Digging Deeper

by Barbara Elsborg

  Flick breathed a sigh of relief.

  “You’ll have to speak up. I’ve been at the firing range and I’m temporarily deaf,”

  Kirsten shouted.

  Eventually she got cut off. Kirsten checked her watch and wrote down the time.

  “You are so mean to your mother,” Flick said.

  “That wasn’t your mother?” Josh asked in alarm.

  “Too easy, Josh.” Flick ducked as he threw a cushion.

  * * * * *

  “Beck? Are you awake? I’ve made you a cup of tea.”

  A woman’s voice. Beck’s eyes flashed open and he scanned the room, breathing out in relief when he realized the voice had come from the other side of the door. Willow, not Dina.

  “Are you decent?” Willow asked.

  “He won’t be and you’re certainly not. I’ll take that in,” Beck heard Giles say. The door opened.

  “Sleep okay?” Giles asked.

  “Great.” Beck sat up.

  “Good, because I have a feeling you’re about to have a bad day.” Giles handed over the tea.

  “Why?” Beck didn’t like the grin on Giles’ face.

  “Dad’s rung to say the press are camped out at the Hall. It’s silly season. I’ve already guessed the headline. ‘Indy unearths singing sensation’.”

  “That had nothing to do with the dig.”

  “Ah, but why let the truth interfere with a good story. One of your students caused the rumpus and they want the story from your mouth, with photos.”

  “Shit.” Beck thought about what his head of department was going to say and wanted to slide back under the covers.

  “If I were you,” Giles said, “I’d go up to the Hall, make a statement and get it out of the way.”

  “If you were me, you’d have left the country.”

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  Giles coughed uncomfortably. “Well, I only did that because Yasmin’s brothers were after me.”

  “Since all this is down to Flick, maybe if I give them her name, they’ll leave me alone.” Beck groaned. “She’s caused me nothing but trouble since the moment I saw her.”

  “Flick’s not a threat to you.”

  “In the way a killer whale isn’t a threat to a seal pup?”

  “And what a cuddly little seal pup you are.”

  “Piss off,” Beck hissed, but when Giles had gone, he smiled.

  * * * * *

  Beck took his time over breakfast in the hope that the press would have evaporated by the time he walked up to the Hall. He ate a bowl of cornflakes one flake at a time, but soggy corn was no match for the patient press. They’d sniffed a juicy story and it would take an earthquake to shift them.

  He was amazed at the number of reporters and photographers milling about on the gravel. Henry stood on the steps and waved to him.

  “Professor Beckett.”

  Beck felt like a goldfish tossed into a pool of piranhas. All faces turned and he struggled amidst a sea of arms waving microphones. Henry pulled Beck to his side.

  “I was waiting for you. We’ll face them together.” Henry had a gleam in his eye.

  “Is it true you risked your life staying with your student?” someone shouted.

  “Is it true you and she are having an affair?”

  Beck’s eyes opened wide in alarm.

  “They don’t know about Flick. Don’t give them her name,” Henry whispered.

  “Can’t your students tell the difference between a Roman artifact and a piece of twenty-first century crap?” yelled a woman.

  “Is this a publicity stunt?” called another woman.

  “It worked,” someone else shouted and everyone laughed. Beck pulled himself together. “The point is,” he said in a firm voice, “you don’t take risks with people’s lives. If it had been an unexploded grenade or a mortar you’d have a very different story to write, maybe even a tragic one. I think it was brave of her to have stayed where she was until the army investigated.”

  “Can you give us the name of the student? We’d like a photo of the two of you together.”

  “With Rudolph,” someone added.

  “No,” said Beck. “Contrary to what you think it wasn’t a Yorkshire University student involved.”

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  “The young lady in question was a visitor here and has now left,” Henry said. Interesting, Beck thought.

  “What’s her name? What was she doing on your dig?” someone called.

