Indiana Jones and the Dance of the Giants

by Rob MacGregor

  Deirdre saw him glance expectantly in her direction. She had a good answer for the question, but she kept her hands folded on the desk. Finally, Jones pointed to a man in the back row.

  "The Hyperboreans may have traveled south and possibly visited Delphi where Apollo reigned," the student said. "Later, they brought home stories of the god which were passed from generation to generation."

  "Okay," Jones said. "But remember the myth is Greek in origin. How would the Greeks know that Apollo visited the island of the Hyperboreans every nineteen years?"

  Someone else raised a hand. "Maybe one day Greeks showed up on the shores of Britain and discovered that a sun god was worshipped here as well as in their homeland. So they just made up the story that it was Apollo, and that he visited the island and his mother was born there."

  Jones nodded. "That's possible. But the Greeks, for all their glories in architecture and sculpture, mathematics and astronomy, were not much on geography. They weren't known as great travelers, like the Phoenicians, Egyptians and the Celts themselves. But individual Greeks may have set off on their own, and traveled along the trade routes established by other peoples."

  Jones's gaze paused on Deirdre again. She knew he was literally asking for her to enter the discussion. She demurred. "Now, let's take a look at the legend of Stonehenge."

  Deirdre listened as Jones related the tale which was even more familiar to her than the story of the Hyperboreans. The story took place around the year 460, after the departure of the Roman legions from Britain. It was a period of great instability when the Saxons, led by Hengist, made repeated attacks against the Britons, ruled by Vortigern.

  Finally, a peace conference was held between the rivals, and those attending were told to come unarmed. But Hengist told his men to hide daggers in their clothes and the peace conference turned into a slaughter as hundreds of British nobles were murdered. Soon after, Aurelius Ambrosius, who had been reared in exile in Brittany, succeeded the slain Vortigern as king of England, and Hengist was driven from power. Ambrosius decided to commemorate the mass murder by erecting a monument at the site of the massacre.

  "He wanted the monument to last for all time, so he called upon the magician Merlin for help," Jones continued. He glanced at his notes. "And Merlin replied: 'If thou be fain to grace the burial-place of these men with a work that shall endure forever, send for the Dance of the Giants that is in Killaraus, a mountain in Ireland. For a structure of stones is there that none of this age could raise... For the stones be big, nor is there stone anywhere of more virtue, and, so they be set up round this plot in a circle, even as they be now there set up, here shall they stand for ever.'"

  "Excuse me, Professor Jones," a student said. "But how is this story related to archaeology? I mean we all know that Stonehenge was built long before the time you're talking about."

  "You're right, of course. But let me finish, and hopefully you'll see the connection between the myth and science."

  Ambrosius gathered an army which sailed to Ireland under the command of Uther of Pendragron with Merlin at his side. They defeated an Irish army, which defended the great stones, but were unable to move the great blocks until Merlin worked magic upon them. Then, the soldiers were easily able to transport them to their ships and return to England. Still under the guidance of Merlin, the stones were erected in the same form as they had been at Killaraus."

  Jones paused, and looked in the direction of the student who'd asked the last question. "Granted, this is fantasy. The structure is far older than the fifth century, and scientists have assumed the stones originated from nearby the site."

  It was obvious that he was setting up the class for something. Deirdre was captivated; she had no idea what he was leading up to.

  "Now, let me refer you to an article which appeared not long ago in the Antiquaries Journal, the July 1923 issue to be precise. The article is by Dr. Herbert Thomas and is entitled 'The Source of the Stones of Stonehenge.' Thomas provides convincing evidence that the bluestones—the ones used in the early construction—could not have originated in the area beyond the Salisbury Plain, the site most often attributed as their source. Instead, the eminent geologist offers convincing evidence that they came from the Prescelly Mountains in South Wales, one hundred and thirty-five miles from Stonehenge."

