Gareth was looking at her. “All right then, you tell me where Linda’s body was found.”
Matilda extended her senses, dissolving them into space and time. Her nostrils caught a whiff of smoke. She heard voices, perhaps a man’s and a woman’s, too distant to make out words. The sound of the crushing blow echoed from the cliff face. The woman’s short cry of surprise did not.
“There.” Matilda pointed to a leaf-and-dirt covered space about thirty yards from the basin, not far from the charred remains of a bonfire.
Gareth pulled several photographs from his bag and looked at them. One of his brows arched upward. “Spot on.”
Together they cleared away the debris, revealing a leveled and smoothed stone floor. Matilda crouched and laid her hand flat on the rock. It droned beneath her fingertips like a long plucked string. “I wonder why the body was left here. . . .” The thought flicked away from her grasp and she shook her head. “You didn’t tell me she was hit from behind first.”
“You’ll have read the reports already,” Gareth replied.
“No, I haven’t. Watkins gave them to you, remember? When are you going to start trusting me?”
“I don’t think it’s a matter of trust.”
“Faith, maybe? Or credulity?” She stood up, brushing off her knees, and considered the detective’s closed and almost belligerent face. “I want to read the reports and look at the photos, but not here. Too much rock for footprints, I suppose. Nothing conveniently left behind by the killer, no driver’s license or anything like that.”
“Nothing was here save the woman’s body. She was wearing denim trousers and a coat—ordinary clothing. Her handbag was lying beside her.”
“She came here with someone she trusted. A man, I suppose, although surely it was too chilly that night for much sexual activity.”
Gareth jerked his head back the way they had come. “Car park’s just there. It’s filled with tire tracks.”
“But who’s to say whether she had sex here?” Matilda closed her eyes. The wind keened past her ears. It had been windy that night, too. Even if Linda had had time to scream, no one would have heard her. But she hadn’t been frightened soon enough to scream. Thank God for that mercy, at least.
Matilda opened her eyes and looked around the area, not at the rocks and the leaves, but through them. There, something glinted. Not like the coin at the dig—gold had a distinctive shimmer to the eye, a deep note to the ear. This was something else.
She walked to a pile of brush not far from the ashes of the fire and pulled out a small piece of paper. It was damp and dirty but still legible. “A sales slip from a store called ‘The Antiquary’s Corner’, proprietress Celia Dunning.”
“That’s the shop where Linda worked.” Gareth plucked the paper from her hand. “Someone bought a vase there for eight quid on March 2. Well after the murder, more’s the pity. This was dropped by someone gawping at the murder scene.”
“Still, isn’t it interesting that it’s the same shop?”
“Yes.” Gareth put the paper carefully into his bag.
“Were the ashes of that bonfire there in February?” Matilda asked.
Again Gareth consulted his pictures. “Yes. You think they’d have washed away in the rains since then.”
“Perhaps there’s been another fire lit here since then. The goddess Brighid had a sacred fire even after she was reincarnated as St. Brigit.” Gareth blinked at her. “All right, what else did Clapper tell you this morning?”
“Some local lads have put it about that the travelers are devil-worshippers.”
Matilda frowned. “Some people experiment with the occult the same way they experiment with drugs, sex, music, and anarchy. It’s not a good idea to invite something into your mind, though, if you can’t control it.”
“You don’t believe that rubbish?” Gareth demanded.
“I don’t know whether I do or not. Quite a few of what we call both devils and saints today were once gods. Some of them were the gods of the same Celts who either made this ledge a place of power or who discovered the power that was already here. Whether the gods exist as independent entities or live in the depths of our own minds I can’t say. They’re just as powerful either way. They can be just as inspiring, and just as deadly.”
Gareth turned abruptly and walked back to the horses. “It’s getting on for four. We’d better be getting back.”
Matilda strolled up behind him, so that when he looked back at her they were standing a handsbreadth apart. “If nothing happens at the dig, why don’t you go to the traveler’s encampment next week?” she suggested. “They’d tell a reporter more than they would a police officer. I’ll pay a visit to Ms. Dunning in Manchester.”
