by Tim Roux
The Ghost Who Fed Them Bones
by
Tim Roux
ISBN 1468127128
EAN 978-1468127126
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.
'The Ghost Who Fed Them Bones' is published by Taylor Street Publishing LLC, who can be contacted at:
http://www.taylorstreetbooks.com
http://ninwriters.ning.com
'The Ghost Who Fed Them Bones' is the copyright of the author, Tim Roux, 2009. All rights are reserved.
All characters are fictional, and any resemblance to anyone living or dead is accidental.
Chapter 1
Immediately I enter the house, I sense it.
I nearly turn and run straight out again.
But that would be gay and make me look stupid.
So, instead, I continue as my hair follicles prickle to attention in a Mexican wave, my skin tingles, my spine chills, my mouth dries, and my ears hiss.
Shit!
I know what it is, but where is it?
This is a vicious one. I can feel it building up its attack. It is getting louder, deeper.
As our shoes clack on the stone floor, I can hear it humming. My crown is tautening and a surge jolts my spine, ending in an overwhelming rolling shudder between my shoulder blades.
Is someone stepping on my grave or am I stepping on theirs?
Where the hell are you?
In the fireplace?
Beyond the tapestry on the far wall?
Behind the Madonna and Child in the nook?
In the six corners of the ceiling?
In a chip or crack somewhere?
Lurking in the shadowed corridor leading off to the left?
Oh for fuck’s sake, show yourself! Get it over with!
Whatever it is that is announcing itself to me is wafting plasma clouds around the room in sombre colours – drab, ochre, sienna, umber, grey, lots of grey, nearly black - a maudlin rainbow swirling through the air.
OK, what am I dealing with here – violence, hostility, threat, anger, revenge, fear?
That is always where I start. Even if I guess it completely wrong, I need to get some fix on its intentions before I can work out a strategy. The paranormal often strikes out of nowhere. When I am confronted with the more violent ones, we inevitably end up circling each other like at a shoot-out .
Have you gone again?
This one is not giving anything away. It is not backing off but it is not coming at me either. Yet. Often they feign retreat, only to lunge at me when they think I am off-guard.
Hang on, I can see whatever it is – some kind of cupboard – vibrating rhythmically and I can hear the plates inside it clattering and the glasses chiming. There is an old gilt mirror next to it. A shadowy face will appear there in a minute. They love to pull off that one to scare at least a fart and a burp out of me.
Actually, there's not a lot they can do to me beyond scare me, but I don’t stick my fingers into electric sockets for the sake of it either.
John motions me to a chair and offers me a coffee. It is as if we are standing in two entirely different worlds.
He hasn’t noticed a thing.
I'm not going sit down – I'm not allowing myself to be cornered - so I loiter on shifting feet.
John remains totally oblivious. It is as if he is immune, protected. In its presence we cannot understand each other. If I collapse, he will reckon that I am epileptic or mentally unbalanced, or something. He'll sooner or later tell my brother Mike about it, and Mike will say, “Oh yeah, Paul thinks he sees ghosts. Just ignore him,” and they will all laugh nervously and slap me in a box marked ‘weird’ from which I will never escape.
So I had better stay standing, whatever the provocation from this uneasy spirit, whatever shock tactics it gets up to. Social stigma is much more bruising in the long run than the paranormal.
My ears continue to hiss, my head feels like it is being shoved forwards from the neck.
I make an effort and shield myself momentarily from the insistent sensation of menace in order to scan the room. Beyond this disturbing atmosphere and the swirly mists, there is an elegant, sparsely-furnished room with grey flagged floors, whitewashed rough-plastered stone walls, and cast iron furniture, softened by geometric, pristine white cushions.
“What do you think of the house, Paul?” John enquires, clearly expecting me to confirm how much I like it, which I probably would without the special effects.
“Yeah, it’s great,” I reply.
“Isn’t it? I couldn’t believe it when I first arrived. I wasn't expecting anything like this.”
“You took a flyer on it, did you?”
John shakes his head dismissively. “It wasn’t like that.”
“OK.”
“Anyway, it was a most wonderful surprise. How do you take your coffee, Paul?”
“Black, please.”
“Do you like it strong? I can always make it stronger.”
I smile reassuringly. “I am sure it will be fine. We make it the English way at home.”
John hesitates. “Are you sure?”
“Yeah, I’m sure.”
After passing me my coffee, John flops down in a chair and expels a restrained, satisfied sigh. “These chairs are so comfortable, surprisingly. Sit yourself down.”
Where are you? Are you still loitering? I don't need icy fingers gripping my shoulders and cold breath down my neck.
I cannot feel it any more. Has it dissipated, lost interest, got distracted?
Reluctantly, I take the seat but remain firmly on my guard. My eyes continue to swivel out there in the back of my head. I am still expecting it to try to creep up on me.
“So how do you know the Marchingtons?” John quizzes me.
