Liot Literary

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A Halloween Short Story

By Fran Connor

I ease my company Audi A3 into a parking space. From the cars already here, I reckon I must be one of the last to arrive. Damn, it’s started to rain. All the way here it was fine, now I’m here it rains. It’s probably an omen. Don’t start on omens — it’s Halloween!

Bedlington House with its blackened stone edifice up on the moor outside Buxton could be the inspiration for a Brontë sisters’ novel.

How naff is that? A pumpkin by the door. It doesn’t get any better inside. Fake cobwebs, plastic spiders, a witch on a broomstick hanging from the ceiling or is it Letitia Banks from HR. Stop it!

“Carol Blackwood, I’m with the Hart and Sole Enterprises conference,” I say to the very white-faced receptionist standing behind a counter with an axe in her head.

She clatters her long red fingernails on a keyboard. “Yes, Ms Blackwood. You are in a single on the first floor.” She pushes a key card with the number 13 on it across the counter.

“Good job I’m not superstitious.”

“Oh, it isn’t room thirteen, it’s room one three, room three on the first floor,” she says.

I trundle my small suitcase up a flight of stairs, no lift. More cobwebs along the corridor. Let’s hope they’re fake. If not, the housekeeper needs sacking. Room one three or thirteen whatever! Ah, here it is.

It’s not bad. They haven’t ruined it. Leaving the bare stone walls exposed may not keep the heat in but it retains its character. They’re thick judging by the depth of the window seat. A single bed will do nicely. Bedside table with lamp and phone. Mini bar with some miniatures. Desk and chair. A view down to the town through an arched window. Yes, it’ll do.

***

My entrance doesn’t go unnoticed. I’m the only one who isn’t in a silly costume.

“You’re not entering into the spirit of the weekend Carol,” says Bill Jenkins sauntering across with two glasses of champagne or more likely Prosecco. The vampire teeth and blood round his mouth suits him. Finance Director!

He hands me one of the glasses.

“I’m that ordinary woman who goes into the wrong place and gets murdered, like in Psycho. I’ll stay out of the shower!”

***

To be fair, it wasn’t a bad dinner.

Not wishing to be a complete party pooper I’ll stay for a couple of dances and make my exit. I’ve had enough and definitely want to escape before the Karaoke.

Back in the quiet of my room I sit on the window seat and gaze down on the lights in Buxton flickering through the rain.

Pulling my hair into a ponytail, I slip into my Aladdin pants and long-sleeved pyjama top and climb into bed. Ah bliss! Sleep.

Yikes! I’m standing in a room. It’s cold. A young woman sits at a window. She wears a pale blue dress with a high neckline, long sleeves with ruffled cuffs and a fitted bodice like someone from a few centuries ago. She burns a piece of paper at a candelabra.

Have those morons slipped something in my drink and put me in here? I’ll kill them!

The woman screams. A shrill scream goes right through me.

The door bursts open. Come off it! A guy dressed up like one of Cromwell’s Roundheads comes running in. “By Our Lady, woman, what dost thou cry out for?”

The woman shakes. “A phantom. There!” She points at me and screams again.

The Roundhead looks right through me and now back at the woman. “Thou art mad woman. Dost thou think I be a muttonhead?”

“It isn’t funny!”

“It doth speak!” says the woman clutching her hands to her chest.

Roundhead stares back in my direction and around the room. “What trickery is this thou dost impart?” He dashes out of the room as quickly as he entered and slams the door shut.

A bolt slides. How dare they do this to me?

I step towards the woman, “Why are you picking on me? Is it because I didn’t wear a silly costume?”

She cowers.

The room is about the same size as my hotel bedroom and the walls are the same, so is the window seat. It’s an arched window but not double glazed like mine. It’s dark outside. It isn’t a room on my side of the building because I can’t see the lights down in Buxton.

The woman stands and backs slowly against the wall. I’ve no idea what the hell is going on.

“Whoever you are, can you tell me what is happening?” I say trying to keep the pleading out of my voice.

Her teeth chatter as she tries to press herself into the wall. “I beseech thee. Do not hurt me. Thou dost wear such strange attire. Art thou a phantom from the East?”

“No, Basingstoke.”

“My punishment happens on the morrow when I am burnt at the stake. For why hath thee come to me now?”

“I have no idea what you are talking about.”

“I lay with a man who was not my husband and bore a child. Hath my husband sent for thee to torment me more? If that be so, ‘tis he who is the witch, not I.”

This is ridiculous. I’m leaving. My hand tries to grip the door handle, but it passes through. I can’t hold anything.

“Where are we?” Don’t panic!

“Bedlington Manor.” She’s calmed down a little.

“And what is the date?”

“Thou art filling me with dread. ’Tis the eve of All Hallows.”

“What year?”

“The year? ’Tis the Year of Our Lord 1657.”

