Dust to dust sd-8

by Ken McClure

  Taking great care, Smith removed another half-metre of soil with the digger before he and Fielding changed to manual clearing of the final section with their hands and small trowels to leave an area of stone wall of about two square metres exposed. They climbed up out of the trench to allow Motram to descend and take a look for himself. He did so and ran his hand over the stone with barely suppressed pleasure. ‘Well done,’ he said, with a broad smile on his face. ‘We’re almost there.’

  The smile faded when he emerged from the trench to see a man with a briefcase walking towards them. The others followed his gaze.

  ‘Please God, it’s not the press,’ murmured Blackstone.

  The four men stood in silence, awaiting the arrival of the newcomer, who did not smile when he reached them. ‘Dr Motram?’ he enquired, looking from one to the other.

  ‘That’s me,’ said Motram.

  The man removed a card from his pocket. ‘Norman Bunce, Health and Safety. I understand you are about to open a tomb containing victims of the Black Death…’

  Motram closed his eyes, hoping that divine inspiration might provide him with a better opening line than What the fuck do you want? He opted instead for, ‘Seven-hundred-year-old victims of Black Death, Mr Bunce.’

  ‘Be that as it may, doctor…’ said Bunce, starting out on a soliloquy that ended with the edict Motram had been fearing throughout. Nothing more was to happen on site until Health and Safety had sanctioned it.

  Details of contact numbers were exchanged as the four men accepted the inevitable. ‘I must say I’m surprised at you, Mr Blackstone,’ said Bunce. ‘Historic Scotland are usually very much on the ball when it comes to safety.’

  ‘We still are,’ said Blackstone sourly.

  ‘No need for that attitude,’ said Bunce.

  ‘There’s no danger to anyone. The corpses, if they’re there, will be seven hundred years old,’ said Blackstone flatly.

  ‘Let’s leave that to the professionals to decide, shall we?’

  ‘What professionals are we talking about here, Mr Bunce?’ asked Motram.

  ‘I’ll make my report and my superiors will take the necessary decisions about whom to seek advice from,’ Bunce announced, aware of the growing aggression in the air.

  ‘They can’t be too few on the ground,’ murmured Fielding.

  ‘Good day, gentlemen.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t believe it,’ Cassie exclaimed sympathetically when she heard what had happened. ‘What will you do now?’

  ‘We just have to wait for a decision.’

  ‘But surely they couldn’t stop it altogether?’

  Motram shrugged. ‘Who knows?’

  ‘At least you won’t have this sort of thing to deal with when you become a celebrity nail technician.’

  ‘Absolutely not,’ said Motram. ‘Mind you, nail scissors can be extremely dangerous in the wrong hands…’

  Two days later Motram got the call he had been waiting for. The excavation and opening of the burial chamber could go ahead subject to the meeting of certain conditions. Health and Safety wanted to inspect the equipment and protective clothing the men would be using when recovering samples from the chamber. They also wanted a Public Health doctor to interview the four of them on site before the chamber was opened and administer any protective injections he thought necessary.

  ‘Probably anti-tetanus,’ said Cassie when she heard. ‘I could give you that.’

  ‘You’d probably also have to give me a certificate signed by two independent witnesses and a justice of the peace,’ growled Motram. ‘Best let them do it.’

  ‘They’re only doing their job,’ Cassie said soothingly. The look she got in return suggested she might be on her own in holding that view. ‘Be positive. You are going to get in to your chamber.’ She hugged Motram and persisted in looking at him until he gave in and smiled.

  ‘You’re right.’

  With all the formalities finally out of the way, health checks over and injections administered, Motram and the others were left on their own to open up the chamber. Motram watched the official vehicles depart and then joined the others in a slow walk over to the site. ‘Quite a day,’ said Blackstone.

  Motram nodded. ‘Days like these don’t come along too often in science,’ he said. ‘Research can be a bit of a plod when things aren’t going well but when a moment like this pops up… by God, it’s worth waiting for.’

