Worthless Remains (19 page)

I climbed back out of the greenhouse area the way I had come and walked confidently back towards the house by starlight, which was a mistake because my right foot disappeared into a hole in the lawn and I fell flat on my face and twisted my ankle. I sat on the ground rubbing it and shone my torch at the unexpected hole. That was definitely not supposed to be there. It was far too deep and steep-sided to have been dug by an animal, bringing to mind the spade I had run into earlier. I flashed the torch around but its weak beam did not reveal any other holes, nor the author of this one. I hobbled back to the house and into the kitchen, found ice cubes in the fridge, shook them into a carrier bag and packed that around my ankle. Then I hobbled back to bed.

‘Nighthawks,' Andrea said. We were standing with our breakfast cups of coffee by the hole I had fallen into. ‘We've got bloody nighthawks.'

‘And what are they when they're about?'

Cy joined us. ‘Thieving bastards, is what they are.'

‘For once I agree,' said Andrea. ‘Nighthawks are thieves armed with metal detectors who turn up at night on archaeological sites and dig up anything they fancy or can sell on eBay. They're after coins, jewellery, any precious metal or artefact.'

‘Metal detectorists are brainless scum. Half of the time they don't even know what they dig up or destroy.'

‘Not all of them are bad, Cy; we've had this conversation before. Some do keep records and notify us when they find something. Most are trainspotter-type people. But these chaps – and they are always men – that raid archaeological sites at night are criminals. We'll tell the police of course but I know what they'll say.'

So did I. ‘We no longer have the manpower?'

‘Yup,' said Cy, kicking at the pile of earth left beside the hole. ‘They're too busy chasing after drunks and druggies all night to protect us.'

‘Hang on a minute.' Andrea pounced on the pile of earth Cy had kicked and lifted up what looked like a lump of mud to me but made Andrea smile happily. She stood up and rubbed at the lump with her thumb until we could see it was a Roman coin. She squinted at it. ‘There you are, fourth century. We'll make an archaeologist out of you yet, Cy; you dug it up with your boot. Chris here probably disturbed them and they didn't have time to find it.'

‘They'll be back for it,' Cy said.

‘I'm afraid Cy is right. We'll have to keep eyes and ears open for the rest of the week,' said Andrea. ‘They always come back.'

Cy was visibly fuming and his hands worked into fists. ‘If I get my hands on one of them I'll ram his metal detector where the sun doesn't shine.'

Andrea fluttered her eyelids. ‘Aw, Cy, I didn't know you cared.'

When Mark Stoneking heard what had happened he was equally enraged, thumping the breakfast table. ‘Letting archaeologists dig up the lawn is one thing, but thieving nighthawks quite another. If I catch any of them I'll let them have a dose of birdshot from my twelve-bore!'

‘I wouldn't advise it,' I said, suddenly sounding like a policeman. I would have to watch that. ‘Unless you can prove your life was in danger it'll earn you a jail sentence. Mind you, I had some trouble myself a while back, so I emptied the shot out of some cartridges and replaced them with uncooked rice. Hurts like buggery but is unlikely to do much lasting damage.'

He immediately stood up. ‘Excellent idea. Any kind of rice?'

‘Obviously, Arborio would be apt if you had trouble with Italians but for your average British thief pudding rice will do.'

‘I'll go and ask Carla if she's got any. I'm not having these people creep around my house at night digging for treasure. And who knows, perhaps it was one of them who shot at Morgan. Perhaps they were trying to steal the
ballista
and it went off.'

It was a subdued team that returned to the legitimate dig under a sky of lazily moving summer cloud. Last night's incident and the subsequent questioning by police meant that many had had too little sleep and too much to drink. Guy was monosyllabic at the breakfast table and the Britons, who were moving off now, looked glum. There was no more bravado, no more jeering. The Roman legion were tidying their camp and barely gave the departing Britons a glance. Emms called the hospital and announced the news that Morgan was now ‘in a stable condition'. ‘And how stable is Guy this morning?' she asked. We were standing on the terrace while Guy finished his breakfast inside.

