Dust to Dust

by Lillian Stewart Carl

  “You did your homework.” Michael prodded her ribs with his left hand.

  “I’m a poor sod of a historian, too.” She snaked her right hand across the emergency brake and rested it on his leg. Michael was an unusual man in not displaying professional jealousy. Of course, he already had his Ph.D., and he probably considered a degree from Edinburgh more prestigious than one from Missouri.

  Culzean was a massive mansion perched on a cliff above the sea. Its eighteenth century graciousness concealed its origins as a medieval keep, like a socially conscious family hiding its uncouth cousin in the basement. Michael and Rebecca walked for over an hour among the avenues of pines and beeches. The sunlight was warm, but the dense fluid shadow of the trees was cool, reminding Rebecca of her dream. In spite of herself she shivered.

  “I’m lettin’ you go hungry!” Michael exclaimed. They wended their way between clumps of picnickers and found a vacant table overlooking a border of rose bushes. He laid out the food—rolls, ham, Ayrshire cheese, tomatoes, fruit and shortbread—and produced napkins and plastic glasses.

  Rebecca sang, “All the roses in the garden would bow and ask his pardon.”

  “Her pardon,” Michael corrected, and finished the verse, “For not one could match the beauty of the Queen of Argyll.” He pushed his sweater sleeves up to his elbows, pulled out his sgian dubh and cut thin slices of the tomato.

  “I dreamed you were coming after me with that,” Rebecca told him. “I’ve been reading too much about the Border Wars.”

  “I ken what a sgian dubh was used for in the past,” Michael returned, carefully wiping the blade. “But this one’s never given the coup de grace to more than the odd vegetable.” The knife slipped gleaming into its sheath and the sheath went back into his sock.

  Rebecca couldn’t remember food tasting quite so delicious before. Michael placed morsels between her lips and kept her glass of whisky and water full. A couple stretched out under a magnificent copper beech turned on a radio, and the evocative music of Debussy wafted down the wind. Rebecca unashamedly stuffed herself before she spoke more than pleasant banalities. “Michael, I have something I have to get off my chest.”

  “Here?” His brows rose playfully.

  “Not my blouse. Business.”

  “Oh.” He sighed, crestfallen. “Well, if you must.”

  “I must.” She leaned her elbows on the table. “You know about Dr. Nelson, my dissertation director. He had a student a couple of years ago named Laurel Matheny. She got her degree and landed a plum of a job at an excavation in Virginia last summer.”

  “No the same one Jeremy Kleinfelter directed?”

  “I’m afraid so. Matheny was the research assistant fired for fudging the results. Her career was ruined before it started.”

  Michael frowned. “We heard aboot the cock-up in the results. The dig went ower time and ower budget. Matheny was scramblin’ to save next year’s fundin’ by comin’ up wi’ results that didna exist—something aboot a Harington farthin’ in the wrong stratum, was it?”

  “It was.” Rebecca rotated her glass, watching the pale amber fluid ebb and flow on the sides. Back in Archeology 101 her teacher had explained the concept of strata by stacking books on his desk. The book on the bottom had been there the longest time, the one on top the shortest. The strata of an archeological deposit were much more complicated, of course; scientists often had to analyze different kinds of soil. Finding a Harington farthing, a tiny copper coin used only for a few months in the seventeenth century, was like finding an artifact with a museum label on it. The stratum where the coin was found could be dated very closely.

  Rebecca sipped at her whiskey. It stung her throat. “Matheny swore to Dr Nelson that she recorded that farthing accurately. It was Kleinfelter who changed the records to make it look as if the farthing dated a structure. And he let her take the rap.”

  “His word against hers, eh?”

  “The distinguished professional against the neophyte. The man against the woman.” Michael snorted. Rebecca ignored his comment. “But who would’ve had the most motive for cheating? The person who was still on probation, or the person with the reputation to guard and the ego to guard it with?”

  Michael asked, “What do you believe, Rebecca?”

  Ants trooped across the table, scouting for crumbs. With her fingertip Rebecca shoved several into their path. “I trust Dr. Nelson, and he trusts Matheny. She and her husband went back to Michigan last fall while Nelson tried to clear her reputation. He has no proof, though. And Kleinfelter’s standing pat.”

