The Manuscript I the Secret by Blanca Miosi, Gretchen Abernathy Page B

heart.” Francesco’s jibe was stilted, a poor attempt to mask his growing fear.
    “Hmph! I didn’t realize it ‘til right now!” Claudio managed to cough out between the exhaustion and the dust.
    He kept at it for another half hour and finally stopped to rest, panting. His shirt was drenched with sweat. Francesco handed him the canteen, and he gulped thirstily.
    Claudio got back to work with renewed vigor. After a few more hacks, the rock splintered like a river dividing into multiple streams. Claudio removed the debris carefully and, aided by his headlamp, made out a small box and the shape of a tube at the back of the niche.
    “Eureka! Francesco, I think we’ve found something!”
    He removed the last piece of rock and took hold of the chest, but it would not budge. It seemed to be anchored down at its base. Claudio grabbed a trowel from the tool bag and started working it under the chest little by little. When the glue finally yielded, he jerked the chest out with one strong heave. He handed it to Francesco and turned back to the niche with his light. The metal tube was lying in a back corner. He reached far back, grabbed it, and, looking it over, guessed it was about sixteen inches long and an inch and a half in diameter.
     
    Claudio looked around for the chest and saw that Francesco had set it on the ground. He put the tube down on the ground and picked up the chest. It was heavy and closed in an apparently hermetic seal. With his headlamp he studied the lock to see how to work it, but eventually he opted to force it with the blade of the trowel. All of a sudden, as if some mechanism had been triggered of its own accord, the lid sprung open. The bright blue contents lit up the cave like a firecracker going off. Claudio, taken completely by surprise, dropped the chest. Some sort of bright rock tumbled over the floor into a corner and pulsed with a hypnotizing blue glow. The men stared at it for a prolonged moment, unable to look away. Finally, Francesco covered his eyes and screamed, “For the love of God, Claudio, put it back in the chest!”
    Claudio woke from the daze and grabbed the gleaming rock. It was cold through his leather gloves. He put it back in the chest and closed the lid. They heard a light click .
    “Oh, God! We’ve been blinded!” Francesco whimpered.
    “No...hang on...I think that thing just temporarily dazed us.”
    After a few eternal seconds, the flashlights once again put form and shadow back in their proper places for the men, lighting up the now empty niche.
    “I think we should put everything back like it was,” Francesco said weakly. “I don’t like this.”
    “No way. Even if I wanted to, we couldn’t. The flagstone is in a million pieces, and I want to know what’s in that tube,” Claudio said, trying to open it.
    “No, please, wait ‘til we get outside to open it. I don’t want anything else weird to happen down here. We should leave,” Francesco insisted.
    Claudio picked up the chest and the metal tube and put them in the canvas bag.
    “You remember the way, I hope?” Claudio jested, searching for a way to lighten the mood.
    Francesco just stared at him, and that was enough. He was completely silent the entire way back to Yerevan except to say he would come by the hotel the next day at noon.

8
    Yerevan, Armenia
    1974
     
    Francesco Martucci was emotionally exhausted. He left Claudio at the hotel door and headed for his humble abode. The room he rented belonged to a widow and her daughter who lived in one room of the house and rented out the remaining three to other families. His refuge was at the back of the house, with no view except onto the backyard of a similarly run-down house. He could have lived better. Yet, despite the leverage afforded by his post as a professor of history and archeology, Francesco Martucci was used to a simple life. Everything in Yerevan was controlled by the communist system, and he felt fortunate to have a room of his own. Things had