...Chapters 5 & 6
Click here for chapter 6

** (5) **

David Crawford and his grandmother sat together watching television. The programme they were watching was a drama based on the events in a hospital somewhere in London. There were several threads to the storyline, but the main thing seemed to be that there were a lot of agitated and unstable people in the hospital. This included the doctors and nurses who worked there, and the patients and their family members who visited them. There was also an obvious attempt in the drama to educate the viewers against certain evil practices; these included visiting the accident and emergencies department with a minor ailment, and taking illicit drugs. The possible consequences of both these actions were exemplified with considerable effect in the drama. Strangely enough, David was beginning to feel not quite himself. He didn’t exactly feel unwell: it was just that something was not quite right. His head felt slightly lighter than normal. He considered the possibility that he might be going down with the flu. Some of his friends had been absent from the sixth-form college he attended for over a week with this ailment. There was also the possibility that it might be the result of the almost overwhelming warmth and stuffiness of the cottage living room. His grandmother needed extra warmth because of her age, and so the gas fire was as usual turned up to its maximum level.

When the episode of the drama they had been watching ended, his grandmother went to the kitchen. She reappeared again abut five minutes later with two mugs of hot chocolate. “You look a bit flushed, pet. Is the fire too hot for you?” she inquired with concern in her voice. “No, I’m okay Gran. Thanks,” he replied, taking one of the mugs of hot chocolate from her. He knew that his grandmother would prioritise his comfort above hers if he indicated that the room was indeed too hot. Besides, he could go and stand in the kitchen for a few minutes to cool off, and open the kitchen door to clear his head. In the meantime, he blew across the surface of the steamy, creamy hot chocolate and then took a sip. His grandmother sat back down and glanced at the evening news that was now on the television. For her, the news these days seemed to cover mainly incomprehensible events in far-off locations. Apart from the fact that the events were invariably distressing, the places in which many of them took place seemed so totally alien and unrecognisable. Where were these places when she was younger? Were people actually living peaceably in Kosovo, or in East Timor, or in any of the other current hot spots all those years ago when she was still a young woman? Or did these places and their tormented inhabitants just suddenly appear one day as if out of nowhere, possibly sometime after the introduction of decimalization? The international news was followed by the local news, which once again had an item on the murder of the young woman in Newcastle-upon-Tyne the previous night. This reminded her that terrible things also happened to innocent people much nearer home. On the report, the police appealed for witnesses to come forward. The police admitted that they had nothing much to go on so far. Police security cameras did not cover the relatively secluded part of the city where the murder had apparently taken place. They did, however, have some grainy footage of her walking alone down Dean Street. After a few moments, the young women stepped out of the range of the security cameras and then no doubt in a few terrible moments more stepped off the world. Elsie Crawford sighed and felt consumed by grief. She also felt angry and helpless. Then she looked at her grandson and wondered what type of world he would eventually live in when she had gone.

In an attempt to lighten up her mood, she decided to speak to her grandson. “It’s strange that Paul Jackson hasn’t come over to see you this evening,” she pointed out, referring to a friend of her grandson who lived in the cottage directly across the road. “Yes, I thought he might drop by,” replied David. “Maybe he’s gone out with some other friends.” This was his indirect way of saying that Paul Jackson had gone out with his girlfriend. At seventeen years of age, Paul Jackson was one year older than David Crawford. “I expect I’ll see him tomorrow,” he added.
“I can’t imagine him walking around the village on a night like this. Listen to that wind!” commented his grandmother, as the windows in the cottage shuddered under the strain of a particularly strong gust. “Why don’t you give him a call? Invite him over here, if you wish. You can both watch ‘Match of the Day’ later on,” she suggested, referring to the popular television programme that covered the highlights of the day’s main soccer matches. Right on cue, as if part of a contrived scene in a stage play, there was a sudden knock on the front door of the cottage. “That’s probably him,” David said, standing up to answer the door.

“Hello, Paul,” said Elsie Crawford as Paul Jackson entered the living room. “Are you okay pet? You look upset,” she said noticing the uncharacteristically serious expression on his face. “I’m okay, thanks, Mrs Crawford,” answered Paul Jackson, and then added: “But my cat, Katy, is missing. We haven’t seen her for three days. When she didn’t return last night we were concerned. But not turning up today means that surely something is seriously wrong with her.”
“Wow, that is weird!” hollowed David. “And the funny thing is we were just talking earlier this evening about the disappearance of cats from the village.” He now felt that the malaise he had experienced earlier in the evening begin to lift. This seemed to follow the breath of cold fresh air taken when answering the door. Yes, he now definitely felt much better, maybe even slightly elated. But surely this could not be attributed to some sort of schadenfreude at hearing of his friend’s distress. Perhaps he was just galvanized by the excitement of realising that there was evidently a real mystery in the village; even if it was perhaps, at least to someone who didn't own a cat, a relatively trivial one.