  “Where he’ll be standin’ is Rudesburn. Wi’ you and me his assistants this time.”

  “Oh yes. You may have a good reputation at the Museum, but you’re responsible to them for the dig. I don’t even have my degree yet. What I have are the volunteers—four loose cannons. We’re the perfect patsies.”

  Michael tipped up his glass, drained it, and set it back on the table with a solid thunk. An ant barely escaped. “Dinna get the wind up. Even if Kleinfelter’s guilty as sin, we canna assume he’ll pull the same trick here. We’ll make sure the dig goes right and is done by the Festival in August. It’s a minor grid and trench excavation, after all, no like that big, corporation-funded expedition in Virginia. Which reminds me.”

  “Don’t tell me you have a bit of scandal too?”

  “I didna think it was until you told your tale.” Michael grimaced. “I was talkin’ to the archivist at the British Museum…”

  Rebecca grimaced. British Museum. London. Sheila.

  “… who said that Kleinfelter was researchin’ there last spring. He turned doon a job in London itsel’ to come to Rudesburn.”

  “Why would a publicity hound like Kleinfelter choose such a small dig in what must be to him such an out-of-the-way place?”

  “I think I can answer that. I sent you bits of the chronicle written by Mary Pringle, Rudesburn’s last prioress, in 1602, did I?”

  “Yes. But what . . ?”

  “There’re some pages of the manuscript that’re no in Edinburgh. I found them in the attic of the old Kerr manor house at Rudesburn last month, when Colin and I went ower the site. Mary implies that the heart of Robert the Bruce may no be at Melrose, after all, but at Rudesburn.”

  Rebecca exclaimed, “The first prioress of the Cistercian house was Marjory Douglas, and the Douglases were Bruce’s right hand clan! Pringle says that Robert himself had a wheel-cross erected on that hill behind the priory, where there used to be a castle, during the years the priory was deserted.”

  “Got it in one.” He poured another splash of whisky into her glass. “But—and a muckle great but—if I just found that hint aboot the relic heart last month, why did Kleinfelter sign on to the dig in April?”

  Rebecca sipped. The smoky-sweet flavor seeped into her sinuses. Trees and lawns, gardens and romping children, were bright as a crazy quilt. The couple beneath the beech were getting down to serious business. She averted her eyes. “I know why. Publicity. Spectral nuns and hidden treasures. And not necessarily historical treasures like Robert the Bruce’s heart.”

  “What’re you on aboot?” Michael asked.

  She gritted her teeth and spoke to her glass. “Colin called while you were out.” The inexorable words of explanation fell like a sudden rain shower from a blue sky.

  Michael’s hands clenched into fists, his forearms cording with sinew; his wrists were deceptively slender and his hands delicate, but Rebecca knew how strong they could be. He looked as if he’d swallowed a goldfish and was trying to keep it down. “I’m no surprised she’d try to sensationalize the dig. That’s her style, right enough. Flash and cash.”

  “We all have skeletons in our closets,” said Rebecca, more tartly than she’d intended.

  “Oh aye, like that bastard of a lawyer in yours.”

  “At least I never slept with him,” she retorted.

  Michael’s chin went up and out, a gesture she recognized only too well. “Sheila
didna come cheap, I assure you. She and her mates did me ower right and proper. I’ll no be makin’ excuses for it noo.”

  “You have an excuse. Galloping male hormones.”

  “Well, I beg your pardon!” he snapped.

  They sat stiff and silent, facing away from each other. Several children rushed by, shouting. Blackbirds wheeled overhead. The breeze tickled the rich purple leaves of the beech, making them rustle like distant laughter, and fanned Rebecca’s hot cheeks. The couple turned off their radio, collected their belongings, and walked away hand in hand.

  I haven’t been here a day yet, she thought, and already we’re fighting. “Sheila’s a hell of an insignificant fly to land in our honey.”

  “That she is.” Michael’s hand moved across the table and clasped hers. “I lied to you once, but never aboot her. If you’ve no learned you can trust me by noo, love, when are you?”

  “I trust you. That’s not what I meant.”

