Keep the Dog Hence

Frontispiece

2010-01-14T06:13:00.004Z

Chapter 12 - December - Endings and beginnings

2010-01-11T08:28:00.000Z

At last Juniper is preparing to return to Perth. She is sad to leave London, but cannot afford to stay any longer, and so is putting the South Kensington flat up for sale. Her modest inheritance is almost gone and she is committed to return to the University in the New Year.
The drawing (if properly documented) would have funded time to establish herself in an English university. However without any history, the drawing is worth only a fraction of its true value.
Alex decides to attend a final auction at Christie's of 16th C religious and travel books. The baddies have placed their book in the auction in the hope of realising enough money to pay off their travel debts. It is listed in the catalogue as "16th C guide to France, 160pp, octavo, good condition. Acquired in Les Eyzies from family of original owner Nov 1936".
Alex bids for the book, intending to give it to Juniper as a farewell gift.
He wins it for a modest price and gives it to Juniper.
Seated on the floor amist a clutter of tea chests and wrapping paper, Juniper accepted the parcel from Alex.
"What is it?"
Alex smiled a little sadly. "Just something to remind you of our travels".
Junpier unwrapped the parcel and smiled at the worn little leather book. Then she frowned. "Oh, the endpaper has come away from the board on one side."
She picked gently at the loose paper. "And there's something inside".
She delicately pulled out a sheaf of handwritten pages. The crabbed French was difficult to decipher, but Juniper immediately made out the words "Memling" and "dessin".
"What a strange coincidence".
Alex leafed through the thick parchment sheets. "More than just a coincidence.". He pointed to a sheet halfway through the bundle with a credible sketch of their Flemish drawing. It was followed by a detailed list of dates, prices and previous owners, dating from the 12th C to the last transaction in 1652.
Juniper looked up at him in delight. "Do you think it can be?"
Alex smiled and touched her cheek gently. "I'm sure of it. Our Memlings have come home to roost after all."

Chapter 11 - November - A Reckoning

2010-01-11T08:10:00.000Z

Junpier and Alex return to Paris to speak with the Abbe Breuil and arrange for the grotto to be properly secured.
They then return to London from Calais.
The baddies are on the same ferry. They are bickering quietly over what to do with the stolen bible.
Their argument becomes physical. In the process the bible falls to the deck. The paper lining of the cover is damaged, revealing a piece of parchment tucked in between the endpaper and the board.
It is a drawing of a young man, unmistakeably by an expert Flemish hand.
Callista snatches the drawing and tucks it into the newspaper she is carrying before the other baddy can get more than a brief look at it.
Juniper and Alex leave the ferry first and walk toward the train station.
As Callista and the other leave the ferry, Callista is jostled and the newspaper falls onto the dock. The drawing falls from the paper and a gust of wind picks it up. The drawing is tossed gently about in the air for a little while before being blown from Callista's view and dropped gently on the bonnet of a parked car in front of Alex. Alex picks it up curiously.
With a shock he realises what it might be and shows it to Juniper. Chilled by the ferry ride they stop for tea in the station cafe before taking the train. They discuss the find excitedly.
"I'm sure it's authentic but if only it had provenance.", said Alex.
"Not provenance perhaps, but certainly Providence", laughed Juniper.
The baddies catch the earlier train back to London in sullen silence.

Chapter 10 - October - Almost Lost

2009-09-21T12:57:00.001+01:00

While Juniper and Alex are away visiting Abbe Breuil, the baddies, having followed the crumbs left behind by J & E, arrive at the Chateau in search of the paintings. They have drawn the conclusion that the paintings are hidden behind 16th C masonry on one of the lower levels, immediately above the grotto (of which they are unaware).

The decide to use explosives, stolen from the local criminals (a bunch of bad boys pushed out of Munich by the 1929 putsch).

Unbeknownst to them, they set off the explosives shortly after Juniper and Alex return to the grotto with a student of the Abbe (Jean-Paul) and permission to enter.

The explosion blocks the doorway and they fear they are trapped. (reprise of the prologue). However, the explosion exposes a fault in the back wall which leads to an extension of the grotto. Inside are cave paintings to rival Lascaux or Font de Gaume.