  “She has no connection with the dig.” Beck wondered how many times he had to repeat it. Not that it would make any difference. If they wanted her to be a student, they’d say she was. “The incident occurred in a field adjacent to the one in which we’re working. There’s nothing more to say. This story is as dead as the one about the Beast of Ilkley Moor.” Beck forced himself to smile.

  He heard Henry coughing at his side and turned to look at him.

  “Well, actually I did see the Beast on Monday night,” Henry said. “In the field where the dig is taking place.”

  The microphones moved away from Beck’s face to Henry’s. Fresh blood and Beck had the feeling Henry had deliberately opened a vein.

  “Do you think it was trying to warn you about the bomb?” came a voice. Beck suppressed a laugh. Some of these people had to be sharing a single brain cell.

  “Can you describe it?” asked a woman.

  “It had a long thin tail. Looked like some sort of cat but it reared up on its back legs at one point. It was dark-colored except for the tail.”

  Beck sidled off as Henry talked.

  As he walked back down to Giles’ house, he took out his phone and rang Isobel.

  “Fancy a day off?”

  “I’ve only just got here.”

  “The press are swarming. They want a story, and although the bomb scare had nothing to do with us, we’re going to get dragged in. Make all five of them promise not to talk to anyone about what happened.”

  “That won’t work.”

  “Take them to Lightwater Valley theme park for the day and stick them on a few roller coasters. I’ll pay.”

  “That might work. I’ll call you later.”

  Beck had things to do. No, one thing to do. Find Flick. Take her breath away again by kissing her because he’d been wondering how much more of a hint he needed? She liked him. More than liked him. He just had to convince her he felt the same way. 90

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  Chapter Fourteen

  Flick had promised to spend the day laboring for Bob Hulme, a farmer who owned a large chunk of land around Timble. They’d chatted in the pub a couple of weeks before and Flick had told him she’d studied drystone walling. He’d made the irresistible offer of payment for her help rebuilding several sections in his fields. Maybe the word “studied” had been a slight exaggeration. Not one man had registered for the course and the teacher not only had a moustache but boobs. Flick hadn’t bothered with lesson two but how hard could it be? No cement to mix up, slap on and scrape off. More like an overweight three dimensional jigsaw puzzle. It was merely a matter of selecting the right shaped rocks and stacking them in a pyramid. Easy.

  Flick was looking forward to a day away from everything and everyone. She’d packed sandwiches, a large bottle of water and her gardening gloves. Bob picked her up at 6:30 in the morning. He was large, red-faced guy with a shock of blond hair.

  “Morning, Flick,” Bob said as she climbed in his Land Rover.

  “Good morning.”

  “Now if you see anything you don’t like the look of, for goodness sake don’t put your finger on it.”

  “And after I’d decided this was going to be your lucky day.”

  Bob laughed.

  “How did you know it was me?”

  “Because you and trouble are joined at the hip.”

  “And you still want me to help?”

  Bob glanced over. “As I recall, you told me drystone walling w
as at the top of your list of skills.”

  Flick wriggled. “You shouldn’t have bought me that last vodka and orange. Top of the list was stretching it a bit.”

  He sighed. “You have done this before?”

  “Yes.” The fact that the first and only lesson had not moved beyond “This is a piece of limestone, this is sheep poo. Don’t get them confused,” did not mean she couldn’t do it.

  Bob dropped her off next to a broken-down stretch of wall and then drove further up the hill. Flick gaily waved goodbye before turning to the pile of stones and groaning. 91

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  She sorted them by size, by shape and considered sorting by color. There were no corner pieces, no straight edges and the largest stones proved impossible to move. Not as easy as she thought.

  While occupied with this, Flick made a mental note to go through her CV, take out skills she had yet to master and put them under hobbies. Included in that was her ability to change barrels. The pub manager had returned on the afternoon of day one to find his cellar inches deep in beer with a soaked Flick trying to lasso a spinning barrel with a hose. There hadn’t been a day two. Grinstead’s sneaked in under her radar and Flick groaned. Who’d set her up? Who hated her that much? She couldn’t think of anyone. Only she had to. She shouldn’t be pretending this was going to go away. Maybe she should write again to the managing director. That would be the tenth letter. Ten could be her new lucky number.

