Being a historian, Mr. Braithwaite was delighted with the find. So eager was he to have the papers that he made
a grab at them, knocked them off the library desk, and sent them in a cascade across the parquet floor. "Er, oh dear, er,
I do beg your pardon, Mr. Preston. Very, er, clumsy of me, I'm sure!"
But the old carpenter was not listening, he was holding up a square of material which had fallen out from
between the folds of one edition of the Chronicle. "Look what I've found."
Alex recognized the thing instantly. "That's a needlework sampler, like children used to embroider their
alphabets on. What does it say?"
Amy knelt by Jon and read aloud the bit she could understand. " 'Evelyn De Winn. 1673.' Ben, it was sewn by
one of Winnie's family!" The embroidered writing was extremely neat, showing what a clever needlewoman Evelyn
De Winn had been, though it was hard to make out the rest of the letters, as a lot of them were strangely archaic, each
letter s being shaped like an f.
Mr. Braithwaite was suddenly transformed from a bumbling librarian into a scholar of Old English text. He took
up pen and paper excitedly. "Give it here, I'll translate for you. Amelia, sit there and write this down, please!"
There were no "ers," "ahs," or other hesitations from Mr. Braithwaite as he dictated in a clear, slow voice to her:
"Take the Commandments paces west,
away from the bless'd naming place,
to where the heavenly twins stand ever
gazing at Sol's dying face.
Turn as a third Gospelmaker would
to the house named for the rock,
'twixt here and there you must stop to drink,
your first reward to unlock."
Mr. Braithwaite scratched his fuzzy mane. "Hmm, 1670, a time of persecution for British Catholics and noncon-
formists. That was when the almshouse ceased to be St. Peter's and the new church was built on the hilltop. They
called it the Chapelvale Church, though secretly it was still known to the local Catholics as St. Peter's, hence its
present name."
Jon indicated the sampler. "Thankee, sir, you can keep this for your library archives, we'll make do with Amy's
translation."
The librarian was once again his former self. "Er, quite, er, that is, thank you, Mr., er, yes, very good!"
25.
BACK AT THE ALMSHOUSE ALL TIDYING UP was forgotten as they sat around the big oblong table and
studied the poem from the sampler and Amy read out the first line slowly." 'Take the Commandments paces west.'"
Jon shrugged his shoulders. "What's a Commandments pace?"
Ben had guessed, but he let Alex answer. "Must mean ten paces, because . . . there's ten Commandments!"
"True, true." The old man nodded approvingly. Ben winked at Alex. "Well done, pal."
" 'Away from the bless'd naming place,' " Amy went on.
Alex looked disappointed. "That's not so easy."
Amy reasoned, "Whatever a bless'd naming place is, we've got to take ten paces away from it. Naming place,
naming place. Any ideas, Ben?"
Ben looked stumped. "Naming place, let me see... Does it mean the name of a place, or a name like mine and
yours, Amy, Alex, Jon—"
The old ship's carpenter interrupted. "I remember when I was young, I hated my full title, Jonathan. Though my
ma used to say, 'Jonathan you were christened and Jonathan you shall stay.' You can't change your christening name!"
Ned had settled down for his afternoon nap beneath the table, when Ben disturbed him by banging on the table
as he gritted out in frustration, "The bless'd naming place, where is it?"
Recognition hit Alex like a slap in the face. "Christening! Naming place! It's where they baptize babies!" Amy
whooped delightedly and hugged him. "What a clever brother I've got, he's a genius!"
Crimson-faced, Alex shrugged off his sister's embrace. "Where was the naming place here, Jon, d'you know?"
Ned flashed his master a thought. "Right under this table, I think. Feels as if this bumpy chunk of stone's the
base of something bigger that was broken off." The Labrador shuffled lazily out to find another napping spot,
remarking, "Of course, I might be wrong, but it's worth a try."
Ben mentally answered his friend's idea. "Thanks, pal. Now let's see if I can discover it without giving away our
secret."
Jon was stroking his beard, looking this way and that.
"Hmm, baptismal font, every church has one, though I've never thought of a font being in this old place.
Hmmm."
Ben patted Ned as he lumbered by. He spoke aloud to the dog, so his three friends could hear.
"What's the matter, old boy, not comfy enough under there? Let's take a look." Dropping on all fours, he
crawled under the table. "Hahah!"
At the sound of Ben's exclamation, Amy crouched and stared under the table at him. "Something there?"
"I think so, it's a sort of raised square bit with a broken part sticking out the middle. Will that be it, Jon?"
The old ship's carpenter nodded to Alex. "It may be. It may be. Let's move this table. You take one side. Lass,
take care of the two bricks under the leg. Stay there, Ben!"
The table was moved, the boy stayed on all fours by the remnants of the baptismal font, looking up at Amy for
approval. Instead, it was the Labrador who received her hug.
"Good old Ned, it was due to you we found it, good boy!"
If a dog could ever smirk, Ned did. He flicked his tail toward his master. "Sorry about that, pal, but credit where
it's due, y'know. Nothing like a hug from a pretty girl, eh!"
But Ben was more intent on solving the mystery than bantering with Ned. He watched Jon trace the graven
lettering around the limestone base with his clasp knife blade, reading aloud. " 'In nomine Patris, et filius, et spiritus
sanctus.' In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit—I remember that from Sunday Mass when I was a
lad. This is it. This stub is probably the column of the font basin. How did the rhyme read, boy?"
"Take the Commandments paces west,
away from the bless'd naming place."
Alex walked over and stood by the font base. "Ten paces west from here. Anyone got a compass?" He met Jon's
slightly disapproving stare blankly. "How'r we supposed to know which way west is?"
The old ship's carpenter smiled. "I can tell you've never been to sea. Show him, lad."
Ben faced the open rear windows, warm with afternoon sunlight. "West's where the sun sets, over there."
Alex began measuring out ten paces solemnly in the right direction. Amy sat down on the floor beside her
strange friend, and whispered to him. "Jon said that as if you'd been to sea. Have you, Ben?"
He tried to shrug off the question. "The sea? Oh, for just a little bit, nothing much really."
She stared curiously into his clouded blue eyes. It started to race through his mind again—how could he tell her:
wind, waves, storm, the world of waters. A dumb boy and a half-starved dog, crouching in the galley of the Flying
Dutchman, with a captain (Vanderdecken) roaring oaths at the heavens as he tried battling his way around Cape Horn
in the teeth of winter gales. Murder on the high seas, an angel dropping to the deck, the numbing shock of being
plunged into an icy green maelstrom of ocean.
He was wrenched back to reality by Jon clapping a huge arm about his shoulders. "Are you all right, lad?"
The feeling ebbed. He shook himself. "Er, yes, mate, I'm fine. Bumped my head on that table when you moved
it. I'll be all right, it's nothing."