David’s grandmother, however, nodded as if acknowledging some awful truth. She once again mentioned the case of her friend’s missing cat, without recounting the spiteful remarks that had been made about the cats possibly being used as meat by the Thai takeaway. Her friend’s remarks on this matter had annoyed and upset her, and she didn’t want to be a party to the rumours now spreading around the village. Elsie Crawford knew that Jack and Nok Hume couldn’t possibly have had anything to do with these disappearances. It was probably some youths from the Forestry Flats playing cruel pranks. Then suddenly, a childhood memory pushed its way unexpectedly into her consciousness. The recollection was both profound and slightly disconcerting. It was something that was not part of those thoughts and experiences frequently recalled because of their importance and links with the present. Nor was it one of those strange and unimportant memories that for some unfathomable reason the mind sees fit to retain and recycle for evermore. This was a package of events and feelings experienced, stored and then almost lost. She was a young girl again in the village of Wet Rain Hill and her cat, her darling little cat, with its insatiable appetite for salmon and trout heads was missing. It had been missing for a whole day. She was crying and sobbing uncontrollably as she walked around the village calling out its name: “Katy, Katy … Katy”. Yes, strangely she had also called her cat Katy rather than something like: Kitty. She had wanted her cat to be known by a less common appellation. Then she was lying in bed at night trying to come to terms with this new and unwelcome emotion: profound sadness. Her parents had promised to get her a new cat, which was surely a sign that they thought her cat would never return home again. She never did see Katy again.

“Gran, are you okay?” boomed a young, familiar and anxious voice.
“Yes, I’m okay. Don’t worry about me, pet,” she replied, bringing herself back to the present. “Just now, you looked so strange. Are you sure everything is okay Gran?” asked her grandson with concern. “Everything is fine. I was just thinking about the cat, that’s all,” she replied. Then she turned to Paul Jackson, and asked: “Aren’t you staying Paul?” She was referring to the fact that he had still not taken off his coat. “I was only going to stay for a couple of minutes Mrs Crawford,” he replied. “I need to continue looking for Katy. I’ve only looked around the village, including the graveyard because she sometimes plays in there. I think I’ll go and have a wander down Wet Rain Hill.”
“It’s no ..,” she was going to say that it was no use, but then she said: “It’s no night to be wandering around the hill. You’ll get blown away.” Paul Jackson smiled at her, but did not otherwise respond. Then he pulled out a torch from the inside of his pocket and began to fidget with it. This indicated that, despite Mrs Crawford’s advice and the foul weather outside, he did intend to continue his search for his missing cat. “What a poor thing,” sighed Elsie Crawford. This was a statement that could apply either to the cat or to Paul Jackson. “Gran, I’m going out to help Paul look for his cat. I need to clear my head as well. Don’t worry, we’ll stay near to the cottage,” said David going out to the hallway to collect his coat. His grandmother looked concerned. “Why don’t you just look over into Wet Rain Hill from the garden at the back? Paul has a torch,” she suggested as he reappeared with his coat. “You don’t need to go charging down the hill in the dark tonight.” The sudden recollection that she had seen a figure snooping around the back of the cottages a few days ago increased her anxiety. “And David, please only stay out for five or ten minutes. What will your father and mother say to me if anything happens to you?” she asked.
“Nothing is going to happen, Gran. We’re only looking for a cat, not an escaped convict!” said her grandson in reassuring tones. “And besides, just as Dad said this evening, nothing ever happens in Wet Rain Hill anymore.”
“Except the disappearance of its cats,” countered Elsie Crawford.

As he opened the door and stepped out from the kitchen into the darkness of the garden at the back of the cottage, David had the sensation of crossing a threshold into a different realm. For a start, there was an abrupt change in the temperature. The cloying heat of the cottage was replaced by the raw coldness of the night. The cottage itself and the stone wall surrounding the garden seemed to have little or no effect in offering any form of shelter from the wind. The turbulence of the night air made him momentarily gasp for breath. It was like wading into a deep, tempestuous and invisible ocean. The wind tried furiously to wrest the door from his grip and to send it crashing back into his companion’s face. David held onto the door handle with all his strength until the burden was taken over by his friend coming behind him. Then the two young men struggled along the short garden path towards the wall, which faced onto the hill. A myriad of stars peppered the bible black moonless night sky above.