  After a while, Flick relaxed and began to sing. Now she’d buried Grinstead’s deep in her mind, this was going so much better than expected. The sheep had left her alone and the sun had come out. The wall did look a bit wonky, but she’d made good progress. The last rock slotted into place and Flick looked up to see Beck striding up the hill on the other side of the wall. It was the wrong moor and she wore the wrong clothes, but she felt like Cathy watching Heathcliffe coming toward her. Beck looked dark and dangerous. No, Flick corrected, the dangerous part would be her. But her heart did a little jump for joy.

  Beck put his hand on the top of the wall to hoist himself over on to her side. The stones shifted and suddenly Beck formed part of an avalanche heading in Flick’s direction. She shrieked and fell backward. The whole of the section she’d rebuilt toppled over and spread out at her feet along with Beck who lay motionless.

  “Are you still alive?” Flick gasped.

  “Just,” he groaned.

  “Well, prepare to die. I’ve spent all morning working on that.”

  “Drystone walls aren’t supposed to collapse at the slightest touch.”

  “I don’t call fifteen stone the slightest touch.”

  He levered himself upright. “I don’t weigh that much.”

  “Ten stone then.”

  “I don’t weigh that little.” He scrambled to his feet and brushed himself down. I’d like to do that, Flick thought, then looked behind him at the devastation and sighed. “I’ve too much to do to argue about how much you weigh. I thought it was supposed to be the female of the species who obsessed over weight.”

  “You brought it up,” Beck said in a grim voice.

  Flick decided to change the subject. “How did you know where I was?”

  “Phone call to Giles, another to Willow, a text message to Kirsten and then I spotted you from the road. I could probably have spotted you from outer space dressed like that.”

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  Flick looked down at her bright red top and the green and black striped shorts. He was right. Her shoulders slumped and she began to move the rocks again. “Fine. Just leave me in peace to finish this.”

  She picked up one of the large stones and put it at the base of the wall. Beck picked it up and moved it.

  “It’s better that way round,” he said.

  Flick bit the inside of her mouth and picked up a smaller rock, tossing it from one hand to the other. Beck caught it in flight.

  “I’ll point them out. You pass them to me. I’ll slot them in place,” he said.

  “You have to train for ages to master the craft of drystone walling.” Flick passed him another stone.

  “So how long did you train?”

  “Two hours.”

  Beck turned and grinned. Flick tried not to blush and failed. He made this look so easy, working at twice her speed, picking up two rocks for every one she handed him and jamming them in far more forcefully than she’d managed.

  All Beck had to do was tell her how he felt. How difficult could that be? Very.

  “So why aren’t you working?” Flick asked.

  Beck crouched with a huge stone in his arms. “I am working.”

  “Aren’t you supposed to be digging holes?”

  “I’ve given everyone the day off. The Hall has been invaded by the press. Henry seemed keen they didn’t get hold of your name.”

  “That was nice of him.”

  “Where do you want to put the ties?”

  Flick stared. “Is that a trick question? In the wardrobe?”

  “Do you call them throughs?” Beck shoved another rock in place.

  “Are you speaking English?”

  “Do you know anything at all about what you’re doing?”

  He winced when she scowled. He was supposed to be asking her out, not pissing her off. “I’ll take that as a no. Brief lesson. The wall has to slope inward from both sides to be stable. Two stones wide with the occasional tie or through going the whole width. Fill in the centre and gaps with smaller stones. Large flat stones on top and then add a coping made up of flat, rounded stones laid on their edge.” God. Seal my mouth now. Beck could see her working up to some smart quip and knew he deserved it.

  “Thank you,” she mumbled.

