‘It’s hard to know which would have been worse,’ Jack said thoughtfully. ‘Suffocated in superheated gas at Pompeii, or incinerated alive at Herculaneum.’
‘Come live by the sunny Bay of Naples,’ Costas murmured. ‘Today, all that happens is you get mugged or run over.’
‘Don’t speak too soon,’ Jack said. ‘Remember that picture of the 1944 eruption? The seismologists have been talking doom and gloom for decades now, and the earthquakes are pretty ominous.’
Costas shaded his eyes and squinted at the summit of the volcano, where the sunlight was beginning to radiate off the barren upper slopes. ‘Pliny was here? The elder one, I mean. In Herculaneum?’
‘According to his nephew, he took one look at the eruption and hared off in a warship towards the volcano, this side of the bay, under the mountain. It was supposedly a heroic mission to rescue a woman.’
‘The undoing of many a great man,’ Costas sighed.
‘It was hopeless. By the time he got here the shore was blocked with debris, floating pumice like sea ice. But instead of returning, he got his galley to row south to Stabiae, another town beyond Pompeii directly under the ash fallout. He stayed too long and was overcome by the fumes.’
‘Sounds like a Shakespearean love tragedy. Maybe he was really overcome by grief.’
‘I don’t think so,’ Jack said. ‘Not Pliny. Once he saw his girlfriend was doomed, he would have been on to something else. What he really wanted was to get close to the eruption. I can see him, notebook in hand, sniffing and identifying the sulphur, collecting pumice samples along the shoreline. At least he’d finished his Natural History.’
‘What with all that multi-tasking, he was probably heading for a burnout anyway.’
Jack rolled his eyes, then caught sight of two figures making their way down the entry ramp into the site, a woman and a man. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘It looks like we’re moving at last.’ He pushed off from the railing, and ruffled his hair. Maria was wearing desert boots, khaki combat trousers and a grey T-shirt, and her long black hair was tied back. She had a well-honed, lean physique, and the look suited her. Maurice Hiebermeyer was several paces behind her, a cell phone clamped to his ear, and cut a somewhat less svelte figure. He was slightly shorter than Maria, considerably overweight, and was wearing a curious assortment of safari gear over a pair of scuffed leather dress shoes. He was red faced and flustered, constantly pushing his little round glasses up his nose as he spoke into the phone. His shorts reached well below his knees and seemed perilously close to half-mast, almost miraculously free-floating.
‘Don’t say anything,’ Jack muttered to Costas. ‘Anything at all.’ He fought to keep a straight face, and glanced at Costas. ‘Anyway, you can smirk. When was the last time you looked in a mirror? You look like you’ve just walked out of six months in a submarine.’
Hiebermeyer halted before reaching them, gesturing at the phone and turning his back on them, while Maria walked up and embraced them both. Jack closed his eyes as she pressed against him. He had missed seeing her, hearing her sonorous voice, her accent. It had been an intensive time together during the search for the menorah, and Jack had gone through the usual moments of emptiness when the expedition was over. Above all he wanted to see that she was well, that he had made the right move in suggesting that she join Hiebermeyer in Naples. Maria shot him a look from her dark eyes. ‘It’s been six weeks since I was on Seaquest, but it seems a lot longer.’
‘It’s the company you miss,’ Costas said, looking at her with concern.
‘I’ve really tried to put it all behind me,’ she said quietly, turning away from them and gazing out over the site. ‘I had a text message from Jeremy this morning, and that was the first time I’d really flashed back to our time in the Yucatan, those terrible scenes. It’s been good for me to have this new project to focus on, better than going back straight away to my medieval manuscript research at the Institute. And Jeremy’s taken care of everything in Oxford. It’s just the break he wanted, a chance to serve as acting director while still just a graduate student, and he’s brilliant at it.’
‘I really want him at IMU full time, you know,’ Jack said. ‘It’s only been a couple of months since he joined us on the trail of the Vikings, but already he seems like a permanent fixture. I always know when someone’s right, and the moment he walked through the IMU engineering lab and began talking to Costas about submersibles I knew that was it.’
‘How is my favourite new dive buddy?’ Costas said. ‘Has he told you I passed him with flying colours on his checkout dive? A real natural.’
‘Buried up to his neck in the lost library at Hereford Cathedral. He’s got some fantastic new stuff, Jack. Another early map, some reference to Phoenicians, I think. He’s itching to show you. And he’s had an idea for some new diving contraption, Costas. I don’t understand a word of it.’
‘Really?’ Costas said in hushed excitement. ‘If it’s Jeremy, it’s got to be good.’ He reached into his hip pouch for his cell phone, but Jack stopped his arm.
‘Not now. Bad timing.’
Costas relented, ruefully. ‘Just keeping on the ball.’
‘No multi-tasking, remember? Let’s stick with where we are for now.’
‘Yes, boss.’
‘I’m grateful you suggested me, Jack,’ Maria continued. ‘It’s a real privilege to be here. And an eye-opener in more ways than one. But it should have been you here from the outset.’
‘Then you’d never have had the pleasure of spending time with our old friend Maurice,’ Jack said with a smile. ‘I know you haven’t seen him much since Cambridge.’
Maria sidled up to them. ‘He’s a dear man,’ she whispered, looking questioningly at Jack. ‘Isn’t he?’
‘He is a dear man,’ Jack replied quietly, giving her a knowing look. ‘Remember, he and I were at school together, even before we all met up at Cambridge. I had my first real adventures with him, when we were kids. You know, he’s treated like a god in Egypt, with some justification. Easily the finest field archaeologist I know. And despite appearances, he’s not one of those Egyptologists who thinks all other archaeology is beneath them. He’s tremendously knowledgeable, inquisitive across all periods and places. He wouldn’t be seen dead in a wetsuit, but he’s a perfect adjunct professor for
IMU.’
‘So what’s with the shorts?’ she whispered.
‘Ah.’ Jack looked at Hiebermeyer’s backside, and struggled with his expression. ‘Genuine German Afrika Corps, circa 1940. Seemed appropriate, when he first went to Egypt and needed kit. I gave them to him as a graduation present. He gave me my British Eighth Army khaki bag. I always have it with me too.’ Jack patted the battered bag hanging against his side. ‘My fault. Sorry.’
‘Some suspenders would help,’ Maria whispered. ‘You know, lederhosen.’
‘What Jack’s saying,’ Costas said with a twinkle in his eye, ‘is that Maurice grows on you.’
‘He’s developed quite a lot since you knew him at Cambridge,’ Jack said.
‘Just as long as he doesn’t expect me to treat him like a god,’ Maria whispered, then she stood back and spoke normally. ‘Anyway, now I see what it’s like to be in Jack Howard’s shoes. I just hope I haven’t taken the steam out of your sails.’
‘We haven’t exactly been sunbathing on the foredeck,’ Costas said. ‘Wait until you hear what we found yesterday.’
Hiebermeyer looked increasingly exasperated, raising his eyes and bunching his fist in the air, then suddenly he listened intently on the phone and flashed a look of relief. He nodded towards Maria, then snapped the phone shut and walked over, shaking hands quickly with Jack and Costas. ‘I thought I’d be wasting your time.’ His voice was slightly hoarse with stress, his German accent more pronounced. ‘I couldn’t believe it. All I did was step out yesterday to call you. They weren’t going to let us back in.’
‘Can you finger anyone?’ Jack said. ‘I might be able to exert some pressure in the archaeological superintendency.’