Read The Avalon Chanter for Free Online Page B

building.”
    “ It’s possible.”
    “ Out with the old, in with the new.
Genevieve’s feast day is January third.”
    “ Is it now?” asked Alasdair.
    Jean didn’t add that January third was their
wedding anniversary. They had yet to have an anniversary. “So who
do you think was buried here, anyway?”
    “ That’s another long story.”
    “ Yeah. That’s the one I came to hear.
Professor Lauder . . .”
    “ For heaven’s sakes, call me
Maggie.”
    “ Maggie.” Yes, there was something very
intimate about this moment, the two of them kneeling side by side
over a dead body. A lost soul. Perhaps the mouth gaped open in
prayer for release from purgatory. Perhaps it claimed its own
identity. Perhaps it was caught in a nightmare, screaming and
screaming and making no sound.
    Alasdair sank down on Jean’s other
side, his wry glance saying as clearly as words, once an academic, always an academic .
“What’s that?”
    “ What’s what?”
    He retrieved the flashlight and focused it
steadily on the body’s left side. “Either he’s got a third arm, one
laid straight by his side, or that’s some sort of stick.”
    A presence at Jean’s shoulder was either Tara
or Crawford leaning in for a better look.
    Ignoring them, she squinted, trying to
resolve the shape. A baton. A wand. A long, thin, black, pitted and
scabby tubular shape with a flat flared end.
    “ It’s a chanter,” said Maggie. “Made of
wood, likely African blackwood. I saw it earlier. That’s why . .
.”
    “ You’re thinking the body is your
father?” Alasdair asked when she didn’t finish her sentence.
“You’ve got a name for him, then?”
    Maggie didn’t reply. There could be no short
reply to that non sequitur. And Alasdair wasn’t in a position to
interrogate her.
    For I’m a piper to my
trade , Jean thought, managing at the last
second not to vocalize the words. My name
is Rob the Ranter: The lasses loup as they were daft, When I blaw
up my chanter.
    If Maggie thought the man was her father,
that implied her mother had done some out-of-wedlock louping. And
raised more questions than it answered, number one of which was,
why the hell had the man, any man, ended up in this old tomb?
    Someone cleared his throat. Oh,
Crawford. He’d perfected the butler’s discreet ahem . “I’ll mind the scene till Berwick arrives.
Best you be taking Maggie home, Tara. A nice cuppa, that’ll turn
the trick.”
    “ Like a cup of tea is going to fix
anything?” Tara seized her mother’s shoulders and pulled her
upward. “Come on, Mags. It’s past supper time. Granny’ll be
wondering where we are. If she remembers we exist.”
    Maggie’s eyes released the sight of the grave
with an almost audible pop. They gazed from face to half-obscured
face, toward the roof and the far wall with its row of narrow
windows, through the larger window overhead, its broken ribs fading
as the light failed. “Your Granny,” she said. “Mum. Elaine Lauder
that was.” And she began to laugh, a quiet chuckle building toward
hysteria.
    “ Mags!” Tara gave her a little
shake.
    With a hiccup, Maggie caught herself. “Off we
go, then.” Side by side the two women walked away.
    Jean stood up, and only then realized how
cold her legs had become, the chill oozing up from the ancient
stone. Sometimes, she thought, pilgrims desperate for redemption
crawled on their knees toward a sacred site.
    She tottered off after Tara and Maggie, then
paused while Alasdair passed the flashlight over to Crawford.
Passed the torch, both literally and figuratively.
    When he joined her all he said was, “Mind
those trenches.”
    Even with dark-adapted eyes, falling into one
of those trenches was an ever-present risk—you wouldn’t break your
neck, but you’d damage more than your dignity. Minding the
trenches, they left the chapel and the ruined church. Outside a
cold sea breeze was scented delectably with peat smoke and cooking
food. Back there at the edge of the grave Jean