"Look," Rex said, standing. "I think it's time Nick and Bridget saw what is going to be the centerpiece of all this, what's going to make all this happen. Let's take them over to the chapel."
I looked out of the window at the rain still falling.
"It's okay, Nick. There's a tunnel that goes from the cellars right into the back of the church."
As Rex led the way out of the room, Faye fell into step beside me.
`Nick, please stick around. I need this to work. Askwith sank all our money-my money-into it."
"But this is the kind of thing I loathe," I muttered.
"Wait till you see what Lucy found."
"Yeah, and I don't see much grieving about her either."
"You don't know the full story."
"So tell me."
"Later," she said, as we progressed down a well-lit sloping corridor to a narrow Norman doorway. We all grouped together as Rex inserted a large key into the lock.
We entered a small chapel, very simple, smelling badly of damp. Rex led the way to a much shorter, narrower door behind the altar. This had modern locks and bolts on it.
When he had released the locks, he ushered us down a short flight of stairs into a well-lit crypt. A jumble of coffins lay around us.
"Okay," Rex said, his voice reverberating oddly in the confined space. "We'd decided to have the theme park and we knew we were going to have the Grail Quest adventure. Where better for the Grail chapel than a genuine old Norman chapel? Better still-its crypt. Lucy, God rest her, was to catalog whose remains were in here. That hasn't been done for two hundred years-since Victorian days we've been burying kith and kin in the family crypt in the village church. This one is too near the river. We've done a lot of work on the outside recently because it used to flood all the time."
He walked over to a black marble sarcophagus. Its lid had been propped up against the wall and a sheet of glass fitted in its place.
"And what does she find here?"
Rex's eyes glittered with excitement as he turned to me.
I shrugged.
"The tomb of King Arthur and Queen Guinevere."
"Yeah, yeah," I said, looking round at the ring of faces all watching me keenly. "Pull the other one."
"Hey, I thought this guy was supposed to be working with us here?" Buckhalter said to Rex. Rex gestured for him to be quiet.
I looked down into the sarcophagus. Lights had been rigged up at either end of it to illuminate the collection of white and discolored bones. Little attempt had been made to sort the bones. There were two skulls, one pelvic girdle, one very long shin bone. Other bones and fragments of bone lay jumbled together.
"It's true, Nick," Faye said.
"How come they're buried here?" Bridget said, puzzled. "This place really was Camelot, then?"
"There was no Camelot, here or anywhere," I said. "And this sarcophagus is medieval. No way would a sixth-century warlord have been buried in a marble tomb-he'd be put in a long barrow somewhere."
"It's the sarcophagus from Glastonbury Abbey," Faye added patiently. "The one that used to sit in the quire."
"Again?" I said.
"Wynn's ancestors nicked it at the dissolution of the abbey. Lucy tracked it down in the Wynn family records. The abbey was dissolved in 1539 and everything was sold off or stolen. I guess Rex's ancestor either wanted the remains of Arthur and Guinevere or wanted to use the marble tomb for his own family."
I must have been looking blank, although I was actually trying to dredge up my history.
"Don't you remember?" Rex said. "The monks at the abbey stumbled upon Arthur and Guinevere's bodies in 1191 when they were doing some digging near the Lady Chapel. There was a lead cross identifying them, although Guinevere spelt Wenneveria-was referred to as his second wife. We don't know when the lead cross was separated from the tomb but we know it was in the possession of a Chancellor Hughes of Wells in the 1830s. It hasn't been heard of since."
"Hang on," Bridget said indignantly. "Back up a bit. I've never heard anything about Arthur and Guinevere's bodies being found. How come there's all this stuff about whether Arthur existed if everyone knew where he was buried? And how come everyone seems to have forgotten it since?"
"I vaguely remember this," I said, scratching my head.
"The two sites-where they first found the remains and where they were removed to-are marked by signs in the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey," Rex said. "Their remains were removed in the presence of King Edward I and Queen Eleanor to a black marble tomb inside the abbey in 1278. On April 19, to be precise. The tomb remained there until the dissolution of the abbey in 1539. Nobody knew what happened to it after that. Until now."
