Last Message Page 12

  I knew we would see some cave art soon, and that wasn’t just a sixth sense. I had studied the Chauvet on the French Ministry of Culture’s website on my cell back at the hotel. They’d posted an interior map. I was certain we were just steps away from entering the part of the cavity called the Brunel Chamber. There would be drawings there. My flesh began to tingle. The passage narrowed and grew shorter. We were going to have to get low to get through here. But what a reward on the other side! It felt like we were burrowing into the center of the earth.

  Then I saw it.

  Up ahead, through the opening, I could just make out a sort of cascade of stalagmites, and in it there appeared to be the outline of a mammoth. A mammoth! A creature from another time! I realized that I still had Mermoz’s glasses on. So I took them off to see better.

  That was a mistake, the biggest of my life.

  Suddenly, with the dark lenses removed, the whole cave brightened and it felt like God was descending into our midst and directing my gaze toward the art. I had a sense of being in a truly magical place.

  Then I dropped the glasses.

  They clanked loudly on the metal walkway.

  The scientist in front of me was a young woman, the one Mermoz had been teasing two days ago. The sound of the glasses hitting the metal startled her, and she turned and looked directly at me. As I rose from retrieving my shades, I glanced back at her. She gasped.

  “You’re not him!” she exclaimed.

  The security guard was three people behind me, bringing up the rear. There was no doubt that he had heard what she said. Suddenly, I was in deep trouble. I had just two options. The first was to scurry deeper into the passage and take my chances hiding from him in the recesses of the Chauvet. I dropped that possibility instantly. I would either be lost forever or he would quickly find me. So I seized my only remaining possibility. Run! Run back to the entrance and out of the cave! Turn and rush past the scientists behind me and by the security guy, before they could even think about laying hold of me, then make for the door!

  But the woman grabbed me, gripping my battery belt. I tore it off in one motion and dropped my panel light to the walkway. I pivoted and got past the three men behind me in a flash. Caught by surprise, as I’d hoped, they merely gaped in astonishment. I was sure that nothing remotely like this had ever happened in the Chauvet Cave.

  But the guard was a good one. He was ready for me. He reached out to seize me. I ducked. His swipe knocked the helmet from my head. It sailed off and fell with a crash into the precious mineralized floor of the cave, a floor mostly untouched by humanity (and certainly by plastic hard hats) in 32,000 years! I felt terrible about that. But at this very moment it was a good thing for me. It caused the guard to stare, wide-eyed, at the helmet, stunned for a moment. It was as if he had been in charge of an historic, priceless Ming vase and I had just smashed it to smithereens.

  His pause allowed me to pass him. But now I had no hat and no light. Attempting to recall exactly how the walkway went, how many steps there were upward and where they were, I rushed along the metal surface back toward the steel door, blind, praying that somehow, somehow, I could get to it and open it. I was imagining how many years I would get in a French jail for this. I hadn’t wanted to hurt anything or anyone! I had just wanted to see the paintings! In an instant, the guard was after me.

  Then I fell.

  “Voilà!” shouted my pursuer, reaching out for me. But I kicked backward and hit him somewhere—I don’t know where; it felt like his shoulder. He cried out and fell on the walkway. I heard his helmet fall off, strike the walkway and crash onto the cave floor too!

  Up the first flight of steps I went in the pitch black; then I turned and raced up the next flight, thinking hard about where the stairs were. They were steep, but I timed them correctly. I took two or three strides at the landing and smashed into the door. It almost knocked me cold.

  It was locked, sealed as tightly as a tomb.

  Behind me, the guard was pounding up the stairs, his way lit by the beam from a scientist’s helmet behind him. He was yelling at me.

  “Arrêtez! Arrêtez!”

  But then, a little woozy, I heard a faint sound outside.

  There was someone on the other side of the door. I could hear him, calling a name that sounded like the security guard’s. Then I heard the ping-ping-ping-ping-ping of the numbers being punched on the key pad out there.

  Suddenly the door opened.

  The man who had given us our shoes must have heard me crash into the door. An alarming sound, no doubt, and likely one he had never heard before. Perhaps he had even heard the shouting inside. He must have thought something had gone terribly wrong and that someone needed help. He was right.

  I rushed past him into the blinding light, emerging from a lost world back into reality, reached down and grabbed my runners, stuffed them into my big pockets, and began racing along the pathway toward the scientists’ buildings, the Pont d’Arc and freedom! Tree branches whipped against my sleeves and my face. I had long legs, hockey and football legs, and I could run like the devil if I needed to. I needed to now, big-time.

  The man who opened the door had been so stunned by my appearance that he hadn’t moved at first. But when the security guard came out of the cave shouting in French, both were immediately on my tail.

  I had a good head start. I wondered if it was enough. I sped downward with everything I had, twisting and turning, thinking that the two men behind me were at least in their forties and that I should be able to outrun them. I had to beat them soundly. I couldn’t just slightly outpace them: I had to get far ahead, to somewhere, anywhere, where I could get into a car and escape, without them seeing the vehicle or its license plate. How I was going to commandeer a vehicle was another question. I ran so fast that in minutes I could see the first parking lot in the distance, beyond the vineyard.

