August 21, 2025 • 27 mins
Dive into a captivating collection of ghostly tales where the spirits come not from the human realm, but from our beloved animal companions. Each chapter reveals spine-tingling stories of hauntings featuring dogs, cats, birds, jungle creatures, and more. Join Allyson Hester as she guides you through these eerie encounters that blend the supernatural with the animal kingdom.
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Part two of chapter three of Animal Ghosts. This is
a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
For more information or a volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
This reading by Alison Hester of Athens, Georgia, Part two,
Chapter three of Animal Ghosts by Elliot O'Donnell. Another experience
(00:24):
of haunting by the same animal was told me by
a Chelsea artist, who assured me it was absolutely true.
I appended it as nearly as possible in his own
words Heralds of Death. It is many years ago he began,
since I came into my property, Heatherley Hall, near Carlisle, Cumberland.
(00:45):
It was left me by my great uncle, General Winpole,
whom I have never seen, but who made me his
heir in preference to his other nephews, owing to my
reputed likeness to an aunt to whom he was greatly attached.
Of course worse, I was much envied, and I dare
say a good many unkind things were said about me,
but I did not care. Heatherly Hall was mine and
(01:09):
I had as much right to it as anyone else.
I came there alone my two brothers, Dick and Hal
the one a soldier and the other a sailor, were
both away on foreign service, whilst Beryl, my one and
only sister, was staying with her fiance's family in Bath.
Never shall I forget my first impressions depict the day
(01:32):
in October afternoon, the air mellow, the leaves yellow, and
the sun a golden red. Not a trace of clouds
or wind anywhere, everything serene and steel. A broad highway,
a wood, a lodge in the midst of the wood,
large iron gates, a broad carriage drive, planted on either side,
(01:55):
with lofty pines and elms whose gnarled and forked branches
through grote and not altogether pleasing shadows on the pale gravel.
At the end of the avenue at least a quarter
of a mile long wide expanses of soft, velvety grass,
interspersed at regular intervals with plots of flowers, dahlias, daisies,
(02:18):
no longer in their first bloom, chrysanthemums, et cetera. Beyond
the lawn the house, and beyond that again, and on
either side, big old fashioned gardens are full of fruit.
Fruit of all kinds, some such as grapes and peaches.
In monster, greenhouses and others, luscious pears, oranges, golden pippins,
(02:40):
et cetera, in rich profusion in the open. The whole
encompassed by a high and solid brick wall, topped with
a bed of mortar and broken glass. The house, which
was built or rather faced with split flints and edged
with buttressed and cut gray stone, had a majestic but
(03:01):
gloomy appearance. Its front, lofty and handsome, was somewhat castellated
in style. Two semi circular bows or half moons, placed
at a suitable distance from each other, rising from the
base to the summit of the edifice. These were pierced
at every floor with rows of stone mullioned windows, rising
(03:23):
to the height of four or five stories. The flat
wall between had larger windows, lighting the great hall, gallery
and upper apartments. These windows were abundantly ornamented with stained
glass representing the arms, honors, and alms deeds of the
Wimpole family. The towers half included in the building, were
(03:45):
completely circular within and contained the winding stare of the mansion,
and whoso ascended them when the winter wind was blowing
seemed rising by a tornado to the clouds midway Between
the towers was a heavy stone porch with a Gothic gateway,
surmounted by a battlemented piapet made gable fashion, the apex
(04:08):
of which was garnished by a pair of dolphins, rampant
and antagonistic, whose corkscrew tails seemed contorted by the last
agonies of rage. Convulsed the porch doors thrown open to
receive me, led into a hall, wide, vaulted and lofty,
and decorated here and there with remnants of tapestry and
(04:30):
grim portraits of the wimpoles. One picture in particular riveted
my attention. Hung in an obscure corner where the light
rarely penetrated. It represented the head and shoulders of a
young man with a strikingly beautiful face, the features small
and regular like those of a woman, the hair yellow
and curly. It was the eyes that struck me most.
(04:53):
They followed me everywhere I went, with a persistency that
was positively alarming. There was something in them I had
never seen in canvas eyes before, something deeper and infinitely
more intricate than could be produced by mere paint, Something
human and yet not human, friendly and yet not friendly,
(05:15):
something baffling, ignomatical haunting. I inquired of my deceased relative's
aged housekeeper, Missus Grimstone, whom I had retained, whose portrait
it was, and she replied with a scared look. Horace,
youngest son of Sir Algernon Wimpole, who died here in
seventeen forty five. The face fascinates me, I said, Is
(05:40):
there any history attached to it? Why? Yes, sir, she responded,
her eyes fixed on the floor. But the late master
never liked referring to it. Is it as bad as that?
I said, laughing, Tell me well, sir, she began, They
do say, as how, Sir Algernon, who was a thorough
(06:02):
county squire, very fond of hunting and shooting and all
sorts of manly exercises, never liked mister Horace, who was
delicate and dandified what the folk in those days used
to style a macaroni. The climax came when mister Horace
took up with the Jacobites. Sir Algernon would have nothing
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more to do with him then, and turned him adrift.
