The Green Stone

by Graham Phillips

  Joanna had said they must find the Stone by 31 October, Halloween, the major witch festival of the year. Either they or their adversaries must succeed by that date.

  Marion was deeply concerned. ‘We’re on the right track,’ she said, ‘but we’ve got it wrong.’

  ‘In what way?’ Alan asked.

  ‘I don’t think the Stone has been found. I definitely saw where it was. I’m sure of that. By the avenue of trees I described. I’m certain it’s still hidden.’

  ‘So what about Charles Walton and whatever it was that he was supposed to have had?’ asked Andy. ‘Has that nothing to do with it?’

  ‘I think the Meon Hill murder has something to do with what we’re up against. I don’t know how I know, but I’m sure something is trying to get a message to us.’

  She explained how she felt that the dark-haired woman she had seen was the head of the coven that met at the Rollright stone circle, but they were not a third party. Rather they were the group who also sought the Meonia Stone. Perhaps, she suggested, they had stayed for years near Meon Hill because they believed that this was where the Stone was hidden. She was sure that the evil force - the evil being that Joanna had spoken of - had for years been manipulating this coven, hoping that they would one day discover the Meonia Stone. Why they hadn’t found the sword she didn’t know. She also felt that there was more to the sword than they yet understood, that its secret was still to be revealed.

  Besides, Joanna had told them of the Nine Worthies and of Pakington’s involvement. Perhaps Joanna’s evil opposition only knew of Gertrude Wyntour’s involvement, and so never knew of the coded message at Harvington Hall.

  ‘I think there is another stone,’ said Marion. ‘What Walton had was something different, their stone if you like.’

  Alan nodded in agreement. ‘D’you think their stone could do us any harm?’ he asked.

  Marion nodded. ‘I think it could.’

  ‘This might sound rather weird.’ Alan said, ‘but the words “beware of the round stone” came into my mind the other day. I don’t know if it’s relevant.’

  No one seemed to know. Marion said that she had had a further impression, that the coven headed by this dark-haired woman would meet at the Rollright Stones on Halloween for some evil purpose. She knew that they must find the Stone by the night of Halloween and use it to put an end to her powers. But her coven was also looking for the Stone, and they now had the means of finding it. Marion felt that the coven had in some way been alerted by Joanna’s communication. Perhaps it was for this reason that Joanna had not been able to tell them where the sword was hidden; instead she could only alert them to the clues to set them on the right path. But if Joanna knew and was a living woman, why had she not collected the sword herself? They did not know.

  Marion felt that some of the psychic messages had been intercepted, but that their adversaries were unaware that they had already found the sword. Before they broke up Alan and Marion had a simultaneous impression that something was searching for them. They could feel it, drawing ever nearer. Soon it would find them. There were five days left in which to find the Meonia Stone.

  The Rollright Stones

  Meon Hill stood out ominously against the horizon as they approached that Sunday morning. The gradual incline contrasted sharply with the cloudless sky beyond. Only the small cluster of trees that marked the summit broke the even skyline. These lonely copses standing high above the rolling terrain were, legend has it, first planted centuries ago by the Druids, thus creating temples of nature for their secret rites. Wooded groves where the ancients called upon the forces of nature. Folklore and country tales hold the last vestiges of these age-old mysteries. Tales of the heroic deeds of Celtic warriors who once stood watch on the ramparts of the Iron Age hill fort that now lies overgrown and forgotten on the upland beside the wood. A silent guardian of the easternmost gateway to the fertile Vale of Evesham, Meon Hill looks out over the tiny market gardens and peaceful orchards dotted across the countryside as it sweeps away into the west.

  Satan himself, so legend tells, had created Meon Hill. In a moment of rage, he cast a huge clod of earth in the hope of destroying the great Abbey of Evesham. But God had intervened, and the Devil threw too far; the pile of earth had crashed some nine miles to the east, creating what is now the mount of Meon Hill.

  The village of Lower Quinton appeared anything but sinister as they parked their car for a clearer view of the hill before them. Andy, Graham and Janet discussed their next move, finding it difficult to believe that somewhere in the area there might exist a satanic order of witches, a diabolical cult who had killed once and could, if the need arose, kill again.

  They decided to drive on, following the maze of narrow country lanes running part of the way up the hillside. They scanned the surrounding landscape, searching for Marion’s avenue of trees - their only clue. They followed the road until it ended and parked on the grass verge beside an old farm gate. Clambering over the fence, and following the narrow pathway alongside the recently harvested field, they climbed the gentle slopes towards the summit of the hill. From here they had a panoramic view of the countryside, but nowhere was there an avenue of trees. Perhaps the local church held some clue. The architectural style told them it was old, built well before the days of the Gunpowder Plot. Maybe it was dedicated to St Mary. Meonia fore Marye, was that the meaning of the message? But unless the church could offer further clues there was little point in starting to dig indiscriminately.

  Graham and Janet studied the map as Andy went off in search of the hill fort remains. They discussed the reality of the witch coven. There was no actual proof. Then again, nearly all the psychics had experienced visions and messages about the coven.