  Jones moved away from the podium and paced in front of the class. "Now of course Wales is a fair distance from Ireland. Yet, the new information seems to partially confirm Geoffrey of Monmouth's tale that the builders of Stonehenge transported the stones a great distance and over water. The myth, you see, apparently contained a nugget of truth, and it's all the more astonishing when you consider the true age of Stonehenge, because the wheel, as far as we know, was not in use four thousand years ago."

  Deirdre was not only impressed by the story's relevance, but pleased that Jones had brought up Merlin. He'd soon be finding out much more about the ancient enchanter.

  When class ended, the students filed by Jones's desk and dropped off their papers. He promised that he would return them at the end of the week when the final exam was given. As Deirdre turned in hers, Jones spoke up. "Thank you, Miss Campbell. I'm looking forward to reading it."

  She smiled, but didn't say anything for a moment. Maybe her silence was as foolish as her garrulous behavior had been. "I'm looking forward to your reaction," she answered, then quickly left the room.

  7

  Scorpions in London

  Clutching a stack of papers under one arm, Indy reached into his jacket pocket for the keys to his Russell Square flat. He stabbed at the lock and missed. He stabbed again, then a third time. The keys slipped from his grip, and clattered onto the wooden floor.

  "Damn it." He bent down and balanced the papers on one knee. He patted the floor, feeling dust and grit, but no keys. "C'mon. Where are ya?"

  If he'd pressed himself earlier in the week, he would've finished grading the papers by now. But he'd managed to get through fewer than half of them, and now they were due back tomorrow in time for the final exam.

  He peered around the pile of papers in the dim hallway light, and spotted the keys behind his heel. He pressed his chin against the papers, and reached between his legs. He grasped the keys with his fingertips, but the papers bulged in the middle, threatening to spill over the hallway. He adjusted the pile as best he could, and stood up. He fumbled with the keys until he found the right one. But just as he reached for the lock again, the knob turned from the inside, and the door creaked open a couple of inches.

  "Jack, grab some of these papers, will ya?" Indy had hardly seen Shannon since his friend had gotten the job at the club. Shannon was asleep when Indy left in the morning, and by the time Indy came home Shannon had gone out for the evening. But this morning Shannon had been awake, and said he'd be home this evening.

  "Jack?" Indy backed into the room. Just as he turned his legs were kicked out from beneath him. He dropped to the floor. Papers spewed from his hands.

  "Damn you, Shannon," he yelled, pushing off from the floor. "What the hell are you—"

  Something heavy struck him across the back of the neck. The pain was bright, brief; then he slumped to the floor.

  He twitched his nose. Something was tickling him. As he came awake, his first thought was that he must be late for class. Then he realized he was on the floor, lying on sheets of papers. A pair of spats was inches from his face.

  "Don't move," a voice said. Shannon's voice.

  Indy felt a tickling sensation against his cheek. He shifted his good eye to the side, but couldn't see what was tickling him. He raised his head slightly, and looked up just as Shannon squatted down.

  "Don't move!" Shannon hissed again.

  Shannon's arm was raised and it looked as if he were about to slap Indy with the back of his hand. Then with a flick of his wrist, he knocked something off Indy's shoulder. Two quick steps. A foot slammed against the floor, and Indy heard a crackling sound, like dry twigs snapping.

 
"What was it?" Indy lifted his head.

  "Scorpion."

  "What?"

  "You heard me. Its tail was twitching against your cheek like it was going to strike."

  Indy stood up, and looked at the four-inch-long carcass lying next to Shannon's foot. It was crushed against the title page of a term paper. He walked across the paper-covered floor, and prodded the thing with his toe. A shiver flared across his back as if an icy finger had run down his spine.

  "God." It was all he could say.

  "You okay?" Shannon asked.

  Indy touched his neck. "Yeah, I think so."

  "What happened?" Shannon scrutinized him as if he expected to see more scorpions on him.

  "I don't know." Indy looked at the papers strewn across the floor, shook hiis head, then winced as a shot of pain radiated from his neck to his right shoulder. "Look at this mess."

