The Most Frightening Story Ever Told

by Philip Kerr

  “Can I help you folks?” he said.

  “We’re looking for the owner of the house,” said Mr. Rapscallion.

  “I’m the owner,” said the man. “My name’s Burt Erney, and I’m planning to restore this house and live in it myself.”

  “Then I really think we have the wrong address,” said Elizabeth.

  “We were looking for the Shivers family,” said Mr. Rapscallion. “Fenton Shivers and his son, Billy.”

  “Sorry,” said Mr. Erney.

  “Our mistake,” said Mercedes.

  Mr. Rapscallion, Altaira, Mercedes and Elizabeth started to walk back along Sycamore.

  “Wait a minute,” said Mr. Erney. “Did you say Shivers?”

  “Yes,” said Mr. Rapscallion.

  Mr. Erney went back into his truck and took out his briefcase. “I have the deeds to the house with me,” he murmured, searching through some old papers. “I thought I recognized that name. Yes. Here we are. A Mr. Shivers was the previous owner of the house.”

  Mr. Erney showed them the deed.

  “Only I didn’t actually buy the house from him. I bought it from his lawyers, just a few weeks ago.”

  “There’s something attached to the back of the deed,” said Elizabeth. “It appears to be a newspaper clipping.”

  “So there is,” said Mr. Erney, and, removing the paper clip that attached the clipping to the deed, he handed it to Mr. Rapscallion.

  Mr. Rapscallion glanced at the clipping and sighed. “It appears to be dated forty years ago,” he said, and then read the clipping aloud:

  Hitchcock: Monday. Three members of a family, including a six-month-old baby, were killed and one was seriously injured when a truck lost control and ran into the back of a car on Hitchcock High Street, outside the public library on Sunday morning. The victims were traveling in the car. They have been identified as Fenton Shivers, 38, his wife, Agnetha, 34, and their daughter Fiona, age six months. The Shiverses’ son, Billy, 12, has been admitted to the Walden Pond Hospital, Potter Road, in critical condition but is not expected to survive. The family, residing at 320 Sycamore, in Southeast Hitchcock, was on its way to the Hitchcock Baptist Chapel when the accident happened. Fenton Shivers was at the wheel at the time of the accident. The driver of the truck was not injured.

  Mr. Rapscallion was quiet for a moment.

  Altaira took a deep breath and tried to stop herself from screaming. “Well, I guess that explains why his hand was so cold,” she muttered.

  “You held hands with him?” said Mr. Rapscallion.

  “I thought I did. Now I’m not so sure.”

  “Yikes,” said Elizabeth.

  “That’s what Billy used to say,” said Altaira.

  She sat down on the sidewalk for a moment and wiped a tear from her eye.

  “Are you okay?” asked her father.

  “I think I’m going to barf.”

  Mercedes and Elizabeth sat down as well and put their arms around her.

  “She’s had a bit of a shock, that’s all,” Mr. Rapscallion told Mr. Erney. “We all have. May I borrow this clipping, please?”

  “Of course.”

  After a few moments, Altaira started to feel a bit better.

  “Come on,” said Mr. Rapscallion. He started to walk back along Sycamore.

  “Where are we going?” asked Mercedes.

  “The Walden Pond Hospital,” said Mr. Rapscallion. “On Potter Road.”

  The Walden Pond Hospital, which was now called the New Walden Pond Hospital, was a large building on the edge of a small lake. There was an old part and a new part. The old part looked better than the new part.

  They went inside and asked to see the person in charge and eventually they were all admitted to the office of a Dr. Price, who was a tall, fair-haired man in a white coat with large bright eyes.

  Mr. Rapscallion explained their mission: “We’re making inquiries about a patient who was brought here forty years ago.”

  “Forty years?” Dr. Price took a deep breath. “That’s quite a while.”

  “Yes, I know it’s a long time. The boy was called Billy Shivers and he was age twelve. This may sound strange to you, Doctor, but we were hoping to find out when he died. Presumably it wasn’t long after the car accident that killed the rest of his family. I brought this newspaper clipping along to help us find out a bit more.”

  He handed over the clipping, but Dr. Price did not read it.