Above, the baddies break through the shattered masonry to find... a mummified body, a leather satchel and a much-thumbed and crumbling English Vulgate Bible. Some poor soul had somehow been immured in the 16th C.

They take the Bible, hoping to make a few pounds from it, and leave.

Down in the cave, Juniper sees the dim light above through a crack. She manages to wiggle up through the rock into the upper chamber, in time to see the baddies walking across the meadow below.

She calls down to the two in the cave, promising help but swearing them to silence about the grotto. She hikes back to the troglodyte village to find the passionate prehistorians they had previously met. They agree to rescue Alex and Jean-Paul, but keep the grotto secret.

Chapter 9 - September - Under the Shadow

2009-09-19T13:38:00.000+01:00

Only
There is shadow under this red rock,
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
T.S. Eliot - The Wasteland, 1922

In Les Eyzies, Juniper and Alex discover the clue in the cave that will send them back to the ruined house in the forest and then back to Chateau de Commarque.
As they walked down the hill, Alex saw the ruined building to the right.

Only the stones were left, stained greenish in the dappled light of the young wood.
"Do you think this is the place?", said Alex.
"Ruin" was neatly marked on the walking map in tiny Gothic letters. Juniper pulled the plan from her rucksack and compared it to the crumbling building. She dropped her rucksack on the bank and scrambled over a broken section of wall into the nearest part of the building, followed closely by Alex.

They find the grotto under the castle. Abbe Breuil (who was Chairman of Prehistory at the Collège de France at the time), had closed the grotto in the 1920s, but had arranged access for them. He was flattered by Alex's interest in his recent book about Altamira - Henri Breuil, Hugo Obermaier (1935): The Cave of Altamira at Santillana del Mar, Spain, Madrid, 1935. Breuil was also missing his friend Teilhard de Chardin, who was in China this year.

Chapter 8 - August - Two roads diverge

2009-08-19T09:59:00.005+01:00

"TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth; "
Robert Frost (1874–1963), The Road Not Taken 1920.
Callista is standing behind Juniper in the post office queue when Juniper comes to collect her parcel. Juniper bumps into Callista on her way out and drops the parcel. Some letters and newspaper clippings spill out. Callista helps to pick up the papers and Juniper leaves.
At this moment Callista recalls that she had seen Juniper before and makes the connection with the conversation at the exhibition. She quickly notes down Juniper's address as she had glimpsed it in the parcel, realising Juniper lives only a few streets away on the other side of Kensington.
Callista and Auden contrive to meet with Juniper and somehow get in on the game.
Juniper put down her book.
"So where did you meet Auden, anyway?"
Callista sighed, inspecting a well-manicured finger for chips in the polish.
"Darling, I've known him forever - our mothers were at school together"
"Has he always been this unpleasant?"
"Oh yes, trauma of a boarding-school childhood and all that."
Juniper felt little sympathy and frowned, her green eyes luminous in the dappled sunlight from the oak trees.
"I don't think you should allow your childhood experiences to define you - the best people transcend them."
Callista rolled over on the picnic blanket and dusted stray grass from her tunic.
"Oh really, you do set such high ideals for everybody."
Juniper looked out across the Round Pond to the gazebo in the distance.
"I simply don't think any amount of schoolyard bullying and gruel for supper justifies behaving like a complete pig all of the time. Doesn't he realise how beastly he is being?"
"Of course he does darling, he just doesn't care - that's his peculiar malicious charm."
"Well, I won't stick it.", said Juniper.
Callista through coincidence and meeting, manages to become friendly enough with Juniper for Juniper to share some of her plans. Juniper shares that she and Alex are planning to travel through Belgium, down along the southeast border of France and diverge from the old border at Arles, and catch a train northwest to Bordeaux.
They intend to walk from Bordeaux to Les Eyzies, then take the train north to Dover and the Channel ferry home.
Callista displays polite interest and says wistfully that she too would like to do something similar, but money does not permit. She asks Juniper to write and share her adventures. Juniper, delighted to have made a new friend in London, agrees to do so.
The first letter arrives from Juniper a few days later. It tells of their adventures in Namur and Dinant, and outlines their plans as far as Arles. Callista and Auden plot to cross paths at Arles. Callista redirects her mail to Arles poste restante, so she can pick up the trail when they arrive.
They find some dinosaurs (Bearnissart), eat their lunch on opposite sides of the same hill, and follow a selection of mysterious clues until Juniper and Alex find themseves walking into Les Eyzies at nightfall.
Juniper and Alex meet a bad-tempered Dominican friar called Alfred.
"Not very impressive for Domini Canes..."
"Hounds of the Lord? I suppose small, yappy terrier of the Lord lacks a certain something."
"Teeth, perhaps...".
They walked on down the street, sniggering quietly.
The baddies have followed a false clue and are in Sarlat.

