Shadows in Scarlet Read online

  “… red jacket with embroidered buttonholes, and wool material in a tartan pattern,” the archaeologist was saying. With a dental pick he lifted a scrap of cloth. The pattern was mottled and dark but discernible—green and blue squares overlaid with a red stripe. “He was not only British but a Highlander.”

  “The 71st Regiment of Foot,” said Carrie, with half a glance at Amanda. “They were at Williamsburg in July of 1781. Some of them were billeted at Melrose.”

  “And this particular officer left his calling card.” Hewitt pointed to several small discs.

  Carrie groped in her purse for her glasses. “Pewter buttons, each with an incised ’71.’ Most obliging of the man. And that’s—a buckle?”

  “From a shoulder belt, I’d say.”

  Carrie and Amanda bumped heads over the buckle. It was crisply cast, a thistle and a crown over a disk engraved with another ’71.’ Along the bottom bar of the buckle ran the words, Nemo me impune lacessit. “The motto on the arms of Scotland,” said Carrie. “‘No one pushes me around and gets away with it,’ more or less.”

  “Or, informally, ‘Wha daur meddle wi’ me.’” Amanda hadn’t been digging around in Scottish history for nothing, although she probably didn’t have the accent right. She pointed to the letters carved along the top bar of the buckle. “And that?”

  “Quicquid aut facere aut pati,” read Hewitt. “The regimental motto.”

  “Something about everyone either performing or suffering,” Carrie translated with a frown of uncertainty. “Between ‘do or die’ and ‘all for one and one for all,’ I guess. I’ll look it up. Oddly enough, Amanda was already researching the 71st Highlanders.”

  Amanda opened her mouth and shut it again—nothing she could say was going to bail her out now. The lackluster sheen of the metal fittings was no way like the subtle shine that had illuminated James Grant’s ghost, but it was bright enough.

  “And this.” Hewitt lifted a long cardboard box from the end of the cabinet and opened it. Inside, on a bed of cotton wool, lay the scabbard. It gleamed a dull gray, its surface pocked with corrosion, its length bent into an obtuse angle. “Thirty-five inches long. Steel, not leather, fortunately, or it wouldn’t be in this good a shape. It was excellent quality in its day. Presumably the sword was, too, but we didn’t find that. It could have been lost or looted in the battle.”

  “A wealthy man, to carry such a weapon… .” Again Carrie glanced at Amanda, and murmured, “Naw.”

  The faint chemical smell of the lab was mingling uneasily with the chocolate in the back of Amanda’s throat. She remembered to breathe through her nose before she started hyperventilating.

  “There’s a badge,” said Hewitt. He pointed to the open end of the scabbard. A bronze ellipse was fixed just below the rim, its surface raised in a design.

  Amanda leaned closer. “It looks like a pyramid with grass growing out of it. Are those words curving over the top, or smoke?”

  “Oh boy.” Carrie took off her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Oh boy. It can’t be …” She put her glasses back on, plucked the magnifying glass from Hewitt’s pocket, and peered intently at the badge.

  Amanda braced herself. Incoming.

  “I looked that up this morning,” said Carrie, slightly strangled. “It’s the crest of clan Grant. A burning mountain—Craigellachie, in Strathspey. The words say ‘Stand Fast.’ Bill, these bones might belong to James Grant.”

  “Not the James Grant,” Hewitt said warily.

  “Yes, the British officer from Melrose Hall. In the miniature portrait reproduced on the front of the brochure. The one Sally Armstrong had a crush on. The one who ran up the stairs with his sword… . Wait a minute. Amanda said there were two Grants in the 71st. This might be the other one. Since they didn’t have rank insignia then, I don’t know.”

  Amanda realized she was biting her lip. She released it.

  “How about this?” Hewitt produced one more cotton-filled box. “A snuffbox. It was in his sporran. That fur pouch there. Probably badger.”

  On the cotton rested a small brass box, its lid a bas-relief of a battlemented building. In the harsh light of the lab Amanda could see every incised stone. Beneath the—the castle—a word was etched in flowing script: Dundreggan.

