by Alice Feeney
Amelia steps away from me. ‘What?’
‘Last night… I didn’t come downstairs to get a glass of water. I saw… something down here, before we went to bed. I didn’t want to scare you, so I waited until you were asleep, then came back downstairs to try and make sense of it. You were already so upset after the crypt incident; I didn’t want to make matters worse—’
‘Can you please get to the point.’
‘I would if you’d let me.’
‘What did you find?’
‘This,’ I say, opening one of the kitchen drawers. It is crammed full of old newspaper articles about October O’Brien. ‘She’s the actress who—’
‘I know who she is, Adam. It’s not something I’m likely to forget,’ Amelia snaps, pulling the neatly cut press clippings out one by one, and laying them on the kitchen table. ‘I don’t understand. Why would these be here—’
‘And I found this down in the crypt just now. I thought about hiding that from you too – I know how much this weekend meant to you – but I also know you don’t like secrets.’
I show her the pamphlet.
‘What is it?’
‘I think you should just read it for yourself. I don’t think we’re really welcome here.’
‘But then why offer a free weekend as a raffle prize? They invited us.’
‘Who did?’
Amelia doesn’t answer because she doesn’t know.
She picks up the flimsy piece of white paper covered in typed words, then lingers on the front page as if scared to open it. I watch in silence while she reads.
The History of Blackwater Chapel
A chapel has stood on this site, next to Blackwater Loch, since at least the mid-ninth century. When the current owner purchased the property and surrounding land, it had already been abandoned for several years. With a great deal of love and hard work, they decided to transform this derelict building into a beautiful home.
The original features include several carved stones, which are dated between 820–840 – it is one of the oldest Scottish chapels on record. We know that the chapel has not been used for its original purpose since the last priest, Father Douglas Dalton, left in 1948. There are no surviving accounts of his time here, only local (unsubstantiated) rumours that he fell to his death from the bell tower.
According to other records, the chapel’s congregation dwindled down to almost nothing as the local population aged, and that was why it was left abandoned. Not much was known about the chapel’s true history, until building work began to convert what was by then a crumbling wreck into a liveable space.
Excavations in the crypt, to make a stronger foundation, revealed that the chapel had been used as a witch’s prison in the 1500s. Iron rings were found in the crypt’s walls, where women and children convicted of witchcraft were chained before being burned at the stake. The bones of more than one hundred suspected witches were found buried in the floor, along with their offspring. Tests revealed that one skeleton was that of a five-year-old girl.
A collection of local anecdotes and urban legends all share similar stories about Blackwater Chapel. Most include tales of ghostly figures that can be seen floating over the loch at night. There are several accounts of women dressed as witches, with burnt faces and singed clothes. Rumour has it they walk around the chapel after sundown, peering in through the stained-glass windows, searching for their murdered children. There have been several reports of such sightings in the local press over the years, before people got so scared that they stayed away.
Almost all of the builders involved in the renovation of the property said they felt inexplicably cold in the crypt, and some claim they heard their own names being whispered when they were down there. But it’s important to note that not everybody who visits Blackwater Chapel witnesses paranormal activity or ghostly apparitions.
We hope you enjoy your stay.
Amelia
‘We need to find Bob, and get out of here,’ I say, as soon as I’ve finished reading.
Adam puts the pamphlet and newspaper clippings about October O’Brien in a kitchen drawer, then closes it firmly, as if making them disappear might help. I’m not sure what the link is yet between October and this place, but he can’t seem to look me in the eye.
‘I didn’t want to scare you—’
‘I’m not scared. I’m angry,’ I interrupt. ‘I don’t believe in ghosts. Someone is trying to frighten us. I don’t know who yet or why—’
‘I don’t think we should jump to conclusions.’
‘I agree. We should find Bob, pack up, and jump in the car instead.’
We’re dressed less than five minutes later. After searching the whole chapel again for the dog, there’s nowhere left to look except outside.
Now that the snow has stopped falling, it feels like stepping into a painting. The sky has turned from black to grey to pale blue since I woke up, and I can see so much more than when we arrived in the dark last night. There are snow-covered mountains and dense forests in the distance. A handful of white clouds are reflected on the still, glassy surface of the vast loch, and the old white chapel seems to shine in the early morning sun. Then I notice the bell tower and remember last night. The part of the wall that collapsed is impossible to miss. No wonder the sign on the door said DANGER.
‘Adam…’
‘What?’
‘The fallen wall.’
‘What about it?’
‘What if Bob somehow got up to the bell tower, and the damaged wall… and fell?’
‘Then he’d be lying broken in the snow.’
I don’t like the way he answered the question, but I know Adam is right. We start searching outside in silence. This is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful and unspoilt corners of the world, but I can’t wait to leave.
I didn’t bring the best clothes or shoes for this weather. The snow is so high we have no choice but to wade through it in our trainers. My socks and feet are wet within seconds, and the bottom half of my jeans are soaking and heavy with freezing cold water. I’m so worried about the dog, I barely notice. Seeing the place in daylight, we can now truly appreciate the isolation and scale of the vast valley we’re in. We don’t find what we are looking for, but we soon discover what happened to all the missing bathtubs in the property. Three claw-foot roll-top baths are hidden around the back, and have been filled with plants – heather by the looks of it, in various shades of pink and purple.
