Part 5

WHEN I was a child of twelve my parents moved to a new neighbourhood. We had lived in our fresh house about a month when I was awakened one night by very heavy footfalls. I sat up in bed and was amazed to see a bent and dirty nun stumping beside my bed. She wore a nun’s habit, very roughly made of coarse material. She was wringing her hands, which were tied at the wrists, and on her feet were heavy wooden shoes. As I gazed at her she turned her face to me, and her look of anguish was terrible. Over her face hung wisps of hair, and on her face were blood marks. I looked at her quietly for a second or two before I realised that the whole room was changed; it was much smaller, the walls were rough enough for barn walls almost, and there was no wainscotting. To my horror I saw that a door was open by the side of my bed where there was no door. This really frightened me and I screamed loudly, but, after my first screams, the room became ordinary, and when my father entered I told him what I had seen. He got very angry with me, banged down the candle, and left me much comforted by its tiny glow. In the morning I told my parents what I had seen, but they both told me I was a foolish child, and forbade me to mention my “nun,” as I called her, but they allowed me to have a candle for a few nights until I forgot my visitor. Soon after this I went to school and quite forgot my experience, as a healthy child would do.

About three years later, I was again sleeping in the same room, when I was awakened by heavy footsteps. I felt too frightened to cry out, and all the same scene was enacted. I dared not tell my parents this time, but confided in a dear old farmer who lived at “The Priory” next door. He listened to me with respect, and told me that our house was some hundreds of years old and had been a monastery in earlier days. He knew that my bedroom had been altered from two small ones to one large one. He also advised me to tell my parents of my fright, as he was sorry for me. After this I slept in the attic for some time but, later, I was taken ill and, to save steps, I was put into my “nun room” again. My fright had worn off by then. However one night, as I lay tossing on my bed, I again heard the heavy footfalls. I screamed loudly, and when my mother came in she found I had fainted from sheer fright.

I have had many experiences of ghosts, though I am far from hysterical, and have been laughed at when I have spoken of them, so I usually keep silent about them. But my “nun” was so real that, on cycling by the house recently I felt shivery at looking up at the old bedroom window. And why a nun should appear in a monastery is a thing unexplained.

Was it a Curse?

I WELL remember when I was a schoolgirl, my father taking an old farm which had been uninhabited for years. It was a quaint old house with three stairways, and the best bedroom had queer little knobs and ornamentations all over the ceiling, and the date 1643 or 83 let into the wall—I forget exactly, it was so long ago.

It was pleasantly situated, but bore a bad reputation, for it was said that the old lady who owned it in bygone days had come by it through fraudulently altering a will; then, towards the end of her days, it was unlawfully wrested from her for some paltry debt. This preyed on her mind and she died soon after, vowing that she would haunt the spot, so it was said, and anyone who took it would rue it. My mother was very averse to taking it and so was my grandmother, who, indeed, begged and prayed father to have nothing to do with it, saying there was a curse on the place, and no good would come of it. However, father, not being at all superstitious, but an honest, God-fearing man, laughed at such predictions. He had the farm put in repair, and we went there to live.

From that day our modest prosperity vanished; we lost money steadily. In a few months my father was brought home seriously ill. He got up at last from his bed a wreck of his former self, only to linger for two years a semi-invalid, then a recurrence of his illness took him from us within a few days.

My mother’s mind broke down under the shock and worry, and she had to be taken away, and we girls were left fatherless, as bad as motherless, and penniless into the bargain. Our home was sold up, we paid our debts and got out of that disastrous house as soon as we could. As for our uncanny experiences there—we were awakened more than once by sounds as if all the heavy furniture we possessed downstairs was being dragged about, also by footsteps coming up the flagged path that led to the front door, and by raps at the window.

Also, one evening, I remember distinctly we four girls were all sitting quietly sewing, when, all at once, we jumped nearly out of our skins at a loud rat-tat-tat at the front door. “Whoever can that be at this time of night?” we said. My eldest sister snatched up a light and ran to answer, and came back saying: “There's no one there.” At this moment, our dog, chained in the back yard, snapped his chain and ran round the house howling piteously.

