by Sean Munger
At first I thought nothing of these things and withdrew from the room. You will even see my note on the ledger pages ~ “child’s toys” ~ but as I retired to the servant’s room I thought this strange. Mrs. Quain is elderly, her son grown, but the son does not have children of his own. The toys were not dusty and looked good as new as if a child had just laid them down. So they were not left over from the Quains’ own children ~ why, then, should there be a child’s things in the house?
I retired to bed. In the middle of the night I was awakened by the sound of laughter coming from behind the door
Anine, raising the teacup to her lips as she read this, nearly dropped it. She sighed out loud. Laughter coming from behind the door! So Bradbury had heard it too. That proved it was real, or at least that there was something causing it; if not the spöke, then something else.
I was awakened by the sound of laughter coming from behind the door and, alarmed, I launched out of bed and opened it but there was no one there. It sounded like the laughter of a child. Then from downstairs I began to hear something. It was music but sounded quite different from a normal tune ~ tinny, like hearing it through a cone made of thin metal. The tune was very bright and cheerful but upon hearing it I felt the most dreadful terror I have ever experienced ~ surpassing even the terror of battle.
The source of the music, I knew, was the third floor, northwest quarter bedroom where I saw the toys. The tinny metal sound was the tone of the child’s harpsichord. The tune I knew well ~ “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring,” a melody of J.S. Bach ~ played with such utter precision, not a single missed note. But so high ~ the pitch so high, squeaky, irritating ~ the shriek of a child’s lungs ~ and yes I began to hear shrieking ~ or thought it was shrieking ~ but it was laughter ~ coming from that accursed room ~ and when I opened the door in the darkness ~
These words were written at the bottom of the page. When Anine turned over to the next page her eyes widened. The words written here were very haphazard, but the letters were very large, a strange silent scream leaping up at her from the diary:
SADNESS
SADNESS
SADNESS
ADNESS
DNESS
NESS
MNESS
MDNESS
MADNESS
SADNESS
MADNESS
MADNESS
MADNESS
ALICE
The next few pages were gibberish. Or at least they appeared to be gibberish; they were solid blocks of letters, filling the entire page, line after line. Amongst them Anine perceived a pattern:
jesujoyofmansdesiringholywisdomlovemostbright drawnbytheeoursoulsaspiringsoar touncreatedlightwordofgodourflesh thatfashionedwiththefireof lifeimpassioned strivingstilltotruthunknownsoaringdyingroundthythrone
Then, a few pages after that, this appeared:
ALICE!
GOD MY DAUGHTER
LOVE MY DAUGHTER
I HURT YOU
DID NOT MEAN TO HURT YOU
GOD CURSE ME FOR HURTING YOU
WANT YOUR HAPPINESS
HAPPINESS IN HEAVEN
DEAR GOD IN HEAVEN
I WANT TO BE IN HEAVEN
WILL SOON BE IN HEAVEN
WITH ALICE
The next page was difficult to look at. It was filled with a crude drawing of an ejaculating penis. Around Bradbury had drawn strange teardrop-like slashes which reminded Anine of the lacerations depicted on the body of Christ in paintings of the Passion. She did not know why but her mind was suddenly filled with the horrifying impression of a naked man flagellating himself while having an orgasm at the same time. She immediately turned the page and the image receded.
She shuddered. Bradbury, she realized, was quite insane, but portions of the diary were written in a lucid state of mind. After the disturbing drawing she found another section that seemed to have been written while he was slightly more rational—but perhaps only slightly.
Thursday, June 3, 1880. The clock in the hall reads 4 o’clock PM but I do not know what time it is ~ and I cannot leave this house. I have tried. After the madness that has overcome me on each of the preceding nights I awakened this morning and knew I must leave or the sadness will destroy my sanity for all time. But I cannot leave. Opening the front door takes me to the accursed corridor. It is a long corridor with golden silk walls. There are patterns on the walls painted in blue ~ patterns that repeat ~ a giraffe and a bear and a monkey marching along the walls ~ like on the child’s harpsichord, the dreadful child’s toy, the demon child, the child of Satan who giggles behind the door at night ~
I cannot step into the corridor. If I step into the corridor with the patterned walls the sadness will explode my heart. Blood will spurt from my eyes and ears and I will die instantly. But yet I cannot stay.
