"The Guide at Fountain's Abbey"
A short ghost story...
Every year, around late October, the National Trust keeps World Heritage Site Fountain’s Abbey open late into the evening, the site being lit by coloured floodlights. It looks magnificent!
They also put on events during those evenings. In October 2022 I read the following story to a group of about 30 people in the lavatorium.
The Guide at Fountain’s Abbey
He liked the early mornings best, when it was still quiet, before they let the public in. It had become a ritual. “We need you to go down to the Abbey,” they’d said on his first day, “and do a quick recce, just to check.” He’d asked them what he was checking for. “Anomalies.” Maureen had seen the confusion flicker in his face. “You know, to confirm that no-one’s got in over night — human or animal — and that, if there’s been any heavy rain or strong winds, the old place has stood up okay.” He doubted whether, after all these years, a spot of rain was going to do any damage.
Once he’d settled in, he started to get to work slightly earlier in order to give himself a little more time on his rounds. He had a deadline by which he needed to report back, so any form of loitering was out of the question. If he wanted to spend more time in the Abbey — as he found he did — he had to do so at his own expense. During those first few weeks he began to arrive five minutes early, then ten, and so on. Settling into his new routine — and with his fellow colleagues getting used to him and his ways — by the time Christmas came his penchant for extended inspections became something of a soft joke with the rest of the team. “You must know every brick,” one of them said. “Not yet,” he replied. When they closed the monument for Christmas Day, that was hard.
Not having been a particularly young man when he started, getting down to the Abbey during the winter became increasingly problematic, especially after he slipped one February morning and banged his head because he’d not been looking where he was going, mesmerised — as always! — by the sunlight through the old window arches. After that, they let him use the buggy on mornings when he was feeling particularly stiff. When he took it, he did so reluctantly.
It was early during the Spring solstice when he found the monk waiting for him. Emerging from the darkness of the Frater of the Lay Brothers he had initially missed the other man standing near the wall of the Chapter House, his eyes taking a moment to re-adjust to the growing brightness of the day. He loved the long vaulted dark frater; for him it felt like the heart of the Abbey, the peaceful place where he always started his rounds. It grounded him, provided him with the context for his day. Perhaps more than that. The monk, simply dressed in long brown vestments was, he realised, looking directly towards him. No-one had mentioned there would be someone else doing the rounds; perhaps it was a new colleague, an actor rehearsing a part, pandering to the trend for ‘interactive experiences’. None the wiser — and keen to get off on the right foot — he made his way round the cloister towards the Chapter House.
“Morning,” he called from perhaps twenty or thirty yards away, “looks like it will be a grand day.”
His companion said nothing. Getting closer, he saw the monk was older than he had first thought, and surely too old to be a new recruit to the team unless his ageing was the genius of make-up.
“I’ve not seen you before,” he offered, trying to find a way into conversation. Getting no reply, he glanced around the cloister, up to the external walls of the nave, and over the monk’s shoulder into the darkness of the Chapter House. “It’s so peaceful here isn’t it?”
It was the kind of gambit he used when he came across visitors during the day, liking to address those who stood slightly apart from the rest, standing in quiet contemplation. There was never any answer other than ‘yes’ — except this time.
The monk turned and walked through the passage alongside the Chapter House and towards the main edifice of the abbey, the presbytery, the nave. And so he walked with him, commenting not just on the physicality of the place but how it made him feel. In reality it was a one-sided conversation, though it didn’t seem that way. Pausing by the north transept, he found himself looking up at the broken walls to where the roof would have been, and to the deepening blue sky beyond. He stood there for a moment, then when he returned his gaze to ground level he found he was alone.
Back in the office, he asked Maureen whether they were planning any new features for visitors. “Features?” she had asked, “Such as?” “Oh, I don’t know, a more interactive version of the tours we currently offer.” She had laughed gently at his use of the word ‘interactive’ as if it belonged to a generation alien to him. He let it go. Then after a pause, she said “Are you okay?” Confused, he sought clarification. “Why?” “You look a little pale, that’s all.” He let that go too.
The next morning — arriving even earlier than usual — it was with some impatience he made his way down to the Abbey, heading immediately for the Chapter House. Disappointed not to find the monk there, he resumed his normal routine — only to find the brown-robed figure waiting for him in the Refectory. Not expecting any verbal acknowledgement, he merely nodded to the monk who this time nodded in recognition. Just then he felt a slight chill which, once it had passed, permitted them to begin their slow inspection together, disappearing side-by-side into the darkness of the Frater of the Lay Brothers.
This story appears in my 2024 short fiction collection, Dust, dancing.