The Magician's Sons

Chapter 35

It was a tight squeeze through the first long tunnel, but once Copper had reached the end of it, he found himself in a larger passage which stretched on, seemingly without end, and branched off into many other corridors.

He felt nervous. But why should he? Mordechai had given him perfect directions. He thought he remembered them still, although, he had been so sleepy the morning before that everything felt foggy now.

Let's see...Father said to take a left, I believe. He walked in that direction. And then a right? He wasn't sure. He followed his guess, took another left and then felt giddy as he realized he was getting close to his prize. He didn't know how to gauge how far a quarter of a mile was, but he walked straight ahead, prodding the ground in front of him with his hoe in search of the treasure hole. Yards and yards passed by. Nothing valuable turned up.

Oh dear! I must have taken a wrong turn! This can't be right! he thought in confusion. Maybe I remembered wrong! Yes, that's it! It was a right turn then a left and another right, wasn't it? That must have been it!

He ran back in the direction he had come from. But now, things were getting really difficult. How far had he travelled? Which passage was the one he had entered through last?

It's this one, I think, he decided, choosing a tunnel at random and crawling through to the other side. But how could he be sure? The boy's heart started pounding with panic as he spun around in circles searching for a familiar scene. He couldn't find anything. All of the tunnels looked alike, and yet, all of them led to different places.

"Porgy! Vernon! Ozzy! Where are you?" he shouted. His voice echoed into the distance. Then he waited, but nothing except the squeaking of rats and the scratching of their feet met his ears.

"Oh help! What've I done?" he whimpered to himself. Dread gripped him. Fear started wrapping its cold arms around him. "I'm all alone. Nobody knows just where I am! I don't even think Father could find me in this maze!"

Stories which Gibbs had told him came back to his mind as he stood there trembling. He had been told that shoremen always hunted in threes or fours so they could ward off rats and protect each other. He had no one nearby. He had no protection.

Suddenly, the legendary treasure lost all of its shine in his eyes. What good was gold if he died trying to find it? He had to get back to the main tunnel and get out before the tide came up. But which way would lead him out?

Running from corridor to corridor, Copernicus tried to remember. Some of the passageways were too big to be the tunnel he had started from. Others were small, musty, and dark.

I heard Gibbs say, once, that some little passages have no air in 'em! If a man goes down the wrong one, he'll suffocate!

He had heard other things too. Once, in a taunting way, Gibbs had told him an odd horror story. True or false, you be the judge, but the shoremen said that, once, a farmer's sow had run off. She had found her way into the sewers from the river entrance, and there, lost in the labyrinth, she had born a litter of piglets who had grown into a violent breed of wild hogs. Rumor had it that they were always roaming the distant tunnels, living off of rats and scraps of refuse.

"Their eyes glow in the dark," Gibbs had teased. "And when they see you, they give a squeal before they charge and rip you limb from limb!"

As the recollection ran through Copper's mind, one of the rats gave a loud squeak, and Copernicus almost jumped out of his skin. With a cry of terror, he started running—frantically searching for any way of escape.