The Five-Day Dig

by Jennifer Malin

  An urge to reassure him almost overwhelmed her, but she tried to preserve some caution. “I sure hope not.”

  He hesitated. “Fair enough. Call me if you need me.”

  A little whimper squeaked in her throat. She hoped he hadn’t heard it, because it made clear how much she did need him. “Thank you,” she choked out.

  She was tempted to keep him on the line for more reassurance, even with her father’s research waiting. Instead, she forced herself to say goodnight.

  Once off the phone, she glanced at the journal lying on the desk. Having it in her possession after so many years of pining for it was almost too much. To give herself time to savor the moment, she decided that before reading it, she would wash her face and get dressed for bed.

  When she climbed under the covers with the volume, she still felt trepidation. What would it contain? Would the notes be enough for her to understand her father’s lines of thinking? If there were any way she could complete the research and publish his legacy, she would gladly make the effort.

  With shaky hands, she opened the cover and skimmed the first few pages. They dated to a trip he had made to Egypt two years before he died. The entries included few words – mostly sketches of artifacts. He had been a skilled artist, and the details in the renderings intrigued her.

  Eager to read his analysis of the finds, she moved on, but the next dozen pages were laid out the same way. Frustrated, she began to flip more quickly. Then she noticed a strange pattern. Under each drawing, he had jotted a range of dollar figures: $500-$1,500 beneath a footed alabaster vessel, $300-$500 for a silver snake bracelet. He seemed to be estimating the value of the items – but why?

  She pinched the remaining pages between thumb and forefinger and flipped through them. About one-third of the journal comprised Egyptian artifacts, each beautifully sketched – and priced. Following that, he had treated ancient Greek and Roman finds in the same way, depicting jewelry, oil lamps, mosaic panels and marble busts. The whole book followed the same format. There were no research notes, no analyses, no theories.

  As her suspicions gelled, a sick feeling tightened in her gut. No wonder her father had never published. His “research” amounted to nothing more than selling artifacts on the black market!

  Her eyes stung again. This was the lost work she had mourned nearly as much as the man himself?

  She threw the book across the room. If her concept of his professional life was so skewed, could she even trust her personal memories about him? She didn’t know what to believe – or how the reality of who he was reflected on her as his daughter.

  Between this and the forged letters, she felt like crawling under a rock. How much would a flight home tomorrow set me back? she wondered, dreading facing her colleagues in the morning. Maybe she would even schedule a sabbatical for the fall. The plan to escape from her pathetic life appealed to her, but what would she do with herself?

  Her phone rang again. Chaz? She grabbed it and saw Liz’s name on the screen. Holding a conversation was the last thing she felt like, but she needed someone to keep her anchored, and it was safer to lean on Liz than Chaz. She picked up the call. “Hello?”

  Her friend hesitated. “Winnie? You don’t sound like yourself. Is everything all right?”

  She sucked in an unsteady breath. “It’s been one of the worst days of my life. I’m about to book a flight home.”

  “Oh, God. What happened? Is it Sam?”

  “No, no, nothing like that. I’m sorry for being melodramatic.” She pulled herself together and gave a jumbled account of the discovery of the forged letters, leaving out her suspicions of Chaz. Then she described the miraculous appearance of her father’s journal and what a disgrace it had turned out to be. “I can’t even tell you how crushed I am. My whole career was built on top of his.”

  “That’s not true,” Liz said. “Your career is your own. You’ve built it on years of study, dedicated research and your own intelligence. You have so much to be proud of. And you’re not responsible for your father’s actions, only your own. Don’t confuse the two.”

  She held her temples. “I guess you’re right. I can’t even think straight right now. My life feels like it’s been turned upside-down.”

  “Have a glass of wine and go to bed. In the morning, get back to work, and you’ll feel more like yourself again.”

  “That doesn’t seem likely.”

  “Let’s try focusing on your work now. I called because I wanted to hear how the excavation is going so far. Can you fill me in?”

