St Paul's Labyrinth

by Jeroen Windmeijer

  ‘Come on,’ he said with surprising articulacy, ‘we’re all going to have a look down that hole. I just want to—’

  ‘Absolutely not,’ Janna cut him off.

  Daniël wobbled his head, as Indians do when they are reluctant to say either yes or no.

  ‘I want to be the first person to walk through part of the tunnel,’ Arnold said, smiling at Janna. ‘Further than you went. Come on, let this old fogey have a bit of fun.’

  ‘It can’t hurt to have a quick look, can it?’ Daniël said, although he didn’t sound sure.

  Peter turned off his music and stood up. Speaking of networking, he thought, watching Daniël.

  Janna’s jaws were tightly clamped together. It was clear that she also understood that it would be unwise to cross the great Van Tiegem. He was known for his vindictive character.

  ‘Okay then,’ she said, like a parent giving in to a spoiled child but trying to sound strict at the same time, ‘but just a few minutes, and no more than twenty or thirty metres … I’m not taking any responsibility for this. Daniël and I will wait for you both up here so that …’

  Arnold was already tugging at the safety barriers that had been laid over the pit. He yanked at one of them with his full weight until it suddenly moved and he fell backwards. A monstrous screech of metal on stone echoed through the narrow street.

  Janna swore under her breath.

  Daniël and Peter carefully lifted the barriers up and moved them out of the way.

  ‘Is this really a good idea?’ Peter tried again.

  ‘We can hardly let him go down there on his own,’ Daniël said, with more reluctance than he had shown just moments ago. ‘And you know what he can be like once he’s got an idea in his head … I don’t want to be the one to antagonise him. But I don’t want to upset Janna either, so if you could go with him …’

  ‘Oh, great. That’s all I need,’ Peter mumbled like a sulky child.

  Janna, who had apparently decided to make the best of a bad situation by at least making sure everything was done correctly, fetched the rope ladder and secured the two pegs firmly in the ground. She produced two bulky hardhats with lamps on them from an enormous bag and gave them to Peter and Arnold.

  ‘You can use the light on your phone as well if you need to,’ she said.

  Arnold was already crawling over to the ladder on his hands and knees.

  ‘Those who are about to descend salute you,’ he said, tapping his helmet in a jocular salute.

  A fiery bolt of annoyance shot through Peter.

  Daniël helped Arnold by guiding his feet onto the first rung of the ladder. The ladder wobbled as he steadied himself, but he quickly found his balance.

  If this was the circus, the audience would be applauding with relief now, Peter thought.

  When Arnold reached the bottom, Peter got onto his knees, with his back to the pit. He felt around with his foot for the first rung. When he was sure it was secure, he lowered his other foot and began to climb down.

  ‘You brought me up from the grave, O Lord. You kept me from falling into the pit of death,’ he murmured.

  He glanced into the gaping black chasm below him now and then as he descended and saw the faint glow of light from Arnold’s hardhat. When he reached the hole at the bottom of the pit, he lay on his front, dangled his legs over the edge and slowly slid down into the darkness.

  ‘You’ve got to see this,’ he heard Arnold say in the distance, as though he was talking to no one in particular. He said it again, and this time there was a note of bewilderment in his voice. ‘You’ve got to see this!’

  The lamp on Peter’s helmet gave off a bright, broad beam of light, but it only made the gloom beyond it seem even blacker.

  Arnold had walked in the direction of the Hooglandse Kerk and then stopped, a few metres away from Peter.

  ‘What, exactly, have I got to see?’ Peter asked. But as soon as he got closer, he saw what Arnold meant. Fixed to the wall at shoulder height was a metal ring that held a blackened torch.

  Arnold touched it hesitantly, as though he expected it to burn his hand. He looked at his sooty fingers and rubbed them together.

  ‘That’s what my hands look like when I clean out the grate after we’ve been burning logs all evening. This torch has only just been put out.’

  ‘What is this?’ Peter said, astonished by how calmly Arnold was handling this absurd situation, as though he had been through much worse before.