"So why do we get all this old bollocks about whether he really existed?" Bridget said.
Rex shrugged.
"How do you know it's really the sarcophagus purporting to contain Arthur and Guinevere's remains?" I said. "Or that these aren't the bones of someone in your family?"
Rex's smile looked a little forced. "Look at the lid. The Red Book of Bath reported in the fifteenth century that the monks wrote an inscription on it."
I walked across to the lid. There was a light directly overhead and I could clearly see the incised letters in the pitted, black marble. I read out the inscription.
"Hic facet Arthurus, rex quondam, rex futurus." I looked at Bridget. "Here lies Arthur, the once and future king."
"So is this King Arthur or not?" Bridget said.
"You bet," Buckhalter said.
"That's the wrong question," Rex, Faye, and Genevra said, more or less together.
Rex continued: "What we have here is a great story that deserves to be told. Right, Nick?"
I didn't say anything for a moment. Buckhalter scowled.
"Thought you were going to join us in our endeavor. You better get with the program, buddy."
"Has any attempt been made to date the bones?"
Rex waved airily. "Carbon dating isn't accurate enough to tell us precisely whether these bones are sixth century. Lucy, God rest her, decided it wasn't worth it."
"What's your problem, Madrid?" Buckhalter said.
"It makes no sense that Arthur and Guinevere would be buried in Glastonbury."
"It does if Glastonbury was the ancient Isle of Avalon, as is claimed," Rex said.
"But it wasn't," I said stubbornly.
"Prove it," Rex said. He grinned and put an arm round my shoulders. "That's why you're here, Nick. To write it as you find it. I don't want you to lie. And let me tell you something. Personally I don't much mind whether it's really Arthur and Guinevere or not. It's still a heck of a story and it will get a lot of customers through our gates."
He looked at Bridget.
"Did you ever hear about the Cadbury dig back in the sixties?"
She shook her head.
"Locals had been claiming for centuries that it was the site of Camelot. It was actually originally an Iron Age fort and certainly a very important site. A group of archaeologists wanted to excavate there but they needed funding. Now I'm not saying they deliberately misled would-be backers but they chose to call the dig the Camelot Excavation.
"Money poured in because people assumed that these chaps were going to dig up the Round Table. Needless to say they didn't. They found no proof at all that the place had been Camelot and I doubt they ever expected to. When the excavation report finally came out-almost twenty-five years later, in the nineties-I don't believe there was even a mention of Camelot or King Arthur."
We trooped back into the house. I was hoping to have a talk with Faye-well, to be honest, more than a talk-but she slipped away before I had a chance. Rex and Bridget went into a small reception room for a nightcap. Genevra and Buckhalter went their separate ways.
I wanted to know more about Lucy. In any case, I would need to look at her papers for the story I was going to write. I was impatient to get started. I assumed one of the desks in the room we had visited earlier was hers. Tomorrow, I decided, I w
ould go into Glastonbury and check out the things Rex had said about the tomb of Arthur and Guinevere.
I went to my room and pondered all that had happened during the day. I'd brought the book from the library up to bed. I read through the section I'd found again.
I slept late. By the time I'd done my yoga and showered it was almost eleven. I went down to the library to return the book and see what others they might have to help me with the historical research about the tomb.
I found Bridget there.
"You're late to rise-how'd you sleep?" she said.
"Alone. How about you?"
She merely raised an eyebrow. She was sitting in a wingback leather chair, blowing smoke rings in the air, Country Life open on her lap.
"Bridget, do you know your Holman Hunt?"
"Didn't know you were into rhyming slang," she said sleepily.
"It's not rhyming slang, you berk."
"That is.,,
"He's an artist-berk is rhyming slang?" I thought of the possibilities: Turk? Perk? "For what?"
"Berkshire Hunt, you Charlie."
"Never knew that. Listen, there's no easy way to say this so I'll just say it."
"I'ni agog."
