Sweat ran down her face, smearing the dirt encrusting her skin, making small tracks like tears, but she did not weep. “There has to be a way out,” she whispered hoarsely, tearing herself free of him, going to the wall behind her nephew’s sleeping bag, flashing her beam over it. If there had been a passage there, it was now filled with what appeared to be the same kind of fresh rock fall that blocked the one through which they had entered. Suddenly, before he realized what she was doing, she began to run, crouched over to avoid the low ceiling of the cavern. She beat at the solid stone with her hands, casting her flashlight beam this way and that, sobbing harshly but without tears. She splashed into the little stream, across the tiny pool and out the other side, and begin digging frantically at the loose rubble where Max’s foot had been caught. More rock began to fall, a large boulder breaking loose from the wall near her head tumbled into the pool, splashing water over her filthy yellow slicker.
