The Buried Circle - Jenni Mills [123]
Martin’s face has that closed-down look again. ‘No point asking me. I’m one of the bloody dreamers.’
The team has been excavating for a couple of days now, Harry and I wielding cameras. First, the skin of turf has been peeled away over an area the size of a small living room. Now the students are chipping away layer by layer at the soil. They’re a metre down, and still haven’t reached the stone. One of the men–rangy, bearded, bright red sunburn–holds up a fragment of something. Martin leans down and takes it from him. ‘Clay pipe,’ he says. ‘Seventeenth century, I’d say. Bag it, Reuben.’
‘Boring, then,’ I suggest.
‘No! Martin brightens as soon as the subject is archaeology. He pretends to tear out handfuls of hair. ‘Why can’t television people ever get it into their thick heads that the past isn’t about frozen moments, it’s about layers and continuities? That was Keiller’s mistake. He was only interested in prehistoric Avebury, so it didn’t strike him as vandalism to wipe out the later settlement that grew up within the circle. How’s your grandmother, by the way?’
‘Fine,’ I say, watching Ed set down the wheelbarrow on the bank and strip off his shirt. ‘Look, he’s flaunting himself.’
Martin sighs. ‘Petal, he’s hot.’
‘I know.’
‘And stop being jealous of the students. One of them’s engaged to Reuben, and the other two are lesbians.’
‘He’d think of that as a challenge,’ I say gloomily. ‘When are they going to uncover the stone?’
‘Patience,’ says Martin. ‘Serious archaeology cannot be rushed.’
‘It has to be when it’s Solstice next week.’
Michael has insisted that all digging be suspended for the Solstice period, when the campsite and the village fill with pagans. He arrives on site shortly after Martin’s friend Kit, who is some kind of engineer, to discuss how the stone can be lifted.
The upper surface has been revealed. It’s massive, nearly three metres long, diamond-shaped, buried in a pit cut exactly to fit its shape.
‘Like…a coffin,’ says Ibby. ‘Like it was alive, but now it’s dead.’
‘Or sleeping,’ says Martin. ‘One line of thinking is that the stones represent the ancestors. More than represent, perhaps–they’re the physical embodiment of them. They have to be enclosed within the earthen banks of the circle to prevent their ghosts wandering. So when the later inhabitants of the village at Avebury start to bury stones, are they making sure the spirits sleep even more soundly?’
‘Interesting,’ says Michael. ‘How long will it take to lift?’
Kit shrugs her shoulders. She’s a petite woman, in her late thirties or early forties, with dark hair in a spiky cut. ‘We’re aiming to use the same techniques as the people who first put it here,’ she says. ‘So no modern ropes or pulleys. The students will plait hawsers from honeysuckle, which is the kind of material they might have used. Could take a few more days to finish that and wedge it upright in its original socket. Afterwards we’ll bring in modern gear and mix up a nice safe concrete base to hold it in place. No wandering ghosts, I promise.’
‘You have until Friday,’ says Michael. ‘Then you have to be off site.
Solstice is the middle of next week, but people start arriving at the weekend. If you haven’t finished that afternoon, you’ll have to make the area safe and cordon it off. Ed and Graham will help.’
‘We’ll be done by then,’ says Kit, confidently. ‘Promise.’
CHAPTER 31
On Thursday morning, Adele and the social worker from the Geriatric Psychiatric Unit turn up at nine sharp to collect Frannie. The new social worker is called Bob. He’s in shorts. Frannie catches one glimpse of his thick white legs, covered with gingerish fur, and takes against him.
‘Okey-dokey, Frances,’ he says, in the jolly tone that men of his age–not much older than me, that is–reserve for elderly ladies.
‘I think she’d prefer to be called Mrs Robinson,’ says Adele.
‘I would have called you that but I was afraid you’d have the pants off a young chap like me.’
Adele’s eyes roll heavenwards.