"I know the one," acknowledged Marquez, his words barely intelligible. "It leads to the next level of the Paradise."

Identifying the obvious signs of hypothermia in the miner, the drowsiness, the confusion, Pitt elected to take him instead of Ambrose, who was in the better shape of the two. He had to be quick, because the numbing cold had tightened its grip and was draining the life out of them. "You're next, Mr. Marquez."

"I may panic and pa.s.s out when I'm submerged," Marquez moaned.

Pitt gripped him on the shoulder. "Pretend you're floating in the water off Waikiki Beach."

"Good luck," said Ambrose.

Pitt grinned and gave the anthropologist a friendly tap on the shoulder. "Don't go away."

"I'll wait right here."

Pitt nodded at Marquez. "All right, pal, let's do it."

The trip went smoothly. Pitt put all his strength into reaching the shaft as quickly as possible. He could see that unless the miner got dry soon, he would lose consciousness. For a man afraid of water, Marquez was game. He'd take a deep breath from the regulator and dutifully pa.s.s it back to Pitt without missing a beat.

When they came to the ladder, Pitt helped push Marquez up the first few rungs until he was completely out of the cold water. "Do you think you can make it up to the next tunnel on your own?"

"I'll have to," Marquez stammered, fighting the cold that had seeped into his veins. "I'm not about to give up now."

Pitt left him and returned for Ambrose, who was beginning to look cadaverous from the effects of the icy water. Hypothermia from the cold water had lowered his body temperature to ninety-two degrees. Another two-degree drop and he would be unconscious. Five more minutes and it would have been too late. The water was only inches away from the chamber's ceiling. Pitt didn't waste time in talk, but shoved the mouthpiece into the anthropologist's mouth and pulled him down into the cleft and out into the tunnel.

Fifteen minutes later, they were all grouped around a fire that Pat had managed to ignite from sc.r.a.ps of wood she'd found in a nearby crosscut pa.s.sage. Scrounging about, Pitt soon discovered several old, fallen timbers that had remained dry over the years the mine had been abandoned. It wasn't long before the tunnel was turned into a blazing furnace and the survivors from the inundated chamber began to thaw out. Marquez began to look human again. Pat rebounded and was her old happy self as she vigorously ma.s.saged Ambrose's frozen feet.

While they treasured the warmth of the fire, Pitt busied himself with the computer, planning a circuitous route through the mine to the ground above. The Telluride valley was a virtual honeycomb of old mines. The shafts, crosscuts, drifts, and tunnels totaled more than 360 miles. Pitt marveled that the valley hadn't collapsed like a wet sponge. He allowed everyone to rest and dry out for close to an hour before he reminded them that they weren't out of the woods yet.

"If we want to see blue skies again, we'll have to follow an escape plan."

"What's the urgency?" shrugged Marquez. "All we have to do is follow this tunnel to the entrance shaft and then sit it out until rescuers dig through the avalanche."

"I hate to be the bearer of bad tidings," Pitt said, his voice grim, "but not only were rescuers finding it impossible to get their heavy equipment through twenty feet of snow up to the mine on a narrow road, they were pulled from the search because of rising air temperatures that were increasing the chances of another avalanche. There is no telling how many days or weeks it will take for them to clear a path to the mine entrance."

Marquez stared into the fire, picturing the conditions topside in his mind. "Everything is going against us," he said quietly.

"We have heat and drinking water, however silty," said Pat. "Surely, we can exist without food for as long as it takes."

Ambrose smiled faintly. "Sixty to seventy days is what it generally takes to starve to death."

"Or we could hike out while we're still healthy," offered Pitt.

Marquez shook his head. "You know better than anyone, the only tunnel that leads from the Buccaneer Mine to the Pandora is flooded. We can't get through the way you came."

"Certainly not without proper diving gear," added Ambrose.

"True," Pitt admitted. "But relying on my computerized road map, I estimate there are at least two dozen other dry tunnels and shafts on upper levels that we can use to reach the ground surface."

