Ghosts and Hauntings

by SIMS, MAYNARD

  “You say you “thought” these would be sufficient. Not turn out as well as you had hoped?”

  “They started well, until…look let me show you. Do we have the time now?”

  Cecil looked quickly at the clock on the mantle and pulled a chair away from the table. “No time like the present, unless you want to freshen up first?”

  Hugo was already placing the pages from his sketch as neatly as he could onto the scarred surface of the oak table. “Not at all. I want your opinion on these.”

  They spent some minutes looking over each sketch in turn. At first Cecil made the appropriate noises about the quality of the work, which was as fine as a man of his brother’s reputation had every right to anticipate. As the drawings moved on, so there was a change both in their subject matter and in Cecil’s demeanour.

  “You’ve gone rather quiet,” Hugo said, noticing the altered atmosphere in the room.

  “Have I?” Cecil attempted bluster but it was a half hearted effort and with a heavy tread he stood, pulled towards him two glasses and a decanter of whisky and poured two generous measures.

  Hugo took his glass and said, “This looks serious, unless you have developed a love of whisky of which I was unaware.”

  Cecil drank a long pull and sat. “These,” he touched one or two of the later drawings. “You can see how the tower has moved I suppose.”

  This was not what Hugo expected at all and he picked up some of the pages and studied them. Cecil was right, in that the earlier drawings had the tower upright and proud, which was certainly the initial impression that had been made upon him as he studied it. In the later drawings, the ones where it was easy to surmise that the door was slowly opening, the tower was slightly off centre, as if it was moving, almost swaying in the wind.

  “I haven’t observed there being a tilt to the tower,” Hugo said.

  “And nor is there one. You note of course that in these last few the door seems to be opened?”

  “I wondered at first if it wasn’t a blemish on the page, sometimes these sketch pads are not as good a quality as they might be.”

  Cecil shook his head vehemently. “This is no blemish. The door is drawn as you the artist have seen it…”

  “But I went directly up to the tower, and the door, to see for myself, at close quarters, whether it was indeed open and no, it was locked in fact.”

  “As I have kept it since I made the error of having it placed there.”

  “So how can it be…”

  Cecil filled their glasses again and said, “And how can it be that in this, the very last drawing I fancy, there is a figure standing in a doorway that is not there?”

  “Ah, so you can see it. Again I wondered, hoped in fact, that there had been a thumb smudging the image so that what I could plainly see was, possibly, not there at all.”

  Mrs. Becton then made an appearance and asked whether she might prepare the table for dinner. The brothers decided this was a good juncture in which to pause their discussion and to go to their rooms to dress for dinner.

  When they returned the room was scented with cooking aromas and within moments of them sitting at the table they were served a soup of vegetables and potatoes. Wine was set out and when Mrs. Becton came to take away the soup bowls prior to bringing in the main course Hugo asked her politely where she had placed his drawings and equipment. Her responses horrified him.

  “Ah, the equipment, including the easel thing and chair, I put at the foot of the stairs so it might all be taken out another day.”

  “And the drawings?”

  Mrs. Becton frowned as if the question were a difficult one and one on which she might be tested. “Drawings? Do you mean those pieces of paper with scribble on them? I put them out with the rubbish.”

  “Mrs. Becton!” Cecil was aghast. “Those are my brother’s drawings from his day’s labour.”

  Tears welled in the woman’s eyes but she was genuinely perplexed. “I am truly sorry, I didn’t mean…but there was nothing on them apart from some random lines and perhaps the occasional word.”

  “Show me where they are,” Cecil said. “And once I have them I will ask you to serve us dinner.”

  It was a chastened Mrs. Becton who brought in the dishes of lamb, vegetables and accompaniments. Hugo waited until she had left before he stood next to Cecil’s chair and between them they spread out the partially crumpled pages of drawings.

  “She was right,” Cecil said, unable to keep the amazement and some fear out of his voice.

  The drawings that they had studied earlier no longer existed. These were the same pages but the content was altered, and altered considerably. What they were looking at now was an impression of the tower but scribbled with anger and, so it seemed, hatred. It was easy to see why Mrs. Becton had concluded the pages contained nothing of interest because they seemed at first perusal to be nothing but lines and blotches such as a child may attempt.

  “Whoever has done this? Hugo said.

  Cecil dropped the pages he was holding, all except one which he held so tightly that his finger tips turned white and the page was becoming even more crumpled than it was.

  “Steady,” Hugo said. “Shall I take a look at that one?”

  Cecil reluctantly handed it over, picked up his glass and drained the contents vigorously.

  The image on the final page, held by Hugo, was the clearest image that remained, and was in fact the only one that could be deemed to resemble a deliberate effort at artistic interpretation. It was of the tower, but a squat version thereof, and with a distinctive tilt to one side, away from the church building. The doorway to the tower was wide open and stood just before it, almost with one leg in the doorway and the other still outside, was a stunted little man, clothed in cloak and with strange leggings, and holding aloft a walking stick which was being used in quite a threatening manner.

  “What do you know of this?” Hugo said.