“You mustn’t go about alone!” he protested.
“We can’t hang around together all the time, people will wonder why.”
“Then get Sweeney to go with you.”
“We can’t both leave the dig. Besides,” Matilda added, “you agreed that shove on the Underground platform was probably an accident.”
Gareth exhaled in frustration, his warm breath blowing across Matilda’s face. She could see herself reflected in his dark eyes. The tension in his body drew every fiber of hers erect.
“Go ahead,” she said. “Remind me that the murder case is yours, not mine. Tell me that you’re hoping to get a promotion out of it. Point out that I’m cramping your style. And I’ll tell you that you’re cramping mine.”
“I don’t believe in second sight, Matilda.”
“I’m not asking you to. I’m simply asking you to work with me, not against me. Give me a chance to prove myself to you.”
He looked right and left, up and down. Then, suddenly, he laughed. The sound burst against the cliff face, shattering the tension so decisively that Matilda sagged backward a step. “I’ve never thought Superintendent Forrest had a sense of humor,” Gareth told her. “He must have, though, to assign us together. All right then, make a believer out of me.”
“That sounds like a dare.”
“It is that.”
“I accept.” Formally they shook hands, and shared the same rueful smile.
Gareth led the horses to the well to drink. Matilda took one last look around the ledge and across the peaceful Cheshire countryside. Shades of gray. . . . Perhaps Linda’s quick squeak of surprise hadn’t gone unheard after all. Perhaps something had been listening. Whether it had accepted the sacrifice remained to be seen. And Linda had been a sacrifice, Matilda was sure of that. Not to some half-baked occult game, but to greed.
She avoided the ignominy of having Gareth boost her onto the horse. Still, she couldn’t avoid wincing when she sat down. By the time they had gone several hundred yards, though, she’d gone numb.
Matilda kept Bodie just far enough behind Gremlin that she could contemplate Gareth’s chiseled profile. He sat straight-backed, guiding his horse with barely perceptible movements, radiating determination. Of all the cases he could’ve been given, Matilda thought, this one, with its mysteries of belief and emotion, was the most difficult for his pride to handle.
They weren’t heading back down the Edge at the same place they’d climbed up. “Where are we going?” she asked.
“Shadow Moss. Didn’t you say you wanted to see the place the hand was found?”
“Sure.”
They left Durslow looming behind them. Twisting in her saddle, Matilda could just see the ledge behind the intricate tracery of the oak branches. It was a lap in the huge body of the Edge. A frisson of awe and fear shivered down her spine. Firmly she turned herself around.
The silver sky was darkening to charcoal. More than once a spray of rain scudded down the wind. The horses put their heads down and plodded onward. Soon they left the dirt path and emerged onto the shoulder of a narrow asphalt road that led across open heath. A signpost read “Racecourse Road.”
“More horses?” Matilda asked.
“I believe the locals used to race horses h
ere in the eighteenth century or so.”
“Are there any local legends about horses?”
“Always going on about rumors and legends, aren’t you?” he asked, but his tone was light.
“Yes. They’re important.”
Gareth didn’t commit himself to agreement. They crossed the heath and plunged through a thicket of swaying birch trees, then pulled their horses to a halt. A peat-cutter rose like some antediluvian beast above black gashes in the bog. Green mosses and spikes of yellow grass lined straggling dark pools. Bumps of red rock broke through the weeds. Clouds clustered overhead, closing the horizon. If Durslow Edge was a place of power, Shadow Moss was a sad place. As strong as death, Matilda thought. As melancholy as the grave.
“It looked like this two thousand years ago,” she said. “Except for the peat cutter, of course. Where was the hand found?”
“Over there.” Gareth made a gesture that might have included anything from the nearest pool to the Outer Hebrides.
“And they’ve found the body since then. While I’m in Manchester I’ll have to go see the hand and the body both.”
“Why?”
“They’re important, too, I think. . . .” She stopped. She would eventually prove the truth of her visions to him, but only if she kept mere impulses to herself.