They aren’t the only unexpected discoveries.
We stumble across a small graveyard – as I suppose might be expected behind an ancient church – with a collection of elderly looking headstones almost completely hidden by the snow. There are also a series of dark wooden sculptures dotted around outside the chapel, at least two or three in every direction that I look. Hand-carved rabbits that appear to be leaping out of the frozen ground, an enormous tortoise, and giant wooden owls, perched on the tree stumps they have been fashioned from. They all have huge, hand-chiselled eyes, which seem to stare in our direction, as though they are as cold and scared as we are. Even the trees have faces carved into them, so it’s impossible not to feel watched.
I call Bob’s name over and over, but after twenty minutes of walking in circles, I don’t know what to do. A non-dog person wouldn’t understand, but it’s just as distressing as losing a child.
‘Do you think someone has taken him?’ I ask, when we seem to have run out of all other ideas.
‘Why would anyone do that?’ Adam says.
‘Why does anyone do anything?’
‘Who then? We’re in the middle of nowhere.’
‘What about that little thatched cottage we passed on the track in?’
‘It looked empty.’
‘Shouldn’t we check?’
He shakes his head. ‘We can’t just accuse someone of—’
‘No, but we could ask for their help? They’re a lot closer to the main road than we are, so might still have power… or at least a pho
ne we can use. It’s not that far to walk. It’s worth trying, isn’t it? If Bob did get out somehow, they might have seen him?’
Adam never really wanted to get a puppy. The childhood memories that still haunt his dreams put him off – understandably – but that changed when he met Bob. My husband hides it well sometimes, but I know he loves that dog just as much as I do.
‘OK, let’s go,’ Adam says. He takes my hand and I let him.
Some parts of the loch are frozen, and again my thoughts turn to Bob. He hates rain, or sleet, or snow, or anything falling from the sky, but he loves the water – always jumping in rivers or running into the sea. But surely our silly old dog would have known to keep away from a frozen loch. I try not to think about it as we trudge towards the cottage in the distance. Except for the sound of our footsteps compacting the fresh snow, the cold air is hushed and muted. Silence can be eerie when you’re not used to it, and living in London and working at Battersea, I’m definitely not. Sometimes I hear dogs barking in my sleep. But here, it’s so quiet. Unnaturally so. There aren’t even any birds singing. Now I think about it, I don’t remember seeing any.
It didn’t look that far when we set out, but it takes us more than fifteen minutes to reach the cottage. It’s a tiny thing, with whitewashed walls just like the chapel, and a thatched roof. Almost like a Hobbit house. It’s so small and remote that I can’t imagine why anyone would want to live in it, but there is a car parked outside – almost completely hidden from view – which gives me hope that someone does. It’s a big vehicle, an old Land Rover perhaps. It’s hard to tell with it being half buried by snow. Whatever it is, I’m sure it will cope better than my car in this weather.
I clear my throat before knocking on the bright red door. I’m nervous for some reason, and not even sure what I’m going to say if someone opens it.
I needn’t have worried; nobody does.
It’s strange because I could have sworn I heard voices when we walked up the path – a radio perhaps, or someone talking to a child in a hushed tone. I look at Adam, who shrugs, then I knock again. A little harder this time. There’s still no answer, no sign or sound of life at all.
‘Look at that,’ Adam says, staring at the roof.
I presume he means the thatch, but when I look up, I see the smoking chimney. Somebody must be inside.
‘Maybe they can’t hear us,’ he says. ‘You stay here and I’ll take a quick look around the back.’
He disappears before I can answer, and is gone so long I start to worry.
‘Anything?’ I ask, when he finally returns. It might just be the cold, or my imagination, but he looks paler than he did.
‘Yes and no,’ he says.
‘What does that mean? We just need to find Bob.’
‘It’s a mess around the back, completely overgrown and there’s even an outside toilet. No outside bath this time, at least, but I think whoever lives here must be old. There’s no other door, just a couple of dirty windows. I saw a woman inside, sitting next to a fire.’
‘Great—’
‘Possibly not,’ he says, interrupting my positive thoughts with more of his negative ones. ‘I knocked on the window to get her attention and I think I scared her.’
‘Well, that’s understandable – I doubt she gets many visitors all the way out here. We can just apologise. I’m sure she’ll want to help once we explain.’
‘I don’t think so. There were candles everywhere—’
‘Well, there has been a power cut and it is probably rather dark in there.’
‘No, I mean everywhere. Hundreds of them. She looked like a witch casting a spell.’
‘Don’t be daft. That stupid pamphlet has put silly ideas in your head—’
‘That wasn’t all. She had an animal on her lap.’
I picture poor Bob and feel sick. ‘What kind of animal?’
‘A white rabbit, I think…’ Relief floods my fear. For a moment I was terrified of what Adam might say. ‘… I didn’t have very long to take it all in before she saw me.’
