from his shirt. He needed to take some pictures so that Angélica and her father could see this. Maybe they could give him a logical reason as to why there was a mound of skulls and several piles of bones inside a cavern deep within a limestone mine, because all of his ideas stemmed from horror movies and childhood boogeymen.

  He directed the light around the walls, making sure there were no other entrances or alcoves that could hide some terror lying in wait for him. A large chunk of rock sat against the wall across the way with two other slightly smaller ones in front of it. Someone must have positioned them there, but where had they come from? Had the Maya people left them behind when they dug out the mine? He checked overhead. The ceiling looked jagged above him, but more solid than the rest of the mine had so far. They could have come from there.

  Stepping forward carefully, he lifted his camera. As he checked the settings, his pulse pounded in his ears. Sweat slicked his back, running down his spine as he tried to avoid coming down on anything that used to belong inside of a layer of skin.

  What in the hell was this place? A mass burial chamber? In a mine? Was this where they disposed of any miners killed while on the job? If so, shouldn’t there be hair or jewelry or some other evidence of their humanity besides bones? How long would it take for a body to decompose down here?

  Shaking all of those morbid thoughts from his head, he blocked out the questions and focused on taking the best pictures he could under the circumstances. This was a job. That was all. Maybe if he took enough photos, Angélica wouldn’t feel so strongly about wanting to see this for herself.

  He bent down and held his flashlight on what appeared to be a broken human femur bone, snapping a picture. He moved his flashlight to another piece and another, clicking the shutter button again and again.

  Why were most of the bones broken? Why so many?

  Shaking away the questions, he moved to the next pile, clicking away as his flash lit the room repeatedly.

  Maybe this was a mass burial site for one of the losing ball teams. Or had these been warriors from a particular battle whose story was told by the petroglyphs outside?

  Click-flash. Click-flash. Click-flash.

  Were they sacrificial victims? Was it their blood that had been used to coat the wall where Juan was waiting for him?

  Stepping around a scattering of broken bones, he focused on one of the skulls in the “head” mound. It had a chunk missing near the right eye socket. Was that from a blunt instrument during a battle? He’d have to search through Juan and Angélica’s books on the Maya to see what sort of weapons they used.

  He lowered onto his knees and chose the macro setting on his camera, moving in closer to another skull. The metering light flickered for a moment, then the flash lit up the room. He took several more pictures of the skull along with a couple of others from slightly different angles, and then he returned to the scattering of broken bones and did the same.

  When he finished, he stepped back and tried to take a few wider-angled shots of all the rubble, holding the flashlight in his armpit, but the room was so dark that it was hard to get the full macabre scene.

  By the time he’d finished, his camera battery indicator showed twenty percent remaining. His own tolerance level was closer to five percent when it came to this creepy catacomb and its bony treasures.

  Itching to return to the wall and Juan’s easy laughter, he picked his way through the bones back to the tunnel exit. As he reached the dark hole, something glittered at eye-level, catching his attention. He aimed the beam at the wall above the tunnel. A figurine sat inside a pocket chiseled into the rock. Only one this time, not nine, and it was bigger than the others.

  He stepped closer, lifting his camera. He snapped several shots, double-checking them to make sure he had a clear picture. This one looked different from the others, the sculpture more detailed … and ugly. The top half looked to be some kind of feral cat, the bottom half human. The other figurines were made of jade, while this one appeared to be obsidian.

  He leaned forward, blowing some of the dust off the figure. Yep, black and shiny. He tried to imagine what it would look like if it were real, coming up with a comic book image.

  Something clattered behind him.

  He whirled, his light bouncing all around the room as stars swirled back into vision. One of the skulls rolled a short way along the floor, coming to rest against a bone.

  Okay, enough of this shit.

  He stuffed his camera back inside his shirt and did his best Speedy Gonzales imitation back through the tunnel. After a flashlight check to make sure nothing was lying in wait for him in the adit leading off deeper into the mine, he returned to the hole in the wall in record time.

  He could hear Juan whistling and creaking about as he drew near. The sounds of another living being sent a surge of relief through his limbs. As he unwrapped his camera strap from around his neck, he realized how wet his shirt was. It was not the heat that had him hot and bothered this time.

