The Monument Mystery

By David Adamson

When Grandpa was a boy, he befriended a creature on the family farm who could be invisible to human eye. This creature sat on the shoulder of Jack (Grandpa) and, being invisible, guided Jack with answers to exams and other problems.

The friendship lasted all of Jack’s life and even helped him, as an adult, with business problems and decisions, so that his grandchildren also had access to this knowledge and guidance.



This story is based on family farms in East Anglia, which have records for the last 1000 years and the ebb and flow of different cultures. The basic wildlife has remained little changed this last 1000 years other than wolves dying out, but the forests that covered all of the areas have gone and so the creatures supported by them have been reduced. In this story, the Guardian maintains the balance and still uses his five-year calendar gold hat (German museums have some of these dating from the Bronze Age). It was the spread of arable farming that needed these tall hats and grassland farming calendar hats were less high. Much old knowledge on astronomy and seasonal cycles was lost when the hat use and class of people who interpreted their information were done away with by incoming Christians who melted down the gold hats to fund the first churches.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Brown Dog Books
• Release date: Oct 26, 2022
• ISBN: 9781839525681

Book preview

Characters:

Sooty Smith – the goblin, alias Sam Ooti Smith

Aelfi – the water sprite, alias Ancient Elemental Life Form Indigene – ‘Original inhabitant’

Jack – farmer’s youngest son, alias Junior Art & Craft Kobold – Saxon wood sprite

Uncle Barry – a professor, Jack’s uncle

Guvnor – Jack’s dad

Background

This story is based on a West Suffolk farm and its history and the records and memories of previous occupants. Because it is the source of a river it had Stone Age occupation and flint axes are found there still. It has been primarily woods and parkland through the ages with little arable land until tractor power developed in recent times, so deer hunting in the woods, rabbit hunting and fishing were the main occupations. The grassland supported cattle, horses and geese flocks but dairying was the main function.

It was an abbey-owned property from AD 1000 and has been recorded over ten centuries. People associated there range from Saxon and Viking leaders to Civil War notables and illegitimate royals.

Chapter 1

Whiff of Adventure

The early morning sunshine flooded through his bedroom window and Dad turned over in bed enjoying the sun’s warmth and light. He thought about making a tray of morning tea when a sharp, door-bang, making the window rattle, changed his priorities and he slid out of bed to investigate. Down below his window and going through the garden gate into the field was the cause of the noise. His young son, Jack, accompanied by his terrier dog, Bonnie, was setting out across Monument Field towards the pond. The Guvnor watched them, remembering his own happy boyhood in such a lovely summer, and knew instinctively what Jack had in mind. Yesterday, Joe, the farm digger driver, had found a big stone slab by the pond edge and Jack had listened in to the conversation. Joe said it would come in very handy for a base when they put the water pump in to provide extra water change to the fish ponds that were fed from the pond and its water source. Dad had replied that Joe was not to move the stone until he’d had time to look at it. Jack knew that the farm only had chalk, clay and flints, so naturally he immediately thought that it sounded interesting.

Dad smiled to himself that he would have thought the same thing at twelve years old and was also aware that Jack was acting before anyone could say no.

Monument Field was a mass of yellow buttercups and Dad grinned to himself as he watched Jack in his short trousers trying to high-step over the canopy to avoid the wet getting into his boots, then giving up and running directly towards the pond – Bonnie snuffling and fossicking behind him, thoroughly approving of the rabbit chasing that this walk and adventure was producing.

Jack arrived at the pond edge and walked around it until he found the stone slab. Joe had taken the topsoil off and scraped it pretty clean. Jack wondered whether the slab was part of the long-disappeared monument. All the farm maps showed Monument Field but there was never any site marked. The farm records of when it belonged to the local abbey were detailed and meticulous, so Dad had often felt cheated that a thousand years of continuous records were still insufficient.

Jack was wet through and Bonnie was both soaked and filthy – she had chased some rabbits to their holes and now sat at Jack’s feet with a black muzzle and soil-clogged feet where her digging efforts had turned her from a white terrier into something that resembled discarded carpet. She looked at Jack expectantly for the next adventure. Jack walked to the digger and almost immediately a rabbit bolted for cover and Bonnie followed whooping with excitement. It did good though, as her rush through the buttercups washed her face and feet clean and she looked quite white again.

