Finally the lane broke through the trees and deposited them on an area of flat, open countryside. Shugborough Hall was visible in the distance against the skyline, a large, brooding presence.
With the threatening atmosphere of the lane behind them, their mood lightened. Samantha even laughed in a release of tension, then apologised in case Hal thought she was going mad.
As they trudged across the white plain, Samantha said, ‘Have you any idea what’s happened to Hunter?’
Hal had considered that question long and hard and guessed that Hunter was embroiled in heroism somewhere, fighting the good fight. ‘No idea,’ he replied blithely. ‘You know Hunter. He’s a law to himself.’
‘That’s the problem. They’re talking about treason this time. Some are saying he’s deserted.’
‘Do you believe that?’
‘No. Of course not. He’d be the last man out. What about all those rumours that he freed the prisoner and they took off together?’
Hal guessed this was probably true. Hunter wouldn’t have told Hal his plans so that he would be able to stand up to questioning, but it was logical that he’d seek the support of another Brother of Dragons. ‘Why would he do that?’
‘Oh, I have no idea,’ Samantha said with frustration. ‘I can’t understand him at all.’
They fell silent as the hall loomed up before them. The mansion house looked empty, the facade gleaming as white as the snow all around, the ten-columned portico hinting at the mysteries of ancient Greece. Two wings spread out on either side, giving the building an impressive bulk. It looked out across the sweeping fields, grand yet stern and brooding.
‘Do you know where we’ve got to go?’ Samantha whispered.
Hal had researched the hall and its history in such detail that he could find his way around the rambling old pile blindfolded. The quickest way to the Shepherds’ Monument was to head to the formal gardens on the far side. But that would entail walking past the front of the mansion house with its windows like dead eyes, and that spooked him for some reason he couldn’t explain.
‘We go this way.’ He indicated the outline of the nearest path that wound through shrubs past the side of the building. ‘It’s called the Lady Walk, takes you through to the gardens at the back. If we follow it around, it’ll bring us to the Shepherds’ Monument.’
They moved through another area of thick trees where the feeling of being watched returned in force, but then the path led them back into the open along the banks of the River Sow, its waters slow-moving and black. On the other bank, the floodplain stretched out towards Milford, the snow unmarked.
‘Nobody around,’ Hal said to reassure them both.
Another feeling descended on them as they left the cover of the trees and moved along the river bank, not oppressive or threatening this time, but still potent. It felt as though they had pushed through a veil into another room where the mood was alive with numerous possibilities.
‘Can you feel it?’ Samantha said, her voice hushed but intrigued. ‘It feels as if something’s about to happen.’
The sensation was so strong that Hal looked around to see if they had moved through some kind of physical barrier. To their right, they were presented with a vast area of formal lawns with stone steps leading the eye to the magnificent rear aspect of the mansion house. In the foreground was an ornate pond with a fountain in the form of a cherub and a swan.
A ruined monument rose up on the riverbank on their left, but as they passed it, Samantha grabbed Hal’s arm tightly and grew rigid as she looked up at a statue of a druid mounted on the top.
‘It moved,’ she said. ‘I’m sure it did.’
Hal watched the statue for a long moment. Something about the face unsettled him. ‘We’re just getting jumpy,’ he said.
‘You’re right — I’m sorry.’ But Samantha couldn’t help glancing back several times as they continued on their way.
The crunch of their footsteps echoed loudly over the still gardens as the path wound back towards the house once more, passing into another heavily wooded area. A strange building shaped like a Chinese pagoda appeared out of the gloom to their left.
‘What is it with all these odd monuments and buildings?’ Samantha said. ‘I’ve been to one or two of these old houses, but none of them had things like this.’
‘That one’s called the Chinese House,’ Hal said. ‘In the mid-eighteenth century, two brothers from the Anson family who owned the hall restyled the house and gardens. Thomas Anson had travelled pretty extensively — maybe he brought back designs he particularly liked. There’s a Doric temple in the ancient Greek style further on. He was a member of the Society of Dilettanti, who were basically a bunch of connoisseurs of history and architecture who went all around the eastern Med collecting knowledge and artefacts and generally showing off their good taste…’ The word died in his throat.
‘What is it?’ Samantha asked.
‘I don’t know,’ he began hesitantly. ‘Maybe that society was only interested in art and culture. Or perhaps they were searching for something.’
‘Something linked to the mystery of the Shepherds’ Monument?’
More connections clicked into place in Hal’s mind. He began to glimpse a grand scheme reaching back through history. ‘A lot of the societies back then were interested in esoteric knowledge but hid it behind a facade of mundaneness. Secret knowledge shouldn’t be for the masses, that was the general belief. Painters, musicians, writers — they’d often use codes, sacred geometry, all sorts of things to bury secrets in their works so that only the initiated would find them.’
‘You’ve done a lot of research,’ Samantha said, impressed.
Hal stared at the Chinese House. ‘Symbolism,’ he mused to himself before turning to Samantha excitedly. ‘Things that look normal and meaningless on the surface, but which have hidden meaning underneath. Secret symbols.’ In his rush of thoughts he was starting to gabble and he could see from Samantha’s face that he wasn’t making sense. ‘The Shepherds’ Monument clearly means something beyond what it appears to be on the surface — a garden ornament. What if all the things in this garden are part of the wider secret? All linked. All meaning something when they’re placed in context.’ Suddenly excited, he grabbed Samantha’s hand and pulled her along the path.
Finally they came upon the Shepherds’ Monument, just off the path to their right, set in an avenue of shrubs with a wall of trees behind it. Hal felt a shock run up his spine when he saw it: everything about its position in the landscape suggested that it was important.
‘The atmosphere is even more electric here,’ Samantha said quietly. ‘There has to be something in this.’
‘Did you ever doubt me?’ Hal walked slowly down the short avenue; the crunching echo of his footsteps now sounded strange, distorted.
When he finally stood before the monument, none of the pictures he had seen in the books had prepared him for its scale: he was dwarfed by its size. The reversed image from Poussin’s painting was only one small, though central, part of the whole monument. It was framed by two giant stone columns topped by a megalithic block, with another ornamental block on top. On the large stone that straddled the columns, two faces had been carved, one smiling, one sad, like the Greek masks for tragedy and comedy. The size and shape of the framing monument reminded Hal of nothing less than one of Stonehenge’s trilithons.
Underpinning the whole monument was the mysterious inscription: O.U.O.S.V.A.V.V. with a ‘D’ and an ‘M’ carved partly beneath the line. Another clue left by the Society of Dilettanti, perhaps, its meaning now lost to time. Cautiously, Hal reached forward and scraped his fingers across the rough stone surface of the Poussin relief, picking out the legend ‘ Et in Arcadia Ego ’ carved on the tomb.
But as he removed his hand, a large blue spark jumped out from his fingertips and crackled into the monument. Hal jumped back in shock.