Artifact

by Gigi Pandian

  I grabbed Lane and Rupert and dragged them outside to the garden. I believe it was a grand garden with a variety of rare roses, but even if I had been inclined to notice such things, I was in no condition to pay attention to them. I barely noticed the cold wind whipping around us.

  “Sit,” I said, indicating a stone bench. They glanced at each other, then back at me. They sat. “You’re going to tell me exactly what is going on.”

  Chapter 43

  Lane cupped his hand against the wind and lit a cigarette. He blew the smoke out of the corner of his mouth directly onto Rupert’s face. Rupert was too distraught to notice.

  “Knox was working at that big auction house,” Rupert began. “Sir Edward Gregor came in to get a piece of jewelry appraised to see if he wanted to sell it. It was the only piece like it in his possession, some family heirloom, so he didn’t know if he could get much for it beyond the value of the gemstone itself. It was appraised at the value of the ruby, since no one had any idea where the piece might have come from. Sir Edward decided not to sell it, but Knox saved one of the photographs of the necklace.

  “You know the type of things Knox always read instead of working on his dissertation. He’d seen references to some old treasure called the Rajasthan Rubies. When he saw Sir Edward’s ruby necklace, he thought it might be a part of that bigger set because of the unique size and shape. What is it, Jaya?”

  My face must have shown recognition of the name of the treasure Lane had mentioned. Lane’s face was impassive.

  “Oh, the Rajasthan Rubies?” Rupert said derisively. “Daft name, I know. It wasn’t in any of the literature I found at the library, I can tell you that.”

  “Then where—?”

  “I didn’t ask Knox.” His face again clouded over. He shook his head sadly. “We knew there had to be something sketchy about the treasure,” he continued, “since this bloke only had one piece of it. But of course it wasn’t enough to go on, was it? We didn’t do anything else at the time. That was over a year ago. But then, a few weeks back—”

  He broke off as another set of tourists wandered into the garden.

  “Bloody summertime crowds,” he grumbled.

  “I suppose we should find somewhere more private,” I said, though I hated to interrupt Rupert’s story. “Come on.”

  The two men stood up from the bench, glaring at each other once more before they followed me. We walked in unfriendly silence toward the front of the estate and the car park. We were about to reach the front of the main house when Lane dropped his cigarette and threw me up against the hard stone wall.

  “Police,” he said in a loud whisper, pinning Rupert against the wall with his other arm.

  I looked around the side of the wall quickly before Lane pulled us back. Two policemen were standing over our rental car, inspecting the license plate.

  “Your coat?” Lane asked as soon as we were further down the side of the house.

  I groaned, closed my eyes, and nodded. “It’s in the trunk.”

  Lane swore. “Someone must have seen us leaving the dig,” he said. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

  “And do what?” I asked.

  “Knox’s blood is all over your coat,” Lane said. “Whatever we decide to do, I’d rather it not be from inside a jail cell again.” He shot Rupert a spiteful look.

  “Look, I’m sorry about that,” Rupert said. “All the evidence told me you were in on it, didn’t it? Let’s get out of here. I’ve got a car.”

  “We can’t very well walk up—”

  “It’s not in the car park,” Rupert said exasperatedly. “I’ve been trying to stay out of sight, remember?”

  Rupert led the way through the side of the garden, toward a sloping hillside. We followed a path along the edge of the mound until Lane held back.

  “It looks like part of the path up ahead is in plain view from the car park,” he said.

  “Not much of it.”

  Lane did not look pleased. “Trying to hide from the police is completely different from blending in and keeping away from people who think you’re dead. They’re looking for us.”

  “Then it’s equally imbecilic,” Rupert said, “to stand here arguing instead of heading to my car.”

  “We’ll have to go this way,” Lane said, walking off the path.

  I followed.

  “Where the hell is he going?” Rupert said.

