The Rings of Poseidon

by Mike Crowson

  * * *

  There was an air of expectancy and enthusiasm over the camp at breakfast next morning and the local workers arrived early. The ground was still wet after the rain, but the rain itself seemed to have moved on. Just a few clouds still threatened the odd shower. Alan and the local gang wanted to get back to the investigation of 'their house', the crew generally were hopeful of making more finds and Gill, Frank and Manjy all wanted to look for the 'hand' from Steve's story. Steve would have liked to join them from the start but he had various routine jobs to do first. He hurried through checking the vehicles and topping up the generator fuel tank, before he left to meet the ferry.

  Alicia split them into four teams again. Alan Wainwright and two of the local men went on excavating the first house, several volunteers were digging along the route of the passageway in search of the next house and Alicia took Manjy and another of the volunteers to help her move and lay out the bones from the entrance to the village.

  "You can take charge of those uncovering the passageway once you finish here," said Alicia, "but this job calls for a certain amount of skill."

  Frank and Gill both wanted to dig for the hand and, as they clearly weren't going to concentrate on anything else, Alicia let them, though using two of the University specialists together was possibly not the best use of her resources.

  Manjy helped move the bones and lay them out on a sheet of plywood, while Gill, Frank and the two girls who had been part of Gill's team the day before stood waiting for them to get out of the way. "Well," said Alicia, "these look like the remains of a small but fully grown adult."

  "Is that flake of rust a spearhead?" asked Frank.

  Alicia followed the direction of his pointing finger. "It certainly could be." she said, and bent down to pick it up.

  "Steve's early," observed Manjy watching the Landrover turn out of the field. "We've only just started and he's off already."

  "I expect he's hoping to be back here by the time we find the hand," said Gill.

  "If we find it," Frank corrected her. "We aren't sure that it's here to be found at all."

  "Whether the hand's here or not, Steve can't hurry the ferry, can he?" said Alicia, scrambling out of the trench. "It's not likely to be early just because he is. Anyway, this does look like a spearhead. Mind you, that in itself doesn't make Steve's story any more or less likely. What it does do is hint at violence in the destruction of the village."

  She put the spearhead, if that's what it was, on the board and added, "Come on you two, we'll move these remains and see if they have anything to tell us."

  "OK," Frank told the two volunteers, "Go down another six to twelve inches where the body was and sift carefully for anything - weapons, buttons, buckles, ornaments - absolutely anything." He turned to Gill. "You and I are going to find that hand if it's there to be found," and he sank his spade through the tufty grass and into the sandy soil beneath.