  Nothing to do now, she informed herself, but take the bullet. A metaphorical bullet. But this was what she wanted, to give the man his name back again. It was what he wanted, wasn’t it?

  Carrie turned, her eyes bulging. “It is him! James Grant of Dundreggan! Jesus, what a coincidence!”

  “James Grant.” Hewitt nodded, slowly, as though rolling his individual brain cells into their proper holes.

  Amanda deflated, sagging backward against the table that held the bones. They stirred behind her, making quick dry rustles on the paper. Cold fingers touched her neck—the draft from the air conditioning duct above her head. Somewhere a door slammed. She repeated, “What a coincidence.” Bless Carrie for saying the words first.

  “It’s circumstantial evidence, but that’s what archaeology is,” said Hewitt. “Odder things have happened. We turned up what might have been Thomas Jefferson’s toothbrush several years ago. The context was right. The content was right. Why not?”

  “The triumph of curiosity over chance?” Amanda suggested.

  Shaking her head, Carrie handed Hewitt his magnifying glass. He turned it thoughtfully in his hand. “Why were you already researching James Grant, Amanda?”

  “Carrie and I were talking about romantic illusions, about the story of James and Sally. Then I knocked over the miniature portrait. It was like he threw himself at me.” She grimaced. That sounded so lame.

  But Carrie was chuckling. “Can’t resist a handsome face, huh?”

  Amanda grabbed the bait. “Or a man in a uniform. Clothing as an indicator of class, that sort of thing. And with the oral tradition at Melrose—I mean, stories are artifacts, too.”

  “True enough,” Hewitt said with a nod.

  Maybe not quite true enough, Amanda thought, but she quit while she was if not ahead, at least not behind.

  “But why was he buried in the garden?” asked Carrie. “The record, what record we have, indicates he died in the battle at Greensprings Farm. He could have been wounded, I guess, and returned to Melrose.”

  “Killed instantly,” Hewitt reminded her. “Maybe he was ambushed by local partisans just before or after the battle. They buried him secretly so his compatriots wouldn’t come looking for revenge.”

  “And the other British assumed he was killed in battle,” offered Amanda. “Seems kind of sloppy to lose an officer like that, though. A peasant, maybe, cannon fodder, but an officer?”

  “A wealthy man,” Carrie added. “Good family connections, no doubt, to secure his commission. Proud enough of his name and his ancestral estates to carry mementos of both around with him. Not the man you’d expect to end up in an obscure, unmarked grave.”

  “We’ll probably never know the truth.” Hewitt lifted his magnifying glass and turned from the badges back to the bones. He peered so intently at them Amanda expected them to disintegrate before his eyes. “If we could find living relatives we might be able to do a DNA test, confirm his identity. Then let them decide what to do with the bones. Carrie, will you ask for Grant’s military records from England, please? Time to move from the forensic evidence to the historiography.”

  “Amanda already has, Bill. I’ll let you know the minute they come in.”

  “Good, good. Very efficient.”

  “Thank you,” Amanda told him, although efficiency had nothing to do with it.

  Carrie put her glasses back into her purse. “This has been absolutely fascinating, Bill, but I have to get back to the library.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Hewitt,” Amanda said. “It’s all just too cool for words.”

  He waved vaguely in their direction. The women showed themselves the door.

  Carrie burbled about Grant and Melrose, probabilit
y and congruence, as they walked across to the library. Amanda didn’t have the chance to respond with more than the odd monosyllable, which suited her just fine.

  “Thanks,” Carrie said outside the door. “That was the best lunch break I’ve had in years. I’ll write up another new spiel for the tourists—properly larded with ‘it is believed’ and ‘the evidence points to’, of course—and bring it with me tomorrow. I hope London answers your query soon. I can’t wait for the next chapter in the Grant saga.”

  “There may never be another chapter,” Amanda pointed out, as much to herself as to Carrie.

  “Curiosity over chance, remember?” Waving, Carrie hurried into the building.

  Amanda unlocked her car, waited a minute while the heat dissipated, and then drove away on automatic pilot, only a tenth of her mind noticing such petty details as traffic lights.

