Daphne shuddered and took a moment to compose her thoughts. No wonder the ghosts were so vindictive; they must have taken the lives of George’s family, because life attracted the dead - they were jealous of it. That’s why George’s ghost had asked her to leave, he knew the ghosts would attack them soon enough, but Katie had said the children were harmless. Maybe that’s how they started.
Daphne stood up, her research done, when a headline from the month of September caught her eye.
The Paignton Horrors
Daphne sat back down and brought the article forward. It had large pictures of Christian and Melanie Paignton. Daphne read the article with mounting dread.
Sinister experiments
Wanton murder of children
Punished
Torture
Daphne’s hands were claws, she clutched the wooden desk as she read each horrible detail. The article detailed the ongoing constabulary investigation that had come to light after the fire. The authorities had been suspicious of the legitimacy of operations at Paignton Children’s Infirmary for a while, citing the unexplained number of deaths of child patients at the infirmary. Investigation revealed that conditions in the infirmary were deplorable, twenty children stuffed in an area intended for only five, poor hygiene coupled with malnutrition where the proprietors had cut corners to save money.
But the worst was what they did with their patients: The children were never treated for illness, but were experimented on. The Paigntons’ were obsessed with finding the cure for cancer, going so far as to transplant tumours into the body of the children they wanted to experiment on. The children were beaten, tortured and abused, all in the name of science. When the authorities began to show interest, the Paigntons’ set fire to the building, killing every child inside.
Daphne skipped a few months ahead to the final trial and conviction of the infirmary proprietors. The judge had sentenced them to hang at the very site, on the anniversary of the day they had killed those poor children. A special gallows had been set up with five nooses. There was a picture of the hanging bodies of the staff and the Paigntons’.
“It’s not the children…” Daphne murmured, sudden clarity soaking her mind. “It’s the bloody ghosts of the doctors and the staff! The children are harmless.”
Daphne looked at her notes. She noticed that Susan and Paula had conditions that were similar to many of the tortures described in the final article. And she noticed something else, the date of the fire and the date George committed suicide coincided. The activity at home was getting frantic because the anniversary of the fire was less than five days away.
“Shit! I have to tell them! They have to fucking believe me!” Daphne picked up her bag and ran out of the National Archives, hoping she wasn’t too late.
CHAPTER FIFTY-FIVE
Mute Horror
21st August 1983
2:00 PM
Something wasn’t right. Katie was only ten but she knew when her family was fighting. Her parents had been exchanging dark looks since Daphne left abruptly after breakfast. Poppy looked like the cat that had eaten the cream and gotten away with it; Katie could guess she was behind the tension in the house.
Amber and Katie had kept themselves busy with their dolls, trying to enjoy the last days of summer holiday before school began. They had taken some old wooden crates from behind the tool shed and set them one above the other under the cherry tree. Amber had decorated with flowers, and Katie had added leaves and cherry pits. The dolls were given their very own house to play in.
“We should bring the kitchen set as well,” Amber said. “They can have a picnic!”
“I’ll go get it!” Katie volunteered. She had jumped to her feet and run inside the house. Sarah was preparing lunch, while Andrew was watching a documentary with Poppy in the living room. Katie hummed to herself as she climbed the stairs. She had just reached the landing when she saw the girl who visited her often at night.
She was a little taller than Katie, but Katie couldn’t determine her age because her face was nothing but a puckered area of melted skin that had burnt black to the bone in some areas. Only a few wisps of her blonde hair remained on her scabby scalp. She wore no clothes, her body a mass of fissured black skin.
“Hello Margret,” Katie said cheerfully. “We’re going to play dollhouse. Do you want to come?”
The girl shook her head frantically, waving her hands. Katie didn’t understand the urgency of the gesture.
“What’s wrong? Are you frightened?”
The girl began to wave towards the stairs, waving her hands, motioning Katie to go back.
“I don’t understand. Don’t you want to be my friend anymore?”
“Katie? Who are you talking to?”
Andrew was peering up the stairs, a look of mild concern on his face. Katie turned to face him.
“Nothing, Daddy. I just came to get some t-“
Katie’s words were cut short by the violent hands that pushed her. Katie went flying down the stairs, a terrified scream tearing through her tiny throat. She hit her head in the middle of the staircase, went careering head over heels till she lay at the bottom of the stairs, unconscious.
Andrew watched in mute horror as his youngest lay crumpled in a heap at his feet. He looked up and saw a great shadow at the top of the stairs, staring down at him. The eyes glinted maliciously, then the smoke dispersed and sunlight flooded the landing.
“Sarah!”
But she was already by his side. She had heard the screams. Andrew picked up Katie’s limp body, his hands trembling.
“We have to get her to the hospital!” Sarah was screaming hysterically.
The front door burst open in that moment, and Daphne came rushing in. She took in the scene before her, her parent’s tear stained faces, Amber and Poppy looking on in silent terror, and beyond any of her imaginings: Katie’s limp, lolling head.
“I’m too late,” Daphne moaned. “No!”
