Paul Jenning's Spookiest Stories

by Paul Jennings

  Everyone on the train started to grin. I bit my tongue like mad to stop myself from smiling but I have to admit that it really was funny. Gerald just looked at a spot on the roof and stood there with his hands behind his back, pretending that nothing had happened.

  A few people started twittering and giggling. The poor kid just didn’t know what to do so he just kept on pretending that everything was all right. Gerald looked around desperately. I’m sure that if the door had been open he would have jumped out of the moving train just to escape from the mirth.

  The only person in the train who hadn’t noticed the flowers was Scouse. He was too busy scratching his shaved head and taking swigs out of a tinny. Every now and then he would give a loud burp.

  The train plunged into a tunnel and everything went black. I stopped biting my tongue and allowed myself a big grin. I just couldn’t help it. Anyway, Gerald couldn’t see me smiling in the dark. Right at that moment the lights switched on and Gerald looked into my eyes.

  He had seen me grinning. His bewildered eyes seemed to say, ‘Not you too.’ It was at this moment that I realised I had betrayed him. I forced the smile from my face and opened my mouth to speak but he looked away just as the train stopped at an underground station.

  The doors slid apart and Gerald stared at what was left of his twenty-four-dollar bunch of flowers. They had gone. He stood there lamely holding twelve broken stems wrapped in pink paper. There was not one petal left. They had all been ripped off in the tunnel. Now he had lost his grandmother’s money and his flowers. And even worse, he had made a fool of himself in front of a whole carriage full of people including me.

  With a strangled cry he jumped off onto the platform. Scouse jumped after him. ‘Look at the little fairy clutching his invisible flowers,’ sneered Scouse.

  I stepped off the train too and stood aside as it sped past me.

  Scouse snatched the rose stems from Gerald’s hand gleefully. ‘Look at this,’ he mocked as he read the card that Jenny had written:

  TO SAMANTHA WITH LOVE FROM GERALD.

  ‘I’ll bet she likes getting these.’ He shoved the prickly stems into Gerald’s face.

  Gerald grabbed the broken stalks and looked around like a hunted rabbit. He looked straight at me, red with shame. He wanted to escape but Scouse was blocking his way. Without a sound, Gerald jumped off the platform onto the tracks and ran up the tunnel.

  ‘Come back!’ I shouted. ‘Trains come through the loop every five minutes.’

  He made no reply and I heard his clattering feet disappear into the tunnel.

  ‘Let the little fairy go,’ said Scouse, showing his yellow teeth in a leer. Then he spat into my face and walked off laughing.

  I ran screaming down the platform to find a porter. ‘There’s a boy in the tunnel!’ I yelled. ‘Stop the trains.’

  The ground began to tremble gently and a rush of cold air came out of the tunnel. There was a low rumble and then a scream.

  The train rushed out of the tunnel. As it slowed I noticed a bunch of broken flower stems wedged on one of the buffers.

  3

  There were not many people at Gerald’s funeral. Apart from the priest and the undertakers there was just me and Gerald’s grandmother. After the coffin had been lowered into the ground we walked slowly back to the gate. I told the old lady about what happened in the flower shop. She already knew the rest from the police. She smiled sadly and explained about her pension money that he had spent. ‘Not that I care about that,’ she said. ‘If only I had Gerald back I would give everything I have.’

  I watched with tears in my eyes as the bent old lady slowly walked off. I had told her about that ratbag Scouse but I didn’t mention that I had smiled in the train when the roses got caught in the door. I felt too ashamed.

  That night I had terrible dreams about roses and thorns. I kept seeing a dark tunnel from which a lonely voice sadly called my name.

  It was no better that day at work. I kept dropping things and breaking them. And the palm of my hand was itchy. I kept scratching it but nothing would stop the itch.

  I was glad when it was time to knock off. I went out into the potting shed to get my parka. A terrible feeling of sadness suddenly swept over me. It seemed to flow out into my body from the palm of my left hand.

  And then it happened. From the palm of my left hand a blood-red rose erupted from my flesh. Slowly it unfolded, budded and bloomed. A magnificent flower nodding gently on the end of a graceful stem. I tried to scream but nothing came out. I shook my head wildly and my rose fell to the ground.