Jack said to Bonnie, Come on and we’ll look at the slab. He jumped down on top of it and, remembering what Grandpa always did, started to measure it by boot lengths. The stone was twenty boot lengths by eight and obviously far too heavy for him to move. Jack sat down on a big fallen bough and thought about it, then jumped down on top of the slab and started clearing the soil around the edges with a bit of stick. The cleaning revealed angular cuts in one long edge but nothing on the other three sides. Jack’s Uncle Barry had explained ogham script to him last holiday and now Jack was sure he had discovered something very special indeed and very rare in Eastern England.

He came back to the tree branch, sat down and tried to think what he could usefully do, as he hadn’t thought to bring pencil or paper. He said to Bonnie, It’s no good you sat there, wagging your tail – I need ideas. The wetness of his boots reminded him that he really ought to dry them out a bit and he also felt a little cold, what with having wet pants and all the excitement of the script, so he jumped up and down. His boots squelched horribly and the wet warm ooze between his toes made him want to kick his boots off as quickly as possible. He pulled them off and stuck them upside down on some twigs of the branch so that they drained. The sun was quite warm and soon a column of vapour rose from the boots and went into the canopy of a very old and big oak tree that grew on the pond bank. In jumping up and down he realised that his pocket knife was in his trouser pocket and, taking it out, had the brainwave that he could carve a representation of the ogham if he could find a suitable piece of wood. He remembered that Joe had tipped some building rubbish – plaster and rubble – into the wood gateway and, sure enough, a twelve-inch piece of lath poked out. Jack seized it and bore it back in triumph to the slab and copied all the ogham marks as best he could.

Bonnie and Jack sat together on the branch and wondered what to do or even what not to do next. Bonnie suddenly behaved very oddly for her and tried to climb onto Jack’s lap – she usually settled for pats and treats rather than cuddles. You are a silly old dog, Bon, and he stroked her head. In the quietness Jack thought he heard a baby crying but it was a very small noise and sounded short of breath too. The sound got a little louder and Bonnie scrabbled on his lap and growled. The noise seemed to come from the oak tree and Jack turned over in his mind what creature could make a noise like that – very feeble – but owls, squirrels, etc. don’t make sounds of that sort. Bonnie now growled and all her back hair stood up.

Bonnie, I told you that you’re safe and there’s nothing to worry about… and then rather bravely said, …and that goes for whatever animal you are up there.

Jack got the impression of movement, and a vapoury green column where it met the canopy solidified and a small green figure sat there on a branch swinging its legs but looking very sad and miserable. It’s quite alright, said Jack. I meant what I said about helping you. If you come down, you can tell me the problem – I’m sure we can help.

The little person slid in one continuous slide down the tree trunk and came and sat beside Jack. Jack held Bonnie tightly by the collar so that she couldn’t be nasty and, turning around, said, I wish I could come down trees like that – that was fantastic! The little fellow grinned and said, I’m Aelfi and I’m a guardian water sprite and I’ve been so frightened I just couldn’t cope. Jack couldn’t quite see why sitting in the crook of an old oak tree could be that frightening when you could move like Aelfi did.

Aelfi grinned and although he was a normal shape, he had green teeth so his smile did look unusual. When he turned round quickly his outline got blurred and Jack got the distinct impression that, seen side on, he might be invisible. I’d love to hear your story, Aelfi. I’ve never heard of you before and my dad and grandpa have not mentioned you being here before either.

Aelfi replied, Well, mortals have four generations per one hundred years and I’ve been banished for a thousand years. Anyway, I got the wrong side of a bishop who’d previously been a druid and so, knowing the old magic, he managed to trick me and put me in a sealed gold container beneath a great stone slab that needed ten men to move it.

I know the slab! cried Jack. But it isn’t moved. However did you get out?

Aelfi carried on. "That is what has been so frightening – a great dragon pawed and pawed at the slab and it made the ground shake and vibrate like an earthquake. The movement broke the seal and I escaped. I’m made of water and molecules so I eased out of the bottle and found my way to the air and light and after one thousand years of darkness and loneliness, I was ever so happy to see the sun again! Then, everything turned black – a great mechanical dragonfly hovered over me and all the ground shook and I couldn’t stand the noise and vibration – my shape lost any definition and it all just reduced me to tears – so