Paying the Piper

by Sharyn McCrumb

  "I saw Callum, but he was about finished when I was there. Leath and Marchand have been up for ages, getting ready for today's project. Where's Alasdair?"

  Elizabeth made a face. "He has also been up a while. He's

  in there helping Gitte make breakfast, and she is simpering like mad."

  "Oh, well." Denny smiled. "You know how women are with a foreign boyfriend."

  With that he strolled away, leaving Elizabeth to wonder whether or not she had been insulted.

  Derek Marchand, delighted with the return of good weather, supervised the assembling of the surveying equipment for measuring the standing stones. As a civil engineer he was in his element with tachymeters and tripods. He had risen at dawn, and the traces of red on the horizon had lifted his spirits immeasurably. His first impulse had been to shake Tom Leath awake and to begin the day at once, but an instant later he decided that he did not want to share these early moments with anyone.

  He pulled on a white fisherman's sweater over his turtle-neck and set off inland toward the stones. The peat was still slippery from the previous rains, but to Marchand's nose the air smelled dry and fresh—a further promise that today the work would begin in earnest. The stones were still black shapes in the graying light of morning, and their twisted forms silhouetted against the sky looked oddly graceful, like dancers frozen in place. They seemed to bow to each other and to him, beckoning him closer.

  Derek Marchand wondered what dawn it was, or perhaps what moonset, that would make the stones reveal their secret to a waiting communicant. Midsummer, perhaps, or Beltane. He was sure that there was some significance to the standing stones and that the paths of sun and moon were somehow bound to this rine of rock mired in neat on a forgotten island. If you stood just here—or perhaps there, by the tall tapered stone—and looked . . . where? At the mountain? At the smaller island just past the channel? . . . From some such point of reference, on a given day ordained centuries ago, the sun would rise just over one certain stone; or perhaps by standing at one special place within the circle, one could see the moon caught in a fold between two mountains.

  The ancient engineers had set it all up to some heavenly purpose, and modern man had yet to determine what it was. Marchand was sure, though, that the extraordinary efforts put forth to construct that monument over a span of decades had not been expended frivolously or for the sake of art. There had been some careful plan at work, perhaps a religious one. He was certain that the circle had been precisely engineered to tell its builders something that they needed to know. The time of the solstice, perhaps, for planting or for worship. What in heaven—literally—had they watched for?

  Such determinations were months—perhaps years—away from the work at hand. Before the astronomical significance of the Banrigh stones could be considered, hours of more prosaic measuring had to be done, in order to determine heights, widths, and angles. Marchand thought he might even leave the star-charting to a younger scholar. He doubted that he had the time or the strength to stay for all the answers. He would settle for his short-term goal: determining the unit of measurement they had depended on to construct their circle. That was knowledge enough for him. They had not been children, these old ones. For all their quaintness of dress and lifestyle (to modern sensibilities), Marchand did not underestimate them for a moment. Modern scientists achieved a good deal by standing on the shoulders of a host of others whose discoveries had made later ones possible, but these old ones had stood alone, and they had accomplished much. He watched the sun come up over the water and shower the stones with golden light. Far off were wave sounds and the cry of seabirds, but across the stubble of heather, among the standing stones, all was quiet.

  Two hours later the circle was glinting in bright sunshine, and the site was animated by the babble of voices and a flash of red and yellow sweatshirts weaving in and out among the stones.

  Marchand, looking like a silver-haired gnome, was directing the bustle of activity, sending his workers scurrying to and fro with every new instruction. The first order of business was to check the temperature and the humidity, since weather conditions—especially dampness—affected the readings of the electronic surveying instrument.

  Tom Leath, in a hangover-induced calm, was leaning against one of the stones, studying an ordnance map, trying to concentrate on Denny Allan's explanation of the procedure. Leath, who was accustomed neither to surveying nor to Scottish accents, and who was not in his most receptive mood at present, kept nodding and wishing that the lilting Glasgow accent would stop clanging in his head.