Leaning forwards on the stone garden wall, they gazed into the darkness that engulfed the hillside before them. All that could be seen in the distance were isolated spots of light coming from a few homesteads to the east and west, or lights from the occasional vehicle on Boldlaw Road to the west. For a while, they did not speak to each other, and only listened to the strange tune that was being played this particular evening by the wind. Everything above the ground seemed to be vibrating, shuddering, clashing, hissing and whistling. An empty overturned metal bucket waltzed erratically around the small patio in one corner of the garden; only its weight preventing it from lifting itself over the wall and fleeing down the hill.

Paul Jackson took out his torch and shone it down the hillside. The beam illuminated tufts of grass amidst bare patches of rocky earth nearby the cottage. The steep curvature of the hill created a horizon, below which, the torchlight could not reach. As he swept the beam to the left, a group of sheep was caught by it huddled up against the high stone wall of the village school next door. Startled by the torchlight, their shallow caprine eyes gazed back in fear and incomprehension at the source. Then the sheep jostled each other in panic and eventually shuffled away out of sight. Paul Jackson then directed the beam to the right towards that part of the hill behind the Humes’ cottage. Almost immediately, a light came on in the kitchen at the back of the cottage. “Switch it off,” gasped David. “They’ll think someone’s snooping around their cottage again.” Paul Jackson switched off his torch. Unlike the living room at the back of the Humes’ cottage, the curtains in the kitchen were not drawn. Nok Hume could be seen taking something from the refrigerator. She evidently, however, could not see the two figures leaning over the garden wall next door. A few moments later the kitchen light was switched off and the sound of the audience laughing on the television programme the Humes were watching could be heard as Nok Hume returned back into the living room of her cottage.

“It’s hopeless, isn’t it?” gulped Paul Jackson, barely audible as the wind grabbed his words and scrambled them into the valley below. “There’s no way we’re going to find her out there tonight.” David responded with a non-committal nod of his head. There was no gate leading out from the garden onto the hill, only a ledge in the form of a large flat stone projecting out from both sides of the wall that made climbing over it easier. Paul Jackson stepped up onto this ledge and switched on his torch again. Then he clambered completely onto the top of the stone wall and began shining his torch down the hill. From this elevated position, he was able to see further down the hill than before. But for some reason, David felt slightly irritated by this manoeuvre. Perhaps it was because he felt that his friend was being slightly presumptuous in clambering around property that was not his own. And maybe it was also because he didn’t like being looked down upon, not to mention being left in the dark.

“Wow, you should see this, Dave! Liz’s Rock really looks weird there in the distance,” Paul Jackson said turning towards David. At that very moment, the torch beam strayed slightly from its original direction and for an instant caught something moving down the hill. Only David was looking in that direction and only he saw it. Frozen, he was unable to respond to his friend’s comments in any meaningful way. Instead, he stood in a trance trying to come to terms with what he had apparently just seen on the hill. It was either the most remarkable trick his imagination had ever played on him, or it was something that absolutely did not fit into the world or scheme of things that he had been living in up to that very moment. He was just about to try to communicate to Paul Jackson about what he had just seen when something else distracted the both of them. It was the sound of someone shouting. “What the hell is going on?” exclaimed Paul Jackson, using his torch to search the darkness for the source of the noise. Cries of hysteria, of terror, were borne out of the darkness by the wind. For a few seconds the torch beam could not locate anything moving on the hill, then suddenly Paul Jackson yelled out: “Look Dave, it’s that weird guy who’s lives alone in Church Lane!”

A figure could be seen running along the hill from the general direction of Liz’s Rock towards Boldlaw Road. He was evidently unconcerned by the torchlight emanating from somewhere above him. His clearly had other more pressing concerns at present. Nothing, however, could be seen following him on the hill. As far as they could see, he was alone, and eventually ran to a point someway down the hill where he reached the dry stone wall dividing Wet Rain Hill from Boldlaw Road. Then, he flung himself over the wall onto the road and disappeared from sight.

“Please don’t tell my Gran that we’ve seen someone snooping around out there; it’ll frighten her to death,” demanded David Crawford in a firm but hushed tone, as they both returned back into the kitchen a few minutes later. “I won’t say a word,” agreed Paul Jackson, and then he continued: “but I think this guy must be some sort of pervert: a peeping Tom.”
“Well, I overheard this evening that some guy in the village has got the hots for Nok next door, and he has been making a nuisance of himself,” said David. “I wouldn’t be surprised if that was him.”
“Crikey! But I’d like to know why he is running around screaming and shouting like someone demented. He’s not going to get much peeping done at that rate. I reckon he must have been high on LSD or something like that.”
“I don’t know. Maybe he saw something that scared him,” suggested David thoughtfully. He decided not to mention to his friend anything about what he believed he had seen moments before.
“Anyway, please, not a word,” pleaded David once again as they both entered the living room. The television program: ‘Match of the Day’ had already begun.