  “You’re asking me about William Shivers?” He looked surprised.

  Mr. Rapscallion nodded. “I know it’s a lot to ask.”

  “Look, I don’t know what this is about. Or who you people are. But William Shivers was, in a way, this hospital’s most famous patient. When I say famous I actually mean infamous. You see, William Shivers was in a coma here at Walden Pond for forty years.”

  “A coma?” said Altaira.

  “Yes. That’s a profound state of unconsciousness, miss,” the doctor told Altaira. “Or what’s also sometimes called a persistent vegetative state. It just means that the person’s brain died a long time before their body.”

  “I know what a coma is, thank you,” said Altaira.

  “Then you’ll also know that people can remain in a coma for a very long time before they die. That’s what made Billy—I mean William—so famous. Until he died, just about a month ago, William Shivers had remained in a coma for almost forty years. That’s what made him infamous. Forty years is the longest coma in American medical history.”

  “Crumbs,” said Elizabeth.

  “And the house?” asked Mr. Rapscallion. “320 Sycamore?”

  “After his family died, it belonged to William. But of course no one could buy it, because he couldn’t sell it. Not until he himself died.”

  “I see,” said Mr. Rapscallion.

  “Do you mind telling me what this is about?” asked Dr. Price.

  “If I told you,” said Mr. Rapscallion, “you’d never believe me.” He sighed. “Can I ask you one more thing? Where is Billy buried?”

  “He was cremated,” said Dr. Price. “And his ashes were spread on the lake out there. It’s what usually happens when the deceased person has no relations to decide these things for us.”

  “Thank you.” Mr. Rapscallion’s voice was now little more than a whisper.

  Altaira had already started to cry.

  “Don’t cry,” he told his daughter.

  “Why not?” she said. “I mean, it’s not every day you fall in love with a boy who’s been dead for a whole month.”

  They went back to the Haunted House of Books.

  But on the way, they stopped in at L. B. Jefferies Photographic on Hitchcock High Street to collect the films Mr. Rapscallion and Mercedes had left there for processing.

  They took the prints into the Reading Room to take a look at them.

  But none of the pictures taken of Billy by either of them in Kansas City or Hitchcock had come out properly. Sometimes there was a sort of blurred figure that was almost there, but mostly there was nothing at all.

  Elizabeth selected one of the pictures. “Is that a picture of a ghost, do you think?” she asked.

  “It is, as far as I’m concerned,” said Mercedes. “As far as I’m concerned, this picture seems to put the matter beyond dispute. Billy was a ghost.” She laughed. “There was me thinking they didn’t exist. And all the time I was hanging out with one.”

  “Me too,” admitted Mr. Rapscallion. “I thought I would never see a ghost. And it seems I’ve been seeing one for four whole weeks.”

  “Looks like this shop was haunted after all,” said Mercedes.

  “I used to think this shop was the scariest thing,” said Altaira. “But I guess it doesn’t look so scary now. Not in view of what’s happened. Last night I walked a ghost home. I had coffee with his dead family and then he and I sat out on the porch and watched the moon. If Billy was a ghost, and I think he must have been, he was the nicest ghost anyone could hope to meet.”

&
nbsp; She smiled bitterly. “How do you like that for luck? The first boy I fall for and he turns out to be a ghost.”

  “Him being a ghost would certainly explain his old clothes,” said Elizabeth. “And his father’s. Those are the clothes people were wearing forty years ago. And it probably also explains why they looked so thin and pale in themselves. They were dead, after all.”

  “But it doesn’t explain everything,” said Mr. Rapscallion. “It doesn’t explain why Billy told me that he was so afraid of ghosts. How can you be afraid of ghosts if you are a ghost? And it certainly doesn’t explain why those four horrible children, Wilson, Hugh, Lenore and Vito, were so scared of a story that wasn’t scary. I don’t suppose we’ll ever have the answers to all those questions.”

  “I’m not so sure,” said Mercedes. “Look.” And she pointed up at the stuffed raven that was sitting on the bust of Pallas just above the chamber door. “Is it my imagination, or is there a piece of paper in the message capsule attached to its leg?”

