"What should I do?" I asked lazily, my eyes still closed. "Expect nothing and see what comes?"
He was silent for a moment. "That might work." He hesitated. "Your mother doesn't know what to do with you—I can tell you that. That's why she's a little stiff. She doesn't know what role to play."
I opened my eyes and wrapped my arms around my knees. The sun had dried my skin and the rock was warm beneath me. "Neither do I," I said.
"You've been doing okay," he said. "Just keep on the way you're going."
I did not look at him. I watched Barbara dive beneath the water and pop up like a cork.
"I think that having you here will be good for Liz," he said. "I think she needs people more than she is willing to admit."
I heard him shift position, but I still did not look at him.
"Someone once told me that archaeologists are anthropologists who don't like live people. They dig up dead ones because dead ones can't talk back. That's not quite true. But I think live people are too fast for most archaeologists. We're a slow-moving lot. We look at a change in pottery technology that took a hundred years and say that that's pretty quick. We're used to taking our time. You'll have to give Liz some time to get used to the idea that she has a daughter.''
"All right," I said slowly. "I will." I lay back on my towel and let the sun warm me.
After a time, Barbara left the water and lay down beside us. Tony left after about fifteen minutes of sunbathing, saying he had some reading to do back at the camp. Barbara propped her head up to watch him go. He waved from the crest of the hill, then vanished from our sight.
"Ten to one he'll be on his third gin and tonic by the time we get back," Barbara said in a matter-of-fact tone.
I looked at her sharply.
"Don't get me wrong," she said. "I like Tony. Everyone likes Tony. And we all see that he drinks too much." She rolled over and lay on her back, her head pillowed on one arm. Her dark hair was slicked back and still glistening with water from the cenote. "It hasn't interfered with his work so far. He's still a brilliant teacher, from what I've heard. It's just in the field that he lets himself go."
I remembered what he had said about warmth and peace. Barbara glanced up at my face and shrugged.
"Sorry. I suppose I shouldn't have mentioned it. After a while, there's not much to do in camp except gossip about the other people. Dead people, fascinating though they may be, are not nearly as interesting as the live ones." She turned her head and opened one eye to squint at me. "Don't you agree?"
"I suppose you're right."
"Of course," she said. "Now—what do you suppose Carlos and Maggie and Robin are saying about us?"
"What makes you think they are talking about us?"
"I thought we just went through that. They're talking about us because live people are more interesting than dead ones. You don't think that archaeologists talk about archaeology all the time, do you? No, they talk about other archaeologists. So what do you think they're saying about us?"
"Ten to one, Maggie thinks that I'm stuck up," I said, adopting her tone. "Probably thinks you are too."
"No bet there," Barbara said. "And Robin will go along with that, because Robin goes along with anything Maggie says. She has the mark of the eternal sidekick. What about Carlos?"
"If Carlos has any brains, he'll stay out of it."
"Ah, your first error of judgment. Carlos has no brains. I'd bet that he will try to defend us—at least he'll defend you. Carlos and I aren't the best of friends."
"So I'd noticed," I said dryly.
Barbara shook her head. "I can hear those wheels turning," she said. "And you can just stop. No, I never slept with Carlos. But I watched him sleep with four different women last summer—courting each one with equal energy and passion—and dropping each one just the same." She shrugged. "The first of the women was a very good friend of mine. She had to hang around the rest of the summer and watch Carlos make his moves on numbers two, three, and four. All of them were very nice women. All of them were burned." She shrugged again. "I don't know why he does it,