“We have to get her to the hospital!” Sarah screamed. Daphne helped start the car, and then they were all driving at rapid speed to the nearest A & E.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SIX
Exorcism
23nd August 1983
They had camped out at Sarah’s parent’s house. The girls had pulled up mattresses in the living room, while Andrew and Sarah were given the guest bedroom. Celia Brown wasn’t too happy with the arrangement, but she was pleased with the opportunity to give her opinion on what she considered her daughter’s many mistakes; the biggest of which was marrying Andrew Collins.
“I always told you that man had no sense,” Celia berated, as she helped Sarah make the beds in the living room. “But no, you had to marry a history professor with his head stuck in the past, and then have the audacity to have a large family you could scarcely afford, then spending all that money on a large house as if you were made of millions. Now look at what’s happened; poor Katie’s in hospital because Mr. Dazed and Confused couldn’t be bothered to check the house before buying it. Your father would have ‘sussed’ out the woodwork on that stairs the first time he saw the house. But not Andrew, heaven forbid he had to take his nose out of a book too long to watch where he was going…”
Sarah had tuned her mother’s needling voice out. She was too emotionally distraught to pay any attention to the grumblings of an old woman who had always loved to control every aspect of her daughter’s life. Her mind was elsewhere, sifting through the events of the recent past, piecing them together, allowing herself to believe.
“Mum,” Sarah sighed. “I’m knackered. Could you please make some tea?”
Celia’s face softened.
“Of course. You sit tight.”
Sarah had no intention of sitting tight. Ever since the doctors had told her that Katie was alive but not out of danger, Sarah’s world had turned upside down. Katie had been very lucky the fall hadn’t killed her. The thought of losing her child, her baby, in such a sudden and cruel way, had opened up her eyes to some
of the peculiarities around the house which she had tried so hard to ignore.
Making sure Poppy was sitting with a stunned Amber, Sarah ushered Andrew and Daphne into the guest bedroom.
“We need to talk.”
“What’s the point?” Daphne shrugged. “You won’t believe me.”
“I believe you, Daphne.” Sarah swallowed. “God help me, but I believe you. I’ve been hiding something from you, hiding it from myself as well.” And even though Sarah knew her recent conviction about the things she had experienced in the house was genuine, she still hesitated to articulate them, as if admitting them would make them real in a more tangible sense.
“I’ve smelled smoke in the house, burning smoke, but no source of the fire.” Sarah took a deep breath. “I’ve seen soot marks on plates I have just finished washing, and I have heard screams in the kitchen; shrieks, tortured cries, coming from one of the cupboards. I thought it was a dream, a stress hallucination, but I know in my heart it wasn’t a dream. It was fucking real.”
There was stunned silence. Daphne ogled at her mother as if she had never seen her before. Shocked at her admission and swearing, something, she rarely did. Andrew was looking at his hands. Sarah was sure Andrew would tell them both they were crazy, and leave the room. He had always been the first to deny ghosts or anything paranormal, and he wasn’t going to change his beliefs now.
“I heard children giggling and running up the stairs. I thought it was Amber and Katie,” Andrew swallowed hard. “But when I went into their room it was empty. Incidentally, I saw you,” he looked up into Sarah’s green eyes, “walking into our bedroom, minutes before you shouted from downstairs, clearly having come home from the shops. I’ve smelled smoke; I’ve seen a charred body dragging itself across the floor outside my study.” Tears pooled into Andrew’s eyes. “And worst, I saw something push Katie down the stairs!”
Sarah wobbled on her feet, grabbed one end of the bed and sat down, the energy draining from her legs like water from a bucket with too many holes.
“You were right, Daphne.” Sarah’s whisper was choked. “You have been right this whole time and we’ve been too bloody stupid, too benightedly proud to believe you.”
“The way we’ve treated you.” Andrew said. “Can you ever forgive us?”
“Oh, shush, there’s nothing to forgive.” Daphne held Andrew’s shoulder, and extended a hand that Sarah took gratefully. “Thankfully, Katie’s ok. I talked to the doctor before leaving and he’s hopeful for a complete recovery. What we must do now is figure out how to get our bloody house back.”
“Is that possible?” Andrew was quizzical. “I’ve never heard of hauntings ending.”
“We don’t even know what’s haunting the house. The Paignton family didn’t burn to death.” Sarah ran her fingers through her hair in frustration.
“I know what’s haunting our home.” Daphne sat down between her parents. “The plot of land where the house is, once housed a children’s hospital an infirmary. It was owned by this married couple who were doctors, Christian and Melanie Paignton. They conducted horrible experiments on the children, trying to find a cure for cancer, but when the police started investigating they burned the infirmary down with the children still inside.”
“Shit” Sarah gasped. Andrew looked green.
“The couple and their three staff members were convicted and hanged at the very spot at which they committed the atrocities. I believe the Paignton couple are behind the murders of George Paignton’s wife and daughters. The death of George Paignton coincided with the date of the fire: 26th August.”
“That’s four days from now.” Sarah
“Yes. And I think that’s why the ghosts have become so restless. They want atonement for what happened to them, but the Paignton couple’s ghosts won’t allow it. They go on a murder frenzy at the same time and they are now aiming to do us harm.”