  He put his arm around her shoulders. She wrapped her arms around his waist and pressed against him. His sweater was as soft and warm as a cat. “You’re a puzzle, lass. Most women haver aboot their man’s old loves. You’re upset because I slept wi’ her wi’oot really carin’ for her.”

  “Confirms my suspicion that men and women come from different planets.”

  “You may come from the outer rings of Saturn, but I’m no so sure aboot Sheila.” He emitted a rueful laugh. “Did I ever tell you what happened? It was the night the Museum opened the Jacobite exhibit. I was wearin’ my posh claes. A group of us went oot to the pub, and I found mysel’ wedged into a booth next to Sheila. She’d been makin’ eyes at me—I’m no so dense as to miss that. But there, at the pub, the first thing I kent she had her hand beneath my kilt and halfway home.”

  “She made a frontal assault, then.” Rebecca couldn’t help but smile.

  “Oh aye. I was so shocked I almost spilled my beer.”

  “And what does a Scot wear beneath his kilt, anyway?”

  “Traditionally, naething. But that’s a wee bit breezy. I canna speak for everyone, but I wear Fruit of the Loom y-fronts, mysel’.”

  Rebecca laughed helplessly against his shoulder. “With Sheila, then, things went downhill fast.”

  “At first it was quite stimulatin’,” he admitted. “Later I heard her laughin’ wi’ her friends aboot me. It went ower a cliff then, you might say, wi’ a damned hard landin’.”

  For a time they sat comfortably together. At last Rebecca said quietly, “Rudesburn has its fair share of ghost stories. Let’s hope that this time there aren’t really any ghosts or treasures. Other than our own. Surely we have enough to worry about.”

  “Amen,” he replied, and suddenly he yawned. “I was up at 4:30, packin’ the car and closin’ the flat. Should we be goin’ back to the hotel?”

  “I should hope so,” she told him. Heedless of the ants, the children, the birds, they indulged in another long kiss.

  In those far Northern latitudes the early evening light didn’t fail, it thinned, like gold stretched into finer and finer leaf. To Rebecca’s eyes the hills, the farms, the sea glowed magically from within, lamps with crystal chimneys. Her friend Jan in Ohio had once opined that distance extinguishes a small flame and fans a large one. Now Scotland itself seemed to be reflecting the conflagration in Rebecca’s—mind. Heart. Stomach.

  She saw a billboard proclaiming, “Scottish Power”. “Are the nationalists making much headway?” she asked.

  “Nationalists?” he queried, then laughed. “Ah, that’s the electric company, lass.”

  It was when they were locked away in their room that she noticed the snag in the sleeve of his sweater. She was on him immediately. “Take it off. Careful. Let me see. Either you caught it on something, or a thin place in the yarn separated… . Whew, only a couple of stitches undone. Don’t wear it again until I fix it for you, okay?”

  Michael stood in his shirtsleeves, looking at her with a peculiar expression. “Ah, she’ll have my head!” he exclaimed, and opened his garment bag. From its depths he produced a fisherman knit vest in a soft shade of heather green. “My mum made this for you. I forgot to give it to you.”

  Rebecca stroked the labyrinthine stitches. The color complimented her tawny hair, and it fit perfectly. “It’s beautiful! How did she know my size?”

  “I told her.” Michael’s hands outlined a female in mid-air.

  “Just how much did you tell her?”

  He grinned sheepishly. “My tongue ran away wi’ me. I told them all aboot it. Dad looked at me wi’ that inscrutable fatherly look, and Mum said she’d just have to make you a sweater. Maddy said you sounded like a fine braw lass who’d be takin’ me properly in hand. And she threatened to write and tell you all my bad habits. We may be adults, but she’s still my big sister.”

  “It must be nice to be such good friends with your family. I’m convinced I’m a changeling.”

  “Left by wee kilted fairies, I doot.” Michael patted her cheek reassuringly and handed over a manila envelope. “Here, have a keek at these.” Grabbing his shaving kit, he retreated into the bathroom. A few minutes later, his voice in song rose over the splash of water. “Lang hae we parted been, lassie my dearie; now we are met again, lassie lie near me. Say that you’ll aye be true, never deceive me…”

  “Never,” Rebecca said to the blank face of the door. She folded the sweater and went through her nightly ritual of make-up removal, contact lens cleaning, nightgown and socks. Then she pulled up a chair and propped her feet on the edge of the bed. Inside the envelope were computer printouts, the results of the geophysical survey superimposed on a map of Rudesburn Priory. That drainage ditch might repay some effort, and there was more extensive vaulting beneath the remains of the lay sister’s dormitory than she’d expected from the original description of the site.

