The Janus Stone

The site is still deserted. Ruth had half expected to see Irish Ted and Trace. There is still some work to do back-filling trenches, though maybe they have decided not to bother in view of the fact that the house is shortly to be razed to the ground. Ruth collects the finds from the foreman’s hut. No sign of him either, thank goodness. She looks across at the arch silhouetted against the blue sky. Omnia Mutantur, Nihil Interit. She must remember to ask Nelson to check when the arch was built. It seems a strange, grandiose thing to find in a private house. Ruth is reminded of Roman generals being granted triumphal arches when they achieved great victories. She thinks of a trip she and Shona took to Rome a few years ago. The arch of Titus in the Roman forum, decorated with reliefs illustrating Titus’s victory against the rebellious Jews. She remembers reading that it is meant to be impossible for a Jew to pass through the arch. ‘I can do it,’ Shona had exclaimed, running laughing underneath. ‘You’re not Jewish,’ Ruth had objected. But Shona had been in the midst of an affair with a Jewish law lecturer and considered that this counted.

She should have another look at the trench where the cat was found but something makes her wary about going into the grounds, so far away from the main road. There is something heavy, something watchful, about the silence. Don’t be silly, she tells herself, it’s broad daylight. What can possibly hurt you? She shoulders her backpack and picks her way through the rubble, past the outhouses and into what was once the back garden. Was this ever the happy place that Kevin Davies remembers? Ruth tries to imagine children running laughing through the garden, swinging on the tree, throwing pennies in the wishing well. No, the well was covered up by then. She approaches the well now and looks inside. A dank, unpleasant smell meets her and she straightens up hastily. When was the well covered? That’s another question for Nelson. The skulls must have been put in the well before the concrete cap was put in place. Skulls in a well. The words have a crazy, topsy-turvy sound, like a nightmare nursery rhyme. She thinks of the children on the beach. Ding Dong Dell.

The cat’s trench is by the outer wall, bulging now with age. This is the boundary. Terminus, the God of boundaries. ‘I pray to him whenever I go to Heathrow,’ Nelson had said when he heard the name. She can’t imagine Nelson on holiday somehow. She is sure that Michelle insists on somewhere sun-kissed and glamorous whereas Nelson is more suited to wilder, colder places – the Yorkshire moors, perhaps, or the Scottish Highlands. She can just picture him up to his waist in some freezing loch.

Ruth stands up, easing her back. It is really hot now and the air is still. She climbs out of the trench and walks along by the outer wall. The new buildings are obviously going to come up right to the edge of the boundary. So much for spacious apartments. The modern walls look brash and confident against the crumbling flint of the originals. There are still some apple trees here though, and, in the far corner of the site, Ruth finds gooseberry and redcurrant bushes choked with thistles and dusty with builder’s dirt. Blackberries too, the brambles reaching out like tiny, spiteful fingers. The flowers haven’t set yet and, by the time they are berries, these bushes will have been ripped out to make room for ‘spacious landscaped gardens with water features’.

‘Blackberry and apple pie,’ says a voice, ‘now there’s a dish fit for a king.’

Ruth wheels round. An elderly man in a dark suit is standing smiling at her. He has an unripe apple in his hand and, for one mad moment, Ruth thinks of Adam in the Garden of Eden. An older, sadder Adam come to mourn the devastation of paradise. Then she sees the clerical collar and her brain clicks into gear.

‘Father Hennessey?’

‘Yes.’ The man holds out his hand. ‘You have the advantage of me, I’m afraid.’

‘Ruth Galloway. I’m an archaeologist.’

‘An archaeologist?’

‘I specialise in forensics.’

‘Ah,’ says Hennessey, understanding. ‘You’re involved in this sorry affair then.’

‘Yes.’

Father Hennessey sighs. From Nelson’s description, Ruth imagined that he would be a more aggressive presence, like one of the fire and brimstone preachers she remembers from her childhood. This man just looks sad.

‘The building work’s more advanced than I thought it would be,’ he says. ‘How on earth have they managed to cram so much onto one site?’

‘By making everything extremely small,’ says Ruth drily. ‘The whole of one of these flats could probably fit into the drawing room of the original house.’

‘You’re right there,’ says Hennessey, ‘this was a grand house once.’