Lovely In Her Bones

IT WAS GOING to be another hot day. The sky was blazing blue by eight o’clock, not a breath of air stirring. The parched clay in the clearing was dead land, like a scar surrounded by the living forest. Elizabeth and Jake sat on a fallen log at the edge of the clearing, less than enthusiastic about the day’s work ahead.

“This place is going to be an oven,” said Elizabeth, tossing a pebble past her sneakered foot. “Can’t we pack it in?”

“Hey,” Jake protested. “This is my first day as site manager and already half my crew is mutinying.”

“Make it unanimous,” said Victor, flopping down beside him. “I just filled up the water jug, but don’t expect it to last past nine o’clock.”

“It’ll probably evaporate from the heat,” said Elizabeth. “What if we pass out from sunstroke?”

“Oh, come on! We’re in the mountains! I’ll bet it isn’t even ninety. You’re feeling the humidity, that’s all. Anyway, we said we were going to finish this project, remember?”

“But the sheriff’s department took my skulls!” said Elizabeth. “What am I supposed to do?”

“I’ll assign you to something else. Don’t worry, there’s plenty of work to be done-especially if the day people don’t show up.”

Victor took a swig from the water jug. “Mary Clare’s gone, Milo’s back in a nice air-conditioned motel room, and we’re stuck out here-”

“Like birds in the wilderness,” Elizabeth nodded.

“Look,” said Jake in tones of strained patience. “If you want to go back to the church, fine. But I’m going to stay up here and work, particularly since I think this site ought to be guarded. Now, if you want to risk being down there alone, go ahead.”

“I’ll stay,” said Elizabeth in a small voice.

“I suppose somebody has to keep an eye on things here,” said Victor grudgingly. “But if I get sun poisoning…”

“We’ll just add you to the sample,” smiled Jake. “You did say you were part Indian, didn’t you?”

They worked in silence for most of the next hour, troweling, measuring, and marking various points about the site. Elizabeth stopped periodically to apply more baby oil to her arms and face, saying that she had no desire to look like a radish in the interests of science. A little after nine, when the sun had sharpened the angle of its rays on the clearing, they heard voices in the woods. Elizabeth looked questioningly at Jake, but he motioned for her to keep working. A moment later he heard the rustle of underbrush near the tent, and Comfrey Stecoah emerged, holding a hunting rifle.

“Y’all just go on with what you were doing,” he said softly, fading back into the bush.

Elizabeth went on tying string to a wooden stake in what seemed to her like slow motion, as the indistinguishable babble of voices grew louder. Suddenly the words became distinct, and she recognized one of the speakers. “Jake!” she called out loudly for Comfrey’s benefit. “It’s the day workers! And we’re very glad to see them, aren’t we?”

“Yes!” Jake called back. “They-are-our-friends.” He glanced over his shoulder to see if the message had been received.

Five diggers from the local archaeological group came straggling in from the trail. Jake and Elizabeth greeted them effusively, casting anxious glances back toward the underbrush. Victor unscrewed the water jug and peered into it, frowning.

As soon as the workers had been settled into their usual tasks, Jake excused himself and headed for the bush. “What are you doing here?” he hissed.

Comfrey Stecoah emerged from behind a tree to the right of him. “I’m over here,” he said.

“Yeah-with a gun. Why?”

“Why, I’m just looking out for you, Little Beaver,” said Comfrey with an easy smile.

Jake scowled. “Look, Mr. Stecoah, I think that gun could cause more problems than it solves. I think we’re safe up here in broad daylight.”

“Do you, now?” Comfrey rubbed his finger speculatively along the line of his jaw. “Seems to me like I snuck up on y’all with a loaded rifle. If my intentions had been evil, I reckon I could’a blowed you all to kingdom come, with nobody being the wiser.”

Jake had to admit he had a point. The killer was still loose in the woods, presumably. What could it hurt to have some volunteer protection? The sheriff’s department certainly hadn’t offered any. “Okay,” he said. “I guess it would be okay for you to stick around.” He eyed the rifle nervously. “Just don’t wave that thing around. You’ll make us feel like a chain gang.”

Comfrey nodded. “I don’t want to scare you folks, but somebody has to protect my people’s stake in this land. Somebody wants us to lose this land, and he won’t stop at killing just one of you. Not for the money this land is worth.”

“Well… why don’t you come out there and sit down?”

“I don’t want to be a target, boy,” Comfrey said in a pitying voice. “I’m your guard.” He looked serious. “I wanted to tell you’uns how sorry I am that the doctor got killed. He was a good man, and he was trying to help us.”

“Yeah,” said Jake softly. “He was okay.”

“I don’t reckon he’d want any harm to come to the rest of you’uns, so you go on back out there, and I’ll see that it don’t.”

Jake blinked. “Okay. Just be careful with that thing!”

Comfrey smiled. “I ain’t never killed anything by accident.”

Victor troweled away, careful not to expose his upturned buttocks to the “loaded bush.” He was sweating profusely. How long had it been since his last trip to the water jug? Last time he had drawn some meaningful looks from the trenches, and he was sure that if he approached the water jug again, something caustic would be said. Naturally, no one understood his delicate metabolism, or the nature of his sensitive skin. He oughtn’t to be out in the hot sun at all really, he told himself. Victor had long been convinced that discomfort was a bona fide illness. Unfortunately, most people did not subscribe to this theory, so for their benefit, he usually attributed his indisposition to something more acceptable, such as a migraine. It was nearly hot enough to warrant one, but Victor was determined to stick it out. He saw himself as second-in-command at the site now, and the increased feeling of self-importance compensated for the discomfort of the work. Perhaps after the next development (he allowed himself to fantasize Jake’s arrest and departure in leg-irons) he might become site manager himself.

Victor began to plan a letter to his parents informing them of his new, exalted position. He considered himself the intellectual hope of his hopelessly bourgeois family. His mother’s emotional life centered around the characters on the one-o’clock soap opera, and his father’s imagination was limited to believing that the Reds would someday win the world series. Victor considered it his duty to shock them with bizarre opinions whether he believed them or not. By the time he had finished seventh grade, his parents had decided that he was a genius. They were now waiting, a little nervously, to see what he would make of himself. The archaeological dig was a perfect example of something Victor would do for a summer, instead of going home and getting a job to earn tuition money. He had announced his plans by saying that he would spend the summer robbing graves. Victor smiled, thinking of his parents’ reaction to the news of his promotion: he doubted if they would know what he was talking about.

“We’re out of water!” called one of the day crew.

“Well, go and get some,” someone shot back.

“Hey, I didn’t even get any yet!” the digger protested, upturning the empty jug. “I’d probably drop in my tracks.”

“I’ll go,” Victor heard himself saying. His reverie about becoming site manager had put him in a good mood, and besides, if he went back to the church he could drink all the water he wanted before refilling the jug. The walk in the woods would be cooler, too, than grubbing in the hot sun in the clearing. “You go on back to what you were doing, and I’ll bring the water. No trouble.” He managed to sound as if he were making a gallant sacrifice for the welfare of his troops.

The troops sneered. “You used most of it anyway!”

He ambled out of the clearing to catcalls and demands that he hurry back.

The woods were somewhat cooler, but that was the limit of Victor’s aesthetic appreciation of nature.