  I fell in a chair, dazed, and watched with horror. No, not horror: awe, as eleven more perfect blooms grew from the palm of my hand.

  I knew after the third one that there would be a dozen. A dozen bloomin’ roses. Blood-red and each with two dots on each perfect petal. And under the dots a downturned line.

  I stared at the dots. They were eyes. Unhappy eyes. And underneath, a sad little suggestion of a mouth. Each petal of each rose held a portrait of the dead boy’s face. I knew that Gerald had sent me a message from beyond the grave.

  I collected the roses in a daze and took them into the shop. Then I wrapped them in pink paper and tied them up with a bow. I ran a chewed fingernail along the ends and curled them up. After that I wrote on a small card and attached it to the ribbon.

  Then I set off for home.

  Scouse was on the train.

  He leered as soon as he saw me. I stood with my back to the sliding doors and as they slid closed I let the roses become trapped in the door. I stood there, saying nothing as the train lurched off.

  There was no one in the carriage except Scouse. ‘Another little person with flowers in the door,’ he mocked. He stood up and poked me in the stomach. It hurt. ‘Another sap. Another creep who buys flowers.’

  I grabbed his wrist with my one free hand and tried to stop him jabbing me.

  Just at that moment the train plunged into the tunnel and Scouse broke my hold in the blackness. I felt his powerful arms on my neck and I fought desperately for breath. I was choking. He was strangling me.

  I felt my life ebbing away but I just couldn’t bring myself to let go of those roses, and so I only had one free hand and couldn’t stop him.

  Without warning the doors burst apart as if opened by giant arms. A roaring and rushing filled the carriage. A sweet smell of roses engulfed us. The hands released my neck and Scouse screamed with terror. As the light flicked on I saw that the compartment was filled with rambling roses. They twisted and climbed at astonishing speed. They covered the luggage racks and the safety rails. They twisted along the seats and completely filled the compartment. I couldn’t move. Then I saw that the long tendrils wound around Scouse’s legs and arms. And neck.

  Tighter and tighter they drew around the hapless man’s throat until at last he lay still on the floor. I knew that he was dead.

  And then, as quickly as they had come, the creeping roses snaked out of the door and vanished into the black tunnel. There was not a sign that they had ever been there. Except the one dozen roses that I had started with. They were perfectly intact. Not damaged a bit by their exposure to the tunnel. I smoothed down my dress and then picked up the bunch of roses as the train stopped at the station.

  I looked again at the label I had written. It said:

  TO GERALD WITH LOVE FROM SAMANTHA.

  When I got home Mum was amazed by the roses. ‘Why Samantha,’ she said. ‘They are beautiful. And look, each petal has two little dots that look like eyes and a little line like a mouth. They are faces.’

  I could feel tears forming in my eyes. ‘Yes,’ I said, examining them closely. ‘And each little face is smiling.’

  The house was enclosed in darkness and Miss Pebble was alone. She had been alone for sixty years. She had no family and there was no one to care for her or help her. And now she was scared. But it was no good calling out. She was alone in the night.

  She loved her old house. She had l
ived in it all her life. She loved the old verandah and the tin roof. She loved the old cellar under the ground. She loved everything about it. It was her home.

  A few days earlier a shifty-looking character had offered her a lot of money for the old cottage. But Miss Pebble wouldn’t sell. She wanted to live in the house until she died.

  People said there was a ghost in the house. They said Ned Kelly had once lived there many years ago. Before he had been hanged for murder and robbery. Some people said that Ned’s ghost walked at night. Moaning and groaning and wearing the steel armour and helmet that he had made to protect himself from the bullets of the police. Miss Pebble didn’t believe it. She didn’t believe the house was haunted. She had never heard any moaning in the night. Not until now.

  She sat up in bed. There was someone in the house. She could hear movement. It sounded like someone crying.

  The noise was coming from the kitchen. It was very soft. She told herself not to be silly, there was nothing there. It was just her nerves. But she could feel her hands shaking in the dark. She wanted to turn on the light and go and look. She knew she couldn’t go to sleep until she had checked in the kitchen. But she was too scared. So she lay there all alone. In the dark.

