Maybe he didn’t want to be saved, thinks Ruth. Aloud, she asks, ‘Did Pendragon have any family?’

‘A sister,’ says Cathbad. ‘They weren’t close. I gave her name to the police. I ought to speak to her as well, I suppose.’

A sister, but no children, thinks Ruth. Just like Dan. Are their deaths linked as well? In the sunshine of the park it’s hard to believe in shadowy fascist conspiracies. But there is someone out there, someone who wants to scare her too. Ladybird, ladybird. Ruth shivers, looking round at the children on the slide, at the parents sitting on benches, at the elderly bowlers on the green. Is he here, the texter? Is he watching her now?

‘Don’t stop,’ orders Kate.

Ruth pushes the swing, enjoying the sight of her daughter, her dark hair and red T-shirt silhouetted against the sky.

‘Higher, higher,’ shouts Kate.

Cathbad too is watching Kate, leaning on the fence with the devil dog at his side. ‘What a wonderful thing it is to be a child,’ he says. Ruth thinks he sounds very sad.

*

When they get home, Ruth has a message to ring Todd Holland at the American lab. She does so and they spend a few minutes establishing her identity, the identity that is, apparently, coveted by someone else.

‘I’ve got the DNA and isotope results here,’ says Todd. ‘They’re very interesting, especially when you think where the bones were found. Of course, the Roman Empire stretched into all sorts of places, but even so.’

‘Yes?’ says Ruth, encouragingly. Her mouth is suddenly dry.

‘Well, oxygen isotope analysis points to the subject originating from the north of England.’

Big news, thinks Ruth. She has known all along that they are dealing with a northerner, a sort of Ancient Roman version of Nelson – or Sandy. But Todd isn’t finished. ‘The interesting thing is the DNA result …’

‘Don’t tell me it’s a woman.’

‘No,’ says Todd, sounding surprised. ‘Subject is male and at least one of his parents was from North Africa.’

When Ruth puts the phone down, Cathbad is looking enquiringly at her.

‘King Arthur was black,’ she says.

CHAPTER 23

‘What do you mean?’ asks Cathbad.

‘The tests show that the skeleton found in the tomb had North African DNA.’

‘How can that be?’

Ruth paces the room. It’s as if some of the excitement described in Dan’s diaries has communicated itself to her. Some of the fear too. This could be huge, she tells herself. She sees the headlines in the papers, ‘Legendary English King was Black says Archaeology Expert’. Then she remembers that someone burnt Dan alive to protect this secret.

‘There was a black Roman emperor,’ she says. ‘Septimus Severus, I think. The Romans were in North Africa and it stands to reason that some of the population would have become Roman citizens.’

‘Didn’t you have to be Roman to be a Roman citizen?’

‘No. They were quite progressive that way. St Paul was a Roman citizen, remember. I wonder if there were any other black Romans in Britain. I’m going to ring Max.’

Max answers on the second ring. He sounds delighted to hear from her. Guiltily, Ruth remembers that she never really gave him an answer about coming up to Lytham.

‘I wanted some information,’ she says.

‘Oh.’ Max’s voice changes. ‘Of course.’

She explains about the isotope results. Excitement of a different kind begins to creep into Max’s voice.

‘There were some skeletons excavated in a Romano-British cemetery outside York. I don’t think they did DNA tests but the limb proportions and skeletal facial features appeared to point to the men being black African. Also there was a North African legion stationed at Hadrian’s Wall. They were from Morocco, I think. They found African DNA in the local populations around Hadrian’s Wall which suggests that the soldiers intermarried with the local people. It was actually Septimus Severus who made it legal for serving legionnaires to get married.’

‘So our man could maybe have been the son of one of those soldiers?’

‘It’s possible, yes.’ She can almost hear Max’s mind working. ‘Maybe his father went back to Rome with the legions. Our man could have been trained by his father in Roman cavalry arts and gone on to become a war leader, defending his people against the Picts. Those communities must have felt very vulnerable after the Romans withdrew.’

‘So King Arthur could have been black or mixed race?’

‘Why not? That could be the reason for all the mythology around him, the suggestion that he was different, somehow “other”. It could even account for the Raven King legend.’

‘Because ravens are black?’

‘Exactly.’

‘I wish we still had the bones,’ says Ruth. ‘Then we’d know for sure.’

‘How are the investigations going?’

‘Slowly.’ She doesn’t tell him about Pendragon or about the increasingly threatening text messages. In turn, Max doesn’t offer to come up to Lytham. After a few further archaeological exchanges they say goodbye.

Ruth turns to find both Cathbad and Thing staring at her.

‘Max says there were African Romans in the north of Britain,’ she says. ‘There was even an African legion at Hadrian’s Wall. King Arthur could have been the son of one of those legionnaires.’

‘How are things with Max?’ asks Cathbad.

*

Much later, after Cathbad and Kate are both in bed, Ruth goes back to Dan’s diaries.

10 May 2010

Excavation day. I went to the site early to watch the sun go up. So beautiful over the river with the birds flying in from the sea. Made me wish I could paint or sing or something. The others turned up at nine and I started excavating the bones. I still felt bad removing them from their grave but I felt that I had made my peace with King Arthur last night. I felt that he understood.

Clayton determined to do it all by the book. Lots of people watching – Guy, Elaine, Sue Chow, some old dears from LAS. It was a bit of a shock to see Pippa there. Why did she come? It’s not as if she has any interest in archaeology. We didn’t speak but once or twice I saw Elaine looking over as if she suspected something. Clayton was oblivious, though. All he cared about was whether the local press had got wind of it. For some reason, he wants it all kept quiet until we know for sure. It’ll make a bigger splash then, I suppose.

Oh my God, my first sight of the fully exposed skeleton! He looked so kingly and peaceful, lying on his back, hands crossed over his chest. I heard Guy mutter ‘Jesus’ and even Sue seemed moved. I lifted out the head – the skull is complete, lovely nuchal crest, large mastoid bones, heavy brow ridges. He was a fine, strong man. Beautiful eye orbits, almost rectangular, wide nasal cavity, adult teeth all erupted. I looked at it for so long that Clayton started to get impatient, reminding me that it was imperative to get the excavation completed by the end of the day.

When it was all done – all the bones numbered and bagged, recording sheets complete, bone and teeth samples taken for analysis – I wanted to take him back to Pendle. Actually, what I really wanted was to take him home but (wisely) I didn’t say this. Then Guy said that the bones should go to the CNN lab in Blackpool. He has contacts there, apparently. I thought Guy was becoming too obsessed with the White Hand and said so. We shouldn’t let ourselves be dictated to by a bunch of fascist lunatics. But Clayton agreed with him so Guy drove the Raven King to the lab. I hated to see him go.

Ruth looks up from her laptop. It’s dark outside; the house is silent. She can recognise so many things in the diaries – the thrill of discovery, the moving and exacting task of disinterring a human skeleton – but there are also many elements that surprise her. She is amazed at Dan’s quasi-mystical identification with King Arthur. All this talk of paying homage to the Raven King, of making his peace with him. She just can’t relate this to her memory of Dan – that cheerful, cynical student. The old Dan would never have gone to watch the sun come up, she is sure of it. As a matter of fact, once they watched the sun rise together, after an all-night party in Denmark Hill. She remembers standing on a balcony drinking Bloody Marys and watching the first dossers of the day arriving in Ruskin Gardens. Dan did not declare a burning desire to paint then: he had expressed a wish for a McDonald’s breakfast and had set out in search of one. Somewhere along the line Dan had become a fully-fledged New-Age thinker. She wonders if he was ever taught by Erik.