The Five-Day Dig Read online

  THE

  FIVE-DAY

  DIG

  JENNIFER MALIN

  Copyright © 2011 Jennifer Zorger

  First edition: November 2011, Jennifer Malin Books, www.jenmalin.com

  All rights reserved. This work may not be copied, redistributed or stored in a digital database, with the exception of short quotes and passages for the purpose of review or analysis.

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental. Organizations, places and events in this book are either fictitious or used fictitiously.

  “Now, the part of their account that deals with the divine, and to which I listened, I am not anxious to set forth ... for I think that all men know equally about the gods.”

  – Herodotus, The History, 5th century BCE

  UNO

  WINNIE PRICE’S GAZE strayed from the market-share chart on the overhead screen to the time reading on her laptop. Three-forty-six, and she had a pile of final papers to grade by tomorrow at noon.

  “So, you see,” the dean said from behind the lectern, “Growden is facing a bigger challenge than ever before to develop donors and grants. Our local rival, Cartledge University, is beating us at this game.”

  Chaz Frazer, Winnie’s teaching assistant, leaned close to her left ear and whispered, “Cartledge delenda est.”

  She smothered a grin. The kid was a little too cocky, but the classicist in her couldn’t resist a Latin pun. His words played on the phrase that Cato the Elder had used to end all of his speeches: Carthago delenda est or “Carthage must be destroyed.”

  The dean slid his laser pointer into his breast pocket. “Are there any other announcements before we adjourn our last faculty meeting of the semester?”

  Winnie shut her laptop, ready to stash it away and run.

  “I have one.” On her right, Dr. Will Farber, her department chair, stood up, blocking her view with the bulk of his tweed blazer. “I haven’t had time to discuss this with my people yet, but a couple of us in Classical Studies have been invited to present at one of the most prestigious conferences in the field of Mediterranean archaeology.”

  Winnie looked up at him in surprise, wondering which conference he meant and whether she’d be asked to go. A change of pace would do her good, but she hoped she wouldn’t have to present. Teaching a small group of students didn’t intimidate her, but speaking to large crowds of academics made her edgy.

  The dean gave her boss a nod of approval. “Excellent. We need to network all we can in this economic climate. Tell us about the opportunity and how it came about.”

  “It seems the conference organizers read Dr. Price’s new book and were impressed.” He glanced at Winnie, his face crinkling with a smile she rarely got from him.

  A little laugh of disbelief slipped out of her. First, the new book had received a dream of a review in The New York Times. Now this. Her other book had gone virtually unnoticed by anyone but family and friends.

  Will glanced around the room. “Winifred and I will both be presenting at the Conferenza Archaeologica di Campania outside of Naples in Italy, next month.”

  Italy? The smile on her lips tensed. Her late father had adored Italy – and she had, too, before he died there.

  “A valuable side benefit of publishing,” the dean said. “Good job, Dr. Price.”

  She forced a gulp down her throat. “Thank you.”

  A smattering of applause echoed around her, but her mind slipped back to that summer in Italy with her family. It had happened on a Sunday. The weather had started out gorgeous – azure skies with big white cumulus clouds – but in the afternoon a nasty storm moved in over the Tyrrhenian Sea. Dad had gone sailing, as he’d done several other days. Mom worried about him being on the water alone. Winnie reminded her what a good swimmer he was. At fourteen, she’d still thought of him as infallible.

  Three days later the guardia costiera recovered the boat but not his body.

  Twenty years had gone by since then. She had learned to live without her father, but she’d never quite had the will to go back to Italy.

  Distracted by the memories, she hadn’t noticed her colleagues putting away their things. When they got up to leave, the motion around her triggered her back to the present. She stuffed her computer in its case and stood up, cradling it in her arms.

  “Well done, Winnie,” Chaz said beside her in his clipped British accent. As they filed into the aisle, he swept a lock of pin-straight, black hair out of his clear brown eyes. “I wish I were going.”

  “You’ll accompany us, Charles,” Will droned to him over the top of her head. “We’ll need an assistant with us, and your youth and energy will be a plus in making new connections.”

  Chaz stopped in his tracks, almost causing Winnie to walk into him. “You’re joking. A trip to Italy is mega! And it will move along research for my dissertation. Cheers, Dr. Farber!”

  Once upon a time, she would have been that excited. Her hesitation now made her feel old. What was wrong with her? So much time had passed. The conference would be fascinating. She wouldn’t have to go to the same places her family had visited, if she could even remember them. Most of that summer was a blur.

  They funneled out of the room into the hallway, and her two colleagues fell into step with her. “Are you quite all right, Winnie?” Chaz asked. “You look unwell.”

  “I’ll be fine. It’s just that ...” Her throat tightened. She hated showing vulnerability at work, especially since the chairman always expected his staff to be “on,” but she doubted she could keep her feelings to herself for the entire trip. She took a deep breath. “My father died in Italy. I haven’t been back since the family vacation when we lost him. I was fourteen.”

  “Bloody hell. I’m sorry.”

  “Thanks.” She looked away. “It was a long time ago.”