  “I’m back.” He handed his camera through the hole.

  “Hey, you’re still alive,” Juan joked. “Did you find anything else in there?”

  Besides a monster’s den? “A few things.” He handed the gas meter through and then his hard hat and mask.

  After one last glance behind him with his flashlight to make sure nothing had followed him, he gripped the bottom edges of the hole and hoisted himself up the wall. Not giving a shit about scratches or bruises, he pulled himself through the hole. Dangling down the other side of the wall, he reached for the ground.

  “Need some help?” Juan asked.

  “Nope. Stay back.”

  He slid farther through the hole, moving quickly, half-afraid something would latch onto his ankle or foot from the other side and try to drag him back into that catacomb. As before, gravity exerted its usual force and Quint tumbled the rest of the way through. This time he managed to roll out of the fall with only a few scrapes in the process.

  “Impressive.” Juan offered a hand up, which Quint took. “You looked like an Olympic gymnast.” He handed Quint the camera and tried to brush the dust off Quint’s back. “Wow, you’re soaked clear through.”

  “Why couldn’t the Maya people build open-air arenas like the Roman Coliseum instead of these damned temples and underground hellholes?” He thought about all of those skulls piled together and shuddered.

  Juan’s eyes narrowed as he stared up at him. “What happened in there, Quint?”

  “I don’t want to talk about it until I’m standing under blue sky and sunshine.” He didn’t wait for Juan to start for the exit, but rather led the way, jamming his hard hat on his head as he walked.

  Juan’s boot scuffed over the floor behind him, his cane creaking as he tried to keep up with Quint. When they neared the entrance, Juan pressed him again for answers. “What did you see back there, Quint? Did you find another altar stone?”

  “No.” With the sunlight visible at the end of the tunnel, he stopped and waited. The older man’s worried expression matched Quint’s own feelings. “No altar stone, but there were more petroglyphs.”

  “What else?” Juan searched Quint’s face. “What did you see that has you wanting to get the hell out of Dodge, son?”

  Quint frowned over Juan’s shoulder at the darkness beyond. “I found a cavern. It had several piles of bones on the floor.”

  “What kind of bones?”

  “The human kind.”

  * * *

  “I need your help with something,” Angélica said to Pedro.
>
  He was working alongside Fernando and Gertrude, excavating the small cache of morion-style helmets, breastplates, and arm and leg greaves left behind by the Spanish conquistadors. Why there was a collection of centuries-old, rusted body armor but no bones or weapons was a mystery in itself.

  Once again, Angélica was left scratching her head. What in the hell had happened at this site? Had her mom stumbled onto something that explained the artifacts left from various groups over the centuries? Was that why she’d been murdered?

  Had she been murdered? Or was this all some weird coincidence?

  “Where are the swords?” Pedro rubbed the back of his neck, scowling at the excavation site. “Those Spanish bastards usually carried three-foot-long, double-edged steel swords made in Toledo, Spain. I’ve seen them in museums in Cancun and Mexico City. Between the conquistadors’ weapons and full set of armor, the natives never had a chance.”

  “It was one mercenary bloodbath after another, I know, but I need your help on something else right now.” Angélica motioned him to follow her around the side of the temple for a little more privacy. She waited for him in the shade of a mahogany tree.

  She spoke to him in Spanish in case one of the INAH crew happened to be out of sight but within earshot. “Quint told me about your theory.”

  He switched to his native language without a blink. “You mean about Daisy?”

  “What about Daisy?”

  He grimaced. “Never mind. Which theory do you mean?”

  She shelved the Daisy question for later and stayed on her original course. “The one about my mom being murdered.”

  Pedro’s eyes widened for a moment. “When did he tell you?”

  “Yesterday when we were in the Chakmo’ol Temple. Last night, I looked through Mom’s notebook and figured out that someone had removed all the pages of notes she had written about this site except for one, which was stuck to the page before it.”

  “The one left behind—those are the notes you have spoken about? The words and drawings that don’t make a lot of sense?”

  “Exactly.” She took a steadying breath. Talking to Pedro about her mom caused a welling of emotions she hadn’t expected. “Quint and I are thinking that someone killed her to hide whatever she’d found. They stole her notes and left her for dead, trying to keep what she’d discovered here a secret.”