‘And what happened when she did?’
‘She stared at me for a long time, then just walked right up to the window, as close as I am to you now. Still carrying the fat white rabbit, if that’s what it was. Then she pulled the curtains shut.’
Robin
Robin didn’t just pull one set of curtains; she closed them all.
She blows out every candle too – there were only a handful, not hundreds, but men are predisposed to exaggeration – then she sits in the dark, waiting for her heart to stop beating so fast. It never occurred to her that someone would be rude enough to trespass on her property or walk around the back uninvited – peering in through the glass as if she were an animal in a zoo. The curtains aren’t really curtains at all – they are second-hand bedsheets nailed above the windows. She notices the yellow tinge of pipe smoke to the threadbare fabric. It used to be white. But it doesn’t matter what something used to be, so long as it does the job. And things don’t need to be beautiful to serve a purpose. Robin might not be pretty anymore, but she has every right to be here.
Not like them.
Robin used to sit in the dark, just like this, when she was scared as a child. It was an all too regular occurrence. She does what she did then to try to calm herself down: crossing her legs, closing her eyes, then focusing on her breathing. Slow, deep breaths. In and out. In… and… out. At least it was only him who saw her, that’s something to be glad about.
It seems obvious now that she thinks about it – of course the visitors would come here looking for help – she’s just annoyed that they managed to catch her off guard.
Robin wonders what they must be thinking now.
This is hardly a normal situation for any of them, far from it, and she expects that the stress and fear must be starting to take its toll. Married couples always think they know their partners better than anyone else – especially when they have a couple of years under their belts – but that doesn’t mean it is true. Robin knows things about both of them that she is certain they do not know about each other.
She saw him looking at the rabbit on her lap, with a mixture of horror and disgust on his face. But Oscar the rabbit is her only companion these days. Like her, he is a creature of habit, and always tends to jump up on the armchair after his breakfast of grass, fresh vegetables, or – when the snow comes – tinned jars of baby food. At least he’s real, unlike the characters Adam Wright makes up inside his head and spends all his time with. Mr Wright is sometimes wrong. Robin will not be judged by these people.
She crawls towards the front of the cottage on all fours avoiding the windows. She needs to know whether the visitors have gone yet – there is so much to do and so little time. But they haven’t. Gone. So she slides down to sit with her ear against the sealed-up letterbox, still holding the rabbit, stroking its fur. It is surreal to hear them talking about her on the other side of the door. They might not know who she is, but Robin knows who they are. She invited them here after all, even if they don’t realise it yet.
They will soon enough.
Amelia
‘We should try knocking again,’ I say.
‘I don’t think that’s a good idea,’ Adam replies. ‘She looked like a nutter.’
‘Shh! She can probably hear you; this place isn’t double-glazed. How do you know it was a woman?’
He shrugs. ‘Long hair?’
Sometimes Adam’s inability to recognise features on faces is more annoying than others.
‘If it is a woman,’ I say, ‘then maybe I should try talking to her. I don’t see any other buildings nearby, she might be the only one who can help us.’
‘What if she doesn’t want to help us?’ Adam whispers.
I’m already freezing, but I feel colder than I did before when he says that. I think about the October O’Brien newspaper clippings he found stuffed inside one of the kitchen drawers at the chapel and I feel sick. It’s such a long time ago
now, but Adam worked with the actress before what happened, happened, and I sometimes still wonder—
‘Do you think she might be who you saw outside the window last night?’ he whispers.
I shrug and it turns into a shiver. Relieved a little that at least he believes me about that now. ‘I don’t know. Do you?’
‘How would I know? I didn’t see what you saw, and we both know I wouldn’t be able to recognise them again even if I did.’
‘Well, was the person you saw just now fat or thin? Old or young?’
‘Medium build, I guess, and she had long grey hair.’
‘So, old then?’
‘Maybe.’
‘I wonder if she is the housekeeper?’
‘If she is, she’s a bad one.’
‘Someone wrote those notes for us to find,’ I remind him.
‘Don’t housekeepers clean things? From what I saw through the window, she doesn’t look like she knows how to use a feather duster. She may have a broom… for flying around at night—’
‘This isn’t the time for making jokes.’
‘Who says I’m joking? You didn’t see what I saw with all the candles and the white rabbit on her lap, like she was casting a spell. We’ve got enough problems right now without upsetting the local witch.’
Sometimes having an overactive imagination is a curse. I take out my mobile and hold it up to see that I still don’t have any signal. Adam watches, then does the same with his.
‘Anything?’ I ask, looking over his shoulder. But he shakes his head, and puts his phone back in his pocket before I see the screen.
‘Not even one bar. Why don’t we climb to the top of that hill, I think I can see a footpath,’ he says, pointing at what looks like a small mountain to me. ‘One of us might get a signal up there, and if not, at least we’ll have a view of the whole valley. If there are any other houses, or people, or even a busy road where we could flag someone down, we’ll be able to see it.’
It’s not a completely crazy idea.