Murder In The Queen's armes

THIRTEEN

Wherever Bowser had been, his gigantic nose told him when they’d reached the foot of Barr’s Lane, and he came charging viciously through the rain, throwing his heavy body against the wire fence again and again. Gideon had been expecting it this time, but even so, the hairs on the back of his neck went up, and he and Julie moved by the monstrous animal with all due speed.

Chilled through, and with their feet soaked, they had hoped for a hot lunch at the Queen’s Armes. Too late they remembered that Hinshore and his wife went to Bridport on Thursdays to do their weekly shopping, so the hotel was deserted.

They had, however, noticed an old, attractive pub, the George, across the street. More in need of hot food than warm footwear, they went there without changing from their wet clothes. Inside, happily, the George was a rustic pub at its best-a small, barely modernized seventeenth-century coaching inn with oaken beams and flagged floors, smelling of beer and fried fish. Half of one wall was a fireplace so capacious that there were two small tables with benches within it, one at each end. Between them, in the old fireplace’s center, was a small wood stove with a metal hood and chimney, in which burned a cozy little blaze of scrap lumber. Although the pub was crowded and full of cheerful noise, one of the tables inside the fireplace was vacant, and Gideon and Julie made for it, gratefully basking in the dry warmth.

They sat with the steam rising from their wet shoes until the blood seemed to move through their bodies again and they were able to take off their ponchos and think about ordering. On the bar was a placard listing the luncheon menu: Ploughman’s lunch,?1.20; shepherd’s pie,?1.20; haddock and chips, 90p; steak-and-kidney pie (with peas and chips),?1.20.

"Steak-and-kidney pie for me," Julie said, not surprisingly. In a few brief weeks she had developed a near-addiction to the pungent stew. "And a gallon of hot tea."

"And I’ll have the shepherd’s pie." He worked his way through a crowd at the little bar to order from a barmaid, as harassed as English barmaids always seemed to be, and as friendly, then came back to the table carrying two brandies. "To help us thaw out."

Gideon swirled his brandy, sniffed it, took a good-sized swallow. "Ah," he sighed, "that’s better. Hey, that trudge through the rain was fun. I speak retrospectively, of course."

"It was fun, and you know it." She watched him take a second, thoughtful sip from the snifter. "You’re wondering what happened at the hearing, aren’t you?"

Gideon smiled. Pretty soon they wouldn’t have to use words at all. "Yes-"

From across the room a high voice cut through the noise. "What’s the matter, you can’t even say hello?"

"Abe!" Gideon cried. "We didn’t know you were here. Come join us!"

At the far end of the bar, Abe disengaged himself from the group of English men and women he had been conversing with. There were hearty, teasing good-byes, and someone even clapped him on the shoulder. A young woman offered to carry his plate and glass for him, an offer Abe declined. Holding a nearly empty half pint of beer in one hand and a plate of fish and chips in the other, he threaded his way toward them.

Gideon marveled at him, not for the first time. How could anyone be more out of place in an English country pub? And how could anyone seem more at home? As tenaciously as Abe had clung to his old speech and mannerisms, he was at the same time the most adaptable of men, fitting himself to local custom-whether in a university faculty club, a Bantu kraal, or a Dorset pub-with a willing ease that was unmistakably genuine and enthusiastically reciprocated.

"So," he said as he sat down and arranged his food fussily before him, "you had a nice walk? You didn’t get wet?" He corrected himself with a smile. "Wet you didn’t get?"

"Wet we got," Gideon said, "but it was a nice walk all the same."

The barmaid came with their tea and food, and Gideon ordered another glass of beer for Abe. For a few minutes they busied themselves with their meals. Gideon’s shepherd’s pie was substantial and fortifying, an earthenware pot filled with spiced ground meat and overflowing with a thick covering of steaming, brown-crusted mashed potatoes. After a few minutes, as if by agreement, they sat back a little, ready to talk.

"Well," Abe said, "it didn’t go so good at the hearing. Nathan’s got troubles. They’re closing down the dig."

"You weren’t able to say anything that helped?" Gideon asked.

Abe pushed a golden shred of haddock back and forth on his plate. "I said, and they listened, but what do they care what a wonderful dissertation he wrote in 1969, or that he ran a beautiful dig on Baffin Island in 1977? This they already knew. With now they’re concerned." He shrugged and let his fork fall to the plate. "It was a fair decision; I can’t complain. As for Nathan, I could talk myself blue in the face and he wouldn’t know how to say, ‘I’m sorry, I made a mistake.’ "

"Poor guy," Gideon said quietly.

"Yeah, the poor guy, but what could they do? For this he has only himself to thank."

"Abe," Gideon said, "you don’t think it’s possible that he did it, do you? Stole the skull from Dorchester, buried it here, and pretended to discover it?"

Abe shrugged elaborately. "Who knows? First he swears up and down he didn’t do it, and then he swears up and down it’s impossible that anybody else should do it."