  Cecil looked tired and defeated but was nonetheless resilient. “Let us sit and enjoy dinner, and either during, or shortly after, I will tell all I know.”

  The men sat and ate in a silence that was broken only by the incessant ticking of the clock that merely emphasised the delay between them.

  Leaving the plates where they were, having finished eating, if not drinking, the men moved through to the sitting room where they claimed a chair each.

  “You know I have been here a while, and that my immediate predecessor decided, after some consultation amongst the parishioners I might add, that the doorway to the tower should remain bricked up. Now why he came about this conclusion is not mine to mention but the effect was that when I mentioned at one of my first services that I was instructing work on the door to be commenced, and that the tower doorway would once again be serviceable, there was an opposition the like of which I had no reason to expect.”

  “And why did you come upon the decision?”

  Cecil shrugged eloquently. “Merely for practical reasons, no more than that. The congregation enter through the main west entrance and I thought it would be convenient for all concerned if exit was through the tower doorway.”

  “But that convenience was not recognised by everyone?”

  “It was opposed by them all. I know, I know, I should have demurred, listened to the majority and left well alone, but…”

  “The driver was not so far removed from the truth of it then.”

  “Driver?”

  “No matter, you chose to press on with the removal of the obstruction and have a door restored. And the reason?”

  “The stubborn streak in me, in both of us if truth be told, that was a legacy of our father, if not of mother.”

  “At times it stands us in good stead.”

  “And at others it leads us away from the path of the sensible choice and makes us take action that…actions, that bring consequences.”

  Hugo wondered what those consequences might be but he guessed that he had already experienced one manifestation. “Do y
ou suppose we might take a stroll together tonight? Shortly in fact.”

  “Naturally, and may I make a guess as to our destination?’

  Hugo smiled tightly. “I feel all but certain that we shall pass, at some juncture, the tower doorway.”

  Later that evening, but not by much, dressed appropriately, and with torch and firm resolve, the two men emerged from the rectory and began a slow but definite stroll along the path that linked rectory and church.

  At the lych gate, despite their intent, they paused and admired the craftsmanship that had constructed the feature. Once inside the churchyard, and with headstones and yew surrounding them, they could not help but glance up at the building in front of them.

  The church building was not large but it was substantial. Built from an outer layer of stone and flint the walls were solid and spoke of worship practised for centuries. The windows were impressive, one in particular filling a good proportion of the wall itself.

  It was the tower that was the focus of their walk and gradually they wound their way along the side path of the church until they stood in front of the doorway.

  It was open.

  “I was not expecting this,” Cecil said.

  “Perhaps we should have done,” Hugo said. “And have you seen the marks on the outside of it? The oak is fair scratched.”

  Cecil examined the wood, and as he knelt he could see quite clearly the deep indentations that were inscribed on the door. They were the marks that an animal may have made and he found his finger tips could insinuate themselves into the grooves. “These are fierce deep,” he said.

  “They are too high up for any animal with which I am familiar,” Hugo said. “But they may…what was that noise?”

  “There is someone in the tower,” Cecil said.

  It was dark inside and they were glad to have brought the torch. It illuminated a dusty floor where recent marks on the floor showed an uneven tracing, possibly of footsteps, leading to a narrow and winding staircase.

  “That leads up the tower, and eventually to the bell,” Cecil said.

  “I fear we have no choice but to follow.”

  Hugo led and Cecil did his best to match the pace but he was several steep stone steps behind when he reached the level that preceded the bell enclosure. There was a rough wooden flooring built at the top of the staircase and as Cecil stood upon it he saw his brother. Hugo was backing away from a shadowed shape.

  “Hugo, you are too near the edge,” Cecil called in alarm. Hugo was holding onto the upper arch of an aperture in the tower wall, but his feet were distressingly near the opening.

  In front of Hugo, so in between he and Cecil, was the indistinct shrunken form of what looked very like an old man. He was stooped, clothed in a tattered cloak and with threadbare leggings beneath. His right hand, gnarled and misshapen clutched a walking stick with which he was prodding at Hugo.

  “Get away from the edge,” Cecil shouted, but it was too late.

  Hugo fell backwards, arms flailing at thin air.

  Cecil was left alone in the tower.

  Pulford placed down his knife and fork and pushed the plate genteelly away. The pub garden was overflowing but the private nook they had found remained blissfully undisturbed. Munby and Henry sat patiently dozing in the warmth of the day, a bowl of water half drunk between them.

  “You say Denning is no better recovered?” Priestley said.

  Pulford shook his head and poured the last of the Sancerre. “No, I regret the prognosis is bleak. The fall was broken to some extent by a yew tree of good vintage but nevertheless the tower is tall and the damage to his body is, so the doctors seem to agree, irreparable.”

  “I shall get another bottle,” Priestley said.

  When he returned, Pulford said. “Naturally Cecil Denning took it badly.”

  “I imagine he would, no doubt feeling that his interference with the tower door was in some way to blame for what befell his brother.”

