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“Merci Oui, it’s very special,” she said “L’orange sanguine Do you say ‘bloody orange’?”

Miranda grinned “Blood orange,” she said, arching her eyebrows “How appropriate”

After we finished our drinks, Jean took me upstairs to my roo in one of the plane trees — with a bird’s-eye view of the garden In the distance, beyond Jean and Elisabeth’s smaller, separate house, sprawled a jumble of tiled rooftops and spiky church spires One of the spires, silhouetted against the sky a few blocks aas unlike any I’d seen before: an open iron frame, its cluster of bells completely exposed It was a bare-bones skeleton of a steeple, I realized; exactly my kind of steeple

I pointed “That church steeple — is it being restored?”

He followed n It’s built that way for the mistral”

“The what?”

“Thewind froainst the wind The wind blows through, instead of pushing it down” I liked the steeple even more now; its spare skeletal beauty was born of function

As I leaned on the sill, lingering over the view, I noticed Miranda looking up, waving “I’ the Garden of Eden”

“Come visit anytime,” I said “Just watch out for snakes And don’t eat the apples”

“Sorry, Miranda what?” I hadn’t heard the question My brain was empty but my mouth was full Blissfully full

“I know carbon-14 dating’s pretty good,” she repeated, “but how close can it get? How precisely can it nail the age of the bones?”

“Pretty daood”

I was finishing a bowl of lamb stew — my second bowl of lamb stew — at Pace é Salute, a Corsican restaurant near Lumani that Jean and Elisabeth had recommended Its naarded as fine things, but neither could compete with the honeyed lamb stew, arlic, citrus, and savory broth

Suddenly Miranda’s question triggered a faintthat had occurred as I was preparing to board ht frohteen hours had passed since y, had dashed out to the helicopter withinto the inner pocket of the jacket I’d been wearing for the past four thousand miles, I pulled out a letter she’d tucked into ent” that had arrived in the lad you said that,” I told Miranda “I would have forgotten this until the next tiht’ve been years”

The envelope was post the letter, I scanned it again, because I’d given it only a cursory glance on the plane “You’re not the only one interested in C-14 dating So is the Institute for Biblical Science”

“The Institute for Biblical Science?” Miranda’s eyebrows shot up “Isn’t that a contradiction in terms?”

“Not necessarily,” I said, “though in practice, yeah, science often takes a backseat to the Bible”

“And they’re writing to ask your advice about C-14 dating? I’ to heap fire and bris at creationism from time to time”

“Not fierce,” I said “Just factual Okay, et a lot of fan lasses — a recent, annoying necessity — I read aloud “‘Dear Dr Brockton: I’ to ask your opinion on the accuracy of carbon-14 dating Our Institute is initiating a study of artifacts frohts on the precision and reliability of C-14 dating for establishing the age of artifacts, as well as huhts you have on the feasibility of extracting and sequencing genetic material from bone specimens We would be happy to hire you as a consultant on this project, although — as you et is limited Please contactproject Best regards, Dr Adam Newman, PhD, Scientific Director, Institute for Biblical Science’”

I folded the letter and reached for the envelope, but Stefan held out his hand “Pere He read it quickly, then handed it back with a look of disdain “Do what you want, but I advise you to stay away froe your reputation”

Miranda leaned forward on her elbows “What makes you say that?”

“A colleague of mine did some excavation at Qumran,” he said “The place where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found Someone from this place — this so-called institute — didn’t like a journal article she published They attacked her work, tried to destroy her credibility They even ainst her Very unpleasant”