  The small ravine that had looked ominous during the night was now a welcome sight. Lane walked quickly, not slowing when he reached the edge of what I saw was a small stream with high banks. There wasn’t much water in the ravine, but there was mud. Lane jumped in without hesitation. I could barely see the top of his head from where I stood. He turned and put his arms up to help me down.

  “It’s better than the alternative,” he said softly, lifting me down. “You’re on your own,” he added to Rupert.

  “It’s my car,” Rupert pointed out.

  “You’re welcome to take the main path and explain to the police officers who spot you why you happen to not be dead. I’m sure Jaya and I will have plenty of time to get away by some other means while they work out your story.”

  Rupert jumped down behind us, splashing in the mucky water.

  Lane led the way, walking sure-footedly in the gummy mud. We emerged on a dirt road with a Peugeot parked along the shoulder.

  Safely inside the car, we sat in silence as Rupert headed toward the highway. Rupert handed me a knit cap. I didn’t need to ask why he wanted me to put it on. We sat tensely as he tried to keep an inconspicuous, casual pace on the smaller roads on the way to the A90.

  Once we were heading south on the highway, blending in with the other small cars and trucks, I broke the silence.

  “Lane Peters, meet Rupert Chadwick.”

  Chapter 44

  “Charmed, I’m sure,” Rupert said into the rear view mirror.

  “Where are we heading?” Lane asked. His knees were almost even with his chin in the cramped back seat. Now that we were out of immediate danger he kicked over a bundle on the seat next to him and stretched out his legs.

  “Hey, watch it with your mucky feet,” Rupert said, looking into the rearview mirror.

  “It’s only a little mud.”

  “I’ve been staying at a flat in Edinburgh,” Rupert said. “It’s a couple hours’ drive, but it’ll give us a place to sort things out.”

  “Keep talking while you drive,” I said.

  “Where was I?” Rupert said.

  “Three weeks ago.”

  “Nothing had come of Knox thinking there might be something to Sir Edward’s ruby necklace—until this summer. Fiona rang up Knox from this dig she’d arrived at. She mentioned that during their initial survey, they found a ruby in the earth. They assumed it had fallen off a piece of jewelry from some wealthy hiker, so they turned it in to the local police station. Since the Gregor Estate was next to the dig site, and since the stone was a ruby, that got Knox thinking. The dig was understaffed, so Malcolm was happy to have extra help. Knox was able to search around at night, and he found that ruby bracelet I sent you. It was shallowly buried in a sandy area along the cliff.

  “Knox rang me up, since now that we had a location, we had more to go on. Since the Rajasthan Rubies hadn’t been seen in ages, except for the necklace that Sir Edward Gregor had, we thought the treasure must still be hidden. We guessed that Connor Gregor got lucky and succeeded in getting the treasure out of India, and he brought it back to Britain. He’d been in India under the Raj, and Sir Edward Gregor was his descendant. It all fit. We thought Connor must have left a clue somewhere. But as much as we searched, both at the Gregor Estate and around the site where we found the bracelet, we didn’t find anything else. That’s when I thought you could help. We never stopped to think it might have been someone else in the family. I was righ
t that I needed you.”

  Rupert paused as he passed a truck on the road.

  “We were exhausted from digging at night and exploring and helping on the dig during the day,” he said. “At the time, I thought it was sleep deprivation making me paranoid, but something seemed strange on the dig. A mood. Something was off. I was sure someone had found out what we were doing. I hid the bracelet in my room, and when I went to check on it one night, I could tell someone else had moved it. That’s when I decided to send it to you. It seemed like your specialty. Plus you were always so clever. You told me how easily you’d figured out the clues left in that company man’s diary. I knew you’d be able to find something we missed.”

  He glanced over at me fondly before turning his eyes back to the road.

  “And I was right,” Rupert said, smiling as he drove. “How did you put it together with the girl?”

