Ancient Echoes

CHAPTER 49



THAT AFTERNOON, MICHAEL was alone at the stables. Earlier, the village men took the others away to work. His arm felt much better already, and he wondered about the poultice Ben Olgerbee had used.

In the distance, he saw Ben Olgerbee walk by.

The word “wizened” came to mind to describe Olgerbee, a small, thin man who walked with a stoop, his chest concave. Wizened cheeks. Wizened hair. Wizened...Michael thought of a similar word. Wizard.

Something made him decide to follow the man.

Past the stables, near the fence that circled the village, a trap door lay flat on the ground. Olgerbee opened it and descended steep steps, then lit a torch and shut the door behind him.

Michael waited until he thought Olgerbee might have walked away, and then opened the door and hurried into the dark, narrow tunnel. When he shut the door behind him, he saw only a faint bit of light in the distance.

Michael hurried to catch up to Olgerbee, whose torch led him through a dark, narrow tunnel away from the village. Michael grew increasingly more claustrophobic with every step. Fifteen minutes passed before they stepped out of the tunnel near a steep, rocky rise.

Tucked away behind tumbled boulders along its base was the entrance to a cave. Olgerbee went inside.

Michael waited. He expected Olgerbee to come out any moment. When he didn't, Michael inched closer.

He didn't expect to be able to see much at all in the darkened cave, but to his amazement, torches fastened to the stone walls lit the way.

Michael crept along the wall until the tunnel opened to a wide room.

Olgerbee sat on the ground, eyes shut as if meditating. Before him lay pure gold nuggets. Numerous nuggets. Piles of them. A fortune in them.

Idaho had seen a few gold strikes, but most had been mined out. Michael saw gold the size of one and two inch river rocks, smooth as eggs and oval shaped. He couldn't even imagine where such gold had been found. It couldn't have been veins of gold ore, but must have been from some river to have been worn so smooth, but he'd never heard of panned gold being that size.

“Who's there?” Olgerbee cried. As he roused from his golden reverie, he glanced about in suspicion.

Michael didn't move in hopes Olgerbee would assume the sound came from one of the many creatures that walked the forest and caves.

When Olgerbee stopped listening, Michael quietly backed out of the cave and hid near its mouth to wait for Olgerbee to leave.

He didn't have to wait long.

As Olgerbee headed back to the village, Michael snuck into the cave.

Alone, the gold looked even more wondrous, the quality and quantity more unbelievable, than he'd imagined.

He truly understood why people considered it the most perfect of all metals, and why, in every civilization, it had been valued and often used in worship.

A small golden box lay in the back of the cave. The box, about one cubic foot, reminded him of a tabernacle—where Catholics house the consecrated host—with doors that opened from the front to reveal the contents.

A simple hook and eye clasp with no lock held the double doors shut. He opened it.

Inside he found an old, grimy bowl made from some thick metal, possibly iron. He lifted it out. It felt heavy, the inside coated with a sooty substance, and looked quite poor and cheap among all this gold. Why someone put it in a place of honor was anyone's guess. It’s slightly sulfuric odor told him nothing.

Under the bowl lay some sort of book. The cover seemed too grow warm at his touch…as if there were a connection between him and this book. His heart pounded.

When Charlotte told him about Book of Abraham the Jew, she said it was bound with a cover of brass, and written on some sort of delicate rinds.

He opened the cover and found the leaves weren't paper, not even parchment, but could well be what Nicolas Flamel described in his writings.

The first page had greatly faded writing on it, a very stylized script that formed words in classical Greek. Michael had studied both Greek and Latin.

Upon the first leaf, written with large albeit faint gold capital letter, he read, “Abraham the Jew, Prince, Levite...”

This was it! The book that had been rumored about for centuries, argued over, sought…and here it was.

He carefully turned a page. The leaves felt fragile. He feared the material might crumble in his hand.

Some pages were filled with writing that would take time and effort to translate. Others were painted with symbols—the god Mercury, a Caducean rod with two serpents, an old man with an hour glass and a scythe, flowers, dragons, griffons, a rose tree, a king, infants, mothers weeping at the feet of soldiers, and on and on.

It made no sense to Michael. Maybe this was why a scholar of the Kabbalah had been needed.

Time passed quickly. He put everything back the way he had found it. He knew he had to get back before anyone realized he was gone and where he had been. Yet, here, in his hands, he had held the knowledge that men sought for several millennia. And walking away from it was difficult.