“Well then,” he said, “whatever you think important.” He pulled Gremlin’s head around. Splashes of mud sketched dark patterns on the horse’s pale flanks.
The taste of the well water lingered in Matilda’s mouth, making her tongue feel mossy. The raw wind cut right through her jacket. She thought longingly of the fire in the bar, of whisky, of the heavy quilt on her bed. She urged Bodie to a faster pace.
Chapter Seven
The rain scudded along horizontally, like a lawn sprinkler. Sweeney raised his umbrella. Two minutes later it blew inside out. “All right then,” he called, “let’s pack it in.”
The more muscular boys spread plastic over the raw trenches. Tucking her pick beneath her arm, Ashley helped Jennifer gather up the camera equipment and sketch books. She glanced toward the farm. The gray horse and the brown one were nowhere in sight. She wondered where Gareth and Matilda had gone, and why.
Sweeney herded the students down from the mound, across the road, and into the hotel. They left their tools in a closet just off the entry and headed upstairs.
Jason walked behind Ashley up the staircase. “Whoa, your butt’s so muddy it looks like Mom needs to change your diaper,” he said.
“Hey,” Ashley returned, “at least I’m not leaving it in piles for everyone to step in, like some people.”
Jason made a sound that might have been a laugh. Beside him Caterina smiled blankly. Bryan stopped at the top of the steps and repeated, “Yeah, like some people, whose mother’s called him half a dozen times already.”
“I was only joking.” Jason shrugged and grinned.
“No problem,” Ashley told him sweetly. She winked her thanks at Bryan—he was nice, but so, well, ordinary—and ducked into her room. Gareth was right. Don’t let them smell blood.
After dinner Ashley found Gareth sitting in the bar, meditating on a pint of ale. His hair glowed a burnished bronze in the dim light. Stopping by his table she asked, “How was your ride?”
He looked up sharply, then smiled his usual cramped smile. “Quite nice, thank you, if a bit wet towards the end.”
“Where did you go?”
“To the viewpoint on Durslow Edge. I needed some photos of the area.”
“I took riding lessons when I was little,” Ashley said. “I kept hoping my dad would buy me a pony, but then he moved out.”
Matilda slowly picked her way across the room and eased herself into a chair. “Someone needs to invent a saddle that sits like an easy chair. Would you like to join us, Ashley?”
“Thanks, but I was going to look at Jennifer’s sketches. She’s a real artist, she drew a great picture of that memorial stone.”
“Memorial stone?” Matilda asked.
“The one Sweeney and Caterina were going on about?” inquired Gareth.
“That one, yes. It was set up in front of the headquarters building, and later on someone re-used it as a building stone, that’s why it was so near the surface.”
Matilda’s head tilted to the side like a bird eyeing a worm. “And what were the names on the stone?”
“Marcus Cornelius Felix,” Ashley replied, “and his wife Claudia Sabina. Makes you wonder what they looked like, doesn’t it?”
“Oh my, how obliging of Howard and Caterina,” said Matilda. “Marcus and Claudia. Ground truth.”
Gareth repeated, “Ground truth, eh?”
Ashley, out of her depth, backpedaled. “Well, see you later.”
“See you later,” Matilda told her, and Gareth said, “Cheers.”
He’d smiled at her twice now, Ashley thought. He was just being polite, though. She turned, and then stopped to let Clapper squeeze through the narrow lane between tables. Behind her Gareth said, “Now you’ll be telling me it was this Marcus and Claudia you saw last night.”
“Yes,” Matilda answered, “that’s what I’m telling you. Obviously I should have told you then for you to be convinced now, but I was trying not to annoy you. Not annoying you is turning out to be a task equal to telling the tide to turn, I’m afraid.”
Gareth laughed. “Just give me the evidence, Matilda. I’ll sort it out.”
“That’s the deal, isn’t it?”
Clapper edged on by. Ashley plopped down beside Jennifer. Her attention, though, was still focused behind her.