"That makes sense," said Marquez. "Except that most of those tunnels have collapsed over the past ninety years."

"Still," said Ambrose, "it beats sitting around playing charades for the next month."

"I'm with you," Pat agreed. "I've had my fill of old mine shafts for one day."

Her words prompted Pitt to walk over to the edge of the shaft and peer down. The flickering flames from the fire reflected off the water that had risen to within three feet of the tunnel floor. "We don't have a choice. The water will spill out of the shaft in another twenty minutes."

Marquez stepped beside him and stared at the turbid water. "It's crazy," he muttered. "After all these years, to see water flooding up to this level of the mine. It looks like my days of gemstone mining are over."

"One of the waterways that run under the mountain must have broken through into the mine during the earthquake."

"That was no earthquake," said Marquez angrily. "That was a dynamite charge."

"You're saying explosives caused the flooding and cave-in?" asked Pitt.

"I'm sure of it." He peered at Pitt, eyes suddenly narrowed. "I'd bet my claim that somebody else was in the mine."

Pitt stared at the menacing water. "If that's the case," he said pensively, "then somebody wants all three of you very dead."

5

"YOU LEAD OFF," PITT ordered Marquez. "We'll walk behind the beam of your miner's lamp until its batteries give out. Then we go the rest of the way on my dive light."

"Climbing to the upper levels through shafts will be the tough part," said the miner. "So far we've been lucky. Very few shafts had a ladder. Most of them used hoists to transport the miners and ore."

"We'll tackle that problem when we face it," said Pitt.

It was five o'clock in the afternoon when they set out through the tunnel, heading west as indicated on Pitt's dive compa.s.s. He looked odd, hiking through the tunnel in his dry suit, gloves, and Servus dive boots with steel toes. He carried only the computer, compa.s.s, underwater dive light, and the knife strapped to his right leg. He left the rest of his gear beside the dying embers of the fire.

The tunnel was clear of debris and the first hundred yards were fairly easy. Marquez led the way, followed by Pat and Ambrose, with Pitt bringing up the rear. There was enough walking room between the ore car tracks and the tunnel wall, making it unnecessary to step and stumble over the rail ties. They pa.s.sed one shaft, then two, that were empty and lacking any means of climbing to the next level. They came to a small open gallery with three tunnels leading off into the darkness.

"If I remember the mine's layout correctly," said Marquez, "we take the tunnel that angles to the left."

Pitt consulted his trusty computer. "Right on the money."

Another fifty yards and they came to a rockfall. The amount of loose rock was not ma.s.sive, and the men set to work digging a crawl s.p.a.ce. An hour of effort and a quart of sweat later, they had gouged an opening big enough for all to snake through. The tunnel led to another chamber, this one with a shaft leading to an old hoist that was still in place. Pitt shined his light into the vertical pa.s.sage. It was like looking into a bottomless pit upside down. The top lay far out of the range of the beam. But this shaft looked promising. A maintenance ladder was gripping one wall, and the cables that once lowered and raised the lift cages were still hanging in place.

"This is as good as it gets," said Pitt.

"I hope the ladder is sound," said Ambrose, grabbing the vertical sides and giving it a shake. It trembled like a bow from the base up until it vanished in the darkness. "My days of climbing hand over hand up old slimy cables are long gone."

"I'll go first," Pitt said, sliding a thong on the dive light's handle around his wrist.

"Mind the first step," Pat said, with a faint smile.

Pitt looked into her eyes and saw genuine concern. "The last step is the one that worries me most."

He gripped the ladder, climbed several rungs, and hesitated, not happy about the wobble. He pressed on, keeping an eye on the hoist cables hanging only an arm's length away. If the ladder gave way, he could at least reach out and stop his fall with one of the cables. He ascended slowly, one rung at a time, testing each one before giving it his full weight. He could have moved much faster, but he had to be sure the others could safely follow him.