One day there was a great commotion in the neighborhood.
The government troops were hunting the place in search of rebels,
and who should come galloping up the avenue with a
couple of troopers in hot pursuit, but mister Horace. The
noise brought out Sir Algernon, and he was infuriated to
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think that his son was the cause of the disturbance.
A disgraceful young cub. He called him that, despite mister
Horace's entreaties for protection, he ran through him with his sword.
It was a dreadful thing for a father to do,
and Sir ali Adrenon bitterly repented it. His wife, who
(07:03):
had been devoted to mister Horace, left him, and at last,
in a fit of despondency, he hanged himself out there
on one of the elms lining the avenue. It is
still standing ever since then. They do say that the
wood is haunted, and that before the death of any
member of the family, mister Horace is seen galloping along
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the old carriage drive. Hm pleasant, I grunted, And how
about the house is it haunted too? I dare since say,
she murmured. Some will tell you it is, and some
will tell you it isn't. In which category are you included?
I asked, well, she said, I have lived here, happy
(07:47):
and comfortable forty five years the day after tomorrow. And
that speaks for itself, don't it? And with that she
hobbled off and showed me the way to the dining room.
What a house it wants. From the hall preceded doorways
and passages more than the ordinary memory could retain. Of
these portals, one at each end conducted to the tower stairs,
(08:11):
others to the reception rooms and domestic offices. In the
right wing, besides bedrooms galore, was a lofty and spacious
picture gallery in the left a chapel for the Wimpoles
were formerly Roman Catholics. The general fittings and furniture, both
of the hall and the house in general, were substantial, venerable,
(08:34):
and strongly corroborative of what Missus Grimstone hinted at. They
suggested ghosts. The walls, lined with black oak panels or
dark hangings that fluttered mysteriously each time the wind blew,
were funereal, indeed, and so high and narrow were the
windows that little was to be discerned through them, but
(08:54):
cross barred portions of the sky. One spot in particular
appealed to my nerves, and that a long vaulted stone
passage leading from a morning room to the foot of
the back staircase. Here the voice and even the footsteps
echoed with a hollow, low response, And often when I
have been hurrying along it, I never dared walk slowly.
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I have fancied, and maybe it was more than fancy.
I have been pursued. Time passed, and from being merely
used to my new environments, I grew to take a
pride in them, to love them. I made the acquaintance
of several of my neighbors, those I deemed the most desirable,
and on returning from wintering abroad, brought home a bride,
(09:39):
a young Polish girl who added luster to the surroundings,
and in no small degree helped to dissipate the gloom. Indeed,
had it not been for the picture in the hall,
and for the twilight shadows and twilight footsteps in the
stone passage, I should soon have ceased to think of ghosts, ghosts,
(10:00):
your worsooth. When all around me vibrated with sounds of
girlish laughter, and the summer sunshine sparkling on the golden
curls of my child wife saw itself reflected a millionfold
in the alluring depths of her azure eyes in Halcyon
days like these, who thinks of ghosts and death? And
(10:20):
yet it is in just such times as these that
hell is nearest. There came a night in August when
the air was so hot in the sultry that I
could scarcely breathe, and unable to bear the atmosphere of
the house and the gardens any longer, I sought the
coolness of the wood Olga. My wife did not accompany me,
(10:41):
as she was suffering from a slight Thank god, it
was only slight sunstroke. It was close on midnight, and
there was a dead stillness abroad that seemed as if
it must be universal, as if it enveloped the whole
of nature. I tried to realize London, to depict the
Strand and Piccadilly, a glow with artificial light and reverberating
(11:02):
with the roll of countless traffic and the tread of
millions of feet. I failed. The incongruity of such imaginings.
Here here, amidst omnipotent silence, rendered such thoughts impossible. A
leaf rustled, and its rustling sounded to my ears like
the gentle closing of some giant door, A twig fell,
(11:24):
and I turned sharply round, convinced I should see a
pile of broken debris. I love all trees, but I
love them best by day. To me, it seems that
night utterly metamorphizes them, brings out in them a subtler,
darker side. One would little suspect. Here in this oak,
(11:44):
for instance, was an example. In the morning, one sees
in it naught but quiet dignity, venerable old age benevolence, and,
by reason of the ample protection its branches afford from
the sun, charity and flat aanthropy, its leaves are bright, dainty, pretty.
Its trunk suggests nothing but a cozy and soothing retreat
(12:08):
for students and lovers. But now see how different these great, spreading,
gnaurled branches are. Hands claws monstrous and menacing. Those leaves
no longer bright, remind me of a hearse's plumes. Their rustling,
of the rustling and switching of a pall or winding sheet.
(12:28):
The trunk, black, sinuous towering is assuredly no peace of timber,
but something pulpy, something intangible, something antagonistic, mystic, devilish. I
turn from it and shudder. Then my mind reverts to
the elm, the elm on which Sir Algernon hanged himself.
(12:49):
I remember, it is not more than twenty yards from
where I stand. I stare down at the soil, at
the clumps of crested dog's tail and stray blades of
sucking darnell. I forced my attention on a toadstool, whose
soft and lowly head gleams sickly white in the moonbeams.