** (6) **

David Crawford slept poorly that night. The little sleep he managed to get was filled with strange and violent dreams. In one of them, he was chased by a pack of preternatural cats across the slopes of Wet Rain Hill. Then, in a manner possible only within the terrible logic of a nightmare, the fearsome cats were transmogrified into a pack of fast-moving jaw-snapping crocodiles. Racing across the inclines of Wet Rain Hill, exhausted and terrified, he struggled to flee from the terrible reptilian horde that pursued him. But as he sensed that the creatures were close on his heels he found himself, oblivious of the unrealistic discontinuity in his situation, suddenly standing in the graveyard of St George’s church helping his friend Paul Jackson look for his lost cat. The cat then appeared before them, standing by an old moss-covered gravestone. But when Paul Jackson approached this spot to try to retrieve the cat, the earth around the gravestone opened up and swallowed him screaming into its depths. His last memory of this alternative ontological realm was that of fleeing in blind panic from the graveyard, out through the lich gate onto Church Lane, only to encounter an equally hysterical Mr X running towards him.

Sunday morning was bright and bitterly cold. The high winds had now completely died down. David Crawford awoke with a start. His heart pounded, and his body was convulsed with pain: a residue of the terror of his nightmare. It seemed to take several minutes for these feelings to finally subside. He lay in bed thinking about what he could have possibly seen the previous evening. These thoughts simultaneously terrified and fascinated him. But even now, so soon after the event, it had already begun to feel much less real. The boundary between reality and imagination or dreams had become confused and indistinct.

The Crawford family took Sunday lunch just after noon, which was their usual time. There was, however, one change to the normal proceedings on this day. Professor Brock, who owned the cottage situated one up from of the village school, had been invited to have lunch with them. He did not normally reside in the village and usually only spent weekends in Wet Rain Hill. For the rest of the time he stayed in Durham, which was about a forty-minute drive away by car. Professor Brock was a professor of archaeology at the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. He was in his mid-fifties, and had lived alone ever since his wife died in a freak accident in their home three years ago. It was not long after that time that Professor Brock had bought his cottage in the village. He had stated at the time that the visits to the cottage gave him an opportunity to recover from his sudden bereavement. Moreover, the location of the village of Wet Rain Hill gave him a base from which he could carry out some archaeological research in the area.

Professor Brock’s local archaeological interest was the gathering of evidence about the settlements that had been at Wet Rain Hill in prehistoric times. Predating the village’s medieval origins, and like many similar highpoints in the surrounding countryside, there was some evidence that the hill would have been used by the Romans as a hilltop fort around two thousand years ago. At an earlier date, around two thousand five hundred years ago, there was a strong likelihood that the hill would have been an iron-age fort. Once again, this supposition could be supported by comparison with similar hilltop settlements in the region. But what particularly interested Professor Brock were the inhabitants of Wet Rain Hill stretching even further back into prehistory. The markings on Liz’s Rock were evidence of stone-age inhabitants living around five thousand years ago. But non-monument-building nomadic tribes were known to be active in Northumberland as far back as at least eight thousand ears ago. Shortly after this time, relatively speaking, the ice sheets of the last great ice age had withdrawn from Britain.

The local press had simplified and popularised some of Professor Brocks’ work on the prehistory of the region. Consequently, he was well on his way to becoming something of a minor local celebrity. Television and local radio appearances were becoming increasingly frequent for him. There was, however, one aspect of his work considered by some to be rather controversial. It was also probably one reason why the local press had picked up on him and his work in the first place. Within the discipline or science of archaeology, he had become an expert in the study of the use of hallucinogenic substances by prehistoric man. His work emphasised their use in ancient shamanistic ceremonies, and the role that they may have even played in the evolution of human intelligence. Some popularised presentations of his work had conjured up silly descriptions of cavemen getting high whilst eating magic mushrooms and drinking deer urine. He had also been criticised because some people believed that if not advocating then at least he was glorifying the use of drugs. These were charges that he vehemently denied, countering them by saying that they were simple-minded and offensive.

In his most recent research, which had not yet been reported by the press, he had been involved in something much less controversial. He had been making an attempt to decipher and interpret the ancient markings on Liz’s Rock. He had recently published a research paper on this subject in a respected scientific journal. In this research paper, he had postulated that the markings on Liz’s Rock were inextricably linked to the presence of Bell Hollow nearby. He had also suggested that there would need to be an exploration of this cave in order to obtain a further understanding of the ancient markings. In fact, Professor Brock had made plans to organise a university expedition to the cave. This would be the first recorded exploration of Bell Hollow, at least in modern times.