  The noise grew louder. It was coming closer, coming along the hall. Miss Pebble heard clinking. And clanking. It sounded like chains being dragged along. Something was coming towards her room. It was definitely moaning and groaning and clinking and clanking. Miss Pebble gave a little sob. She wanted to scream. She wanted to shout for help. But she didn’t. She lay there saying nothing, hoping it would go away.

  The noise came closer and closer.

  Light appeared under the bedroom door. Soft flickering light, like light from a candle. Miss Pebble gasped. Her heart beat quickly and her head started to spin.

  And then the door began to open. Slowly. Light flickered into the room. Slowly, slowly the door opened. And there in the dark hall he stood. The ghost of Ned Kelly. He had a steel helmet over his head with a slit cut out for the eyes. His chest was covered with steel plates. In one hand was a candle and in the other was a revolver. Green eyes glowed through his helmet.

  Miss Pebble froze. Her heart almost stopped with fear.

  Ned Kelly started to walk towards the bed. He moaned. His armour creaked. He stretched out a hand for Miss Pebble, a long, skinny hand. Then the candle went out. It was completely black.

  Miss Pebble screamed. She put her hands to her mouth and screamed and screamed. Then she jumped out of bed. She stumbled through the darkness out into the hall. Out through the front door.

  It was raining outside. It was freezing cold. But Miss Pebble didn’t care. She ran out into the street screaming. She was soaking wet and her bare feet were cut and bleeding. She fled down the road and into the dark night.

  Ned was alone in the bedroom. He walked over to the door and switched on the light. Then he looked at his watch. It was a digital watch. It said 12.45 a.m.

  The figure pulled off his hood. He wasn’t Ned Kelly at all. And he wasn’t a ghost. He was a young man, a teenager. He laughed to himself. ‘That will make the old bag sell the house,’ he said. ‘Or my name is not Mick Harris.’

  2

  The next night in another town an old man was locking up a church. His name was Mr Pickle. All the others had gone. Choir practice was over. It was dark outside and cold. He put his hat on his bald head and shivered. He wished he was home, having his supper of cheese and biscuits and a nice glass of port.

  He thought of the warm fire at home and his favourite TV show – A Country Practice. He decided to hurry back.

  He took the short cut home through the graveyard. The graves were old and the grass was long. But there was a little track that went past his mother’s grave. Mr Pickle looked after her grave. He kept it tidy and he put flowers on it every Sunday after church.

  But tonight it was windy and cold and dark. He took his hat off as he went past his mother’s grave but he kept walking. Then he stopped. Something was different. The flower bowl had gone. He turned round and went back to the grave.

  The moon went behind a cloud. The night grew even darker and it was hard to see. Mr Pickle bent down and looked at the grass on the grave. His heart almost stopped. He saw something terrible. The grass moved. He was sure the grass had moved.

  He took a step back. The grass on the grave was moving up and down. He was filled with horror. There was a scraping noise, like digging. Something was digging its way out of the grave. Suddenly a small hole appeared. And out of it came the bones of a hand. The skeleton of a hand and an arm appeared. And waved around. On one finger was a wedding ring.

  Mr Pickle was filled with fear. He opened and closed his mouth. ‘No, no,’ he screamed. He took a step backwards. Then he felt a sharp pain in his chest and down his arm. He put his hand over his heart. The pain grew worse. It was killing him. He fell to the ground and lay still.

  A man ran out from behind a tree. It was a fat man dressed in a suit. He bent over Mr Pickle. He put his head on Mr Pickle’s chest and listened. Then he picked up Mr Pickle’s arm and felt his wrist. There was no pulse.

  The skeleton was still waving around in the hole. The man in the suit ran over to it. He pulled out the arm and threw it on the ground. A groan came out of the hole.

  ‘Shut up, Mick, you fool,’ said the man. ‘Pickle is dead. He’s croaked. We’ve gone too far this time.’

  The man grabbed a shovel. He started to dig in the grave. He uncovered a long box. Then he opened the lid. A young man sat up, a teenager. ‘What’s up, Shifty?’ he asked.

  ‘You’re a fool. That’s what’s up,’ said Shifty. ‘He’s dead. Pickle is as dead as a doornail. And it’s your fault.’

