by Clare Revell
Evan frowned. “Sonar? You didn’t mention that before.”
“It’ll give us an accurate 3D image of the bottom of the lake. I also want to do a proper dive into the church crypt.”
Something flickered in Evan’s eyes. “In case there really were smugglers?”
“Yeah. Seriously, I want to check the foundations and wall integrity. Plus there might be something left there of historical value.”
He sighed. “I shall let you get on. See if I can track down some of those files.”
Lou watched him leave. He’d seemed eager to help at one point. Now the opposite was true. Her phone rang, and she grabbed it off her belt. “Hello.”
“Lou, are you busy?”
She walked to the window and drew the heavy curtains across them. “Not for you, Varian. What can I do for you? Although I am surprised you’re not here in person. I didn’t think you trusted me to do anything.”
“We’re busy here,” he stated. “I’ve seen your photos, at least the ones you saved to your servers. I was trying to see the rest but I can’t get in.”
She snarled. “Too right you can’t get in—I changed all the passwords. My server, Varian. How dare you hack into it? Maybe you’ve forgotten what the word private means, but I sure haven’t. That isn’t all of the photos by a long chalk. Oh, and by the way, I won’t be uploading anymore until my work here is completed. Only then will you get a written report. It’s fascinating how much of the village is still relatively intact down there. We’ve made some interesting discoveries—”
“That isn’t why I called.” Varian cut her off sharply. “I wanted to discuss Llaremont.”
She swivelled and waved at AJ, getting his attention, before miming the cutting of her throat. “What about Llaremont?”
“I want those files back.”
Lou laid a finger to her lips and put the phone on speaker, laying it on the table beside her. “What files are those? The Dark Lake ones you gave me? Because right now, I’m using those.”
“Don’t be a smart-aleck,” Varian barked. “It doesn’t become you. You know darn well what files I mean. The Llaremont ones. All your files, photos, and notes have gone. No one has seen them since you left the dig.”
Lou looked deadpan at the phone, not that he could see her. “I see. And that’s my problem because?”
“The computer has been wiped. Around the time you logged onto the company server and changed your passwords. All the backups are missing. As is Monty’s flash drive. I need those files.”
“Well, I didn’t take them,” Lou told him. “I was angry you fired me from the Llaremont dig, yes. More than angry. I stormed out, leaving everything behind. Including my tools and personal belongings. AJ brought those up here for me. I changed my passwords because it was the third Thursday of the month. If you bother to check, I always change my password then. And I changed them just after midnight the day after I left Llaremont, if you bother to check the time. AJ told me the computers crashed, but he said it was much earlier in the evening.”
Varian muttered an expletive.
“And there’s no need to swear at me. Maybe Monty lost the files himself. He’s good at that kind of thing.”
“Monty hasn’t seen them. Those files belong to me.”
Lou shook her head. “In point of fact, they don’t. They’re mine, but I promise you I did not bring them with me from Llaremont.”
“It will take us months to re-catalogue everything. No one knows this dig like you do. It was your project.”
“Exactly what I tried to tell you when you threw me off it,” she snapped. Then she sucked in a deep breath. “But no more. Now it’s your headache, not mine. Have fun attempting to reconstruct all my theories. You wanted me off the project; don’t ask for my help now.”
“If I find you’ve gone behind my back and published anything before Monty has a chance to…”
“You’ll do what, Varian? Sack me? Discredit me?”
“It’ll be the last thing you ever do.” Varian’s voice carried an unmistakable threat. “You will never work in archaeology again.”
Lou sucked in a deep breath. “Well, it’s been nice chatting with you. Now I must get back to work. Reports to write, photos to log, maps to draw. Good night, Varian.” She hung up and leaned heavily on the desk.
AJ eyed her. “It’s kind of funny that he can’t find the files. What will you do?”
“Finish typing them up,” she said, the decision made in a second. “I’ve just been told publishing Llaremont will be the last thing I ever do. So I’m going out with a bang, and he won’t get a chance to fire me, either. How would you like second name on the paper?”
His eyes widened and his face lit up. “Seriously?”
Lou nodded. “Yep. You brought the notes up here for me. He’ll probably fire you, too, when he finds out.”
“Worth it. He’s a sanctimonious old goat at times.”
“Then let’s go out in a blaze of glory,” she challenged. “Dark Lake can wait until tomorrow. I want this paper prepped and ready to be published next week.”
AJ straightened. “You can do that?”
“I have a contact at History Today. Let me give her a call.” She hit the speed dial button on her phone. “Jackie, its Lou Fitzgerald. I have a last minute paper you might be interested in if you have a minute. You’d have world exclusivity on it.”
Less than three minutes later, Lou beamed at AJ and gave a triumphant thumbs-up. “She’ll publish it. As long as it’s on her desk before midnight tomorrow, it’ll make the next edition which comes out on Tuesday.”
AJ grinned. “I’d love to see Varian’s face when he finds out.”
Lou cleared the table, carefully putting away all the Dark Lake maps and documents. “In all honesty, it’ll probably be the last thing either of us see.”
“Like you said, Dr. F. Out with a bang.”