  Suddenly, they heard something fall not far from where they were standing. Arnold turned around so abruptly that his hardhat fell off. He clumsily tried to catch it, but lost his balance and banged his head hard on the rough wall. He reeled and crashed into Peter, who barely managed to catch him.

  ‘What was that?’ Arnold asked. His voice came out strangled and shrill, like a frightened child’s. All the bravura he’d put on display earlier was gone in an instant. He bent down to pick up his helmet.

  Peter looked behind him at the spot where the faint light from outside permeated the thick, black darkness. They heard Daniël shout something, but couldn’t make out the words. It was only then that Peter noticed that Arnold was bleeding from a large scratch on his forehead.

  ‘You’re bleeding, Arnold. We should go back.’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ Arnold said, wiping the blood from his brow with his sleeve. ‘I feel fine. Don’t worry.’

  Peter walked back to the spot where they had entered the tunnel and shouted up to the surface. ‘Did you say something, Daniël?’

  ‘We’ve thrown a rope down!’ Janna shouted back. ‘Can you see it?’

  Peter looked down and saw a long rope coiled near his feet.

  ‘Like Ariadne, remember, in Knossos. In the Minotaur’s labyrinth.’

  ‘Thanks! But we’re coming back up in a minute!’ he shouted. His words were meant for Arnold rather than Janna, but Arnold had already moved a few paces further down from the torch.

  Peter put the end of the rope under a pile of bricks that had been left when the tunnel collapsed. If they didn’t pull on it too hard, it would stay where it was. He had no intention of going any further into the tunnel than the rope was long.

  ‘I hope your initial curiosity has been satisfied,’ he said as he unwound the thin, strong rope. ‘Let’s go a bit further. We’ve got about thirty metres of rope here, I think.’

  But Arnold had already walked away. Peter couldn’t tell if this was the overconfidence of a drunkard, or the burning desire to beat him to an archaeological scoop. Peter quickened his step so that he wouldn’t fall too far behind.

  All at once, the light from Arnold’s headlamp vanished.

  ‘Arnold!’ Peter shouted. His voice echoed through the chamber.

  ‘I’m here!’ came the distant reply. Peter realised that the tunnel must have curved away from him so that the light from Arnold’s helmet was no longer visible.

  They had walked about twenty metres now; Peter had let out more than two-thirds of the rope.

  He walked further down the tunnel and saw that he had been right about the bend. Arnold came into view again, standing still and staring upwards as though there was something fascinating there. Peter stood next to him and looked at the same spot, but saw nothing.

  ‘What are you looking at?’

  ‘I’m not looking, I’m listening.’ He raised his hand and pointed a finger in the air. ‘Shush.’

  Peter listened intently. He could hear the faint gurgle of flowing water. It was coming from … below them.

  Arnold stamped his foot on the ground. ‘Ab urbe condita … ’ he said solemnly. ‘Are you familiar with the work of Livy?’

  Arnold was fond of demonstrating the knowledge of Greek and Latin he’d gained at grammar school, although in practice this was limited to recitations of a few well-known sayings and proverbs.

  From the foundation of the city … The opening lines of Livy’s history of the city of Rome.

  ‘I wouldn’t go as far as to
say I was familiar with his work,’ Peter replied, ‘but I know that saying, naturally.’

  ‘Exactly, this is … It looks like this was planned when the city was founded. I believe what we hear below us is part of a drainage system. It must be … You would usually expect to see groundwater this far down. You wouldn’t be able to dig this without anyone knowing about it. Not if the city had already been built above you.’

  Peter was becoming increasingly excited about what they had found. They couldn’t even begin to imagine what the consequences of their discovery would be. But at the same time, he felt a growing disquiet. A young man covered in blood in subterranean passage … Who knew what other macabre things took place here?