Who it was, or what it was, I know not; we saw nothing, but I don’t think anyone would have played a trick on us at such a time when we were in deep trouble. Then, too, it was a lonely place, and the house stood back from the road enclosed with high garden hedges, and in those days country folk were not wont to travel the dark lanes at nine or ten at night to frighten their neighbours or, indeed, for any purpose unless necessity compelled them.

Only once during our stay there did we see anything. One night my second sister was awakened by the feeling that someone or something was in the room, and was horrified to see the figure of an old woman, with thin grey wisps of hair, bending over the bed. As she lay, too frightened to call to the rest of us, the figure gradually retreated in the direction of the door, which led into the best bedroom.

I don’t care to recall these things, for even after the lapse of many years their remembrance both saddens and terrifies. Was there some sinister influence surrounding this spot? Or were our misfortunes just the chances and changes of this mortal life which might have occurred anywhere? Who can rightly say? What happened to the next tenant (if there was one) I do not know. We removed to a distant county, and I have long lost touch with any I used to know who might give me news of it.

The Lady with the Thimble

MY aunt has often told me that, when she was staying with her mother at a friend's house in the city, at night time a curious tapping, as if with a thimble, on the door of her room used to awaken her, and then something seemed to appear at the bottom of the bed which was one of the old-fashioned four-post type. Then she would feel the bed shake beneath her, the shaking increasing in volume. The tapping was heard about a quarter to twelve, and everything ceased on the stroke of midnight.

Her mother used to think she was dreaming, but, as she was so emphatic in her story, they agreed to change rooms, my grandmother sleeping in her daughter’s room. Soon after twelve o'clock my grandmother entered my aunt’s bedroom, looking very frightened. “You are quite right,” she said, “I can’t sleep there another night; I don't know how you managed to sleep there so long.”

The next day my aunt inquired as to the occupants of the room who had preceded her. The host looked rather anxious. “Why,” he said, “my mother used to sleep there; she died rather suddenly a year or two ago, and I don’t think anybody has ever occupied it since.” My aunt told him of what had happened, and he said that his mother was always accustomed to wearing a thimble, and, on entering a room, used to knock on the door with it. He was unable to give an explanation of the shaking of the bed, so that must be put down as an unfathomable mystery.

A Reverend Gentleman’s Story

MY grandparents, with their two sons, lived at a lone farm about a mile from the village. In my early days I spent much of my time with them, and often heard them speak about the visitations of “the ghost.” They quite believed the place was haunted, and, taking into account my own experiences, I was led to believe the same.

It was no uncommon thing, as we were sitting round the fire in the evening, to hear three distinct knocks at the top of the chimney, which would gradually descend to the back of the fireplace. So used were they to these rappings that they would be dismissed with just a passing reference.

On moonlight nights my uncles would often go out to shoot rabbits. On one occasion, when they came back, they said they had seen a man sitting on the branch of a tree. They challenged him to come down, thinking he was a poacher in hiding, but, as they were looking at him, he suddenly disappeared.

On another occasion, one night, when the snow was on the ground, one of my uncles came in from the village, and said there was a man sitting astride the wheat stack at the back of the house. My grandfather took his gun and went up to the back bedroom window, and, looking out, sure enough there sat the human form. My grandfather shouted: “If you don’t come down, I'll shoot you.” But before he had time to raise his gun, the figure vanished. Next morning they got a ladder and examined the roof of the rick to see if they could find any footprints, or if the snow had been disturbed, but not a trace could be found!

Sometimes the ghost would appear in different shapes and forms. In the winter the cattle were kept up in the yard and cow-sheds. My grandfather’s brother, who lived in the village, used to come up early to feed them. One morning, when he had finished his work, he came in and said: “The thing was in the manger again.” The “thing” referred to was a white calf, which he had seen more than once in the same position, but it always disappeared when he went up to it.

My mother often referred to her experiences with the ghost when a girl at home. It would come when she and her sisters were playing around the ricks. It took the shape of a round log, covered with long black hair, full of bright spots. After rolling about for some time, it always finished up by going into the pond at the end of the barn. On one occasion a girl with long black hair joined them at play. At first they thought it was a girl from the village, but when they gathered round her, she vanished.

