‘You’ve gone over the chapel pretty thoroughly then?’
‘At least half a dozen times.’
‘It would have been the perfect location for a secret entrance but I can see the problem. There aren’t many places to hide it in here, that’s for sure,’ Ferguson said, gazing up and around the chapel.
‘That’s what’s so baffling. I was so damned sure that the entrance to the priory cellars, catacombs or whatever you want to call them was hidden in this chapel that I could smell it. But now I think it’s most likely somewhere in the house.’
Ferguson nodded. ‘I suppose it’s still the most logical site. I don’t think, somehow, it would be anywhere else.’
‘I guess so,’ Kingston sighed. ‘But there’s no saying where those damned monks built their priory. It could have been anywhere on the entire bloody estate.’
‘What does Jamie think about all this?’
‘At first, she was—well, ambivalent I suppose is the right word. I think, in the beginning, she thought I was some kind of English Don Quixote. But lately she’s come round to the idea that there may be something to it after all. Although, I must say, she’s not one for digging into the past.’
‘She’s an exception, then. Most of the Americans I’ve met lap up anything that’s historical. English history must be on the curriculum of every college in the country. Sometimes I think they know more about us than we do ourselves.’
Kingston waited patiently while Ferguson spent the next ten minutes snapping digital photos of every inch of the chapel. It seemed a trifle excessive to Kingston but Ferguson was an archivist after all, and by the miniature size of the camera, it was reasonable to assume that it was a new toy. After a few minutes spent viewing the results on the LCD monitor, they left the chapel and went back to the house, to join Jamie for lunch. By the time Ferguson left, it was close to three.
Kingston decided to take a walk to the walled garden where the peach house was nearing completion. When discovered, it was little more than a grey skeleton of rotted wood and broken panes of filthy glass supported only by the ivy and a strangle of vines that had almost sealed its fate. Kingston was all for taking it down but was persuaded by one of the master joiners on the team that it could be refurbished. What followed in the ensuing weeks was a singular achievement of extraordinary skill, patience and love. Despite the severe rot in the wooden sections, two joiners were able to make accurate templates to rebuild the framework. Behind them two glaziers went to work installing glass that was saved from the original framework and matching panes cut from old ones found in a salvage yard. Finally, the paint crew had given it a primer coat and two top coats of white paint. The brick flooring was now being installed and soon the handsome structure, butted against the high garden wall, with its steep sloping, south-facing roof would be home to peaches, nectarines, guavas, passion fruit and pineapples as it was in its glory days.
At four thirty, Kingston left the gardens and made his way back to the cottage where his bag of tools was ready waiting. The canvas bag contained a hammer, set of screwdrivers, chisel, pliers, electronic stud finder, several types of brush, can of air spray, a heavy Mag-lite flashlight and other miscellaneous items. Recalling the maxim that flashlights are tubular metal containers often kept in a briefcase to store dead batteries, he wasn’t going to trust his memory as to when the batteries were last changed, so he threw in four new spares.
It was drizzling steadily as he made his way to the chapel. Somehow the weather seemed appropriate for the Gothic encounter to come. This could be his last trip to the chapel. If he didn’t find the secret entrance to the catacombs this time, he would give up.
Closing the door to the chapel behind him, he switched on the flashlight and walked down the aisle to the first row of pews. There, he placed the toolkit on the bench, turned on the floodlights and sat down next to the aisle. He shivered. The place was like a tomb. Unlike his previous visits, where he’d spent many hours examining the limestone walls and timbers up close, and scrutinizing the floor on his hands and knees, he decided, this time, to simply sit and study the interior as an integral unit. He wasn’t quite sure what this might accomplish but he’d tried just about everything else and his instincts told him that perhaps he was looking too hard: that the answer was staring him in the face. Maybe not ‘staring’ but it was here somewhere. He felt it in his bones.
Sitting on the hard pew, he looked around the interior. It was now so familiar that he could visualize it with eyes closed. After a minute or so he gave up. With one elbow resting on his knee, he lowered his head, closed his eyes and massaged his brow. ‘Damn,’ he muttered under his breath. He sighed deeply, opened his eyes and stared blankly at the wooden rail of the pew front barely inches from him. It was the colour of dark chocolate with a lighter grain. He was sure it was oak. The eighteenth-century Welsh dresser in his flat had similar graining and patina. He leaned back, stretching an arm along the back of the pew, looking across the aisle to the row on the other side.