  ‘I only hope it lives up to expectations,’ said Blackstone.

  Motram paused to look at the abbey in its beautiful setting, parts of its ruined walls as old as the secret he was about to unlock, and felt the excitement of anticipation rise inside him. He put on his white cover-all suit while Smith and Fielding prepared their tools for the breach of the chamber wall. They had already erected a sealable plastic entrance ‘vestibule’ over the area they would open up. They would chisel out the mortar and make sure the stones were loose enough to be moved easily before retreating to allow Motram to enter on his own.

  Blackstone chose to pace slowly up and down, leaving Motram alone with his thoughts. John sat on the grass, listening to the sound of chisels on stone and watching the crouched shapes of Smith and Fielding through the plastic screen. The noise stopped and the world seemed deathly quiet for a moment before the pair emerged. Fielding lowered his mask and said simply, ‘All yours, doc.’

  ‘Good luck,’ said Blackstone.

  Motram accepted the stone chisel handed to him by Smith as he passed by — just in case he needed it — and entered the plastic ‘vestibule’, closing the entrance flap behind him. He knelt down and tested the stones by rocking a couple before pulling out the first without any trouble. The gap grew as the stones piled up in neat rows on either side of him, but he resisted the temptation to stop and shine his torch in through the hole until the gap was big enough for him to enter. He took a slight pause to get his breath back, reminding himself in the process that he needed to take more exercise, then crawled head first into the chamber and got slowly to his feet.

  TWELVE

  In what little light was coming through the breach in the wall behind him, Motram could see that there were stone benches lined up along both sides of the tomb. It had been sheer good fortune that Smith and Fielding had picked a spot between two of these benches. He clicked on his torch but, strangely, the world remained black. The walls of the chamber were black, the benches were black and the bodies lying on them appeared to be black — or at least what they were wrapped in was black.

  It was impossible not to draw parallels with the mummified occupants of the Egyptian pyramids, but in this case nothing had been left to accompany the departed on their journey to the afterlife, no colourful ceramics, no gold, no wine jars, just the blackened shapes of corpses that had lain undisturbed for seven centuries.

  The first hurdle had been cleared. The bodies had been found, but the big question remained to be answered. The sixteen occupants of the benches looked like human bodies but until he had penetrated the outer wrapping he wouldn’t know for sure how successful the Le Clerks had been with their preservation methods and how well the bodies had survived their long wait. Everything now depended on that. He shone the torch beam down into the bag he had brought with him and took out a bubble-wrap roll containing a number of surgical instruments. Spreading it on the ground, he selected a scalpel and a pair of latex gloves. The big moment had arrived.

  Motram knew immediately that something was wrong when he gently placed a hand on the torso of his chosen body. He could tell at once that it lacked substance. He had only sought to steady himself with his left hand while he inserted the tip of the scalpel into the wrapping material in the neck area, but now he felt forced to investigate and apply more pressure with the flat of that hand. It didn’t take much before what little resistance there was gave way and his hand went clean through the corpse-shaped wrapping, leaving only a gaping hole and a cloud of dust which swirled mockingly across the beam of the torch he’d temporarily pro
pped up on a neighbouring bench. Dust and dry, brittle bones was all that was left of the bodies after seven hundred years in their underground lair. Nothing of substance had survived.

  Motram pulled the mask from his face and felt a wave of disappointment sweep over him. He supposed that this had always been the most probable outcome after such a long time, but he had failed to take the likelihood on board to any significant degree. Foolishly, he had allowed himself to believe that the preservation of the bodies was a realistic possibility and he had been seduced by the idea of going down in history as the man who solved the riddle of Black Death. He was now paying the price in crushing disappointment.

