'And how the hell did anybody get down here to cut them?'
He hung on to the niche nearest him and studied the pattern in the cliff
face. 'Why would anybody go to all that amount of trouble?' He could
think of no reason nor purpose. 'Who did this work? What would they want
down here?' It was an intriguing mystery.
Then suddenly something else caught his eye. It was a circular
indentation in the rock, precisely between the two rows of niches and
above the high-water mark. From so far below it looked to be perfectly
round - another shape that was not natural.
He paddled further around, trying to reach a position from which he
would have a clearer view of it. It seemed to be some sort of rock
engraving, a plaque that reminded him strongly of those marks in the
black boulders that flank the Nile below the first cataract at Aswan,
placed there in antiquity to measure the flood levels of the river
waters. But the light was too poor and the angle too acute for him to be
certain that it was man-made, let alone to recognize or read any script
or lettering that might have been incorporated in the design.
Hoping to devise some way of climbing closer, he tried to use the stone
niches as aids. With a great deal of effort, usin them as foot- and
hand-holds, he managed to lift himself out of the water. But the
distances between holds were too great and he fell back with a splash,
swallowing more water.
'Take it easy, my lad - you still have to swim out of here. No profit in
exhausting yourself. You will just have to come back another day to get
a closer look at whatever it is up there.'
Only then did he realize how close he was to total exhaustion. This
water coming down from the Choke mountains was still cold with the
memories of the high snows. He was shivering until his teeth chattered.
'Not far from hypothermia. Have to get out of here now, while you still
have the strength.'
Reluctantly he pushed himself away from the wall of rock and paddled
towards the narrow opening through which the Dandera river resumed the
headlong rush to join her mother Nile. He felt the current pick him up
and bear him forward, and he stopped swimming and let it take him.
'The Devil's roller-coaster!' he told himself. 'Down and down she goes,
and where she stops nobody knows.'
The first set of rapids battered him. They seemed endless, but at last
he was spewed out into the run of slower water below them. He floated on
his back, taking full advantage of this respite, and looked upwards.
There was very little light showing above him, for the rock almost met
overhead. The air was dank and dark and stank of bats. However, there
was little time to examine his surroundings, for once again the river
began to roar ahead of him. He braced himself rilentally for the assault
of turbulent waters, and went cascading down the next steep slide.
After a while he lost track of how far he had been carried, and how many
cataracts he had survived. It was a constant battle against the cold and
the pain of sodden lungs and strained muscle and overtaxed sinew. The
river mauled him.
Suddenly the light changed. After the gloom at the bottom of the high