  “Good grief, you’re right,” said Mr. Rapscallion. He leaped up from his chair and, fetching a stool to stand on, reached up, removed a small piece of paper from the raven’s leg and read out loud what was written there: “The Modern Pandora, page sixty-six.”

  “The book!” yelled Elizabeth. “The scary story.”

  She ran to the shelf where Mr. Rapscallion had placed it carefully after the reading and, ignoring the loud creak as it opened, hurriedly turned to page sixty-six. A sheet of very thin, almost transparent paper floated to the floor like some ethereal thing.

  They all looked at it for a moment, hardly daring to pick it up, afraid of what it might say.

  “I’m scared to touch it,” admitted Elizabeth.

  “Me too,” admitted Mercedes.

  “And me,” admitted Mr. Rapscallion.

  Altaira bent down and retrieved it from the Reading Room floor. And this is what it said:

  Dear Mr. Rapscallion,

  Thanks very much for the last few weeks in the shop. I’ve had a terrific time haunting the place, and you and Mercedes and Elizabeth and the lovely Altaira/Redford have all been very kind to me. As you have probably gathered by now, I’m a real ghost. Yes, we do exist! I decided to hang around after my recent death because the fact is that I was just a little bit scared about moving on into the next world, so to speak.

  I think it had something to do with being in a coma for forty years. I’m not sure. After forty years of being neither one thing nor the other, it’s easy to get a bit confused. My dad did his best to talk me around to the idea of the afterlife, or whatever you want to call it, but, for a long time, there was something about the idea of being dead and moving on that I didn’t like. I suppose I was scared of ghosts because I was a ghost, if that doesn’t sound too pathetic. And that was partly why I hung around the shop. I suppose I thought that if I read enough stories about ghosts, then I might not be afraid of being one.

  Anyway, I’ve gotten over all that now. In fact, I got over it just last night when I went down to the so-called Haunted Cellar. You see, there was this tunnel down there, and there was a light at the end of it. Not just any light, you understand, but a really fantastic light that made me feel wonderful. Better than I’ve felt in a long while. And there was something pulling me toward the light, too. It was about then that I noticed my body wasn’t there anymore and that felt just fine. Also there were all these amazing colors, and flowers and stars and galaxies, and yes, it sounds a bit corny, but I sort of knew that I was at one with the universe. My dad was there, too, to help guide me over to the other side. And I wasn’t in the least bit afraid. He was a bit reluctant to let me go back again, but I simply had to return for just a few minutes to say goodbye to you in person last night, to write this note and to say goodbye to Altaira of course. Tell her I’m sorry I have to leave her like this just as we were becoming good friends. I’ll never forget her. You can also tell her that now that she’s met a real ghost, there’s no need to be afraid of anything and certainly not some stupid ghost story about a pocket handkerchief.

  My dad got the idea of how to bring me through to the other side when I told him about the contest. And from talking to you, Mr. Rapscallion. I expect you’ve guessed by now, but, of course, it was Dad who assisted you with the reading of the scary story last night. He did all that creepy ghost stuff. He was very grateful to you for helping me out and decided to do the same for you. And to help those other kids, too. He only scared them a bit, just enough to make them behave themselves a bit better from now on. Which I’m sure they will.

  Perhaps we’ll see each other again one day—in this world, or the next—I don’t know. I’m not sure how this ghost thing works yet. My only regret is the way you all had to find out that I’m dead. Sorry about that. I know it must have been a bit of a shock for you all. Especially Altaira.

  Well, that’s all for now. I’d best be going. My dad will be thinking that something dreadful has happened to me. Not that anything dreadful could really happen to me. Not anymore. But you know what I mean. You can’t stop a father from worrying about his son, I guess. Especially when that father loves me as much as mine does. Remember me, if you will, but always try to remember this: that Love is always stronger than Life and Death.

  Take care.

  Your affectionate friend,

  Billy Shivers

  p.s. Tell Elizabeth I really enjoyed the story. And Dad says the kids were a lot more scared by it than you’ll ever know. They were just pretending they weren’t. The way kids do, right? Scaring kids—for that matter, scaring anyone!—is a lot easier than you might think, Mr. Rapscallion. Take it from one who knows.

