“Hmmm,” the scrivener said ponderously.
“More problems?” Erik sounded tense.
Griffin referred to his photos of the symbols and then back to the boulder again. “You see these markings just here? They don’t seem to match any of the characters we have.”
“Great!” Cassie exclaimed. “We came all this way to translate two lines that don’t tell us anything yet.”
“Oh, ye of little faith,” the scrivener intoned. “Give me a few moments to sort this out.” He sat down cross-legged on the ground in front of the stone and stared at it.
Cassie thought he’d gone into a trance because he continued to stare at it for about ten minutes without moving. She groaned. This didn’t look good. What were they missing?
“Would this help?” Erik asked laconically as he held out the granite key toward Griffin.
“What?” the scrivener looked up at him distractedly, not realizing what he was holding. Then recognition dawned. “Good grief, where did you get that?”
“You left it behind at the hotel. I thought it might be important, so I brought it with me.”
Griffin took the stone key contemplatively. “Despite my initial ideas about the key, I’ve come to the conclusion we don’t need it physically at all. In fact, I’m not quite sure what good it will do to—” He stopped short and caught his breath. “Hello, what’s this?”
Cassie shone her flashlight up at Erik. “Do you know what he’s talking about?”
The security coordinator rolled his eyes. “I hardly ever know what he’s talking about.”
Griffin was on his knees in front of the boulder again, trying to fit the granite key into the slot in the large rock.
Erik and Cassie both focused their beams on the hollow spot on the boulder.
After Griffin positioned the key, he studied it for a minute. “No, that’s not it,” he murmured half to himself. He rotated the stone cylinder and tried fitting it into the slot again. “Not quite yet.” Rotating it yet again, he leaned back on his heels to consider. “Ingenious!” he exclaimed, his voice filled with admiration.
Cassie leaned forward to peer over his shoulder. “What is?”
Erik held his flashlight steady over the key.
“You see these markings on the boulder, just here?” Griffin asked her.
“What about them?”
“They constitute half of a symbol. The other half is on the edge of the key itself.” It would be the same as if I did this.” He took one of the pages of symbol photographs and drew a line across the row of hieroglyphs, bisecting each of them through the middle.
“I get it.” Cassie nodded approvingly. “Those hash marks on each edge of the key. They’re actually the top half of a symbol.”
“Yes, but the trick is to know which side of the key to fit into the groove on the boulder. The key has five sides, hence five edges with half symbols.” Griffin observed the boulder again. “I believe I’ve aligned them properly now. Let me try to translate the next line.”
He sat back down in a cross-legged position. Cassie held a flashlight over his various note papers, so he could write unencumbered while Erik held a light over the inscription on the boulder.
It took Griffin another fifteen minutes of muttering and leafing through his notes to finish the job. “Aha!” he exclaimed. “A useful clue at last!”
His companions exchanged an eager look.
“It reads: ‘At the home of the Mountain Mother.’”
Cassie felt more than a little deflated.
Sensing her reaction, Griffin protested, “Just be glad I was able to make it sound even that intelligible. Linear B is not a language that lends itself well to poetry. I might as well be using an accounting glossary to write blank verse!”
The pythia relented. “I know you’re doing the best you can.”
“Moreover, that line isn’t as cryptic as you might think.” The scrivener smiled for the first time. “The term ‘Mountain Mother’ is a very precise epithet for the goddess. It was used specifically in connection with her place of worship on Mount Ida.”
“So that line gives us a place to look?” Cassie asked uncertainly. “There’s a mountain on Crete that’s called Ida?”
“Exactly so,” Griffin affirmed. “And a peak sanctuary where the great goddess was venerated. The home, if you will, of the Mountain Mother.”
Erik rubbed his head wearily. “Time for a recap. What does the message say when you put it all together?”
Griffin referred to his notes. “The entire text now reads: ‘You will find the first of five you seek, when the soul of the lady rises with the sun, at the home of the Mountain Mother.’”
“So, we know how many relics there are and where the first one is hidden,” the security coordinator mused out loud.
“All that remains is to solve the riddle of the second line,” Griffin added. “A task which cannot be accomplished here. Might I suggest we continue this discussion in more comfortable surroundings?”
Cassie stood up, dusting off her jeans. “It looks like we’ve got our work cut out for us.”
From out of nowhere, an arm shot out across her throat, pulling her backwards. She could feel a gun barrel pointed at her temple.
A voice with a southern accent punctuated the darkness. “I’d say your work is just about done, folks.”
Chapter 38 – Rock and Roll
Griffin and Erik sent the beams of their flashlights in the direction of the voice. They revealed a man with one arm across Cassie’s neck and the other pointing a pistol at her head.
“Now, you boys don’t want to do anything foolish, do you? Get this young lady killed or somethin’ like that?” he drawled. “Hands up where I can see ‘em, fellers.”
“Who are you?” Griffin demanded, raising his arms above his head.
“It’s him,” Cassie said shakily. “It’s the man who killed my sister.” In all her fantasies of confronting Leroy Hunt, she had never imagined this scenario. Her visions had always included a cordon of policemen standing between her and her sister’s murderer while she hurled taunts
