The Trespass Page 7

  “Churchill?” Sara’s eyes reflected the light Dracup was searching for. He could almost hear the penny drop.

  “Yes! Churchill!” Dracup shouted. “Reeves-Churchill. Theodore’s colleague on the expeditions. He’s still alive!”

  Chapter 7

  The time is now, Ruth told herself. He will listen. She hesitated and then heard herself speak, surprised at how calm she sounded. “Forget this Professor Dracup,” Ruth told Kadesh. “He cannot harm us.”

  “He has already harmed us. Harmed me.”

  Ruth pressed on, heedless of the risk she was taking. He was grieving, but she had to know. She had chosen the time carefully. They were resting, breaking their long journey in the anonymity of the French countryside. Kadesh was quiet, thoughtful; pondering his next move. In this mood he was approachable. “It was not the Englishman’s doing,” she appealed. “It was his father’s father. He was the one who transgressed.”

  Kadesh drew himself up to his full height and Ruth shrank before him. He towered above her, though she herself was tall – like all her kind; her ancestry had fashioned her that way.

  Kadesh glowered and then seemed to check himself. “The Englishman has taken a life; my brother’s life. He must reap the consequences. And the law must be fulfilled.”

  Ruth changed tack. If she acknowledged his success, then surely he would reconsider. “You have completed your mission. Our treasure will be restored to its rightful place. Surely there is nothing to be gained –”

  Kadesh held up his hand in a dismissive gesture. “Gained? There is much to be gained. Justice will be done. And then I will be satisfied.”

  “What will you do with the girl?” Ruth asked. “She cannot be any use to you.”

  “We shall see.”

  “Have compassion on the child, Kadesh. She is innocent.”

  “No one is innocent in the sight of God.” Kadesh motioned to Natasha. She was playing with a doll that he had found for her. Perhaps, Ruth hoped, this was a sign of some latent paternal instinct. They could hear the girl chattering quietly to the doll in her make-believe.

  “And when it is finished,” Ruth asked, “will you allow him to keep what he has taken?” She held her breath, terrified at her boldness. He knew what she meant; she could see it in his eyes.

  “Water will find its own level. Like must cleave to like.” He fixed her with his dark, hooded eyes. “It has always been so.”

  “Yes,” Ruth replied, “we must follow the pattern established for us. We must be in His will.” She held out her hands in supplication. Was his heart so distracted?

  “Do not lecture me, woman.” Kadesh turned away, presenting his back. “Leave me. My heart is sorrowful.”

  “Tarshish was a good man. I – I am sorry.” Ruth knew the conversation was over. She made her way back to where Natasha lay, chattering to the dolly. When she saw Ruth approach she looked up, fearful, then relaxed and held the doll up for inspection. “Look, she has a little light inside.”

  “That’s pretty, isn’t it? Better not touch her there.” Ruth moved the child’s fingers away from the tiny pulsing red light just visible beneath the doll’s dress and stroked Natasha’s dark curls, wondering at a child’s capacity to accept the inevitable, to adapt to changing circumstances. If only she could find it in herself to follow the child’s example.

  Chapter 8

  The nursing home was, contrary to Dracup’s expectations, set in well-kept grounds in a pleasant suburb of the city. The drive was flanked by a row of stately elms, fading to yellow and red as the chlorophyll lost its potency and little by little relinquished its task of nourishing the leaves; soon the earth would reclaim them and the cycle would begin afresh.

  Dracup parked the car and gave Sara a strained smile. He hoped it was the same Churchill and that he was not about to make a fool of himself. Throughout the night he had slept little, tossing and turning, images of Natasha flitting in and out of his exhausted mind. He finally gave up at six and, bleary eyed, decided to tackle the remainder of the desk contents in the front room. At least when he was occupied he felt less vulnerable, less hopeless.

  “Will Farrell be all right at the flat?” Sara asked as they crunched their way up the gravel drive.