  “I’ll try.” Gathering her thoughts, Winnie recounted the major finds the team had uncovered, then expanded on a few details about the purgatorium. To her surprise, as she spoke about her work, she began to regain a sense of normality.

  When she finished her summary, Liz gave a low whistle. “It sounds incredible. I envy you.”

  A laugh burst out of her. “You do? With all this craziness going on, it’s hard to remember that I’m working on an amazing dig. Thank you for reminding me.”

  “We all need a little prodding now and then. Speaking of which, have you slept with Chaz yet?”

  The question surprised her. She thought she had dispelled Liz’s speculations on that point, but evidently her friend knew her better than she did herself. Denying her feelings now would be useless. “I’m not sure where that’s going, if anywhere. I’ll update you when I get home.”

  Liz tried interrogating her further, but she refused to say anything else. Scrambling for a change of subject, Winnie asked her about the baby, a topic the new mother couldn’t resist.

  After they hung up, she lay back in bed, clinging to what solace the conversation had offered her. So her father wasn’t a saint or even much of a scholar. So her boss believed her capable of forgery, while the man she had been falling for might actually have done it. Even if the worst turned out to be true, she still led an exciting life in many ways.

  Why, then, did it feel so empty?

  In any case, she wasn’t about to quit “The Dig,” when she’d probably never get an opportunity like it again. She only had to put on a stoic face for the next two days; then she would have the rest of summer break to digest the experience and work out what was next.

  What she would say to her colleagues after the accusations of forgery and the shame of her father’s notebook, she didn’t know. But she wouldn’t give up yet.

  QUATTORDICI

  EARLY THE NEXT morning, a knock sounded at her door.

  “Winnie, it’s me,” Chaz’s muffled voice intoned.

  She opened up without hesitation, and her heart sped up when she saw him, but tension still hung in the air.

  “Are you ready to go down to the site?” he asked with no expression.

  “Almost. Come in for a minute.”

  He entered and closed the door. As she went to the dresser to get a pair of socks, he sat down at the desk and picked up a pen, tapping it on a notepad. “I got Dr. Farber’s letter from him.”

  Her gaze shot to him in surprise. That he would bring up the letters first seemed like a sign of innocence, but she was afraid her attraction to him could cloud her judgment. “He didn’t send it straight to his lawyer?” she asked, no longer caring if she sounded fed up with their boss.

  “No, he handed it right over to me. He only said that he’d be interested in anything I find out.”

  “Hmph.” Socks in hand, she sank down on the bed. It didn’t seem like Farber’s style to retreat so easily. Recruiting Chaz to spy on her would fit his MO better. Or was she being paranoid? “Did you take a look at it?”

  “Yes, but I didn’t come up with much. The signature looks like it was done by someone unfamiliar with the real thing – or who didn’t care about reproducing it accurately. But I can’t think of anyone with a motive. When we get home, I’ll talk to our colleagues.” He looked at her. “How would you feel about talking to the police?”

  Again, she felt it was a good sign that he didn’t avoid ment
ioning the police and that he’d met her gaze as he did. Also, he did know Farber’s signature – if he’d forged it, wouldn’t he have done a better job? Or was she grasping at straws? “I hadn’t even thought about it,” she said. “Of course, if Farber decides he’s going to press charges against me, I won’t have a choice.”

  “I think he knows that pressing charges would be absurd. Unfortunately, his jealousy of you sometimes gets the better of him, and he says things he shouldn’t.”

  “Jealousy?” She stopped in the middle of reaching for a sneaker. “He has no reason to be jealous of me. As one of the biggest grant winners in the school, he has the bigwigs at Growden fawning all over him. Those people don’t even know my name.”

  “But your books have both had commercial success. His have gone unnoticed outside of academic circles.” He gave her a curious look. “Surely, you’re aware that drives him ’round the bend. He tries to make himself feel better by belittling you.”