  "The ordnance survey has the national grid superimposed on it, right?" Denny was saying. "Okay, in the margin you'll find the angle between grid north and true north . . . Not following me? Look, if we calculate the azimuth of a line with respect to the grid, it can be reduced to true north if we apply the correction obtained at the observer's end of the line. And if we know the grid coordinates of two points, then we can find the azimuth of the line joining the two points."

  "Fine with me." Leath shrugged. "We tend to put things in simpler terms for the measuring done in my fieldwork."

  Denny smiled. "I know you'll be wanting to get on to your own specialty here."

  "Right. Give me a kitchen midden. Once I find where these fellows dumped their garbage, I can find out where they lived."

  "There's a lot of peat covering up mat secret."

  "Too right." Leath sighed. "It took a major storm on Mainland in the Orkneys to uncover the ruins at Skara Brae. I suppose I could pray for more rain. Ah, well, that's neither here nor there. Suppose you tell me in less grandiose terms how I can help."

  Denny handed the Englishman a hexagonal-shaped prism. "Hold this," he said. "And go and stand where I tell you."

  The site may have been ancient, but me surveying techniques were not. The tachymeter used an infrared beam bounced off the prism to determine distance, and Leath's job was to hold the prism against the base of each standing stone while Denny took aim from the tripod set up in center circle.

  "We are closing a traverse," Denny said to Elizabeth, who was noting down the figures on a clipboard as he called them out to her.

  "Shall I write that down?" Elizabeth asked.

  "No, hen, I'm explaining it to you. Closing a traverse means that we will be shooting the location of a number of points around a circle and then coming back to our original point."

  "Impressive jargon," Elizabeth said approvingly. "Mind if I take a look through the sight?"

  Denny stepped back and motioned her to the tachymeter. "No! Don't stand with your legs astraddle the tripod legs, dear! It's too easy to bump it out of alignment that way. Stand between the legs. That's fine. Now have a look."

  She peered into the lens. "It's upside down," she announced.

  "It's supposed to be."

  "I see a little symbol on the stick. I think it's supposed to be a V."

  "That stands for five," Denny told her. "They put it in Roman numerals so you won't mistake it for a nine when you see it upside down."

  "Why don't you just hold the measuring stick upside down?" Elizabeth wanted to know.

  Denny shook his head. "There's no explaining science to some people," he said.

  "That means you haven't a clue." Elizabeth nodded.

  The day spent measuring the circle was the most perfect one imaginable in a Highland summer: comfortably warm sunshine and a bright blue sky with only a few puffs of clouds low on the horizon. They had spent many hours carefully measuring the site and rechecking their findings, stopping only for quick lunch of potted meat sandwiches fetched to the site by Alasdair, who was being more cooperative than anyone had expected. He and Gitte had taken charge of a second tripod and were measuring the levels at the base of each stone, while Owen followed, making chalk marks on

  the stones to indicate the points of measurement. Callum, as usual, photographed the work in progress.

  Marchand and Denny had compared their findings and pronounced the site a
flattened circle, composed of two arcs of 240 degrees and 120 degrees respectively.

  "Does mat make sense?" Elizabeth wanted to know; she was resting on the grass, adding notations to her clipboard.

  "I think so," said Owen, who was also resting. "There are hundreds of these stone circles all over Britain, and from what Marchand was saying today, mat seems to be one of the recognized types of circles.''

  "I haven't seen any evidence of a tomb, yet, have you?"

  "I asked about that," Owen said. "Callum told me that if you do find tombs associated with stone circles, they were added by a later culture. The original builders did not use the circles for burial purposes."

  "So much for the treasure." Elizabeth sighed. "I wondered when I saw Alasdair poking into the peat with a sharp stick. What was he looking for?"

  Owen shrugged. "More stones. They seem to think a few are missing."

  "The villagers probably snatched them for millstones in the Middle Ages."

  "It's really going to be difficult to measure that outer ring of the henge monument. The posts were usually timber or small stones, and those will be a couple of feet into the turf by now.''

  Elizabeth nodded. "Shoveling required. I doubt if we get to that stage on this expedition, though. If we stay that long,

  we'll be digging peat anyway—to bum!"