There is now a trumpet. I hear its music every moment of every day. It is a German silver trumpet tied with a red ribbon. It tweets and toots and squeals every moment ~ this horrible squeaky screeching, right in my ear, right next to me all the time ~ some times I think I have seen it, the German silver trumpet with the red ribbon ~ squeaking tooting screeching tooting squealing ~ and the music.
I AM LOSING MY MIND. These things cannot be real ~ there is a boy here ~ a little boy ~ the spirit of a boy who loves music ~ I believe he is dead ~ must be dead ~ dead like my little girl Alice ~ dead for many years ~ dead here ~ dead in that upstairs room ~ those were his toys I saw ~ the harpsichord ~ the pattern in the corridor ~ bear monkey giraffe bear monkey giraffe bear monkey giraffe ~ a dead boy ~ a dead child ~ and I will soon be a dead man.
The next page:
THIS IS THE ONLY WAY!
The one after that was the most terrifying.
To anyone who may be reading ~ .
Thirteen years ago, on the day after Christmas, 1867 I murdered my daughter Alice. She was six years old. It was not intentional. We were playing. The game we played ~ the awful game we played ~ I cannot set down into words ~ but I hurt her without meaning to ~ the monster inside me, the devil who did this thing, who hurt this child, I can no longer live with. Here in this house I understood this ~ there can be no happiness, must be no happiness for me so long as I live and Alice is dead ~ I loved her ~ I told my wife she fell from a tree ~ and she still believes this to this day ~ she never knew what happened to Alice ~ but she will know through my deed that I reject all happiness, that I can have no happiness, that no one shall have happiness, especially not in this place. I will soon be with Alice. Forgive me.
Erskine Darnell Bradbury
Wednesday 4th of June, 1880
When she closed the book Anine felt physically ill. She lurched out of the settee, reaching for the bell cord, and felt hot acrid vomit propelling itself up her throat. She retched and closed her mouth but a jet of it spurted from her lips, splattering the tea set and the silver tray. She felt woozy. Shocked by the caustic smell she staggered and finally rang the bell cord. It seemed to take forever for Miss Wicks to arrive, and during those awful moments her heart was pounding, her head spinning and her stomach doing cartwheels.
“I’m—I’m sorry,” Anine gasped when Miss Wicks opened the pocket door. “I’ve been taken ill.”
Wicks said nothing but the way she swung into action impressed Anine. She escorted her upstairs, helped her change into a dressing gown, tucked her into bed and returned less than twenty minutes later with a mysterious fizzing substance in a ceramic carafe.
“Drink this, ma’am,” said Wicks, pouring the froth into a cup. “It’ll settle your stomach.” Indeed it did. Wicks next appeared with a bowl of chicken soup and some biscuits, freshly made by Mrs. Hennessey. She then set about tidying up the room. A chamber pot, folded towels and a fresh bowl and pitcher were at the ready but Anine had no need of them. By the end of the day she felt much better—except for the gnawing terror that had claw
ed its way out of Bradbury’s diary and into her head.
“Miss Wicks,” said Anine, as the hour approached for Julian to return home, “I was reading Mr. Bradbury’s book when I took ill. I’d appreciate if you tidy up the Green Parlor and put the book somewhere it won’t be discovered by accident. And I’d like to rely on your discretion.” She didn’t know why, but she had a curious irrational fear of someone else knowing about the diary; now that she knew its contents this fear was even stronger.
“I’ve already taken care of it, ma’am. And don’t worry about me saying nothing. I wouldn’t have been serving ladies as long as I have without knowing when to keep my mouth shut.” Wicks stepped over to the wardrobe. “Will you be dressing for dinner, ma’am? Mr. Julian will be home soon and if you’re not dressed he may be asking why.”
She’s protecting me. This affected Anine profoundly. Throwing off the covers she said, “You’re a very wise lady, Miss Wicks.”