I glanced from it to a sleeping clothes capped dandelion,
(13:12):
from it to a thistle, from it again to a
late bush vetch, and then, willy nilly, to the accursed elm.
My god, what a change. It wasn't like that when
I passed it at noon. It was just an ordinary
tree then. But now now, and what is that that
sinister bundle suspended from one of its curling branches. A
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cold sweat bursts out on me. My knees tremble, my
hair begins to rise on end, swinging round. I am
about to rush away, blindly, rush away, hither thither anywhere, anywhere,
out of sight of that tree, and of all the
hideous possibilities it promises to materialize for me. I have
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not taken five strides. However, before I am pulled sharply
up by the sounds of horses, hoofs of hoofs on
the hard gravel away in the distance. They speedily grow nearer.
A horse is galloping, galloping towards me along the broad
carriage drive, nearer, nearer, and nearer it comes. Who isn't
(14:19):
what is it? Hey? Deadly nausea seizes me. I swerve
totter real and am only prevented from falling by the
timely interference of a pine. The concussion, with its leviathan
trunk clears my senses, all my faculties become wonderfully and
painfully alert. I would give my very soul if it
(14:41):
were not so, if I could but fall asleep or faint.
The sound of the hoofs is very much nearer, now,
so near indeed, that I may see the man. Heaven
grant it may be only a man. After all. Any moment, ah,
my heart gives a a great sickly jerk. Something has
(15:03):
shot into view. There, not fifty yards from me, where
the road curves and the break and the foliage overhead
admits a great flood of moonlight. I recognize the thing
at once. It's not a man, it's nothing human. It's
the picture I know so well and dread so much,
(15:23):
the portrait of Horace Wimpole that hangs in the main hall.
And it's mounted on a cold black horse with wildly
flying mane and foaming mouth own and on they come, thud, thud, thud.
The man is not dressed as a rider, but is
wearing the costume, and the picture, I e. That of
a macaroni, a nut more fit for a lady seminary
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than a fine old English mansion. Something beside me rustles,
rustles angrily, and I know, I can feel it is
the bundle on the branch, the ghastly grown, creaking, croaking
caricature of Sir Algernon. The horseman comes up to me.
Our eyes meet, I am looking in those of a
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dead of a long since dead man. My blood freezes.
He flashes past me, thud, thud thud, a bend in
the road, and he vanishes from sight. But I can
still hear him, still hear the mad patter of his
horse's hoofs as they bear him onward, lifeless, fleshless, weightless
(16:30):
to his ancient home. God, pity the souls that know
no rest. How I got back to the house I
hardly know. I believe it was with my eyes shut,
and I am certain I ran all the way. About
four o'clock the following afternoon, I received a cablegram from
MALTA intuition warned me to prepare for the worst. Its
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contents were unpleasantly short, and pithy Hal drowned at two
o'clock this morning. Two years passed again, and August night
hot and oppressive as before, and again, though surely against
my will, my better judgment, if you like, I visited
the wood horses hoofs, just the same as before, the
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same galloping, the same figure, the same eyes, the same mad,
panic stricken flight home, and early in the succeeding afternoon
a similar cablegram, this time from Sicily. Dick died at
midnight dysentery Andrews. Jack Andrews was Dick's pal, his bosom friend.
(17:40):
So once again the phantom Rider had brought its grisly message,
played its ghoulish role. My brothers were both dead now
and only Barrel remained. Another year sped by, and the
last night in October a Monday saw me impelled by
a fascination I could not resist once again in the wood.
(18:02):
Up to a point, everything happened as before, as the
monotonous church clock struck twelve from afar, came the sound
of hoofs nearer, nearer, nearer, and then, with startling abruptness,
the rider shot into view, and now mixed with the awful,
indescribable terror the figure always conveyed with it, came a
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feeling of intense rage and indignation. Should Beryl, Beryl, whom
I loved next best to my wife, be torn from me,
even as Dick and Hal had been no ten thousand times,
No sooner than that I would risk anything. A sudden inspiration,
(18:46):
coming maybe from the whispering leaves, or from the elm,
or from the mysterious flickering moonbeams, flashed through me. Could
I not intercept the figures drive them back? By doing so?
Something told me Beryl might be saved. A terrible struggle
at once took place within me, and it was only
after the most desperate efforts that I at length succeeded
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in fighting back my terror and flung myself out into
the middle of the drive. No words of mine can
describe all I went through. As I stood there anticipating
the arrival of the phantoms, at length, they came right
up to me, and as with frantic resolution, I screwed
up the courage to plant myself directly in their path,
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and steered up into the writer's eyes. The huge steed halted,
gave one shrill neigh, and, turning round, galloped back again,
disappearing whither it had emerged. Two days afterwards, I received
a letter from my brother in law. I have been
having an awful time, he wrote. My darling Beryl has
(19:54):
been frightfully ill. On Monday night we gave up all
hope of her recovery. But at twelve o'clock, when the
doctor bid us prepare for the end, the most extraordinary
thing happened. Turning over in bed, she distinctly called out
your name and rallied. And now, thank god, she is
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completely out of danger. The doctor says it is the
most astonishing recovery he has ever known. That is twenty
years ago, and I've not seen the phantom rid since,
nor do I fancy he will appear again. For when
I look into the eyes of the picture in the hall,
they are no longer wandering, but at rest. Perhaps one
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of the most interesting accounts of the phantasm of a
horse in my possession is that recorded by C. E. G.
