Excalibur Rising (9 page)

     “And the tide went out,” she said. “They’ll be under mud; if they’re under anything at all.” 
     “It’s what I do,” said Ryan.
     “Well,” said Violet, determined to achieve the upper hand before it was too late, “it’s not what I do. I have absolutely no intention of going on some wild goose chase in the marshes.  Todd told me that Mr. Mandretti has made reservations at the Dorchester Hotel in London, which I understand is an excellent establishment.  I don’t intend to do anything until I have taken a long bath.”
     Ryan stared at her. “Really,” he said. “You’re not going to start work, you’re just going to take a bath?”
     “Yes,” said Violet, although it was not so much the idea of a bath that interested her, as the desire to be rid of the constraint of her traveling clothes. “I’m going to take a bath,” she repeated, “and then I’m going to call on Carlton’s wife, or I should say widow, and see what she knows.”
     “But we have a lead,” Ryan protested, “and I’m not talking about your vision, or hallucination or whatever it was.  The fact is that your friend Carlton thought the goblet had been stolen from a church in Norfolk.”
     “Do you have any idea how many churches there are in Norfolk?” Violet asked.
     Ryan remained silent.
     “You’re wasting your time,” said Violet, set now on her stubborn path.  “I’m going to the Dorchester. I’m going to take a bath, and then I’m going to have a nap.”
     “That’s all very well for you, “Ryan said. “You may regard this as an all-expense paid jaunt, but I have a living to earn, and like it or not, Michael Mandretti is my living, so I don’t have time to lie around in hotels, taking baths and naps___
      “You’ll regret it,” Violet said, “when jet lag catches up with you.”
     “So I should go to Norfolk on my own?”
     Violet shrugged her shoulders. “If you want to,” she said. “I can’t stop you.”
     She began to pick up her possessions.  The paperback journal lay on the padded divider between the seats.  She thought about returning it to Ryan as though it was of no importance to her, as though it had not utterly destroyed her self-confidence. She looked at the cover and the lurid picture of the knight.  Surely Carlton could have found a better illustrator.  Who was this supposed to be?  She flipped open the first page.  Mordred, son of Arthur, and the destruction of Camelot.  Hastily she closed the book and stuffed it into the magazine pocket beside her seat, where it could be picked up by the cleaners.  She should not have looked.  Now the image was emblazoned on her mind ready to be dredged up by her sub-conscience and presented as a vision. 
     The pilot’s voice crackled over the intercom.  “We are beginning our descent to London Heathrow. The temperature on the ground is a balmy 10 degrees Celsius, that’s 48 degrees Fahrenheit for those who prefer to think that way, and the time is 7:00 a.m.”
     The plane descended rapidly with rainwater streaming past the windows, and settled onto the tarmac with a couple of bouncing thuds.
     They ran the usual gamut of deplaning, immigration, waiting for their baggage, and passing through Customs, and emerged eventually into the crowded arrival concourse.  Although Violet had not admitted it to Ryan or Mandretti, this was, so far as she knew, her first visit to England.  She had been an un-named and unwanted orphan in France and had gone from there to the United States.  However, she had undertaken enough international travel that she knew what to do next.  As they stepped out into the concourse she immediately spotted a uniformed flunky holding a Dorchester Hotel sign with her name scrawled on it.  He came forward to relieve her of her luggage.
      “It’s my ride to the Dorchester,” she said to Ryan, “Are you sure you’re not coming?”
     “No,” he said, “I’m certain Crispin Peacock is here somewhere.”
     Violet searched the sea of faces. “Do you know what he looks like?” she asked.
      “No,” said Ryan, “but he says he’ll recognize me.”
     The driver from the Dorchester began to move towards the exit.
     “I have to go,” said Violet.  As she turned away from Ryan she came face to face with a young woman who seemed to be trying to reach Ryan.
     “Excuse me,” said Violet.
     The girl gasped. “What are you doing here?” she asked, staring into Violet’s face.  “You’re not allowed here.”
     Violet stepped back and looked at her accuser.  She was frail and waiflike girl, enveloped in a long black trench coat.  A wide brimmed black hat was pulled down low on her forehead. Strands of unkempt blonde hair escaped from the hat and were tangled in the pale chiffon shawl which lay across her shoulders.  Her eyes were huge and blue and met Violet’s with a desperate, panicked stare which Violet thought might be attributable to illegal substances of some sort.
     “Who are your sisters?” the girl asked. “How have you been allowed here?  Why are you so fat?”
     Violet pushed the girl aside.
     “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.  “Leave me alone.”
     “You shouldn’t be here,” the girl said. “You’ll spoil everything.  This is my quest.  He’s mine.”
     She pushed past Violet and approached Ryan.  Violet doubted that Ryan had heard any of the interchange.  He was standing still, head and shoulders above most of the people in the crowd, waiting to be recognized.
