by Неизвестный
The Ghosts of Durley Hall
By Jeff Jones
“Why couldn’t we all go out for a nice meal like normal people do to celebrate their birthday? I mean, who’s ever heard of throwing a séance at a supposedly haunted house to mark the passing of another year? No wonder she hasn’t got many friends. I don’t know why Danny’s gone along with this, really I don’t.”
“Firstly, Peter, Kate is normal, so don’t ever say anything like that again. So she’s a little ‘out there’, so what, you know she’s always been into this paranormal stuff. It’s our job as her friends to support her in however she chooses to celebrate her birthday. That’s what friends do remember?” replied Susan.
“And why have we had to drive right out into the middle of nowhere in the pouring rain? Why couldn’t we have carried this farce out in town?”
“Because you don’t tend to get many haunted mansions in the town centre, Peter, that’s why.”
“Waste of time, that’s what it is.”
“Give it a rest, Pete. Look we’re here now.”
Susan stopped the car at the bottom of a long straight driveway. The rusty iron gates were open and a weathered sign saying ‘Welcome to Durley Hall’ hung above the entrance. The mansion was just about visible at the end of the tree lined drive, but no lights appeared to be on.
“Well it certainly looks the part,” said Lisa.
“It’s just a dark and neglected building nothing more,” scoffed Peter. “Come on, let’s get this over with.”
The car crunched its way slowly up the shingle drive and they soon pulled up outside the mansion and parked next to two other cars.
“Looks like we’re last,” said Steve.
The friends climbed out of the car and hurried into the building through the already open front door, shaking the rain off their coats as they entered.
“Hi, guys, thanks so much for coming. I’m so excited. I’ve not met her before, but the medium I’ve hired is meant to be superb,” said Kate before hugging each friend in turn.
“Honestly, Kate, when you said bring your own spirits, I didn’t think you had this sort of party in mind,” quipped Peter. Everyone laughed.
“I’m glad to see you haven’t lost your sense of humour, Pete, you might need it. Come through all of you, everyone’s here now, we can get started,” said Kate.
They followed Kate into another room where they were greeted by three more friends. The room was small and smelled musty. Here and there old discoloured wallpaper clung tentatively to the damp saturated walls. The room’s solitary window was shuttered and the only light in the room emanated from a number of candles spread around the room. In the centre of the room was a large, round and felt covered table upon which sat three large candles. Only one of the seats was occupied and this was by a large woman in drab coloured clothes, who seemed to be watching the friends with a bemused look. Her grey hair was flattened and pulled back into a tight bun giving her a fierce look.
“Everyone, this is Edna Lucas. She is one of the most famous mediums in the country,” announced Kate proudly. “Please all take a seat.”
“Looks more like an extra large to me,” said Peter to Steve who was seated next to him.
Steve had to suppress a laugh, but Susan who had also heard it, gave him an embarrassed dig in the ribs. The medium briefly glanced at Peter, but if she had heard him and had been offended, her face didn’t betray the fact.
“Welcome everyone,” said Edna. “I know that some of you are sceptical about what we hope to achieve here tonight and one or two of you might even be completely hostile to the very concept of life after death, but if we are to do this, I must insist that for everyone’s safety, you all do exactly as I say. Are you all in agreement?”
Kate and some of the others answered positively, whilst the rest nodded in acknowledgment. Peter just raised his eyes to the ceiling. When he looked at Edna again she was staring at him with what looked like the hint of a smirk tugging at the corners of her mouth.
“Good, then let us begin. Who are we trying to contact tonight; a loved one?” Asked Edna.
“I... we’d, like to contact the original occupants of this house, the Durleys. It is said they died in a fire here some years ago. People say that the Durleys have never left here such was their love for the place. New people took over the mansion and had it rebuilt to its original specifications, but as soon as the work was finished, the haunting started. The wife refused to stay there, so they moved out,” said Kate enthusiastically.
“I have heard this too. Very well, please all join hands and close your eyes and I will try and summon their spirits forth.”
“Not a ghost of a chance,” whispered Peter.
Susan kicked him under the table and gave him a venomous look before shutting her eyes again. Peter rubbed his leg where she had kicked him and saw that Edna was staring at him again, definitely he thought, with a smirk.
“You must be silent,” said Edna.
Peter joined hands with Susan and Steve and closed his eyes while Edna began to chant. After a couple of minutes, Edna gasped and slumped forward in her chair. Everyone had opened their eyes by now and some were looking at Edna with real concern. Peter was smiling and shaking his head at the performance.
Suddenly Edna shot bolt upright and they all saw that her eyes had taken on a vacant, distant look. “Someone’s here,” she whispered.