A friend of my boyhood, writing to me from the
United States some months ago. He says, knowing how interested
you are in all cases of hauntings, and in those
relating to animal ghosts, especially I am, I'm sending you
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an account of an experience that happened to my uncle,
mister John Dale, about six months ago. He was returning
to his home in Bishopstone, near Helena, Montana, shortly after dark,
and had arrived at a particularly lonely part of the
road where the trees almost meet overhead. When his horse
showed signs of restlessness. It slackens down, halted, shivered, whinnied,
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and kept up such a series of antics that my
uncle descended from the trap to see if anything was
wrong with it. He thought that perhaps it was going
to have some kind of fit or an attack of
agu which is not an uncommon complaint among animals in
this part of the country, and he was preparing to
give it a dose of Quinnan when suddenly it reared
(21:46):
up violently, and before he could stop it was careering
along the road at lightning speed. My uncle was now
in a pretty mess. He was stranded in a forest
without a lantern, ten miles at least from home. Feeling
too depressed to do anything, he sat down by the
roadside and seriously thought of remaining there till daybreak. A
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twinge of rheumatism, however, reminded him the ground was a
little warmer than ice, and made him realize that lying
on it would be courting death. Consequently, he got up and,
setting his lips grimly, struck out in the direction of Bishopstone.
At every step he took, the track grew darker. Shadows
of trees and countless other things for which he could
(22:29):
see no counterpart, crept out and rendered it almost impossible
for him to tell where to tread. A peculiar, indefinable
dread also began to make itself felt, and the darkness
seemed to him to assume an entirely new character. He
plodded on, breaking into a jog trot every now and
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then and whistling by way of companionship. The stillness was sepulchral.
He strained his ears, but could not even catch the
sound of those tiny animals that are usually heard in
the thickets and first bushes at night, and all his
movements were exaggerated until their echoes seemed to reverberate through
the whole forest. A turn of the road brought him
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into view of something that made his heart throb with delight.
Standing by the wayside was an enormous coach with four
huge horses pawing the ground impatiently. My uncle rushed up
to the driver, who was so enveloped in wraps he
could not see his face, and in a voice trembling
with emotion, begged for the favor of a lift, if
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not to Helena itself, as far in that direction as
the coach was going. The driver made no reply, but
with his hand motioned my uncle to get in. The
latter did not need a second bidding, and the moment
he was seated, the vehicle started off. It was a large,
roomy conveyance, but had a stifling atmosphere about it that
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struck my uncle as most unpleasant, and although he could
see no one, he intuitively felt he was not alone,
and that more than one pair of eyes were watching him.
The coach did not go as fast as my uncle expected,
but moved with a curious gliding motion, and the wheels
made no noise whatever. This added to my uncle's apprehensions,
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and he almost made up his mind to open the
carriage door and jump out. Something, however, which he could
not account for, restrained him, and he maintained his seat. Outside,
all was still profoundly dark. The trees were scarcely distinguishable
as deeper masses of shadow, and were recognizable only by
(24:38):
the resinous odor that, from time to time sluggishly flowed
in at the open window. As the coach rolled on
at length, they overtook some other vehicle, and for the
first time for some hours, my uncle heard the sound
of solid wheels, which were as welcome to him as
any joy bells. Just as they were passing the conveyance
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a small wagonette drawn by a pair of horses. The
latter took fright. There were loud shouts and a great stampede,
and my uncle, who leaned out of the coach window,
caught a glimpse of the vehicle dashing along ahead of
them at a frightful speed. The driver of the coach,
apparently totally unconcerned, continued his journey at the same regular
(25:24):
mechanical pace. Presently, my uncle heard the sound of rushing
water and knew they must be nearing the Usk, a
tributary of the battle, which was only five miles from
his house. The forest now ceased, and they crossed the
road over the bridge in a brilliant burst of moonlight.
About a mile or so further on, the coach halted,
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and to my uncle's surprise, he found himself in front
of a house he had no recollection of seeing before
he got out, and to his horror, saw that instead
of riding in a coach, he had been riding in
a hearse, and that the horses had on their heads
gigantic sable plumes. While he was standing gazing at the
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extraordinary equipage, the door of the house slowly opened and
two figures came out, carrying a small coffin, which they
placed inside the vehicle. He then heard loud peals of
mad hilarious laughter, and coach and horses immediately vanished. My
uncle arrived home safely, but the shock of what he
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had experienced kept him in bed for some days. He
learned that a phantom coach similar to the one he
had ridden in, had been seen in the forest twenty
years previously, and that it was supposed to be a
prognostication of some great misfortune, which supposition, in my uncle's
case at least proved true, as his wife died of
(26:53):
apoplexy a few days after this adventure. End of part
two of Chapter or three of The Animal Ghosts M.
