The Lost Gardens

Chapter One

Somerset, 2003





The clang of metal on metal resounded off the walls of the old stone house, echoing across the lawns to be lost in the dense forest beyond.

‘Doctor!’

Lawrence Kingston brought the sledgehammer down on the iron stake one more time.

‘Doctor!’

He looked up to see the carrot-haired figure of his foreman, Jack Harris, approaching. Leaning the sledgehammer against his leg he wiped his brow with the back of his hand. He was about to take a rest anyway. For the last twenty minutes he had been surveying, driving in stakes on the top lawn—one of three football-field-size levels that stepped down from the back of the big house. Once mown and rolled twice a month to look like green carpeting, they were now a waist-high tangle of weeds.

‘Need you to come and take a look at something,’ Jack said, nodding back over his shoulder.

‘Be right there.’ Kingston picked up the survey maps, put them in his canvas bag and walked over to join Jack. Was it good or bad news? From the look on Jack’s face, Kingston couldn’t tell. ‘What you got then?’ he asked.

Jack smiled. ‘You’ll see in a minute.’

With nothing further said, they took off.

Soon they reached a clearing some five hundred yards from the house. It was in one of the most overgrown sections of the ‘Jungle’, as it was now nicknamed. Nearby, to the staccato whine of chainsaw and thwack of axe blade on wood, Jack’s crew of three was chopping up the fallen trees and cutting down the dead ones, many of which were supported by their less tipsy neighbours. Wood-smoke from their bonfire was thick in the still air. When Jack and Kingston arrived, the men stopped work and gathered around.

Jack said nothing, waiting for Kingston’s reaction. Facing them, built partway into a vertical limestone crag, was the façade of what appeared to be a small chapel. Off to one side was a house-high tangle of ivy, brambles and vines that had been cut and ripped away from its walls by Jack’s crew.

‘It was completely covered,’ said Jack. ‘You could’ve walked by here a hundred times and never known it was there. Three feet thick it was.’

‘Amazing,’ Kingston muttered, walking up to the blackened oak door, touching the rubblestone surround. Fern-edged trails like giant snail tracks tattooed the wall where the ivy had been tugged away. On either side of the door two identical stained glass windows displayed griffins. The glass was filthy but intact.

‘Did you go inside?’ asked Kingston.

‘No, I thought it best to wait for you.’

‘Let’s take a look then.’

Gripping the large iron door handle, Kingston turned the key and the door swung open, hinges creaking. Why the key had been left in the door was something that he would ponder later. He was too excited to worry about it now.

Sufficient light filtered through the open door for them to make out the interior. The space was no more than twenty-five feet wide and about forty feet long. The walls were wood and plaster, the ceiling simply raftered. For a chapel, and that’s surely what it was, Kingston was surprised at the absence of ecclesiastical artifacts and trappings. The only ornamentation apparent was the handsome bronze sconces, four on each of the two long walls, none holding candles. A central flagstone aisle ending at a pulpit was flanked on either side by eight rows of simple wooden pews. The pulpit was panelled with turned balusters. But Kingston’s eyes were not on the pulpit. He was looking at what was beyond.

As he walked farther down the aisle he could now see clearly what had seized his attention. Behind the pulpit alongside a small baptismal font was a large stone circular well about five feet in diameter. It looked out of keeping with the rest of the interior. He went up and rested his hand on the cold stone.

‘Well, I’ll be damned,’ he said, turning to Jack. ‘I bet this was originally a healing well.’

‘A healing well?’

‘Right,’he said, leaning over the waist-high ledge, peering down into the inky darkness. ‘They go back to Celtic times and beyond, long before the Romans came. I’m told there are quite a few around here.’ His voice echoed around the stark walls of the chapel. ‘The waters are believed to have healing powers. In the Middle Ages wells were sanctified and frequented by pilgrims.’

One of Jack’s crew had followed them into the chapel. ‘What do the waters heal?’he asked.

‘Apparently just about anything ailing you—from a hangnail to a heart condition. Skin complaints, asthma, epilepsy, stomach ailments, you name it—even paralysis! Mental as well as physical, so legend has it.’

Kingston stepped back, reached into his pocket and took out a coin. Dropping it into the well, he counted under his breath. One … two … on three, he heard the plop of the coin hitting water. ‘Deep, by the sound of it.’ He turned and cast his eyes around the low ceiling. ‘Tomorrow, let’s rig up some lights in here, Jack, and we’ll show it to Jamie. She has her own place of worship now.’