L'Association pour l'histoire des chemins de fer en France

Chapter 7 - July - Lost Burgundy

2009-08-18T02:21:00.002+01:00

The International Surrealist Exhibition was held from 11 June to 4 July 1936 at the New Burlington Galleries in London, England.

Juniper's researches in Brussels and Bruges put her on the trail of what appear to be a collection of lost Flemish masters, Memling, van Eyck, and Bosch. The small group of paintings, the property of a Flemish nobleman, disappeared in the 15th century, lost in the turmoil following the breakup of the Duchy of Burgundy following the death of Duke Charles the Bold at the Battle of Nancy. The paintings appeared to have travelled roughly along the 15th C border of the Holy Roman Empire.
Juniper posts a parcel of books and papers back to London to save carrying them.

Chapter 6 - June - Black Shirts, Black Hearts

2009-07-15T04:28:00.011+01:00

Up here the hill isn't worked anymore. It's all
bracken,
and rocks on the ground, and sterility.
It's no place for work now. The peak is scorched
and the only cool thing is your breath. The real labour
is in reaching the top: one day the hermit climbed up
and has stayed ever since, to recover his strength.
The hermit wears nothing but goatskin,
and he gives off a musk of animal and pipe
that has soaked into the land, the bushes, the cave.
Cesar Pavese, "Work's Tiring", 1936

Juniper is not the only person looking for something. Auden and Callista are having breakfast at a famous London restaurant (TBC), where they read something relevant in a newspaper.
Auden has at times eked out his remittance dealing in art. He has access to a few modest paintings through some shadier dealers. He sees an advertisement for an early Flemish exhibition at the New Burlington Galleries. He drags Callista along, hoping to chat up a patron and negotiate a deal.
At the International Surrealist Exhibition Callista overhears Juniper and Alex discussing the possible Memling and their intentions to look for Anckaerts.
She does not realise the import of this at the time, but it will become important later.

Chapter 5 - May - Portrait of a Young Man

2009-06-13T00:49:00.004+01:00

The Memling turns out to be a 19th C fake by a forger working in Brussels called Jean-Claude Anckaerts. Research at the Gallery and among the papers found in the flat suggests that Anckaerts is a relative of Juniper's, hence the possible path of the Memling to London. Juniper decides to learn more about Anckaerts and plans to go to Brussels.

Chapter 4 - April - A Heap of Broken Images

2009-06-12T07:32:00.000+01:00

April 3 – Bruno Richard Hauptmann, convicted of kidnapping and killing Charles Lindbergh III, is executed in New Jersey.
Juniper investigates the flat, finding some small treasures, discovering London. She decides to sell some of the uglier pictures and have some of the others cleaned.
Juniper meets Alex for the first time.
After cleaning, one of the paintings in the flat looks like it might be a Memling.

Chapter 3 - The Keys to the Kingdom

2009-06-12T01:50:00.001+01:00

Juniper obtains the keys to the flat (#11 Kensington Court Gardens - same building as TS Eliot was living in) and a potted history from the law firm.