  ‘Listen, Arnold, this is all fantastic, and you’re … We’re the first people to come down here, apart from the poor man who ended up under a pile of rubble this afternoon … But let’s leave it at this for now. We’ve satisfied our initial curiosity. We can come back tomorrow with more people, more light, and we definitely need more rope. It’d be irresponsible of us to go further now. We don’t know what’s down there. You’ve wounded your head … After the weekend, we’ll have the Geo—’

  But Arnold was deaf to his objections and walked away from him again. ‘Just a bit further. This is …’

  The beams from their headlamps cast grotesque shadows on the walls. Their footsteps sounded hollow.

  We must be under the Hooglandse Kerk by now, Peter thought. But there was no sign of a way out or up. When he looked around him, he had to admit that he was impressed by the neatly constructed walls, by the solid arch of the ceiling, by the dry, even floor, by the drainage system.

  They were running out of rope. It would reach as far as where Arnold was standing now, a few metres away from Peter.

  Arnold carried on walking.

  ‘Hey, will you listen to me? We’re going back. We can go further tomorrow.’ Peter stood with the end of the rope in his hand, not sure what to do next. His headlamp illuminated the path ahead and shone on Arnold’s back.

  ‘We can’t really get lost down here. We’ve not seen any side tunnels, or any stairs … This is sensational, Peter. I just want to walk a little further.’

  Aware that he was likely to lose sight of Arnold again, Peter put the rope down. He laid it carefully on the ground, next to the wall and well in sight. By the time he looked up again, his companion’s light had vanished.

  The silence and darkness seemed to have intensified, as though Arnold had literally been swallowed up.

  Peter took a few uncertain steps forward and saw that the tunnel formed a T-junction and split off to the left and right a few metres ahead of him.

  ‘Arnold?’ he said. He cupped his hands around his mouth and called out Arnold’s name again, but there was no response.

  He was suddenly aware of how cold and damp it was. What should he do now? He called out again, but all that came back was the echo of his own voice. He began to half-heartedly go down the tunnel on the right, but after a few metres, he reached a wall. This part of the tunnel was a dead end.

  He turned around, making sure that he didn’t let go of the wall. Without the rope, it was his only guide. He went back to the point where the path split and then walked a couple of metres into the other tunnel. He called Arnold’s name again and it came out like a hiss. ‘Arnold!’

  He took a few more apprehensive steps.

  ‘Arnold!’ He was screaming now. His voice died away almost instantly.

  He was jarred by the sudden, chilling sensation that he was being observed by something or someone hiding just beyond the reach of his headlamp beam. He was suddenly very scared, like a small child in the night, afraid of the monsters under his bed. He wanted to get out of here, go back up into the sunlight.

  ‘Hello,’ he said haltingly. ‘Hello? Is anyone there?’

  He had to get out of here. Now.

  But before he’d even started walking back out of the tunnel, his headlamp blinked erratically and then went out. Now he was in total darkness. An instinctive fear of the dark – a deep, primitive, irrational fear – overwhelmed him. He flailed his fists around to ward off an invisible enemy.

  ‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me …’ he murmured to himself.

  His breaths were quick and shallow. His hands trembled as he took his phone from his pocket. The light from the screen that usually glowed so softly blazed now with the brilliance of a lighthouse beam.

  Where had that bloody Van Tiegem gone? That obstinate bastard.

  This was useless.

  He turned back to fetch help.

  He felt something cold brush past his neck.

  Peter spun round in a panic. The jerking movement made his headlamp come on again. He took the hardhat off and aimed the light at the tunnel behind him. He couldn’t see anything.

  He shone the light on the ground in front of him and saw the end of the rope a few metres away. Tears pricked his eyes, as much from relief as from the dust in the air. He left the rope where it was in case Arnold came back.

  This had been such a stupid idea! He had let himself get carried away by that damned Van Tiegem and his insistence on being first! Never, not once, had that man shown the slightest interest in the actual work of digging. But if there was ever a nice find somewhere, he was there like a shot to make sure he was front and centre on the photos.

  Above all, Peter was angry at himself. They’d have to come back of course, with more people, more light, and a longer rope.

