Birthright

The woman who’d been the catalyst, or the last straw, in the shattering of her marriage to Jake.
    It didn’t matter if Dory had a voice like a sleek, contented cat as long as she did her job.
    “Got another one.” Jake stopped by Callie’s sector, nodded toward the lanky man standing with Digger. “Itinerant, got his own tools. Name’s Matt Kirkendal. Heard about the project, wants to dig. Seems to know his ass from a line level.”
    Callie studied the newest arrival. He had a long braid of streaked gray, worn-down work boots, a tattoo of something that snaked under the sleeve of his T-shirt.
    It looked as if he and Digger were already bonding.
    “Hands are hands,” Callie stated. He appeared strong, she decided, weathered. “Stick him with Digger for a couple of days, see what he’s made of.”
    “That’s my plan.”
    He watched as she ran a string between two nails in preparation for making a record drawing for the vertical slice through the accumulated deposits in her section.
    “Want a hand with that?”
    “I’ve got it. What do you think of the new grad students?”
    “Girl’s easy to look at.” Ignoring the fact that she could, indeed, handle it herself, he attached a tape measure to the nails with clothespins. He caught the look Callie shot him, answered it blandly. “Despite the prim name—Teasdale—she’s not afraid to get her hands dirty, either. The guy—he’s an eager beaver—more eager, I’d say, because he wants to impress you. Sends you longing glances.”
    “He does not.”
    “Serious crush. I know just how he feels.”
    Now she snorted. “A crush is different from wanting to get a woman naked and onto any available flat surface.”
    “Oh. Guess I don’t know how he feels, then.”
    She refused to laugh, and only released the faintest of smiles when Jake walked off.
    T he latest find had also brought more press. Callie gave an interview to a reporter from the Washington Post while she knelt beside the two skeletons, resting her back and shoulders.
    “The adult bones are female,” Callie said. “A female between the ages of twenty and twenty-five.”
    The reporter was female as well, and interested enough to scoot on her haunches a little too close to the bones until Callie impatiently motioned her back.
    “How can you tell the age without lab tests?”
    “If you know anything about bones, and I do, you can judge their age.” Using the tongue depressor, she pointed out the joints, the fusion, the formation. “And see here, this is interesting. There was a break in the humerus. Most likely in mid-childhood. Probably around the age of ten to twelve. It healed, but knit poorly.”
    She ran the tongue depressor lightly over the line of break. “This arm would have been weak, and likely caused her considerable discomfort. The break is reasonably clean, indicating to me it was from a fall rather than a blow. Not a defensive wound as she might have received in a fight. Despite the injury she was in good health, meaning she wasn’t shunned from the tribe. They cared for their sick and injured. That’s illustrated in the way she and her child were buried.”
    “How did she die?”
    “As there are no other injuries, and the remains of thechild indicate newborn, it’s probable she, and the child, died in childbirth. You can see they’re not just buried together. They were arranged here with her holding the child. This indicates compassion, even sentiment. Certainly ceremony. They mattered to someone.”
    “And why should they matter to us?”
    “They were here first. Who they are, what they are made it possible for us to be.”
    “There are some who object to the exhuming and studying of the dead. For religious reasons, or simply because human nature often decrees that those we’ve buried should remain undisturbed. How do you answer that?”
    “You can see the care we take in what we do here. The respect given. They have knowledge,” Callie said, leaning back to brush at dirt. “Human nature also demands, or should, the seeking of knowledge. If we don’t study, we’re not honoring her. We’re ignoring her.”
    “What can you tell me about the curse?”
    “I can tell you this isn’t an episode of The X-Files. Sorry, I’ve got to get back to this. You may want to speak with Dr. Greenbaum.”
    She worked another hour, steadily, silently. As she reached for her camera Jake came over to join her. “What is it?”
    “It looks like a turtle carapace. It’s