Part two of chapter three of Animal Ghosts. This is
a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
For more information or a volunteer, please visit LibriVox dot org.
This reading by Alison Hester of Athens, Georgia, Part two,
Chapter three of Animal Ghosts by Elliot O'Donnell. Another experience
(00:24):
of haunting by the same animal was told me by
a Chelsea artist, who assured me it was absolutely true.
I appended it as nearly as possible in his own
words Heralds of Death. It is many years ago he began,
since I came into my property, Heatherley Hall, near Carlisle, Cumberland.
(00:45):
It was left me by my great uncle, General Winpole,
whom I have never seen, but who made me his
heir in preference to his other nephews, owing to my
reputed likeness to an aunt to whom he was greatly attached.
Of course worse, I was much envied, and I dare
say a good many unkind things were said about me,
but I did not care. Heatherly Hall was mine and
(01:09):
I had as much right to it as anyone else.
I came there alone my two brothers, Dick and Hal
the one a soldier and the other a sailor, were
both away on foreign service, whilst Beryl, my one and
only sister, was staying with her fiance's family in Bath.
Never shall I forget my first impressions depict the day
(01:32):
in October afternoon, the air mellow, the leaves yellow, and
the sun a golden red. Not a trace of clouds
or wind anywhere, everything serene and steel. A broad highway,
a wood, a lodge in the midst of the wood,
large iron gates, a broad carriage drive, planted on either side,
(01:55):
with lofty pines and elms whose gnarled and forked branches
through grote and not altogether pleasing shadows on the pale gravel.
At the end of the avenue at least a quarter
of a mile long wide expanses of soft, velvety grass,
interspersed at regular intervals with plots of flowers, dahlias, daisies,
(02:18):
no longer in their first bloom, chrysanthemums, et cetera. Beyond
the lawn the house, and beyond that again, and on
either side, big old fashioned gardens are full of fruit.
Fruit of all kinds, some such as grapes and peaches.
In monster, greenhouses and others, luscious pears, oranges, golden pippins,
(02:40):
et cetera, in rich profusion in the open. The whole
encompassed by a high and solid brick wall, topped with
a bed of mortar and broken glass. The house, which
was built or rather faced with split flints and edged
with buttressed and cut gray stone, had a majestic but
(03:01):
gloomy appearance. Its front, lofty and handsome, was somewhat castellated
in style. Two semi circular bows or half moons, placed
at a suitable distance from each other, rising from the
base to the summit of the edifice. These were pierced
at every floor with rows of stone mullioned windows, rising
(03:23):
to the height of four or five stories. The flat
wall between had larger windows, lighting the great hall, gallery
and upper apartments. These windows were abundantly ornamented with stained
glass representing the arms, honors, and alms deeds of the
Wimpole family. The towers half included in the building, were
(03:45):
completely circular within and contained the winding stare of the mansion,
and whoso ascended them when the winter wind was blowing
seemed rising by a tornado to the clouds midway Between
the towers was a heavy stone porch with a Gothic gateway,
surmounted by a battlemented piapet made gable fashion, the apex
(04:08):
of which was garnished by a pair of dolphins, rampant
and antagonistic, whose corkscrew tails seemed contorted by the last
agonies of rage. Convulsed the porch doors thrown open to
receive me, led into a hall, wide, vaulted and lofty,
and decorated here and there with remnants of tapestry and
(04:30):
grim portraits of the wimpoles. One picture in particular riveted
my attention. Hung in an obscure corner where the light
rarely penetrated. It represented the head and shoulders of a
young man with a strikingly beautiful face, the features small
and regular like those of a woman, the hair yellow
and curly. It was the eyes that struck me most.
(04:53):
They followed me everywhere I went, with a persistency that
was positively alarming. There was something in them I had
never seen in canvas eyes before, something deeper and infinitely
more intricate than could be produced by mere paint, Something
human and yet not human, friendly and yet not friendly,
(05:15):
something baffling, ignomatical haunting. I inquired of my deceased relative's
aged housekeeper, Missus Grimstone, whom I had retained, whose portrait
it was, and she replied with a scared look. Horace,
youngest son of Sir Algernon Wimpole, who died here in
seventeen forty five. The face fascinates me, I said, Is
(05:40):
there any history attached to it? Why? Yes, sir, she responded,
her eyes fixed on the floor. But the late master
never liked referring to it. Is it as bad as that?
I said, laughing, Tell me well, sir, she began, They
do say, as how, Sir Algernon, who was a thorough
(06:02):
county squire, very fond of hunting and shooting and all
sorts of manly exercises, never liked mister Horace, who was
delicate and dandified what the folk in those days used
to style a macaroni. The climax came when mister Horace
took up with the Jacobites. Sir Algernon would have nothing
(06:23):
more to do with him then, and turned him adrift.
One day there was a great commotion in the neighborhood.
The government troops were hunting the place in search of rebels,
and who should come galloping up the avenue with a
couple of troopers in hot pursuit, but mister Horace. The
noise brought out Sir Algernon, and he was infuriated to
(06:43):
think that his son was the cause of the disturbance.