  Everyone was silent for several minutes.

  After a while Altaira said, “That was the nicest boy I think I never met.” She smiled tearfully. “If you know what I mean.”

  “Absolutely,” said Mercedes.

  Altaira looked around the air in the room as if Billy might still be there, unseen. “I’ll never forget you, Billy,” she whispered. “Not ever.”

  Mr. Rapscallion took off his glasses and wiped a tear from his own eye. “Odd that it should have taken someone who was dead to show me the true meaning of life,” he said.

  “Gosh, and me,” admitted Elizabeth.

  “All of which means just this.” Mr. Rapscallion took hold of Elizabeth’s hand and kissed it. “It means I’m going to write a love song, on the piano. And then I’m going to sing it to you, dear Elizabeth. And if you like it, then perhaps you might do me the inestimable honor of consenting to be my wife.”

  “Yikes!” exclaimed a blushing Elizabeth. “This is all a bit sudden. A bit scary. I really don’t know what to say.”

  “I do,” said Altaira.

  Twice in my life I have seen a ghost. Or thought that I did. And in both cases I also believed that the ghost wanted to scare me.

  The first time was when I was a child of about ten or eleven years old. I would like to be able to describe this incident as a hallucination, except for the fact that I remember it so vividly. It was the look of sheer malevolence on the apparition’s face that alarmed me the most and caused me to jump six or seven feet, from one side of the room to the other.

  That night, I slept with the light on.

  The second time was in the autumn of 1975 and I was nineteen years old. I was standing in front of a dressing table and unloading my pockets of wallet and keys, and as I glanced up at the cheval mirror in front of me, I saw someone step away from behind me. I could not have said that it was a man or a woman with any degree of certainty any more than I could have said that there was someone there at all, for I knew the room to be empty of anyone but me. But the strong sense that I had seen something in the blink of an eye was underlined by the fact that at the very same moment, the electric light fused with a loud bang, the fan heater stopped working and the flame on the gas fire died out. In the same moment, I felt something very cold behind me, as if someone had opened a refrigerator do
or, and, with my hair standing on end, I felt quite sure that if I turned around, I would see a ghost—moreover, a ghost that wanted to scare me. So I ran out of the room and into the drawing room, where the friend I lived with looked up from the book he was reading and said, “What’s the matter? You look as if you have seen a ghost.”

  That was another night I slept with the light on.

  Do ghosts exist? I don’t know. No one does; however, for a number of reasons, I prefer to think that they do. But mostly, the reasons boil down to this: I’d hate someone to prove that they really don’t exist. Life is dull enough as it is without ghosts going the way of the Loch Ness monster and Santa Claus.

  A poll of two thousand people in August 2009 showed that 40 percent of people believe in ghosts; this compares with a 1950s Gallup poll in which only 10 percent of the public said they believed in ghosts.

  Clearly, there are more people who want to believe in ghosts than there used to be. After all, where would Christmas be without a good ghost story?

  It goes without saying that I have met several people who claim to have seen a ghost. My own mother was one of these. And I believe her father told her he once saw a ghost, too. Neither of them strikes me as the kind of person who would make up a ghost story. That’s my job.

  The best ghost story I ever heard was the one in Kansas City, in 1987, which informs the scene in chapter fourteen of this book, in which Mr. Rapscallion and Billy go to stay at the Savoy Hotel. Because it was there that I met an old man who told me the following tale.

  I have no idea if it’s true or not. But I’d like to believe it is.

  I once met Harry Houdini. I was a kid at the time, about eight or nine years old. He was staying at the Savoy Hotel on Ninth Street, where my dad was the manager, and—I’m not sure how this happened exactly, because Houdini was incredibly famous—Houdini agreed to keep an eye on me for half an hour while my dad went outside to run an errand for him. Houdini was the most famous escape artist in America, and he couldn’t walk around the streets like normal people or else he’d have been mobbed. So, anyway, he showed me some magic tricks and looked at my toys and games, and noticing a Ouija board among my possessions, he laughed and told me that spiritualism was nonsense.