To Dream of the Dead

He put out his hand. Coops nodded, shook it limply. Jane thinking the way he was looking today, Eirion would have no reason at all to feel threatened. Pity about that.

‘You didn’t come here on a wet Sunday to look for me,’ she said.

‘Weather’s lousy, half the county’s under water, and Blore’s in the pub. I just wanted to…’

He was worried about something. Possibly even upset, and it wasn’t about what had happened to her. She had a sense of parting, the end of something for him, too, and she shivered in the damp, airless drabness of everything.

‘Main reason,’ Coops said, ‘is we’ve arranged to go away for Christmas, to my wife’s parents in Somerset.’ He gestured with his head towards the meadow. ‘Blore’ll be carrying on, with a skeleton crew. He doesn’t seem to observe Christmas. This is the last chance I’ll get this year to try and see what’s going on.’

‘But you’re in charge, aren’t you? You’re the county guy… the employer.’

‘That’s no longer the way it operates, Jane.’

Coops gave Eirion a sideways look.

‘Forget everything you’ve heard about the Welsh,’ Jane said. ‘He’s absolutely to be relied on.’

‘I can die happy now, I can,’ Eirion said. ‘I am no longer a symbol of the ludicrous English preconceptions about my race.’

Coops smiled faintly, then looked away across the site towards the grey swelling that was all that remained of Cole Hill. He bit his upper lip.

‘As the Council — or rather the Council Cabinet — are into farming out as much as possible to the private sector, the truth is that half the time we’re not quite sure who we’re supposed to be working for.’

‘The council-tax payers? The people?’

‘Don’t make me laugh. Decisions get made over your head, you don’t even know who’s made them or why. I… probably need to get out of this area next year, get a job somewhere else.’ He pulled off his hat, wiped his face on the lining. ‘You going away for Christmas?’

‘Coops, my mother’s the vicar. This is the time of year when they do big box-office? So if there’s anything you need me to do…’

He shook his head.

‘Hey, it’s not as if I’ve got anything to lose. I’ll be looking for a new… career path or something, in the New Year.’

‘No! Jane, listen to me, this is was what I was afraid of. You must not let that bastard ruin your life, do you understand? This job needs people like you.’

‘Loonies?’

‘People who care. People who… love everything here that’s ancient and mysterious, even if it isn’t spectacular… even if it isn’t visible. In fact, there’s a report coming out from English Heritage next year that will suggest that, the way we’re going, less than ten per cent of the ancient monuments we can see now will be visible for future generations. No decent money available for conservation, developers ripping up the countryside. We need people who can get angry about that.’

‘Blore gets angry.’

‘He also gets rich. Easy enough to get angry over lost causes like the Serpent.’ Coops wiped his forehead again with his hat, put it back on. ‘I’m probably a bit overwrought, Jane. Couldn’t sleep last night, which is not like me.’

‘Coops, could you just, like, spit this out?’

‘Not that easy. I don’t really know what I’m getting at.’ He walked away, up the path towards the orchard, as if the site might be bugged. ‘OK… I don’t have many friends in the Chief Executive’s department. In fact just the one, and no more than a lowly secretary to an assistant, but she… happened to be in the right place at the right time to notice that someone in that department had received a report. About this dig.’

‘From who?’ Eirion said.

‘Not from us, that’s the point.’

‘From Blore?’

‘It’s a report which, in the normal way of things, might have been expected to go to my boss.’

Eirion said, ‘Blore is reporting directly to the Chief Executive of the Council? About Coleman’s Meadow?’

‘Blore was very proprietorial about this excavation from the start. Did all the geophysics personally, with ground radar, and he was working here before any of us even knew he had the contract.’

‘And what does that suggest?’ Eirion said.

‘Well, obviously, it’s a prestigious excavation. And it’s exciting. We don’t often find unknown standing stones, and whatever happens it’ll make for some fantastic television. Now, it might only be that, or it might be… he’s found something we didn’t expect.’

‘Like what?’ Jane said.

‘Well, I don’t know, do I? Whatever it is he’s — Obvious he’ll want to keep it to himself, especially if it could provide an eye-popping climax to his programme. If he has got something, he’ll let it out no more than a week before the programme goes out, for maximum publicity.’

‘Yes.’ Eirion nodded. ‘That’s how it’s done.’

‘What could it be, Coops?’

‘I’m not sure. At the end of the day, he might be a shit but he’s a bloody good archaeologist. I’ve just spent a couple of hours walking round the place, trying to second-guess him, but he covers his tracks. He had one stone more or less unearthed, the whole thing, but now the soil’s gone back, or most of it. As if there’s something he doesn’t want anyone else to see.’

‘Couldn’t that just be because of the danger of flood damage?’ Eirion said.

‘Sure, but…’

‘What can we do?’ Jane said.

‘Nothing.’

‘No, I mean, what can we do — me and Eirion? We’ve really got nothing to lose, Coops. We can watch him. We can watch what he does, where he goes.’

‘No. I don’t want you going near him, Jane. I’m serious. He’s done enough to you already, but if he really takes offence he can script his programme in a way that will make you look even worse.’

‘We don’t have to make it obvious. What are we looking for?’

‘God… I don’t know.’ Coops ran a hand over the stubble on his jaw. ‘Anything unexpected. Say, for instance, if he suddenly starts to extend the site. In any direction.’

‘What would that mean?’

‘Well, it… it could mean, obviously, that there’s more here than we thought. Originally, as you know, we were thinking in terms of a shortish stone-row, like Harold’s Stones at Trelleck. The original geophys suggested three stones, possibly a fourth, fairly randomly arranged, no identifiable pattern and not too far under the surface. But Blore’s done his own survey and, although I haven’t seen the results, I wouldn’t rule out something more extensive.’

‘A stone circle?’

‘Too early to speculate with any authority.’

‘But this excavation,’ Jane said. ‘You’re saying this could be just the beginning of something huge. I mean, like the Serpent? As important as that?’

‘Please, Jane…’ Coops wiped some dampness from his forehead with his sleeve. ‘I wish I’d never…’

‘I won’t go near him. I’ll be very careful.’

Eirion said, ‘Jane, I don’t think—’

‘We’ll be very careful. Coops, do you have a number where I can contact you? I know you’ll be back after Christmas and everything, and Blore’s not going to have that much—?’

‘No,’ Coops said. ‘You don’t understand, I won’t be here after Christmas. Not officially, anyway. We’ve been told to stay out of it. Get on with other things. Leave it to Blore.’

He looked gutted.