From The Cellar It Came & Other Scary Stories | Podcast - Nightshade Diary

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Do you feel a sharer up your spine from fear? Yes,
it's another story from the Night's Shade Diary. You know
what that means. Check under the bed and make sure
no one or nothing is there. Is the closet door
securely shut. Then leave your disbelief behind, amp up your
imagination and hang on tight for another ride into terror

(00:22):
and mystery. And like all good horror stories, just imagine
it's a dark and stormy night, and remember screaming like
a little girl is permitted from the cellar. It came
by Elliott O'Donnell. The wealthy lady Adela Minkin, whose yacht

(00:45):
at Cow's was the envy of all who cruised in.
Her was the owner of a considerable amount of house property,
much of which, as she freely admitted to me, she
had not set eyes on, nor had any special desire
to do so, having very competent agents to handle her affairs. However,
when curious reports kept filtering through to her about an

(01:06):
alleged haunting and one of her houses in Edinburgh, she
became intrigued and decided to put the haunting to the test.
Lady Adella was a perfectly frank and open minded woman,
though she had never experienced any occult phenomena herself, she
was not inclined to dismiss as so much rubbish the
evidence of those tenants who declared they had witness manifestations. Accordingly,

(01:29):
she proceeded with her test in very practical fashion, commencing
her occupation of the house in f Road with a
perfectly unbiased mind, and resolving to stay there, if need be,
for at least a year, so as to give it
a fair trial. Lady Adella took up presidence in the
house in the early summer of nineteen o eight, having

(01:50):
been told that the hauntings were generally at their heights
in the late summer and early autumn. It is, I
think unnecessary to enter into any detailed description the house.
In appearance, it differed very little, if at all, from
those adjoining it. In construction, it was, of anything, a
trifle large. The basement, which included the usual kitchen offices

(02:13):
and cellars, was very dark, and to a great puzzlement,
Lady Adela found that the atmosphere here after sunset on Fridays,
and only on Fridays, was tainted with a strong smell
of damp earth, together with a sweet and nauseating, something
she and the servants were totally unable to account for.
All the rooms in the house were of fair dimensions

(02:34):
and cheerful, except on Friday evenings, when a distinct gloom
settled on them, and the strangest of shadows were seen
playing about the passage and on the landing. Now, as
I have said, Lady Adela was a thoroughly practical woman,
and so she inclined to put down these Friday feelings
to mere fancy and anyway. She told herself, if all

(02:57):
she encountered was nothing worse than a weekly many of
smells and easily digested shadows, she was not likely to
suffer any harm. But as the weeks went by, the
shadows and the smell grew more and more pronounced, and
by the arrival of August had become so emphatic that
she could not help thinking they were both hostile and aggressive.

(03:19):
At about eight o'clock in the evening of the second
fright in August, Lady Adela were purposely alone in the
basement of the house. She had felt that the presence
of the servants in the house minimized her chances of
seeing the ghost. If ghost it was, and so she
sent them all out for motor drive, and for once
unconventionally rejoiced in having the house to herself. She was not, however,

(03:43):
entirely alone, for she had two of her dogs with her,
two beautiful boarhounds, trophies of her last trip to the Baltic.
With such faithful companions, she felt absolutely safe and ready,
as she acknowledged afterwards, to face a whole army of phantoms. First,
she made a tourd the premises. The housekeeper's room pleased
her immensely, at least, she persuaded herself. It did. Why,

(04:08):
it is quite as nice as any of the rooms upstairs,
she said aloud, as she stood with her face to
the failing sunbeams and rested her strong white hand on
the edge of the table. Quite as nice, Colin, Max,
come here. But the boarhounds for once did not obey
her with good grace. There was something in the room
they did not like, and they showed how strong was

(04:30):
their resentment by slinking unwillingly through the doorway. Lady Adelas
scolded them lightly. Then her eyes wandered around the walls
and struggled in vain to reach the remoter angles of
the room, which had suddenly grown dark. She tried to
assure herself that this was simply the natural effect of
the departing daylight, and that had she watched in other

(04:52):
houses at this particular time, she would have noticed the
same thing. To show herself and the dogs how little
she minded the gloom, she went up to the darkest
corner and prodded the walls with a riding whip. She laughed,
there was nothing there, nothing whatsoever to be afraid of,
only shadows. She then walked out into the passage, and,

(05:13):
whistling to carl In Max, who contrary to their custom,
would not keep to heal, made another inspection of the
kitchen at the top of the cellar steps, she stopped.
The darkness had now set in everywhere, and she reasoned
with herself that it would be foolish to venture into
such dungeon like places without a light. She soon found one, and,