From 2009-02-01_winter_thames

Chapter 2 - Falling toward England

2009-06-11T23:54:00.007+01:00

February 1936, SS Hopetoun

Juniper takes ship for London.
In this chapter we meet British Fascists Auden Barnsley and Callista Sloane. Auden and Callista are second cousins and intermittent lovers. They are both short of cash - a combination of laziness, tight-fisted parents and profligate spending habits. They tend to squeak their way through life with charm and credit. They find the Fascist movement vaguely appealing, but it is more a hook to hang their boredom on than a serious commitment. They are lazy, greedy, venal, slightly grubby, but somehow appealing in their squalor - almost Withnail-like.
Unknown to Juniper, Callista is travelling on the same ship. They cross paths briefly at Southampton Docks, the first of a number of accidental crossings and coincidences joining Juniper, Alex, Auden and Callista in a quartet (implied reference to Four Quartets).
Auden meets Callista at the dock and travels with her back to her flat at the northern end of Earl's Court Road.

Chapter 1 - A letter arrives

2009-06-11T23:34:00.003+01:00

The story begins and ends in parallel with the short reign of Edward VIII (20th Jan 1936 - Dec 11th 1936) though this hardly features in the story. There are twelve chapters - one per month (April, of course, being the cruellest). The story occurs in the context of a Europe being dragged inevitably into war, though, again, this is not primary to the plot.

Sint-Jans Hospital, Bruges, August 1494
Edmund was tired and irritable. Though the thick walls of the hospital wards kept out the worst of the summer heat, the air was still humid, thick with the smells of the sick and the dying. It was still some hours until sunset, but he was more than ready to go to his narrow bed.
He was in Bruges that year as a visiting physician. Trained at the great St Bartholomews of London, he had been resident in Sarlat in southern France for some two years. His old mentor had written to Edmund and suggested he would benefit from time spent learning at Sint-Jans, as well as remedying a shortage of trained personnel.
Though he had mostly enjoyed his time in Bruges, he missed the open meadows and great rivers of the Dordogne, and especially Isabel.
Memling is dying in a bed in the hospital. Edmund shows him the drawing. Memling recognises it as the lost sketch from 15 years before and gifts it to Edmund, writing him a brief note to that effect. Memling's daughter, sitting at his bedside, also makes a note in her diary of the gift.
Perigord, November 1495
Edmund was so tired and so cold. It seemed as though he had been walking all his life, stumbling from town to town. It seemed years since he had walked in the summer heat of Bruges, though it had been only a few short weeks.
It had been a long walk from the last chance for food or rest, but Edmund looked forward to reaching his home among the English community in Sarlat.
He reflexively patted the little leather-wrapped bundle in his satchel - his letters of commendation from Sint-Jans and St Bartholomews, apothecary's receipts for Isabel and her father, and Memling's gift. The drawing had provided solace on many a lonely night. He would look at her finely sketched features and think of Isabel waiting for him in Sarlat. They had been betrothed since the summer of the year before. She had not wanted him to go to Bruges, but he felt duty-bound to honour the promise he had made to his mentor.
One more day's walking and he would find himself home. But the shadows were lengthening and he knew he could not go much further that evening.
Edmund walks out of the forest and happens on the donjon and fortifications of Commarque. Smoke rises from the chimney and he looks forward to a bed and a hot meal. In the grass in the late afternoon light he treads on a viper and is bitten. He manages to crawl part-way up the steep hill, but is unable to climb further than a sheep pen, used for lambing and abandoned for the winter, tucked under a natural overhang of the rock. He cries out for help but is not heard. Seeking warmth and shelter, he tucks himself in an alcove at the back of the grotto. He attempts to light a fire, but his flint is damp and his hands are shaking too much. In his cold, weakened, exhausted state he succumbs to the snake bite and dies where he lies during the night. The pen remains unused until the spring. By this time windblown brush and left over straw had disguised his body. It remained unnoticed by the shepherds who used the pen of the lambing season. The next autumn, high winds and a minor earth tremor caused a fall of rock, hiding his body completely.

A mysterious letter arrives from a law firm in London. An elderly Irish cousin, has died and left Juniper a sum of money and the keys to a flat in South Kensington.