  Finally, they arrived at a decision. If the messages were accurate, then it was better to know their enemy. But where to begin? If, as Marion claimed, the coven was to meet at the Rollright Stones in less than three days’ time, they would now be making preparations for their satanic rites.

  They decided to go to the Rollright Stones but, before leaving, they checked in the church. There was nothing of interest.

  What, they wondered, lay ahead of them as they drove away from Meon Hill towards the ancient stone circle? The tranquillity of the sunny afternoon did little to dispel their mounting fears.

  Chapter 10

  Race Against Time

  The incense smoke spiralled upwards from the altar. Defiant points of yellow light from the candles adorned the image of Our Lady. The old priest solemnly led his tiny congregation in prayer. A feeling of safety and reassurance, the serenity of the church.

  But something else broke in upon that holy sanctuary. A sense of something vile, something wicked and immeasurably evil. Gaynor felt a dark shadow falling around her. She shuddered, trying to fight it off. She looked at her two younger brothers who were still singing. Her little sister stared innocently up at her. She knew they could not feel it; she knew she was alone. Why would it not leave? What did it want with her?

  She tried to concentrate on the priest’s voice, to fight it off. That kindly voice, no evil could defy his loving concern. A greater power operated through him, guiding and inspiring his words. But the shadow fell between them, blanketing his words with a heavy curtain of darkness. How could something so wicked enter the house of God?

  Then she knew. No evil approached her. She felt the now familiar love of her ‘friends’. They were calling her. There was something evil, but not in the chapel. Her ‘friends’ wished her to see it; she was being alerted, warned. The evil she had felt jarring at her nerves was far away in some distant place. They wished her to see it. They were sad, sorry that she must be shown, but only she could help. Gaynor agreed. She was willing to see.

  The darkness melted away to reveal a scene, somewhere terribly old. Once, good things had taken place there; there had been joy, the lore of nature, happy people. But this was no more. There had been atrocities against nature, acts of cruelty. Now evi
l lurked there, a dark shadow covered everything. What was this place? Gnarled and contorted shapes. Grey figures in a ring, silently waiting. As the light by which she saw grew in brightness Gaynor could see that the shapes were not people but cold stone, a circle of standing stones. How could they do this? Who had filled this place with such evil, transforming it into a desecrated sanctuary?

  Then she saw the woman, her long, black hair flowing wildly in the wind. She was not young although she was still beautiful. But her eyes, the windows to her soul, betrayed her. Bottomless pits of darkness they shone no beauty, only blackness. She was the instrument of some terrifying force which through her worked unimaginable cruelty.

  In her hands she held something, something she was making. An intertwined ring, a crown of thorns, a sacrilegious offering between which she wove sprigs of black and red berries, beads of deadly poison. A mockery of all that was good. Gaynor almost felt the bitter contempt of the woman as she placed the blasphemous token on the stone slab with a parody of loving care.

  Why should she be shown such wickedness? Again she was answered. The scene faded, and she saw familiar faces, people she knew. Graham, Andy and Janet. They were smiling, but she knew they were heading for danger, great danger. They were drawing nearer, closer to this evil, a power they did not understand, which could destroy them.

  Gaynor almost cried their names aloud. She must tell them, stop them. But how?

  Seven long strides shalt thou take

  If Long Compton thou canst see

  King of England thou shalt be…

  These were the words a conquering king was said to have heard as he approached the crest of the hill outside Long Compton on his triumphant march through England. The witch who owned the hill had set him this task, but as the King marched forward a mound of earth rose up blocking his view of the village. He and his knights were turned to stone with the words:

  As Long Compton thou canst not see

  King of England thou shalt not be

  Rise up, stick, and stand still, stone,

  For King of England thou shalt be none.

  Thou and thy men hoar stones shall be

  And I myself an eldern tree. . .

  The legend of the Rollright Stones has existed for more than four centuries, and over the years the old stone circle has become the traditional meeting place of the witches for which Long Compton was notorious. Embedded deep in the earth of the hill overlooking the tiny village, the almost perfect circle of ancient stones was, in reality, constructed by Megalithic peoples over 4,000 years ago. Like so many other Megalithic sites throughout Great Britain, archaeologists today can only theorise about the true purpose of the circle.

  When Andy, Janet and Graham arrived at the Rollright Stones on that warm Sunday afternoon, they were only concerned with the latter-day usage of this site. Standing beside a narrow country road, the stone circle is on privately-owned property, and a trust has been set up to ensure its preservation. The circle is open to the public and a small hut stands just inside a clump of nearby trees from where the wardens collect an entrance fee and maintain a protective watch over the circle. However, as they quickly discovered, there is nothing but simple goodwill to prevent anyone from entering the circle at the dead of night. As darkness descends, the stones are left alone, a timeless monument to the ancients who erected them. (1)

  As Andy and Janet made their way around the ring, attempting to defy the legend that the stones cannot be counted, Graham spoke to the woman in the hut, casually suggesting that he was interested in witchcraft being practised there.

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘it was a good few years ago now, back in the 40s or 50s, I think. There was a lot of talk, and several people claim to have seen them.’

  ‘Is there any evidence that it continued?’