(05:34):
armed with candle matches and the whip, began her descent.
There were several cellars, and they presented such a dismal
appearance that she instinctively drew her skirts tightly around her
and exchanged the slender riding whip for a poker. She
whistled again to the dogs. They did not answer, so
she called them both by name angrily, but for some

(05:55):
unaccountable reason, they still would not come. Lady Adela ran
unsacked her mind to recall some popular operatic ear but
although she knew scores, she could not remember one. The
only melody that filtered back to her was one she
detested of Ottoville tune she had heard three nights in
succession when staying with a student friend in the Latin

(06:16):
Quarter in Paris. She hummed it loudly, however, and holding
the lighted candle high above her head, walked down the steps.
At the bottom, she stood and listened. From high above
came noises which sounded like the rumbling of distant thunder,
but which she determined after a few moments, was only
the rattling of windows. Reassured that she had no cause

(06:38):
for alarm, Lady Adela advance. Something black scudded across the
red tiled floor, and she made a dash at it
with her poker. The sharp noise of the poker striking
the floor woke countless echoes in the cellars, and called
into existence legions of other black things that darted hither
and thither in all directions. She burst out, laughing. They

(07:00):
were only beetles. Facing her. She now saw an inner cellar,
which was far gloomier than the one in which she stood.
The ceiling was very low and appeared to be crushed
down beneath the burden of a stupendous weight, and as
she advanced beneath it, Cheff expected that it would cave
in and bury her. A few feet from the center

(07:20):
of the cellar, she stopped, and, bending low, examined the
floor carefully. The towels were unmistakably newer here than elsewhere,
and presented the appearance of having been put in at
no very distant date. The dampness of the atmosphere was intense,
a fact which struck her as somewhat odd, since the
floor and the walls looked singularly dry. To find out

(07:42):
if this was the case, she ran her fingers over
the wall, and, on removing them, found they showed no
signs of moisture. Then she wrapped the floor and walls
and could discover no indications of hollowness. She sniffed the air,
and a great wave of something sweet and sickly half
choked her. She drew her handkerchief and beat the air
vigorously with it, but the smell remained, and she could

(08:04):
not in any way account for it. She turned to
leave the cellar, and the flame of her candle burned blue.
Then for the first time that evening, almost indeed, for
the first time in her life, she felt afraid, so
afraid that she made no attempt to reason her fear.
She understood the dog's feeling now and found herself wondering

(08:24):
how much they knew. She whistled to them again, not
because she had any confidence they would respond, but because
she wanted company, even the company of her own voice.
And she had some faint hope too, that whatever might
be with her in the cellar would not so readily
disclose itself if she made a noise. The one cellar
was passed, and she was nearly across the floor of

(08:47):
the other when she heard a crash. The candle dropped
from her hand, and all the blood in her body
seemed to rush to her heart. As she told me,
I could never imagine it was so terrible to be frightened.
I tried to pull myself together and be calm, but
I was no longer mistress of my limbs. My knees
knocked together, and my hands shook. It was only the dogs,

(09:09):
I feebly told myself, I will call them that. When
I opened my mouth, I found my throat was paralyzed.
Not a syllable would come. She knew full well too,
that the hounds could not have been responsible for the noise.
It was like nothing she had ever heard, nothing she
could imagine, and though she struggled hard against the idea,

(09:29):
she could not help associating the sound with the cause
of the candle burning blue and the sweet, sickly smell.
Incapable of moving a step, she was forced to listen
in breathless expectancy for recurrence of the crash. Her thoughts
became ghastly. The inky darkness that hemmed her in on
every side suggested every sort of ghoulish possibility, and with

(09:52):
each pulsation of her overstrained heart her flesh crawled. Another sound,
this time not a crash, nothing half so loud or definite.
Drew her eyes in the direction of the steps, and
the object was now standing at the top of them,
and something lurid like the faint, phosphorescent glo of decay
emanated from all over it. But what it was she

(10:15):
could not tell, except that it was inexpressibly antagonistic and foul.
I would have given my soul to have looked elsewhere,
but my eyes were fixed. I could neither turn nor
shut them. For some seconds, the shape remained motionless, and
then with a sly, subtle motion, it lowered its head
and came stealing stuffly down the stairs towards me. I