"I don’t understand," Julie said. "Why is it impossible?"

"Because," Gideon said, "the fragment was a couple of hundred feet from the dig, and barely visible. It could have gone unnoticed forever. Anybody who’d planted it would have made it more noticeable and put it near the trenches, where it would have been sure to be found."

"Well, if it was so impossible to find, how did Nate find it?"

"He…I don’t really know." Gideon turned inquiringly to Abe. "Did he say?"

"He found it because he’s a perfectionist who can’t stand it if one little pebble is out of place on his dig. He says he’s taking a walk, he sees a piece of paper on the ground, he bends down to pick it up, and out of the corner of his eye, bingo, he sees the bone. Just luck, that’s all. But," he said, addressing Julie, "the thing is, whether he put it there himself or not, he’s the director and he’s got to be responsible-and Stonebarrow Fell is now completely farpotshket. You know farpotshket? "

"That," Gideon said, "is screwed up, plain and simple."

Abe nodded. "Screwed up. You said it, buddy."

Like the others, Julie was toying with her food. "I suppose it’s a silly idea," she said, "but isn’t it possible that Nate is just as much the victim of a hoax as Horizon Foundation or anyone else?"

Gideon replied. "But as Abe said, it’s Nate’s dig; he’d get all the credit for anything found there. Who else would have anything to gain?"

"Wait a minute," Abe said, brightening. "Maybe that’s the wrong question. Maybe the question should be: Who had anything to lose?"

"And the answer," Julie said excitedly, "would be Nate Marcus. Couldn’t somebody have sabotaged him? Duped him into thinking he had a legitimate find that proved his theory, so that in the end he’d be ruined because the thing would eventually be shown to be a fraud?"

"That," Gideon said admiringly, "is absolutely labyrinthine. But I don’t know if it holds up. If someone was doing it to discredit Nate, how could he know for sure the fraud would even be discovered? Sure, I recognized it as Pummy when I saw it, but a lot of anthropologists might not, and for all anyone knew, the substitution in the Dorchester Museum might have gone unnoticed for years-and Nate would have been a hero."

"Unless," Abe said, "Julie’s secret hoaxer made sure the word got out; for example, a little word to the West Dorset Times? There was a reporter waiting at the gate for us, you know."

"Yes, I know," Gideon said. "And that reminds me… Abe, you never told the Times I was coming to Stonebarrow Fell, did you? Or anyone on the dig?"

Abe looked blankly at him. "What for?"

"That’s what I thought," Gideon said. "Now, back to this theory you two are cooking up-this unnecessarily rococo theory, to borrow a phrase-I think it falls down on one crucial point; from what you said, Abe, Nate’s maintaining that he discovered the thing personally, without any little hints from anyone else. So how could anyone be duping him?"

"That’s true," Abe mused. "Even when he saw it, he almost didn’t see it."

"That’s what he says, " Julie said vigorously. "Maybe he’s protecting someone."

"Protecting the one who sabotaged him?" Gideon asked.

"Well…" Julie laughed suddenly. "I think you’re right. This theory’s started to sound a little unga…umpki…"

"Ungepotchket," Abe said, a smile on his face. "Very good. You learn quick. But ungepotchket or not, I think maybe you got something. Only what, I don’t know."

Gideon thought so too. Something wasn’t quite right in her rationale, but the basic idea was starting to make sense. Nate had the most to lose, all right, and plenty of well-earned enemies who would love to see him lose it. Was it possible that he’d been set up? But how? They were silent for a moment, and then Julie asked, "Abe, what will happen to him now? What will they do to him?"

"Nothing will happen to him," Abe said with a shrug. "They’ll just close down the dig, that’s all. And Professor Hall-Waddington doesn’t want to press any charges; he just wants his skull back. But Nathan’s reputation is finished. He’ll never lead another dig, and if he ever gets out of that little college in Missouri, I’ll be surprised. It’s a pity; a sad ending for a boy with a lot of promise."

"It sure is," Gideon said. "And you wasted a lot of time and money coming all the way out here."

"Not wasted," Abe said, and as the old man looked up, Gideon saw a telltale gleam in his eye. "You don’t close down a dig overnight, even a little one. It takes a few days to wind it down, right? You got to backfill, clean up, straighten out the catalog, write a site report… They asked Nathan to do it-which was a kindness, in my opinion-but he said no. Your Inspector Bagshawe told him he has to stay in Charmouth awhile, but if he never sees Stonebarrow Fell again, it will be too soon. So I said I would do it."

"You? You’re going to personally supervise closing it down?"

"Sure, what’s the big surprise? Who else, Frawley? Why not me?"

"For one thing, because you’re a cultural anthropologist, not an archaeologist."

"In my day," Abe said, "anthropology wasn’t split into a hundred little pigeonholes-microethnology, paleolinguistics-you were an anthropologist, that’s all, and you had to learn everything."

