Dying Fall

letter.
Well, Ruth had rung Dan but who had received her call? Nelson said that Dan’s mobile was missing. Is it even now in the hands of his murderer? Who would want to kill an archaeologist working at an obscure university? Could it possibly be linked to Dan’s discovery? It could be big, Dan had said. It could change everything. And now Dan is dead and everything has changed.
    Seeing Nelson always disturbs Ruth anyway. When she saw him today, dark-suited and sombre, walking through the chattering students, she was struck – as she was the first time they met – at how
grown-up
Nelson looked. It wasn’t just the clothes (he had been to an inquest in the morning, hence the black tie), there was something in his face, in his whole demeanour, that set him apart. Ruth’s students might be post-graduates but they still looked like teenagers, with long hair and keen expressions. Nelson, striding over the grass, frowning, not looking right or left, looked grim and uncompromising, even slightly dangerous. Ruth wishes, more than anything in the world, that she wasn’t still attracted to him.
    As she turns into the King’s Lynn road she vows, as she has done many times before, to put Nelson behind her. They have a child together, they will always be linked, but Nelson is happily married and Ruth is in a relationship with Max. But what is that relationship? ‘I can’treally call him your boyfriend, can I?’ said her mother, archly, when she first found out about the affair (not through any fault of Ruth’s; her brother had snitched). Someone at work referred to him the other day as ‘your partner’, which seemed far too official.
    Max lives in Brighton, Ruth sees him perhaps twice a month and they do coupleish things together; they take Kate to the park, they go to the cinema, they eat take-aways in front of
Doctor Who
. And they sleep together. If it wasn’t for the sex, Ruth would say they were just good friends. And they
are
friends. They get on really well, they’re both archaeologists, they share a similar sense of humour and have both been through rather a lot, one way or another. They never argue and are always considerate of each other’s feelings. And that’s just it. Nelson is hardly ever considerate and he and Ruth argue all the time, but the two nights they spent together are etched on Ruth’s soul and she can’t erase them, however hard she tries. Much as she disapproves of Nelson, fiercely as she sometimes hates him, there is something slightly wrong with any man who isn’t him.
    Sandra greets her with a smile, cutting off Ruth’s apologies with a tolerant ‘Doesn’t matter, love’. And Kate doesn’t seem worried; she has been playing in the paddling pool with Sandra’s other two charges, but by the time Ruth arrives Kate is dry and dressed and eating an irreproachably healthy snack of raisins and apple chunks. Sandra is an excellent childminder; Ruth is lucky to have her. And if she sometimes wishes that Sandrawasn’t so bloody good at all the kid stuff, that just shows how unreasonable she has become. She needs a holiday.
    Ruth sings all the way home. She needs to keep Kate awake so that she’ll go to sleep at bedtime. Ruth keeps looking in the mirror and, as soon as Kate’s head droops, she launches into another manic chorus of ‘The wheels on the bus’. Meanwhile her thoughts, like the bus’s wheels, go round and round. Was Dan murdered? Why? Is Cathbad the father of Judy’s baby? Is he still in love with her? Why did Nelson come to the dig when he could easily have telephoned? Who is the Raven King and how is he linked to Dan’s death?
    At home she checks her answerphone and is relieved there are no messages. No one else is dead then. She switches on her laptop and finds the usual stream of mail from the department, and from Amazon hoping to interest her in any book with ‘stone’ in the title. She is in the middle of deleting when a new sender catches her eye. University Pals, it’s called. Thinking of Dan and of Caz, she clicks on the message. ‘Hi Ruth,’ runs the cheery salutation, ‘want to catch up with your old mates from uni? Join our website and hear about your old chums from University College London, Archaeology 89 . One click and the years will roll away.’
    Ruth has been thinking so much about UCL recently that she almost clicks on the link. Then she hesitates. More than most people, she knows the dangerous lure of the past. When, two years ago, her