(10:38):
followed its approach like one in a horrible dream. Another step, another,
yet another, till there were only three steps left between us,
and I was at last able to form some idea
of what the thing was like. It was short and squat,
and appeared to be partly clad in a loose, flowing
garment which was not long enough to conceal the glistening

(11:00):
extremities of its limbs from its general contour, and a
tangled mass of hair that fell about its neck and shoulders.
It seemed to be the phantasm of a woman, its
head being kept bent o unable to see the face
in full, but every instant I expected to have sight
of it, And with each separate movement of the figure,

(11:21):
the suspense became more and more intolerable. At last it
stood on the floor of the cellar A broad, horribly
ungainly figure, which glided up to him thankfully passed me
into the far cellar. There it halted as nearly as
I could judge on the new tiles, and remained standing
as I gazed at it, too fascinated to remove my eyes.

(11:43):
There was a loud, echoing crash, a terrible sound of
wrenching and tearing, and the whole the ceiling of the
inner chamber came down with an appalling roar. I think
I must then have fainted, for I distinctly remember falling
into what seemed to me to be a black, interminable abyss.
When I recovered consciousness, I was lying on the tiles,

(12:06):
and all around was still in normal I got up,
found and lighted a candle, and spent the rest of
the evening without further adventure in the drawing room. All
the following week, Lady Adela struggled hard to master a
disinclination to spend another evening alone in the house, but
when Friday came again, she succumbed to her fears and
kept the servants at home. She sat reading in the

(12:29):
drawing room till late that night, and when she looked
out the window to take a farewell glance at the
sky and stars before retiring to bed, the sounds of
traffic had completely ceased, and the whole city lay bathed
in a refreshing silence. She put out the lights and
got into bed. It was just one o'clock when she
fell asleep, and three o'clock when she awoke with a
violent start. Why she had awoken puzzled her. She had

(12:54):
not been dreaming, and there seemed nothing to account for
her sudden wakefulness. She lay still, her tired eyes closed again,
and wondered. Surely everything was just as it was when
she went to sleep, and yet there was something different,
something new. She did not think it was actually in
the atmosphere, nor in the silence. She did not know

(13:16):
where it was until she opened her eyes again, and
then she knew. Bending over her, within a few inches
of her face, was another face. It was on a
larger scale than that of any person I've ever seen.
It was long and proportioned to its width. I could
not make out where the cranium terminated at the back,

(13:38):
as the hind portion of it was lost in a mist.
The receding forehead was partly covered with a mask of
lank black hair that fell straight down into space. There
was no neck nor shoulders, at least none had materialized.
The skin was leaden hued, and the immense maciation so
extreme that the raw cheekbones had burst through in places.

(14:01):
The size of the eye sockets, which appeared monstrous, was
emphasized by the fact that the eyes were considerably sunken.
The lips were curled downward and tightly shut, and the
whole expression of the withered mouth, as that of the
entire face, was one of beastial malignity. I was petrified

(14:22):
as I stared helplessly at the dark eyes pressed close
to mine. I saw them light up with fiendish glee.
The most frightful change then took place. The upper lip
writhed away from a few greenish yellow stumps, the lower
jaw fell with a metallic click, leaving the mouth widely
openly showing a black and bloated tongue, and the eyeballs

(14:44):
rolled up and entirely disappeared, their places being immediately filled
with the most lowsome signs of advanced decay. A strong
vibratory movement suddenly made all the bones in the head
rattle and the tongue wag, while from the jaws, as
it from some deep down well, came a gust of
putrescent when tainted with the same sweetly odor which I

(15:07):
recognized from the cellar. This was the culminating act. The
head then receded, and, growing fainter and fainter, gradually disappeared altogether.
I leaped out of bed, put on all the lights,
and did not dare close my eyes again until the
birds had begun their dawnchorus. Lady Adela was now more
than satisfied that there was not a house more horribly

(15:28):
haunted in Scotland, and nothing would induce her to remain
in it another night. Being anxious naturally to discover something
that might in some degree account for the apparition, she
made endless inquiries concerning the history of former occupants of
the house. Failing to discover anything remarkable in this direction,
she was eventually obliged to content herself with the following tradition.