  “I had forgotten how your father died,” her boss said without emotion. “You haven’t been to Italy since then? How does one become a classicist while avoiding Rome?”

  A stab of annoyance at his insensitivity helped her push her grief into the background. “Well, I did a semester in Greece.” The words came out sounding defensive, and that irritated her even more.

  The teaching assistant gave the chairman a wry look. “Fortunately, classical works can sometimes be found outside of Italy and Greece, as well.”

  Farber laughed, apparently not taking the jab personally. Chaz had a knack for being blunt in a light way that didn’t offend people, and she envied him for it. She shot him a grateful look for coming to her defense, and he gave her a gentle smile that calmed her down. Amazing how far a little empathy could go.

  At the door to his office, their boss paused. “I’ll have my assistant send both of you the conference details this afternoon. She’ll make the travel arrangements for us.”

  Chaz offered him his hand. “Thank you for the opportunity, Dr. Farber.”

  “I know you’ll represent Growden University productively.” He shook hands, then went into his office and shut the door.

  Frowning, Chaz turned to her. He obviously felt he had to say something about her father.

  She didn’t want to talk about it. Breaking away from his gaze, she continued on her way toward her office.

  He kept pace with her. “Dr. Farber really should have asked if you were happy to go.”

  “It doesn’t matter. If the organizers requested me, of course I’m expected to go. It’s a great opportunity for the university.”

  “But it won’t be easy for you.”

  She hugged her computer to her chest. “I always meant to go back when the right moment came. Now we’re invited to a world-class conference. The time is right.”


  As they reached her door, she made herself look at him.

  He focused his gaze squarely on her. “I imagine your father wouldn’t have wanted you to avoid Italy.”

  “No, he wouldn’t have.” Looking down, she fumbled for her key in the pocket of the computer bag. “Daddy loved Italy. He was an archaeologist, specializing in Mediterranean civilizations. He would have jumped at the chance to attend this conference.”

  “So, one might look at it as an opportunity to honor his memory.”

  “Yes. Good point.” It was a nice idea, if she could keep it in mind. She took out the key and unlocked her door. “That could make it a positive experience – in addition to the lectures, which are sure to be excellent.”

  The thought reminded her that she’d be presenting. Funny how that prospect didn’t seem to matter as much now. “I hope my book presentation lives up to the rest.”

  “It will. The book is ace.”

  As she entered her office, he started walking away but glanced over his shoulder at her. “And if you need support of any kind, I have your back.”

  A nervous laugh broke from her throat. She hoped she wouldn’t need more support than she wanted to accept. “Thank you.”

  “My duty and my privilege as your devoted TA.” He bowed and left.

  Ducking into the office, she shut the door and plopped down at her desk. Her limbs felt shaky, and her eyes stung. She pulled a compact out of a drawer and flipped it open to look in the mirror. As she had suspected, pink capillaries crazed the whites of her eyes, making the green of her irises stand out oddly. Against her ashen face, her auburn hair looked darker than normal, too. She got the weird sense that she was looking at a stranger.

  She snapped the compact shut and put it away.

  As she started to close the drawer, something else inside it caught her eye – a small paperweight of her father’s in the shape of the symbol the ancient Egyptians had called tyet. Similar to the better-known ankh, its meaning was less clear, but it was generally taken to represent life or resurrection. Being somewhat of a linguist, she’d noted that the name sounded like tied in English and that the symbol looked like a knot. Unfortunately, that didn’t clarify what it stood for.

  The red stone artifact was small for a paperweight, yet too big to make into jewelry, which is why it usually lay in a drawer, unused. She picked it up and contemplated it. Like the symbol, her father’s work remained obscure to her. Not only had he never finished the book he’d been writing, the journal he’d carried everywhere had been lost with him in the boating accident.

  In spite of all the years she’d had to soften the pain, a tear rolled down her cheek. It had been so unfair to lose not just him but his legacy.

  Opening her computer bag, she placed the amulet in an inner pocket, planning to take it with her on her trip. She didn’t believe in charms or luck – not with the way her life had gone – but the object would remind her that being in Italy she would be closer to her father, not just physically but possibly in understanding what had driven his work.

  She snatched a tissue from a box on the desk and blew her nose. Her cocky teaching assistant had been spot-on with his advice. She needed to approach the trip in a productive way.

  Allowing herself a last sniff, she dragged her attention to the present. She had to make arrangements for her trip: prepay bills, get someone to water her plants, have her mail held, etc. Then there was the matter of her brother. In the two years since her marriage had gone awry, she and Sam had gotten used to toughing out their problems together – and he had plenty of problems. If he needed support while she was away, she hoped her sister would be able to fill in.

  But before she could worry about that, she had papers to grade. She took out her computer and got to work.

  ***

  A MONTH LATER, Winnie stared out the window of a 777. She never slept well on planes, and the flight had felt interminable. Now she could detect the first violet rays of dawn, and relief washed over her.

  As she made out the snow-capped peaks below, she felt something even stronger. A sense of magic, buried deep inside her, bubbled to the surface. To her surprise, a smile tugged at the corners of her mouth.

