Artifact by Gigi Pandian

Author:Gigi Pandian
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: book club picks;Henery Press;cozy mystery series;women sleuths;amateur sleuths;beach reads
Publisher: Henery Press Publishing
Published: 2018-12-11T18:13:14+00:00

Chapter 25

Knox sat with his head bowed over his drink at the bar as I joined the others.

Douglas Black emerged from behind the bar carrying hot plates of food. He served Fergus and Angus first, showing the proper respect for the old regulars, then came back with plates for the rest of us. When a steaming plate of meat pie with a side of carrots and buttery baked potatoes was set down in front of me, I found I was even hungrier than I thought.

Malcolm called over to Knox, “There’s room here at the other end of the table.”

“Ta,” Knox replied. “I’m all right.”

“Cheers, everyone,” Malcolm said, raising his glass.

I poured more than a generous serving of both brown sauce and vinegar onto my potato. Malcolm was too polite to comment. Fiona wrinkled her nose.

“I was explaining,” Malcolm said between bites of food, “that we’re short-staffed this summer. I wasn’t able to acquire as much of a grant as this work deserves. My theories aren’t what you’d call mainstream. Locating this site through the discovery of a first stone wasn’t enough. I have some detractors in high places.”

“He thinks the Picts weren’t Celts,” Lane said, as if this was supposed to mean something to me.

“But the debate is far from settled!” Malcolm’s eyes grew wide as he spoke.

Derwin nodded along with him, his Adam’s apple bulging alarmingly. No wonder the locals were creeped out by this group.

“You two are acquainted with the mysterious Picts?” Malcolm asked.

“The professor is being sarcastic,” Derwin said. “The Picts—or ‘picti,’ the painted people, as the Romans described them—aren’t mysterious at all. Not in the most commonly used form of the word. Not like the Druids.”

He laughed at his own joke. At least I think it was a joke.

“The mystery,” he said, ignoring his food, “is because we haven’t yet come to understand their system of communication.”

“Much of the history of the region hasn’t yet been pieced together,” Malcolm said. “In the ninth century, Kenneth MacAlpine united the Picts and the Scots to form Scotland, but before that the details of the Picts have been harder to piece together based on lack of written records. All we have is the stones. But so far, they’ve defied deciphering.”

“Conventional wisdom,” said Derwin, “has the Picts as Celtic peoples, but there isn’t any conclusive evidence to support that claim. It’s purely backwards reasoning: ‘The Picts put Celtic crosses on their stones once they were converted to Christianity in the fifth century, ergo they were originally Celts’.”

I smiled at Derwin. Maybe he was my kind of scholar after all.

“Malcolm already has some evidence to support his theory,” Fiona said, startling Derwin. Her translucent eyes were ghostly in the firelight, commanding the attention of the group.

“The Picts had a matrilineal society,” she said. “The familial line was passed down from the mother instead of the father. But there’s still not nearly enough known to be able to say much.”

Malcolm looked at her fondly. “That’s why discovering more stones is so important,” he said.

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