Hill of Bones
Page 38
‘Perhaps it belonged to Queen Guinevere!’ called Fortescue from his place at the desk. The provocative remark triggered a furious response from Roger Humbolt.
‘Mock as much you want, you moron!’ he shouted. ‘When I’m proved right about Badon, you’ll have to eat your words.’
He snatched up another object from a table, a dented piece of rusted metal with no obvious shape, as far as the police officers could tell.
‘This is part of a helmet; it could have been Saxon or Celtic. It all adds to the burden of proof that there was a battle on this hill!’
Fortescue rose from his chair and sauntered over to where the others were standing.
‘With so little left, it could be from any period! Probably late medieval, could even be Tudor.’
Humbolt thrust his face towards his antagonist, his features now almost as red as his hair. ‘Nonsense, it’s much earlier than that!’ Then he swung round to the other row of tables and jabbed a finger at the pile of darkened, crumbling bones. ‘Look at this lot! Obvious battle casualties! On that skeleton over there, the pathologist pointed out a clear knife-cut on a rib and the edge of the breastbone.’
Fortescue’s reply was scathing. ‘One swallow doesn’t make a summer and one stab wound doesn’t make a battle! Where are all the victims from your Badon, eh? Arthur is supposed to have slain nine hundred himself!’
The other man was now almost purple with rage. ‘You know damned well that wasn’t meant literally! And if we could dig up the whole hill, there’d be hundreds more like this, even after fifteen centuries!’
Shirley Wagstaff tried to cool the argument, but Humbolt was now in full flow. He snatched up another find from the first table and held it up in a shaking hand. ‘And what about this! A knife that I’d stake my life came from the Dark Ages.’
Bolitho felt he should say something to cool their passions. ‘Wouldn’t that blade have more rust on it after all that time?’
The older archeologist glared at the detective with his bulging eyes. ‘You obviously know little about it, Officer. There were smiths in those days who could make rustless iron, like the Pillars of Delhi and Dhar!’
‘Come off it, Roger, they were in India, not Celtic Britain!’ countered Fortescue, derisively.
In angry response, Humbolt jabbed his other forefinger at the handle. ‘Look at that carving, will you? Do you deny that is a bear carved in ivory, the symbol of Arthur the Great Bear?’
‘Plenty of performing bears around until well past Shakespeare’s time, chum!’ sneered Fortescue. ‘And where the hell would they get ivory from in the fifth century?’
‘You ignoramus!’ shrieked the red-headed disciple of the Once and Future King. ‘I know this knife must have belonged to Arthur himself. I feel it in my very soul!’
Before the astounded policemen could stop him, Roger Humbolt had plunged the blade into the chest of the man who had been baiting him.
Bolitho and Bryant watched while the helicopter took off and whirred its way towards Frenchay Hospital, Shirley Wagstaff being on board to comfort Peter Fortescue.
‘The paramedic seemed happy enough about him,’ observed the superintendent. ‘He said that little knife didn’t damage any organs, but caused a pneumothorax, whatever that it is.’
‘He’s not going to snuff it, thank God,’ said Bryant. ‘Are we going to charge the mad fellow with attempted murder or just GBH? I suppose the CPS will choose the easiest option, as usual.’
Bolitho shrugged as they started to walk back to the tent, which was now a crime scene, though the miscreant was still sitting crying in the picnic chair, guarded by the PC from the door.
‘Ironic, really!’ said the superintendent. ‘We come up trying to sort out a murder and almost end up with a totally different one. That bloody Arthur has a lot to answer for; he’s been causing trouble for the past fifteen hundred years!’
His assistant agreed. ‘Solsbury Hill, indeed! Damned place must be cursed!’
Endnote
1. See King Arthur’s Bones, The Medieval Murderers