Did Matilda mean she’d seen the ghosts of the old Romans? Yeah, right, Ashley thought, and yet something else in her mind said, Cool. Whatever, Gareth must be using Matilda’s experience as an angle for his story, although it was odd he’d use the word “evidence.”
Wait a minute, Ashley told herself. Durslow Edge. That was where the murdered woman’s body had been found. And she’d seen Gareth talking to the local policeman, hadn’t she? What if he wasn’t writing an article just on “Our Roman Heritage” but also one on the murder, too? That kind of story was really popular. Bookstores carried dozens of true crime books, their covers lurid in red and black. Matilda must be co-authoring or researching or something. They had to keep a book deal a secret, of course. Journalists could be really competitive.
Ashley felt obscurely pleased with her deductive abilities and promised herself not to spill the beans.
Jennifer shoved the open sketch book beneath her nose and Ashley focused. The drawing of Matilda was rough and yet energetic, capturing her wise half-smile. “That’s awesome,” she said. “I wish I could draw.”
“Pick up a pencil and try it,” Jennifer told her.
“Oh, no, I wouldn’t be any good.”
Clapper plunked down a pile of cardboard coasters. “That’s the lady doctor herself, isn’t it? She’s a canny one, she is.”
“Yes.” Ashley glanced over her shoulder at the bronze head and the fair one bent each over its own glass, like casual strangers thrown together on a subway platform.
* * * * *
By early Tuesday afternoon Ashley had cleared the turf from three feet of stone wall, uncovering several courses of masonry. She shouldn’t probe any deeper without permission. She stood up, stretched, and looked around for Dr. Sweeney.
A cool breeze drove clouds like gray and white meringues across the sky. One moment the fort was in shadow, the next in dazzling sunlight. Squinting, Ashley spotted Sweeney by the east entrance, giving Adrian Reynolds his daily briefing. For every step the professor took backwards, Reynolds took one forwards, so that the two men danced an awkward waltz.
Reynolds looked like a sinister parrot. His beady black eyes darted hither and thither as he spoke, checking out Matilda and Jennifer poring over a drawing of the memorial stone, and Gareth shoveling busily in Manfred’s trench. When he looked at Ashley she bent over her wall again, trying to shut him out. A
gynecological exam didn’t probe as intimately as Reynolds’ eyes.
Caterina, the uninhibited one, stood up from her crouch at the edge of Bryan’s trench and waved. “Signor Doctor, see what is here!”
Reynolds beat Sweeney to her side, but Sweeney elbowed him away. “What is it, my dear?”
“Look, little bits of rock with letters on. Broken writings, you would say?”
“Yes, I would say. Used for fill. Some idiot smashed up a lovely inscription to build a sheep pen or close in a doorway. I suppose he thought he was recycling.”
“Idiot,” Caterina agreed. “See here: deo, ‘to the god’—it was an altar, yes?"
Matilda materialized on Caterina’s other side. Stooping, she touched the jumbled rocks as though she were reading a message in Braille. “It might say deo invicto mytrae. ‘To the invincible god Mithras.’”
“It might,” Sweeney said.
“An altar to Mithras wouldn’t be unusual in a military fort,” said Reynolds. “Miller thought one of those underground temples was here. They went in for carvings and such, but not much in the way of votives, gold or otherwise.”
“Inscriptions are just as important as gold,” Matilda told him.
Sweeney took Caterina’s trowel and scraped delicately at the jumbled stones. “You’re becoming quite the expert, aren’t you? I’d best mind my back, you might be planning a takeover.”
“Oh no, Signor Doctor.” Caterina giggled. “Here, here is another bit with the letter ‘M’ on it.”
Reynolds turned over a couple of stones and Sweeney rapped his knuckles with the trowel. “Leave the artifacts in situ, there’s a good chap. We’ll put you in the picture when we have one.”
Reynolds harrumphed and sauntered off. Bryan leaned curiously over Sweeney’s back. Matilda pulled herself away. “This is a real treasure trove, Howard. In the beginning was the word, right? And here be words, lots of them.”
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