~*~
Having taken several moments to compose himself, Evan set about finding what paperwork he could pertaining to the construction of the dam. His great-grandfather had kept detailed records, and it didn’t take him long to find everything that Lou would need.
Then he strode to the safe and pulled out his great-grandfather’s journal. He opened it to the entry written on the day the village was flooded.
Sept 30th.
It’s done. The fire that began three nights ago is finally out. Despite the ferocity of the blaze, many structures are still intact. There is no point in moving the bodies or attempting a mass burial now. By dawn everything will be buried under several fathoms of water anyway.
About now, the old dam fifty miles away is being blown. Water should reach us in just under an hour.
I wish none of this had been necessary. My job, my calling, is to save lives, not to be responsible for their loss, especially in such appalling circumstances. Maybe it’s fitting I spend the rest of my life caring for the dam here. Caring for the lost, the damned, those I betrayed. The irony is not lost on me.
And I have chosen my words deliberately.
Mabel doesn’t understand why I didn’t fight this. Or why we will be moving back to the manor house. But I am the heir and, therefore, have to take my rightful place, even though it’s the last thing I wish to do. I just hope someday, maybe in eternity, Father will forgive me this last act.
I have written more and sealed it in a watertight box and hidden it in the church crypt. Nowhere else is safe. The reach of CS knows no bounds.
Perhaps one day it will be found and the truth will be told.
Until that point, may God have mercy on my soul and on the souls of those innocents caught up in all this tragedy.
There go the warning sirens. The waters are coming. Just as the fog descends.
It’s quite appropriate. Most of this work was carried out under the cover of the fog, and now the waters roll in the same way.
14
Unable to sleep, Lou got up at six and dressed. She made her way down to th
e kitchen, intending to make tea and toast to keep her going for the time being. Surprised to find Evan already sitting at the table reading the paper, she started to leave, rather than disturb him.
“Morning,” he said. “You don’t have to leave. There’s a large pot of fresh tea on the table.”
“Thank you. I had a hankering for tea and toast.”
He grinned as the toaster popped. “So did I. I’ve made enough for two if you want to share. And before you say anything, you won’t be depriving me. Mrs Jefferson will do her usual mammoth breakfast at eight thirty.”
“OK, thank you.” She sat next to him. “I really want to go around your maze. Does it have floodlights?”
He nodded. “I had the gardener clear the paths yesterday. I had a feeling you’d want to explore it.”
“I love a good puzzle. I always have.” She poured some tea, adding milk and sugar.
Evan brought the toast across and sat. “Help yourself.”
“Thank you.” She covered the toast with butter and marmalade.
Evan folded his paper to the crossword. “Was the bed not comfortable?”
“I’m sorry?” She frowned in confusion.
“For you to be up so early,” he explained. “The guest rooms aren’t used that often and the beds are quite old. I could put you somewhere else if the bed is too uncomfortable for you to sleep.”
“Oh. No, the bed’s fine. I get nights where I don’t sleep. Either my mind is too active and won’t switch off long enough, or I have nightmares, and I really don’t want to go back to sleep.”
“Which was it last night?”
“Bit of both. AJ and I worked quite late, so I was still mulling things over, thinking about today’s dive, and then there’s the fact it’s September.” She finished the toast.
“Do you have something against the month?”
“Yeah.” She rubbed her hands on her jeans. “So I figured I’d get up and maybe go around the maze. Fancy coming with me?”
He frowned. “I told you, I haven’t been in it since I got lost.”
“We won’t get lost. And if I don’t find the middle after fifteen minutes, we head back out.”
“And how will you do that?”
She grinned. “I cheat. Come with me, and I’ll show you.”
He worried his bottom lip for a second and then agreed.
~*~
Evan stood at the entrance to the maze. This must be the craziest thing I have done in a long time. He tugged his coat collar around his neck. The autumn morning was decidedly chilly and still dark. The floodlit maze yawned before them. “Are you sure we won’t get lost?”
Lou nodded and produced a large ball of brightly coloured wool from her jacket pocket. “As I said, I cheat.” She tied the end of the wool to the sign at the maze entrance. “Ready?”
“As I’ll ever be,” he muttered. “And you are way too cheerful for oh-dark-thirty.”
She grinned. “So I keep being told.”
Evan shook his head, trying to push aside the demons associated with the maze and walked beside her. The tall hedges towered over him, making him seem much smaller than his six-foot-two frame. He shivered.
Lou glanced at him. “Who built this maze?”
“It’s been here as long as the house,” he said. “Started life apparently as small box hedges and grew as they do. Small hedges would make it easier.”
She shook her head, back tracking as they reached a dead end. “You’d have thought so, but no. They can be even more annoying, because you can see where you need to go, but still can’t get there.”
Evan turned right. He stood still as Lou headed left. “Where are you going?”
“Behind us is a dead end, right? If you go right, you can see the wool, so that’s the way we came, therefore we go left.”
He nodded slightly, whirling to face the other way.
“What’s in the middle?”
“I have no idea.”
She grinned. “We might never find out. I set the alarm on my phone, so we know when to head back.”
