CRYPTS have always held a strange fascination for me. Although a
staunch sceptic, I am deeply interested in psychical research, and I
have systematically sought out crypts on the supposition that if
there are such things as ghosts they would surely prefer to manifest
themselves in those creepy vaults. But only once has a ghost appeared
to me, and that was in the crypt of a hoary old church in
Lincolnshire. I was quite alone; the verger was away from home, and I
had to borrow the keys from the rector. It was late on a September
afternoon and the light, even with the aid of my bicycle lamp, was
very dim. I wandered around, examining dates on tombs until, passing
behind a pillar, I was scared to see a man dressed in black leaning
against the recumbent effigy of some medieval worthy. “That must be
the verger, after all,” I thought; “but how strange! He must have
duplicate keys.” So I approached him—cautiously, I admit—and, as I
did so, he rose slowly, raised a deprecating hand, as though to stop
my advance, and then gradually vanished into space! The dark eeriness
of the place rather got on my nerves, and I slipped out quickly to
tell the rector of my experience. “Ah!” said he, “you've evidently
seen Black Robert the Monk. There's a legend here that in the
fifteenth century the poor fellow was locked in the crypt for some
offence; but they forgot all about him for a time and when they went
to release him, he was stark dead. His ghost appears occasionally,
and the visitation, strange to say, is said to bring the church good
luck. One would have expected him to cherish a grudge. Anyhow, last
time, a wealthy patron gave £100 to our fund. This time—er—” “It will
be only half a crown,” I responded.