A Knight on the Town

by Hermione Moon

  We leave the shop with a handful of bags, return them to the car, and I head off home.

  “You’ve spent a lot of money on me today,” Arthur says.

  “I know. You’re worth it.” I smile at him.

  “That’s sweet,” he says, “but I can’t be a drain on your finances. That’s not fair.”

  “You said you wanted to find a job,” I remind him. “You can pay me back later, with interest.”

  “Interest?”

  I explain the concept behind adding interest to a loan. “But I’m joking,” I add hastily. “It’s the least I can do after waking you up from your slumber.”

  He studies me thoughtfully for the remainder of the journey, until I start to feel embarrassed by his steady stare.

  “What?” I ask, turning onto my road and pulling up outside the house.

  “Do you have a shovel?” he asks.

  “I… sorry, what?”

  “I’ve got an idea.” He smiles. “We’re going to dig for buried treasure.”

  Chapter Eleven

  Having no idea what Arthur is planning, I put a shovel in the back of the car, and also my metal detector.

  Archaeologists aren’t great fans of metal detectors. An important part of archaeology is studying an artefact in situ, which means examining the soil around the item, and understanding its place in the site. Knowing the condition and age of the soil and other items above and below an artefact can help to date it, and therefore having amateur treasure hunters pulling precious items out of the ground without recording their surroundings is very frowned on.

  But Arthur is determined to find something, so we load up the car, and Arthur finds Google Maps on his phone and pulls up the area.

  “Here,” he says, showing me the screen.

  “Glastonbury Tor?”

  “Is it far?” he asks.

  I show him how to use the directions option and find out how far it is from one place to another. It states four minutes via the A361 or seven minutes if we take Stone Down Lane through the fields.

  “Let’s go through the fields,” he says, and I set off, turning left into Bove Town and heading out into the countryside.

  “There’s an article on Glastonbury Tor,” he says. “There’s a tower on top of the hill?”

  “There have been lots of buildings there. Wooden at first, and then the stone Church of St. Michael was built. The tower is what remains of that.” I head toward Wick Hollow. “I know archaeologists have found evidence of an Iron Age settlement there, and also signs of Dark Age occupation. I think there was a forge, and several postholes, which indicate a building. Was that when you were there?”

  “Yes. People travelled there to make offerings to Taranis, the sky god, and a small village grew up to cater for the visitors.”

  “It’s so strange to hear you talk about those times first-hand,” I tell him in wonder. “I’ve read so much about the Dark Ages, and historians and archaeologists have had to put together events with only one or two pieces of the puzzle.”

  We emerge from the trees around Wick Hollow, and the countryside opens up. Sheep and their new lambs graze on the hills, while tractors move slowly through the fields, spraying crops and spreading fertilizer. Arthur looks around with interest.

  “Does it look familiar at all?” I ask him.

  “No,” he says. “Much of this land was marsh or river.”

  “The Tor is in the middle of what we call the Summerland Meadows, which is part of the Somerset Levels. Here’s an interesting fact for you.” I’m beginning to understand that he likes quirky bits of information. “Sometimes when the ground is marshy or damp, it produces a floating mirage, which makes the Tor look as if it’s coming out of the mist. The effect is called a Fata Morgana, which is named after your sister, because the Italians believed she conjured islands in the Strait of Messina to lure sailors to their deaths.”

  “She’d have liked that,” he says. “What a great story.” He gestures ahead of us. “There’s the Tor.”

  Sure enough, the mound rises up in front of us, the tower clear against the sky. The road curves around it, but Arthur suggests we park at the bottom of the path leading up to it, so I pull over. We get out with Merlin and retrieve the shovel and the metal detector from the back.

  “So we’re going up to the Tor?” I ask him uncertainly. There has been a lot of research done around here, and I’m sure archaeologists would have recovered anything he might have left here long ago.

  But he says, “No,” and he turns and walks off in the opposite direction, carrying the shovel.

  I look at Merlin, who licks his nose, and then we both set off after him.