"I think there may be a serial killer at large with a thing about King Arthur and/or Pre-Raphaelite paintings."
Bridget burped, rather elegantly.
"Wouldn't mind some more fizz," she said, stretching her left foot out then frowning. "Need to re-do my toenails. What's Pre-Raphaelite?"
"It was a brotherhood of painters."
"Wooftas?"
"No, just because it's a brotherhood doesn't make them gay. Men can just like each other, you know."
"Okay, don't get nervous."
"They shared a philosophy about painting. In the nineteenth century. And they painted a lot of pictures inspired by the Arthurian legends."
"Do you think you could speed this up?" Bridget said, closing Country Life. "I thought serial killers were defined by the fact they've killed more than one person-hence a series or serial. We have one unexplained death in a boat. Skip the middle bit and let's get to the nittyo-grittyo."
"Holman Hunt was one of the Pre-Raphaelite painters, obsessed with realism. He once painted the scapegoat of the Bible on site on the shores of the Dead Sea using a live goat tethered to a stake. The goat died of heatstroke but-"
"Nick!" Bridget warned.
"Well, he painted this picture, Light of the holding up a lantern in a gateway. It hangs in the chapel of my old college. It's the painting Fay's husband was found lying beneath."
"Askwith. The accidental death."
"Yeah, okay. But then I find this woman in the boat."
"So?" Bridget was prowling round the room now, opening cupboards and cabinets. "One of these must be a drinks cabinet," she muttered.
"Another Pre-Raphaelite painting is The Fair Maid of Astolet. She died for love of Lancelot. Of a broken heart."
Bridget laughed.
"A man wrote about her, right? Maybe the feminists are right-instead of history maybe we should start writing her-story."
"That's not the point." I opened the book I'd found in the library. "This is Malory's Le Morte d'Arthiir. Book XVIII, chapters nineteen and twenty. The death of the Fair Maid of Astolet. Listen: `And so when she was dead the corpse and the bed all was led the next day unto the Thames and there a man, and the corpse, and all, were put into the Thames; and so the man steered the barget unto Westminster."'
"How touching," Bridget said, stifling another yawn. "The barge was covered with black samite, whatever that is, and she was, `covered to her middle with many rich clothes and all was of cloth of gold.' Astolet was actually Guildford, by the way."
"You think this bint we found yesterday was meant to be the Astolet woman-what was her name?"
"Lucy Newton."
"I mean the Astolet woman."
"Elaine le Blank."
"Elaine le Blank from Guildford." Bridget rolled the name round her tongue. "Sounds just like the woman my ex-husband ran off with."
"The thing is, Williamson knew her as Elaine-I didn't know you were married."
"Knew who as Elaine? Elaine le Blank? Well, he would, wouldn't he?"
"Lucy Newton. Knew Lucy Newton as Elaine. When were you married? And how come you've never mentioned it before?"
"The past is another country, as I'm fast discovering."
"The past is another country-what does that mean?"
"Search me. I heard Rex say it yesterday. Thought it sounded quite good. So let me get this straight. You think Lord Williamson is a serial killer? I know you don't like politicians, but even so, aren't you pushing it a bit?"
"I'm not saying it's him," I said impatiently. "I'm just thinking aloud." I could see a putdown trembling on her lips so I hurried on. "Listen, Tennyson wrote a poem-"
"That Sherpa bloke wrote poetry?"
"Not him. Alfred Lord Tennyson. Charge of the Light Brigade? Long beard? So absent-minded his wife insisted he carry a piece of paper with his name and address on it when he went for a walk because he used to forget where he lived?"
Bridget shrugged. "Vaguely."
"Well, he wrote a poem about the Maid of Astolet except he called her the Lady of Shalott-"
"As in onions? Strange man."
"Holman Hunt, Waterhouse, and, I think, others, all painted her-Waterhouse painted her in a boat. I think they bunged William Morris's wife Jane in a tin bath for the drowned effect. Hang on-no, that was Rossetti's mistress for Millais's Ophelia."
"Nick!" Bridget warned again.
