Page:St Andrews Ghost Stories (1921).djvu/22

14 at one time. The entrance was a Norman archway, and the remains of an oak door still hung there. We found a shallow bath shaped pool of muddy water inside, and a lot of broken stones and bits of old statues and glass. At the far end was a large square opening a few feet above the pool of water. We, of course, made for this, and found there was a cell beyond. The whole well on one side was riven and rent, either by lightning or the effects of an earthquake shock. If that ancient well could have spoken it would have told us as queer tales as St Rule's Tower at St Andrews. There was a most curious, over-powering, sickening odour inside the place, like a vault or charnel house."

I remarked that I knew no smells worse than acetylene gas or the awful smell I unearthed when digging, long ago, opposite the St Andrews Cathedral.

"Well," said Anklebone, "I can't imagine a worse odour than there was beside that Prior's Well. It turned us all so faint. We had to get some brandy. We got into the far cell, and there were two skeleton bodies on the flagged floor. One was a blanched skeleton as far as the neck, but the skull was well preserved, and matted black hair still clung on it and round the jaws. All the teeth were in their place. Some rings had fallen from the bony fingers, and a sword, all eaten away by rust, lay beside the skeleton. The other was like a mummified ape, of a dark oak colour, the nails on the fingers and toes being quite perfect. Chains, also almost worn away, hung round the feet and hands.

"'Good Heavens,' said master, 'it is Sir Guy Ravelstocke and the murdered Apostle!' There was no doubt of that whatever. We had them removed and buried at once. The mystery was solved after all these long years.

"The nigger had been placed there, but the mystery of Sir Guy was inexplicable. Who came for him that night when he rushed out of the door of Lausdree Castle, centuries ago, with his sword, and who carried him to his doom in the Friar's Well? No one can answer that terrible question now. Oh! that the old well could speak and reveal its secret."