Prologue

2009-06-11T23:18:00.016+01:00

Bruges, March 1480.
The last of the afternoon's sunlight left the floor of the studio and only a single bright beam lay on the windowsill. Though the room was chill, the window was wide open. Only the very wealthy could afford glass, and Hans needed the light.
The remnants of a meal lay on a trencher on the windowsill - boiled potatoes, rye bread and herring - poor fare, but it had been a hard winter and it would be a while yet before the spring vegetables were ready for harvest.
He laid down his pen and rubbed his eyes, disregarding the smudge of ink left by his fingers.
This commission was difficult - the portrait of a young wife who had died the month before in childbirth. Her wealthy older husband had originally ordered the painting as a diptych for the family chapel. The sudden death of the girl had been a surprise, but the husband had insisted that it be completed as a memorial after her death. Hans had seen her in life only once, a week before she died. He remembered a shy girl, overwhelmed with the burdens of a busy household and the prospect of her first baby. He had seen her again on her deathbed, and taken detailed descriptions from people who knew her. He had gone several times to look at the baby - a healthy child who seemed to be thriving with its wet nurse - but still found the dead girl's features and personality elusive.
This latest drawing had a nice delicacy of line, but he felt it too idealised, too much like an icon of the Madonna and too far from the plump Flemish blondness of the lost girl. It still seemed worth keeping though, along with the notes he had made on the back about the girl's family and environment, so, as he sometimes did with favourite drawings, he carefully wrote his name and the date in the bottom corner. Perhaps he could sell it to some less discriminating merchant.
He sighed - enough for today. The light was gone, his meal of some hours ago had been meagre and he was still hungry. He pounced the wet ink on the drawing and weighted it down with a river stone he kept for that purpose, before getting to his feet. He stretched, feeling the joints in his back pop from the prolonged position. The hairy terrier asleep under the table awoke, and got to his feet at the sight of his master. Hans stepped to the door, intent on going downstairs for his supper and some ale.
As Hans clumped down the narrow stairs, his wife's cat, a lanky black beast with a foul temper but a talent for mice, slipped into the studio. She smelt the remnants of the herring and was determined for her share.
She jumped onto the table, adroitly avoiding the terrier, and stretched out for the scraps of herring lying on the trencher. The terrier, affronted at the cat's intrusion, jumped up at the table. His barking and jumping served to chase the cat out the door, herring in mouth, but also knocked the river stone from its place weighting down the drawing.
As the terrier chased down the stairs after the cat, a light breeze came through the forgotten open window. It lifted the drawing, and it slipped off the table and out the window.
***
Hans had slept badly - the wind had howled around the chimney pots all night and kept him awake. He woke thinking that perhaps he could make a gift of the drawing to the bishop - he was a sentimental man and loved pretty drawings - perhaps Hans would win a commission for an altarpiece or an offertory.
He walked into his studio, stretching the stiffness out of his back and rubbing sleep from his eyes. He reached for the river stone on the table, only to find it out of its place and drawings scattered across the table and the floor. In the process of tidying the drawings he came across another preliminary sketch he had made of the girl at their first meeting. There was something in her shy smile, the way she looked down and to the right, that seemed to capture her still-unformed character. He pulled a fresh sheet of parchment from the box, selected a narrow piece of willow charcoal and began sketching, the drawing of the previous afternoon forgotten.
***
The evening wind was brisk, and it kept the heavy leaf of parchment aloft without difficulty. The page turned in the air, at one point skimming dangerously low along the surface of the canal and under a bridge, at another point flattening briefly against the brickwork of a chapel wall like a poster. However the wind continued to carry it - across the canal again, around the square, and through the open doorway of Sint-Jaans Hospital. As well as its charitable works the hospital was a major landowner in Bruges, and its administration was a full-time activity. As the breeze died inside the building, the drawing came to rest face down on the rush-strewn floor of the clerk's office near the entrance. A busy lay brother, arms full of papers, spied the handwritten notes on the back of the drawing. Thinking because of the parchment that it was a property deed or some other official paper, he scooped it up and tucked it into his bundle.
The sun was setting, and he knew the bell for Vespers was about to ring. He dropped the bundle on a table in the office and began hastily sorting through it. Rent receipts in one pile, deeds in another, letters in a third pile. He had not at any time turned over the paper and was unaware of the drawing on the other side. Thinking to sort it out in the morning, he slipped it into the pile of deeds and went to Vespers and his supper. Supper that evening was a stew of carp from the hospital's ponds and root vegetables from the winter's stock. Perhaps the fish had a parasite, or the stew had stood too long on the bench before service, but several of the the brothers and sisters of the hospital including the lay brother were taken ill during the night. In the rush and short-handedness of the next few days, the drawing was collected unnoticed into a bundle of property deeds, dated and filed away in a back shelf of the office.

