The Angry Ghost and Other Stories Read online

  Finally, after much prevarication, I mentioned the note; “Where did you find the old note you sent me… and why send it?”

  “Ah yes, I had almost forgotten. I was clearing out some very old clutter from the outhouse behind the church. I found a box indicating – barely legible – ‘Lost Property’.”

  “Was it right to tear out a page and send it to me?”

  “Oh, come now, Monty. Of course I wouldn’t do such a thing but for the fact that it’s likely been there since before I became a priest here, and no one has ever come forward; but then after that entry, is it perhaps not surprising?” he said.

  “Thing is that … as I examined the diary, although I tried to browse through its first pages, I was resisted by the fact that its spine was already too familiar with a specific location; and so, I read the page before me… and shivered. That page had been read and re-read so many, many times.”

  “Why did you send it to me?” I said feeling suddenly a little hot.

  The father looked up at me and his comic air disappeared momentarily. “I think you know… Monty.”

  “I killed her. I killed Rosie,” I said matter-of-factly. “I was responsible for Rosie’s death. I cannot escape that truth; why do you remind me of it?”

  “I sent the note because your responsibility was no more than that of this ‘Mairead’ in the note. You have always blamed yourself, but it was not your fault.”

  After a pause, “I suppose you’ve tried to find this Mairead?” I said.

  “Indeed, but that entry was written seventy-one years ago, and a lot of people have moved through – or died in – this village in that time.”

  I decided it was time to drop this mode of conversation and focus on the father’s story.

  It would seem that apparitions had started appearing to people in the village several weeks ago. Many people had seen these apparitions, apparently, which I felt eliminated the possibility of error by a drunk or simpleton though perhaps mass hysteria was a possibility.

  These apparitions – I say apparitions, as I feel the name is more generic to unexplained sightings and phenomena rather than the images of after-death beings which ‘ghosts’ or ‘spirits’ imply – apparently have been seen mostly around the local church and graveyard. Though I dispelled all belief in the whole ‘ghosts’ thing, it seemed to me that if they were to exist then the graveyard seemed the obvious choice for their location.

  Scene 5: An Evil Cabal… Apparently

  The father had lived in this parish within Kilronan for the last fifty years and St Paul’s Church, which sat humbly at one end of the modest graveyard, had been his place to preach his beliefs to his flock; a flock that until recently had been your God-fearing, salt-of-the-earth kind of people.

  But with the arrival of a small group of travellers, a feeling of distrust had started to permeate throughout his flock. The travellers said that their religion was nature-based, but also that they had an inclination to be at peace with other faiths and hence their desire to unify with the Sunday services. This approach seemed reasonable and so what could the problem possibly be?

  The problem was that after the initial meeting, the leader of this group – the lady with the silver circlet – introduced herself to the father as a witch, and so apoplexy reigned for several moments while the father’s smile disintegrated and his proffered handshake withered like an evening rose and was hastily withdrawn.

  Now – oddly referred to as Devil Worshippers – the father banned them from his church, but despite their seemingly amicable departure, he didn’t like them, and their obvious ambivalence to the church and its doctrines surely vindicated his enmity – he felt.

  In Father Ardal Fitzpatrick’s eyes, this ‘witch’ and her followers must be responsible for any untoward manifestations whether evil or otherwise, and so the ‘ghost’ problem was blamed on the Devil Worshippers, as was the father stubbing his toe one morning, and the sudden vomiting he experienced one evening an hour after his visit to the alehouse where his intake could be best described as ‘copious’.

  To my mind, the ‘witch’ thing was decidedly spurious but to consider them evil too was a leap too much.

  I had asked my old friend where I might find this apparently diabolical cabal. He indicated that they had gathered at an arboretum near to some old standing stones, on the crest of a hill about three-quarters of a mile east of the church.

  Finally, despite my fatigue – and desire for a bath – I decided on my course of action and looked up at Father Fitzpatrick.

  “I’m going to take a look at the graveyard,” I said.

  The father looked up. “Are you sure that’s wise?”

  “Certainly, you know my views on ghosts.”

  “That’s not what I meant,” he said soberly.

  “I’m not going to visit her grave if that’s what you mean; I don’t even know where it’s located anyway,” I said.

  “I can tell you exactly where it is and you should visit it; you’ll feel better. But it’s not only that; I know you’ve become a disbeliever, but there are stranger things in heaven and earth… and some of those things are out there… now… tonight!”

  I stood up wearily. “Have you a lamp I could borrow? I shouldn’t be more than a couple of hours.” I looked over at ‘Gale’ and as an afterthought; “Also, could you let me in when I return? That woman scares me.”

  Father Ardal nodded. “Certainly; I’m not leaving here tonight.” He looked around. “I don’t think any of us is.”

  Chapter 3: Siobhan

  Scene 1: Siobhan

  Armed with the borrowed oil lamp, I left the inn and headed up the road towards the church and its graveyard. It was darker now but the mist still swirled around while the moon’s bright radiance created shadows that appeared to dance under the branches of the beech trees lining the road.