A disgraceful young cub. He called him that, despite mister
Horace's entreaties for protection, he ran through him with his sword.
It was a dreadful thing for a father to do,
and Sir ali Adrenon bitterly repented it. His wife, who
(07:03):
had been devoted to mister Horace, left him, and at last,
in a fit of despondency, he hanged himself out there
on one of the elms lining the avenue. It is
still standing ever since then. They do say that the
wood is haunted, and that before the death of any
member of the family, mister Horace is seen galloping along
(07:26):
the old carriage drive. Hm pleasant, I grunted, And how
about the house is it haunted too? I dare since say,
she murmured. Some will tell you it is, and some
will tell you it isn't. In which category are you included?
I asked, well, she said, I have lived here, happy
(07:47):
and comfortable forty five years the day after tomorrow. And
that speaks for itself, don't it? And with that she
hobbled off and showed me the way to the dining room.
What a house it wants. From the hall preceded doorways
and passages more than the ordinary memory could retain. Of
these portals, one at each end conducted to the tower stairs,
(08:11):
others to the reception rooms and domestic offices. In the
right wing, besides bedrooms galore, was a lofty and spacious
picture gallery in the left a chapel for the Wimpoles
were formerly Roman Catholics. The general fittings and furniture, both
of the hall and the house in general, were substantial, venerable,
(08:34):
and strongly corroborative of what Missus Grimstone hinted at. They
suggested ghosts. The walls, lined with black oak panels or
dark hangings that fluttered mysteriously each time the wind blew,
were funereal, indeed, and so high and narrow were the
windows that little was to be discerned through them, but
(08:54):
cross barred portions of the sky. One spot in particular
appealed to my nerves, and that a long vaulted stone
passage leading from a morning room to the foot of
the back staircase. Here the voice and even the footsteps
echoed with a hollow, low response, And often when I
have been hurrying along it, I never dared walk slowly.
(09:17):
I have fancied, and maybe it was more than fancy.
I have been pursued. Time passed, and from being merely
used to my new environments, I grew to take a
pride in them, to love them. I made the acquaintance
of several of my neighbors, those I deemed the most desirable,
and on returning from wintering abroad, brought home a bride,
(09:39):
a young Polish girl who added luster to the surroundings,
and in no small degree helped to dissipate the gloom. Indeed,
had it not been for the picture in the hall,
and for the twilight shadows and twilight footsteps in the
stone passage, I should soon have ceased to think of ghosts, ghosts,
(10:00):
your worsooth. When all around me vibrated with sounds of
girlish laughter, and the summer sunshine sparkling on the golden
curls of my child wife saw itself reflected a millionfold
in the alluring depths of her azure eyes in Halcyon
days like these, who thinks of ghosts and death? And
(10:20):
yet it is in just such times as these that
hell is nearest. There came a night in August when
the air was so hot in the sultry that I
could scarcely breathe, and unable to bear the atmosphere of
the house and the gardens any longer, I sought the
coolness of the wood Olga. My wife did not accompany me,
(10:41):
as she was suffering from a slight Thank god, it
was only slight sunstroke. It was close on midnight, and
there was a dead stillness abroad that seemed as if
it must be universal, as if it enveloped the whole
of nature. I tried to realize London, to depict the
Strand and Piccadilly, a glow with artificial light and reverberating
(11:02):
with the roll of countless traffic and the tread of
millions of feet. I failed. The incongruity of such imaginings.
Here here, amidst omnipotent silence, rendered such thoughts impossible. A
leaf rustled, and its rustling sounded to my ears like
the gentle closing of some giant door, A twig fell,
(11:24):
and I turned sharply round, convinced I should see a
pile of broken debris. I love all trees, but I
love them best by day. To me, it seems that
night utterly metamorphizes them, brings out in them a subtler,
darker side. One would little suspect. Here in this oak,
(11:44):
for instance, was an example. In the morning, one sees
in it naught but quiet dignity, venerable old age benevolence, and,
by reason of the ample protection its branches afford from
the sun, charity and flat aanthropy, its leaves are bright, dainty, pretty.
Its trunk suggests nothing but a cozy and soothing retreat
(12:08):
for students and lovers. But now see how different these great, spreading,
gnaurled branches are. Hands claws monstrous and menacing. Those leaves
no longer bright, remind me of a hearse's plumes. Their rustling,
of the rustling and switching of a pall or winding sheet.
(12:28):
The trunk, black, sinuous towering is assuredly no peace of timber,
but something pulpy, something intangible, something antagonistic, mystic, devilish. I
turn from it and shudder. Then my mind reverts to
the elm, the elm on which Sir Algernon hanged himself.
(12:49):
I remember, it is not more than twenty yards from
where I stand. I stare down at the soil, at
the clumps of crested dog's tail and stray blades of
sucking darnell. I forced my attention on a toadstool, whose
soft and lowly head gleams sickly white in the moonbeams.
I glanced from it to a sleeping clothes capped dandelion,
(13:12):
from it to a thistle, from it again to a
late bush vetch, and then, willy nilly, to the accursed elm.
