The Dig (16 page)

“Gold?”

“Oh, it’s gold, all right,” said Stuart, coming up behind me. “Gold with very intricate cloisonné work.”

Although I can’t imagine this meant a great deal to Robert, it did nothing to dampen his enthusiasm. As I handed the pyramid to Mrs. Pretty, he kept jumping up and down beside her.

“May I see, Mama? Please may I see?”

Rather than pass the pyramid to him, Mrs. Pretty held it out between her thumb and forefinger. He put his face very close to
it, scrunching up his forehead and squinting at it from as many angles as possible. Afterwards, she let the men have a look — they had also gathered round and were showing a lively interest.

“You found this, did you, Mrs. Piggott?” Mrs. Pretty asked.

“Yes,” I said. “I believe so … I mean, yes, I did.”

At this, she grasped my hand, much more strongly and more warmly than I would have expected.

“Well done, my dear. Many congratulations. What a wonderful discovery.”

Part of me wanted to tell her that it had just been lying there. That all I had had to do was bend down and pick it up. But I said nothing. However ill-deserved all this praise may have been, I didn’t want it to go away. Not completely. My mouth was very dry. I kept hoping Mrs. Pretty’s butler would reappear with more barley water, but he never did.

While we were standing around in a dazed sort of way, Mr. Brown came over and asked if I wouldn’t mind telling him where I had found the pyramid.

“I can easily show you, if you like,” I said. “If you’d just come down the ladder.”

He glanced around before saying, “I’d better not, thank you.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll hold on to the bottom.”

“No, no,” he said, and gave a laugh. “It’s not that. Mr. Phillips has said he doesn’t want me going anywhere near the burial chamber.”

“Mr. Phillips? Why on earth would he say such a thing?”

“I don’t exactly know, although I dare say he has his reasons. Perhaps you could show me from here.”

I pointed down into the ship. “Just down there,” I told him. “See that greenish band there? Just to the left of it.”

After gazing at the spot for some time, he nodded, thanked me again and walked away. In the end, it was Stuart who suggested in a slightly embarrassed fashion that we should all go back to work.

When Phillips came back during the afternoon, he promptly flew into a rage at not having been there when the discovery was made. When shown the pyramid by Stuart, he glared at it, as if both stupefied and affronted by its presence.

“Ye gods,” he muttered.

“Peggy found it, CW,” Stuart told him.

Phillips didn’t react to this; he just kept on glaring at the pyramid. Soon afterwards the light turned an odd lemony color and rain began to fall. At first, it looked as if it would be no more than a shower, but then came several claps of thunder. These were followed by an extraordinary sight. A dark curtain was being drawn down the center of the estuary, wet on one side, dry on the other. It might have been moving on rails, brushing against the surface of the water.

We all helped to put the covers back on and then took shelter beneath the trees. The rain grew heavier, clattering on the leaves and sending brown rivulets running down the spoil heaps. In the wood, Robert amused himself by jumping from one mossy hummock to another. By six it was plain that we were not going to be able to continue. Phillips told the men
they could go, as soon as they had made sure the tarpaulins were securely fastened.

We drove back to Woodbridge with Phillips following. I sat beside Stuart with the window open and the thundery breeze buffeting against my face. My limbs were so heavy I felt I had molasses flowing through my veins. As we drew up outside the Bull, the street lights were already being turned on due to the weather. Orange balls of light stood out against the dark gray sky.

“Oh, Lord,” said Stuart as he was putting the car keys into his pocket.

“What’s the matter?”

He withdrew his hand and unfolded his fingers. Under the street lights, the gold pyramid gave off a soft oystery glow.

“I had been intending to give it to Mrs. Pretty, but it must have completely slipped my mind. What do you think I should do, darling?”

“Don’t do anything,” I said.

“But shouldn’t I tell Phillips?”

“Not now — not tonight. Just remember to give it to Mrs. Pretty in the morning.”

When we walked through the front door, I could hear the sound of laughter coming from the bar. Clouds of smoke billowed into the corridor. We waited for Phillips to come in. I had assumed he would march straight past the bar and head for his room. To my surprise, though, he rubbed his hands together and said, “I think this calls for a celebration, don’t you?”