Julian returned and they had dinner. Anine, in a maroon silk dress with matching earrings, looked none the worse for wear. He spoke aimlessly of politics over the table, his usual tirade of disparagement against Garfield and the Republicans. He slept in their bedroom that night but made no attempt to touch her. She was grateful of that.
This time when she heard the woman laughing in the night Anine was prepared. She raised her head off the pillow, staring into the darkness split only with the terrible cymbal-crash of the ticking clock, but she knew she had been awakened by it. Her heart was pounding but her terror was at least constrained by some sense of understanding. It’s not just me, she knew now. Bradbury heard it too. He was insane, but this part of the experience in the house—whatever explained it—must have had some semblance of objective reality.
When she heard the laughter again she looked over at Julian. He was sleeping on his stomach, dead to the world. It was pointless to awaken him. He wouldn’t believe in the reality of the phenomenon even if he heard it for himself.
She reached for her dressing gown and shrugged it on in the darkness. Pausing at the door, she pressed her ear to the wood.
Yes, the spöke was there. She could hear it. Creak…creak… Then the laughter came again. It was so faint as to be barely perceptible, but it was there.
Anine opened the door. The hallway was very dim. Miss Wicks often left one light in the entryway on, the gas turned very low. It was so faint that the orange glow barely filtered up to the second floor. But at the end of the hallway Anine could see a figure.
She was astonished at first. Rubbing her eyes, now certain of what she was seeing, the terror suddenly clutched at her. Twenty feet away, at the very end of the hallway near the doors to two of the guest rooms, Anine saw what was unmistakably the bell-shaped figure of the lower half of a woman’s dress. It was red and covered with some dark pattern. A fringe of red lace danced against the floor. The upper body of the woman was shrouded in darkness. As she moved the red-black bell of the dress moved with her, swishing about with the sound of gently rustling fabric. The giggling came again—a soft, polite, airy laugh—and then the shadows swallowed all.
Instantly Anine wrenched open the bedroom door, darted back inside and closed it behind her. Her breaths were fast and shallow. She could hear the pounding of her pulse in her ears. There was no mistaking it this time. She had seen it. For a split-second, yes; dark, yes; indistinct, yes. But she had seen it.
She turned. Julian still hadn’t awakened. Gingerly Anine tiptoed back to bed, took off her dressing gown and draped it on the bedpost. She was so terrified of the figure at the end of the hallway that right now even Julian’s presence was comforting. She bundled the covers around her, gathering them up as if they were armor that would deflect the supernatural.
Well, there’s no use denying it any longer, Anine thought. This house is hemsökt. Haunted.
Chapter Eight
The Woman
Anine knew she needed to bring someone else into the circle—if only to preserve her own sanity—but with each day that passed without a note from Rachael she realized her choice of allies was extremely limited. Until she could be seen socially without turning the women of New York even more fiercely against her, Anine knew she could count on no hope from outside the walls of her house. Yet she steadfastly refused to be isolated. The terrifying gibberish in Bradbury’s diary had set off an alarm inside of her. That could happen to me. It was imperative to make sure it did not.
Two mornings after she’d seen the specter in the hallway Anine waited until Julian left for his office, then retired into the Green Parlor and rang the bell cord. She made a point to be standing—not sitting down—when Miss Wicks opened the pocket doors and entered. The detached, maid-ish way she said “Yes, ma’am?” caused Anine to vow that this was the last time Clea Wicks addressed her as merely an employer.
“Come in, Miss Wicks. Close the doors.” When she had done so Anine motioned to one of the chairs. “Sit down, please.”
Wicks hesitated but awkwardly took a seat. “Have I done something wrong, ma’am?”
“No. Quite the contrary.” Anine thought about how to start. She almost said, I wanted to thank you for your discretion about my illness and Mr. Bradbury’s book, but she knew that Wicks would simply shrug it off. Ultimately she decided that Wicks would respect nothing so much as a blunt statement of the truth. “I wish to confide in you, Miss Wicks. Something is happening in this house—something quite unusual. You may have noticed that I’m shunned in society. I do not know why. But I don’t wish to alienate the women of New York any more than is necessary. I need someone who understands. And I thought, who better to turn to than another woman who lives inside these walls?”