  ‘No, they seemed to give up after the police became interested. Tried to tie it up with a murder.’

  ‘On Meon Hill?’

  ‘You know about it, then?’

  Graham nodded.

  ‘Someone wrote a book about it.’ (2)

  Unfortunately, this hardly proved that witchcraft had been practised there since the 1950s. However, from the adjoining road anyone could come and go as they pleased. As no houses stand anywhere near the circle and the road is little used, it was probable that no one would be likely to know.

  So how could the researchers discover whether a coven practised there today? Had the 1940s/50s coven finally left the Rollrights after falling under suspicion for the savage murder of Charles Walton? Whoever they were, they had not been arrested. Were the Meon Hill murderers, or at least their successors, about to return to the Rollright Stones as Marion had suggested?

  Some four hundred yards to the south-east of the circle stand the Whispering Knights, a group of five megaliths thought to have been the remains of an old burial chamber contemporary with the Rollright Stones. In legend, the five men were also petrified as they knelt together, plotting and scheming some distance from the King and his main band of men. As the researchers drew nearer, they saw that one of the stones lay horizontal, fallen centuries ago to give the Whispering Knights the appearance of huge vultures gloating over a stony carcass lying between them.

  As Andy looked over the iron railings surrounding the stones, his jaw dropped. Janet had seen it first. Graham stared blankly. On the recumbent stone, as if on a sacrificial altar, lay what at first looked like a posy of tiny red flowers. A closer examination revealed they were not flowers, but red and black berries woven into a ring large enough to wear as a headband. Berries, twigs and thorns interwoven together.

  So someone with a knowledge of witchcraft had been there, and recently too. It was almost certain that the stones were being made ready for a witchcraft ceremony. They did not touch or remove the entwined ring, deciding it was best to leave it undisturbed.

  Halloween was just three days away. Perhaps someone would return that night to continue their magical preparations. The researchers, too, would return secretly to keep watch. They booked into The White Hart Hotel at Moreton-in-the-Marsh and Andy telephoned the others, before they prepared to set off to the Rollrights. They thought it sensible to notify someone else of their intentions.

  Marion’s voice was almost deafening as she answered the phone. ‘Where are you?’

  ‘Near the Rollright Stones,’ Andy answered.

  ‘You must get away from there,’ she urged. ‘Gaynor’s been frantic all day. She’s certain you’re in great danger. You must get away now!’

  She told them of Gaynor’s vision in the church that morning, of the woman and the ring of berries. The accuracy was unbelievable. They decided there and then to cancel the hotel reservation and leave immediately. But this was not all. Marion insisted they must not return to Wolverhampton but go directly to her house. They could stay the night. Whatever happened they must come. She was insistent.

  They drove the 150 miles to Flint, arriving in the late evening. What would have happened had they returned to the Rollright Stones would never be known. They could only guess what their phone call to Marion Sunderland might have saved them from.

  On the morning of Monday, 29 October. Andy and Graham returned to Knights Pool with Janet, Marion and Gaynor. It was their first sight of the lake in daylight. They were eager to photograph the bridge and, if possible, discover more about its history. The lake lies on the estate of nearby Croome Court, which was once the stately home of the Earl of Coventry, but today is owned by the Society for Krishna Consciousness, as their British headquarters and as a meditation centre.

  Gaynor felt intuitively that they must return to the pool. The previous evening, she had said that at last she knew the purpose of the sword, and the answer to its hidden secret. It was not the cryptic message that was important, but the sword itself that would lead them to the Stone. She insisted that she personally must take the sword to the bridge. This was why she had been shown the bridge and the running man in her dream.

  In the light
of day, Knights Pool was not nearly so sinister as its cold waters had been at the dead of night. Water fowl lazed across the pool, occasionally diving for food in the murky depths. A soft breeze blew through the surrounding trees, as the autumn leaves fell onto the quiet waters.

  As Gaynor stood above the bridge staring quietly across the pool, Andy and Graham explained to Janet and Marion how they had discovered the sword. Gaynor was deep in thought. After a while she asked for the sword. She took the hilt in both hands and stretched out her arms. Slowly and deliberately she began to turn, pointing the sword slightly into the air before her. She stopped. The sword pointed away from the lake in the direction of a small apple orchard that lay just beyond the wood.

  ‘Over there,’ she said. ‘About a mile away there’s an old ruin. We must go there now.’

  Marion expressed no surprise. But the other three stared at Gaynor, who smiled back and shrugged nonchalantly. How she knew she could not say, but she insisted she was right.

  ‘That’s it!’ exclaimed Marion, as Gaynor handed the sword back to Andy. ‘The feeling I had the other day about the secret of the sword being different to what we thought.’

  It seemed that Gaynor was to use the sword itself to locate the Stone. But there was more to the sword than a simple divining rod. It would not lead directly to the Meonia Stone.

  They followed the bearing Gaynor had been given. Just beside the road, a mile or so to the south-east of Knights Pool, stood the remains of an old castle. The decaying building looked like an ancient Gothic gatehouse; its once great but now crumbling arch spanned the battlemented wall linking two of the surviving turrets.