‘I'm not his psychiatrist. But if anything can make you jumpy, then having the chap next to you get shot usually does the trick. It didn't do much for my own Zen, I assure you. Are your digs always like this?'

‘There's usually plenty happening but this is quite exceptional, even for us. In the past we've had scaffolding collapse, all our tools stolen, a river breaking its banks and putting the site under three feet of water. We've had permission to dig withdrawn halfway through filming because of a dispute among the owners and once the diggers went on strike. You see? I'm no stranger to directing shoots under difficult conditions, but this is scary even by my standards. What do you think? Was it meant for Morgan or Guy?'

‘Your guess is as good as mine.'

‘The police have put a guard outside Morgan's room at the hospital but haven't offered to protect Guy in the same way, so they must think the dart was meant to kill the one it hit. And I don't see a single police officer here now. Are they just going to let it lie? They haven't arrested anyone for it, have they?'

‘They never ignore a violent crime like yesterday's; I wouldn't worry too much about that. They'll be back.'

As Emms went inside to coax Guy Middleton into another day's performance in front of the cameras my attention was claimed by the arrival of Annis Jordan, mural painter to the stars. She had packed the Landy to the gunnels with painting gear and strapped two ladders and planks to the roof rack. I helped her unload and carry the equipment inside.

‘So where's Lurch?' she asked as she stepped into the gloomy entrance hall. ‘I had expected a creepy butler. Or a footman with staring eyes at the very least.'

‘No butler. There's a housekeeper. Carla.'

‘Is she spooky?'

‘Self-possessed. Very good to look at.'

‘Oh, yeah?'

‘Oh yes. But she only has eyes for the Stone King. Guy Middleton tried to grope her in the pool. Be warned, that man has roving hands as well as an expensive single-malt habit.'

‘Gossip at last.'

Mark Stoneking found us depositing boxes of paints and jars full of brushes in the pool house. I introduced them. Dauber and muso stood among the paint pots and sized each other up; both seemed delighted by what they saw. Stoneking started by telling Annis how much he admired her painting – even though he had only seen them on a computer screen – and Annis told him she had all his albums – even though she had only recently dug them out again. I left the mutual admir-ation feast before they started autographing each other and went back to the dig.

Guy was in front of the cameras, fluffing his lines. Even the ordinarily patient Emms had a sharper tone this morning as she corrected Guy's mistakes. Middleton was only saved from a roasting by the arrival on the terrace of Hilda Carson, the Roman food expert. Emms came up to greet her but stopped next to me to vent her frustration. ‘That's the problem with using actors to speak the lines instead of archaeologists; he doesn't actually understand what he's saying. If he knew anything about archaeology he wouldn't constantly get things muddled up.' She looked me in the eyes, laid a hand on my arm and smiled. ‘I've no idea why I'm telling you. Probably because you're not part of it. Don't mind me. Just make the right noises.'

‘There, there.'

Her hand remained on my arm. ‘I'm sure you could do better than that.'

‘OK, how's this: Emms, you're
so
right. It must be
very
trying having to deal with an alco
holic
actor because the punters
adore
him when Andrea, the head archaeologist, could do it
standing on her head
.'

‘That's much better. Come and meet our food historian. I have it on good authority you're a bit of a foodie yourself.'

‘Whose authority?'

‘A large police superintendent's.'

‘He can talk.'

‘Hello, Hilda,' she said. The two women kissed on both cheeks. Hilda was about fifty, a whole foot shorter than the director. She wore a blue and white checked shirt, jeans and trainers and had slight sunburn on her nose and forehead. ‘I'm glad you came out to help us again, and on a bank holiday at that.'

‘Couldn't have done it otherwise, I'm so busy at the moment. But I love doing these demonstrations, and Roman is such a good period, too.'

Emms introduced us. Before she could explain why I was hanging around the place Mark Stoneking arrived on the terrace to greet Hilda. It appeared they had spoken on the phone.

Hilda buried her hands in her jeans pockets. ‘Mark, you said you might be able to provide a few rabbits for the cooking demo. Any luck?'

Mark slapped a hand to his forehead. ‘I did, didn't I? Rash words. I'll go and see what we can do. And Chris here promised to help shoot some, I seem to remember. Let's see if we can pot some now. When do you need them?'