My god, what a change. It wasn't like that when
I passed it at noon. It was just an ordinary
tree then. But now now, and what is that that
sinister bundle suspended from one of its curling branches. A
(13:36):
cold sweat bursts out on me. My knees tremble, my
hair begins to rise on end, swinging round. I am
about to rush away, blindly, rush away, hither thither anywhere, anywhere,
out of sight of that tree, and of all the
hideous possibilities it promises to materialize for me. I have
(13:56):
not taken five strides. However, before I am pulled sharply
up by the sounds of horses, hoofs of hoofs on
the hard gravel away in the distance. They speedily grow nearer.
A horse is galloping, galloping towards me along the broad
carriage drive, nearer, nearer, and nearer it comes. Who isn't
(14:19):
what is it? Hey? Deadly nausea seizes me. I swerve
totter real and am only prevented from falling by the
timely interference of a pine. The concussion, with its leviathan
trunk clears my senses, all my faculties become wonderfully and
painfully alert. I would give my very soul if it
(14:41):
were not so, if I could but fall asleep or faint.
The sound of the hoofs is very much nearer, now,
so near indeed, that I may see the man. Heaven
grant it may be only a man. After all. Any moment, ah,
my heart gives a a great sickly jerk. Something has
(15:03):
shot into view. There, not fifty yards from me, where
the road curves and the break and the foliage overhead
admits a great flood of moonlight. I recognize the thing
at once. It's not a man, it's nothing human. It's
the picture I know so well and dread so much,
(15:23):
the portrait of Horace Wimpole that hangs in the main hall.
And it's mounted on a cold black horse with wildly
flying mane and foaming mouth own and on they come, thud, thud, thud.
The man is not dressed as a rider, but is
wearing the costume, and the picture, I e. That of
a macaroni, a nut more fit for a lady seminary
(15:48):
than a fine old English mansion. Something beside me rustles,
rustles angrily, and I know, I can feel it is
the bundle on the branch, the ghastly grown, creaking, croaking
caricature of Sir Algernon. The horseman comes up to me.
Our eyes meet, I am looking in those of a
(16:09):
dead of a long since dead man. My blood freezes.
He flashes past me, thud, thud thud, a bend in
the road, and he vanishes from sight. But I can
still hear him, still hear the mad patter of his
horse's hoofs as they bear him onward, lifeless, fleshless, weightless
(16:30):
to his ancient home. God, pity the souls that know
no rest. How I got back to the house I
hardly know. I believe it was with my eyes shut,
and I am certain I ran all the way. About
four o'clock the following afternoon, I received a cablegram from
MALTA intuition warned me to prepare for the worst. Its
(16:53):
contents were unpleasantly short, and pithy Hal drowned at two
o'clock this morning. Two years passed again, and August night
hot and oppressive as before, and again, though surely against
my will, my better judgment, if you like, I visited
the wood horses hoofs, just the same as before, the
(17:16):
same galloping, the same figure, the same eyes, the same mad,
panic stricken flight home, and early in the succeeding afternoon
a similar cablegram, this time from Sicily. Dick died at
midnight dysentery Andrews. Jack Andrews was Dick's pal, his bosom friend.
(17:40):
So once again the phantom Rider had brought its grisly message,
played its ghoulish role. My brothers were both dead now
and only Barrel remained. Another year sped by, and the
last night in October a Monday saw me impelled by
a fascination I could not resist once again in the wood.
(18:02):
Up to a point, everything happened as before, as the
monotonous church clock struck twelve from afar, came the sound
of hoofs nearer, nearer, nearer, and then, with startling abruptness,
the rider shot into view, and now mixed with the awful,
indescribable terror the figure always conveyed with it, came a
(18:26):
feeling of intense rage and indignation. Should Beryl, Beryl, whom
I loved next best to my wife, be torn from me,
even as Dick and Hal had been no ten thousand times,
No sooner than that I would risk anything. A sudden inspiration,
(18:46):
coming maybe from the whispering leaves, or from the elm,
or from the mysterious flickering moonbeams, flashed through me. Could
I not intercept the figures drive them back? By doing so?
Something told me Beryl might be saved. A terrible struggle
at once took place within me, and it was only
after the most desperate efforts that I at length succeeded
(19:11):
in fighting back my terror and flung myself out into
the middle of the drive. No words of mine can
describe all I went through. As I stood there anticipating
the arrival of the phantoms, at length, they came right
up to me, and as with frantic resolution, I screwed
up the courage to plant myself directly in their path,
(19:33):
and steered up into the writer's eyes. The huge steed halted,
gave one shrill neigh, and, turning round, galloped back again,
disappearing whither it had emerged. Two days afterwards, I received
a letter from my brother in law. I have been
having an awful time, he wrote. My darling Beryl has
(19:54):
been frightfully ill. On Monday night we gave up all
hope of her recovery. But at twelve o'clock, when the
doctor bid us prepare for the end, the most extraordinary
thing happened. Turning over in bed, she distinctly called out
your name and rallied. And now, thank god, she is
(20:15):
completely out of danger. The doctor says it is the
most astonishing recovery he has ever known. That is twenty
years ago, and I've not seen the phantom rid since,
nor do I fancy he will appear again. For when
I look into the eyes of the picture in the hall,
they are no longer wandering, but at rest. Perhaps one
(20:39):
of the most interesting accounts of the phantasm of a
horse in my possession is that recorded by C. E. G.