  “I always took that for plain old contempt.” Tying her shoe, she considered his point. She guessed jealousy could explain Farber’s treatment of her, but it didn’t seem likely.

  He got up and went to gaze out the French doors. “Onto a happier subject, how much of your father’s notebook did you read?”

  She let out a humorless laugh. “Not much. Big disappointment.”

  He spun back around. “How could it be?”

  She hated to tell him, but what good would hiding the truth do? If everything came out later via another source, she would only look like more of an idiot. “Evidently, my father’s ‘research’ amounted to valuing antiquities for the black market. Have a look for yourself.” Getting up, she picked up the journal from the floor and tossed it to him.

  He caught it one-handed, his forehead creasing. Turning the book right-side-up, he opened the front. His eyes widened. After studying the first page at length, he looked at several others. “These renderings are brilliant.”

  She didn’t respond, her disillusion keeping her from admitting her father had possessed any good qualities.

  While he looked through more of the journal, she retrieved a hoodie from the closet. “Shall we?”

  “I suppose so.” Examining one last sketch, he set the book on the bed with care. “Perhaps you could have some of his drawings framed.”

  She shrugged into the hoodie. “What would I do about the dollar figures? Crop them out?”

  He shrugged. “Although the figures may imply that he was involved with something questionable, it’s not clear-cut. Many sales of antiquities are legitimate.”

  “If he had worked for Sotheby’s or Christie’s, the family would have known about it.”

  “In any case, you’re not responsible for his choices, and the drawings are art-quality. I would hang them in my home.”

  “I wouldn’t.” But as soon as she’d said it, the thought occurred to her that her mother or one of her siblings might feel differently. She softened her tone. “It is a nice thought, though, and I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but let’s talk about something else.”

  “Sure.”

  On the way downstairs, he filled her in on how far he’d gotten on the purgatorium after she’d left early the day before. Then they caught a ride to the site with Dunk and Enza, who didn’t ask about either the forged letters or the journal. Instead, Dunk spoke obsessively about getting as much done as possible in the remaining two days.

  Enza listened to him with concern clouding her face. “How can I help, Duncan?”

  “For one thing, the police are cramping my style,” he said. “Whenever I run between trenches, they stop me and ruin the shot. I can’t get them to understand how important it is to keep the program exciting. Being from the same culture they are, do you have any idea how to cut through the crapola, as you Italians say?”

  She frowned. “Crapola is not Italian. I do not know this word.”

  Even Winnie had to laugh. It broke the tension.

  When they got to Trench 2, she and Chaz worked quietly. As they shoveled lapilli into buckets, side-by-side, she searched her mind for anyone else connected to her that might have either tried to forward her career or set her up to look like a fraud. Her ex-husband? He’d just remarried, so she didn’t think he cared one way or another.

  Once she seemed to have exhausted all of the possibilities, she forgot about the letters and let herself just enjoy her work. They had made it inside the purgatorium and were squeezed together in a narrow tunnel, along with buckets, tools and trays. Whenever a pail reached its capacity, they passed it to a student outside the archway, who conveyed it to someone else above the trench. Finds proved scarce, but the lack of artifacts made for quick progress.

  At lunch in the catering area, Amara came by their table and handed them scripts for the reenactment.

  As Chaz skimmed the short composition, he laughed. “I see that I’ll be sacrificing red eggs. I’ll have to ask Dunk if I need to dye them before tonight.”

  “Signora Vaccula will prepare them for you,” Amara said, then turned toward Dunk, Jack and Enza at the next table.

  Winnie reviewed her lines with a grimace. “Amara is offering up cakes. Is it just me, or do these sacrifices seem kind of measly? I wonder if I can come up with something to add to them.”

  He grinned at her. “Why? Are you worried that the goddess won’t approve, and the curse will get us?”

  “If you were a goddess, would you approve of these lame rites? Even I don’t approve, and I’m spiritually challenged.”

  After lunch, the afternoon passed quickly, especially since Dunk urged everyone to get back to the house early to study their scripts and get dressed for the reenactment.