     The girl tugged at Ryan’s arm. He looked down at her.  Violet could see that he appreciated her waiflike beauty.
      “Do you have it in your pocket?” the girl asked.
     “What?” said Ryan
     “The pin,” she said. “Do you have a piece of the pin in your pocket.”
     “She’s high,” said Violet.
      “Go away,” said the girl.
     “Are you my driver?” Ryan asked.
      “I hope not,” said Violet.  “You’d better come with me.”
     The girl tugged at Ryan with her pale, elegant hand.
     “Just hold the pin,” she said.
     A masculine voice called through the crowd. “Professor Ryan?”
     The girl looked around, panic showing on her delicate features and then she melted back into the crowd, as Ryan turned to greet a smiling young man with a mass of dark curly hair.
     “This is my ride,” said Ryan, “but it looks like yours is disappearing with your luggage.”
     Violet saw that the driver from the Dorchester was waiting impatiently at the edge of the crowd. She hurried to catch up with him and followed him out into the chilly, rain soaked morning.  As she was being ushered into the sleek black limousine she saw the girl again standing with the rain pouring down onto her hat and soaking into her hair, watching as Ryan and Peacock crossed the road.  She was not the only observer.  As the limousine pulled away from the curb she saw another watcher standing in the shadows, a tall man with a patch over one eye.
CHAPTER SIX
Marcus Ryan

      Ryan yawned, rubbed his eyes and stared despondently at the cement surface of an elementary schoolyard in Upper Malden, Norfolk.  He wasn’t even standing in the yard itself because he was being kept out by a wire mesh fence, but even from outside the fence, he could see that the surface was solid, unyielding cement.  Lights shone from the windows of the little school and he could see children moving about inside.
He saw a teacher looking out of the window.  No doubt she would be making a report to the authorities that two strange men were lurking outside the fence and staring fixedly at the schoolyard.
     “Oh well,” said Crispin in his cultured British voice, “not much good standing here old man.  This won’t get us anywhere.”
     He patted Ryan’s shoulder in a gesture of sympathy and turned back towards the warm interior of his Mercedes.  Ryan followed obediently.
     Crispin bore very little resemblance to Taras, but he had already told Ryan that he was only a distant relative.  They shared the same great grandfather, and that fact, coupled with the inability of most members of the family to produce offspring, had made him the heir to Taras’ estate.  He was tall and thin, where Taras had been short and quite definitely not thin.  They did share the same mop of curly hair and bright blue eyes.  Ryan guessed that Crispin was somewhere in his early thirties. He also guessed from Peacock’s  accent and his tendency to call Ryan old boy, and old man, and sometimes old chap, that he was the product of an upper crust British education.  His black leather coat looked expensive, as did his car, but his feet were adorned with battered old tennis shoes.  Ryan was not sufficiently up on the subject of fashion footwear to know whether or not they were a ridiculously expensive brand. He only knew that they looked old and worn. 
     Crispin had wasted no time in leaving the airport, navigating a maze of junctions and roundabouts with speed and confidence and giving the Mercedes its head as they headed out of London. They slowed only once when they encountered a roadblock created by a group of ill-clad, noisy protesters. 
     “It’s our national pastime,” Crispin confided.  “We protest progress in any form.  Doesn’t really matter what it is.”
     “What are they protesting?” Ryan asked. 
      Crispin surveyed the array of banners. “A dam in North Wales,” he said.  “I’ve heard about this one.  It’s more than just a dam, and the destruction of a village.  There’s a herd of wild horses living in the valley, and that’s why everybody’s upset. We’re a nation of animal lovers, you know.  Nothing like a bit of animal cruelty to rile up the population.”
     “Can’t they move the horses?” Ryan asked.
     “Of course they can,” said Peacock, “although any horse with any sense would move itself.  They have plenty of room to roam up there in the middle of nowhere.  I doubt if they’ll just let themselves drown.”
     “So all this protesting is a waste of time?” said Ryan.
     “Rite of passage, old boy,” said Peacock.  “We all have to join in.  One cannot be a bone fide student unless one has been in a protest.  I personally lived in an oak tree for three months.”
     “What?”
     “So they couldn’t cut it down,” he said. “In the end the police got me down with a crane, and the oak tree went the way of all flesh. “  He shrugged his shoulders. “But I did my bit;” he said. “I earned my stripes you know.”
     Ryan had the impression that Crispin Peacock would be the life and soul of any party he attended, and looked forward to spending more time with him.  He was a refreshing change from Violet Chambray and her prickly pretentiousness, and quite definitely nothing like Michael Mandretti.
     Once they were through the protesters they picked up speed and continued north-east at an alarming rate, until they came to a standstill at the school yard.