Professor Brock had taken lunch with the Crawfords at the cottage on several occasions before. Although he was an academic, he did not appear to have the arrogance and overweening sense of self-importance that some of his kind possess. He was willing, and able, to express his work clearly to non-experts without being patronising or abstruse. He originated from the north east of England, and had what is generally known as a working-class background. After passing through the English comprehensive system, he had gone on to study anthropology and archaeology at the University of Durham, which was a world-renowned centre for this subject. The University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne where he now worked had in fact, up until it gained its independence in nineteen sixty-three, been a college of the University of Durham. Further graduate study at the University of Durham had resulted in Samuel Nazarene Brock obtaining a Ph.D. in anthropology and archaeology. The title of his research thesis was Sacrificial Murder in pre-Roman Britain. His later pioneering work in the study of the use and role of hallucinogens in pre-historic society had earned him the title of professor.

As usual, the conversation at the Sunday lunch table ranged over a variety of disparate subjects. The local football results were discussed at first. And then the murder of the young women in Newcastle-upon-Tyne was mentioned. Professor Brock explained that he had first heard of the murder on the radio when driving to Wet Rain Hill on Saturday morning. He was naturally shocked and slightly concerned for the safety of his students who were approximately the same age as the victim, and who also liked to socialise in the city centre. Following the subject of the murder, recent happenings in the village were discussed, particularly the disappearance of cats and sheep. Alan Crawford, however, did not feel it was appropriate to mention the rumours circulating the village connecting the Humes’ takeaway with the disappearance of the cats. He did not initiate any discussion of the individual, known by the Crawford family as simply Mr X. Elsie Crawford made no mention of the fact that she had seen a stranger prowling nearby her cottage. And neither Alan Crawford nor his son mentioned their observations from the previous evening. David, however, had already told his father late last night how he and Paul Jackson had seen Mr X frantically running and screaming across the hill. Alan Crawford had already connected this with Mr X’s arrival in the Blackbird public house the previous evening in a distressed state.

Then out of a mixture of politeness and genuine interest, Alan Crawford turned the conversation towards Professor Brock’s work. Professor Brock mentioned his latest research concerning Liz’s Rock, which had been accomplished mostly on his weekend trips to Wet Rain Hill. Alan Crawford asked Professor Brock to explain in layman’s terms how he generally went about his work. Professor Brock began by trying to draw similarities between his modus operandi and that of a detective at a crime scene. Evidence had to be sought, gathered and sifted through meticulously. Great care had to be taken to ensure that something apparently insignificant and irrelevant, but which was in fact vital to a complete understanding, was not overlooked or discarded. Considering the analogy between archaeology and detective work, Alan Crawford interrupted Professor Brock to suggest that perhaps one major difference, however, was the lack of eyewitnesses. Witting or unwitting, crimes often had eyewitnesses. In pre-historical research, however, there would seem to be no credible eyewitnesses to speak of; no written records or testimonies. Professor Brock agreed, and pointed out that this was in fact the very definition of prehistory: namely, that which relates to the period before written records. He then explained that despite all these difficulties it was still possible to make some progress in this field. New technology and computers had brought particularly new and exciting possibilities for this work. Computers could tirelessly and faultlessly process and analyse data. Mathematical algorithms could be used to crack codes and translate languages. Images of objects could be enhanced and improved. Samples of materials could be digitally sniffed and identified. A variety of possible historical scenarios could be modelled and simulated. Records could be compared and exchanged over the Internet, and so on. The list of possibilities was forever expanding. Alan Crawford pointed out that much of what the professor had just said could also now be applied to police work and crime solving. The use of computers and new technology had also revolutionised the world of crime solving.

“And as in the case of solving a crime, establishing a motive is also important in my work,” said Professor Brock, as desert was being served.
“But in the case of some crimes surely the motive is not always apparent,” remarked Rhoda Crawford. “Take for example the senseless murder of that poor girl on Friday evening. The murderer gained nothing. He was simply evil, and was probably high on drugs as well.” Professor Brock nodded gravely in response to these comments. It was possibly the mention of drugs and the controversy surrounding this subject in connection with his work that made him momentarily hesitate. He had often repeated and emphasised that he himself had never ever used any drugs: soft or hard. And that despite his insight into the subject, the closest he had ever come to directly experiencing the effects of such drugs had been to read Thomas De Quincey’s nineteenth-century classic: Confessions of an English Opium-Eater. Eventually, Professor Brock replied grimly: “I think you’ll find there’s probably a motive of sorts there as well. However base it may be.”