  Dracup knew what she meant. Farrell could take the opportunity to do a little research of his own in their absence. It was clear to Dracup that Potzner’s focus was Red Earth; Natasha’s predicament held little interest for him. And if the CIA were a step ahead and decided to act...He dared not predict what the result would be. Dracup realized that, to Potzner, Natasha was expendable. Compared to his precious research project she was way down the list of priorities. And that meant Dracup needed to guard any information carefully – to work with Potzner until a point had been reached where he had enough to go on without him. Dracup wondered when – if – that point would ever arrive. He took a deep breath and replied. “Yes. I think so. I get the impression he’s not fully signed up to the Potzner agenda.”

  “Me too. Maybe that’s a good thing.”

  “We’ll see. Let’s hope I’m right about Churchill.”

  They rang the ancient pull-down bell and were greeted by a cheery-faced woman in uniform. “Good morning! You’ll be for Mr Churchill?” They followed her into the reception area where Dracup was immediately struck by the smell, a heady mixture of cabbage, sweat and micturition that floated down the centrally-heated corridors and caused Sara to wrinkle her nose. “It’s very warm in here.” She gave a small cough and grimaced at Dracup.

  “Circulation breaks down as you get older. You feel the cold more,” Dracup whispered.

  “Just along here,” the care assistant told them. “I should warn you that Mr Churchill is a wee bit – wandery. He’s a hundred and five, you know, so he’s doing amazingly well.”

  “He certainly is,” Dracup agreed. “But I wonder, can you tell me before I meet Mr Churchill – does he have another part to his name? I mean the first part of a double-barrelled name?”

  She put a finger to her mouth. “Now, let’s see, Oh yes – Reeves. Reeves-Churchill. But we call him by his first name – George.”

  Dracup’s heart missed a beat and he exchanged a glance with Sara. “Thank you.”

  “We have a church service at ten o’clock for the residents. You’re very welcome to join us if you like. Can I get you a coffee?”

  “That’s very kind,” Sara said. “Coffee would be fine. And we’d be delighted to attend the service.”

  “We would?” Dracup stage-whispered. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been in a church, let alone a service.

  “You’ll get more out of Churchill if you spend some time with him. Integrate with what he’s doing. Believe me, I’ve dealt with elderly people before.” Sara widened her eyes.

  Dracup knew that look. It meant: I’m right on this. Just do it, and no arguing.

  They were ushered into a long room where between fifteen and twenty residents were sitting in quiet expectation. A few looked up when they entered, but most simply stared into the distance or into their laps. No one was reading or engaged in any activity as far as Dracup could see. The care assistant led them over to the far end of the room where an old man was sitting, or rather propped, in a wheelchair. There was a dark green blanket spread over his knees and a faraway look in his eyes. His hair was white and thin, spread across his head in some cursory third-party attempt at style, while his arthritic hands firmly grasped the arms of the wheelchair as if their owner feared that the chair might tear off unexpectedly on some wild, unbidden ride. The silver head bobbed and smiled. A milky cup of tea lay untouched on the table beside him. The room was even hotter than the reception area and corridors through which they had passed, and the smell in the confined space of the lounge was overpowering. Dracup wondered how they could stand it.

  “Two visitors to see you, George.” The care assistant bent down to Churchill’s level and spoke loudly into his ear. “He won’t hear you unless you talk
to this side,” she told Dracup.

  Dracup bent awkwardly, then squatted down on his haunches.

  “Wait, I’ll get two chairs,” the care assistant said. She bustled off to some other room.

  Dracup cleared his throat and spoke into the old man’s ear. “Mr Churchill? My name is Simon Dracup. You knew my aunt, Mrs Hunter. She used to visit you.”

  The old man nodded and smiled. Dracup looked at Sara for help. He tried again. “Mrs Jean Hunter. Her father was a friend of yours – Theodore Dracup, my grandfather.”

  Churchill looked at them blankly. The assistant returned with two chairs. “Give him a wee while. He’ll need to get used to you.” She smiled and went off to attend to another resident’s request. He heard her voice in the background, reassuring and cajoling as she handed out hymn books.

  Sara leaned in close. “I’ll have a word.”

  Dracup pushed his chair back. Why not? This is going nowhere...

  “George. Do you like to sing?” Sara asked the old man.