“I don’t really,” I reply, drumming my legs on the floor to let it know that I am on its case, whatever the appearance. “We met John in the market at Gignac a month or so ago, and we had coffee together, he, Peter, Mike and I, then he invited us over for lunch. We said that we were meant to be going back to Valflaunès for lunch with our parents, and he insisted that we invite them too. I asked whether an extra four people wouldn’t be a pain, and he said not in the least – the family always likes fresh faces - so that was that. We seem to get on, well enough anyway, and they keep inviting us over. We try to get them to come to Valflaunès, but they aren’t interested. And you?”
“Much the same story, except that it was Fiona I bumped into in Pézenas and, like you, we got talking, and she said that they were planning a party – all English people from the area – and would I be willing to join in? I thought that it was rather extraordinary that a lone, unaccompanied woman should be so forward. I even wondered for a moment what I was getting myself into, then she handed me a formally printed card with the Marchington family name and crest, and the artist’s impression of the Château here at Freyrargues,” he laughs self-deprecatingly, “so I reckoned it must be safe after all.”
(Erm). “Had you heard of them before?”
“Never, but there again I am new to the region. I have only been here a few days – well, ten, eleven.”
“The name ‘Harding’ didn’t do anything for you?”
“That, yes. I followed the case at the time. How could I not? I couldn’t remember how it came out, though, whether the wife was returned unharmed or not and, of course, she hasn’t been here at the Château, so there was no immediate clue. I had forgotten that the daughter, Sarah, had been taken as well.”
> “She doesn’t trust me an inch. She tenses up the minute she looks at me.”
John smiles. “That does not necessarily mean that she doesn’t trust you. It may be rather that she doesn’t trust herself.”
“With what?”
“Paul, I am sure that you are never short of girls who are interested in you, and Mike neither.”
I do not respond to this observation. There is nothing to say or to do with it. “So you are a policeman, are you John?”
“I was. I have just retired after forty years of dogged service.”
“How is it going?”
“It’s a blessed relief, seeing as you ask. I don’t miss it in the least. I am even thinking of settling out here, in fact. I am sure that if I return home I shall soon find myself at a loss. What can you do in the pouring rain all day? Here is like being on holiday.”
“You are on holiday.”
“Yes, but I have a feeling that if I were to settle here, it would always feel a bit like being on holiday. I would have to find myself a little house around here somewhere; nothing as fancy as this. I couldn’t afford these prices. I might try somewhere further inland, look for something that needs a bit of doing up which would mean that I could afford it and that I would always have something to do to keep me busy.”
“Do you have anyone back in England?”
“No, I am all on my own. Nobody to miss. I can make a new start.”
“You must have some friends.”
“Yes, I have a few friends but I am sure that they will come and visit me from time to time, with all the Ryanair airports around here and the cheap wine. Most coppers are great boozers, you know, at least the ones I have worked with for the last forty years.”
“It must be the pressure of the job.”
“Maybe.”
We continue along this strained track of conversation for about another quarter of an hour before I decide that it is probably time for me to head back to Valflaunès. After all, John and I really don’t have anything in common. He wanted to show me where he was hanging out as a gesture of friendship, and I agreed to come – that is all. I think we may have used up all of our conversation, for this session at least, and I will be glad to be out of here before misery guts gets me. Whatever it is that is lurking here, I really want nothing to do with it. Patience has never been a virtue of mine. That is the trouble with being psychic. All sorts of intuitions impose themselves unbidden upon me. I just hope that John is safe here. I have considered warning him, but then everyone just thinks you are mad, so I can’t be bothered. He’ll be all right. He is clearly not picking up anything threatening in the atmosphere, so it will probably leave him well alone, whatever it is. Let’s hope so, anyway.
“Well, thanks for showing me where you are staying, John,” I say, getting up.
“Thanks for coming. Any time. I just wanted to prove that I wasn’t a homeless vagrant.”
(Know the feeling). “The Marchingtons make you feel that way, don’t they?”
“Well, I suppose that if you have resided in country piles for hundreds of years, everything else does rather look like a hovel. I am sure that they do not mean anything ill by it. It is simply a reflex.”
“Come to Valflaunès sometime.” (Genuine offer, surprisingly. Well, somebody should come and see us).
“I would like to. Thanks.”
I lead the way to the hired Renault and get in. “Bye, John,” I call as I complete my three-pointish turn and pull away. “See ya soon.”
John waves, follows my departure with his eyes, and turns back towards his haunted house as I disappear from view.
Bye, Sucker! (Not you, John).
* * *
In class, I was always the one who appeared to be conversing with the ceiling – “off with the fairies”. Every teacher I ever had commented on this, on my need to escape my reality, which was a statement fuelled by a misconception. I wasn’t escaping reality, I was embracing it. And I was with the fairies, well not fairies exactly, with the spirits that live around us and that everyone refuses to acknowledge. I find it hard to believe that everybody is that thick, so I assume that it is a wilful blindness you cloak yourselves in, afraid to peep out and recognise your true world in its entirety.