  “Sad to say but there is no “in some way” about it. The stubborn streak to which he alluded, caused him to plough on with the restoration of the door, deaf to the protests of those who, through bitter experience and longevity, knew more about the subject than he did.”

  Priestley opened the wine, poured some, and said, “So what was the reasoning behind the opposition to the tower door being open? It seems, from a distance, to be eminently sensible.”

  Pulford picked at a bone on his plate. “It was, the suggestion itself was sound, but it was the history that it brought to bear that caused the problems.”

  “We have time enough for that history, assuming you know it. Which I can see from your face that you do, and would already know from your habitual diligence that you will have researched it thoroughly.”

  Pulford smiled. “It seems the tower that Hugo Denning drew was not the original one affixed to the church of St Michaels. Nothing unusual in that of course, during their hundreds of years of existence most if not all churches have undergone extensive alterations, some quite severe.

  “St Michaels was originally Norman in origin, and the tower then was a typically squat and utilitarian affair, which nonetheless served the parish well until it fell into a state of disrepair and considerable work was required. This was commissioned by the Church in the late nineteenth century.

  “The architect asked to carry out the project was not a local man, which means he was not immediately welcomed in the parish. The original tower had no doorway, but the design put forward by the new man had a full door that was intended to open onto a path that would traverse the churchyard. There were murmurings against the plans but he was a stubborn man – where have we heard that before? The tower was completed, and is the structure that Hugo saw and which he drew.

  “When he left, having been paid for his services, he is said to have issued a dire warning that any thoughts of not using the door as it was intended to be used would anger him. Of course out of sight and all that, the parishioners soon got to work bricking up the doorway until it was sealed as they preferred.

  “Not only was the man stubborn he was also persistent, not to mention suspicious. He obviously had a strong belief, well founded, that the work he had provided would be altered. He returned, and, upon find the doorway blocked, proceeded to beat on it with his walking stick, naturally to no avail, as a stick, no matter how stout, is no worthy opponent of a brick wall. And so the fellow marched around path, entered the church by the main entrance, and began to curse and berate the congregation, for this was a Sunday, the day of worship. The rector attempted conciliation but it was beyond all that. The tower was the subject of the man’s eternal damnation.”

  “This was the late nineteenth century, you say?” Priestley said.

  “The mid 1880’s I believe.”

  “And yet,” Priestley said. “Both brothers Denning saw the man, and poor Hugo…”

  “Quite,” Pulford said. “I think I can make some room for pudding, don’t you?”

  THE HOUSE THAT WAS

  TOO GRAND FOR LAUGHTER

  If approached from the south, where the land was mainly pasture and neatly arranged hedgerows, the house looked imposing. From the especially hilly north, with its outcrops of rock and dense copses, there was a diminutive stature about the same house.

  The day we saw it for the first time, we argued about which direction we had approached from. Lucy was adamant we had driven up from the south, along the signposted B road, which circumnavigated the fields of ripening wheat, and occasional oak. I was certain, fairly sure anyway, that we had passed the exit on the M6 and turned back on ourselves, so that it was the north road that took us to meet the estate agent.

  In the end, as with so many of our long drawn out disagreements, we compromised. A kind of vague easterly direction was agreed upon. It was how our relationship had steered for too many years. Never enough courage to say exactly what was on our minds, hurting one another for fear of honesty. The time when the old adage of never going to be
d on a row had long since ceased to have any meaning for us. The normality of it was harsh words spoken with ease and whether they were, or had ever been, intended to wound was something confined to he long and distant past, which as is said, is where a different language is spoken and where today’s sadness was once laughter.

  The bank was kind, in a way, about how it let me go. Restructuring, de-selection, not failure to be chosen, just others better placed for the position. No, not your age, not your moderate success; reports had always made average sound almost a virtue. I could go into a transition pool, help out with projects, fill in where needed. A loser’s pool is what they meant but were too Human Resources briefed to say so. I had never been a strong swimmer so it didn’t appeal. Not after so many years. A financial package was worked out, not particularly in my favour, and thirty six years were come and gone.

  Whether we came from the north, or from the south, whichever way it was, the gravel drive was always going to be the final destination. I pulled the Rover through the wrought iron gates that looked weary of standing open as if they longed to be pulled shut occasionally. They stood leaning slightly away from one another, as though they hadn’t met properly for years, had forgotten how. The gravel slipped under the tyres and I slowed our speed.

  There was an impressive avenue of trees ahead of us. The gravel drive was interspersed with weeds, plantain and couch grass mainly, and the trees themselves were in need of pruning, but coming as we did from an expensive but cramped detached house in the London suburbs, this was a kind of freedom.

  “There is some work needed here,” I said.

  “They’re only trees, John.” Lucy said, and although there was humour in the tone, there was no disguising the patronising air in the words. The same manner I often overheard from her conversations with her golf club friends. “Bank manager? John? Not quite. Assistant, able number two that’s my man.”

  I pushed the automatic gearshift into Drive and did just that. Slowly, and with furtive glances to either side I drove along the winding drive, under the green canopy of leaves, and stopped by a low walled fountain. The house waited in front of us.