  That was when I thought of Mermoz and his getaway car. Yes! He would be down there, waiting for me. Surely, he would help me; surely, he wouldn’t be the villain he said he could be.

  But then I saw him.

  He had heard the shouting and was coming up the path toward me. He had a look of anger in his eyes. He was yelling something. I couldn’t tell what it was. Then it became clear. And when it did, I realized that he wasn’t joking about the part of his plan that had scared me so much. He was naked except for his boxer shorts, a new wig and a goatee.

  “Scoundrel!” he cried. “Scoundrel!”

  For an instant, I hoped he was kidding. But his hands were stretched out toward me and the anger wasn’t leaving his eyes.

  Mermoz was coming at me, blocking the pathway. He was going to play this out exactly as he said. The great Mermoz was going to seize me and send me to a French jail! My chance to fulfill my grandfather’s dreams, my chance to exonerate him, to impress Vanessa Lincoln, to change my life, was gone.

  SIXTEEN

  THE MEANING OF LIFE

  Mermoz was a strong man and very sweaty and, of course, almost naked. I decided to give him a little “shake ’n’ bake,” which is what our number-one running back on the McKinley High Minutemen calls a move he makes on linebackers when he gets them one-on-one in open field. I gave Mermoz a little feint with my head, shoulders and hips, then spun around, putting my back to him, in order to slip by on the path. But he seemed to be blessed with some athletic ability too, because he didn’t go for the move, at least not for all of it, and actually got his hands on me as I tried to slide past him. Maybe he played soccer or rugby or something. His sweaty chest was instantly glued to my back, his arms wrapped around my ribcage.

  “I have you, scoundrel!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. He was projecting his voice up the hill toward the security guard and his cohort, who were barreling down toward us.

  But I’d had it with Mermoz, big-time French author, artist and self-promoter extraordinaire. He was absolutely nothing like Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.

  So I squirmed sideways and gave hi
m a knee in the…uh…well, I hit him where he didn’t want to be hit. Where no man ever wants to be hit. And I did it with a great deal of violence. I wasn’t about to let this clown ruin everything.

  “Sacré bleu!” he cried out, in a voice that was almost two octaves higher than his normal tone. At the same time, he released me and shot his hands toward the area I had so expertly injured. A man like Mermoz has his priorities.

  My move had two perfect results. First, it incapacitated my enemy, but even more importantly, it caused him to fling himself, as dramatically as he seemed to do everything, across the path just as the other two men arrived. The collision was spectacular and accompanied by an impressive array of French curses. One sound that echoed in the gorge indicated that at least two skulls had collided. All three men lay on the path for a while, groaning and moaning, not moving.

  I made the most of the opportunity. I was down the hill as if I were the fastest guy on the US Olympic track team. Going down, it almost felt like I was flying. There were times when it seemed like my feet didn’t touch the ground for several yards at a time. The terrain flattened out near the vineyard, and then I was past the scientists’ buildings, through the parking lot and on my way toward the other path that went toward the lot for the Pont d’Arc.

  “Arrêtez!” I heard a voice cry out and glanced back. The security guard, the biggest and the strongest of the three men who were in pursuit of me, had recovered. In fact, he was already nearing the buildings and had spotted where I was going. It must have been the other two skulls that had smacked together.

  “Le gouvernement de la France,” he cried, “vous ordonne de vous ARRÊTER21”

  I knew that fleeing would probably make whatever they did to me even worse, but I had to take a chance. I had to gamble that I could get away. If I could just reach the next lot, perhaps I could escape. But once I was on that second path, the guard seemed to be gaining on me. He must have known the terrain very well. I was growing more frightened. How on earth would I be able to elude him! Mermoz’s getaway car was probably locked and parked near the scientists’ buildings. I had no means of driving out of here! I ripped off the goatee and pulled off the wig and stuffed them into my coveralls. I had to take them with me. I didn’t want them to be recovered as evidence of the great crime Mermoz would be accusing me of. I was glad I hadn’t given him my real name.

  I reached the Pont d’Arc parking lot and stood there for a second, looking about, anxious to find some way out, any means that was faster than on foot. Should I actually steal a car? Should I go that far? Then I heard words that were like music to my ears.

  “TAKE OFF, EH!”

  The Canadians! They were at their vehicle and having some sort of a spat. Not a real one, just the sort Canucks like to have when they are teasing each other. They were arguing about something, shoving each other around. Probably about the merits of French beer, or European girls, or maybe something about hockey. I didn’t know and I didn’t care. They were at their car, ready to leave!

  I raced up to them.

  “Hey, Buffalo!” one of them called out. “Why the rush? Why the red face? Why the funky blue overalls, man?”

  “USA! USA!” chanted the other one. “Run, Yankee, run!”

  “Get in the car!” I cried out.

  “What?”

  “Get in the car! Someone is after me!”

  “Dude, did you mess with someone’s chick?” asked Molson.

  “A car chase?” cried Maple Leaf, and instantly he was behind the wheel, Molson piling in beside him, and me diving in through the open window into their backseat.