The sooner the better, it turned out. In the cluttered gun room Mark handed me a fine Browning over-and-under shotgun, a mate to the one he was loading for himself. They were engraved with autumn game and worth an absolute fortune. We walked down to the lake along the edge of the wood where the diggers were encamped.

‘Broad daylight is not the best time to hunt rabbit,' Mark said. ‘Much easier with a lamp at night, but at least we're less likely to kill anyone this way. Place is crawling with people.'

‘At least the Britons have left the field.'

‘Yes, that poor man,' Mark said. ‘I hope he'll be all right. I still can't believe someone here wanted to murder him.'

‘Or Guy.'

‘Or Guy. Or you, for that matter.'

‘It had occurred to me. And unless it was one of Morgan's own troop it means that person is still here. Have you changed your mind about the urn falling from your roof at all?'

‘It's beginning to look dodgy now, isn't it?' He pointed. ‘Go that way. We'll skirt the lake and the wood for a bit. You can see the diggers' tents up there now.'

To our left, about thirty yards beyond the fringe of the woods, a collection of tents, blue, red, green and silver-grey. Their camp had been set up close to the weed-fringed stream that ran through the length of the wood and then out to feed the lake. Lengths of washing line were strung between trees; clothes and sleeping bags were hanging up to air. Soon the ornamental lake began to narrow and curve a little to the right. Here an area of bracken encroached on the path and reached out towards the lake from the fringes of the woodland. Another hundred yards further and I could see the end of the wood and of Stoneking's private domain, marked by a low electrified fence, designed to keep out sheep or cattle. There were none in the grassy fields beyond.

‘This is a good place; we'll wait by those trees there. Our bunnies love this area. It's the bracken, gives them cover from buzzards. But they'll show themselves . . . Oh, there's one right there, see?'

A tiny fluffy thing had appeared at the edge of the bracken cover. ‘That's barely a mouthful,' I complained.

‘We'll wait.'

‘Until he gets bigger?'

I was never a hunter. Occasionally I'd get the notion to shoot a rabbit in the long grass around Mill House but as often as not I was outwitted by the things or simply missed by a mile. There is, however, something primevally exciting about watching and waiting for prey, a deeply buried hunting instinct that awakens as soon as you hold a weapon and see edible critters move about in the wild. Mark had chosen the place well. Not five minutes after our arrival four rabbits were hopping about on the grassy slope between the bracken and the edge of the lake.

‘All right,' Mark murmured in my ear. ‘You'll take the left, I'll take the right. When you're ready, on the count of three. One . . . two . . .'

On three I squeezed the trigger. Mark let fly with both barrels, killing two rabbits. I killed a bracken.

‘You really are quite a lousy shot, aren't you? If you're ever accused of shooting anyone I'll be your character witness.'

‘Told you.'

‘You can be gun dog then. Fetch.'

I picked up the rabbits, Mark paunched them and we moved on. ‘Are you beginning to regret the
Time Lines
thing yet?' I asked.

At first I thought he was ignoring the question but he was merely taking his time before answering. ‘I thought it would be great. I mean, I liked the programme. I was thrilled to meet them. But I had no idea there would be so many of them. The diggers. Geo-physicists. And the re-enactors. All the people you never see – sound man, camera man, the technical staff and the caterers.'

‘At least the re-enactors will leave tonight.'

‘Oh, yeah, and in a couple of days we'll get a busload of school kids to be shown around and they'll stay and wash all the finds that have come up so far.'

‘You must have agreed to all that.'

‘I didn't read the contract.'

‘I didn't read mine either, not beyond the agreed fee. Presumably they'll pay you well.'

‘Reasonably well. But if I break the contract and tell them to leave
I'll
be paying
them
. A huge amount. Couldn't afford to.'

‘Grin and bear it?'

‘Don't know about that; it's not something I've ever been good at. Wait, see what I see?' He lifted the gun, aimed, fired and two more rabbits keeled over. ‘That'll have to do; I'm getting bored with this. I want to go back and see whether Annis has made a start on my mural. If I like it I might get her to do the whole pool house . . .'