  * * *

  They kept working until seven to make up for the days the rain had cost them. Even then the sky was bright with full sun, but everyone except Marchand was too tired to care. He and Denny stayed at the circle for "just one more measuring," while the others straggled off to the burn to wash off the sweat before going back to camp.

  Elizabeth shivered as she plunged her arms into the icy spring. "Ugh!" she said. "The Bronze Age is losing its charm incredibly fast."

  Gitte nodded. "Tonight I will heat water on the camping stove, no matter how long it takes. I do not think we get really clean in cold water.''

  "Boil some extra water," Owen told her. "I'll want some to soften up my honey and hot wax."

  "You'll crack the jar," Gitte told him.

  Owen rolled his eyes. "I'll wait until it cools off some. Honestly!"

  "So you're cleaning the bagpipes tonight, huh, Owen?" Elizabeth asked.

  He blushed. "I might as well. You'll be playing bridge, and nobody else wants to talk to me. Besides, Marchand says that he's sending me over to the small island to measure that stone tomorrow, now that it's stopped raining. I told him I'd just take some food and camp over there for a couple of days. That way I can play my bagpipes without disturbing anyone."

  Elizabeth privately thought that sound would carry very well indeed over still water, but she decided not to say so. Perhaps Owen wanted her to protest that his playing was no disturbance at all, and that was nearly true. It was not that he played well, but it took enormous lung power to play, and as a relative beginner, Owen had very little endurance. He was, therefore, only able to be a nuisance for short periods of time.

  By the time Marchand and Denny showed up, tripods slung over their shoulders, there were long shadows in the grass and the air was chilly. Gitte had finished boiling the water on the camping stove and had allowed its burners to be used for preparing dinner, a concoction of stewed vegetables in beef broth. True to his word, Owen had commandeered a tin cup full of the water and had set his wax-and-honey mixture in it to reach the proper consistency for lubrication.

  "You might have saved some of it for coffee!" Alasdair had grumbled, so Gitte had gone back to the spring for more water. She then set a smaller pan to boil.

  Marchand, his cheeks red from sun and exercise, accepted a steaming cup of tea and took his place at the long table beside Callum, who was eating cheese and crackers while he waited for the stew. "What did you think of your day, then?'' he asked heartily.

  Among the assorted murmurs of enthusiasm, Owen piped up. "I was still hoping we'd find a burial chamber."

  Callum looked up from his cracker. "Do you want neolithic, or will any one do?"

  Owen narrowed his eyes. "I don't mean the village cemetery, thank you!"

  Denny laughed. "I don't think that's what he meant, Owen! You're talking about the sea dead, aren't you?"

  Callum nodded. "Yes, of course. I took some photos of them, but of course they aren't germane to the project."

  Owen was instantly alert. "Sea burial?"

  "Those flat stones near the causeway. The ones sticking

  up in the ground, like small standing stones. The islanders put them there. It's the way they buried bodies washed ashore from shipwrecks. They didn't do crosses, because they didn't know if the deceased were Christian or not."

  "You mustn't disturb them, though," Tom Leath warned him. "That crosses the line between archaeology and grave robbing. They're much too recent to interest us anyway."

  Alasdair yawned and stretched. "Owen won't do any body snatching, will you, Owen? There's no sport in it. I fancy there's another site on the island as well. Did you catch that, Farthing?"

  Callum shrugged. "The Tarans, you mean? It's possible, I suppose. I haven't looked closely."

  Owen, who had fished the jar of honey and hot wax out of the pan of water, looked up from his bagpipes. "What are 7ara«5?" he demanded.

  "Unbaptized children. When a child was stillborn, or if it died before it could be given the rite of baptism, the islanders did not bury it in the ordinary cemetery.''

  "They were put in unmarked graves in special burial grounds high up in the hills or on the grassy ledges of cliffs facing the sea,'' Alasdair said in a tone that made it clear that he was showing off rather than being helpful.

  "Why?" asked Elizabeth, whose passion for folklore had been aroused by the discussion.

  "To give them a chance at salvation," Callum said solemnly. "The high places are halfway between heaven and earth, and their parents hoped that the kind spirits of the middle kingdom—between heaven and hell—would take pity on the little spirits."