  His spirits were so low that he actually felt physically weak and had to support himself on one of the stone benches while he tried to summon up the energy to leave and face the others outside with the news of failure. But, as the minutes passed, he didn’t recover: instead, he started to feel worse. Disappointment was becoming anger and anger was threatening to become rage. The lines between one emotion and another were becoming blurred. Sweat broke out on his brow and he started to feel very ill indeed…

  Blackstone looked at his watch and asked, ‘Do you think he’s all right?’

  ‘Let’s not grudge him his moment of glory,’ said Fielding with a smile. ‘This is probably the pinnacle of his whole career.’

  ‘I’m still looking forward to seeing what’s in there myself if he’ll let me,’ said Smith. ‘It’s dead exciting.’

  ‘Here he comes,’ said Fielding as he caught sight of movement behind the plastic. The three men moved towards the sloping trench, anxious to hear what Motram had to say. When he saw that the scientist seemed to be having difficulty, Fielding moved in to help him with the plastic door flap.

  ‘Well?’ asked Blackstone.

  Motram, still carrying the torch in one hand, started to move slowly up the steep slope without answering. Blackstone exchanged a puzzled glance with the others and leaned forward to ask, ‘Everything okay, John?’

  Motram looked up at him, eyes burning like coals. Without warning, he swung the heavy torch into his face.

  Blackstone’s left cheekbone shattered and he screamed out in pain as he fell over, grabbing at Fielding in an attempt to stop himself slipping into the trench. Smith tried to help Fielding who was in danger of being pulled in too but unwittingly came within reach of Motram, who swung the torch again, this time connecting with the back of Smith’s head. All three men tumbled into the trench behind Motram, Blackstone desperately trying to shield his shattered face and Fielding half somersaulting over him before the deadweight of Smith landed on top of him.

  Motram continued his slow, ponderous journey up the slope and started out across the grass towards the digger. He climbed on board and punched the start button, mumbling to himself as he struggled with the unfamiliar gears.

  Smith was unconscious and Blackstone barely knew what was going on around him because of the excruciating pain in his face, but Fielding was all too aware of the little yellow digger beginning to trundle towards them and the pair of murderous eyes looking directly at him. ‘What the fuck are you doing, man?’ he cried out in panic. He knew he had to get out of the trench but it was taking him an eternity to free himself from the weight of Smith on top of him. He felt as if he were caught in a living nightmare.

  The digger had almost reached him by the time he had managed to free his legs and swing one up over the lip of the trench. Motram saw his intention and responded by steering the digger to that side and lowering the bucket sharply.

  Fielding fell back into the trench, crying out in pain and clutching his injured knee. He could only watch as Motram managed to reverse after several abortive tussles with the digger’s control levers. It was clear that he intended to drive the digger down the slope and over the bodies of the three men lying there, perhaps to continue straight on through the wall of the burial chamber.

  To Fielding’s relief, Motram misjudged the alignment of the digger’s tracks as it lurched forward after an uncertain change of gear. He missed the narrow entrance to the trench so that the left track stayed above ground while the other started down the slope. The angle of tilt was too great for the digger and it toppled over to the night, coming to rest against the lip of the trench and throwing Motram out onto the grass, where he lay holding his throat and seemingly fighting for breath before rolling over and lying still.

  The digger’s engine died, restoring peace to the abbey and its surroundings, making everything that had gone before seem quite surreal to Fielding, who stared at Motram’s motionless body, willing it not to recover, before looking briefly up at the sky. ‘Mad bastard,’ he mumbled, searching through his pockets for his mobile phone.

  ‘He did what?’ exclaimed Cassie Motram when the police told her what had happened.

  ‘He appeared to take leave of his senses, doctor. Ran amok, according to the others; almost killed one of them and severely injured the other two.’

  ‘But this is my husband you’re talking about,’ protested Cassie. ‘He’s an academic, for God’s sake. He’s the kindest, most gentle man on earth. He goes to enormous lengths to avoid killing spiders. There just has to be some awful mistake.’

  The senior of the two policemen sent to break the news gave an apologetic shrug. ‘I’m afraid the medics have had to restrain him and place him in an isolation facility at the hospital,’ he said. ‘They say they haven’t ruled out some kind of… reaction to what was in the tomb.’