  I looked around for a moment smiling at an imagined Lon Chaney Jr.’s werewolf emerging from behind a wall with a hairy coat and cold, wet nose.

  Despite my tiredness, I straightened my back and headed onwards looking to my left and right, half expecting something I didn’t believe in, to jump out at any moment.

  Interesting, I mused, that despite my unshakable disbelief in the irrational such as ghosts and goblins, there seemed a residual feeling from my youth where I felt there must be some dark, dank recess of my mind where the shades of such creatures may cower and only occasionally surface when prompted by some external stimuli to encroach and intrude on the consciousness.

  I was grateful for the full moon as it lit up the night and I found the lamp redundant.

  I was just entertaining the blatantly obvious misconception that today had surely gone on for more than twenty-four hours, when I noticed the young child I had seen earlier.

  As I drew closer and with a slight dissipation in the fog, I could see her more clearly than before and noticed that her dress and ribbons, which I earlier took to be quite dark, were actually a deep red matching her little doll’s dress. She was maybe six years old and was sitting cross-legged with her doll, which – despite its lack of a head – she spoke to and looked at so lovingly, sitting up in front of her.

  She sat on the kerb looking up at the stars and seemingly quite oblivious and unconcerned by the late hour and the almost claustrophobic humidity of the night air.

  I approached closer, whistling and scuffling my steps so as not to surprise or alarm her.

  She looked up from her doll to the stars above.

  As I was passing she spoke: “Why do the stars twinkle?” she said.

  I stopped and looked at her and then up at the sky. It didn’t seem right to give her my own understanding of sun-sized balls of fire optically fluctuating due to the distortion of the atmosphere, and so I told her what my mother had once said to me many years ago.

  “Errm… they are the spirits of people ne
wly arrived in heaven,” I said, and then cringed.

  She smiled. “That’s nice; there must be an awful lot of people going there every night. You know I often sit for hours just watching them just… twinkle and twinkle.”

  I was just in the process of mentally congratulating myself on my clearly obvious skill in interfacing with the youngest generation when she turned her head to look at me and with a look of innocence and yet profound wisdom, continued, “… but of course, you are wrong, for if that were so, we would see something when people go to hell.”

  For a moment, I stared and I thought I heard the sound of my lower jaw hitting the ground, but I recovered quickly.

  “Are your parents close by?” I asked. “It’s very late…”

  I wondered if she had strayed from the group at the arboretum though her attire was of a presentable – if rather old-fashioned – apparel as opposed to that of one living outdoors.

  “I want to go home,” she said suddenly. “Can you take me there?”

  Despite the importance of my current mission, I felt a moment’s righteousness in the idea of returning a scared and vulnerable child to her home and parents – though oddly, she didn’t seem scared or vulnerable.

  “Okay, what’s your name and where do you live? My name is Monty.”

  “That certainly is a funny name; mine’s Siobhan,” and “This way,” she replied standing up and skipping along the road, her headless doll swinging from her hand.

  I paused a moment and felt a moment’s light-headedness as a sudden memory from a long time ago hit me like a thunderbolt. My sister had always called me ‘James’ – my middle name – as she often said she found my first name, ‘Monty’, quite ‘funny’.

  After a deep breath, wondering as to why she might think that ‘Monty’ was a funny name and why I should care what a six-year-old thought anyway, I walked on following her. The coincidence that I had a note concerning a headless doll and a small girl called Siobhan, was not lost on me but I naturally dismissed it for the chance happening that it clearly must be.

  I smiled. It is too easy in this world to jump to conclusions and make connections where none exists.

  Scene 2: The Graveyard

  I knew the hill with the arboretum was a little way away but if she knew where she lived, why did she want me to take her there?

  Then I realised the mist seemed thicker. Perhaps she thought she might lose her way, I thought.

  After several minutes of fast walking – did this kid never tire? – the church slowly hove into view. Siobhan stopped and I assumed she was waiting for me to catch up. But as I reached her she sat down, cross-legged, and gazed across the road at the black slate wall and the graveyard beyond.

  Half of the graveyard was in shadow from the church’s obstruction of the moon’s light. Like broken teeth the tombstones jutted from the blackened earth. I noticed that the mist seemed to swirl in greater concentration around me and again I experienced the feeling of seeing movement at the corners of my vision.

  I looked back at the child – or where she had been – only to find her gone.

  There was nowhere for her to have disappeared to – except the graveyard – so I crossed the road and walked through its gates.

  I looked up at perhaps several dozen gravestones; I saw none of the large angels or monoliths that often dominated the bigger cemeteries; only small, modest gravestones.

  There were simple folk buried here – and one dear to me that I had chosen never to visit.

  I felt it wrong to disturb the silence but with obvious contradiction, I whispered loudly.

  “Siobhan!”

  There was neither sight nor sound of the child and I was beginning to feel quite concerned as I walked among the graves.

  As I wandered past the stones I noticed epitaphs and inscriptions in memory of long departed loved ones.

