Our man in Camelot

'I'm glad you think so, sir. Though my personal view is that his enthusiasm was, shall we say, premature. In fact, if he hadn't been so confident I would have said it was impossible… But you must excuse me while I deal with this customer… If you would care to look over those shelves beyond the desk at the back—on the right—the ones marked 'History'… start at the very top. You'll need the library steps—'

Merriwether cut off the tape.

'Wow!' exclaimed Shirley.

'He's a great old guy,' said Merriwether, smiling. 'I had to prise those books out of him one by one, like they were his own flesh and blood.'

'He thought you were after Badon too,' said Howard Morris.

'That's it, man. I had to promise I wasn't going to start digging up the English countryside.'

Mosby looked towards Morris. 'The book the Bishop wrote—have we got it?'

'Not yet. But we're looking. And the one thing you mustn't do on any account, Captain, is start asking for the Novgorod Bede. Don't even mention it—leave it to us.'

'Okay. But suppose Audley starts asking?'

'He won't.'

'Why not?' said Shirley.

'Because he's not an expert on the period.'

She frowned. 'For God's sake—he's writing a book on it!'

'He's writing a book on a man who lived in the twelfth century—not the sixth.'

'But it's all—what's the word—mediaeval.'

'So it is. And George Washington and Franklin Roosevelt are all modern. But you wouldn't expect an expert on the Second World War to be an expert on the War of Independence, would you, Mrs Anthony Price - Our man in camelot

Sheldon?' Morris looked at her expectantly for a moment. 'He knows what any Cambridge history graduate— any good graduate, that is—ought to know. Which for our purposes is enough, but not too much.'

'He knows enough not to believe in King Arthur—isn't that too much?'

Morris turned towards Mosby. 'I think you had something to say about that, Captain?'

'Huh?' Mosby tore himself away from the contemplation of the Novgorod Bede. 'I—what?'

'You said you knew why Audley doesn't believe in King Arthur.'

'Oh, sure. He's just not romantic.'

'What do you mean—just not romantic?' snapped Shirley.

'Just exactly that. Remember when you twitted him with the Old South being romantic, and he looked like he'd smelt a nasty smell—like an accountant looking at a bum set of figures? Old Jeb Stuart wasn't a knight in shining armour to him, he was just a 'competent cavalry commander'.'

'But that's what you said King Arthur might be, Doc,' murmured Merriwether. 'In fact it's exactly what you said.'

Mosby was unabashed. 'Sure I did. Only I can show you a photograph of Jeb Stuart, and you can't show me one of King Arthur.

'With Jeb Stuart there's proof and with Arthur there isn't—which is what I've been saying all along. But Audley, he lives by facts, like any good historian and any good intelligence man should; lives with them, eats them and sleeps with them. And the facts on Arthur are mighty thin on the ground.'

For a moment no one said anything. Then Shirley shook her head.

'So—okay. But then what makes anyone think he's going to help us find Badon Hill?'

'Well, for a start it's a fact.' Mosby looked towards Howard Morris.

'But impossible to find, you said.'

'I settle for improbable. And it seems Major Davies didn't do so badly.'

'But we don't know how he did it,' said Shirley.

'That's true,' said Morris.

'And the idea of trying to use Audley is crazy anyway. The British are going to be so mad when they find out —'

' If they find out. Audley's still got a clear two months of his leave. He's not likely to report back that he's decided to take a day or two looking for a 1,500-year-old battlefield. It doesn't sound like a security risk,' said Morris.

Merriwether grinned. 'No one's going to argue with you there.'

'Except we know better,' said Shirley. 'So suppose we run into trouble?'

'Then there's a fair chance that Audley's presence will protect you,' Schreiner's voice came out of the depths of his armchair. 'Even Panin might think twice about making that sort of trouble. It's even possible that Audley's appearance will put them off. Or at least buy us some more time.'

Shirley stared at him. 'Whereas Mose and I are strictly expendable?'