Alan Crawford steered the discussion away from the murder and back towards Professor Brock’s work. “What would you say was the motive in the case of the markings on Liz’s Rock?” he asked.
“Primarily, the motivation I would say was religious. Compared to us, the people who made the markings and carvings on Liz’s Rock had a very different mental outlook on the world in which they found themselves. The world of dreams, of trances and of visions would have been to them a real and undifferentiated part of their existence. They would have seen and felt spirits all around them, in the rocks and trees, in the streams and rivers, and in the animals they hunted such as deer and goats. The spirits of the dead would return in dreams and trances to advise, warn or chastise them. We generally use the term shamanism to classify this type of early religion. Some people in the group or tribe, the shamans, would have been regarded as having special powers that gave them access to the spirit world. In my opinion, the markings on Liz’s Rock appear to be an attempt to communicate with the spirit in the rock,” answered Professor Brock.
“And they must have truly believed that there was a big spirit in Liz’s rock to do all that work on it,” suggested Alan Crawford.
“Yes, indeed. And they may have gone to all that trouble, because they were either asking for a very big favour or they had a very big problem. I believe that they were, in effect, asking the rock to move onto the top of Bell Hollow. They wanted to block the entrance of Bell Hollow, but didn’t have the manpower or the technology to move the huge stone. They believed that moving it would offer them the protection they were seeking,” explained the professor.
“But protection from what?” asked Alan Crawford.
“I don’t know for sure. But clearly they were seeking protection from something they perceived to be potentially baleful or harmful. Maybe it was from something they thought was causing sickness or disease to the people in the area. There are other possible explanations as well. Maybe they wanted protection from unhappy spirits of the departed. Or maybe they were seeking protection from unfriendly strangers or wild animals that were making incursions into their territory to steal food and animals. But based on my study of the markings, whatever was the cause of their fear had I believe a definite link with Bell Hollow.”

There was a brief pause in the conversation at this point. Alan Crawford was tempted to interject a mildly jocular remark, but decided that to do so would be unbecoming. It was his son who, instead, uttered more or less the same remark that he had in mind. “The Stone Age inhabitants of Wet Rain Hill were probably tired of having all their cats disappear. And probably supposed that they were jumping down Bell Hollow,” said David, very conscious that fortunately Paul Jackson wasn’t around to hear this slightly cruel joke. “Well, I can certainly rule cats out of the picture,” said Professor Brock responding quickly with a degree of earnestness that might not have been expected in the circumstances. “You see, the first domestic cat didn’t appear in Britain until after the first Crusades to the Middle East about nine hundred years ago. But sheep were domesticated thousands of years earlier, and they may have been kept by, as you put it, the Stone Age inhabitants of Wet Rain Hill. So, it may have been the case that they were indeed loosing their sheep down Bell Hollow.”

Elsie Crawford, who had been listening quietly to the discussion, asked to be excused from the table in order to go into the kitchen. The professor thanked and complimented her on the delicious lunch before continuing: “Anyway, I hope to do some exploration of Bell Hollow sometime early next year with a team from my university. This might give us some extra insight. It would be really exciting if proof of a link between Liz’s Rock and Bell Hollow could be established. There’s also the exciting prospect of finding something of archaeological interest in Bell Hollow: maybe bones, animal and human, as well as tools.”
“Finding the old church bell would be something,” suggested David.
“Yes, it would. Finding the church bell from St George’s would be something of a coup. But I’m also hoping for something more ancient than that.”

After desert had been eaten, Professor Brock together with Alan Crawford and his son remained sitting at the table. In the cottage, the division of labour on the occasion of Sunday lunches still followed traditional lines: Rhoda Crawford had now joined Elsie Crawford in the kitchen in order to wash the dishes and clean up. Continuing the discussion, Alan Crawford broached the subject of drugs, specifically Stone Age drugs. He was well aware of the effects that the taking of certain types of drugs had on some people nowadays. It started with a desire to escape for a brief period of time into an alternative, perhaps ecstatic, state of reality, whether it was simply a pleasurable high or something akin to the Stone Age shaman entering the alternative realm of the spirits. This was inevitably followed by a return to the humdrum reality of everyday life. But for some, the urge to return again and again to this altered state was compelling. Inconveniently, this addiction needed to be financed, and crime would invariably be the financier. Within this diabolical spiral of cause and effect, the drugs themselves would make people more willing to take risks in the thefts and robberies that they carried out, and would even make some more unconscionable in the use of violence to perpetrate these crimes.