  Arthur heads across the field. Relieved that I’m wearing flats and not heels, I almost have to run to keep up with his long-legged stride. He scans the landscape as he walks, a frown on his brow.

  “What are you looking for?” I ask. “Some kind of landmark?”

  “There used to be an avenue here,” he says. “It marked the ceremonial way to the Tor.”

  “I know where that is,” I reply.

  He stops and looks at me. “Really?”

  “Yes. Two great oaks mark part of it—they’re known as Gog and Magog.”

  His jaw drops. “They’re still standing?”

  “Sort of. They were cut down to make a farm at the beginning of the twentieth century, but the trunks are still there.” I begin walking again, and Arthur follows me.

  It’s a magical day. It’s quiet out here; I can’t hear any traffic, and the only sound is birdsong. I spot house sparrows, chaffinches, goldfinches, and a couple of magpies—two for joy! And from the trees in front of us comes the distinctive sound of a cuckoo.

  It’s warm in the afternoon sun and sweat prickles between my shoulder blades. Summer’s coming, and for the first time in ages, I feel excited at the thought of the future. I have so much I want to show Arthur.

  “So Gog and Magog were there in the sixth century?” I ask, mainly because I like his voice and want to hear him talk.

  He nods. “They were young then, planted only a short time before I first saw them. We came here before the Battle of Camlann. The Saxons had pushed us back repeatedly, and we had to retreat many times. I knew a confrontation was looming. I came here with some of my men, and we buried our coin to keep it safe.”

  It was a standard practice at the time, and coin hoards have been found all over Britain.

  “It’s probably been found already,” I tell him gently.

  “We’ll see.” For once, he’s not smiling, and his eyes hold a kind of grim determination.

  We don’t speak again for a while. My heart is thumping hard, partly because I’m walking fast, but also at the thought of discovering an ancient hoard, something that belonged to Arthur all those years ago.

  In front of us, a tall hedge marks the border of the field. There’s a break in it halfway along, with a wooden stile. Arthur vaults over it easily, and Merlin sneaks under it. Arthur turns and holds out his hand, and his fingers close around mine as I navigate the stile and jump down.

  “They’re just up here,” I tell him, and we turn left and walk up the narrow lane. The Tor is behind us now, and it’s only a short walk before we see the two old oaks on the right-hand side.

  They’re only about a third of the height they would have reached, and the trunks are now dead, but they’re still impressive. Arthur reaches out a hand and brushes it over the wood. I can’t imagine how strange it is for him to connect with a piece of the ancient past that was so young the last time he saw it.

  He drops his hand and investigates the hedge between the two oaks. “Through here,” he says, and he pushes the branches apart and disappears.

  Merlin squirms beneath, and I bend and follow, the tough branches of the hawthorn scratching my cheek. Primroses the colour of butter dot the grass beneath the hedge, and I try not to crush them as I slip through.

  I emerge into the field on the other side and stand be
tween the oak trees. “Here,” Arthur says, and he unzips his jacket, lets it slide off, and tosses it aside.

  “Wait,” I say as he goes to pick up the spade. “The detector will tell us if anything metal lies beneath the surface.”

  I switch it on while Arthur sweeps the ground free of branches and debris in a circle about six feet wide. Then I start to pass the pad of the detector across the ground.

  I prepare myself for the disappointment of finding nothing and try to think what to say to Arthur in consolation, but I’ve barely begun to form the thought when the detector emits a high-pitched beep. My heart bangs against my ribs. If it was iron, the detector would have given a low-pitched beep. There are precious metals beneath the surface of the soil.

  Arthur retrieves the spade, walks to where the detector beeps the loudest, and thrusts the spade into the ground. Beside him, Merlin starts digging with his paws.

  I watch them, my heart racing, filled with conflicting emotions. I desperately want this to be Arthur’s hoard—both for him, and for the excitement of discovering something so important. But part of me feels guilty at the thought of digging up the past like this. I studied archaeology for long enough to know that this is wrong. But how can I tell him to stop now?