     “This is where legend has always placed King John’s unfortunate encounter with the North Sea,” Crispin said.
     Eight hundred years had left their mark and in the intervening centuries the sea had receded, leaving acres and acres of flat new land.  Man had moved onto the new acreage with houses, farms, roads and railways, and a cement school yard. Ryan could smell the sea salt in the air and way off in the distance he could sense the grey waters of the North Sea rising and falling beneath the sodden sky, but it had been many, many years since this particular spot had been beneath the waves. The only evidence of the past in the whole featureless landscape was the spire of an old church breaking the line of the distant horizon.
     “Oh well, back to London,” said Crispin. “There’s nothing to see here.”
     Crispin settled himself behind the wheel and Ryan sank back into the passenger seat and stared out of the window at the damp countryside.  Although it was no longer actually raining, a brisk wind was sending black clouds scudding across the sky and ruffling the emerging green shoots on the trees and hedgerows.  The road unfolded ahead of them in an arrow straight line aimed at the distant church spire.  Ryan watched the spire grow closer and made out the church to which it was attached.  He tried to put a date on it.  Eight hundred years? Nine
hundred years?  In such an ancient countryside centuries simply piled on top of each other marked only by the slowly receding ocean and the ever increasing farmland; while the church remained unchanged. 
     “Just a minute,” he said to Crispin as they hurtled down the narrow road.
     Crispin applied the brakes and turned to look at Ryan.
     “ I want to see the church.” Ryan said.  “How old would you say it was?”
     “No idea,” said Crispin. “You’re the expert.”
     “From the look of the tower I would say it definitely predates the Norman invasion,” said Ryan. 
      “If you say so,” said Crispin.
      Which means,” said Ryan, “that it was here when King John passed this way.”
     “Ah,” said Crispin, “interesting thought, old boy.”
     “ I suppose it was on the edge of the marsh at one time,” said Ryan. “This place might even have been a port.”
      “High and dry now,” said Crispin.
     Ryan felt his spirits lift.  His instincts were aroused. On that fateful evening when King John had fled in desperation across the marsh, this stone tower was standing there.  From this tower some medieval priest could have looked down and seen that long train of wagons struggling across the marsh.  He could have seen the sun setting and heard the shrieking of the carthorses, and the cracking of whips.  Ryan pulled himself out of his reverie, ashamed to find that he had been mentally quoting Violet; actually quoting Violet’s regurgitated mumbo jumbo.
     “I’d like to stop here,” Ryan said. “The letter from Carlton Lewis said that the goblet might possibly have come from a church in Norfolk.”
     “A church,” said Crispin, “he actually said it came from a church?”
     “Yes,” said Ryan.
      “But he didn’t say which church,” said Peacock, “and there are hundreds of churches in Norfolk, so what makes you think___?”
     “It’s just a hunch,” said Ryan.
     Crispin brought the car to a halt in front of the church gates and Ryan climbed out leaving Crispin alone in the warm interior.       
     “You’re not coming?” he asked.
     Crispin reclined the driver’s seat and closed his eyes.
     “Just going to get a few minutes shut eye,” he said. “It’s a long drive back.”
     Not so long, Ryan thought. They had only been on the road for three hours.  He was surprised that Crispin would be too tired to take an interest.
      The church was quite small, built of grey stones and surrounded by a church yard where gravestones of immense antiquity huddled amongst towering weeds.  A weathered sign board announced that this was the Church of St. Mary, Lower Malden, and that the Rev. Barry Marshall was the Vicar.  A few cottages faced the church across the main road and a shabby Victorian house stood alongside the back wall of the graveyard. 
Ryan went through the gate and up to the oak door.  Locked.  He tried not to be disappointed.  What else should he expect at 3:00 on a Thursday afternoon?  He made a circuit of the building, and discovered a small outbuilding, possibly a place to store a lawnmower and some tools for grave digging, although there was little evidence of anyone using a lawnmower recently, and no obviously new graves; they all seemed equally ancient.
      A sudden gust of wind reminded him that the temperature had still not exceeded 48 degrees Fahrenheit.  He shoved his hands into his coat pocket, feeling the uneven shape of the jeweled remnant.  He wondered how he had managed to make his way through the various airport metal detectors without being asked about it. Was it made of a metal that could not be detected?  How could that be?
     He looked back at the car.  He could see Crispin Peacock standing beside the vehicle talking on his cell phone.  His voice was carried on the damp air, not the words, but the tone. Obviously Peacock was involved in an argument  in which he seemed to be doing most of the talking.  Ryan hesitated, not wanting to interrupt. Disappointed girlfriend?  Angry wife?  A business deal gone wrong?  His banker? 
     He turned aside and stepped off the path.   Suddenly a thick grey mist boiled up from the ground among the graves wrapping him in a dense shroud of fog.  He blinked his eyes and took another step forward. 