  ‘Reaction? What d’you mean? What kind of reaction?’

  The policeman looked helpless. ‘The doctors say they can’t rule out some kind of poisoning or infection…’

  Cassie sank into a chair, holding her head in her hands, unwilling at first to even consider what she was being told. ‘Let me get this straight,’ she said slowly, trying to adopt a rational approach when she really just wanted to scream. ‘You are telling me that John entered the chamber sane but came out mad?’

  ‘That’s pretty much what we’ve been told, doctor.’

  Cassie shook her head as if trying to clear it. ‘I have to go to him,’ she said, getting to her feet. ‘Borders General Hospital, you say?’

  ‘Yes, doctor. Sorry to be the bearer of such bad news.’

  Bad news became tabloid news the following morning. The redtops had a field day. The Black Death, the opening up of a centuries-old tomb and the resulting insanity of the principal investigator was the stuff of editors’ dreams. It didn’t take them long to invent an accompanying curse that had come down through the years, which enabled them to draw parallels with the families of those who’d incurred the supposed wrath of the pharaohs when the pyramids were opened up in Egypt.

  THIRTEEN

  ‘Girls,’ complained Peter. ‘Why do they always have to take so long?’

  Dr Steven Dunbar smiled at his young nephew’s impatience. They were standing outside the changing rooms at Dumfries swimming pool waiting for Steven’s daughter Jenny and his niece Mary to emerge. ‘It’s just the way things are, Peter. One of the things in life we blokes have to accept.’ Seeing that Peter remained unconvinced, he added, ‘The pizza will taste all the better when we finally get there.’

  Steven, a medical investigator with the Sci-Med Inspectorate, based at the Home Office in London, had been on leave for the past month. He had escaped to Scotland for some respite after a particularly tough assignment, which had threatened his life and exhausted him both physically and mentally. He lived in London but his daughter Jenny stayed up here in the village of Glenvane with Steven’s sister-in-law Sue and her solicitor husband, Peter, along with their own two children, Peter and Mary — an arrangement that had been in place since the death of Steven’s wife Lisa from a brain tumour. Jenny had been a baby at the time so she had never known anything else.

  In the normal course of events, Steven would spend every second weekend in Scotland, but the hell of his last assignment had meant not seeing Jenny for over six weeks s
o he was trying to make amends. A favourite outing for the children was always to the swimming pool in Dumfries, followed by pizza and as much ice cream as they could eat. Tradition had it that he would receive a mock telling-off from Sue when they got home but, for the children, this was part of the enjoyment.

  ‘At last,’ exclaimed Peter as the girls emerged. ‘What do you do in there?’

  ‘We have lots of hair to dry,’ said Mary. ‘You don’t.’

  ‘Talking to do, more like,’ grumbled Peter.

  ‘Are we going for pizza and ice cream, Daddy?’ asked Jenny.

  ‘You bet.’

  ‘Even if it makes Aunty Sue angry?’ she asked, suppressing a shared giggle with Mary.

  ‘I’ll fix things with Aunty Sue,’ Steven assured her.

  They emerged into the sunshine and took hands as they crossed the main road at the traffic lights to walk on the broad pavement by the River Nith.

  ‘Can we go out on the bridge for a moment, Daddy?’ asked Jenny as they were about to pass an old stone bridge crossing the river.

  ‘Oh, yeah, let’s,’ said Peter, starting to look around for pebbles.

  ‘Me too,’ said Mary.

  Jenny was content to hold her father’s hand as they stepped out onto the bridge. ‘I like this bridge. It’s very old, isn’t it?’ she said, running the flat of her hand along the stones.

  ‘Hundreds of years,’ replied Steven.

  Jenny paused to read a signboard. ‘Dev… Devor… Devorgilla.’

  ‘Devorgilla’s Bridge, nutkin.’