It was in this rick yard that my cousin and I had a hair-raising experience. One evening as it was getting dusk, we were romping in a heap of straw; then we sat down and covered ourselves up to the neck. Sitting there, we heard a panting noise, like a horse trying to get its breath after a race. Looking up we were horror-struck to see a huge animal like a lion, with long, shaggy hair, coming towards us. We sat breathless. It then passed over our legs and disappeared through the bushes into the pond. Terrified, we ran into the house and told what had happened.

I had another experience later on, early one morning on the road leading up to the farm. Just before me I saw a white calf’s head projecting from the corner of a heap of stones. It was motionless, so I went to see what was the matter with it, but as I came up to it, it vanished and appeared at another corner! I then thought of the white calf in the manger, and started to run. On another occasion my brother and I were driving along this same road one dark night. As we got to a very narrow part of the road we saw before us two large lights. Thinking it was a carriage with lamps we wondered how we should pass. I pulled in to the left and waited. We could hear nothing. As the lights drew nearer they seemed to grow larger. At last we saw the outline of some monster beast, and these lights were its eyes. I could have touched it as it passed. Neither of us spoke a word till we got to the village. The horse did not seem to have seen it.

In the course of time my grandfather gave up the farm and came to live in the village, but, strange to say, the family ghost followed him! Many weird and uncanny things happened about the house, some of which I could speak of from personal experience.

My grandparents have long since passed away, since when nothing more has been heard of the family ghost.

Whose Eyes?

“I SHAN'T be a minute; I’m going to fetch a book from my bedroom.”

So saying, I got up and smiled across the table at Mr. P., the gentleman boarder. “Let me go,” he said. “Certainly not,” I answered, and lightly ran out of the room and up the inky black stairs. There was the awful soundlessness and stillness of impenetrable darkness, and I had to slacken my steps to feel for each stair. When I was about half way up someone pushed against me from behind and tried to tread on the same stair as myself. I gasped and instantly thought it was a practical joke that Mr. P. was playing on me, and I said fiercely: “Go away, Mr. P.! You ought to be ashamed of yourself, frightening me like that.” As he didn’t answer me, I turned round to push him away, and found Emptiness. The horror of this was so great that, regardless of the danger of missing the stairs, I literally flew up the remainder and opened my door and rushed inside.

As I was in the act of banging the door a pair of eyes gazed at me out of the darkness. Oh! it was awful!—Eyes without a body, gazing at me. I flung myself against the door to shut them out, at the same time covering my eyes with my hands.

My bedroom was pitch dark. Outside, I knew I had to face unknown terror—what was I to do? Not a sound to be heard, and the only living people in that house were at the bottom of all those stairs.

If I moved from the door those eyes might come in; if I remained where I was, what unseen thing might touch me? At last I remembered a bit of candle and matches that were in a certain drawer. Could I find the chest of drawers? At least it was worth trying.

How I got across that room I don’t know, but I did, and I found that bit of candle and matches and lit up, and I gazed all round that room.

I saw my face in the glass—it appalled me, for my eyes were fairly bulging out of my white face.

With the comfort of the lighted candle I got downstairs. The landlady, Mr. P., and my sister all remarked upon my appearance and asked why I had been so long. When I told them they were very excited, and all went with lamps to hunt for the ghost. To them it was a most exciting event; to me it was a nightmare.

Of course, they found nothing.

Some weeks later, when the ghost was forgotten, my sister and I were sitting in a room on the first floor, the door of which opened straight off a tiny landing of the staircase. My sister was playing the piano, and I was sitting by the fire sewing.

Looking towards her, I noticed the door opening ever so slowly and silently until it was wide open—and no one was there. Thinking, sensibly, it must be the draught, I got up to close the door and, there, in the doorway, on a level with my own, were the pair of eyes, luminous.

I stood stock still and said to my sister: “Look at the door!” To do so, she had to look up and over the piano, and by so doing she looked straight at those eyes. She rushed to my side shrieking. Up the stairs pelted Mr. P., with the landlady following, shouting up, “What's the matter?”

He walked right under those eyes, and, brushing back his hair with his hand, he said: “Great Scott! Aren't you cold up here? Did one of you shriek or call out?”