“Or we might find out and regret it.” He paused as they reached another junction. “Left.”
Lou nodded and wrapped the wool around a branch. “Left it is. Regret it how?”
“It might be a bottomless pit. Or a madman with an axe.”
She laughed. “He’d be a bit old by now. It could be buried treasure. Or a book to sign to say you’ve completed it. I’ve done several like that. Do you have any aerial photos of it?”
“No. Why?”
“Because then you’d have an accurate map of it. You wouldn’t need the string and would never get lost.”
He smiled. “That is a very good idea. I shall organize one for this afternoon.”
She tilted her head. “You can do it that quickly?”
“I have my own plane.”
“Oh, how the other half lives,” she chuckled. “I own my car, but that’s it.” Her alarm rang. “Time’s up.”
Evan gazed at her. Never mind being lost in the maze. He was lost in her eyes and would quite happily stay there. “Leave the wool. We could continue at another point if you wish.”
Lou smiled. “I’d like that.”
15
Having spent the entire day diving and mapping the lake, Lou ate dinner quickly then vanished into the drawing room. She wrote up her notes and then focused her attention to finalizing the Llaremont paper. After all the work she and AJ had put into it the previous night, plus what she’d done in the wee small hours, it was almost ready to be sent. One last read through to check for typos should do it.
AJ cleared his throat from where he sat planning the next day’s dive. “About this dive tomorrow…”
Lou glanced up. “What about it?”
“We need a third person out there.”
“Not happening. I can’t trust a bloke from the pub with a bit of diving experience to do this properly. And Varian won’t send anyone else. It was hard enough convincing him to send you.”
“Look, Dr. F. You and I both know you can’t dive alone. It flouts a dozen safety laws, never mind anything else. That’s not taking your past into consideration.”
Lou narrowed her eyes, her hackles rising. “What has that got to do with anything?”
“What if you have another panic attack out there, inside one of those buildings this time? If I’m not there you’ll be stuffed.”
“We managed perfectly well the past two days.”
He tapped the table. “Besides, a one-legged archaeologist has no place in the field. You need to get in a lecture room or behind a desk where you belong.”
Anger flared, and she slammed her fist into the table. “How dare you?” she yelled. “You know I actually believed you were on my side in all this for a second. Did Varian send you up here to sabotage this?”
“No.” AJ scowled. “Would I have brought those files up if he had? He wanted you out of the way so his son could take the credit for your discovery. He still does. He doesn’t want you publishing first.”
“Good luck with that,” Lou hissed. “This will be sent in the next couple of hours or so. And you’re fired.”
AJ glanced heavenward. “Not again.”
“I mean it this time. You don’t want to work with, and I quote, ‘a one-legged archaeologist,’ then get out. Now. Go on. Get out. Don’t come back.” She returned her attention to the file in front of her, ignoring him.
After a second, the door slammed shut.
Lou buried her head in her hands. All she’d ever wanted was to be an archaeologist or a swimmer. Her stepfather, Jack, had assured her both professions were possible after the docs on the airbase in Guam took her leg. She’d believed him, along with a lot of other stuff he’d said. Over time, those things, along with part of her faith, had been eroded. Perhaps this wasn’t true either. Maybe she’d been right in her assertions that she was a waste of space.
She glanced up as the door to the drawing room opened. S
he somehow managed a faint smile as Evan came into the room. At least her heart no longer did that wow-he-is-so-handsome-and-he-is-talking-to-me-I-think-I-might-pass-out-from-joy thing that it did the first few times she saw him.
His dark gaze swallowed her whole. “Am I disturbing you?”
She shook her head, hit save, and closed the document. “Not at all. I was about to take a break anyway.”
He sat beside her. “When I promised you dinner at the manor the day we met, this wasn’t what I had in mind.”
“No?”
His hand covered hers. “I was thinking more you and me, a few candles, a small intimate dinner, you know.” He glanced around. “Where’s AJ?”
“He’s up in his room. Sulking, most likely.”
“Sulking or skulking?”
Lou sighed. “Sulking. I fired him. For the third time in as many days.”
Evan raised an eyebrow. “You can do that?”
“He’s on my team, so yes, I can hire and fire whomever I please. However, he isn’t convinced I mean it, as he’s still here.”
“May I ask what he did?”
“You may not. And he’s probably right. He’s too valuable to fire. And I’d rather not talk about AJ or work, if you don’t mind.”
“Not at all.” Evan stood and moved over to the sideboard. “Can I get you a drink? It sounds as if you could do with one. I have brandy, whisky, and scotch. There is also wine if you’d prefer, or several mixers.”
Lou glanced over at the bottles. She didn’t want to start drinking because with the mood she was in, she’d end up drunk, and in an even worse temper than she already was. Never mind the fact that a hangover on a dive wasn’t a good idea. “Is that bitter lemon?”
He nodded. “You’d like that?”
“Love it.”
He poured her a glass, and then poured himself a glass of one of the amber liquids.
Lou never had been able to tell brandy and whisky apart. She closed the laptop and took the glass he offered her. “Thank you. You should try mixing this with grapefruit juice. It’s amazing.”