“We’re going to have to sell the house.” Andrew was dejected, his shoulders caved into his slight chest. “We can’t live there.”
“Nonsense!” Celia burst into the room. “I knew you’d take the coward’s approach.”
“Mum!” Sarah cried. “Have you been listening at the keyhole?”
Celia did not look ashamed.
“This is my house; I’ll do as I please. Now listen here, Andrew.” She stood before him, slight, stooped and forbidding. “You are not going to sell that house. It is a good house, cheaply bought, and you will not find another like it. What will you have my daughter do? Pack up from a house that was big enough for her entire family and move into a shack? Hasn’t she suffered enough?”
“Stop it, Mum.” Sarah snapped, standing between Andrew and Celia. “If you don’t have anything constructive to say, please leave.”
“I do have something constructive to say, if you’ll stop hiding your husband behind your skirts for one minute.”
Andrew was growing hot in the face. Daphne could see a full blown argument building up that would distract from the important issue of the haunting, so she intervened.
“Please, Gran, tell us your plan.”
Celia smiled genially.
“Exorcism.”
Daphne stared at her.
“Well, don’t look at me like that.” Celia waved her hands. “I’m Catholic, your mother’s Catholic. I’m pretty sure Father Hughes will be more than happy to pop down and perform one for you.”
“We are not getting an bloody exorcism.” Andrew muttered through clenched teeth.
“Typical!” Celia threw up her hands. “What do you suggest we do? Sit on our hands?”
“I’ll decide what’s best for my family!” Andrew roared.
“Dad!” Daphne held her father by the shoulders. “Think about what you’re doing. Katie’s in the hospital, we’re in danger of losing our home; this is no time to pick a fight with Gran. What have we got to lose by doing it her way?”
Andrew was grinding his teeth. Sarah looked askance between her growling husband and her smug mother.
“And Grandma, really,” Daphne turned on Celia, who had the grace to look chastised. “You know the best way to get people to do what you want is by being nice to them, not through dictating terms and insults. If you care about Mum, about any of us, you have to respect Dad by extension.”
Celia made a face like she had sucked on a lemon.
“I’m sorry.”
Andrew stared at his mother-in-law. Her thin mouth was puckered tight, making him doubt he had actually heard her apologies.
“I’m sorry as well. When can we see Father Hughes?”
Sarah’s smile was of relief. If Celia and Andrew could put aside their differences for the good of the family, anything was possible.
CHAPTER FIFTY-SEVEN
House of God
24th August 1983
“So, what is this, a shared psychosis?”
Poppy was leaning against Celia’s kitchen door eating toast. She was still in her pajamas, her hair in a raggedy braid. She was staring at Daphne while she ate her breakfast.
“So how did you convince them? Hypnosis?”
“I thought you didn’t believe in that crap.” Daphne coolly ate her eggs.
“I don’t. What I want to know is, how you got Mum and Dad to buy it? Just so I can know when you’re trying to work your bullshit with me.”
Daphne sighed. She put her plate in the sink.
“You know, Poppy, if you’d just stop thinking about yourself for one bloody minute, you wouldn’t have such a hard time getting people to like you.”
Poppy looked like she’d been slapped.
“I know you hate my fucking guts because you think Mum and Dad love me more or pay more attention to me; I know you have a very bad case of middle child syndrome; but none of that is the crux of your problem. Your problem is that you have chosen to do nothing about it but blame other people for how you feel. You think I get more attention? Then do something with your life other than digesting big books to get the a
ttention on you. Try being nice once in a while, to gain the affection of Amber and Katie, not demand it like you deserve it by default. But the most important thing you can do, which will be good for you in the long run, is to stop blaming me for every little pissing imagined misery and slight in your life.”
Daphne sighed, her face softening.
“I love you Poppy. I wish we could be friends like Amber and Katie, but shit, sometimes you make it so hard to approach you.”
“You ready, Daphne?” Sarah called from the front of the house.
“I have to go.” Daphne pushed past Poppy, who stood very still.
“Do you think this will help Katie?”
Daphne stopped and looked back at her sister. Poppy was still standing in the doorway, her back to Daphne.
“I believe it will help all of us.”
“Then you have my support,” Poppy nodded sharply, crunched into her toast and made her way to the living room where Amber was watching cartoons.
Daphne was too shocked to react, but as she joined her parents and grandmother on the front porch, she felt a very positive warmth in the pit of her stomach. Sarah was right, if Andrew and Celia could see eye to eye, and Poppy was suddenly civil with her, then there wasn’t anything they couldn’t accomplish.
~*~
Our Lady of Victories was one of the most beautiful churches Daphne had ever seen. She had been to Sunday service when she was younger, but she had fallen out of the habit as she had grown older, something she knew Celia frowned upon.
The church was approached through a large white arch off Kensington High Street, and gave the impression of being a secret alcove, a haven for those who sought refuge. Daphne was in awe of the brick structure with the white arched entrance, the idol of Mary holding baby Jesus looking down upon the church goers, blessing them with their approval.
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