Chapter 4

Helen and John followed the white gravel stones like a trail of breadcrumbs through the Yucatán jungle. Druitt had grabbed what supplies he could from the jeep, insisting Helen travel light given her injury. The wind had picked up in earnest, whipping tree limbs and leaves in their faces as they trekked through the muddy ground. The rain, which had started off as a soft, warm sprinkle, was falling steadily now, pelting at them like an angry Mayan god.

After nearly half an hour of walking, they reached what looked like a limestone outcropping covered in vines. No temple. No city. No ancient ruins. The white way simple stopped.

Helen slipped the pack off her shoulders and sat down, the rain drenching her, her head throbbing.

"It's a dead end, John," Magnus said, holding her head in her hands, her mood souring with her growing pain.

John set down the supplies he was carrying and walked closer to the massive stones, gazing at them intently. "The Mayans never did anything without purpose, Helen," he replied.

Druitt walked around the boulders, which towered a good 15 feet over his 6'4" frame. Most of them were covered with dirt and moss. If he hadn't glimpsed the top white stone, he might have thought he'd walked into a dirt wall, so hidden was it by the surrounding jungle. He turned a corner and felt a gust of air coming from behind a spot covered in pink flowering vines. John pulled back the vines and stared.

"Helen? I presume you have a torch in your pack?" John asked.

Helen looked up and answered him through the mounting rain. "Of course, why?"

"Because I seem to have found our shelter," Druitt said.

The cavern was massive. Water dripped from its porous limestone ceiling forming small pools of clear liquid that dotted the floor. Stalactites clung desperately to the roof, some dropping all of the 20 feet down meeting stalagmites and forming massive columns that rose up like giants in the darkness.

"This is incredible," Magnus said, scanning the cavern with her light revealing formation upon formation. "Look, John," she said, flashing her light toward the back of the cavern, "There's more fissures back there. This cave system could go on for miles."

"It very well could," Druitt agreed.

"Do you think the Maya used this as some sort of ceremonial place? Why else would they create a white way from here to the cenote?" she asked. "John?" she called out when he didn't respond.

"Over here." She saw his light in the distance and followed it and the sound of his voice.

"Look," he said to her when she walked up beside him. He flashed his light on a particularly large formation dripping with water. At the base of it sat 9 idols with amphibian like features and long fangs.

"Do you know who it is?" Helen asked.

"Chaac," John said, examining one of the statues. "Mayan God of rain."

Helen bent down to get a closer look. "It looks like an altar of some kind. There's pottery, grindstones….gifts to the God?"

John nodded. "It would seem so."

A drop of water hit her head. Then another. And another. She flashed her light upward. The water was seeping faster now. The storm outside was intensifying.

"John," she said, pointing her light toward the ceiling. "There's more water coming in from above. This cavern may very well flood in a heavy rainstorm. We should get to higher ground."

"You're right." Druitt stood up and scanned the area looking for a ledge, something they could move to.

"There," he said. "Do you think you can climb that?"

She nodded. "Not much choice, really."

They worked their way up the limestone ledge, John taking the bulk of the supplies and Helen following after him. It was high and flat, a good place to build camp and wait out the hurricane that would soon be pounding the Yucatán peninsula.

John pulled out Helen's sleeping bag and unrolled it urging her to lie down. He'd watched her throughout the day. She would deny it if he asked her directly, but she was fading.

"Do you have any dry clothes?" he asked, concerned about the dampness of the cave and the extent of her head injury. She shook her head. She reached for the medical kit and her canteen and swallowed four more pain pills. "You know, you've had too many of those on an empty stomach, Helen. You should eat something. I assume there are provisions in these packs?"

"Over there," she said, flashing her light on a green back pack. He opened it up and handed her an energy bar. "There's a lantern too, if you need some more light," she told him. "And a fire starter, some dry kindling, and a small pack of wood. It won't last long, but it should help warm us a bit, save our batteries for a time."

John nodded. Helen Magnus was always a woman prepared.

He worked on the fire. She reclined on the sleeping bag, back against a thankfully dry section of limestone wall, doing an inventory of their provisions. When John had finished, he unpacked his duster across from her and laid it on the floor, making a makeshift bedroll for himself. He looked across the firelight at Helen. She lay against the wall; eyes closed now, long brown hair in tangles around her. Even in her disheveled, injured state, she was beautiful.

"You should move closer to the fire, Helen. Try to get warm. Dry your clothes," he urged softly. She opened her eyes and nodded, scooting her bedroll underneath her and moved up to the fire. It'd been a long time since John Druitt had seen Helen Magnus in firelight.

It was Christmas, 1886. Helen had come with John to Newcastle to meet his parents. Long after his mother and father had retired, John laid awake in his room, fire dimming, thinking of Helen, his future, what their life would be like together. He would propose to her in early spring. He'd already informed James and Nigel. He'd even found the perfect ring. He just needed the money to pay for it.

A quiet rap on the door, and John rose to open it. It was her. Blonde curls hanging carelessly down her back, across her shoulders. Her white gown, decorated with lace at the wrists and neck, made her look like an angel in the dim light of the hallway. She smiled at him, that full on mischievous smile she sometimes wore. "Look outside, John," she whispered. "It's snowing!" John turned around to see puffy flakes of white drifting silently past his window. "So it is," he said, turning back around, returning her smile. He wanted her so badly. Needed her so much. "Come and watch it with me a while?" he asked, his voice breaking, his heart pounding. She smiled at him, knowing full well where this night would lead. "Of course," she said, and took his hand. The firelight danced across her golden hair.

John looked up, shaking the memory away. Helen sat across from him, her sleeping bag wrapped around her for warmth. Her bandage, he noticed, was sopped with blood.

"Helen, you're head. It's bleeding again," Druitt said. She reached up to touch it and pulled her hand back down her fingers red. "Damn it," she cursed. She reached for the medical kit but John was already beside her. "Let me," he said. He held one hand on her cheek to steady her, the other dabbed the blood away. "This needs stitches," he remarked. "I know," she concurred.

He knelt, bare-chested, in front of her, his shirt hanging loosely on his shoulders. He redressed her wound, gently brushing her hair out of the way to do so. His hand was warm against her cheek, and his breath caressed her face. The quiet of the cave, the firelight, the sheer proximity of him sent a shiver through her, and she closed her eyes to steady herself. After all these years, after so much that had passed between them, how could he still affect her so?

He cleaned the wound, packed it with gauze, and sealed it with tape. He leaned back to look at her. "There," he said, smiling and brushing Helen's hair gently out of her eyes, lingering perhaps a moment longer than was necessary. She thought he was done when he reached up and took a strand of her hair, holding it loosely in his hand, gazing at it.

"When did you change your hair?" he asked quietly, caressing the brunette strands between his fingers.

She was thrown by the question. "Years ago, why?"

"Just…curious is all," he said.

"You don't like it?" she asked, not fully knowing why she asked or of what consequence it should be to her what John Druitt thought or didn't think of her choices.

"No, I do. It's beautiful," he said softly. "But it was beautiful when we were young as well. I only…wondered." Then he let the strands drop, and moved back to his side of the fire.

"Thank you," she replied. She didn't know what else to say.