‘Those are Roman tesserae. Probably from the Boudiccan period. You can have them if you want.’
‘Really?’ She stared at him. ‘Aren’t they important?’
‘Possibly. It’s too late. The markers are about to be ploughed in, remember? All this lot is more or less rubbish now.’ He sighed. ‘There was so much left to do, but we ran out of time. I suppose we were lucky to get so much, given modern day priorities.’
She glanced up at him, sympathizing with his helpless bitterness.
‘It is sad they couldn’t have incorporated all these remains into the development and used them to bring in tourists,’ she said cautiously. ‘Every town in England has a shopping precinct. Very few have a Roman city.’
‘They’ll think of it. When it’s too late,’ he agreed. ‘They’ll say, “let’s develop the town for tourists. Now what shall we show them.”’
They both laughed wryly. He watched her closely as she took two of the small tiles in her hand and closed her eyes.
‘I wonder who walked on these,’ she said dreamily.
‘Men, women, children. Much like us.’ His voice was very quiet. He held his breath.
‘I see a woman with a long blue gown, her hair bound up with ribbons,’ Frances said slowly. She frowned, frightened by the force of the picture which had come into her head. Please God, don’t let it happen here, not in front of a stranger. She gripped the tile till her knuckles whitened, trying to push away the images as they crowded in. But they came, as they always came, whirling out of nowhere, filling her mind.
He was watching her closely. He bit his lip, trying to conceal his excitement. ‘What else can you see?’ he prompted quietly, hardly daring to breathe.
Frances sat for a moment, holding the tile. ‘She’s afraid.’ It was too late to stop. She had to go on. Her voice strengthened and she began to breathe more heavily. ‘She’s lost Claudia! She’s lost her child!’
‘Claudia! Claudia!’ The woman’s voice rose to a scream. ‘Where are you?’
She stared round frantically. The streets were teeming with panic-stricken people. Near her a cart overturned and she heard a horse shriek with fear. From the distant suburbs the sound of the watchman’s horn echoed across the city again and again.
The child had been at her side only moments before, happily skipping down the gravel road between the shops, her new long red dress a small flame in the dullness of the misty morning.
Boxes of fruit fell from a stall near her as it overturned and the two men behind it vaulted over the planks which moments earlier had been their display area and ran. From the pouch of one fell a scattering of coins. He did not bother to stop and gather them.
‘She’s coming! The Queen of the Iceni is coming!’ a man near Julia shouted. ‘Save yourselves. Run!’
Run! How could she run without the child? Her daughter. Her little Claudia. Julia whirled round, confused and terrified.
Her husband, Claudius, had told them not to pull down the town walls. He had told them it was crazy. He had told them again and again. But no, it was the policy. This was a peaceful country now. This was a land of rich villas, wealthy retired men and their families. There was no danger, they said. No danger at all. That was before they had flogged the British queen.
At her side for a moment she recognized one of the servants from the villa. He was a tribesman, long Romanized. ‘Save yourself, Lady. They will spare no one,’ he shouted, momentarily sorry for the woman who had been kind to him. ‘This is the day we throw the Romans out of our island. Your only hope is to get away!’
‘I can’t go without Claudia.’ She was sobbing now.
‘Then you will die. They will spare no one!’ Already he had gone, running through the crowds towards the temple. In moments he was out of sight.
‘Claudia!’ She spun round desperately, trying to swallow the nausea which had risen in her throat. ‘Claudia! Claudia!’
‘Run!’ The shouts and screams echoed down the narrow street. ‘Run!’ And now she could smell the smoke, acrid and thick; the smoke which drifted across the city from the villas which had been fired in the wealthy western suburbs of the town, the area where she and Claudius lived.
Tears in her eyes she flung down her basket. ‘Claudia! Claudia, where are you? Claudia!’
The sound of racing hooves was coming closer. The echo of chariot wheels on the distant road.
‘Claudia …’ Her throat was dry, her stomach knotted with terror. She must run. But where? The crowds were panicking, screaming, milling in all directions. She tried to keep her balance as a man bumped into her, failed and fell on her knees on the tiled forecourt of a shop as he leaped across her and hurtled away up the road.
‘Mama?’
She was there! Suddenly the child was there, her little hands outstretched, her eyes huge with fright. ‘Mama! What’s happening?’
Julia threw herself at the little girl and hugged her, then frantically she set off, dragging her after her. In a second she and the child had disappeared into the crowded, panic-stricken streets.
Moments later the first of the wooden Iceni chariots hurtled around the corner, the driver carrying a burning torch which streamed flame and smoke in its wake …
Only the sound of sobbing broke the silence.
‘Here. Drink this.’ Charles folded her hands gently around a mug. ‘Are you all right?’
Frances sipped the scalding liquid and spluttered.
‘I put some brandy in it. We had some in the first aid cupboard.’ He sat down opposite her and smiled reassuringly. His heart was thumping with excitement.
Frances put down the mug and groped in her pocket with shaking hands for a handkerchief. The sobs she had heard were her own. She blew her nose shakily. In front of her, on the table, lay a heap of dusty tiles.
‘What did I say?’ she asked at last.