“I should say so,” agreed Stuart.

The bar was crowded, with no spare seats. Even Phillips was unable to make much headway against the throng of drinkers. Stuart and I attempted to reach the bar by another route. But we hadn’t gone far when our path was blocked by a small round man.

“I know who you are,” said the man, rocking confidently back and forth. “I’ve seen you in here before.”

“Have you now?” said Stuart.

“You’re one of those archaeologists working over at Sutton Hoo.”

“That’s right.”

“How are you getting on then?”

“Oh, not too bad. Not too bad at all.”

“Found any gold, have you, old boy?”

Stuart leaned towards him. “As a matter of fact,” he said in a confidential sort of manner, “my pockets are full of it.”

The man laughed so hard at this that he might have overbalanced if it hadn’t been for the press of people. “Marvelous, marvelous. You must have a drink, then.”

“Thank you,” said Stuart. “I think I could do with one.”

“Here,” said the man to the occupants of one of the nearby tables. “Mind your manners, lads. There’s a young lady here with nowhere to sit.”

The men stood up with no sign of resentment. Drinks were fetched and set before us. Before we drank, we all hoisted our glasses at our benefactor, who lifted his in return.

“Congratulations, darling,” said Stuart, with his glass still held aloft.

“Yes,” said Phillips. “Cheers. People spend entire lifetimes waiting for a discovery like this. It hardly seems fair that it should happen to one so inexperienced. Nonetheless, here’s to you, my dear.”

The beer had such a delicious peaty taste that I was reluctant to swallow it. Instead, I kept swilling it around in my mouth until the taste had disappeared. Afterwards I took another mouthful and did the same thing.

“Now, let’s think about period, shall we?” said Phillips, sitting forward with one hand planted on his knee.

“As you mentioned before, CW,” said Stuart, “if the boat is roughly contemporaneous with Oseberg, then that would suggest anything between AD 600 and 800. My initial feeling was that we were looking at something nearer the latter end of the scale. However, the jewelry rather changes all that.”

“Yes, yes. Go on.”

“Well, the only comparative jewelry that I can think of is the piece that Kendrick found at Dorchester on Thames in the early twenties. He believed this to date from the early part of the seventh century. Kendrick, of course, was roundly ridiculed for making such a suggestion. The general feeling was that a piece of such intricate workmanship couldn’t possibly be that old. In effect, Kendrick was invited to recant, although he refused to do so. I think we now have to consider the possibility that he might have been right, after all.”

“We may,” said Phillips. “We may indeed have to consider that possibility. Let’s also consider the coin that Brown found before I arrived. This morning, I took it to Cambridge
for Kendrick himself to examine. As you know, East Anglia did not have a coin-based economy until the eighth century at the earliest. However, a number of Anglo-Saxon inhumations have been discovered with coins in them dating back to around AD 575. The coins are assumed to have been used for symbolic purposes — most probably for placing in the mouths of the dead in order to facilitate their passage from this world to the next.

“I think it’s fair to say that Kendrick was considerably taken aback when I showed him our coin,” added Phillips with satisfaction. “Frankly, he could hardly believe his eyes. It took me a while to convince him it wasn’t a prank, something a student had knocked up in the lab.”

Stuart began to laugh. His eyes were sparkling. I don’t think I had ever seen him look so happy.

“The first thing Kendrick said was that he was quite certain it wasn’t from East Anglia at all. Although he was only able to give it a cursory examination, he believes it to be a
tremiss
from Merovingian Gaul, dating from between
AD
575 and 625.”

Phillips took another drink and pressed his lips together. “Considering all this, now what do we have? We have a buried Anglo-Saxon ship, almost 100 feet in length, with what appears to be a burial chamber at the heart of it. A burial chamber that would appear to be completely intact. I suppose we have to consider the possibility that both the coin and the gold pyramid were placed there at a later date, but I doubt if even Reid Moir would give that one serious credence. No, the inference must surely be that this is the
grave of someone important, and that the jewelry is part of his grave goods.”

