Raoul clips a lock of Martin's hair, and slips it into one of his full sketchbooks. And they bury him there, on a knoll by the bank of the Powder River. The ground has been softened by rain, and while Raoul sketches the land, marks in the river and the cliffs in the distance where they found the first bones, heart and mind too full to think, too full to even draw a proper breath, Charlie and the others dig, with the shovels they brought, and the picks. They dig a hole so deep that Lake, the tallest of them all, can stand upright in it, and only the top of his head is visible.
And Raoul kisses Martin's forehead one last time, and his closed eyelids, and his cold lips, and his hands. And his heart tightens to think that it is not consecrated ground, that Martin's grave is not where anyone else can pray for him, and he goes to his saddlebags, and finds the small bottle of holy water that his sisters insisted he bring with him, and dipping his finger into it he makes the sign of the cross on Martin's forehead, and his lips, and opens the top buttons of his shirt, so he can make it too on his chest, over his heart. And then he pours the remainder of the bottle into the open grave, and hopes that God will take it as enough of an offering to carry his soul to peace.
In the cold of the night, in the hollowness of Martin dead in his arms, he had resolved to never think on God again, but now, the sun at its highest point, the ripples of the river shining golden, he reaches a truce in his internal war, just in case.
He will not have his crisis ruin Martin's chance of an afterlife.
Then they wrap him in his blankets, and with the ropes they had for lowering bones down from the cliffs, they lower him into the grave. Raoul takes a fistful of the soft clay and sprinkles it over him, and takes a second fistful to keep forever, and there are no words he can speak, no words he can even begin to imagine that might do Martin justice, and Roberts whispers a prayer, and Taylor breathes something in Latin, and Jackson grasps Raoul's hand, for the briefest of moments, and murmurs the Salve Regina as he takes a shovel, and scrapes the first of the clay back into the hole.
The colour drains from the world and Raoul sways on unsteady legs, every fibre of his body suddenly too weak, too heavy, and the last thing he sees is the dry white grass rushing up to meet him.
He wakes to voices, to the heat of a fire on his face, to water cold on his lips, and his eyes flicker open, and for one wonderful, glorious heartbeat he thinks it might be Martin, smoothing back his hair, but it is Jackson, and the pain that lances through his chest carries him back to sleep.
"…suspect…his heart. Pneumonia…different progression…his illness…"
"…you mean…illness?"
"…consumptive…early stages, but…"
"And…about Raoul?"
"Exhaustion…needs…couple days…"
"…move soon…taste the snow…breeze…"
When Raoul comes back to himself, it is the grey light of dawn. Jackson nods at him, and makes him drink a thin broth, and he dozes again for a little while until the sun is high, but he is so hollow inside, so empty, he cannot bring himself to move.
There is one irrevocable, impossible fact. And it is that Martin is dead. And if Raoul ever moves again, it will be too soon.
They travel on, leave the river bank and the knoll that cradles all that remains of Martin, and they tie his horse to the back of McKey's wagon, loaded down with the packing crates of dinosaurs. Raoul rides alone, and cannot speak a word, and he knows the others are watching him, but he hasn't the energy to care.
And finally, slowly, they arrive back in Cheyenne. They sell the horses, and the wagon, and arrange passage on a stagecoach back to Denver. Charlie goes his own separate way, and squeezes Raoul's hand in farewell, and they arrange for the bones to travel direct to Chicago (with copies of Raoul's sketches and notes, that Martin had insisted he make each night by the fire), to an acquaintance of Martin's whom he'd told Taylor would take care of them, if something should happen. And when they reach in Denver, Taylor presses a letter into Raoul's hand.
"He told me to give you this," and his eyes are gentle, "a few nights before. Just in case."
But he does not open the letter, cannot bring himself to though his name is there, on the front in Martin's curling script, and he takes it out to look at, in his long nights in Denver, just to trace where Martin's own fingertips once touched.
There are letters waiting for him from Philippe, several of them, and he does not open them either, only sets them aside. The day he goes to the bank to collect the things he stored there, all those months ago, he takes Martin's things home with him too.
His own clothes no longer fit. He has grown too broad for them, his arms too muscled from work. And when he goes out to buy new clothes, he goes, too, to the law offices where he and Martin deposited their wills.
His own he takes back to his hotel and burns.
Martin's he leaves carefully folded, on top of the pile of letters that were waiting for him, too. There is so much, too much, more than he can bring himself to look at.
It is McKey, in the end, who helps him to arrange the things that need arranging, to sort through the letters and papers. McKey who writes to Martin's aunt in Breton to tell her the news, and sends her the things designated to go to her. McKey who shuffles Raoul from Denver to Chicago and back, finally, to Boston, where it all started. McKey who organises the letters to be sent back to their senders, with brief condolence notes. McKey who opens the will, that names Raoul executor, and sees to it that it is fulfilled.
McKey, who sits down with Raoul and pours him whiskey and glares at him until he writes Philippe with the promise that he will be home by Christmas.
And it is McKey, that same night, deeper into the bottle of whiskey, McKey who has become simply John, who hands him Martin's letter, and tells him, in a low voice, that if he does not open it now, then he might never be able to bring himself to.
Raoul draws in a ragged breath, as numb as he's been since the night all those weeks ago when Martin took his last gasp staring up at the stars, and opens the letter.
And that night, reading the sweet words of love, of thanks, the soft acknowledgement that, "I know you were sceptical about this whole endeavour, and I am endlessly happy, every day, to think that you chose to come out here with me even if you didn't believe at first. You've made a first-rate bone hunter, my love", and the lines, half-smudged, "I've suspected for some time that there is something worse wrong with me than mere bronchitis, but I have been afraid of finding out, and I hope, for your sake, that I am wrong," and, simply, "I know that if you are reading this then it must have come to pass, and I hope my death was not too protracted, but mostly, Raoul, I hope my suffering was not such to cause you undue pain," and it is that night, reading those words that Martin set down and hoped he would never have to read, that Raoul, finally, gives himself over to the tears that have lived within him for so long now, and begged to be released.
And as McKey's hands gently lower Raoul's head to his shoulder, Raoul sees again as if anew, the glow of golden firelight upon a pale face, tears shining in a pair of sky-blue eyes, and feels the soft press of uncertain lips against his, and the dampness of tears upon a cheek, but they can only be his tears now, and never anyone else's.
A/N: Just one chapter left which will appear on Sunday, and in the meantime, please review!