  The rest of her mind rocked and rolled. All right! Hewitt had named James Grant’s bones sooner than she’d dared hope, thanks partly to the tips she herself had given Carrie. But she’d gone way overboard worrying about her supernatural source.

  Why shouldn’t she already be on the trail? She was a grad student in one of the historical disciplines, wasn’t she? If Williamsburg archaeologists could find Jefferson’s toothbrush in a place he was known to have lived, in a stratum dated to the time he’d lived there, then nothing was all that weird about finding Grant’s bones under similar conditions. So they hadn’t been looking for the toothbrush or for the bones. That only legitimized the discovery.

  Still Amanda felt like she’d just gotten away with something underhanded… . Yeah right. Like Hewitt, or Cynthia, or even Carrie would believe the truth. It was Wayne who’d believe her, and that sure wouldn’t help.

  What was really coincidence was that she was the person—the woman—loitering outside the gates of purgatory when they opened far enough for James Grant to slip through. She hadn’t asked for him. While she was interested in his time period, her only interest in psychic woo-woo was the occasional New Age album.

  It was like he threw himself at me. And she hadn’t exactly thrown him back. So what if she was susceptible to a handsome face—or at least to the image of one? She had hormones. She had intellectual curiosity, too. Helping James reclaim his name and his rank—repaying a two hundred-year-old insult—had started her on a great research project. All was well that ended—well, no, she had to get her thesis and its footnotes together. Maybe she could come up with a good reason why James Grant was buried in Sally Armstrong’s back yard.

  Amanda turned into a supermarket parking lot and stopped. Her budget would stretch as far as a basket of blackberries. Native blackberries, in memory of the long-vanished flesh of James Grant. Rest in peace.

  Chapter Six

  Amanda woke up Tuesday morning with the taste of fermented blackberries on her tongue. She gulped down cereal and coffee, then brushed and rinsed. The sting of mint cleaned not only her mouth but the lingering images of her dreams, of rushing anxiously from room to room trying to save the furnishings from battles which raged through the entrance hall and up the staircase.

  She left Lafayette perched regally on the windowsill and strolled through the house, opening the drapes and relishing the last few moments of peace before the invasion began. The cleaning crew had left wooden surfaces gleaming and fabrics crisp and fresh. The odor of potpourri almost masked that of mothballs. From Page’s window Amanda surveyed the manicured green lawns with their golden filigree of marigolds. The shadow of the house stretched away from Sally’s window, reaching nearly to the site of the summerhouse. The archaeological team trooped across the garden carrying the tools of their trade, shovels, trowels, and ice chests. Wayne and Roy advanced from the gate. A distant cloud bank hinted that the clear morning sunshine might be only the calm before a storm.

  Turning, Amanda brushed against the table. The miniature portrait plopped onto its face. She picked it up. No, she couldn’t glue it to the tabletop.

  She’d never again be able to think of James’s handsome face without also thinking of the empty eye sockets of his skull… . Now that was getting way too sentimental.

  Downstairs, Carrie handed out new fact sheets. Taking up his position on the steps, Wayne informed Amanda he was a Page right out of history, get it, get it? The stays protected her ribs from his nudging elbow. She bared her teeth in a laugh and threw herself gratefully on the first school group to appear around the corner.

  Just after noon Cynthia Chancellor and her perfectly coordinated apparel arrived in the front hall. She set a Bloomingdale’s shopping bag next to the sideboard and announced, “Well, Amanda, I hear you’ve been a very clever girl. Imagine guessing the identity of the bones before Bill Hewitt, even!”

  “That isn’t exactly what …” Amanda began.

  Carrie peered through the parlor door. “Oh, good afternoon, Madame. May I be of assistance to you?”

  “Oh no, no, I beat the others out here is all. I get so eager about these things. Melrose is becoming one of the premier historical attractions of the area, no doubt about it.”

  “What others?” Amanda asked.

  “Bill and… . Why, here’s Lucy and Vernon now. Come in, come in.”

  The Benedettos stepped into the house looking like serfs entering the castle, not sure whether they’re going to be pelted with coins or with dung. “Hello, Mrs. Chancellor,” Vernon said, adjusting his tie. “You wanted to see us?”

