“Look!” Kozak said, and peering into the hole, Slater could see that the GPR had been right. A veritable tunnel had been dynamited through the earth and it lay there now like an open streambed. The church teetered over it precariously. Still, if the building had managed to remain standing for the past century, what were the chances it would choose tonight to collapse?
Clutching the scabbard between his teeth, Slater shimmied into the hole, flashlight in hand. The passage was wider than he might have expected—good news for Kozak, who was going to have to follow him—but the floor of the church was grazing his head the whole way. The ground was as hard as rock, and his ribs hurt like hell every time he had to pull himself a few feet forward. The air, what there was of it, smelled like the deepest, dankest cellar, and after going only ten or fifteen feet, the tilt of the church made any further progress impossible. Squirming onto his back and aiming the flashlight at the floorboards above his head, Slater found a gap between two of the planks and, removing the knife from its scabbard, wedged the blade into it. As he worked it back and forth, shavings trickled down onto his face, and he had to blow them away. Eventually, a hole opened—a hole big enough for him to put his fingers through. He pulled down, and after several tugs, the wood cracked. He was reminded of the splintering of the coffin lid in the graveyard. He pulled again, but it was hard to get the proper leverage. Taking a breath and turning his face sideways to protect his eyes, he let go of the flashlight and used both hands to pry the board loose. This time it came away, leaving a gap big enough for him to lift his head through like a periscope.
He was in the nave, a few yards in front of the iconostasis.
Ducking again, he squeezed his field pack through the hole and hacked at the neighboring plank until he was able to loosen it enough to push it aside. With considerable effort, he was able to haul himself up into the church, but only barely. Kozak would need more room, and so, before he signaled him to follow, he chopped at a third board until the hole was as wide as a manhole cover. Then, he sat back and took a deep breath, rubbing his rib cage.
From below, he heard Kozak’s voice echoing along the tunnel. “Is it clear? Are you in?”
Slater bent to the hole and whistled through the sawdust on his lips. He could hear a muffled huffing and puffing as Kozak, big but strong, hauled himself along the frozen ground. He imagined this must be what a bear sounded like as it prepared its den for a winter’s hibernation. When he saw his flashlight beam growing bright, Slater slipped his head down into the hole and saw Kozak’s eyeglasses glinting in the darkness. Slater put his hand down, and Kozak grabbed it with his leather glove. Slater pulled, his ribs giving him a jolt, and the professor eventually emerged from the tunnel, scraped, sputtering, and covered with dirt and ice and bits of wood.
“Next time,” he said, “a bigger hole, please.”
Slater smiled.
But as Kozak, his legs still dangling underground, gazed around the church, illuminated only by the feeble glow of the flashlights and the moonlight filtering in through the cracks in the roof beams and the holes in the dome, he looked like a kid at a carnival. “It’s all ours!” he whispered.
“Not for long,” Slater replied. “Let’s go find that sacristy.”
Kozak got to his feet and lumbered across the sloping floor toward the jumble of wreckage concealing the iconostasis screen. “You look at that end, and I’ll look at this,” Kozak said, stepping close to the pile of broken furniture and twisted andirons.
“And what exactly am I looking for?”
“You are at the south end, so you will be looking for the entrance—a door with a picture of St. Michael, the Defender of the Faith.”
“How will I know it’s him?”
“He’ll probably be carrying a sword. I’ll be looking for the exit door, which should show the Archangel Gabriel, the Messenger of God.”
“Which one do we want?”
“Whichever one happens to be open.”
Slater pressed his face toward the screen, trying to peer through the debris. His flashlight picked up flecks of paint—in red and gold and blue—on old whitewashed boards. Here and there, he could even see the outlines of angels and saints and, in one place, what looked like it might have been a painting of Noah’s Ark.
“In grand cathedrals,” Kozak said, while inspecting his own end, “these screens were ornately decorated and went all the way to the ceiling.”
This one went nearly that high, and in its own day Slater imagined that it, too, had been beautiful in its own simple fashion.
“I have found Gabriel,” Kozak exulted, “and he is blowing his horn.”
“To welcome us in?”
“No, the door is nailed shut and boarded over. Very unusual.”
Kozak came down toward Slater’s end. “Maybe we will have better luck with St. Michael.”