  Shannon moved about the room looking in the corners, between stacks of books, behind furniture. "Let's see. You came home, and before you closed the door, you tripped, dropped your papers, and knocked yourself out. Then, somehow, a scorpion crawled on your shoulder."

  "Not exactly."

  "Didn't think so."

  "Someone was here. Nailed me on the neck before I got a look at him." He pulled out his pocket watch and saw that about twenty minutes had elapsed since he'd arrived at the flat.

  "I don't see anything missing right off. Everything looks in order. No sign of ransacking."

  "Not much to take." Indy stepped over the papers. He walked into the bathroom, wet a cloth, and placed it against his neck. Then he saw it. "Hey, Jack. Come here."

  Another scorpion was perched on the edge of the toilet. Indy grabbed a towel and carefully nudged it forward until it dropped into the bowl. He jerked the cord, flushing the creature into the sewer.

  He looked over at Shannon. "What do you make of it?"

  "Don't know. But if I had to guess, I'd say that there was some connection between the black widows and the scorpions. In fact, I'd put money on it."

  "I don't get it."

  "Why don't you lie down. I'll take a look around. Where there's two, there might be more."

  Indy walked into the bedroom, and cautiously pulled back the sheets. Seeing that it was clean of scorpions, he eased down and closed his eyes.

  He was just starting to drift off when he felt something moving under his ear. Slowly, he turned and raised the pillow off the bed. "Aw—" He choked back a yell. "Stay right there," he murmured, then slowly rolled out of the bed.

  Shannon walked into the room. "You say something?"

  "Four of them, under the pillow. You better check your bed."

  "Let's get those guys first." Shannon disappeared, and returned a few seconds later with a box and a broom. He quickly swept the scorpions into the box as Indy held it, and slammed the cover shut.

  "Hey, we're getting good at this. Maybe we should go into business exterminating scorpions," Shannon laughed. "Seems to be quite a problem around here."

  "Very funny, Jack. Let's search the place before we do anything."

  They spent the next half hour scouring the apartment, from the tops of the bookshelves and the ledges above the window frames to the corners and underneath the furniture. Shannon discovered two more scorpions nestled together in one of Indy's shoes. They were tossed into the box with the others.

  "I think we've looked everywhere," Indy said as he carried a stack of papers over to his rolltop desk. He was about to set them down when he saw another scorpion poking its head out of a cubbyhole in the desk. He dropped the papers. "That's it. I'm not staying here, and I'm calling the cops."

  "No, we can't." Shannon squashed the scorpion with a book. "I don't have work papers. I'll be kicked out."

  "I'll say you're a tourist."

  "No. If someone sees me at the club, you'll be booted out, too, for harboring me."

  Indy looked at the desk. "We can't just ignore the whole thing like it didn't happen. We've got the proof right here," he said, pointing at the box.

  Shannon carried the box into the kitchen where he opened a window that faced a brick wall. He pushed it open with one hand, and dumped the scorpions out the window.

  "Hey, what did you do that for?" Indy looked out the window, but the scorpions had disappeared into the dark alley two stories below.

  "Leave it to me. I'm going to find out what's going on."

  "How are you going to do that?" Indy snapped.

  Shannon looked away. "I've got contacts. I'll get to the bottom of it."

  Indy knew Shannon, and yet he didn't know him. There was a side to him they rarely talked about. Shannon's father, uncles and brothers were involved in the Irish Mafia in Chicago, and although Shannon had spurned that life, it seemed as if he could never completely escape it, no matter where he was. The family had kept tabs on him through contacts in Europe, and Indy knew that he was not above calling upon those contacts for help.

  "I don't know," Indy said uneasily. "I don't want to start any more trouble."

  "Relax. I didn't say anything about breaking any fingers or arms, or anything like that. We'll just find out who our connoisseur of poisonous creatures is, and see just what his problem is with you. My guess is that it's got everything to do with this boyfriend of your boss's daughter."

