A smile, almost condescending. 'Not exactly, but very, very close. There are a number of plates that rub up against each other. One may override another or submerge under it, usually with cata… cata…'
'Catastrophic,' Jason supplied.
'Ah, so. For instance, the plate that is the Indian subcontinent slid under the larger Asian plate a few years ago, causing a massive earthquake. The San Andreas Fault is the line between the plate to which North America belongs and that of the Pacific Ocean. One daytomorrow, aeons from now-everything west of that line is likely to slip into the sea.'
Submersion of the Hollywood glitterati was a pleasing thought. Likely to raise the average IQ of both the Pacific and United States.
'Along these fault lines, the magma below sometimes boils to the surface. Volcanoes are least common where there is no fault line activity.'
'I don't recall any volcanoes in the western United States.' Jason said.
Kamito grinned yet again, explaining as though to a small child. 'Possibly the largest volcano in the world is in the western United States, We call it Yellowstone National Park.'
It took Jason a moment be sure he had heard right. In the meantime, the chemist continued. 'Not all volcanoes are above surface to begin with. If you consider the amount of thermal springs that regularly erupt under pressure-Old Faithful, for instance-there must be huge amounts of pressure in the area. It can go dormant or, in days or aeons, erupt, taking Montana and Wyoming with it.'
Not as gratifying as California dropping into the ocean.
'Okay, I get the picture, but the Mediterranean basin is a little large. Could you be more specific?'
Kamito shook his head, the overhead lights shooting rainbow-colored streaks from his glasses. 'Afraid not- not my area of expertise.' He reached into a desk drawer, fumbled around, and produced a card, handing it across the desk. 'Call Maria Bergenghetti; take her what's left of what you people sent me. She's one of the world's top volcanologists.'
Kamito stood, extending a hand; the interview was over.
Jason studied the card, hardly surprised it was in Italian. Like those of most of her countrymen, her business card bore a bewildering list of phone numbers. 'Exactly which one of these should I call?'
'The agency surely knows how to find people. Or you could try calling her office and asking where she is.'
JOURNAL OF SEVERENUS TACTUS
Cave of the Sibyl
Cumae, Gulf of Naples
Campania, Italy
Nones Iunius (June 1)
Thirty-Seventh Year of the
Reign of Augustus Caesar (a.d. 10)
My feet felt as though they were encased in lead, so full of dread was I, almost as frightened of what I would hear as of my impending trip to the netherworld. My guide was silent, the only sound sandals on stone and the cooing of doves. ^1
I inhaled deeply, tasting the musty odor of earth mixed with rancid lamp oil. I saw the cave was largely man- made. Large, regularly spaced openings let in the light, making the dark shadows seem even blacker and obscuring my guide in the gloom. From somewhere in front of me a dim light grew brighter, and there was a moaning, keening sound like no human voice I had ever heard.
Then I saw her.
She sat on the stone floor of a tiny room, the oldest person I had ever seen, the woman who had asked for eternal life but not youth. A guttering lamp emphasized deep furrows the centuries had plowed in the sagging flesh of her face. Her uncovered head was bald, and she drooled from a toothless mouth. ^2 Scattered around her were hundreds of tiny oak leaves. I watched her write on one, set it down, and begin another. According to Virgil, nearly a century past, she was composing prophesies. Should a breeze scatter her work, she would not rearrange the leaves.
She looked up with eyes as dull as unpolished stones, and I saw she was blinded by cataracts.
But how could she write if…
She either saw or sensed me, for she pointed a sticklike finger, its arthritic joints the size of chestnuts, before throwing herself onto her back and writhing with an animation that belied her age. She was mumbling something I could not comprehend. It was only outside that my guide repeated the words she had spoken, something in verse that sounded like [translation]:
'To meet your father you will go,
Even though he is not there below.
No harm are you about to receive, If you are one who will believe.' ^3
I waited for her to finish for a full minute before realizing she had begun to snore.
'But what am I…?' I asked the priest when he had given me her prophecy.
My only answer was the production of a clay dish held by the attendant who had led me in. It was time to leave an offering for the gods in payment for the prophecy.
I reached into my subucularm ^4 for my purse. 'But… but I have no idea what she meant. I mean, she made no sense.'
But then, sibyls didn't have to.
Although I had never been there, legend and literature were full of the riddles spoken by the Delphic oracle in Greece, as well as this Cumae Sibyl. If the priest's rendition was verbatim, she had delivered hers in almost perfect trochee. ^5
Sensing the growing impatience of the cloaked figure, I dropped a gold denarius onto the plate. Far more valuable than indecipherable prophecy, but it does not pay to be cheap when dealing with the gods.
Leaving the cave, I climbed the gentle hill to the temple of Jupiter. Actually, the temple of Zeus, I suppose, since the Greeks had originally built Cumae, as they had most of southern Italy. Had the Sibyl been here then? No matter-I left another gold coin at the foot of the god's statue that stared off across the sea as though it might he searching for Aeneas fleeing the ashes of Troy. Satisfied I had done all I could, I took the path down to the city gate, where the groom held my horse that would take me the few miles south to Baia.
And to Hades.
NOTES
1. Doves, pigeons, and even swallows abound in ancient descriptions, symbols, and pictures of oracles. Since no form of prophecy can continue long without being right occasionally, many scholars believe that carrier birds were used to bring immediate news of far-off events that could then be 'prophesied' weeks or even months before the news arrived.
2. While the oracle at Delphi supposedly made her forecasts under the influence of narcotic gases from a cleft in the earth, the Cumae Sibyl is commonly believed to have made her predictions while in an epileptic seizure.
3. By 'translating' the ravings of an epileptic, the priests could often utilize the information gained as noted in 1, above. They were certainly adept at ambiguity.
4. The subucular is commonly translated as a shirt. Actually, it served more as an undergarment. Severenus was carrying his money in such an unusual way as to suggest he had reason to fear of robbers.
5. The long-short meter of the seven types of Latin verse.
PART III
Chapter Thirteen
