A Late Phoenix Read Online Free

mean your sort of cold either, Doctor. The site owner said he didn’t know this old vase was there and the developer said he didn’t see why he should stand the racket and as for my firm.…”
    â€œYes?”
    â€œMy firm said it wasn’t their fault the thing had turned up …”
    â€œNo, of course not.”
    â€œThough I suppose you could say,” said Burrows heavily, “you could say in a manner of speaking it was.” Here Burrows glared at the luckless Mick. “Anyway, they lost.”
    â€œDid they?”
    â€œThey’d contracted to finish by a deadline and they hadn’t.” He sucked his lips expressively. “Not a penny bonus for anyone on that job.”
    His audience clearly didn’t like the sound of this. A big burly fellow standing next to the man called Patrick stirred.
    â€œIt’s all right, Jack,” said Burrows promptly. “The union didn’t want to find any vases but there wasn’t anything they could do about it either. Not once it had been found.”
    Jack subsided, nodding.
    William Latimer looked from one face to another. In the main they were young men—though the big chap called Jack was older; and they wore cheerful, dirty clothes under their virulent red-colored monkey jackets. Not a single man had string tied round his trouser legs in the old laboring tradition. Any more than Mr. Burrows had a bowler hat to distinguish him as foreman.
    He didn’t.
    His authority was based on something different but it was there all right and they all listened to what he had to say.
    â€œIt was the lawyers,” insisted Burrows. “They argued that these archaeological remains hadn’t been provided for in the contract. And it wasn’t what the contract meant that counted. It was what it said. You know what lawyers are.”
    William nodded. They were about as well understood by the lay public as doctors.
    â€œThey’d got everything else you could think of in.” The foreman wrinkled his brow. “Strikes, lockouts, civil commotion, Acts of God, force majoor—the lot.”
    â€œBut not vases,” said William sympathetically.
    â€œNot vases.” Burrows indicated the skeleton. He grinned. “They have now. Archeological finds are the responsibility of the site owner.”
    â€œThat means we’ll be all right then after all, Mr. Burrows, does it?” asked a lanky man anxiously. “I got mouths to feed at home.”
    William Latimer coughed. “I’m afraid I can’t swear that this is—er—archeological, you know.”
    All eyes turned back to William.
    â€œIt’s too well preserved for one thing to be all that old and the little bones are still here.” That was one of the things he did remember from his anatomy lessons. The smaller bones disintegrated and disappeared first. If they were still present it meant something. “I’m sorry, chaps, but I can’t certify that these are Saxon remains or anything like that. They could be—er—quite young, relatively speaking. I’m afraid that means the police and the coroner.”
    Mr. Burrows groaned aloud.
    Mick, the Irishman, was beginning all over again. This time his voice had a distinct keening tone to it. “Just swung my pick, I did, widout tinking. Making a dacent hole for the marker, I was. The digger’s got to come this way first ting in the morning and …”
    â€œNot now, he hasn’t, Mick.”
    There was a small silence while this fact sunk in.
    â€œIt’d go right through where he’s lying, mate.”
    Mick looked at the skull and let his glance travel along the ground.
    â€œIf the rest of him’s under there,” said Burrows ominously, “where we think it is …”
    The skull, noted William, was still obstinately male.
    â€œâ€¦ then the digger would have had him.”
    Mick’s mate, Patrick, did an expressive