I’ve traveled back in time; impossible. “Who are you?”

“Thou dost speak in a strange tongue, though I understand what thou sayest. I am the Lady Anna Foster, soon to be the late wife of Sir Anthony Foster. Do not torment me phantom, I beg of thee.”

I don’t believe I’m having this conversation, “And you say you are to be burnt at the stake tomorrow?”

“Thou dost torment me phantom. I go to my Maker in the belief I hath not done that for which I am sentenced. My husband hath accused me of witchcraft and I shall die. I love the father of my child and will never give either of them up for my husband to murder even though he hath sworn to spare me if I surrender them.”

“So he’s stitched you up with witchcraft. Sounds like a right bastard.”

“He is many things phantom, but he was born into wedlock.”

We stand and stare at each other. I can’t grip anything or even touch myself. It’s not possible but something has happened. “I am not here to harm you. Please sit down and tell me more.”

She steps forward, hesitates, and then sits. “Did my husband send you?”

“No. I haven’t a clue how I got here.”

“Thou art strange but thy countenance is kind.”

Why have I an affinity to this woman, girl? If she’s acting, then she deserves an Oscar. But it doesn’t explain why I can’t touch anything.

“I think I have been sent to help you,” I say, not totally convinced it is my reason to be here.

“Thou art not a trickster?”

“No.”

“Thou art a phantom.”

“I art. . . I mean I come from the future. I am not a phantom or anything other than a woman just like yourself.”

“But thou art numinous.”

“Not really. Now, how can I help?”

“Your company on my last night is a comfort if you mean me no harm.”

“Are they really going to burn you at the stake tomorrow?”

“It is the sentence of the court. There is no evidence of my witchcraft. My husband doth perjure himself and paid others to do the same.”

The first streaks of dawn appear.

“We need to get you out of here.”

“For sure ’tis not possible.” She points to the window.

Outside in the faint light there’s a stake and piles of brushwood stacked around it. She wasn’t making it up.

“Will your lover give himself up to save you?”

“I forbade him. My husband wants the life of my son too. I would rather die than have my lover and son killed.”

“Where are they?”

She looks at me long and intense. “If I say, perhaps thou will betray me to my husband.”

“I wouldn’t.”

“It is a risk I dare not take.”

I don’t know what else to say. We sit in silence as the sun rises above the distant moor. The sound of metal boots on flagstones in the corridor approach. The bolt slides. Two Roundheads step into the room, one carries a white shift dress.

“Dress for your execution, Witch!” He throws the dress onto the floor and the two march out, the bolt slides.

A glance out of the window and I see a crowd assemble along with more Roundheads.

“Thank you for being with me phantom.” She slips off her blue dress and dons the shift. “I’m ready.”

I can’t let this happen.

The bolt slides. The two Roundheads return this time accompanied by a guy dressed in black with a white collar. He carries a Bible in one hand and a gold or brass cross in the other which he keeps between himself and the condemned. He must be a priest.

The Roundheads bind her hands behind her back and lead her from the room. I follow. I’m invisible to them.

Outside a larger crowd has now assembled, jeering as Lady Anna Foster is pushed towards the stake.

An elderly man in fancy clothes steps forward. “Where is your lover and son? Tell me and I will have you spared and sent to a nunnery to atone for your sin and cleanse you of your witchcraft. The court has agreed to these terms.”

“I shall not tell you. And I go to my Maker innocent of your charge of witchcraft.”

He must be the husband. No wonder she took a lover. I must do something. But what?

She’s tied to the stake.

A man dressed in black leather with a black hood steps forward with a blazing torch. Oh no! This is horrible. I rush forward. I don’t know why but I try to blow the torch out. It goes out. Did I do that?

The crowd gasp. The executioner lights his torch from a brazier. I blow it out again.

He tries again. I blow it out. He and the crowd stampede away. The priest races down the hill; the Roundheads run in the opposite direction. The husband clutches his hands to his heart. He falls to the ground. I think he just had a heart attack.

From a barn a young man dashes forward. He leaps onto the pyre, draws a knife, and cuts Anna loose. She throws her arms around him.

“Thank you, phantom,” she calls to me.

The man helps her down to the ground and then rushes back into the barn. He comes out on a horse with a baby slung in a carrier on his chest.

Anna comes to stand by me. “You were sent to save me phantom.” She pulls a gold ring with a coat of arms from the middle finger of her right hand and proffers it to me.

I can’t hold it. She pushes it into the pocket of my Aladdin pants. It stays.

The man reaches down and pulls her up to sit behind him. They gallop away.

***

I wake, sweat soaked in my hotel bed. That was one helluva nightmare!

The flagstone floor is cold on my bare feet as I climb out of bed and step over to the window to make sure there is no burning stake outside. There isn’t.

There’s something in my pocket. I pull out a gold ring with a coat of arms. Oh my God!

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