The Emperor's Tomb полностью

“Shiji’s creator was the grand historian of the Han dynasty, Sima Qian. He supposedly consulted imperial records and traveled widely, learning from private documents, libraries, and personal recollections. Unfortunately, Qian eventually lost his emperor’s favor. He was castrated and imprisoned, but upon his release he again became the palace secretary and completed this work.”

“He was a eunuch?” Malone asked.

Pau nodded. “Quite an influential one, too. This manuscript still enjoys immense prestige and universal admiration. It remains the single best source that exists on the First Emperor. Two of its one hundred and thirty chapters specifically address Qin Shi.”

“Written over a hundred years after he died,” Malone said.

“You know your history.”

Malone tapped his skull. “Got a mind for details.”

“You are correct. It was written a long time after the First Emperor died. But it is all we have.” Pau motioned to the top silk, brown and stained as if tea had been spilled upon it. Faded characters, written in columns, were visible.

“May I read you something?” Pau asked.

And the First Emperor was buried at Mount Li.

From the time he came to the throne, Qin Shi had begun the excavation and building at Mount Li, and when gathered into his hands the whole empire, more than 700,000 workers were sent to the site to toil.

Through three underground springs they dug, and they poured molten bronze to make the outer coffin and to make the models of the palaces, pavilions, and government offices with which the tomb was filled.

And there were marvelous tools and precious jewels and rare objects brought from afar. Artisans were ordered to fashion crossbows as traps so that any grave robbers would meet sudden death.

Using quicksilver, they made the hundred rivers of the land, the Yellow and Yangtse, and the wide sea, and machines kept the waters in motion. The constellations of the heavens were reproduced above and the regions of the earth below.

Torches were made of oil to burn for a long time. Concubines without sons were ordered to follow the emperor in death, and of the artisans and workers not one was allowed to emerge alive.

Vegetation was planted so that it appeared to be a mountain.

“No ruler before, or since,” Pau said, “has created a memorial of this magnitude. There were gardens, enclosures, gates, corner towers, and immense palaces. Even a terra-cotta army, thousands of figures who stood guard, in battle formation, ready to defend the First Emperor. The tomb complex’s total circumference is over twelve kilometers.”

“And the point?” Cassiopeia asked, impatience in her voice. “I caught the reference to torches made of oil that burned for a long time.”

“That mound still exists, just a kilometer away from the terra-cotta warrior museum. It’s now only fifty meters high—half has eroded away—but inside remains the tomb of Qin Shi.”

“Which the Chinese government will not allow to be excavated,” Malone said. “I’ve read news accounts. The site is filled with mercury. Quicksilver, as you said. They used it to simulate the rivers and oceans on the tomb floor. Ground testing a few years ago confirmed high amounts of mercury in the soil.”

“You are correct, there is mercury there. And I was the one, decades ago, who wrote the report that led to the no-excavation rule.”

Pau stood and walked across the room to another hanging silk image, this one of a portly man in long robes.