  As the graveyard was in the shadow of the church tower, I had to light my lamp and hold it up to read the words. Some of these graves appeared to go back 300 years or so, though I was well aware of one that only went back thirty-six years.

  Despite the sweat on my brow, I shivered and pulled my collar closer to my neck.

  Eithne Lynch I read, forever in our hearts, at peace on this day 4th June 1784 aged eighty-six.

  Ealadha Quinn our beloved father, in heaven 16th December 1901 aged seventy-nine.

  I continued to move along line after line of stones and eventually I decided to head back to the main gate. There were just too many headstones and the girl could be hiding – if that were her intent – behind any one of them. It was when I was some thirty feet from the gate that I looked around one last time and noticed – almost beside me – Siobhan’s doll.

  It was sitting against a stone; that was probably odd in itself, but something else felt out of place; something anomalous that only my subconscious recognised and identified.

  It was difficult to discern the writings on this grave for reasons I have already stated, but again, with the aid of my oil lamp, I peered closely. I felt it was important to read it.

  Born 29th October 1861, entered the gates of heaven 1870. Our beloved daughter is now a twinkling star. I bent down and gently moved the doll over slightly to view the last line, always with us, Siobhan Ryan.

  I continued to stare at it barely able to breathe before forcing an uneasy laugh, standing up and exiting the graveyard. It was easy to see how the gullible could be swayed towards the completely irrational.

  I stopped and looked back; I then noticed how oddly bereft of mist the churchyard was, while it continued to swirl in patches beyond the road. I realised that this was, of course, a perfectly normal illusion where a mist or fog always appears where one is not.

  Walking out through the gates I couldn’t shake the feeling that something was not right – apart from Siobhan’s disappearance.

  I walked through thick mist barely seeing where I was going, immediately questioning my reasoning of the illusion I stated earlier.

  I wondered again about Siobhan. Maybe she was just having a game with me and had found her way home to her family.

  I turned and started back down the hill, though kept glancing back half expecting to see the child again, but I did not see her.

  I hoped she was okay.

  By the time I reached the inn, I was fretting over the probabilities that Siobhan might be lying in a ditch with a twisted ankle or lost in the woods leading to her ‘satanic’ parents. That would explain how she knew where she lived but needed someone to help her there.

  Scene 3: Back at the Inn

  I knocked on the inn door and was surprised by the speed of its opening. Father Fitzpatrick stared at me for several seconds before he jabbed me hard in the shoulder.

  “Ouch,” I said surprised.

  “I’m sorry, my boy; just being sure you’re who you are,” he replied.

  I wondered if the father had had more in his glass than a light beer. “Who else might I be?”

  “A ghost!” he said suddenly staring wide-eyed behind me.

  I looked behind me quickly. “Will you stop that!” I said turning back. “There are no ghosts here; besides, a ghost would be more of a ‘what’ or ‘it’ than a ‘who’.”

  I crunched my way inside.

  After a pause, “I saw that young girl again; the one I saw earlier on my arrival and…”

  “Ah, Monty, you think it may be… your sister? I told you there were ghosts.”

  “No, of course not; that’s nonsense – she didn’t look anything like Rosie.”

  “Oh, I suppose she could not have been one then,” he said rather obliquely I thought, and then he continued. “Did you see anything else?” he asked anxiously.

  “No, of course not. I must have spent an hour walking in the graveyard but nothing – except the child… though she wasn’t “in” the gr
aveyard.”

  “What were you doing ‘in’ the graveyard?”

  “What do you mean ‘what was I doing ‘in’ the graveyard?’ I was looking for something… ‘ghost-like’ and I tell you now – there is nothing there.”

  “You won’t find any ghosts ‘in’ the graveyard,” the father announced.

  I took a deep breath and wondered how many years may need to be served for throttling a priest – would it be considered a major misdemeanour?

  “You told me they were around the graveyard,” I said accusingly.

  I was by this time very tired, and only wanted communication in its simplest form – and my bath.

  “Yes, ‘around’ the graveyard, not ‘in’ the graveyard. There have been a few sightings in the village, but mostly beyond that part of Main Street that goes past the churchyard.”

  I took a deep breath. “I wish you had told me that earlier,” I said a little tersely.

  “Sorry, my boy, you didn’t ask,” he said.

  I stared for only a moment before announcing my intention to seek my bed, once I had bathed.

  I ignored the nod from the landlord and wandered upstairs to my rooms.

  Chapter 4: Breahna

  Scene 1: A Dream

  I didn’t sleep well that night.

  Despite an open window, I lay on my bed, on top of its covers, sweltering and lamenting any kind of movement of the air. There seemed little change of temperature from day to night.

  Eventually I descended into an uncomfortable unconsciousness and dreamed.

  I was trying to cross the road to the graveyard, but each time I tried, a horse-drawn cart would appear from nowhere and almost run me down. I looked around and found that I wasn’t the only one trying to cross the road. There were hundreds of faceless people lined up along the kerb but always the horse and cart stopped them.