  Dracup raised his eyebrows. But then, to his surprise, Churchill began to sing in a high quavering voice:

  “Oh! How I hate to get up in the morning,

  Oh! How I’d love to remain in bed…”

  Sara smiled and patted Churchill’s arm. “You sing well, George.”

  Churchill smiled a toothless smile at Dracup and winked. “We all sang it. In the war, y’know. Ta ta tum, tum tat um. You’ve got to get up; you’ve got to get up. You’ve got to get up this morning!”

  The care assistant appeared again. “Sorry to interrupt. This is Joan Mayfield, the matron.” Dracup turned to see a trim lady in blue uniform smiling down at the group.

  “Mr Dracup. How kind of you to come. Now then, George –” she raised her voice to an appropriate level for Churchill’s benefit. “What’s all this? We’ve already got you up this morning.” She smiled again and gave Churchill’s arm a light squeeze. “He’s a lovely old chap. He will miss Mrs Hunter’s visits.” She turned to Dracup. “I’m so sorry about your aunt. It’s very good of you to let me know.”

  “Oh! how I hate to get up in the morning!” Churchill sang.

  “Yes, George, we know,” the matron laughed softly, “but you should save your voice for the hymns. You’ll know them all, I’m sure.”

  “Very tall, in the hall!” Churchill pronounced.

  “I’m sorry – he does fly off on his fancies from time to time,” Mrs Mayfield said. “But he’s surprisingly lucid when he’s in the mood, aren’t you, George?”

  “Time and again, time and again,” Churchill sang in a thin, reedy voice.

  Dracup leaned in to ask another question, but Sara motioned him to silence.

  “What was that, George?” she asked the old man.

  “In time, you’ll find it – time in the hole.”

  Dracup stiffened. Was this just coincidental rambling, or perhaps –?

  “Dracup, Dracup.” Churchill leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. “Theodore Dracup –”

  Dracup’s heart lurched. “That’s it, George. My grandfather. Your friend. Theodore.” He held his breath but the old man seemed to have gone somewhere else in his mind. He lay back in the wheelchair, smiling, eyelids fluttering. Dracup swallowed and bit his bottom lip in frustration. Sara signalled patience.

  “A shame, shame. What they did. Lali, lali. We found it –” Churchill’s eyes shot open and he leaned forward. The vacant look on his face had been replaced with one of urgency. “You’re a Dracup? Well, yes, you look a bit like him –”

  Dracup moved back in alarm. The change in Churchill was disconcerting. “I’m Theodore’s grandson, George. But I don’t understand what you mean.” He looked around but the matron and care assistant had left them to it. Mrs Mayfield was talking to a newcomer, a young man with cropped hair, dressed in black with a starched white collar. The service was about to begin. “I need to know where, George – Theodore needs to know,” he added desperately. “Where did you find it?”

  “He’s left it for you, he told me. In time you’ll find it.” Churchill fell back, exhausted.

  The care assistant was at Dracup’s elbow. “I think he’s had enough for the moment. He’ll fall asleep during the service, you’ll see. Pull your chairs round and you can sit with him.”

  Dracup heard little of the service. The words of the hymns floated around him, rising and falling in the fragile pitch of tired, worn voices. His mind was racing. There was something left, some residue of experience in Churchill’s mind. Somewhere in that frail cranium lay the secrets that could save his daughter. But how to access them? Dracup racked his own brains, playing with keywords that might help the old man remember. He realized that the service had ended only when a portly female care assistant came in with a tea trolley, causing the young minister to conclude his closing prayer with, it seemed to Dracup, irreverent abruptness.

  “Tea time all. What’ll it be, Doreen?” She began to move around the room taking orders.

  Dracup turned to Sara. “You try. You seem to have the touch.”

  Churchill had his eyes closed again but the muscles in his thin face worked beneath the yellowed, parchment-like skin.

  “Come on, George,” Sara said, cheerily. “We have to go soon. Tell me about Dracup. About what he wrote in his diary.”

  “Diary? All the time he wrote. Did some drawing for me.”

  “That’s it, George.” Dracup felt a glimmer of hope. “Fascinating drawings. And he wrote in cuneiform. Do you remember?”

  “Best that way,” Churchill muttered as if to himself. “Can’t tell anyone.”

