The Fox by Arlene Radasky Page A

want to try to prove it. That’s one of the reasons I became an archaeologist.” I could feel my defensive instincts catch hold now and I continued, arguing, “Now, I’m where I should be. It all feels right, as though I am home. All the digs before were rehearsals. I cannot leave!”
    I walked to the window and leaned my forehead against the cool pane of glass. I looked out into the dark night and tried to see the hill I’d captured in the picture. “I think she wants me here, Marc,” I reflected. “She wants me to find something.”
    “Okay.” Marc’s voice was laced with mockery as he stood up, stretching, filling the space between the chair and the bed. “So, you’re telling me you have regular conversations with dead people, and now, I suppose, we’re going to start digging tomorrow with spirits in tow. Well, I need some spirits, now.”
    I cringed at his tone and pulled back from the windowpane. I turned just in time to see him reach into my suitcase for my bottle of Lagavulin he knew I kept there. “Hey! Stop!” I said, just as he was touching the bottle. “If you want a drink, go get your own.” I never let anyone else drink my scotch. I always had a bottle of Lagavulin with me, and no one dared to touch it without an invitation. I first offered it to him after we found the bowl, but since we arrived here, he’d been helping himself without my objection. Until now.
    I was angry. I wanted him out of my room. He brought back feelings I thought I’d buried with Brad. “If you think I’m strange, then go find a normal person to be with. I don’t want you here right now,” I snapped. When he paused, I continued, “I’m not kidding. I am going to bed, and you need to leave. Now.” I’d told him about a part of me that was sacred, and he’d made light of it. I felt sick to my stomach.
    “Wow. All right, I’ll go. Aine.” He paused. “I’ll have to think about this. I don’t know what to make of your story. I’ve known you too long to know you wouldn’t make something up like this, but it’s so hard to believe,” he said, shaking his head. “I need to talk to the team before we make a decision.”
    Marc pulled open the heavy door. He turned to look at me, confusion in his eyes. “We’ll be downstairs if you want to come and join us.” He walked out of my room, into the hall, and closed the door. He left me staring into my own reflection in the full-length mirror hung on the back of the door.
    “Bloody hell! That’s the reason I’ve never told anyone.” I stared at the closed door. “Why did I let him get to me like that?” I took a deep breath and sighed with a release of emotion. “I don’t care what he thinks. I knew it would turn out this way if I told anyone about Jahna.” I searched the mirror, and said, “Jahna, I need you now. We are so close. I’ll work this site alone if I have to. I’m counting on you, so don’t let me down.” I turned, lifted one of the heavy tumblers on the bureau, and poured myself a drink. Neat, no ice.
    The first sip brought me its lovely, medicinal flavor and I calmed down. I let my thoughts drift back to Skye, to when I was thirteen. Had it really been twenty-nine years since Aunt Peggy had shown me the letter?
    It was almost three hundred years old, and an ancestor of mine, a member of the MacRae family, wrote it. The yellowed parchment had been addressed to a British Colonel at Fort William and my aunt had it preserved amongst other family heirlooms. It described how the son of Dubhglas MacRae, nineteen-year-old Hamilton MacRae, could be identified. He was at Glen Coe in February of 1692, with the MacDonalds. They assumed he was dead after the massacre and his family wanted his body back to be buried on Skye.
    “…his Body is short, not the tall, large Bodyes that are the MacDonalds. He also has Raven Hair and Beard, not red. His Eyes are Green, not Blue. It tis the Second Toe, on each foote, after the Great Toe that is greatly