"All right, but still-why you? Why aren’t Robyn and Arbuckle doing it? They’re the ones who say it has to be shut down."

"It’s not their job," Abe said, showing a little impatience. "Robyn left already for Bournemouth, and Arbuckle went back to his dig in France for a couple of days. They’ll come back and check and see that I closed it down right, and that’s that."

"Robyn and Arbuckle are going to check on you? "

"Why not? They have to sign the final papers. Look, Gideon, what’s all this arguing? Don’t make a big tzimiss out of it. I’m glad to get the chance to do something… better than watch the rain fall down in Washington."

"What about your arthritis, Abe?" Gideon said more gently. "It’s a four-hundred-foot climb."

Abe waved his hand grandly. "I walked it today, didn’t I? Did I complain? Did I slow anybody up?…Well, maybe a little, but what’s the hurry? Gideon, it’ll be fun for me, something for an old man to do."

"Abe," Gideon said slowly, "closing down a dig isn’t fun. You’re doing it because this whole thing doesn’t sit right with you, and you think you can do a little poking around up there. Am I right?"

"Did I say you were wrong? And what’s more, it doesn’t sit right with you, either. There’s somewhere a little monkey business, something rotten in Denmark, no?"

"Well-"

Julie put down her teacup with a rattle. "Now wait a minute, you two. In the first place, from what you tell us, Gideon, Inspector Bagshawe is more than capable of handling any monkey business. And in the second place, if one of those people up there really is a murderer, then… Abe, are you sure you want to be up there on that lonely hill, alone with them?"

"Eh," Abe said. "If one of them really killed that boy, already he’s shaking with fright. To kill someone else right in the same place is the last thing he’ll do. Besides, the police will be over the place for a few days. And anyway, what do I know about murders? That’s your husband’s department. But I’ll tell you the truth." He poked his own chest with a bony, elegant forefinger. "Me, I’m interested in skulls that disappear from museums and turn up in the ground, instead of the other way around. If Hall-Waddington wants to drop it, that’s his business, but me, I’m still interested. And for this kind of interest, believe me, nobody’s going to kill me."

Abe put a chip in his mouth and chewed it slowly. "Listen, Gideon, I was thinking…"

"Oh-oh," Gideon muttered.

Abe looked up in innocent surprise. " ‘Oh-oh’? What, ‘oh-oh’?"

"Oh-oh, whenever you tell me you’ve ‘been thinking,’ in that particular tone of voice, it means you’ve cooked up something for me that’s going to get me in trouble."

"Me?" The old man’s moist eyes opened wider. "Julie, listen how he talks to me, his old professor, who taught him everything he knows," He turned back to Gideon and spread his hands. "What did I cook up? Nothing. I was only thinking you might like to help me with the shutdown, spend a little time up there-maybe two days, maybe three days. I could use somebody I can trust. Frawley and the others…frankly, I’m not too impressed."

Ordinarily, Abe would have applied a good deal of embellishment to such a request: He was an old man, his powers were failing, he needed an alert, bright young man beside him, someone he could lean on in his infirmity, et cetera. This time, however, he seemed to think that coaxing was unnecessary.

And of course he was right. Gideon was just as curious, just as interested in poking around Stonebarrow Fell as Abe was. But Gideon had more than buried skulls on his mind. The uncomfortable feeling of being responsible- albeit unknowingly and unwillingly-for Randy’s death had not subsided, and a couple of days up on the dig, mixing naturally with the crew, might provide answers that Bagshawe, in his official capacity, would have difficulty finding. Just how much the inspector would appreciate his assistance Gideon didn’t know, but that was the inspector’s problem.

Julie made a resigned but reasonably cheerful sound. "Okay, I’ve been wanting to see some of the Hardy things we never got around to, anyway-the cottage at Bockhampton, things like that. Maybe I’ll do a little touring on my own while you two do your Sherlock Holmes thing up there." Her hand found Gideon’s knee under the table. "But you’re going to have to promise to be careful."

He covered her hand with his. "Of course we’ll be careful, but Abe’s right. There’s nothing to be careful about."

"And remember, you’re not a detective."

"She’s right," Abe put in.

Gideon shook his head despairingly. "Why does everyone find it so necessary to keep reminding me of that? When did I ever claim to be a detective?"

The barmaid cleared away the dishes, and Gideon refilled the flowered teapot from the metal pitcher of hot water that had been served along with it, pouring the water directly onto the two gigantic, soggy teabags-each one big enough for three pots of American tea. "There is one thing, Abe," he said. "I hope it’s okay with you if I don’t start until Saturday. Tomorrow Julie and I are going over to Lyme Regis. I want to see if I can hunt down the omniscient editor of the West Dorset Times. "

Abe spread his hands and appealed to Julie. "You see the way it is? One minute you give them a job, and the next minute they’re asking for time off."