The Devil's Cave: A Bruno Courrèges Investigation (Bruno Chief of Police 5)

the map in advance? Why hadn’t he realized that if someone had used the tunnel, they might still be there, or they might have sealed the far end? Maybe he should go back into the cave and follow her through the tunnel. At least the route was known and he’d be certain to find her. No, he had to stick to the original plan. If he got to the ruined chapel and there was no sign of Isabelle and he could not find his way in, that would be the time to retrace his tracks.
    He braked hard as he came to a fork in the road. Cursing,he looked at the map but the light was going. He stepped out to examine it close to his headlamps. He glanced at the setting sun, knowing that was west, and then he used his finger to follow his route from the cave. He found the fork, and saw he was almost there. He roughly folded the map and jumped back into the van, took the right fork and drove more slowly, looking for a turnoff to the left that would take him down to the beginning of the valley that held the ruins of the abandoned village of St Philippon.
    He found the turnoff. With his lights on high beam he saw the stark outline of the crumbling cross on the roof of the chapel. He braked, left the engine running and the lights shining into the ruin, calling Isabelle’s name as he stumbled forward and almost fell over the shallow hillocks of the graves.
    Calm down, Bruno, he told himself. Walk back to the van and get the torch. Check the ground before your feet. If you break an ankle it won’t help Isabelle, stuck in the belly of the earth. Remember what the Baron said: the entrance is hidden in the ruins of the chapel. He made himself stop and examine what was left of the structure. About six metres deep and four wide, the roof was formed of
lauze
, the thick slabs of limestone that locked into one another, supporting themselves without wooden beams. About a third of the roof had gone. The gable end had been rotted by the relentless growth of vegetation so that the cross it supported leaned drunkenly, poised to follow the
lauzes
down into the chapel’s nave.
    The door was just a memory. He shone his torch inside over the confusion of tumbled stone. If there had been a trap-door in the floor, it was long since buried. But somebody hadused this tunnel recently; there had to be a way in. He went outside and studied the walls and surrounding ground. He tried to rock at the nearest gravestones but they were solidly fixed. He went back into the chapel and looked again. The only structure that seemed solid was the altar, a long stretch of pale stone. Why would a remote chapel such as this have something so solid and handsome?
    Bruno tried vainly to lift the huge slab. He bent down to examine and then knock and probe the front and sides of the altar. At the rear the stone was different; three separate squat flags supported the great weight of the altar. He shone his torch onto the floor and was heartened to see scratch marks on the flags by the central stone. He pushed at the top, at the bottom and then felt just a hint of movement. Finally he pushed at one side and the stone, almost a metre high and nearly as wide, swivelled and opened.
    He pointed his torch into the gap and saw steps going down. They looked even steeper and cruder than the ones in the cave. But at least he’d found the entrance. He leaned in and called Isabelle’s name, but heard no reply.
    He sat back and considered. He’d done quite enough rushing into things this evening. He went back to his van and turned off the lights and the engine. He disentangled Balzac from the fishing line and tucked the puppy into the front of his uniform shirt. In the glove compartment he found spare batteries he’d bought in a rare moment of forethought. He took his small hiking rucksack, put in his first-aid kit, a bottle of water and a stretch of nylon rope. He checked his phone but there was no signal in this remote place, so he pulledout a notepad and scribbled down the numbers of the
Mairie
, J-J and the Baron, saying where he’d gone and at what time, and stuck it under his windscreen wiper. Then he went back into the chapel and squeezed through the hole beneath the altar and down into the darkness.
    The light from his torch revealed that he was in some kind of crypt, four rough stone walls probably built at the same time as the chapel above. The floor was made of gravestones, except for one corner where there was a stone-lipped hole with similar steep steps leading down. The steps gave