“The substances these ancient shamans used to enter into the realm of the spirits would have included some of the plants, shrubs, tree barks, and fungi growing naturally around them,” explained Professor Brock. “It is perhaps a surprise for many people to learn that several common or garden plants and herbs can cause extreme hallucinogenic effects when prepared and taken in the right way; for example, certain types of sage or mint. The ancient botanists would have learned this by trial and error over time.”
“And what about deer pee: is it true they drank that?” asked David gleefully.
“Yes, there probably is some truth in it. But the deer urine would only be effective if the deer had been nibbling on certain mushrooms and plants beforehand and had then processed their constituents.”
“Don’t tell me they found that one out by trial and error,” said Alan Crawford smirking.
“Well, now you understand why Santa Clause’s reindeer were able to fly,” said the professor laughing. He continued: “The substances would not have been as socially destabilising as they are nowadays. Knowledge of these substances would have been held only by a select few: the Shamans, as I mentioned before. Their usage would have been also restricted to this select group. The revelations that these substances were capable of producing would have been too much for those that did not have the special knowledge to interpret them correctly. Anyone taking these substances would enter a world where they could see, hear and smell things that were not accessible to others. They would also be able to glimpse usually hidden aspects of apparently inanimate objects. For example, a simple stick lying on the ground when seen through these new eyes might become a giant snake, or a rock a giant salamander lizard.”
“Hence the name Liz’s Rock?” suggested David seizing on this allusion, and then added: “Maybe the rock on Wet Rain Hill had a tendency to turn into a lizard in the eyes of someone under the influence of such a drug.”
Professor Brock paused for a moment, and then responded with a smile: “I wasn’t specifically referring to Liz’s rock in that final example. Interesting, however, you made that link, David. But if Liz is indeed an abbreviation of Lizard, which I believe is itself an English word with Latin roots, the current name of the rock couldn’t possibly have originated from the period in question. This was a time when a long forgotten language would have been used, one that could have had no connection whatsoever with the relatively modern language of Latin, brought to these islands by the Romans about two thousand years ago. It could be argued, however, that the underlying meaning of the name may have been preserved. Perhaps it was called something equivalent to Liz’s or Lizard’s rock in some long lost ancient tongue, and this name was effectively translated at various times and carried down through the ages. In my opinion, that would be unlikely in this case, because over the ages such an association of the rock with a lizard would have required a constant reinforcement of the idea. For example, people in this area would still have had to have seen a lizard in the rock during the Middle Ages when shamanistic practices or the use of hallucinogens were far from the norm. I believe that Liz, simply as the diminutive of the name Elizabeth, has been suggested as the most likely source of the rock’s name. Nevertheless, David, I agree with the approach of looking for meaning and explanation in the names of things and places. Sometimes familiarity with a particular name dulls our perception to this principle. I have a colleague who has lived for a few years in a town called Morpeth, which is just north of Newcastle-upon-Tyne. The name had always struck him as rather curious, until one day he found out that Morpeth was in fact a contraction of Murder Path. This was a reference to the place’s reputation in the past as a dangerous spot for highwaymen and brigands. The past history of the town, or the surrounding area, was in fact encapsulated in its name.”

Elsie and Rhoda Crawford reappeared from the kitchen after completing their chores. Overhearing the tail end of Professor Brock’s discussion on the significance of place names, Rhoda Crawford asked about the background to the name of the village of Wet Rain Hill. But before the professor could respond to this, Elsie provided the generally accepted reason, explaining how the inclination of the land meant that a large amount of the rainwater falling onto the village drained down the hill behind her cottage into Liz’s Burn. This particular hillside was the actual Wet Rain Hill. The name of the village followed straight from this.