A friend of my boyhood, writing to me from the
United States some months ago. He says, knowing how interested
you are in all cases of hauntings, and in those
relating to animal ghosts, especially I am, I'm sending you
(21:00):
an account of an experience that happened to my uncle,
mister John Dale, about six months ago. He was returning
to his home in Bishopstone, near Helena, Montana, shortly after dark,
and had arrived at a particularly lonely part of the
road where the trees almost meet overhead. When his horse
showed signs of restlessness. It slackens down, halted, shivered, whinnied,
(21:25):
and kept up such a series of antics that my
uncle descended from the trap to see if anything was
wrong with it. He thought that perhaps it was going
to have some kind of fit or an attack of
agu which is not an uncommon complaint among animals in
this part of the country, and he was preparing to
give it a dose of Quinnan when suddenly it reared
(21:46):
up violently, and before he could stop it was careering
along the road at lightning speed. My uncle was now
in a pretty mess. He was stranded in a forest
without a lantern, ten miles at least from home. Feeling
too depressed to do anything, he sat down by the
roadside and seriously thought of remaining there till daybreak. A
(22:07):
twinge of rheumatism, however, reminded him the ground was a
little warmer than ice, and made him realize that lying
on it would be courting death. Consequently, he got up and,
setting his lips grimly, struck out in the direction of Bishopstone.
At every step he took, the track grew darker. Shadows
of trees and countless other things for which he could
(22:29):
see no counterpart, crept out and rendered it almost impossible
for him to tell where to tread. A peculiar, indefinable
dread also began to make itself felt, and the darkness
seemed to him to assume an entirely new character. He
plodded on, breaking into a jog trot every now and
(22:50):
then and whistling by way of companionship. The stillness was sepulchral.
He strained his ears, but could not even catch the
sound of those tiny animals that are usually heard in
the thickets and first bushes at night, and all his
movements were exaggerated until their echoes seemed to reverberate through
the whole forest. A turn of the road brought him
(23:12):
into view of something that made his heart throb with delight.
Standing by the wayside was an enormous coach with four
huge horses pawing the ground impatiently. My uncle rushed up
to the driver, who was so enveloped in wraps he
could not see his face, and in a voice trembling
with emotion, begged for the favor of a lift, if
(23:33):
not to Helena itself, as far in that direction as
the coach was going. The driver made no reply, but
with his hand motioned my uncle to get in. The
latter did not need a second bidding, and the moment
he was seated, the vehicle started off. It was a large,
roomy conveyance, but had a stifling atmosphere about it that
(23:55):
struck my uncle as most unpleasant, and although he could
see no one, he intuitively felt he was not alone,
and that more than one pair of eyes were watching him.
The coach did not go as fast as my uncle expected,
but moved with a curious gliding motion, and the wheels
made no noise whatever. This added to my uncle's apprehensions,
(24:17):
and he almost made up his mind to open the
carriage door and jump out. Something, however, which he could
not account for, restrained him, and he maintained his seat. Outside,
all was still profoundly dark. The trees were scarcely distinguishable
as deeper masses of shadow, and were recognizable only by
(24:38):
the resinous odor that, from time to time sluggishly flowed
in at the open window. As the coach rolled on
at length, they overtook some other vehicle, and for the
first time for some hours, my uncle heard the sound
of solid wheels, which were as welcome to him as
any joy bells. Just as they were passing the conveyance
(25:01):
a small wagonette drawn by a pair of horses. The
latter took fright. There were loud shouts and a great stampede,
and my uncle, who leaned out of the coach window,
caught a glimpse of the vehicle dashing along ahead of
them at a frightful speed. The driver of the coach,
apparently totally unconcerned, continued his journey at the same regular
(25:24):
mechanical pace. Presently, my uncle heard the sound of rushing
water and knew they must be nearing the Usk, a
tributary of the battle, which was only five miles from
his house. The forest now ceased, and they crossed the
road over the bridge in a brilliant burst of moonlight.
About a mile or so further on, the coach halted,
(25:48):
and to my uncle's surprise, he found himself in front
of a house he had no recollection of seeing before
he got out, and to his horror, saw that instead
of riding in a coach, he had been riding in
a hearse, and that the horses had on their heads
gigantic sable plumes. While he was standing gazing at the
(26:09):
extraordinary equipage, the door of the house slowly opened and
two figures came out, carrying a small coffin, which they
placed inside the vehicle. He then heard loud peals of
mad hilarious laughter, and coach and horses immediately vanished. My
uncle arrived home safely, but the shock of what he
(26:31):
had experienced kept him in bed for some days. He
learned that a phantom coach similar to the one he
had ridden in, had been seen in the forest twenty
years previously, and that it was supposed to be a
prognostication of some great misfortune, which supposition, in my uncle's
case at least proved true, as his wife died of
(26:53):
apoplexy a few days after this adventure. End of part
two of Chapter or three of The Animal Ghosts M.
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