  Maple Leaf seemed to know what he was doing, or maybe he’d watched too many action movies, because he turned a smoking 360 in the parking lot, wheels squealing, and raced out of there and onto the main road.

  “Away from Vallon!” I yelled. “Turn left! Toward the highway!”

  He did as I said. Both of them were having a great time.

  But that didn’t last very long. They weren’t too pleased when I told them that the authorities from the cave were after me. It took them a while to get it out of me and I didn’t tell them exactly why I was being chased, but that didn’t matter. They slowed the car down. That scared me. I was sure they were going to turn me in.

  “I think you should get out, dude,” said Maple Leaf.

  “Our lips are sealed, Buffalo,” said Molson, “but you gotta go.”

  I didn’t need an invitation. Out I got. That was fine with me. We were already about ten miles down the road, and I figured that just about any of the kayakers and canoers around here, most of them young and all of them hippies and tree huggers, would give me a ride. They wouldn’t know why I was standing there on the side of the road, nor would I tell them.

  Still, the five minutes I waited there were excruciating. I kept expecting the security guard to come roaring along with a screaming police escort of cars. I kept waiting for the two-note blare of those creepy French sirens. I knew that if a cop picked me up this time, he wouldn’t just take me back to my hotel.

  When somebody finally did stop for me, in another dilapidated old Citroën, I didn’t say a word about why I was hitchhiking. I sat in the guy’s car, scared out of my mind, pretending to not know a single word of French, trying to look composed, thinking about what I had done and wondering why in the world I had attempted it. Grandpa was right: it was impossible, and I never should have tried. The authorities would be asking questions back at the Pont d’Arc. They would be very wound up. This had likely never happened before. There was no doubt that they would be coming after me! The whole trip, this adventure that was supposed to change my life, was about to end in disaster.

  The driver dropped me off in a town near the main highway that went south toward Arles and Marseilles, and I quickly got myself a cab. I jumped in and sat in the back, hunched down, my breathing heavy, hoping that the police weren’t following. The imagined sounds of those sirens haunted me. I still had the distinctive Chauvet Cave coveralls on. I had been seen wearing them on the side of the road. That would help them trace me.

  But we got to Arles without any visible pursuit, and I headed right into my hotel, sweating despite not having moved a single muscle in the cab. I glanced toward the café just before I reached the entrance and saw Rose there. She looked over and noticed me too. She could see that my face was white, that I was terrified, and her expression showed concern.

  But I didn’t have time for her, for anything. I had to get to my room, throw my things into my suitcase, check out, and get my butt down to Marseille. I had to find Mom and Dad and get the heck out of France…now!

  When I reached the room, I tore off the coveralls and Chauvet shoes and tossed them into my suitcase with the wig and goatee. I couldn’t leave anything here for anyone to find. I’d burn the whole mess at home, if I ever got home. But once I had everything packed I was shaking so hard I could barely think what to do next. I felt almost paralyzed with fear. I lay down on the bed for a moment. It calmed me. For now, at least, I seemed safe. If I moved, if I went anywhere outside, I might be spotted.

  I started thinking about what I had just been through. Despite all the fear, the magical interior of the cave came back to me, the feeling I had had of being in another world. And then the image of that drawing appeared before me too, that mammoth, painted onto the cascade of stalagmites. I had just glimpsed it in the distance before I had been discovered. As I thought of it, it began to overwhelm me. Someone, a human being from another time and space, more than 30,000 years ago, had created it. He had been trying to figure out his world, make sense of it by recreating an image of a small part of it. He had been making art, a magnificent and very human thing; a thing, it occurred to me, that only human beings do. A feeling of peace came over me. I had been so close to the sacred interior of the Chauvet Cave, perhaps I had been that close to discovering the meaning of life.

  I suddenly sat bolt upright on the bed.

  I had achieved what my
grandfather had asked of me, hadn’t I? I hadn’t been all the way into the cave, but I had actually gotten inside and glimpsed an ancient drawing. Though I couldn’t shake the feeling that I hadn’t really discovered what he wanted me to find, I soon convinced myself that I had done enough.

  I looked down at my suitcase. The last message was in there: the small white envelope. It would tell me everything! It contained my grandfather’s final words to me.

  I bent down, opened the suitcase and with trembling hands took the little envelope out. I sat there looking at it for a while. It felt awfully light, almost featherweight.

  I opened it.

  It was empty.

  LAST

  SEVENTEEN

  IN FLIGHT

  Surprisingly, my heart didn’t sink. I wasn’t disappointed. That was the funny thing about it. And stranger still was that I didn’t know why. That empty envelope meant something to me, something very powerful. I knew it the same way I knew that my grandfather had made a mistake when he wanted to steal the Van Gogh painting, and that I had been wrong to actually take it. I couldn’t find the words, but I knew it. I reached down into my suitcase and brought out the painting. I stared at it for a moment. It was beautiful. In fact, it brought tears to my eyes.

  I knew what I had to do.

  Five minutes later I was getting into a cab that the concierge had hailed for me outside the hotel, the painting tucked inside my jacket. No one seemed to be tailing me. Just as I was about to get in, I noticed Rose watching me at the café. I smiled at her and she smiled back.