‘Careful,’ I said. ‘Round here by the wall. A bit more to your left. Yes, that’s it, there.’
‘So here we are … Maurice, don’t you feel a frightful sense that one’s about to do something one really wasn’t meant to do? Oh, I know this Christianity thing’s pretty well on its last legs these days, but surely there’s a kind of basic thing about not interfering with last resting-places and all that, you know, superstition and primitive fear and the rest of it. Do you honestly think it’s worth it?’
‘That remains to be seen. Hold the torch steady. The next part is going to be totally boring.’
I was understating it. Even a dry, sandy soil yields very slowly to the spade, and it must have been an hour at least before, soaked with sweat and unsteady on my feet, I had uncovered most of the top of the long oaken box I was after. Diana had behaved very creditably in the interval, taking time and trouble to wedge the torch into a crevice in the wall, initiating no discussions, hurrying to shield the light whenever a car approached on the road, falling asleep once for ten or fifteen minutes. She was awake when I finished digging and held the torch again—the reserve one, the battery of the first having given out—while I got going with the hammer and chisel. I had the latter muffled with sacking, but the noise was still considerable in the silence. However, that silence was otherwise unbroken by now, we were a hundred and fifty yards at least from the nearest houses, which were all in darkness, and a dozen taps and some creaking while I levered away were as much as was unavoidable.
When I opened the coffin, there was an odour of dry earth and of what I can only describe as powerful clean sheets; nothing in the least disagreeable. I took the torch from Diana, who bent closer while I ran its beam up and down. Underhill was totally and securely wrapped in linen, rather flattened about the abdomen and below, with the sharpness of bone showing through at knees and feet. At first I saw nothing but all this, then caught a gleam of dull metal at the end by the head. My fingers closed on something and I pulled it out and shone the torch on to it. What I held was a rough leaden casket, rectangular, about the size of a box of fifty cigarettes or a little thicker through. There was a lid, but the metal of this had been crudely fused with that of the casket itself, the whole forming a serviceable damp-proof container. I shook it and it rattled in a muffled, impeded way. I thought I knew what was rattling and what was impeding.
‘Is that all?’ asked Diana.
I shone the torch up and down and across. ‘This was all I expected there to be here. I’ll unwrap him if you like, but I don’t—’
‘No. Never mind. Let’s get the lid on again.’
This too took a long time, and so did shovelling the earth back into an approximation of where it had been. It would obviously be years before the signs of interference ceased to be noticeable, but I could not imagine the Fareham constable, a chubby young man who spent as much time as was relevant at Newmarket races and the rest of the time talking about these and such matters, in the role of inquirer into the possible despoliation of some old bugger’s grave from way back.
‘Well, that’s it,’ I said.
‘Aren’t you going to open that thing you found?’
I considered. As I moved the earth and roughly levelled it off, I had been thinking of almost nothing beyond the prospect of opening the casket, but had visualized total seclusion. On the other hand, after something like two hours of unstinted and largely silent co-operation, Diana was entitled to some return, or at least would be expecting it. Fair enough. And yet, if I really was right about the thing that had rattled … But the possibility of antagonizing Diana at this stage…
I found the hammer and the chisel. ‘Yes. Why not?’
In a couple of minutes I had made enough impression along the line of the original lid to prise the soft metal out of the way. I up-ended the casket and a small object fell into the palm of my hand. It was intensely cold, so much colder than the lead of its container that I nearly dropped it. Diana shone the torch. There it was, just as described; a silver figure about three inches tall and half that from one extended hand to where the other had been, with a smile of sorts on its face. I am no judge of silver, but I knew that the thing was much more than three hundred years old.
‘What an ugly little creature,’ said Diana. ‘What is it? Do you think it’s valuable? It’s only silver, isn’t it?’
I hardly heard her. Here was Underhill’s proof. If I had thought to show what I had found this morning in my office notebook, to Nick or anyone else, before starting on tonight’s expedition, I would now have had something to show the world—something, but not a proof, perhaps a case of extrasensory perception, perhaps just a curious coincidence, an interesting story, an oddity. It was a proof only for me, and even I could not have said how much it really proved. Not yet, at least; but I felt a kind of hope I had never felt before.
‘Maurice? Is it a charm or something? What do you think it is?’
‘I don’t know. I must try to find out. Hold on a minute.’
The expected sheets of paper could be seen inside the casket. I drew them out and unfolded them. They too were cold to the touch, but whether owing to true cold or to damp I did not know or care. The handwriting, the first words were enough, but for a few moments I read mechanically on.
‘AVE, O MI AMICE SAPIENTISSIME. As thou see’est, thou hast understood mee aright. Count thyself the most fortunate of mankind, for shortly the veritable Secret of Life shall be reveal’d to thee. But mark curiously what follows, & thou shalt possess what is more durable than Riches, more to be envy’d than a Crown…’
‘What does it say? Anything about this charm thing?’
‘Not that I can see. Most of it’s in Latin. Legal stuff, probably. I’ll have a go at sorting it out some time.’
Well, I had been right about the papers too, but there was nothing supernatural in that. I folded them up again, slipped then and the silver figure back where they had been and managed to fit the casket into the side pocket of my dinner-jacket. Then I started picking up the tools.
‘Is that the lot? Not much of a show, was it?’
‘Oh, we did find something, didn’t we? Not too bad.’
‘I don’t call that treasure.’
‘That thing may be worth a bit, we don’t know. I’ll find somebody in Cambridge who’ll tell us.’
‘Where are you going to say you got it from?’
‘Leave that to me.’
As we were leaving by the churchyard gate, a gust of wind, unexpected on such a still night, stirred the branches and leaves above our heads. I must have sweated even more than I had thought, because the air struck chill. At the same moment, the light of the torch in Diana’s hand dimmed abruptly. We made our way back to the Volkswagen by almost unassisted moonlight. Down the empty road, the Green Man was in complete darkness, and there was no sound but that of our own progress until I opened the back door of the car and stowed the tools. Diana, a shifting, breathing shape, faintly illuminated at temple, shoulder and elbow, turned to me.
‘Where does Joyce imagine you are tonight?’ she asked, with something of her husband’s accusatory tone.
‘If she happened to wake up, which she never does, she’d think I was sitting up reading or drinking or brooding. But listen, I asked her about our little get-together idea and she was all for it. Any time to suit us.’
Diana reacted to this, but for a couple of seconds I could not have said how. Then she came forward, pressed herself against me and began a steady to-and-fro wriggle.
‘Maurice.’
‘Yes?’
‘Maurice, do you think I might be the most terrible sort of kinky pervert type without knowing it?’