‘You described the sack of Camulodunum. It was as if you saw it all.’ He tried to hide his excitement.
She bit her lip. ‘You must think me such a fool.’ She drank some more of the tea, grateful for its biting warmth. She was still shivering violently.
‘No. I don’t think you’re a fool. I think you are a clairvoyant of some sort.’ Charles leaned across and picked up one of the little tiles, holding it experimentally in the palm of his hand.
‘No. Don’t be silly. I have an overactive imagination, that’s all …’ That was what the judge had said. That was what she clung on to. It sounded normal. Explainable.
‘Are you sure that’s all it was?’ He glanced up at her. ‘I’ve met someone who did something like this before. She came to the centre. We gave her various things to hold and she told us about them – their history. Who they had belonged to. Things like that. It was uncanny. But she stayed quite detached. Purely an observer.’
‘It was my imagination,’ Frances repeated stubbornly. To her chagrin she found her legs were shaking so much she couldn’t stand up. ‘I ought to go.’
Charles glanced at his watch. ‘We’ve half an hour before Tom comes for the trailer. There’s no hurry.’
She smiled wanly and sat back, still fighting the panic, remembering the fire, the screams, the flailing swords.
‘Did they get away?’
‘Who?’ She dragged herself back to the present with difficulty.
‘Julia and her little girl.’
‘I … I don’t know.’ She stared down at the tiles. ‘I can’t remember.’ Suddenly her eyes filled with tears. ‘I’ve never felt fear like that before – never in my whole life. Not even when –’ She broke off abruptly.
‘Not even when?’ he prompted gently after a few moments.
No, she mustn’t tell him. She had told her husband and look what had happened. She touched the small tile with her fingertip gingerly, then abruptly she pushed it away. She stood up. ‘I have to go.’
‘Are you sure you feel well enough?’ He didn’t want her to go. She was a link, a channel to the past which was his whole lif
e.
She tried to smile. ‘I’m sorry. Have I shocked you?’
‘No. I’m not shocked. I’m interested. Do you want to take the tiles?’
She shook her head vehemently. ‘Put them in your museum.’
‘OK.’ He sat watching her for another few seconds. ‘I think they made it, don’t you? Julia and little Claudia.’ He picked up the tesserae and tipped them into a cardboard box. ‘I’m sure they hid somewhere until it was all over.’
She shook her head, biting back her misery. ‘Claudia’s father was killed, and her brother …’ She stopped. She had spoken without thinking. ‘He was only fourteen. Oh God!’ She sat down again and put her head in her hands. ‘And Julia … Julia was raped …’ She was sobbing again.
‘The link is still there, Frances.’ Charles reached out and touched her hand. ‘It’s all right. It will break. That is what the psychometrist who came to see us said. She said sometimes it stretches and stays, like a spider’s thread, then it breaks. It always breaks. Then you will be free. Let me lock up and I’ll walk with you. Have you got a car?’
She shook her head.
‘Where do you live?’
She didn’t want to be alone. Not any more. When she was alone the memories flooded back; the memories of another woman, another time. ‘I live in Lexden. Not far.’
He nodded slowly. ‘Lexden burned first of course. I’ll walk you home if you’ll let me.’
She smiled. ‘Thank you. I’d like that.’
Her eye was outraged and confused by the muddy site outside the van. She could still see the neat row of thatched shops, the entrance to the villa, the gravelled road – and the smoke; the smoke that had rolled over the city and obliterated it.
Slowly they began to walk. They left the site, glancing sadly at the huge machines of destruction waiting in the wings and began to walk through the streets.
Glancing at her he smiled. ‘Each time you go up one of the escalators in the new store they’ll build there you’ll remember today.’
She smiled and shook her head. ‘No, I’ll remember that day nearly two thousand years ago.’ She took a deep breath. ‘I’ve seen her before, you know.’
‘Julia? I thought perhaps you had.’
‘She haunts me. I think she must have lived where our house now stands.’
‘It’s possible.’
‘You don’t think I’m mad?’
‘No.’
‘My husband did.’
The divorce had been in the papers the week before, with all the gory details of her unreasonable behaviour; her year-long obsession with a ghost. It had made the national headlines.
Charles smiled sympathetically. ‘I confess I did recognize you from the photos. But all that proves is that your husband is a racist.’
‘A racist?’ She stopped and looked at him, astonished.
‘He obviously doesn’t like Romans.’ He smiled. ‘Does all this make you believe in immortality?’
‘No.’ It came out more harshly than she meant.
‘You should.’
‘I would have thought archaeologists would believe in the utter finality of death.’
‘On the contrary. We’re professional resurrectors.’ He could sense her pain; real pain beneath the shock and fear. She had walled off the vulnerable wounded part of herself; the part which encompassed the mortal echo which was all that remained of Julia and her child. He should help her to try to forget it. He wrestled with his conscience and lost. ‘Don’t you want to know what happened to them?’ he asked after a long pause.
She shook her head.
‘If you knew the truth they might rest in peace,’ he persisted hopefully.