Some of the friends started to look around the room whilst others like Peter, continued to watch Edna. Kate was smiling, enjoying every minute.
“Who are you?” Asked Edna. “Make yourself known to us.”
There was no reply, but a sudden blast of cold air shot through the room, causing the candle flames to waver and making some of the friends shiver involuntarily.
“Who are you?” Edna asked, but again there was no response.
The unmistakable sound of someone’s footsteps walking across floorboards in the room directly above them broke the eerie silence. Two or three of the guests, including Danny, Peter noted with disgust, suddenly looked very anxious and pale, a look that was enhanced by the quivering candlelight. To Peter it was obvious that this crank of a woman had an accomplice stomping around upstairs and he considered putting an end to this charade by running upstairs and grabbing the perpetrator. Then he thought about Kate and one look at her face told him that she was loving the whole experience and he suddenly didn’t have the heart to spoil her evening; after all, she had paid for this. No, he would sit still and keep quiet, hard as it was.
The sound of a door being slammed upstairs followed by heavy footsteps as they descended the stairs, drew Peter from his thoughts. Rachel let out a gasp and Peter felt Susan grasp his hand that much tighter. Whoever this accomplice was, they were obviously confident that nobody was going to get up and challenge them, but then they had been instructed to sit still and remain silent by Edna.
Peter’s contempt for the whole thing was suddenly challenged by the sound of the door to their room being opened behind him. Rachel, who was facing the door, screamed and made to get up, but Edna forcefully told her to sit.
The door to the hallway was wide open now, but nobody had entered or could be seen in the hallway beyond. Then the door slammed shut, making Susan jump. Her hand was really crushing Peter’s fingers now.
“Who are you?” Edna demanded.
For a moment nothing happened and then the table started to shake violently. A nice trick, thought Peter and he was still thinking that when his chair was suddenly tipped halfway back and held there for a few moments. He swore he could hear rasping breaths as if someone was struggling for air and smell the faint aroma of burning.
Everyone was still staring at the way Peter was precariously balanced, when his chair suddenly righted itself causing him to tip forward and nearly hit his head on the table.
Peter swallowed hard and looked at the people around him. Even Kate looked worried now. Only Edna looked unperturbed and Peter was going to say som
ething when they heard the front door open and then shut with a bang.
Despite Edna’s earlier plea for everyone to remain seated, they all got up and went to investigate, some entering the hallway whilst others stood in the room’s doorway. Standing in the hall shaking the rain from her umbrella, was a woman in her early sixties with grey hair and a friendly face although she looked shocked to see them all staring at her.
“Hello,” she said. “You all look like you’ve just seen a ghost.”
Nobody laughed or spoke.
“Sorry, bad jokes are a by-product of the vocation.”
“Sorry, who are you?” Asked Kate.
“Why I’m Edna, of course, Edna Lucas, the medium. I’m sorry that I’m late, but my wretched car broke down – wish I could have foreseen that.”
“There must be some mistake, Edna’s in...”
They all moved to look at the woman at the table but the room was empty with no other exits.
Mary Durley and her husband watched from an upstairs bedroom as the eight young people sped off in their cars, closely followed by the real Edna Lucas.
“That was fun, Charlie.”
“I know, I never tire of it, particularly when there’s a sceptic. Did you see his face? Priceless. We could have had so much more fun if that medium hadn’t shown up. We really had them going.”
“This is our house and always will be,” said Mary. She kissed her husband and hand in hand they walked through the wall to await the next time.”
Crabmeat
By Adrian Chamberlain
Sam Brookes lowered his drained glass, watching the ice cubes slide back like loaded dice, and considered ordering another. That would be his ninth double vodka, but he wasn’t drunk enough. And that was what he wanted more than anything.
Because ghosts couldn’t haunt you when you were drunk. They weren’t vengeful spirits, lost souls of the dead. They were hallucinations brought on by the conscience, the mind’s own way of punishing itself. So, keep that mind inebriated and the ghosts couldn’t come. Could they?
He shook his head. The ghost was real. It had to be, for Richey to see it. To hear it, speak to it.
Through the window of the now deserted hotel bar he could see the fiery July sun sink below the horizon, its dying rays bathing the bar in warm hues of orange and red. In spite of the warmth, Sam shivered. It would be dark soon.
As the barman warily refilled his glass, a crumpled leaflet sitting on a plate of leftover fish and chips on the bar top caught Sam’s attention. A money-off voucher for entrance to the Sea Life Centre. Now he knew he was being haunted. Mocked by a ghost with a cruel sense of humour. Underlined by tomato ketchup that looked like clotted blood in the dimmed light were more details.