“But surely —” I broke in.

“Yes?”

I knew that I must not appear too excitable. That I must make sure my voice was properly measured.

“Well,” I said, “if that is true, and if Professor Kendrick is right, then surely that would alter our entire understanding of the Dark Ages?”

There was a pause after I had finished and I began to wonder if I had said something foolish.

Then Phillips went, “Mmm … it would rather.”

The curtains had been drawn in our bedroom and the beds turned down. Only the bedside light was switched on. Stuart stretched out his arms in front of him. “It’s been quite a day, hasn’t it?”

“Quite a day.”

“You should feel very proud of yourself, darling.”

“Should I?”

“You know perfectly well you should.”

Just as he had done earlier, Stuart came towards me and wrapped his arms around my shoulders. His tweed jacket had a reassuring smell, of solidity and permanence. It was the sort of smell that could banish doubts and fears, possibly forever. I turned my face up towards his, wanting above all to feel his mouth on mine, if only for a moment. It would have been the crowning of a perfect day.

Stuart, meanwhile, was looking over my shoulder towards the window, as if peering through the drawn curtains at the street outside. Without relaxing his grip, he tilted his head down towards mine. We stayed like that for some time. Then he gently extricated himself and went back over to the armchair.

The nonchalance with which Stuart undressed only made my self-consciousness all the more pronounced. He undid his boots, folded his trousers over the arm of the chair and buttoned up his pyjamas. When I got into bed, the sheets were cold against my skin. I had to push my feet down to the bottom of the bed in one movement for fear that they would become stuck halfway. Even then, there was a moment when I doubted if the warmth of my body would be enough to drive the cold away.

“Ready?” he said.

“Ready.”

“Right, then. Sleep well, darling.”

“And you.”

He reached over and turned off the light.

Instead of leaving the car by the squash court, as he had done before, Stuart continued along the track all the way to the mounds and parked beside the shepherd’s hut. The men were already there with their shovels, awaiting instructions.

Everything proceeded as before: the procession from the house, the setting up of Mrs. Pretty’s chair, supplemented
today by a golfing umbrella. Before we started, Stuart handed the pyramid to Mrs. Pretty, apologizing for not having done so the day before.

I then continued in the same part of the chamber, while Stuart moved to the westernmost corner. Phillips patroled up and down the edge of the trench, monitoring our progress. An hour or so after we started Stuart called me over. He had uncovered the rim of a large bronze bowl. Inside it, showing up as this circular protrusion in the sand, was what appeared to be the rim of a second, slightly smaller bowl. This second bowl had a definite collar-like formation on one side which might have been the remains of a lid. Rather than try to remove either of the bowls, Stuart decided to leave them there until the ground around had been lowered to the same level.

Soon afterwards came another object — the first of several iron clamps. On the same axis as the clamps was a large, apparently amorphous mass of decayed wood. Stuart believed — and Phillips agreed — that these clamps must have been used in the construction of the burial chamber and that the piece of wood was part of one of the walls, or possibly even the roof.

The sluggishness that I’d felt the day before had not gone away. Although I had slept, I had only managed to do so in a restless, fretful sort of way. In my dreams, the sky was black, with planes obliterating what was left of Sutton Hoo, and probably us as well. It seemed an especially cruel sort of joke that we should be unearthing the remains of one civilization just as our own appeared to be on the brink of annihilation. In the
Daily Telegraph
that morning, I had read that the Germans
were reported to be continuing their build-up of forces in the port of Danzig. A Polish frontier guard had been shot and killed — it was presumed by SS officers stationed in the city. Meanwhile, a doodle by Field Marshal Goering, the head of the German air force, had been analyzed by a handwriting expert. The expert had concluded that the person who had drawn the doodle was feeling “very much in control and rather unresponsive.”

Just before lunch, I came across a mass of folded and stitched leather. It looked just like a pad of unburnt newspaper from a bonfire. Although much decayed, several of the stitches were still intact. Phillips suggested putting it in some water. A bowl was brought and the mass of leather immersed. Nothing happened for a while. Then, very slowly at first, the leather began to unfurl.