  "They say that you can hear the wee things crying in the wind," said Alasdair, smirking at Elizabeth's tears.

  "And there's such a place here on Banrigh?'' Owen asked. He was carefully pouring the thick mixture into the sac of his bagpipes, but he was paying careful attention to the conversation nonetheless.

  "Perhaps," Alasdair said, with a mocking smile. "I thought I might go off and see tomorrow. By myself," he added to the three pairs of pleading eyes gazing hopefully at him.

  "I couldn't go anyway." Owen shrugged. "Tomorrow I'm taking the boat to the little island." He sloshed his instrument around a bit in order to coat the inside thoroughly. "I'll let it sit for a bit before I dump it out," he said to no one in particular.

  "I couldn't go tomorrow, either," Elizabeth said proudly. "Cameron is coming, you know."

  "I'd leave the place alone, Alasdair, if I were you," said Callum. "It'll bring you no luck."

  Alasdair smirked. "People make their own luck, I always think!"

  CHAPTER

  11

  Alasdair looked with disfavor at the breakfast foods haphazardly laid out on the slightly sticky wooden table. This must be someone's idea of working-class Scout fare: lardlike margarine, aging bread, teabags, and a cracked cup of white sugar. Powdered orange juice, stewed tomatoes, and canned beans would no doubt follow. He shuddered, wondering if he ought to demand that a supply of stomach tablets to be added to whatever the biologist would be asked to bring on his next stopover. He decided against it. If he complained, the others might think him not a team player, which of course he wasn't. He thought teamwork was a peculiar form of stupidity, merely sharing the incompetence so that no one could be blamed when things went wrong. Alasdair, who could be chillingly efficient when he chose to be, had no use for the encumbrance of others when he wanted to get something done.

  He searched about in the larder for the cheese. That and the bread would make a barely acceptable breakfast, he decided, and he could eat it quickly, without having to be bothered
by the insipid chatter of the others. He glanced over at Gitte, who was still sleeping. She was a stupid cow, of course; he'd never met a woman who wasn't, only some who thought they weren't. He wondered why women made such a virtue of self-sacrifice; perhaps it was nature's way of making it easy to exploit them.

  He stood up. Time to get moving. There would be reproachful looks and sniffles of martyrdom to endure when he got back, but Gitte was used to being left out when it suited him, and well she knew that sulking would get her nowhere. Still, he preferred to deal with her later, rather than now.

  He didn't want to miss the biologist, though. That was important. Hastily, he scribbled a note:

  Must see C. Dawson when he arrives. I want to send something back with him. Also have instructions regarding soil samples, etc. Do not let him leave until I return.

  A. McEwan.

  That should do it, he thought to himself. It left no room for argument. He anchored the note to the table with a corner of the sugar cup; then he pulled on his anorak. He had better be off before the others woke—lazy pigs!

  Elizabeth tugged on her cleanest lambswool pullover—the burgundy-colored one that set off her dark hair so nicely. She wished she had brought a fourth pair of jeans, but perhaps it wouldn't have mattered. The cold spring water was not able to get them really clean anyway, and it took them days and days to dry in the moist chill of a Highland summer.

  Elizabeth reached for a paper tissue and stifled a sneeze. She was running low on tissues; she must remember to ask Cameron to bring her some. Perhaps this was the beginning of a cold. She wouldn't be surprised, considering the climate. She had almost forgotten what it felt like not to be cold and slightly damp. Did her ancestors really need a marauding English army to persuade them to emigrate? The very thought of winter would have sent her packing. It's all a matter of what you're used to, though, she told herself. Only she and Owen, the Americans, seemed to notice the cold. Gitte wore a T-shirt most of the time and seemed to think the weather was normal.

  Still, it was beautiful in the Highlands. She thought that if one had a little house in some less remote place—like Skye— with central heating and a generous supply of hot water, Scotland could be a wonderful place in which to live. However, if one had to subsist in a tin shack from World War II, with no conveniences and nothing to eat but carbohydrates, one might as well be a seal.