Trapped

I closed my eyes. Surely, this was a nightmare. But, when I looked again, the chest and the skeleton were still there, a few feet in front of me.

The room was taller than the tunnel. I could stand upright.  And, it wasn’t as dark as the tunnel. The sound of the sea was deafening and the air was fresh, cold, and salty, and light filtered in. I was very near the water.

My feet seemed to move with no direction from me not backward and out of this place like any sensible person, but forward, closer to the trunk and the bones. My flashlight revealed that the pitiful human remains were clothed in a few fragments that must have been shirt and trousers. A thousand questions swam through my brain. And, curiosity. Once again, that consuming curiosity. The lid of the trunk was open and empty, except for something, a bright, round something that lay in one corner.

Had I found a hiding place of that fabled Spanish treasure I’d heard about? Was it a real story and not just a legend? If so, someone must have taken whatever was inside. And, what about the person who sat against it, as if guarding it? I looked closely and my heart froze. Squarely in the middle of that bony head was a round hole.

So, this man had not, of his own will, stayed in this dark place. Someone had made sure he didn’t leave. A murder had happened here beneath my house, how many years ago? Had the trunk held money or jewels?

With the sea pounding a few feet away from me, I tried to make sense of this. Perhaps two people had dug the tunnel, maybe two people who once lived where I did. But, if this were so, only one of them left with the treasure and made sure the second one didn’t follow him.

Once again, I looked inside the trunk. Could that one object be all that was left of a fabled treasure? Bending forward, I tried to pick it up. It seemed to be stuck. I gave it a hard tug and it came loose in my hand, but as it did, a horrible grinding noise filled the cave. Whirling, I looked behind me. A boulder slid from the ceiling and crashed to the floor, covering the opening in the tunnel.

I couldn’t breathe. My heart hammered and coherent thought fled. No! This couldn’t be happening. I ran to the covered doorway and hammered on that cold, solid rock. Using my flashlight, I beat on it. Nothing moved. The stones were cold, big, and heavy. My doorway to freedom had closed. I was alone, far beneath the ground, with a long-dead person for company, and nobody knew where I was. Collapsing onto the floor, I sobbed.