If it does not come naturally to you, or if you have deliberately closed yourself off, you will have to train yourself to become receptive but, in the right frame of mind, if you raise your head for ten seconds, you will see all the spirits circulating around us. Most of them are harmless – they don’t even seem to notice us much either. They are like people passing us in the street; they are as real as people. Some are entities from other dimensions – Quantum Conquistadors, I call them - escapees from harsher places come to conquer our world, except that they cannot actually conquer it. They can fit in around us, they can lodge inside us, but they cannot take us over.
I see them all the time, and they are a lot more entertaining than almost anything I have ever been taught in Geography or Anthropology. It is like watching moths or bumble bees or dragon flies. They are exotic and mostly mind their own business.
I remember coming home and explaining to Mum that her friend Monica had an old man inside her. I could see his black skeleton (why was it black?) and several ghostly creatures tucked into folds inside her body. I never really asked myself why they were there – they were like jewellery, or bruises or something - but the black bit puzzled me. Mum explained that Monica had attempted to rid other people of invading entities and had ended up being infested with them herself because she wasn’t careful enough. She didn’t channel her healing light via the sun. I wasn’t much into the technicalities of psychic cleansing in those days, so I believed her.
And throughout my life, I have always picked up on suppressed emotions around me, which are forever disturbing and distracting me. Why are people so determined to box them away? When they are constrained, they become so violent, as do I. When I was young, these emotions used to overwhelm me far more than the passing entities, and sometimes they still catch me off-guard. It can be beautiful. When two people are in love, their auras kiss and intermingle like gentle rainbow flames at play. That is awesome! Conversely, when two people are rivals, or furious with each other, they shoot sharp spectral darts at each others’ bodies, and those darts really sting.
And auras flash so many colours. People ask those who claim to be psychics, “What colour is my aura?”, and I always think “When?” Auras are only a specific colour for a second or two. They flit all over the place, changing to reflect each passing emotion, although it is true that most people default to a unique pattern when they are asleep, rather like a fingerprint
The entities that get me are the frantic spirits, like the one at John’s place. They frighten me and there are a lot of them about. Many houses I visit have a resident disruptive ghost, although their fury has often waned over the years into pointless moaning. They remain profoundly discontented without remembering why. I often simply release them to the light, at which point people start commenting on how the house seems brighter suddenly. Sometimes Mum catches me doing it, because she is psychic too, although not as much as me, and she smiles at me indulgently.
Then there are the greatest horrors of all – the premonitions. I wish I couldn’t see those, and I often cut them out. I don’t want to glimpse people as they will be; it is hard enough to deal with them as they are. The most persistent premonition I have is of the end of the world. I have seen it clearly time and time again, ever since I was seven or eight years old. What justice is there in that? I see the hâchéd flesh strewn across a landscape of pulped trees. I see us all holding hands, being blown into oblivion. I see the destruction of the planet. But, above all, I smell the devastation and sense the terror. I pick up so many sensations, but terror is the worst. Fear angers me. I should concentrate on reassuring others who are less aware of what is happening to them, but their panic only serves to heighten my own fears, so I become irritable and provocative
instead.
Cats have adapted themselves better. They recognise frenzied thoughts and choose to nestle close to those whom they sense to be stricken, to comfort them, as the angels do. I just turn nasty and try to prod them into a better mood. I’ll never make an angel but the job doesn’t appeal to me anyway. I certainly haven’t the patience for that
The most terrifying paranormal entity I have ever encountered was at Geneviève’s house. It simply pounced out of nowhere and attacked me. I couldn’t work out what was going on, so I became flustered rather than playing it cool as I normally try to do. I kept batting it off, with increasing desperation. Geneviève was watching me, astonished. She couldn’t see this thing any more than John could detect the creature in his house earlier. She couldn’t understand why I was flailing my arms around my head. Eventually, I persuaded the thing to back off, but for several moments I was afraid for my life, except that my more rational self told me that if I was going to make it to the end of the world, I wasn’t exactly likely to die any time yet.
“Are you all right?” Geneviève asked me, almost as terrified by me as I was by it.
“Yes, it has gone away,” I assured her.
“What has?”
“I don’t know, exactly” I replied. “I was too busy defending myself. It was really aggressive, whatever it was. Don’t you ever hear it?”
“Hear what? We lose a lot of china and vases and things. Papa thinks it's the cats. Maman disagrees. She says it is Papa’s dog, but things often get knocked over when neither the cats nor the dog are in the house, so Maman blames us instead, although I am sure she realises that it isn’t us either.”
“You have a ghost,” I informed her. “A real bastard of a ghost.”
Geneviève flinched. My naming it made it too much of a reality for her. She believed in ghosts, whatever she was pretending. “My parents don’t believe in ghosts.”
“Well, that’s what you have.”
“Someone else told us that. They said we should bring in a priest to exorcise it. Papa declared it the most ridiculous thing he had ever heard, and Maman agreed with him.”