Not just a money-off voucher, but also an invitation to see the new exhibits, amongst them the ghost crab…
***
The Sea Life Centre had been packed with visitors that afternoon, and being stuck amongst hordes of over-excited people gaping at a load of fish wouldn’t have been his idea of spending the last day of the family holiday on the best occasions. But after the dream, the nightmare that could only have been a warning – or a promise – there was even less incentive to come.
Going in now, ducking his head under the fibreglass rocks of the entrance tunnel, he felt like a condemned man lowering his head for the executioner’s axe.
He hadn’t wanted to come to Hunstanton at all, but Helen had insisted that they all needed a holiday. Finances were tight, so it wasn’t going to be a foreign holiday. She’d remembered childhood holidays in Hunstanton, her memory painting the small West Norfolk seaside resort in a rosy light, and insisted on coming here.
In spite of himself, Sam had found the first few days pleasant and enjoyable. Yes, the town was a little run down – what British coastal resort wasn’t? – but they’d been lucky with the weather, constant eighty degree heat and blazing sunshine that made a trip abroad unnecessary.
The change in surroundings was helping them all to relax and actually enjoy being a family once more. The lovemaking with Helen reminded him of the earlier years, when they’d been courting. And father and son bonded again.
An observer watching them play on the beach would see that they were cast from the same stone, Richey’s frame promising to fill out and make him the same tall but stocky man his father was, with a potential for that stockiness to run to fat. Sunlight turned his thick shock of hair golden, the blonde hair and the small nose the only physical characteristics he had inherited from his mother. That, and a tendency to take his time over things, to be a little too serious.
Whereas his father had rushed around like a lunatic at his age, Richey was more calm and thoughtful, analysing everything, searching for different angles and possibilities in every hobby he undertook. Even on holiday.
The hunting for fossils in the chalk and sandstone cliffs was slow and methodical. Sam smiled as he watched Richey checking off each sample against the examples in his notebook with a curt nod of approval, his small face scrunched up with studious intensity.
Sometimes he wished that Richey could be a little less intense, could relax and enjoy life more. Still, it boded well for his future. Not a natural sportsman like his father had been at his age, he wasn’t a total spod at school either. Academic, but popular, with a varied group of friends and interests.
Watching him search for crabs and razor clams in the rock pools after the tide had gone out one day, Sam knew Richey was destined to follow in his mother’s footsteps rather than his father’s. And that was no bad thing. Far better an academic and creative life like Helen’s – lecturer in medieval history at the University of East Anglia, with a lucrative side-line in watercolour painting – than his, a salesman for an office supplies company.
On the Tuesday evening, after trying to capture a spectacular sunset over the remains of St Edmund’s chapel and the disused lighthouse on the cliffs, she’d laid down her brushes and said to him:
“Richard wants to go to the Sea Life Centre at some stage.” She never liked calling him Richey, thought it childish. “Can we go?”
He mumbled assent, not looking up from his copy of the Express. “No probs. We’ll do it Friday, make our last day one to remember.”
Come Friday morning he wished he hadn’t agreed. The dream – the nightmare - he had woken from convinced him that something terrible was going to happen. But a promise was a promise, there was no way he could let Richey down. And how could he explain his reluctance? That would mean telling them what had happened…
***
And so, on the Friday afternoon, the last day of the holiday, they joined the long admission queue. Sam was trembling on the way in, pale and shivering in spite of the heat that beat down on them.
“Don’t worry, just a chill. Dickey tummy.” He pointed to the seafood stall. “While you guys were getting burgers I thought I’d try something different.”
Helen smiled. “Had an argument with a whelk, did you?”
“Should’ve remembered seafood doesn’t agree with me,” he grimaced. “That’ll teach me…” He took their hands, thankful that the lie had worked.
He’d not touched a thing from the stall. He’d never gone near it. Because he remembered the stall from his dream.
Everything was identical. The red and white striped awning, the fat, grinning, bearded face of the stall holder. The trays of various seafood nestled on the fake plastic green ‘lawn’. Even the chalked prices on the blackboard…identical, right down to the last penny. And the wafting aroma of crabmeat had been the same - as had the small, lonely figure at the end of the queue. It was the smell and the final customer that made him pale and nauseous.
Once they entered the cool, dark entrance, far from the nightmarish reminders outside, Sam started to relax, felt better. Even more so when he saw the effect the visit was having on his son. Richey was entranced by the rays swimming in the open pool of the first chamber, his face beaming with childish pleasu
re at the sight of them trying to clamber up over the lip of the tank. The walkthrough tunnel with its tiger sharks had him pointing and laughing with glee and Sam almost felt guilty, realising he had almost deprived his son of this. Helen squeezed his hand and smiled.