Only after she’d said this did Anine realize it was borderline nonsensical. She wasn’t surprised when Wicks cocked her head and replied, “Excuse me, ma’am?”
Anine blushed. “I’m sorry. I realize I’m not making any sense.” She stood up and looked at the window. “Since the first night I’ve been in this house I’ve heard strange sounds. I hear creaking, like the creaking of floorboards, and the sound of a woman laughing. The other night when I heard these sounds I left my room. At the end of the second floor hallway I saw something: a woman in a black and red dress. It was only for a split-second, but I’m certain I saw her.” She looked back at Wicks, whose expression was, predictably, blank. “You asked me right here in this room, the first day you came here, if I was scared of ghosts. I answered no. I realize now that I lied to you. I should have answered yes. I am scared of ghosts. I’m scared of the ghost in this house—and I believe strongly that there is one.”
Wicks’s reaction was not what Anine expected. Her expression softened slightly, but she didn’t look disbelieving or quizzical. “They can’t hurt you, ma’am.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Ghosts. They can’t hurt you.”
“I’m not sure you’re right about that.” She turned from the window. “The other day after I was taken ill you said you put Mr. Bradbury’s book out of sight. Where did you put it?”
Wicks pointed to a polished oak end table which had a shallow drawer. “There.”
Anine stepped over to the end table and slid the drawer open. She removed the small leather book. Pausing for only a moment to run her thumb across the pages—the flash of the obscene drawing going by made her shudder—she turned and thrust it into Wicks’s hands.
“I would like you to read this,” said Anine. “Read it and tell me what you think. Take as much time as you need.” She crossed over to the corner and rang the bell cord. “I’ll have Mrs. Hennessey bring us some tea.”
They consumed two pots of tea while Wicks read the diary. Anine watched her reaction carefully. As she turned one page the maid winced. Anine was certain it was the obscene drawing, but she was curious if it created the same image in Wicks’s mind as it had in hers. At the end, the terrible climax of Erskine
Bradbury’s madness, Wicks finally began to look drawn and sad. After she closed the book and set it on the end table she reached for her teacup. The blankness of her maid’s expression returned, but more slowly this time.
“So that’s why he hunged himself,” she said softly.
“I believe that Mr. Bradbury was insane. Anyone can see that from looking at the diary. But was he insane before he came to this house, or did he only become insane after he was here? He had this thing in his past—this terrible thing he had done to his daughter—and obviously that tormented him. But if the ghost up there is the spirit of a child, seeing it made his own guilt even worse and that’s what caused him to kill himself. Note at the end he kept saying ‘there can be no happiness, no one shall have happiness.’ I can’t help feeling that means something.”
“You said you saw a woman. You didn’t see no child?”
“No. The figure I saw the other night was clearly a woman, wearing a long dress.”
“You heard this music? You see the piano”—Wicks pronounced it peeanah—“or the little trumpet? You seen these things?”
“No, Miss Wicks, I have not seen them. I’ve seen only the woman dressed in red and black. And I’ve heard her laughing in the night.”
Wicks sipped her tea and set the cup down. “Sounds like we got more than one ghost.”
“Then you do believe there’s a ghost in this house?”
The maid shrugged. “You said you seen it. Bradbury said he seen it. The maid who was here before me, that Irishwoman—we don’t know what she saw, but she saw nothing ever again after that night. That’s good enough for me. But I ask you, ma’am: what do you want me to do about it?”
Anine was nearly weak with relief. Thank God she understands. She’d been expecting and preparing for a long uphill battle to convince Wicks that the phenomena were real. She found the maid’s reaction ultimately refreshing, and also curiously rational—as rational as one could be when discussing disembodied spirits.
“There are several things I want you to do. First, I want you to—what’s the American expression?—‘keep your eyes peeled.’ I want you to watch for anything out of the ordinary, however small, however strange it seems. Second, I want you to keep this matter strictly between us. Mr. Atherton, Mrs. Hennessey and Mr. Shoop can’t know anything about it. Third—and this is a little awkward—” Anine tried to keep herself from blushing “—I’d like for you to think of me not as your employer, not as ‘ma’am’, but as your friend. Please, call me Anine. Let’s not have this distance between us, especially now.”