Bless his impenetrable British reserve and hisDon’t fuck with mevocabulary. Bless his heretofore unknown talent for making up authoritative-sounding things like the Smithson Foundation. If anyone can get them out of this, it’s James.
Sounding bored, the agent recites, “Sir, I’m not at liberty to divulge—”
Ripley doesn’t hear the rest, because out of the crowd of faces swims one with a cruel, one-sided smirk.
Will. Standing next to Mr. Shipman, from the neighboring ranch. She remembers those bushy brows, that bitter, weathered mouth. Will found him his guaranteed payout, she guesses. She wonders how much it took.
Cara pushes her way through the crowd, a sheaf of paper in her hand withSearch and Seizure Warrantwritten across the top. “That motherfucker got an emergency injunction. He’s leased the rights to the Shipman side of the canyon. They’re saying Beast didn’t come from Yellowtail, that the creek moved during the Fourth of July storms and we were excavating over the property line. This will come as a surprise, but the government decided they’d better come and interrupt Native prosperity once more for old times’ sake.” Cara’s trying to joke, but her lower lip wobbles dangerously. “I’ve called my parents’ law firm. What else can we do, Ripley? I don’t know what to do,” she cries, crumpling the pages in her fist.
Ripley pulls Cara in for a painfully tight hug. “I wish I knew,” she says.
They pull apart when the forklift’s safety light spins to life, showering the room in blue.
Ripley’s world turns still and silent.
To her right, James is calmly, implacably arguing with Agent Baxter.
To her left, Cara and Griff hold each other.
From across the concourse, Will winks exaggeratedly.
Here in this strange, slow space, Ripley has all the time in the world to think.
Will has to know he’ll lose in court. He won’t want the trouble and expense of a four-year-long legal battle like the one for Sue the Tyrannosaurus.
He doesn’t want Beauty and Beast. He just needs to stop Ripley until he can publish his abstract, get the holotype, and launch himself beyond her reach. Four weeks or four years; the length of the birds’ impoundment doesn’t matter to him.
It only matters to her.
Four years might be enough time for Will to find real bird fossils on the Shipman farm.
Four years from now, Clever Girl might be a ghost town at the edge of Yellowtail Ranch, a cluster of abandoned cabins where local kids go to party and make out.
Four years from now, Ripley’s dad might not be here.
She watches as a man in an orange safety vest inches the forklift forward. Two agents fall in behind the vehicle, another two flanking it at the front. The crates are still in that ignorant, dangerous, heart-ruining stack.
Sound smashes back into her ears, time regaining its hold on her. She should have known that about time—that it always, always wins.
“Ripley.Ripley,” James is saying. “This isn’t the end. We will get them back, I swear to you. I’m going to follow the crates so we know where they’ve taken them.”
“Okay,” she says vacantly, and then he’s gone.
The woman in the gray suit strides briskly over. “Hello,” she says in an accent very similar to James’s but without theAmerican influence. “I’m Marie Wellesley. From the foundation,” she continues at Ripley’s blank look.
She must be with the real financial backer for Clever Girl. “Hi,” she manages. “I’m Ripley Adams. The lead excavator.”
“I know who you are, Ms. Adams.” There’s something about the way she saysI know who you are.It’s tapping on a door in Ripley’s brain that’s stuck shut.
“I understand Ms. Yellowtail has engaged a legal firm here in America,” Marie continues, “and I’ve taken the liberty of contacting the foundation’s solicitors as well. We intend to get the fossils released from FBI custody and transported to Oxford without delay. If you still want a CT scan, we can arrange for that to be done in England.”
“Sure,” Ripley says. This woman can’t help her in time. No one can.
“You’re not what I expected,” Marie says.
“I beg your pardon?” Somehow, she feels she shouldn’t sayExcuse me?orWhat?to this tight, trim, precise person with her elbows cocked at exactly ninety degrees.
“Alfie gave me the impression you were a brilliant, eccentric loner.” Marie examines Ripley from her loose, tangled hair to her limp blouse and saddle-creased jeans.
