Mary showed them to a small rickety bamboo table and motioned to a young girl who came over and brought them their tea.
“Did you say your John Wilkes was the secretary of the cricket club?” asked Katie. “Ralph played at college.”
“Goodness no. John is deputy manager at Lloyds Bank in South Molton. He’s the secretary of the North Devon Archaeological Society. I’m the chairman. Well I suppose nowadays it’s chairperson, but frankly I think the old ways were best. Everyone knew what you meant and no one took offense. Young people today seem to have forgotten how to be private. What with Facebook and talking to people they’ve never met. It’s a funny world. But here I am chatting on and you want to enjoy your tea.”
“Not at all,” said Ralph. “We’re both quite interested in archaeology; amateurs of course.”
“Are you local, then? Perhaps you might like to join our society as well as the cricket club? We meet monthly and there are regular supervised digs. We link up with Exeter University and of course the people who look after Exmoor. Some of our members joined just to keep in touch with things. And of course we put out a newsletter.”
“We’d love to,” said Katie.
“That’s wonderful. I’ll send you the forms. Just an address and that sort of thing. We have a dig over at Sherracombe Ford weekend after next. You’d be more than welcome.”
Ralph explained briefly about his chat with Doctor Franks at the British Museum and that he had seen the exhibition they had put on about the Sherracombe Hoard. Mary seemed a bit taken aback that a comparative stranger should be so aware of what had happened at Sherracombe.
“Are you alright,” asked Katie.
“Yes, of course. It’s just that there’s been a lot on lately and I might have been overdoing things. The newspaper reporters have been asking a lot of questions about the site where they found poor Daniel Kaminsky’s body, and they arrested Mr Bishop for something to do with drugs. Then there was Mr Raines’ accident; he was a founder member, you know.”
Ralph had heard something about an accident from the new Harbourmaster at the Marina.
“I’m sorry,” said Katie. “It sounds as though you’ve really had your share of trouble lately.”
“Well these things happen. But Seth’s death was tragic even if he was a difficult man at times. No one deserves to be run down and left for dead lying in a ditch like that. His sister Megan lives over at Lynton; works at the Farmer’s Market over there. They open a couple of days a week, I think. You know, vegetables, fruit and local produce, that sort of thing. Without Seth to help her out, she needs every penny she can get. We all went over there for the funeral at St Mary the Virgin. We had a collection because funerals are expensive these days and we wanted to help out.” She straightened up and smiled. “So we’ll see you at the dig. Never know we might even find some more evidence of the Roman buildings, although I doubt it.” She smiled and went off to console John Wilkes.
Ralph and Katie finished the last of their strawberry jam and clotted cream scones before they found Mary again. She promised to send them the archaeological society forms and they thanked her for all of the helpful information.
“Shall we drive over and get a preview of Sherracombe Ford?” Ralph asked as they walked back to the car.
They drove over to the site of the dig. It looked pretty desolate even on a beautiful summer’s afternoon. It was a bit early for The Bell, so Ralph decided to save that for another day.
“Ralph, you said something about wanting that man at the garage in Lynton to look at your car. Why don’t we go over now? It’s still early. We could get some fresh farm produce at that market that Mary mentioned at the same time.”
“You’re as transparent as glass, Katie Eggleton. You just want to see that woman Megan that Mary Richardson told us about.”
“Race you up the hill, Mr. Smarty,” shouted Katie as she set out to reach the top of the woods by the dig site. They were not aware that it was so close to the spot where Daniel Kaminsky had been found.
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Chapter 10
It was an unusually hot day. So hot that as they drove over to Lynton the tar on the main roads had begun to soften. Ralph had phoned and asked Joe Minton if he could take a look at the rear brakes on the Jag, as he had noticed a slight scrapping noise. When they walked into the cool vaulted garage, Joe had just finished working on a blue 1936 Railton Straight Eight. He proudly pointed out that it was currently owned by a once famous Formula 2 driver. Katie was used to Ralph’s fascination with vintage cars and she waited while they exchanged tit bits of knowledge.
“I’ve worked on old cars straight from when I left school,” said Joe as he stepped back and admired his latest challenge. Reid Railton had a hand in the design of this beauty.”
“I think I learned somewhere that they started somewhere near me in Surrey,” Ralph remarked.
“Tha’s right. Over Cobham way; but they sold out to Hudson jus’ afore the war.”
“My Jag’s a new boy as far as you’re concerned,” Ralph said jokingly.
“Still a great model, plenny a innovations. An’ she looks good. Morgan goin’ awright fer ya misus?”
“Its great, thanks,” said Katie. She was stuck for anything else to say. As far as she was concerned, a car either started or it didn’t. In Australia where she grew up, men did the mechanical stuff and fixed things that broke; a woman’s role