  The two of them dig for ten minutes, clearing a three-foot-wide square about six inches down, then Arthur stops to tug off his sweater and toss it aside. I stare at the expanse of tanned, muscular chest now visible and swallow hard as he picks up the spade and continues digging. Wow, he’s so gorgeous. I’m fascinated by the way his muscles move beneath the surface of his skin. He must have been magnificent on the battlefield, dressed in leather armour, swinging a sword or an axe at the invaders. I’d have followed him anywhere.

  It’s getting more difficult for him to dig; although he’s got rid of the topsoil, the earth contains tree roots and stones, and he has trouble getting the blade into the dirt. But he perseveres, and it’s only another ten minutes or so before he’s a foot deep.

  Merlin stops for a moment, panting. He stands on the edge of the hole, staring down. Arthur grins.

  “What’s so funny?” I ask.

  “He just said, ‘A large hole appeared outside the local police station. Officers are looking into it.’”

  I giggle. “I bet they still haven’t got to the bottom of it.”

  Arthur’s throaty chuckle is infectious, and soon we’re both laughing, but it comes to an abrupt halt as he suddenly lets the spade fall and drops to his knees. He reaches out a hand and picks up something, then gets to his feet again and brings it over to me on his palm.

  It’s a small silver coin.

  “Oh dear Goddess.” I take it from him and brush the earth away with my thumb. “It’s a silver denarius.”

  “One of many,” Arthur says, returning to the hole. He brushes away the earth with his hand, revealing the lip of an urn, and within it more coins protruding through the layer of soil.

  “Arthur,” I say as he goes to scoop them out. “Wait.”

  He stops and looks up at me.

  “You can’t do that,” I tell him softly. “I know that to you this is nothing more important than the contents of my money purse, but to archaeologists, this is an incredible find. It needs to be excavated properly, so the coins can be photographed and recorded.”

  He gets slowly to his feet. “But it’s mine. And I want you to have it.” He spreads his arms, palms up. He’s angry, although I don’t think it’s with me. “I have nothing,” he says, “not even the clothes on my body are mine. I was a rich man, and I put these coins in the ground myself. I want to give you something back, Gwen. I can’t expect you to keep me. I have some pride.”

  “I know.” I close the distance between us. “I understand. But this is important to me. I value the past, and anyway, what would we do with the coins if we just dug them up? I can hardly spend them in the shops.”

  “No, of course not, but you could sell them to a museum.”

  “They’d want to know where I got them. Look, if we do this right, it’s likely you’ll get the money anyway. We have specific rules in England. Hidden treasure belongs to the Crown, and failure to report finds to the Coroner can earn you a huge fine and even jail time.”

  “Seriously?”

  “Yes, it shows how important we believe artefacts to be. The coroner holds an inquest to determine if it’s treasure. If it is, it’ll be valued at the British Museum in London. Museums then bid on it, and they pay a reward that is shared between the finder and the owner of the land on which it was found.”

  Arthur nods, and I can see understanding dawn in his eyes that these coins are so important, they need to be treated like treasure, not just as money.

  I continue, “A similar hoard was found in Frome, not far from here, in 2010. It was valued at over three hundred thousand pounds. The finder received half of that. It’s a huge amount of money, Arthur.”

  “I understand.” He brushes his hands free of the soil that is clinging to them. “You must of course do what you think is right. I’m just disappointed because I wanted to give them to you.”

  “That’s incredibly sweet of you, and I’m thrilled to have been with you when you found them.”

  He looks down as I rest a palm on his bare chest. His skin is warm, and I can feel his heart thudding away. I brush my thumb over the scattering of hair on his ribs. He lifts his gaze and looks into my eyes.

  “You’re still the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen,” he says. “The sun on your hair makes it look like fire.”

  “Oh, Arthur. How do you always know exactly what to say?”

  “Years of practice.” He smiles. He means years of being with Guinevere—with me.