  Indy sat on the floor and gathered together all the term papers into one pile. "No. Couldn't be."

  "Why not?"

  "Because the spiders in the candy box were sent before I even met Deirdre."

  Shannon was silent, mulling it over. "Good point. But you know what?"

  "What?"

  "I still think there's some sort of connection. My gut feeling."

  "Yeah, well, I'm going to my office for the night. My predecessor left a cot in the closet."

  "Christ, Indy, why don't you stay at a hotel?"

  He picked up the stack of papers. "No, this way I'll get my work done."

  8

  Esplumoir

  It was almost two A.M., and Indy had spent the last three hours grading papers. His feet were propped up on his desk, and he yawned as he jotted a note on the cover page of the one he'd just finished. He scrawled a B minus at the end of the note, then dropped it on the pile.

  He rubbed the ache in the back of his neck. The paper, like nearly every other one he'd read, had not contained a single original thought. No speculation, no drawing of a thoughtful conclusion, no questioning of the authorities unless some other more recent authority had already done it. Mostly, it was repetition of what had been said. Learning by rote. But what could he expect? This was an introductory course, and the idea was to learn the foundations, not to create something new.

  He'd intentionally put off reading Deirdre's paper, saving it for last. Hers would be different; he knew that much. That she would speculate seemed reasonable enough. But that she would actually attempt to prove that Merlin had lived seemed so far beyond the realm of the course that he now doubted what she'd told him in the conference.

  He held the paper in his hands, feeling its weight. It was twenty-five pages, about three times the length of any of the others. The title was a mouthful: "Merlin and the Esplumoir: Evidence Suggesting that the Fabled Enchanter Was an Historical Personage." The paper began by saying that while it was virtually impossible to separate the life of Merlin from the myth, it might soon be possible to prove that Merlin was more than a myth. Then, without elucidating further on the so-called evidence, she launched into a biographical sketch.

  Whether he was a mythical or historical figure, he lived in the latter part of the sixth century in the Lowlands of Scotland, at the time when Christianity was taking firm root in Britain and paganism was waning. He was a druid, a prophet, and a trickster living in a pagan enclave, she said. All of what she wrote was based on writings centuries later, and Indy knew the stories well. He read over it quickly, and made one note suggesting there was also evidence that the legend of Merlin might have been derived from a Welsh b
ard called Myrddin Embreis from a century earlier.

  Next she moved to the tale of Merlin's death, saying that the story was relevant to her purpose. While Merlin was best known as the counselor of Arthur and two other British kings before him, the story of what happened to the great conjurer in later years was one of the most mysterious aspects of the legend. It was said that he met Vivien, a virgin, and fell in love. She swore to be his wife, but only if he would teach her the secret of how to trap someone permanently, by words, so he could never get out.

  Merlin was so captivated by the young woman that he granted her wish. However, all along Vivien was scheming to defend herself. She immediately used the spell to trap Merlin in a grotto. From that time on, Merlin was never seen again, but he cried out from his tomb, and his cry was often heard in the forest.

  However, in another version of the story from an ancient text called Didot-Perceval, the enchanter voluntarily retreated from life, and his last words were these: "Now I will retire into my esplumoir and never be seen again."

  "Maybe Merlin knew all along that Vivien was scheming against him," Deirdre speculated. "He was an accomplished enchanter, who knew well the ways of men and women. Heartbroken and disappointed, he simply played out her wishes. That leads us to the question: What was the esplumoir, and where was it?"

  Indy paused in his reading, and leaned back in his chair. Deirdre was already ahead of most of the other students, because of the mere fact that she'd brought in two varying sources on the myth, and then speculated on the meaning of the variations. Of course, what she'd written wouldn't get far as a premise for a Ph.D. thesis. He could hear his old professors attacking her from all sides. First of all, she had made a great leap of faith in assuming the myth was a true-life experience that had merely been misinterpreted. She'd also glazed over an important part of the myth. If Merlin had decided to depart this world on his own, why had he cried out from his tomb?