Goddess of Death Read Free Page B

he was right. The post of Director of the Department ofMuseums and Antiquities might have suited Karen Stannard for a while, until she could achieve higher office, but it did not suit Arnold: it was one step too far for him. It was his father who had shown him the delights of the Yorkshire countryside and instilled in him a love of industrial archaeology, in the first instance, which he had developed after his move to work in Northumberland. Arnold loved the hills, the slopes of the fells, the distant vistas of sea and the feeling that in these windswept fields men had worked and fought and died and built and that it was under his perceptive eye could be found traces of what they had done and what they had been.
    Office work was different. It was confining, cramping, and stultifying in exactly the way he had dreaded.
    He had told Karen Stannard again only the previous day, when he had been called to her office.
    He had sat in a chair, facing her across her desk. The light from the window behind her had highlighted the line of her cheek and given an auburn tint to her hair; her eyes had been serious as she stared at him, tapping a pencil on the desktop, the top button of her blouse open to offer a disturbing glimpse of the first swell of her breasts. Her chair had been pushed back, her long legs crossed and he could make out the outline of her thigh under the tightening of her skirt. She had never been averse to using her natural charms when seeking to impose her will upon someone: her beauty was a weapon and she used it almost unconsciously.
    ‘It’s not going too well, is it, Arnold?’
    Arnold shrugged. ‘There’s no great problem. The Easterbrook project report was sent in on time.’
    ‘By Spedding.’ Her tone was cool. She sighed, a little dramatically . ‘He’s fitted in well, as we expected, but I get the impression you’re still not at ease with him. On the other hand, when I was in your job and you were my deputy you weren’t all that much at ease with me, were you?
    ‘We got on well enough together,’ Arnold demurred carefully.
    ‘And there were times when we did not.’ She paused, lips parted as she frowned in reflection. ‘However, we must all move on, Arnold. I’ve come to terms with the rigours of my new job with its very different demands; you’ve succeeded to my previous post; it’s time you settled in as I have. But I’ve been hearing things. Not about your relationship with Spedding. I’ve had some minor criticisms of some of your committee work, but I know you for your strengths and I’ve defended you. But it seems to me you’ve become listless, showing a certain lack of interest in various tasks. You don’t demonstrate the proper respect for committee chairmen, for instance…’ She waved a hand, dismissively. ‘All right, we both know they know nothing of archaeology, and can be absolute prats at times, but they’re elected members and they like to feel they’re making some contribution.’ A hint of exasperation crept into her tone. ‘And it’s being said that it’s not easy to find you at your desk. You always seem to be out of the office, doing things that should be left to others. You can’t just expect to continue wandering around in the hills, not in your position as head of the department. There are others who are employed to do the legwork. You’re there to direct, not get your hands grubby.’
    ‘Maybe that’s the point,’ Arnold argued stubbornly. ‘I never wanted this job, Karen. I’ve made that clear from the beginning. And if I’m not up to it, there’s an obvious solution.’
    They stared at each other, both suddenly angry. It was curious how they had always had that effect one upon the other. There had always been an undercurrent in their relationship: competition on her part, exasperation on his, and inability to recognize objectives in the same light. And, he wondered sometimes, something else too. Perhaps repressed desire. He rarely thought about