"Anyway-you see the link."
Bridget stopped and turned to me.
"Okay, I'm getting there. I've read these serial killer novels that sell for big money. The serial killer always has a high concept-the twelve apostles, the four horsemen of the Apocalypse, the seven dwarfs-no, strike that last one. So you're thinking, what, the Pre-Raphaelite Poisoner? The Camelot Killer? How'd the Arthurian lot die?"
"I need to check on that, but yes, it seems possible that there's someone out there just starting on a series."
"And you want to include Askwith's death in this?"
I scratched my head.
"It seems too much like coincidence-but then again I can't see the significance of his death."
"I'd better tell Rex."
"Let's not." I saw her expression. "Hey, nothing against the guy, but I'd rather we kept this to ourselves until we have a bit more information."
"We?"
"Well, you're going to help, aren't you?"
"I'm here to snare a husband, poppet. I'll leave the sleuthing to you."
"But, Bridget, we're a team!"
"And I love you dearly. But as I've already told you, Rex is worth around L16 million and counting. I need to focus full time on the job in hand."
I left Bridget a few minutes later and wandered gloomily down to the conference room, unable to believe that my feisty friend had turned into a gold-digger. The room was empty except for Faye, who was sitting behind a desk looking in a drawer.
"Hi," she said, standing and closing the drawer. "Would you care for a walk in the ha-ha?"
"Sure," I said, my gloom suddenly banished.
She walked round the desk.
"Although I could do with a laugh, we'd drown," she said. "It's flooded."
Since I didn't actually know what a ha-ha was I couldn't make any comment on this. She came up to me.
"I'm going over to Glastonbury," she said. "Do you want to come?"
"Sure. But I need to look at Lucy's papers first."
"Lucy's papers? Why?"
"I need her version of finding the sarcophagus-did she keep any kind of record?" Faye's eyes were on me. "For the book," I added. "I want to get the immediacy of it. If she kept a diary that would be even better."
"I have no idea if she kept a record. I don't know that she would have needed to write anything down. I think we assumed that you'd interview her."
&
nbsp; "I would have," I said. There was a small silence. "Did she have a desk here?"
Faye pointed back at the desk she'd just left. She flushed slightly.
"There. I was starting to sort through her stuff when you came
"Perhaps I could do that?"
I found a box and emptied all the papers in the drawers into it. "What about her room?" I said.
"Oh, she didn't live here at the house. But won't the police have all her stuff for their investigations?"
"Probably," I said.
I nipped up to my room with the box and got dressed for going out. When I came out of the house, Faye was sitting in one of a small fleet of four-wheel drives parked on the gravel.
"If you ever need to go anywhere," she said as I climbed in beside her, "use any one of these. The keys are usually left in the ignition."
"Trusting."
"Probably foolish," she said with a smile, turning the vehicle and sweeping down the drive past her house and onto the road outside.
"I'd like to see your home again after all these years," I said.
"I expect you will," she responded casually, her eyes on the road ahead.
We were heading down on to the Somerset Levels when I plucked up the courage to ask her about Askwith.
"Do you mind if I ask about your late husband?"
"Depends what you want to ask," she said cautiously. Did I see alarm flare in her eyes?
"Did he have any enemies? Anybody who might have wished him ill?"
She looked across at me quickly.
"That's a strange question since his death was accidental. He could be very abrasive but I don't think there was anyone who would have wished him harm. Why?"
"What happened that night?"
"Nick, you're not down here as some private detective investigating recent deaths, you're here to write an account of the rediscovery of Arthur and Guinevere's tomb."
"Faye, I'm sorry. It's just I observed a couple of curious things that night. I hoped you'd be able to shed light on them."
She flared her nostrils. "Well I can't. That's Glastonbury Tor over there. Where do you want me to drop you in the town?"
I looked out at the Tor. The fields around it were flooded. Approaching Glastonbury from this direction, the Tor looked remarkably like an island, surrounded as it was by wide stretches of water. There was a sign at the roadside.
The Once and Future Con (Nick Madrid) Page 6