God! How he wanted to know the truth. What he would give to listen to her describe the scene again; an eyewitness account of the sack of Colchester. It was unbelievable! He could imagine the paper he would present; the articles he would write; the books …
She stopped in the middle of the pavement for a moment, looking at him. ‘Why me? Why do they pick on me?’ Her question had the ring of desperation. Slowly she began to walk on.
He pulled himself together with an effort and followed her. The woman was suffering. It was unfair to encourage her – to encourage Julia – and prolong her agony. ‘As you said, perhaps you live on the site of their home.’
She gave a tight half laugh. ‘We used to dig up things in the garden. Bits of pottery. A coin. A little statue which we gave to the museum. Things like that. We were so excited.’ She tried to bite back her tears.
Her house was large and grey, set back a little way from the road. The garden was full of blossom, the flower beds beautifully tended, the lawns neatly cut. Even in the rain it was lovely.
There was a house agent’s board nailed to the front gate. Charles noted it and frowned. Part of the tragedy of divorce.
As they walked up the drive – the high privet hedges cutting them off from the roar of the traffic in the road outside – he stared round, trying to get the feel of the past which here was so close beneath the surface, trying to reach out as she must reach out to touch the minds of the dead. If only he could do it too. Why was it that she, with no particular interest in history could see it, touch it, feel it, while he … he must be content with books and shards and bones?
He put his hand in his pocket. The small tile lay there, abstracted from its fellows as he tidied up the van. Did it hold the key? Gently he closed his fingers around it. He closed his eyes.
They both turned in surprise at the sound of wheels on the gravel. The gates behind them had been closed. For a moment he didn’t understand; he didn’t seem to be able to focus properly; the air was full of smoke.
Her scream turned his blood to ice. All he saw was the flash of the upraised sword, a glimpse of the eyes of the man who drove the chariot, then everything went black.
About the Author
Encounters
Barbara Erskine is the author of Lady of Hay, which has sold well over a million copies worldwide, the bestselling Kingdom of Shadows, Encounters (short stories), and Child of the Phoenix, which was based on the story of one of her own ancestors. This was followed by Midnight is a Lonely Place and House of Echoes – which were shortlisted for the W H Smith Thumping Good Read awards of 1995 and 1997 respectively – plus her second volume of short stories, Distant Voices. Her most recent novel is On the Edge of Darkness. Barbara Erskine’s novels have been translated into twenty-three languages.
Barbara Erskine has a degree in mediaeval Scottish history from Edinburgh University. She and her family divide their time between the Welsh borders and their ancient manor house near the unspoilt coast of North Essex.
Acclaim for Encounters:
‘A marvellous mixture of emotional tales with the emphasis on love.’
Woman’s World
‘Short stories with the “unputdownable” quality of a good novel … convincing … an easy, compelling read.’
Eastern Daily Press
By the Same Author
Lady of Hay
Kingdom of Shadows
Child of the Phoenix
Midnight is a Lonely Place
House of Echoes
Distant Voices
Copyright
HarperCollinsPublishers
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Hammersmith, London W6 8JB
www.harpercollins.co.uk
This paperback edition 1995
15
Previously published in paperback by Fontana 1991
First published in Great Britain by Michael Joseph Ltd 1990
This collection © Barbara Erskine 1990 and as follows:
‘Cabbage a la Carte’ (Woman’s Weekly) 1976; ‘Feline Express’ (New Love as ‘Cupid Was A Kitten’) 1978; The Consolation Prize’ (Women’s World as ‘A Loving Invitation’) 1984; ‘There was a time when I was almost happy…” (Woman’s World) 1979; ‘Summer Treachery’ (Rio) 1981; Trade Reunions’ (Best) 1988; ‘The Bath: A Summer G
host Story’ (Living) 1987; ‘The Green Leaves of Summer’ (Woman’s Own Summer Stories) 1979; ‘Encounters’ (Woman’s World) 1977; The Touch of Gold’ (The Writer) 1976; The Helpless Heart’ (Woman’s World as ‘Give Me Back My Dreams’) 1978; The Indian Summer of Mary McQueen’ (Secrets) 1980; ‘The Magic of Make Believe’ (Woman’s World) 1984; ‘A Summer Full of Poppies’ (Secret Story, Robinson) 1989; ‘A Face in the Crowd’ (Woman’s World as ‘Forsaking All Others’) 1983; ‘Flowers Shouldn’t Make You Cry’ (Woman’s World) 1979; ‘Someone to Dream About’ (Woman’s World) 1986; ‘Milestones’ (New Idea) 1980; ‘Marcus Nicholls’ (Red Star Weekly as ‘Windows on the Past’) 1980; ‘A Quest For Identity’ (Woman’s World) 1977; The Heart Will Understand’ (Woman’s World) 1980; ‘A Stranger With No Name’ (Woman’s World) 1980; ‘Just An Old-Fashioned Girl’ (Woman’s World as ‘Love Never Changes’) 1981; ‘All This Childish Nonsense’ (Woman’s World as ‘A Promise is Forever’) 1977; ‘A Love Story’ (My Story) 1976; ‘A Promise of Love’ (Woman’s World as ‘Don’t Tread On My Dreams’) 1978.
The Author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work
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Encounters Page 49