(15:51):
It was said down the side of the house there
had once stood a cottage occupied by two sisters, both nurses,
and that one was spected of poisoning the other. The cottage,
having through their parsimious habits, fallen into a very bad
state of repair, was blown down during a violent storm,
the surviving sister perishing in the ruins. Lady Adela, after

(16:14):
being assured that only about one in a thousand people
seemed to possess the faculty of seeing psychic phenomena, decided
to offer the house for rent again, and once the
rumors had begun to fade away, she succeeded eventually in
getting a permanent tenant. Apparently, and most fortunately this time,
one of the nine hundred and ninety nine The Hindoo

(16:39):
Child by Elliot O'Donnell. I met Nurse Mackenzie for the
first time at the house of my old friend, Colonel Malcolmson,
whose wife she was nursing. For some days that was
hardly aware she was in the house, the illness of
her patient keeping her so occupied. But when missus Malcolmson
grew better, I not infrequently saw the nurse taking a

(17:00):
morning constitutional in the beautiful grounds. It was on one
of these occasions that we fell to talking about ghosts,
as she told me of her own uncanny experience some
ten years earlier, at the turn of the century. It happened.
She began shortly after I had finished my term as
probationer in an Aberdeen hospital. A letter was received at
the hospital one morning with the urgent request that two

(17:23):
nurses should be sent to a serious case near Saint
Swithin Street. As a letter was signed by a well
known physician in the town, it received immediate attention and
Nurse Emma and I were sent as day and night
nurses respectively to deal with the emergency. My towur of
duty was to be from nine p m Till nine
a m. The house in which the patient was located

(17:47):
was known as the White Dove Hotel, a thoroughly respectable
and well managed establishment. The proprietor knew nothing about the
invalid except that her name was Vinning, and as she
had at one period of her career been an actress,
he had noticed that she looked unwell on her arrival
the previous week. Two days after her arrival, she had

(18:07):
complained of feeling very ill, and the doctor summoned to
a tender diagnosed that she was suffering from an aggravating
disease of Oriental origin, unfortunately rare in this country. The hotel,
though newly decorated and equipped, was in reality very old.
It was one of those delightfully roomy erections that seemed

(18:29):
built for eternity rather than time, and for comfort rather
than economy of space. The interior, with its oak paneled walls,
polished oak floors, and low ceilings, impressed me pleasantly, while
a flight of broad oak stairs fenced with ball strads
of foot thick brought me to a seemingly interminable quarter
into which the door of Miss Venie's room opened. It

(18:51):
was a low wainscotted apartment, and its deep set window,
revealing the thickness of the wall, looked out upon a
yard litter with brooms and buckets. Opposite the foot of
the bed, a modern French bedstead, whose brass fittings and
flimsy hangings contrasted strangely with the venerable surroundings, was an
ingle containing the smoldering relics of what had doubtless been

(19:13):
intended for a fire. There was no exit, saved by
the doorway I had entered, and no furniture except a
couple of rush bottomed chairs and a table strewn with
an untidy collection of writing materials and medicine. Bottles. A
feeling of depression seized me directly I entered the room.
Despite the brilliancy of the electric light and the new
and gaudy bed hangings, the air was full of gloom.

(19:36):
I felt that hanging around me like the undeveloped shadow
of something singularly repulsive, and on my approaching a sick woman,
it seemed to thrust itself in my way and force
me back. Miss Venning was decidedly good looking. She had
typically theatrical features, neatly molded nose and chin, curly yellow hair,
and big, dreamy blue eyes. She was, of course, far

(19:59):
too ill to convert, and beyond a few desultory remarks,
maintained a rigid silence. As there was no occasion for
me to sit close beside her, I drew up a
chair before the fire, placing myself in such a position
as to command a full view of the bed. My
first night passed undisturbed by any incident, and in the
morning the condition my patient showed a slight improvement. She

(20:22):
was soon after eight o'clock in the evening when I
came on duty again, and the weather having changed during
the day, the whole room echoed and re echoed with
the howling of the wind which raged round the house.
I had been at my post for a little over
two hours and had just registered my patient's temperature. When
happening to look up from the book I was reading,

(20:42):
I saw, to my surprise that the chair beside the
head of the bed was occupied by a child, a
tiny girl. How she had come into the room without
attracting my attention was extraordinary, and I could only suppose
that the shrieking of the wind down the chimney had
deadened the sound the door and her footsteps. I was
naturally very indignant that she had dared to come in

(21:05):
without knocking, and getting up from my seat, I was
preparing to address her and bid her go when she
lifted a small white hand and motioned me back. I
obeyed because I could not help myself. Her action was
accompanied by a peculiar expression that helped me spell bound,
and without exactly knowing why, I stood staring at her,
tongue tied and trembling. As her face was turned toward

