"An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered."
-- G.K.Chesterton
Epilogue
**28 May 1999**
The unveiling of the new antiquities exhibit by the Department of Ancient History was well attended, and was turning into quite a revel. The excitement following the previous night's fund-raiser had brought the curious flocking in.
Adam Pierson, for once immaculate in a well-cut dark suit, picked up a glass from a passing tray and toasted his companions with a charming smile.
"To relic hunting."
Nigel Bailey returned the gesture hesitantly, while Sydney Fox continued to regard him as she would a vase of dubious provenance.
"A strange toast from a man who just spent the whole evening arguing against the practice."
"Ah, but without the respectable ones like you, where would the study of Antiquities be? At least your finds end up in a museum," the wiry man pointed out.
"I don't get you, Adam," Sydney said frankly. "You've got to be the most unlikely researcher I've ever seen." A sudden thought occurred to her. "You know, I looked up the inscription from the breast plate we saw. 'Me-tu-tu' is the old Akkadian symbol for 'Death'. What do you think that signifies? Was it a set of burial armor?"
Instead of responding, Adam looked abstracted and manouvered around till he was facing the door. Nigel followed his suddenly intent gaze to see a very beautiful dark haired woman make a grand entrance. She was poured into an elegant black dress, and attracted a good deal of attention when she paced stylishly in. After a cursory look around the room, her eyes lit up, and she made a beeline for Adam.
Nigel tore his attention away from the vision of pulchritude to throw an envious look at Adam Pierson. He saw the taller man's sharp features settle into what looked like… resignation?
"Why hello, M...Adam, darling! What a delightful surprise," the beautiful newcomer crooned, planting an extravagant kiss on the researcher's lips.
"Amanda," he acknowledged, with a slight smile.
"Madam?" Sydney repeated, quizzically.
"An old joke," Methos explained smoothly. "You know, 'Madam, I'm Adam'?"
"Well, aren't you going to introduce me?" Amanda said brightly.
"Dr.Sydney Fox, Nigel Bailey, meet Amanda..."
"Montrose," Amanda finished smoothly. "I deal in antiquities. Adam and I are old friends, though it has been a long time since we last met."
"Not nearly long enough for me," Nigel heard Pierson mutter into his glass as he drained it.
"Adam has been highly recommended to us as an expert on artefacts of the Bronze Age," Sydney said.
"Really? I'm quite well acquainted with a five thousand year old relic or two myself," Amanda said with a sly look at 'Adam Pierson', slipping a possessive hand into the crook of his arm.
Methos carefully and deliberately replaced his empty glass on the tray carried by a passing waiter. Then he smiled sweetly down at Amanda.
"Lovely to see you again, dear Amanda. We must get together and catch up. Perhaps later tonight?"
"Oh, but Adam, I really do need to speak to you on a matter of the greatest urgency." She batted her eyelashes flirtatiously at him, prompting another wave of envy from an admiring Nigel.
"Then why don't we leave, and discuss it in privacy?" he suggested, putting his hand over hers, where it lay on his sleeve. "Will you excuse us, Sydney, Nigel?"
They agreed politely, though Nigel made a stammering attempt get them to stay on for a while.
"Some other time, Nigel. Coming, darling?" Adam asked, his firm grip giving Amanda no choice but to accompany him out of the ballroom. Once out of the building he let her go, and walked straight toward his car, leaving Amanda to chase after his long-legged stride.
"Methos!" she called after his retreating back.
"Whatever it is, I'm not doing it, Amanda."
"Methos, will you just listen to me for a minute?"
"Save your breath. I'm not getting involved in one of your schemes again. How the hell did you know where to find me, anyway?"
"I told her," Amy said, getting up from her comfortable position sitting on the hood of his car.
Methos glared at his Watcher, and then at the raven-haired Immortal thief beside him. Then he flung his head back to look at the sky.
"Dear Heaven, why me? Why is it always me?" he asked plaintively, of the unresponsive heavens.
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Footnotes:
Byron's rants are excerpted from Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, where he did, indeed, vent his outrage at the transfer of "Lord Elgin's Marbles" to Britain.