     The mist cleared. He stopped in astonishment.  If he could believe the evidence of his own eyes, then he was no longer in the churchyard. He was no longer anywhere that he could possibly be.  He was standing on a stone jetty looking out into a sheltered harbor.  The sea was calm and grey and boats rocked gently at anchor; not modern boats, Viking long ships. 
      The vision seemed real enough.  A cold breeze ruffled his hair, and he heard the screeching of the seagulls that were swooping and diving above his head. He shuffled his feet and felt the surface firm beneath them.  He turned to look at the land behind him.  He was at the estuary of a great river where a series of stone jetties jutted out from the marshes into deep water.  A sea wall protected a huddle of cottages. 
     Two women stood on the sea wall, one swathed in a fur cloak and the other....   He blinked again.  The other person was the girl who had accosted him at the airport. She was still dressed in a long black coat, but now she was holding her hat at her side and her blond hair was being ruffled by the wind. The fringing of her chiffon shawl rose and fell in the passing breeze. 
     He knew she wasn’t real. Maybe she had never been real. Maybe this was all in his imagination and he had only imagined an encounter with a girl at the airport.  He was very tired, and obviously sleep deprived.  This hallucination was probably some kind of clinical psychosis that went along with being hurtled around the world from one time zone to another.  Well, he would soon find out. He took a step towards her. Someone, or something, rushed at him pushing him from the jetty into the water...
       He was not in the water. He was not even wet. He was lying on the ground staring up at a small boy dressed in a dark green windbreaker, blue jeans and mud-caked sneakers. 
     “You alright, mister?” he asked. “I didn’t see you.”
     Ryan gathered his scattered wits and shook his head to clear the vision.
      “I’m okay,” he said. “I must have tripped.”
      Yes, that was it.   Undoubtedly he had tripped himself.  No one had tripped him and surely he could not possibly have seen what he thought he had seen.
      The boy was still staring at him.  “You weren’t there and then suddenly you were,” he said.  “I didn’t mean to trip you.”
     Ryan smiled at the boy. By his clothing he could have been an American boy, but there was an apple brightness to his cheeks and a mop head haircut that seemed the ultimate in Englishness.
     “Are you looking for something?” the boy asked.
     “I’m looking for treasure,” Ryan replied with complete honesty.
     “Really?” The boy’s eyes lit up.  Obviously Ryan had broken the monotony of a boring afternoon among the gravestones; probably the graves of the boy’s ancestors.
    “That your car?” he asked. “That’s a Mercedes, ain’t it?
     “Yes, it’s a Mercedes, “Ryan said,” but it’s not my car.”
     They stared at each other.
     “Have you seen anyone else here?” Ryan asked.  He couldn’t bring himself to actually ask “have you seen a medieval village, a clutch of Viking long ships, and a blonde haired woman?”
     “There was a girl,” the boy said, “but she’s not here now.”
     A hand shot out from behind a gravestone and pulled at the boy’s coat.
     “What?” the boy hissed.  Keeping his eyes on Ryan, he edged sideways to speak to his hidden companion. “Ask him yourself,” he said.
     Another child emerged from the hiding place.  This one was a girl in a navy blue raincoat and bright red rubber boots.  She appeared to be about six years old, which would make her a couple of years younger than the boy.  There was a family resemblance in their apple cheeks and bright brown hair.  Brother and sister, Ryan thought.
     “What treasure are you looking for?” asked the girl.
     “Well,” Ryan said, “I’m looking for a treasure that might have been left here a long time ago.”
     “Oh that,” said the boy.  “King John’s treasure; you won’t find that.”
     “Really?” Ryan said. “What do you know about it?”
     “We learn about it at school,” the boy said.  “Local history.  Jenny doesn’t know about it yet, she’s too young.”
     “Am not,” said Jenny.
     “Are too,” the boy replied, and Ryan suspected that the exchange would continue that way unless he intervened.
     “What exactly do they teach you,” he asked, “in local history?”
     “About how King John lost his jewels in the Wash,” the boy said with strained patience.  He looked at Ryan intently, and recognition dawned on his face. “You’re him, aren’t you?” he said. “The bloke on the telly, does those old Treasure Hunt programs.  You’re him. Cor, no wonder you got a flash car.  Hey, Jenny, it’s him. “
     Jenny was unimpressed. “Who?” she asked.
     “That man what’s on that program that Dad watches on Sundays, the one about looking for treasure.”
     “I don’t watch it,” Jenny declared, but she looked at Ryan with something akin to respect. “You famous?” she asked.
     “I was, once, “he said, “famous enough for my shows to be in syndication.”
     Jenny stared at him blankly, obviously unaware of the importance of syndication.
     “You gonna do a program here?” the boy asked.  “You gonna look for King John’s treasure?”