  Italy. On this boot-shaped peninsula, the ancient past came alive like nowhere else. People still left bouquets on the altar where Julius Caesar’s funeral pyre had burned, and the inhabitants of Pompeii still lay frozen in the positions they’d died in 2,000 years ago. You stepped out of a Metro station in Rome, and the Colosseum gobsmacked you. And you could drink spring water from the same aqueducts the Vestal Virgins had relied on.

  Trying to pick out Pliny the Younger’s beloved Lake Como among the miniaturized Alps, she looked forward to the conference without reservations for the first time. Thanks to it taking place near Pompeii, the event would draw top scholars in archaeology, art, architecture, classics and even geology. Her father had called Pompeii the most evocative site in the world, and she agreed.

  She pulled her gaze back inside the dim cabin, where she had a whole row to herself – the latest little boon in the string of luck that included the conference invitation and the review in The Times. She almost felt as if a guardian angel or the goddess Fortuna had pulled strings to coax her back to Italy.

  Ridiculous thought. No otherworldly being was watching over her. In the darkest hours of her life, when she had begged for help from above, she’d received nothing. Now, she didn’t look for it.

  The sounds of cart drawers and microwave doors slamming at the rear of the plane signaled that the attendants had started heating breakfast. An elderly woman waddled down the aisle toward the restrooms, reminding Winnie that she should run back and wash her face before everyone woke up and formed a line.

  She got up and wove her way around elbows and knees jutting into the aisle, whispering, “Mi scusi.” Her Italian was rusty. The sooner she started using it, the better.

  When she returned to her seat, more passengers had raised their window shades and were gazing out at an orange sunrise. Trying not to be conspicuous, she dabbed on face powder and shaded her eyelids and lips. The prospect of facing Will Farber without make-up didn’t faze her, but encountering her teaching assistant barefaced was another story. She hated the idea of her fresh-faced students viewing her as an old hag, assuming they didn’t already.

  Someone plunked down next to her. “Buon giorno, bella,” a familiar voice with an Anglo accent enounced.

  She snapped her compact shut and turned to find Chaz grinning at her. He looked like he’d just woken up – eyes slightly puffy, hair tousled, black stubble lending shadow to his pale complexion.

  “Buon giorno.” She smiled back. He looked adorable.

  What a thought. She turned away and stuffed her compact in the seat pocket in front of her. He was her student and almost a decade younger than she was. If she was starting to have those kinds of thoughts about kids, maybe it was time to look for someone suitable to date.

  “What do you say to stealing out of the conference early on Sunday and taking the train to Rome for the day?” he asked. “That leaves us Monday as a buffer before we fly home on Tuesday.”

  A lump hardened in her stomach. Her family had spent several days in Rome. She reminded herself they’d only been to a few sites, and it was a big city. Anyway, it didn’t matter. She had other obligations on Sunday. “The conference hasn’t even started, and you’re talking about leaving early already?” she asked more sharply than she intended, annoyed more with her own fretting than with him.

  He held up a book she hadn’t noticed he had with him: Ostia by Carlo Pavolini. “I’ve been reading about the ruins in Ostia, the ancient city port. I reckon it’s the perfect place to spark ideas for my dissertation about sacrificial offerings in Roman religion. Besides the Capitoline temple in the forum, Ostia has sanctuaries for Jove Serapis, the Bona Dea, Magna Mater and Bellona.”

  Now she felt like an ogre for snapping at him. It wasn’t as if he had multiple opportunities to get
to Italy for research. She met his gaze. “You’re absolutely right. You should go. My talk is on Sunday, so I can’t skip out, but you don’t need to be there.”

  His eyes widened. “I didn’t realize Sunday was the day of your presentation. Forget I mentioned it.”

  “Why? Ostia is more important for you to see than my lecture. You’ve already heard me practice most of it. You’ve even read the book.”

  He snorted. “I’m your TA. There’s no way I’m going to miss your talk.”

  His loyalty surprised her. Latching on to it was tempting, because her department chair would probably rip her presentation to shreds – but that wouldn’t be fair to Chaz. “You can’t miss Ostia on my account.”

  “Ostia’s been there for two millennia. It’s not going anywhere soon.” He got up. “I better get back to my seat before the attendants block the aisles with carts. Ciao until we touch down in Naples.”

  “Ciao,” she said faintly. She felt guilty, but he seemed to have his mind set. Maybe she could make it up to him by steering some other good resource for his dissertation his way. Lots of academics with projects would be at the conference. She would keep her ears and eyes open.

  DUE

  “BE ON THE alert for opportunities at the welcome reception, Winifred,” Will Farber said from the passenger seat that evening, while Winnie focused on the Italian cars darting all around her tiny Fiat Punto rental. “You heard what the dean said about concentrating on development. Our department in particular is strapped for cash this year.”

  Fundraising made her uncomfortable, and she couldn’t imagine getting very far with it. She checked the GPS screen and the mirrors, then merged into the center lane. “You’re the master at that kind of thing, William. Can you give me any guidance? Am I looking for wealthy enthusiasts? Corporate sponsors? Other organizations’ projects that we may be able to join?”