  Among the printouts was a photograph. Michael stood next to a nine-foot-tall Celtic wheel cross, his face turned up to it like a saint in a stained-glass window looking up to heaven. Behind him the tracery of the west window of the priory church imitated and multiplied the lines of the cross.

  Michael emerged from the bathroom wearing his usual sleeping garb, a pair of soccer shorts. Her interest in the plans evaporated. “I’ve enjoyed my nightgown,” she told him, “even though you once told me you didn’t think flannel gowns were very attractive.”

  He threw his kilt over a chair, tossed the sgian dubh into his suitcase, and leaned over Rebecca’s shoulder. “It all depends on how easily the gown comes off.” He undid the buttons at the nape of her neck, reached inside the opening and rubbed her shoulders. Gentle sparks of electricity purred down her spine. “Do you still have the metal ring from the wine bottle?” he asked.

  “That you put on my finger Christmas Eve? Of course I do.”

  “Meanin’ that we’re engaged to have substantive talks.”

  “That’s one very important reason I’m here, love.”

  His hands met beneath her chin, tilting her head back. She peered at his upside-down face. “Tae you, comin’ here is comin’ home. Tae me—well, this is home, and I’d no trade it for any place on Earth. But what I want, what I need, is someone tae come home tae. Someone tae be my home… .” He stopped, released her throat and turned away.

  “I understand,” she whispered.

  Michael took the envelope and papers and threw them onto the dressing table. He pulled her glasses from her face and folded them away. He removed her socks and tickled her feet. She jumped. Judging by the angle of his brows, her sudden movement gave him an inspiring view up her nightdress.

  With the smile of a cat contemplating a pitcher of cream, Michael padded across the floor and flicked off the light. The evening glowed through the curtains, filling the room with translucent shadow. He dropped to one knee and scooped the hem of the gown to her knee. “Welcome home, love.”

  Rebecca kissed the tousled hair on the top of his head, took his hand and laid it inside her thigh.
“And you, too, welcome home.”

  1

  Chapter Three

  To Rebecca, the coffee pot smirked as knowingly at the tea pot as she and Michael did at each other. They clinked cups above the toast rack. The tiny sound was lost in the general clatter of plates and cutlery. “Eat,” Michael said. “You’ve been burnin’ a lot of calories recently.”

  Rebecca’s cheeks went as pink and warm as though she’d been basking in the brilliant sunlight outside rather than in his arms. She ducked his amused scrutiny and cut into her link sausage. Usually British sausage resembled a shell casing packed with sawdust, but this one was delicious.

  Sometime in the polished gleam of late evening or the fresh glow of early morning she’d been so overcome by emotion she’d heard herself demanding, “Love me, love me”. To which Michael had wheezed, “That’s what I’m doin’!” And they’d laughed so hard they’d almost fallen off the bed.

  Later she’d embarrassed herself by almost crying. “I’m so happy,” she’d explained to Michael’s bleary-eyed query, “it’s almost frightening.”

  Gallantly he’d roused himself. “We’ll be havin’ our ups and doons. We have tae expect that. But there’s naething we canna handle. “Then, the verbal proprieties observed, he’d fallen comatose.

  The birds were caroling as hysterically this morning as they had all night long. Did they sing in shifts, Rebecca wondered, or did they not sleep at all during the short summer nights? She’d slept better in one night than she’d done in months, tucked into the curve of Michael’s body, safe at last.

  This morning he was back in uniform, running shoes, jeans, and the sweatshirt she’d given him for Christmas emblazoned with a soup can label reading “Campbell’s Cream of the Crop”. “When did Colin and Anjali get married?” Rebecca asked. “I thought they were just living together.”

  “They were. But her mum’s from Bombay, you ken, and wisna best pleased at her daughter livin’ in sin. So they tied it up formally at the Inverness registry office in March. Just as well.”