  He was shocked. “At least the foundations are okay. You weren’t strong enough to move the really large boulders.”

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  Flick bristled and he rushed on. “Drystone walling is quite an ancient skill. There’s some evidence it began in the thirteenth century, though it wasn’t until the sixteenth century that people began to use it as a method of enclosing their holdings.” What the hell was he doing? Where was the witty repartee?

  “Really.” Flick yawned.

  “Most of these walls were built in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Did you know you need one ton of stone for each square yard of wall?” If he’d had a gun, he’d have shot himself.

  “Is that a fact? And how much would it take to cover a body?”

  Beck stopped working. “Sorry. I talk too much when I’m nervous.” Ask me why I’m nervous.

  “So do you think you could get a body in the gap? I wonder if there are any in all these miles of walls.”

  “I’ll shut up,” Beck said.

  “Just don’t stop working.”

  What the hell was he doing? All he had to do was tell her he felt the same way as her.

  * * * * *

  Fifty minutes later they were nearly done. Fifty minutes of mostly silent, hard work where Flick had gone through a million different things to say and dismissed all of them. Beck had given up his day off to look for her and then help her, only he’d not said anything she wanted to hear.

  Bob pulled up in his Land Rover as Flick pushed the last rock into place.

  “Persuaded a passing motorist to help?”

  “I’m a friend of Flick’s,” Beck said.

  Her friend? After he’d worked quietly next to her for so long, she’d begun to think he wasn’t interested.

  “I’m only paying one of you.” Bob ran his hand over the wall and tested a couple of the stones with his fist. “You made a good job of that, Flick’s friend. Saved me having to do it all over again. I’ve got to go back home for an hour or so. Start on that next section and I’ll pay you when I come to pick you up.”

  “Pay her now and I’ll give her a lift back.”

  “That all right with you, Flick?”

  “Oh, had you notice
d I was here?” she said in a sweet tone. Bob laughed and handed her fifty pounds. “You grow more like your Mam every day.”

  As Bob drove back to the road, Flick offered half the cash to Beck. “You did most of the work. You can go now. I’ll do the rest on my own and hitch a lift back.”

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  “So what do you actually do for a living?” he asked.

  “Drystone walling. You can see samples of my craft over there, there and there.”

  She pointed to sections where the wall had collapsed.

  Beck laughed. “What do you really do?”

  “Astro-physicist,” Flick said, stepping into the minefield she’d been trying to avoid. She could have made up a more convincing lie. “Veterinary nurse specializing in small furry creatures.” Now she’d managed to talk herself into a black hole. Might as well give up while she only looked stupid rather than a raving lunatic.

  “Lunch,” she suggested, hoping to deflect him.

  “Brought enough to share?” Beck sat down in the sun with his back against the wall.

  “Peanut butter and Marmite sandwiches.”

  “Peanut butter, please.”

  “No, I mean there’s peanut butter and Marmite on the same sandwich.”

  Beck looked at her as though she was mad.

  “They’re really good.” She sat down beside him.

  He took a tentative bite.

  “What do you think?” Flick asked.

  “I think we’ll finish this wall and I’ll take you for a pub lunch. Then I can apologize for all the stupid things I’ve said and you can tell me again that I take your breath away and this time I can say something sensible back to you and…”

  Flick scratched at a dirty mark on her shorts.

  “Why won’t you look at me?” Beck asked.

  “Can’t.” She could barely breathe.

  “Why not?”

  Because if I look, I’ll kiss you and I might not be able to stop. She fixed her eyes on the ground next to Beck’s left hand.

  “What are you frightened of?” Beck asked.

  “Snake.” Flick croaked the word out.

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  “No, there’s a snake by your left hand.”

  Beck turned his head as Flick threw her sandwich. The snake recoiled, either from the blow or the Marmite. Beck yanked his fingers away, but it was too late, the telltale puncture wounds were evident on the back of his hand.