Clare looked up into the older woman’s soft brown eyes. ‘There’s something you should know, Margaret. Things aren’t quite as straightforward as they seem with the nighthawking.’

Margaret let out a sound halfway between a gasp and a chuckle. ‘I have to confess, Clare, “straightforward” isn’t the first word that springs to mind about the little scam we unearthed.’ Seeing Clare’s expression, Margaret reached out a hand and placed it lightly on Clare’s. ‘I’m not trying to make light of your concerns, Clare. Just tell me what’s happened.’

Clare nodded. ‘There’s a local Druid called Crabby who hangs around the site. He got to know Beth when she was digging here, and he’s been pretty much a fixture while we’ve been here too.’ Clare hesitated, unsure of Margaret’s reaction. She had no idea what her views were on members of the modern pagan community. But to Clare’s considerable relief, if the calmness of her response was anything to go by, they clearly didn’t entirely coincide with David’s. ‘Anyway, Jo and I have got to know him a bit. And when we were chatting to him in the pub one night he admitted that he and one of the other locals were responsible for planting the finds on-site that ended up being sold online.’

‘I don’t understand, Clare. Why on earth would they do that?’

‘Because they wanted to stop the houses being built and they thought that if Beth found something spectacular they’d have to halt the development.’

‘But surely Beth must have realised.’

‘She did, and she told them to pack it in. According to Crabby she told him she didn’t need their “help” because she already had proof of the site’s significance.’

‘I take it Beth didn’t share with this Crabby exactly what the nature of that evidence might be.’

Clare shook her head. ‘No. And I can’t understand what it was. I don’t remember seeing anything in her site notes that suggested she’d found any hard evidence to prove the shrine was here.’

‘Though whether by evidence, gut instinct or pure fluke she was undoubtedly right.’ Margaret nodded in the direction of the trench. ‘Have you considered that Beth might have told Crabby that she’d found something just to persuade him to stop burying artefacts all over the site?’

She shook her head. ‘To be honest, no. But that’s not what’s worrying me. I know Crabby shouldn’t have buried those artefacts here—’

Margaret cut in, ‘And presumably illicitly procured them in the first place.’