  “You can tell us, George,” Sara replied softly. “Mr Dracup is family.”

  Churchill looked up and studied Sara intently. Dracup felt as if some spark of recognition had ignited briefly, then been extinguished. “Are you?” Churchill said quietly. “I don’t know you. You look like one of them.”

  Dracup’s patience was nearing its end. “What does it mean, George? ‘In time you will find the whole.’ It’s very important. A matter of life and death. My daughter – Theodore’s great grand-daughter –”

  Churchill threw back his head and laughed, a harsh cracking sound. Some of the residents turned around and stared in alarm. “Life and death. Yes. From the beginning. And they want to change it.” He put a scrawny arm out and grabbed Dracup’s wrist. “Be careful. It’s not for us to change.”

  Dracup shook his head in bewilderment. Great, more riddles. That’s all we need.

  “Reverend Burton is leaving now,” Mrs Mayfield announced from the centre of the room. “One last hymn before he goes?” She beamed at the assembled ranks. “What’s that, Maisie? All things bright and … yes, number 243 on your hymn sheets.”

  “This is going nowhere,” Dracup said to Sara, who returned a brief, sympathetic smile.

  “You’re right. It might be worth coming back later. He’s too distracted – too much going on.” Sara patted Churchill on the shoulder. “Cheerio, old fellow. We’ll pop in another time.”

  Dracup looked back as they made a tactful departure. Churchill was sitting erect in the chair. He grinned as he sang: “The ripe fruits in the garden, He made them every one...”

  And then Churchill did something strange. He held up his arm and waved it slowly from side to side. The chorus finished and Dracup heard him singing in a high falsetto: “Tick tock tick tock – in the forest it’s seven past seven o’clock.”

  “All right, George,” the matron said. “Never mind that. Last verse – here we are...”

  “He gave us eyes to see them and lips that we might tell...”

  Dracup felt a cold thrill run through his body. Churchill grinned back and sang on.

  “All things wise and wonderful, The Lord God made them all.”

  The chorus receded into the background as they found their way along the corridors to the front entrance. Dracup gripped Sara’s arm as they exited into the cold, clear air of the car park, their brea
th leaving white trails behind them.

  She looked at him in astonishment. “What? What is it?”

  “The clock. Don’t you see? That’s what he was telling us. In the forest it’s seven past seven o’clock he sang. Remember Theodore’s message? In time you will find the whole?” Dracup dragged Sara to the car. “Come on. Quickly. Whatever my grandfather intended to be found, it’s in the clock at Forest Avenue.”

  Chapter 9

  “Okay, come on. Let’s have it,” Potzner yelled, preempting the knock at his office door. Several lab-coated individuals burst into the room, preceded by a slight, bespectacled character Potzner knew as Mike Fish, head of the Forensic Paleontology group.

  “Jim. We have a translation for you.” Fish removed his glasses and held up a red folder. “But I don’t think you’re going to thank us for it.” He smiled apologetically.

  “Try me.”

  “Right.” Fish drew out a sheaf of paper. The other team members shuffled nervously. One of them dropped a biro.

  “In your own time…”

  Fish glanced up and cleared his throat. “Okay. It’s a split message, we think. I mean, we think that around half of the text is missing – there are some connective words that just, well, finish right where they are. Could be that whoever sketched the diagram left out some of the lines. Anyhow, it’s definitely cuneiform script, of the style we’d expect to find in or around the Babylonian environs circa 4000 BC.”

  “And?”

  “This is what we’ve got.” He smiled apologetically. “It doesn’t make a lot of sense.”

  “Just spit it out, Fish, will you?” Potzner shoved his chair back and stood up. Fish’s colleagues shrank towards the door.

  “Right. Here we go. It’s very exciting. The use of cuneiform is normally restricted to tablets – writing tablets I mean – and pottery and so on. Soft imprints. It’s pretty uncommon having an inscription like this on metalwork. The diarist tells us that the composition of the object is silver, with gold inlay.” Fish brushed a stray strand of hair out of his eyes. He was thinning on top and employed a version of the oddly popular comb-over technique, which was, in Potzner’s view, the worst form of denial.