I was standing petrified with fright, with my sister clinging to me.

It was a moment or two before I could tell him, and then he was off in hot chase—he was going to catch the ghost with his gun. He went and fetched a chum, and, together, they made enough noise to frighten an army of ghosts; but they did not catch one.

We all felt a bit eerie, and Mr. P. persuaded his chum to sleep with him a few nights.

It was just as well that he did, for one night, about two a.m., we were all awakened by the most blood-curdling screams it is possible to imagine. My sister and I sat up at once and clung tight to each other. Mr. P. and his chum were soon hammering on our door asking were we all right. The landlady was wandering about her landing in a voluminous dressing gown and night cap, with a candle: a little girl was sobbing in bed, and a boy slept through the lot. The men were determined to put an end to the matter, so down the cellar they went with lamps and pistols, and all over the house, and right up into the unused attic, but nothing could be discovered.

Should any reader want to think of a reasonable clue, I can only tell them that the house was built in such a way that no sun could get into it; it was very old and appeared to have been wedged in to block up a passage way between the backyard of a grocer’s shop and the road. The front and back of the house were built away back from the level of the other houses: the houses on both sides of it seemed to squeeze the very air out of the house—it was a deadly house.

As soon as I walked into the front door I used to shiver and stare straight ahead of me, as if expecting things to happen. Even in the daytime it was always dark as compared to other houses.

A Ghostly Carpenter

ABOUT twenty years ago my brother D went to live in a fairly large house in North London—wife and two little children with him. There was no basement; dining and drawing rooms faced each other from the hall, and, farther along, was a large, square room entirely panelled, with oak ceiling, also, save for one corner not quite finished. Upstairs a back room had evidently been used as a carpenter's workshop; so my brother, a keen carpenter, decided to use it himself, similarly. They were only just settled in when every evening a noise of wood sawing began about seven o’clock—loud and distinct, with every now and then the “whop” as the sawn piece dropped. Many friends and relatives heard it. Then, in the room overhead, began sounds of carpentering; loud noises as if wooden boxes were dropped and pushed along; and, every night, tools, which had been carefully put back in the racks, were found in the morning scattered about the room.

In the oak room a swing was hung from a beam, and my brother had this room as a nursery. In broad daylight, on a summer afternoon, would come the sound of the swing, then a sound as if someone jumped from it, and the swing would go to and fro violently. Many times there have been sounds of someone running quickly downstairs.

A previous owner of the house was an old man who did the oak panelling himself, but died ere it was finished.

My brother and family still occupy the house, and have grown so accustomed to “Bill, the carpenter,” as they call him, that the noises do not trouble them at all. Sometimes these noises stop for a while, and then go on again louder than ever.

There is absolutely no earthly explanation, but I do know it is perfectly true, and many have heard the noises.

Another Reverend’s Story

A REVEREND gentleman tells the following story:—

In an old house in a cathedral town the ghost of a tall, elderly woman dressed in black recently gave much trouble to the inmates. The ladies living in the house saw the apparition constantly, and got quite accustomed to it, but very few servants would stay in the house.

The climax came when the cook was found in a fainting condition and said that the ghost had tried to strangle her, and showed the marks of fingers on her throat.

Something had to be done. A clergyman from the cathedral was called in and exorcised the ghost, whereupon the trouble instantly ceased.

Investigation showed that a woman, answering to the apparition, had committed suicide in the house about fifty years previously. An interesting point is that the ghost was seen in every part of the house except the room in which the tragedy had taken place.

The Girl in White

SOME three or four years ago I was present at a Christmas party, when the talk turned on ghosts. A gentleman present remarked that ghost stories were almost always second-hand. He had never, he declared, met anyone who could say that he or she had actually seen a ghost.

A lady—a great friend of my own—at once replied, and, as nearly as I can remember it, I will give the story in her own words:—

“Well, then,” she said, “you have now met one who has really seen a ghost. My husband here, and others, are well acquainted with the story. I was, at the time, staying with my aunt in an old house, three flats up, in ——— Edinburgh. The beautifully carved mantelpiece, and peculiar markings on the walls, supposed to have been caused by cannon ball, showed that the house had once been occupied by some of the old Scottish nobility.