  “I wanted you to be here as part of the little ceremony I’ve arranged,” Cynthia said, “since you do so much for us here at Melrose Hall.”

  What ceremony? Amanda asked herself. Oh shit, she’d missed something on the schedule.

  A group of tourists surged from the parlor into the entrance hall, Carrie at point. “It has been our pleasure to welcome you to Melrose Hall. Please do us the very great honor of stopping by the gift shop as you return to your carriages.”

  “Where’s the dead body?” a teenager asked.

  “Deceased persons remain in their homes for only a day or so, until the funeral rites can be performed,” Carrie answered. “The bones of the poor wretch consigned to a most unsuitable grave in the garden are now in Williamsburg Town. I could tell you somewhat of …”

  The boy interrupted, “You mean there’s nothing to see?”

  “I very much regret,” Carrie began, to be interrupted again, this time by Cynthia.

  “We’ll be setting up a small display here in the entrance hall in just a few minutes, if you’d like to wait. Outside.”

  Oh. Thanks for telling me. But Amanda had to hand it to Cynthia, the woman eased the tourists out the door and down the steps with the skill of a carnival barker. And the place was starting to resemble a carnival, as another tour group streamed out of the library.

  “If you would do us the very great …” Wayne was saying, and stopped in mid-phrase when he saw his mother.

  “In just a few moments we’ll be setting up a small display about the British officer buried in the garden,” she told the sightseers. “If you’d like to wait outside.”

  The tourists exited. Bill Hewitt, Helen Medina, and several gofers carrying cardboard cartons, light standards, and display panels entered. “Here you are!” trilled Cynthia. “Wayne, run upstairs and bring down the miniature portrait of Captain Grant. Amanda, bring some wineglasses from the dining room—on the silver tray, the one I picked up in the Portobello Road in London. Carrie, help Helen with her lights.”

  Amanda raised an eyebrow at Carrie as she hurried past. Carrie quirked both of hers. The Benedettos retired to a corner. Cynthia shut the front door, closing out the circle of sunburned faces on the top step.

  When Amanda returned with eight crystal glasses, the most she could fit safely on the tray, the exhibit was almost ready. One side of the hall was flooded with light so bright it drained the rich brown of the paneling into ash. In the glare stood the display flats, below the carved and scrolled wooden arch that bisected the hallway
at the foot of the staircase. Laminated maps and sketches filled most of the panels—Amanda recognized them as standard-issue Yorktown Campaign illustrations. Wars looked much tidier, she thought, before the invention of photography.

  Several small photos showed James Grant’s bones both as they emerged in clumps from the ground and lay at parade rest in the lab. Her face carefully neutral, Amanda dodged Helen, who was snapping picture after picture of the assembly process, and set the glasses down on the sideboard.

  Hewitt fixed a long Lucite box to the middle of the right-hand panel. Inside was the scabbard, mounted on thin prongs that made it look like it was floating in mid-air. One of Hewitt’s assistants hung a smaller container on the opposing flat. Amanda craned forward. This box held four bits of brown bone, three no larger than pencil stubs and one considerably smaller. Finger or toe bones, she thought, and a molar. Hewitt was keeping the other ones in the lab until … Until when?

  Until either he ran down some relatives or Cynthia could orchestrate a funeral, all the national news organizations suitably represented, of course.

  “Bill and I decided,” the woman was saying, “that it wouldn’t be in good taste to display an obviously human bone, like a femur or, especially, the skull.”

  “Everyone having seen loose teeth,” Carrie returned, without pointing out that displaying human remains was as much a matter of law as of taste. Scientists weren’t nearly as cavalier with bodies as they used to be.

  “Absolutely. So we chose these little, rather anonymous pieces of bone, and the scabbard, and …” Cynthia indicated a third Lucite box, “… the silver buckle, a button, and the snuffbox. A shame we don’t have the sword. The scabbard is very nice, but it’s got that bend in it, and even with the badge it’s just not as dramatic as a sword would be, is it?”

  Helen shook her head. “Inconsiderate of Captain Grant, not to leave his sword.”

  But he did leave it, thought Amanda. At least, it wasn’t with his ghost.