  Winnie spent half-an-hour on her lines, jotting down a few notes on an index card to use as a cheat sheet.

  Later, she took a long, hot shower. Even if nothing else about the evening proved enjoyable, being clean for dinner would be a nice change.

  When she put on her tunic, she liked it better than she had expected. The draped fabric connected at the shoulders with decorative metal brooches and tied under the breasts to create an Empire waistline. She twisted her hair up into a simplified interpretation of an ancient hairstyle. Aware the camera would be on her, she also applied more make-up than Roman women probably would have had available. The costume didn’t come with footwear, but she had a pair of sandals in her luggage that would work.

  When she looked at the results in the mirror in her bathroom, she smiled. After three days of traipsing around in tees, dusty cargo pants and sneakers, she felt almost Barbie-like.

  Chaz will like this, she thought – then remembered that he might have forged the letters. Even if he hadn’t, it was foolish of her to be considering an affair with him. He wasn’t going to want anything lasting, and she wasn’t getting any younger, so why waste her time? Maybe tonight she’d get an opportunity to flirt with Domenico – but at this point the thought didn’t interest her much.

  On her way out of the room, she grabbed her phone, then worried that it would ruin the effect of her costume. Deciding she could live without it for a couple of hours, she set it back on the night table.

  The tyet amulet lying there caught her eye and bothered her. If her father had obtained it illegally, she didn’t want the damned thing anymore.

  It occurred to her that it was a goddess symbol and would make a good offering for the rites. Since she didn’t have pockets, she stashed it in her bra, along with the index card holding her notes.

  In front of the house, Domenico’s driver told her he had supplies to drop off at the temple and offered to take her with him. While she was getting into the front passenger seat, Chaz stepped outside, his well-made, if pale, legs exposed under a toga. She pulled her gaze away while the driver invited him to sit in the back with the crates. During the ride, they exchanged jokes about each other’s costumes but didn’t say much else.

  When the three of them entered the twilit temple, the aroma of coo
ked beef and spices made her mouth water. Detecting a hint of pine, she noticed that someone had strung garlands around the walls and set up a small evergreen tree on the pedestal in place of the missing statue.

  The driver set down his crates in the center of the room near a low rectangular table surrounded by nine seat cushions arranged in a U-shape. The table held wedges of bread, dishes of sauces, cheeses, round dumplings, mini burgers and olives, both black and green.

  Wearing a multilayered toga, Dunk kneeled at the keystone of the seats, pouring cloudy, purplish beer into mugs and setting one at each place. He dismissed the driver, then noticed Winnie and Chaz. “Welcome.”

  Amara and Enza, looking cute in tunics, were putting out “ancient” appetizers. They added their greetings.

  “Salvete omnes,” Chaz answered in Latin, grinning.

  “This is fabulous.” Winnie turned around to view the frescoes in the atmospheric lighting. Concerns about damaging the paintings with smoke prevented the use of authentic oil lamps, so the team had made do with electric lanterns, which someone had decorated with translucent cellophane “flames” in red, orange and yellow. The effect looked a little childish but added to the mood. Smiling, she asked, “Who did the lamps?”

  “Enza.” Dunk stole a sideways glance at the young woman. “She’s very artistic.”

  “Brava, Enza.” Winnie sat down cross-legged on one side of the U, and Chaz took the cushion next to her. His knee brushed up against hers, but space was tight, so she didn’t bother pulling away, secretly enjoying the contact.

  Dunk nodded toward the mugs in front of them. “Try my special brew.”

  She looked at hers doubtfully. “Shouldn’t we wait till everyone’s here?”

  “Nope.” He dimpled up. “If you’re worried that you might finish yours before we have a chance to make a toast, I doubt it. No one’s going to chug this stuff.”

  “We’ll see about that.” Chaz lifted his drink and sniffed it. His eyes widened a little, but he took a sip. “There’s an interesting note of ... wood.”