  I explained briefly about Rupert having the historical timing wrong, that it was Willoughby and Elspeth who left India during the Sepoy Rebellion, and how I put it together when Fergus and Angus thought I looked like the bean nighe fairy of the local woman who died in childbirth.

  “The girl in that painting looks nothing like you,” Rupert said once I was done with my explanation. “Half the girls in London look more like her. You’re much more striking. Hmm. I wonder if he loved her because she was his daughter or because she got the jewels out of India for him. She made him a very rich man.”

  “That’s horrible,” I said.

  “What? Like you didn’t wonder?”

  “No,” I said. “He took her with him at a time when it was clear being the child of an interracial marriage in India wasn’t going to be easy. You only needed to look at that loving sketch he made to know I’m right.”

  We drove along for a few minutes before I persuaded Rupert to continue with his narrative.

  “How did you end up with the bracelet?” I asked. “Why didn’t Knox have it?”

  He gave a raspy laugh that I didn’t like the sound of.

  “Knox was nervous,” Rupert said. “Felt like someone was watching him. He never saw anyone, but you should have seen how jittery he was. But you know where my skepticism got me. I thought he was paranoid before he gave it to me, but once I had it, I thought I might go mad myself. I needed to get it away from the dig.

  “Right after I drove to a village to mail you the package, I had the accident. I knew for certain that it hadn’t been my imagination after that. Someone was serious enough about having the treasure that he was willing to kill for it. I had the upper hand with him thinking I was dead, so I took advantage of that and thought I could quickly find the rest of the treasure while no one was watching me. I needed a few days to rest up, as I told you. I hadn’t had any luck at the Gregor Estate yet, so I thought I’d at least try my luck at the British Library. You always seemed to find such helpful information there, like the diary that gave me the idea about the treasure being from a Company man in the first place.” He glanced at me fondly again. “But library research is always so dull, and I didn’t find anything.

  “I nearly had a heart attack when I saw you at the library,” he continued. “I’d left you messages telling you not to worry about getting in touch. I didn’t want you getting involved in the mess that nearly got me killed.”

  He explained how he came back to look for more clues at the Gregor Estate. He thought he had figured out where the treasure was buried. He wanted to get everyone out of the way for what he assumed would be his last night of digging, but he again came up empty-handed.

  “I knew I’d lost my one big chance at doing such blatant digging without arousing suspicion,” he concluded, “but I was so sure I’d find it. I didn’t see Knox before I left. Someone else is after the treasure.”

  I stared out the window, watching the landscape around us rush by in a blur.

  “Maybe we got the motive wrong,” I said.

  “What?” he asked distractedly, passing a slow-moving car on the highway.

  “What if it wasn’t about the treasure,” I said, thinking out loud. “You admitted to completely destroying the cave right underneath the dig. Malcolm Alpin wouldn’t let anything compromise his dig.”

  Rupert looked at me incredulously.

  “Malcolm?” he said. “It’s not possible.”

  “I know he seems like a perfectly likable man most of the time, but I’ve seen him when he has one of his fits of anger about his dig—”

  “He thinks the knowledge to be gained from the dig is enormous,” Lane said from the backseat. “His scholarly expedition is too precious to let anyone ruin it with a fanciful treasure.”

  “And his fanatical devotion to proving his ideas in place of mainstream accepted theories,” I said.

  “Don’t you two ever stop finishing each other’s sentences and shut up?” Rupert said. “That’s not it. You two can collaborate about theoretically brilliant motives all you like, but Malcolm couldn’t have killed Knox. I sent him on a wild goose chase last night as well. I was worried about his habit of checking up on his beloved dig. After your friend here was arrested, I called up the inn and left a message for Malcolm that there was some paperwork back at his university he needed to sign first thing in the morning to assure his grant for this dig was processed properly. He needed to head back to St. Andrews that night to assure being prompt for the morning meeting.”

  My hands gripped the dashboard as I took in what he was saying.

  “You see,” Rupert said, “there’s no way Malcolm could have done it. Thanks to me, he has an alibi.”