“How long have you lived in Wet Rain Hill, Mrs Crawford?” asked the professor. “Oh, well I lived here as a child, but not in this same cottage. Then when I got married, I moved out with my husband to Hexham. That was where Alan was born and brought up. Then, five years ago I moved back into the village and into this cottage. So my life started in this village, and I dare say that it will end in this village as well,” replied Elsie Crawford. “You must have some fond memories about life in the village. What was it like living here as a child?” continued the professor.
“It was wonderful. My father was a forester, and my mother was a domestic servant. I know that life was sometimes difficult for my parents, but life for me as a child in Wet Rain Hill was simply wonderful. I remember that we seemed to have such warm summers. There were hills to run down, streams to ford and trees to climb. And even for a girl, so many adventures to be had. As children, we used to imagine that witches and warlocks lived in Bell Hollow. I can still remember looking down with fascination into the darkness of the cave, and wondering where it ended. I can also particularly recall one day, whilst playing with friends that we thought we heard a noise coming out of the cave. It was like a groan coming from deep within the earth. Then screaming with terror and perhaps some excitement as well, we ran as quickly as we could back up the hill to the safety of the village. My parents were furious with me because they had repeatedly warned me against playing beside the cave. They told me that if I fell inside the cave I would never be able to see them again. That really scared me. But as a child, of course, I was naturally very curious about things. In addition, we were all aware of the story of Menzie, the shepherd, who had gone mad up on the hill opposite to Wet Rain Hill. At that time, there were one or two old people still alive in the village who had known him. They said he had gone mad because one day, whilst tending his sheep, he heard something in Bell Hollow. And after having gone to investigate, thinking perhaps that someone had fallen into the cave, he had seen something terrible either inside the cave or coming out of it. Anyway, that’s what they say. One old lady said that Menzie must have seen Old Nick, the Devil himself, coming up from hell,” recounted the old lady.
“Did you ever see anything odd, Gran?” asked David urgently.
“No. I never saw Old Nick or anything else. Nor did anyone I knew personally see anything odd. And as far as I know, the shepherd who eventually replaced Menzie on the hill never saw anything strange. He certainly never ran away, and spent all of his remaining life in the village. Though he didn’t stay in Menzie’s Hut, but lived somewhere in the village instead.”
“What about the bell, Elsie, which is supposedly still in Bell Hollow. Were there any particular stories about it?” asked Rhoda.
“The generally accepted tale, as you perhaps already know, is that the villagers tried to hide it there during the First English Civil War,” explained Elise. “There is a picture in one of the stained glass windows in St George’s church showing the villages lowering a bell into the cave using ropes and pulleys. But no one is really sure why they needed to hide the church bell in the cave. Maybe they considered it to be precious, and didn’t want one side or the other in the civil war to take it. I can’t ever recall, however, coming across a similar story like this one taking place anywhere else in England. But now that I think of it, I can also remember hearing a tale that in fact gave an alternative explanation as to why the bell was placed inside Bell Hollow. In this particular story, the villagers had actually used the church bell as a large sacred object in order to ward off the Devil, whom they believed lived in Bell Hollow. I was reminded of this when I listened to what Professor Brock said just before lunch about Liz’s Rock. It strikes me that what those people might have been trying to do thousands of years ago sounds very similar to what the villagers were trying to do a few hundred years ago; that is if this tale is in fact true. By placing the church bell inside Bell Hollow, the villagers believed they could block the Devil’s very passage out from hell. They were trying to protect themselves from what they imagined to be an evil influence.”
“That’s a very interesting parallel, Mrs Crawford. I wasn’t aware of that interpretation, but I’m very glad to have heard it,” responded the professor, genuinely impressed by what he had just heard. He then continued: “I made the point earlier that the mental world of the people who made the markings on Liz’s Rock was very different to ours. Something similar can be said of the people who lived during the religious convulsions of the seventeenth century. They saw and interpreted things very differently to what we do now. They were deeply superstitious, and dare I say it, very parochial. For them, it would not be beyond the bounds of possibility that the Devil lived in Wet Rain Hill. Or at least that he took a sojourn there.”

Professor Brock looked at his watch, and after thanking the Crawfords once again for the enjoyable lunch and discussion, explained that he would have to return back to his cottage in order to attend to some work he had brought with him for the weekend. But just before the professor left, David Crawford managed to insert one further question into the proceedings: “Professor Brock, if someone living in these parts thousands of years ago saw a crocodile, how do you think would they describe it?”
The professor hesitated for a moment, slightly confused by the question, which seemed on the face of it to be something of a non sequitur. But he responded: “I would be surprised, David, if someone in ancient Britain had ever seen a crocodile, especially just after the last ice age, long before the Romans came. After all, crocodiles are cold-blooded reptiles, and don’t live in these climes. Their metabolism needs warmth and sunshine, so it wouldn’t happen. But if by whatever reason they managed to see one, I suppose they would think it was like a lizard; a giant lizard, certainly.”
“And people living around the seventeenth century?” asked David.
“The same, I suppose: a lizard. For them, it would be the nearest approximation that they could call upon,” replied the professor. “Are you suggesting that ‘Crocodile Rock or Croc Rock’ would have been a more apt name?” he added smiling whilst forming a mental picture of Elton John, dressed flamboyantly and wearing over-sized spectacles, uproariously singing and playing his song bearing the same name on the hill behind the cottage. David Crawford smiled politely, but made no reply. (Click here for Chapter 7)

All material © C. G. Black (2003)