'I generally don't dig up bones. My field is the Celtic Iron Age with a focus on Irish and British Celtic art.'
'Such as?'
'Not necessarily 'art' as we think of it today.'
'No sofa paintings?'
'No sofa paintings.' She made her way to Commonwealth Avenue. Driving on the left had become natural for her in Ireland, but she readjusted quickly. 'Think in terms of the art of everyday items--cauldrons, weapons, tools, jewelry.'
'Is there a market for this stuff?'
'For the right collector, definitely, but there are rules for anything that's found during an excavation. I can't just pocket an Iron Age gold brooch and put it up on eBay.'
'I read about that gold found in England by a guy with a metal detector.'
'Yes, that's an amazing discovery. He unearthed a major hoard of early Anglo-Saxon gold and silver buried in a farmer's field in Staffordshire. It'll take years for archaeologists and historians to assess the objects. Most are articles of warfare. A true treasure.'
'Who gets it?'
'Since it's over three hundred years old, it's been declared the property of the Crown.'
'It'd be stealing if you tried to sneak artifacts out of Ireland?'
She wasn't sure he was asking a question, but said, 'Undoubtedly, yes.'
Scoop eased back in his seat as she drove past the sprawling campus of Boston University. 'What happened to you in Ireland last year, Sophie?'
'You mean--'
'You called the Irish police.'
She tightened her grip on the steering wheel. 'What did you do, call the guards yourself over a Guinness last night? Why? What did I do to pop onto your radar?'
'I mentioned your name to friends in Ireland,' he said.
She glanced over at him. 'That's an incomplete answer.'
'I'd get an F if you were grading me?'
'I'd hand your paper back and ask you to finish your answer,' she said.
'That's because you would be the professor and I would be the student and therefore at your mercy. Right now--'
'It's the other way around. I'm at your mercy.'
'We're just two friends talking in a very little car.' He pointed at a throng of students about to cross from a Green Line MBTA stop on the track in the middle of Commonwealth Avenue. 'Careful.'
'I won't run anyone over,' Sophie said, 'and last year I got in over my head on an adventure.'
'Treasure hunting?'
She shook her head. 'I just told you that I don't treasure hunt.'
'You didn't go off with a metal detector yourself?'
'Ireland has the strictest laws in the EU against metal detecting at possible archaeological sites. To answer your question, no, I did not go off with a metal detector.'
She was aware of his dark eyes on her as they came to Allston. He directed her to Cliff Rafferty's street. She parked in front of a two-family brown-shingled house with a giant oak shading a small front yard, its roots breaking apart the sidewalk.
Scoop unfastened his seat belt. 'Do you think Cliff wants to see you because you're an archaeologist or because you're friends with Percy Carlisle?'
''Friends' is too strong.'
'Were you two--'
'No,' Sophie said quickly.
They got out of the car. 'You and I aren't finished,' Scoop said, going ahead of her to the front door.
Sophie mounted the steps behind him, checking the address Rafferty had scrawled on the slip of paper. 'He's on the upper floor.' She reached past Scoop's broad shoulders for the doorbell but noticed the door was slightly ajar. 'He's expecting me. He probably doesn't want to come down to open up.'
Scoop pushed the door open and called up the stairs. 'Cliff? Scoop here with Sophie Malone. We're on our way up.'
There was no answer. Sophie started up the steps, but Scoop put a hand on her hip and eased past her. She stayed behind him, observing that the injuries he'd sustained in the bomb blast didn't impede his ability to climb a flight of stairs.
When they came to the second-floor landing, Sophie took a sharp breath and grabbed Scoop by the upper arm, her gaze riveted on the French door. Three realistic-looking replicas of human skulls had been tacked to the frame, one on each side and one directly in the middle of the lintel.
'Scoop...'
He glanced at her. 'Stay close to me.'
She dropped her hand from his arm. 'The ancient Celts revered the human head.'
Scoop grimaced. 'Yeah. Great.' He tapped open the door and called into the apartment. 'Hey, Cliff. I jumped in the car with our Dr. Malone here.'
Again there was no answer.
They entered a narrow living room that ran across the front of the house. A sentimental Irish tune was playing softly in the background. Sophie realized it was coming from the flat-screen television. A DVD was running, displaying familiar scenes of Ireland--the Cliffs of Moher, the Healy Pass, a rainbow over a lush, green Irish pasture.
'Something bad has happened,' Sophie said.
Scoop withdrew his weapon. She hadn't even noticed the holster under his jacket. He touched her hand. 'Just stay close.' He squeezed her fingers. 'Real close. Got it?'
She nodded.
Staying in the middle of the room, they stepped onto a worn rug and walked past the coffee table. It was piled with rolls of coated wire, wire cutters, plastic-coated blasting caps and a block of what looked like wrapped clay but Sophie assumed was probably C4 or another type of explosive.
Bomb-making materials.
Just beyond the coffee table, yellow and red glass beads were scattered on the hardwood floor at the edge of the rugs. 'Scoop, glass beads are often found in Celtic graves.'
But she didn't go on. More skulls were arranged on the woodwork of the double-doorway between the living room and the adjoining dining room.
Scoop stopped in the doorway and turned to her, grim, controlled. 'Don't look,' he said.
It was too late. She could see Cliff Rafferty hanging from an exposed beam in the dining room. She recognized his too-short jeans, his scuffed running shoes, his jacket. She didn't want to look at his face but did. From his coloring, the position of his neck, his twisted features--there was no question he was dead.
The rope had been tied to a heavy-duty eye hook screwed into the beam.
Her breathing shallow, her heart racing, Sophie edged next to Scoop. A small, round dining room table had been pushed against the wall. More glass beads were scattered on the bare floor between the table and the hanging scene.
A cast-iron pot was positioned directly under Rafferty's feet. He could have used it to stand on--or had been forced to stand on it. Sophie leaned forward and saw the pot was filled with parts of a disassembled gun, each part damaged, as if the weapon had been systematically hammered and destroyed piece by piece. A police badge, also dented and distorted, had been placed on top of the gun parts.
Next to the pot, on the floor, were two halves of a crude torc fashioned out of twisted gold wire, obviously deliberately cut in half.
Sophie made herself exhale slowly through her mouth. 'Scoop, these are ritualistic symbols--'
'I see. You can tell me what they mean later.' His dark eyes held hers for an instant. 'Don't touch anything and stay right with me. Got that, sweetheart? Right with me.'
They checked the rest of the apartment--the kitchen, bedroom and bathroom--and headed out to the back