Look for sodium nitrite

2009-02-18T15:51:00.000Z

He stabbed the ochre-coloured area on the map south of the city.

"You see, it has to be here, around the creek. It's the only area that makes sense for us".
We clambered up the slope to the fossil beds above the creek.
He picked at the slope with a small tool. I looked closely, watching for the brown marks from the fossilised bone I knew had to be there.
"What are we looking for, I asked?"
"Pinjanthropus if we can find it, otherwise just look out for those tattoo-blue-coloured patches".
He pointed to one of several blue specks about the size of a pinhead in the crumbly ground in front of us. My eye was caught by a darker blue glitter.
"Ooh, sapphire!"
He waved a hand dismissively - "Look for sodium nitrite", but I picked the faceted and polished gem from its dirt bed and tucked it in a pocket.

Thaw and Hurt share a cigarette

2008-12-05T07:51:00.001Z

In the dusty, early morning northern light, lines of impassive, ordinary people stretched to the compass points; each one a victim of violence, assigned, imperceptible, for ever to mark the points of an invisible grid. Each sentinel anonymously nominated from the most afflicted in the space.
A few metres from Thaw, house-height above a ploughed field, John Hurt hung at his ease in a rumpled suit. Hurt took a deep drag on a cigarette and flicked it at Thaw.
The cigarette appeared on the pavement in front of him, smoked halfway down and with a spot of water dampening the tobacco. Thaw picked it up and took a drag. The cigarette was rank from the damp, but it was his first in ten years and he inhaled deeply.
Hurt cocked his head and looked at Thaw critically.
"So you now want to know? Can't get enough of the truth? I like the charming combination of nervous arrogance and cringing humility".
Hurt plummeted limply from his post to fall face-down in the deep mud bordering the pavement where Thaw stood. He rose to his feet, brushed off his unsullied suit and waited, staring at Thaw.
Thaw watched him silently.
Hurt hitched his shoulders and wrinkled his nose, his crumpled-bag, hangdog face betraying nothing but a deep and cynical weariness.
"You'll see. Tattoo Betty."

spaniel in trouble

2008-12-04T15:07:00.002Z

She suddenly heard a chorus of barking and snarling ahead. Without her glasses she could not make out much detail, but people seemed to be trying to separate a group of fighting dogs. Suddenly one dog, an overweight golden spaniel with floppy blond ears, broke free of the group and ran towards her. Without thinking, she crouched down and called gently to the dog. It came willingly enough. As she grabbed its collar, a young woman, almost hysterical with shock, ran to the dog and hugged it.
"They attacked him - they wouldn't let him go - I thought they would kill him."
X looked the dog over, gently patting and reassuring him. He was shaking, and one toenail was split and torn, but he did not appear to be badly hurt. The woman was pale and tearful - her hand was bitten and bleeding.
"His name's Muttley, I'm Lucy - he's not even mine - he's my uncle's - he's just a big baby really. Those dogs just attacked him for no reason."
She pointed to a pair of boxers being poorly restrained by a young man not far off. Another woman approached and introduced herself as an off-duty police officer. After names and statements were exchanged, X walked with Alice and the dog across the main road to a nearby veterinary clinic.
In subsequent months, she occasionally saw Muttley again in the company of an elderly, stocky man in a flat cap. She noticed he still stightly favoured the injured foot. One winter morning, out of a desire to connect with somebody outside of the office as much as anything, she decided to ask after him.
The man watched her warily as she approached, looking at her through gray, keen eyes.
"Excuse me, is this Muttley?"
"It is, why do you ask?"
She related the story. He smiled, warmly.
"Lucy told me the story. That was very kind of you. Thank you."
His name was Arthur Cawfell. He was semi-retired and held a part-time research post at the School of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene.
They would often meet after that - she on her way to work, he exercising the indolent Muttley, and would exchange pleasantries. She shared some of her African experiences with him, and he some of his own adventures.
One day he invited her to attend a lecture on NGO governance at the Frontline journalists' club in Paddington.

