Mackenzie Ford - The Clouds Beneath the Sun

“What are the theories?” Arnold Pryce, in a dark green shirt, had lit up his pipe. The smell was not unpleasant.

“About why its tusks were turned down?” Natalie was longing for a cigarette herself but she preferred to smoke alone. “One theory is that Pelorovis fed on small mammals and used its tusks to spear them. Another is that it fed on mammals—like voles—that live underground, and used the tusks to break through the soil.”

“Were they never used for defense?” Christopher rested his elbows on the table and looked levelly at Natalie. He was wearing a crisp white shirt that made his skin look darker. It suited him, she thought.

“I don’t see how they could have been, do you?” She held her hand out and curved her fingers down. “In order for the tusks to point forward, the buffalo would have to lift back its head. Very uncomfortable and not a strong posture for fighting.”

“Were its tusks ivory, like elephants, or hair, like rhinos?” Kees wore a button-down American-style shirt. He was the most fastidious dresser of all.

“Oh, ivory. Pelorovis was not related to the rhino in any way.”

“So, a short paper for Nature , yes?” Eleanor replaced her spectacles.

“If you agree, yes. Just a letter to the editor, describing what we’ve found. A few hundred words. Nothing earth shattering.”

“Never mind. It’s important in its way, scientifically, and every little thing adds up. It’s positive.” Eleanor looked around the table but no one said anything. She glanced at Christopher and then back to Natalie.

“Christopher tells me you have a theory about some stones you have encountered, some boulders. Is now a good time to discuss it?”

Natalie wiped her lips with her napkin. “I think ‘theory’ is a rather grand word for what is really just an idea, a hunch.” Her glance took in Christopher. She hadn’t thought he had paid much attention in the gorge when she had pointed out the boulders. But he hadn’t missed a thing.

“But go on anyway.” Eleanor’s gaze raked the table and she smiled. “No one’s going anywhere. I think we can all drink coffee and listen at the same time.”

This was a signal to Naiva to bring in the tray of coffee mugs.

Natalie reached for another banana. “Well, all right, here goes. My idea is this. When we excavate the gorge, we are looking essentially for three things—fossil bones, stone hand axes, plant remains. Fine. But what if early man already had a culture—and don’t jump down my throat, yet. I don’t mean symphony orchestras or film studios. What about the rudiments of a shelter?”

She paused, to give others the chance to object, but no one said anything.

Naiva began handing round the coffees. A jug of milk was placed on the table, and some sugar.

“What gave me the idea is this. As we’ve just been discussing, there are some remains of Pelorovis in the gorge. This adds to all the other bones already discovered there.” She helped herself to milk and, though she shouldn’t, one spoonful of sugar. “These buffalo remains were found in conjunction with a number of stone axes—nothing unusual there. Almost certainly, the axes were used to butcher the buffalo and slice the flesh off the bones. There are few human or hominid remains in the area, so this was a killing and eating area, maybe, but not a living area.” She stirred her coffee and drank some.

“However,” she added deliberately, “and this is my main point… however, on one side of these remains—and only on one side—there are a lot of large stones, small boulders about the size of a head or a melon. The walls are nine or ten boulders high and they extend into the gorge—again, nine or ten boulders thick.” She looked hard at Eleanor and took a deep breath. “Now, this is as far as we’ve gone, so I can’t say that the evidence is any stronger than what I’ve just told you … but it seems to me, given the fact that these boulders are only on one side of the animal remains, and that the layout of the boulders is not random but is obviously artificial … I am wondering whether what we have here is a wall, man’s earliest wall. Perhaps built as a windbreak, something that would have offered some shelter from the elements while early man was having a meal. The prevailing wind is from the west, and the animal remains are all to the east of the stones.”

Another gulp of coffee. “And so, what I am saying is this: instead of excavating in a vertical direction at this point, we need to excavate—very carefully—in a horizontal direction, into the wall of the gorge, and record the position not just of bones and axes and fossil plants, but of ordinary large stones as well. We could be overlooking important evidence.” She cupped her hands around the coffee mug. “That’s it. That’s all.”

All eyes now turned to Eleanor. She had been listening intently, her chin resting on the ball of her hand. For a moment she said nothing.

Natalie’s heart was beating fast. Eleanor, she well knew, was famous for her caution, for never overinterpreting evidence, and she could be very caustic—vitriolic—with those who did.

Natalie glanced at Jack.

He smiled and winked.

At length, Eleanor spoke. “Have you by any chance made a drawing or diagram of this ‘wall,’ so-called?”

Natalie nodded.

“May we see it?”

Natalie rose. “I’ll get it.”

She got up and hurried to her quarters. She had left the drawing on her writing table and was soon back in her place in the refectory tent.

“Here you are,” she said, sliding the drawing across.

Eleanor stared at the drawing for what seemed an age. Tonight she was wearing a bright blue shirt, the sleeves rolled up to reveal her wrists and forearms. Her hair shone in the yellow light.

In the silence they could hear nightjars worrying in the trees of the camp.

Finally, she looked up and across at Natalie. “I don’t think your case is proved, my dear—not yet. But I commend you on your observation.”

She tapped the drawing with her spectacles. “This could be nothing—or it could be the most exciting find in … oh, I don’t know how long. Clearly, we must follow it up.” She put her spectacles back on and smiled warmly at Natalie. “I have to tell you, my dear, Christopher was the one who brought you on this dig—I felt we needed another anatomist. Well, Christopher was right and I was wrong.”

She handed back the drawing. “Don’t lose that. Make a copy. We’ll act on your hunch first thing tomorrow.”

It was then that she suggested listening to some music, a proposal that everyone had accepted enthusiastically.

There were no flames in the fire now, just the crimson glow of the crisp embers and the occasional crackle as the wood snapped under the heat.

Elgar’s concerto, Natalie knew, because Dominic had told her, had been composed at his house in Sussex, England, from where he had been able to hear the rumble of artillery across the Channel in France, in World War I. He had hummed the main themes on his deathbed, suggesting that it was, perhaps, his favorite composition. The concerto, as she also knew, this time from hearing it so often, was Elgar’s response to the war, an expression of his disillusionment.

What music did her father play these days, late at night? she wondered. He had always adored Bach and had a copy of the famous painting by Elias Haussmann in his study at home, the bewigged organist gazing down at the piano. Would she ever see that room again, hear her father play, turn the music for him, as she had done so often when she was a girl? Without her father, she had no home. Her room in Cambridge was cozy, especially in wintertime, when the gas fire was lit and she toasted tea cakes on it. But it wasn’t home. The camp at Kihara was fine as far as it went, and she felt at ease here, most of the time, but it wasn’t home either. What was going to happen? Dominic wasn’t coming back, but did her father have it in him to forgive her for what he thought she had done to her mother? Should she write to him? But if she did, and he didn’t reply, they would be further apart than ever.