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said, "if you can't handle this thing maybe I ought to take over."
"You can have it, Squint," Alex said. "I don't know what I'm doing driving
this thing, anyway. I don't have any experience working this close. I'm scared
to death."
"All right, then," Squint said. "Why didn't you say so to begin with?"
The fifth man was topside, sitting in a stowage sling, with about half his
body sticking out of the open top hatch. His job was to watch the sky for
Marine patrols. His name was Dave. "Listen, you guys," he said. "Not so fast.
Look up there to the left, just above that bench."
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Jimmy stooped down and looked out the front of the boat, while everyone else
scrambled for a look. "What do you make of it?" Dave asked. "Looks like fresh
blasting in the rock to me," Morrie said. "Either that," Dave said, "or a big
crack opened up by an earthquake." He jumped down to the deck, swinging his
weight on the cargo straps. "Take it on up to the ledge, Alex. Let's see
what's what."
Above the sandstone ledge, layers of flint and conglomerate were laying
vertically at an angle. Apparently an earthquake had cracked these apart,
making a fissured passage-way without disturbing the sandstone bench.
Dave stroked his chin. "Ledge ain't wide enough to set down the boat. I sure
would like to see what's in there." "You think somebody's been diggin' for
sunstones in there?" Squint asked.
"That's what we're supposed to be lookin' for," Jimmy said.
"But we can't set the boat down," Alex whined. "Let's just forget it."
"No," Dave said. "No, I want to see what's in there." Morrie had been peering
at the ledge, which couldn't be more than several meters wide. "Look," he
said, "Alex can ease the boat over so the side hatch is above the ledge and
let down the hatch while he keeps it locked on hover. The four of us will jump
out and go in for a look."
Alex looked anguished. "I can't hold it on hover that close all the time
you're in there."
Squint glared at him. "You don't have to, stupid," he said. "After we're out,
shut the hatch and hide this thing someplace on the canyon floor-but someplace
where you can see the ledge. When we come out, we '11 give you the high sign
and you can bring her back up and get us."
Dave and Jimmy were already gathering up some light-packs and a couple of
vibrohammers.
Once inside, the four found themselves in a long, fissured chamber that came
together at the top in an acute angle.
As he shined his light around, Jimmy whistled in amazement. "Wow," he said.
"You don't think this thing could fall in on us, do you?"
"Of course not," Squint snapped. "Can't you see the rocks is leanin' together
at the top? They're holding each other up."
"Come on," Dave said. "Let's see what's up ahead."
About a hundred meters into the mountain, the slowly narrowing fissure had
pinched down to the point that a man could go no farther. Frustrated, they
began to shine their lights around.
"Boy it sure is hot in here," Morrie said. "It's hard to breathe."
"Great Ghu!" Jimmy said, suddenly alarmed. "You don't think we're inside a
volcano, do you?"
Everyone looked uncomfortable for a moment.
"Naw," Squint said. Proud of his deductive powers, he added,"We didn 't see no
volcanoes from up above did'we?"
"It could be dormant," Jimmy said. "What if-"
Before the argument could start, Morrie let out a shout of surprise. "Hey!
Hey, you guys-lookit this."
Squint turned his light to the same spot on the sandy floor as Morrie's was.
"So what," he said. "You found some shiny pebbles."
Morrie bent down and snatched up two of the shiny beanshaped pebbles. He
rubbed them between his palms, then slowly opened his hands. There was a
slight glow coming from within his cupped palms.
"Jeez," Dave said. "They are sunstones!" "Aw, come on," Jimmy said. "You don't
find sunstones just laying around. They have to be cracked out of solid flint.
Everybody knows that."
Dave frowned. "Well, then, somebody has been digging sunstones in here."
"No, no." Morrie shook his head. "It's too hard to get them out of the flint.
When a guy finally gets one, he puts it in a little bag. Nobody would be
careless enough to drop a half-dozen of them on the floor, unless-" He shined
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his light down the fissure. "-Unless somebody was stashing a whole bunch of
them away, down there. Then some could get dropped without anybody noticing."
"A man can't get through there," Dave announced with authority. "It isn't wide
enough."
"A Fuzzy could have though-stupid," Squint said. "A Fuzzy could be trained to
do that."
"Jeez," Dave said. "There could be enough sunstones back there to make us all
rich for life. What are we waiting for? Let's take the vibrohammers and open
up this narrow spot-see what we find."
"What about Ingermann?" Jimmy asked. ' "The hell with him," Squint said.
"We'll take a handful back to him and keep the rest."
"Just enough to get him excited," Morrie said. "Right," Squint said, "and
while he's scheming how to get over here and steal, we all get the hell off
the planet as fast as we can."
Morrie picked up one vibrohammer. "That's assuming we find anything."
"Only one way to find out," Squint said, picking up the other one. "We '11
spell each other on these. You two guys go back to the opening and get some
fresh air. We'll call you when it's your turn."
The communications sergeant came hurrying toward Phil Helton and Captain
Casagra, peering at a sheet of printout in his hand as he walked briskly
along.
"What have they got on Xerxes that we can use?" Helton asked rhetorically as
the sergeant gave him the sheet. Helton held it over to one side so Casagra
could see the list.
The sergeant sidled around so he could look over Helton's shoulder.
"Hmmmmm," Helton said. "Collapsium cutter. That's no good. Heading drill, 1.5
meter. Do the job, but we have to shore up behind it, and it could still get
the whole slide moving-cover up the wreck all over again." He snorted
derisively. "Power shovel, Mark X. Terrific. We have those, but I don't think
we want to make a life's work out of taking the slide apart. Ahhhh. M-79
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