  He reached the opening where they had entered the tunnel. When he was directly under the hole, he shouted upwards. ‘Daniël! Janna! Hey! Can you hear me?’ His voice was hoarse and cracked.

  ‘We can hear you Peter! We’re here! Did you find—’

  ‘I’ve lost Arnold! He’s … The bastard kept going, past the end of the rope. We have to—’

  ‘What!’ Janna and Daniël exclaimed together.

  ‘You’re kidding,’ Janna said. ‘What happened? I told you! You should never … This is not my respons—’

  ‘Yes, I know that! Wait, I’m coming up.’ Peter stood on the pile of rubble so that he could reach the bottom rung of the rope ladder. Afraid that something or someone might grab his legs at any moment, he frantically writhed and squirmed his body through the hole. He looked up as he climbed, and although the light was fading as night approached, he could see the worried looks on Daniël and Janna’s faces.

  They both held out a hand and helped him out of the pit.

  Peter took off his hardhat. His face and clothes were grey with dust, like a miner coming up from the coalface after a long day’s work.

  He stooped over with his hands on his knees. Then he straightened up again and told them what had happened. Daniël leaned in as he listened, but Janna drew back slightly, as though she was afraid. When Peter had finished speaking, she gripped him by the collar, pulled him emphatically towards her, and turned him round so that she could examine him. A studious frown appeared on her forehead. She looked at him questioningly, making Peter suddenly feel very small.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he asked,

  ‘Come and look,’ she said to Daniël. Daniël moved closer and his eyes widened.

  Janna gripped Peter’s arm and squeezed it urgently. ‘What really happened down there, Peter?’

  Peter followed their gaze to the spot they were both staring at.

  In the middle of his chest was an enormous bloodstain.

  6

  Friday 20 March, 6:50pm

  The three of them stared at the bloodstain on Peter’s shirt, frozen like characters in a promotional still from an action film.

  ‘That wasn’t there just now, was it?’ Janna asked.

  Peter tugged himself free of her grasp. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. What do you mean by asking me what really happened down there? I’ve told you, haven’t I? He walked into the tunnel ahead of me and then he walked around the corner
. There was no rope left, but I went in after him, shouting his name. When he didn’t answer, I came back to get you so you could help me.’

  ‘And that blood on your shirt? Is it yours?’ Janna demanded.

  ‘He fell over. We heard a loud noise … You threw the rope down and it gave us a fright. Arnold was stumbling around and his hardhat fell off. He grazed his head on the wall and then he fell against me …’

  Daniël stood between Peter and Janna, like a football captain trying to prevent one of his players from attacking an opponent.

  ‘What do you think happened? That I was down there in the tunnel and thought, oh, I know, I’ll smash Arnold’s brains in, they’ll never find out that I did it?’

  ‘Well … everyone knows you can’t stand him …’ Janna said.

  ‘Hey now,’ Daniël intervened, ‘this won’t achieve anything.’

  ‘We have to go back down,’ Peter said. ‘I didn’t want to go any further on my own.’

  ‘I’m calling the police first,’ Janna said, taking out her phone and dialling the emergency number.

  It was quiet for a moment. They heard her say ‘Police’ and then ‘Leiden’. Peter checked the time on his own phone. It was almost seven o’clock.

  Janna explained the situation. After a brief pause, her voice rose sharply. ‘Excuse me, what do you mean by that?’ She listened to what the person on the other end of the line had to say, then said, ‘Yes, I know he’s been reported missing lots of times before, but this is a totally different situation. He was in a tunnel … under the city, yes … was only discovered today … no, just now … with a colleague … no, they went on their own, but … he’s gone yes … l know this isn’t the first time, you keep saying that, but this time … Listen to me! He’s—’ She looked at her phone as though she was wondering what it was doing there. ‘She hung up on me,’ she said with disbelief. ‘She’s not allowed to do that, she’s not allowed to hang up.’

  ‘Why did she do that?’ Daniël asked.

  ‘She didn’t take it seriously,’ she answered bleakly. ‘The boy who cried wolf …’