  ‘It was your idea, not mine,’ said the teenager.

  ‘Listen, Mick,’ said Shifty, ‘I told you to get in the box. I told you to wave the skeleton hand. But I didn’t tell you to put a ring on the finger. He thought it was his mother’s ring. It was too much for him. It gave him a heart attack. Now he’s dead.’

  ‘Don’t try to blame me,’ said Mick. ‘Or I’ll flatten you.’

  ‘Okay, don’t get ants in your pants. Let’s get out of here before someone comes.’

  Shifty and Mick ran back to the road. They got into an old truck. On the side it said:

  SPOOKS FOR HIRE

  Mick and Shifty drove home quickly. They wanted to get away from Mr Pickle’s body. They didn’t want to get caught.

  3

  The two men ran a business called SPOOKS INCORPORATED.

  They dressed up as ghosts to frighten people. They went to old houses that were supposed to be haunted and scared the owners so that they sold their homes. Mick and Shifty’s friends bought the houses cheap, then paid the two crooks for what they had done.

  ‘Will we get paid now that Mr Pickle is dead?’ said Mick. ‘We were only supposed to scare him. Not kill him.’

  ‘Of course we’ll get paid,’ said Shifty. ‘His house will have to be sold now. Dead men don’t own houses. This has been a good week. Last night we scared the daylights out of old Miss Pebble, and tonight we knocked off Mr Pickle. We get a thousand dollars for each. Two thousand dollars for two nights’ work. That’s good money. Real good.’

  ‘What’s the next job?’ asked Mick. ‘Who do we scare next?’

  ‘There’s a pub in Melbourne called Young and Jackson’s,’ replied Shifty. ‘It’s supposed to be haunted. We are going to scare the owner into selling it for a cheap price.’

  ‘Tell me the story about the ghost in the pub,’ said Mick. ‘Not that I believe in ghosts. Only fools believe in ghosts.’

  ‘Well,’ Shifty said. ‘A long time ago a bloke called John Heart owned Young and Jackson’s. He wanted to see if he could stop meat going bad. So he got a chicken and chopped off its head. Then he filled the chicken up with salt. He thought that filling the chicken up with salt would stop it going rotten.’

  ‘Did it work?’

&nbs
p; ‘No one knows,’ said Shifty. ‘He cut himself while he was chopping off the chook’s head and the next day he died.’

  ‘And now his ghost is supposed to haunt the pub,’ said Mick.

  ‘No,’ yelled Shifty. ‘The ghost of the headless chicken is supposed to haunt the pub.’

  Mick and Shifty started to laugh. They both thought it was funny. Very funny indeed.

  The next day Mick and Shifty made their plans. They were going to spook the owner of the pub so that he would get scared and sell it.

  ‘How are we going to get the ghost of a headless chicken?’ asked Mick. ‘Dressing up as Ned Kelly was a good idea. That scared Pebble, but I can’t dress up as a chicken. I’m too big.’

  ‘We are going to make one,’ said Shifty. ‘We are going to make a headless chicken.’

  Mick and Shifty spent ten days making a mechanical chicken. They used feathers, wheels and a small motor, and they put red paint around its neck to look like blood. At last it was finished. Shifty put it on the floor. ‘Terrific,’ he said. ‘It looks just like the real thing. The owner of the pub will be scared out of his wits.’

  ‘Let’s see if it can walk,’ said Mick. ‘Press the remote control.’ Shifty pressed a button and the headless chicken ran around in circles. It flapped its wings and shook its headless neck. ‘Wonderful,’ Mick went on. ‘In the dark it will look just like the real thing. The ghost of the headless chook. Something is missing, though. It’s good, but it needs something else.’ He looked at the mechanical chicken for a while. Then he said, ‘I know. It needs to make a noise. It needs to cluck.’

  ‘Don’t be a fool. How can it cluck?’ Shifty replied. ‘It has no head. A chook can’t cluck without a head.’

  ‘That’s all the better,’ Mick told him. ‘Don’t you see? A chicken with no head that makes a noise is more scary. It will be more ghostly if it clucks. All we have to do is put a tape recorder inside it. You can make some clucking noises and I will put them on tape. Then we put the tape inside the chicken.’