The Janus Stone

‘Have you called the police?’ she asks. ‘The coroner?’

‘No,’ says Trace, rather sullenly. ‘We thought we’d wait for you.’

‘What do you think?’ asks Ted, leaning over her shoulder.

‘They’re human, they look like a child’s. Hard to tell the age.’ Recently unearthed bones are fairly easy to date but after that, as Ruth knows to her cost, analysis is a difficult business. Though the grave cut is recent, the bones could be anything from fifty to several hundred (maybe even thousand) years old. She is looking at a cross-section, the bones suspended in the side of the trench. They appear to be crouched in a foetal position. She looks at Ted. ‘No skull,’ she says.

‘No,’ he says chattily, ‘we noticed that.’

All of a sudden, Ruth knows she is going to be sick again. She lurches away from Ted and retches violently in the corner of the trench. Trace looks at her with horror.

Ted, though, seems undisturbed. ‘Are you all right?’ he asks. ‘Would you like some water?’

‘Yes please.’ Ruth’s head is pounding and she knows that she is shaking. Why did this have to happen here? It will be all over the department by tomorrow. She crouches down, trying to control her breathing.

‘Here.’ Ted has returned with a battered-looking water bottle. Ruth takes a cautious sip and feels her insides settle slightly. She must stay calm. Breathe.

‘I’m sorry,’ she says, ‘must have been something I ate.’

‘Motorway food,’ says Ted sympathetically.

‘Yes,’ says Ruth, straightening up. ‘We’d better call the police.’

‘Shall I dial 999?’ asks Trace, sounding animated for the first time.

‘I’ve got a number,’ says Ruth, getting out her mobile phone and dialling.

‘Ruth!’ says a surprised voice, ‘why are you calling?’

‘We’ve found some bones, Nelson,’ says Ruth. ‘I think you’d better come.’

By the time Nelson arrives the builders have gone home, leaving only the very irritated foreman. ‘Edward Spens wants this site clear by the end of the week,’ he keeps saying.

‘I’m sure he wouldn’t want to get in the way of a police inquiry,’ says Ruth tartly. The foreman looks as if he isn’t so sure about this.

Ruth hears Nelson’s Mercedes screeching around the curved driveway. She is not sure how she feels about Nelson. She likes him, more than likes him, but she knows that as her pregnancy becomes more obvious things are going to get very difficult between them. Still there is no reason for Nelson to suspect for a few weeks yet. Lucky she has always worn baggy clothes.

Then Nelson himself appears, framed briefly in the doorway. At his shoulder is a policeman called Clough, whom Ruth knows by sight. Nelson speaks briefly to Clough and then strides along the narrow walkway, jumping lightly into the trench. This is Ruth’s main memory of him; always hurrying, always eager to get on to the next thing. But she knows that he can be patient when it comes to an enquiry. Almost as patient as an archaeologist.

‘Who’s in charge?’ is his first question.

‘Me’, Ruth wants to say, but the foreman bustles forward.

‘Derek Andrews,’ he says, ‘foreman.’

Nelson grunts and looks past him, to where Ruth is standing.

‘Where are the bones?’

‘Here,’ says Ruth. During the wait she, Ted and Trace have exposed more of the bones and she has photographed them, using the measuring pole as a scale. The skeleton is now protruding like a macabre mosaic. Nelson squats down and touches a bone gently with the tip of one finger.

‘Are you sure they’re human?’ he asks.

‘Pretty sure,’ says Ruth. ‘There may be animal bones mixed in there but I think I can see tibia and fibula.’

‘Are you going to take them out?’

‘I want to expose the whole skeleton first,’ she says. ‘Remember what I said on the Roman site, about context?’

Nelson straightens up. ‘How do we know these bones aren’t Roman?’ he says. ‘Or bloody Stone Age, like the other ones.’

‘Iron Age,’ says Ruth, through gritted teeth. ‘We don’t know for sure,’ she continues coolly, ‘but the grave looks fairly recent. See the lines cutting through the strata? I guess the body was buried when the walls were built.’

‘When was that?’ asks Nelson.

‘Well, the house looks Victorian. About a hundred and fifty years ago maybe.’

‘You call that recent?’

‘What was on this site before?’ asks Clough.

‘Children’s home,’ says Nelson briefly. ‘Run by the Sisters of the Sacred Heart.’

Clough gives a sharp intake of breath.

‘What?’ Nelson asks irritably.

‘Well, it was run by nuns, wasn’t it?’ says Clough. ‘And you know what they’re like. This could be some poor kiddie they killed.’

‘No I don’t know what they’re like,’ says Nelson, his face darkening, ‘and you, Sergeant, would do well not to jump to conclusions.’

‘We think there was a medieval churchyard on this site,’ cuts in Ted. ‘That’s why we’re excavating here. County archaeologist insisted we do a dig before the new build goes up.’

‘Edward Spens was furious,’ says Derek Andrews, ‘says you’re costing him thousands of pounds a day.’

‘Well, we’re not being paid thousands,’ says Trace sulkily. ‘Every brickie on site gets paid more than we do.’