contract cancellation

2008-12-04T10:26:00.003Z

He was shocked. His face paled, then reddened. His hands gripped the table tightly, but she could see they were shaking.
"How could you cancel the contract?"
"We have always had that right."
He pulled a untidy bundle of paper from his folder and started to flick through it.
"Show me where it says you can do that."
She silently took the papers and leafed through to the page. As she pointed out the clause, she noted irrelevantly that her fingernail was dirty and broken short.
He read the indicated words and nodded slowly.
"Got me there."
He scratched his head, sighed, and stood to leave, his chair grating on the linoleum.
"Better get moving then".
He seemed to take it calmly, but she knew there would be consequences.

Guinea, morning, dry season

2008-12-04T10:04:00.000Z

As she walked down the road, an articulated truck slowly passed her, its lights blinking in counterpoint to the low morning sun. The harmattan dust tinged the sky a delicate sugary pink. Above her, on the hill, Thomas was walking down towards the square. As he drew abreast he stopped.
"Sleep well?", he said.
"Not bad - I turned the light out at eight."
"So you missed the excitement."
"What excitement?"
He grinned, "Wait and see what they say at roll call."

London, winter morning

2008-11-28T11:58:00.000Z

When she awoke, there was a sugaring of snow on the nearby rooftops. As she drank her coffee, she watched individuals and small groups hurrying down the hill to do their Saturday shopping, breaths pluming in the chill air. The cars outside were dusted, though a light rain was swiftly washing it away. In the park, the swans lumbered along the edges of the Round Pond, snuffling and hissing to themselves as they waited for snacks.
The prospect of snow usually cheered her, with its promise of fresh cold on the skin, warm coats, and bright scarves. This morning, though, her mood matched the weather.

Who was here before us?

2008-09-27T09:45:00.000+01:00

The history of Wrong goes back a long long time. In many ways it is remarkably Earthlike. Nobody seems to find this terribly surprising - once life heads down the path of oxygen-using carbon metabolism, the options are relatively limited.

Like Earth, Wrong seems to be in a late interglacial. The mainly warm and humid climate has left little recent fossil or archaeological record for us to investigate. Evidence in the karst country of the north tells us that there were tool-users on Wrong from at least 1 million years ago up until at least 10,000 years ago. Where they went after that we don't yet know.

I'm an archaeologist - it's my job to find out.

Why are we here?

2008-09-27T09:35:00.000+01:00

The main reason people are here on Wrong is resources. People (human and non-human) have become very efficient at extracting minerals from comets and planetesimals. Wrong's system, by some quirk of solar system evolution, has a small, sparse cometary belt with few exploitable resources. Wrong, on the other hand, is rich in iron, copper, gold, nickel, potash, and mineral sands, and many of the deposits are available for both economic and sustainable mining.

Getting along on Wrong - How it begins

2008-09-27T09:19:00.000+01:00

One of the most important memories of my great-grandmother's life was her first sight of Wrong. Of course it wasn't called that then. Back in those long-ago times it was just another orbital body with an atmosphere (#1827376).

My great-grandmother remembers just being able to peer out through the bulkhead - waist-height on an adult. Her father pointed out at the blue-green sphere floating below them.

"What do you think of your new home then? What shall we call it?"

My great-grandmother, who had mislaid her robot bear that morning and was feeling fractious, screwed up her face, stamped her small foot and turned away from the view.

"Don't like it - wrong wrong wrong!"

Her father, used to the volatile moods of small girls, laughed and replied, "Wrong it is!".

Things never really got much more mature after that.