  I slide my arms around his waist, and he lifts his around me. I rest my cheek on his bare chest.

  I can smell the fresh earth and the flowers in the hedgerows. The sun casts its warm rays over us, although I don’t think that’s the reason my skin is heating.

  We stand like that for a long time, while Merlin sighs and snuffles about in the leaves, and the cuckoo calls from the ash tree over the lane.

  Chapter Twelve

  When we get back to town, I park opposite the café and take Arthur to the field unit. Duncan and Una are there, sorting through a box on the big table in the centre. They smile as we walk in, and Una waves.

  “Hey Gwen,” she says. “How’re you doing?”

  “We heard you discovered another body this morning,” Duncan adds. “I’m so sorry. Are you all right?”

  “It was a bit of a shock,” I confess, “but I’m okay. Guys, this is Arthur Penn. He’s an old friend who’s come to stay with me for a bit.”

  “Hello, Arthur.” Duncan shakes his hand, and Una does the same. “It’s lovely to meet you.”

  “Likewise.” Arthur peers into the box on the table. “This looks interesting.”

  “Finds from the Iron Age village near Godney,” Una says. “Mainly animal bones. Interesting, though—we think this jawbone is from a brown bear.”

  “There were bears here in the Iron Age?” Surprised, I address the question to Duncan and Una, but I glance at Arthur and raise my eyebrows. He nods and gives a slight smile. Oh, has he seen one?

  “Oh yes,” Duncan says. “We think they probably died out around the sixth or seventh century AD.”

  “I didn’t know that.” I perch on the table next to the box. “Look, we’ve found something I think you’re going to want to investigate.”

  “Oh?” They both look up with interest—they know how much I love archaeology, and that even though I don’t have a complete degree, I usually know my stuff.

  “I took my metal detector out around the Tor, just for fun,” I tell them, “and we had a walk up to Gog and Magog. We got a signal between the trees, and when Arthur dug down, we found this.” I extract the silver coin from my jeans pocket and hold it out.

  Duncan takes it, and he and Una peer at it.

  “I don’t believe it,�
�� Una exclaims, “it looks like a silver denarius.”

  “That’s what I thought. But that’s not it. It looks as if there’s a whole collection of them in an urn.”

  Their eyebrows rise and their jaws drop. “How did you leave it?” Una asks.

  “We filled in the hole and put some leaves and branches on top of it, which should discourage anyone nosing around. But I think it would be a good idea to rescue it as soon as possible.”

  “Of course.” Duncan looks delighted. “We could go out tomorrow, couldn’t we, Una?”

  “Absolutely,” she replies. “We don’t want to leave it where anyone can just dig it up. I think it’s John Farlow who owns the field with Gog and Magog in, isn’t it? I’ll call him and get permission. We could go around ten tomorrow.” She smiles at me. “What about you, Gwen? Do you want to come and help us lift it?”

  “Oh. Um, well, don’t you need… you know… real archaeologists to do that?”

  Duncan snorts. “We all know you’re as enthusiastic as the rest of us about archaeology. We’d love to have you along.”

  Una turns the silver denarius over in her fingers. “If there are more silver coins, you know that means it’ll be classified as treasure.”

  “It’s treasure to me no matter what the coins are made of,” I say happily, thrilled for Arthur’s sake that they want to get straight onto it.

  “Aw. You’re such a sweetie.” Una comes around the table and kisses my cheek. “Be here at nine thirty, and you can come with us to meet John and lift the pot.”

  “Okay.” We say goodbye and head outside. “I’m glad we don’t have to wait long,” I say to Arthur as we return to the car.

  “It’ll be interesting to see what they have to say.” Arthur is hiding his disappointment well. I’m incredibly touched that he wants to contribute to the income, but pleased he’s willing to wait to do it the right way.

  “I suppose we should go home,” I say, a little reluctantly. It’s been a full day, and we’ve managed to cram a huge amount into it, but I’m sure he must be tired.

  “I thought you’d want to go and see Valerie’s other friend first,” he says.