  Chapter 45

  “You can kill him later,” Lane said, correctly guessing my desire to reach across the car and strangle Rupert. He put his hand firmly on my shoulder, preventing the accident I was in danger of causing.

  “For now,” Lane said, “we need to deal with the fact that Malcolm isn’t the killer.”

  “It made so much sense,” I said. “I really thought I had it.”

  “Yes,” Rupert said, “but greed is a better motive, isn’t it?”

  I didn’t like the angry look in his eyes, or the way his fingers gripped the steering wheel so tightly that the veins on the back of his hands looked as if they might pop.

  “If we’re done questioning each other now,” Rupert said, “maybe it’s time we got down to figuring out what happened to my best friend.” He swallowed hard. “Jaya, you may have identified where the treasure is, but that doesn’t tell us who’s after it or who killed Knox.”

  I didn’t know what to say. I watched the road fly by, listening to the strained hum of the engine as Rupert drove as fast as the Peugeot would take us. I closed my eyes to rest for a moment.

  “Where are we?” I asked, rubbing my eyes.

  “We’re here.”

  In the flat at the outskirts of Edinburgh, Lane cooked up a big pan of thick bacon he found in the fridge. I paced the kitchen with a cup of strong coffee, watching Rupert sleep on the couch in the adjoining living room.

  “No eggs?” I asked as Lane slid the bacon and a piece of stale toast onto a plate. “I thought you were a master chef.”

  “The eggs were on the counter. If you want to risk eating them, be my guest.” He set down the pan and rested his hands on my shoulders. “What do you want to do?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, glancing over at Rupert. He was snoring lightly, but it was a shallow sound. His lips were cracked. They hadn’t been on the train. His bandaged arm rested on his side, and his sleeve was pulled up enough for me to see it was bleeding again. He was getting worse, not better.

  “He’s not faking it,” Lane said quietly, following my gaze.

  “Should we drop him off at the doctor?” I asked.

  “Only if you want to get arrested.”

  “Maybe it’s worth it. Look at him.”

  “No docto
r,” Rupert called out from the couch. “I’m fine. Just need sleep,” he mumbled before falling back asleep.

  “I should go back,” Lane said. “We need to find out more about what’s going on.”

  “Hang on,” I said. “I’m sure you’re implicated almost as much as I am.”

  “I don’t mean go back as me,” he said quietly. He took my hand in his and led me to the kitchen table. “You know that stuff I told you, about my being good at pretending to be other people?”

  “They’d recognize you. They know you. You’re tall. You have distinctive cheek bones. Your hair.”

  “I’d need to pick up a few things first.”

  “This is how you—?”

  He nodded slowly, his eyes fixed on mine. I saw fear in his eyes. Not the panic of being caught, but the dread of being judged by me.

  I reached across the table. I took his hand in mine and squeezed. A forced cough from the kitchen door pulled my eyes away from Lane’s.

  “All right there?” Rupert said.

  “You should be sleeping,” I said. “Are you sure we can’t take you to the doctor? You don’t look good.”

  “Thanks for the concern,” Rupert snapped, rubbing his temple.

  Lane handed Rupert a plate of cold bacon.

  “Cheers,” Rupert grumbled, out of habit more than courtesy I was sure.

  “We were discussing what we should do,” I said.

  “Come up with anything?”

  “I need to borrow your car,” Lane said.

  Rupert stopped chewing. “Not bloody likely. Jaya, I told you this tosser—”

  “You’re supposed to be dead,” Lane said, “and the police have Jaya’s coat covered with Knox’s blood. I’m the only one who can do anything.”

  I looked expectantly at Lane. He clearly didn’t want Rupert to know that disguise was one of the skills he possessed.

  “What do you want to do?” Rupert asked, then resumed chewing the cold bacon.

  Out of habit, I went to the cabinets in search of the HP sauce I knew Rupert liked on his bacon.