(21:27):
the patient, and she wore a very wide brimmed hat.
I could see nothing of her features, but from her
graceful little figure and dainty limbs. I gathered she was
probably both beautiful and aristocratic. Her dress, though not perhaps
of the richest quality, was certainly far from shoddy, and
there was something in its style and makee a suggested

(21:47):
foreign nationality. I was so taken up with watching her
that I forat all about my patient, until a prolonged
side came from the bed reminded me of her existence
with an effort. I then advanced and was about to
approach the bed when the child, without moving her head,
motioned me back to my chair, and again I was helpless.
The vision had obtained that the sick woman, brief though

(22:09):
it was, filled me with alarm. She was tossing to
infrone the blankets and breathing in the most agonized manner,
as if in delirium when a grip of some particularly
dreadful nightmare. Her condition so frightened me that I made
the most frantic efforts to get to her side. I
did not succeed, however, and at last, utterly overcome by
my exertions, I closed my eyes. When I opened them again,

(22:32):
the chair by the bed was vacant. The child had gone.
A tremendous feeling of relief surged through me and jumping
out of my seat, I hastened to the bedside. My
patient was worse. The fever had increased and she was delirious.
I took her temperature. It was one hundred and four.
I now sat close beside her, and my presence apparently

(22:53):
had a soothing effect. She speedily grew calmer, and, after
taking her medicine, gradually sank into a gentle sleep, which
lasted until late in the morning, when I left her
shed altogether recovered from the relapse. I naturally told the
doctor of the child's visit, and he was very angry.
Whatever happens, nurse, he said, take care that no one
enters the room to night. The patient's condition is far

(23:15):
too critical for her to see any one. You must
keep the door locked. Armed with this mandate, I went
on duty the following night with a somewhat lighter heart,
and after locking the door once again, set by the fire.
During the day there been a heavy fall of snow.
The wind had rebaded, and the street turn out as
silent as a grave. Ten eleven and twelve o'clock struck,

(23:38):
and my patient slept tranquility. At a quarter to one. However,
I was abruptly roused from a reverie by a sob
of fear and agony that came from the bed. I
looked across, and there, seated in the same posture as
on the previous evening, was the child. I sprang to
my feet with a cry of amazement. She raised her hand,
and as before, I collapsed back into my paralyzed No

(24:01):
words of mine can convey all the sensations I experienced
as I sat there, forced to listen to the moaning
and groaning of the woman whose fate had been entrusted
to my keeping. Every second she grew worse, and each
sound rang in my ears like the hammering of nails
in her coffin. How long I endured such torment I
cannot say, for though the clock was within a few

(24:23):
feet of me, and never once thought of looking at it.
At last, the child rose, and, moving slowly from the bed,
advanced with bowed head towards the window. The spell was
broken with an angry cry. Literally bounded over the carpet
and faced the intruder. Who are you, I hissed, Tell
me your name instantly? How dare you into this room
without my permission? As I spoke, she slowly raised her head.

(24:47):
I snatched at her hat. It melted away in my hands.
Into my unspeakable horror, I looked into the face of
a corpse, the corpse of a Hindoo child, with a big,
gaping cut and her throat. In our lifetime, the child had,
without doubt been lovely. She was not horrible. With all
the ghastly disfigurements, the repellent disfigurement of a long consignment

(25:09):
to the grave, I promptly fainted. On recovery, I found
that my ghostly visitor had vanished, and that my patient
was dead. One of our hands was thrown across her eyes,
as if to shut out some object on which he
feared to look, while the other grasped the counterpain convulsively.
It felt to my duty to help pack up Miss
Vennie's belongings, and among her letters was a large envelope

(25:33):
bearing the postmark Kettah. As we were then on the
look off for some clues to the address of our relatives,
I opened it. It was merely the cabinet sized photograph
of a Hindoo child, but I recognized the dress immediately.
It was that of my ghostly visitor. On the back
of it were these words Natalie. May God forgive us both.

(25:57):
Though we made careful inquiries for any information as to
Natalie and miss Venning in Querta, and advertised freely in
the leading London papers, we heard nothing, and in time
we were forced to let the matter drop. As far
as I know, the ghost of the Hindoo Child has
never been seen again, but I have heard that the
hostel is still haunted by a woman the Red Fingers

(26:24):
by Eliot O'Donnell. Many of my ghost hunts, from what
promised in the beginning to be a routine investigation of
a simple enough haunting, held a twist in the tail.
A prime example is the case of the Rowlinsons. I
met mister and missus Robert Rowlinson many years ago in Perth.
They told me they were just quitting a badly haunted

(26:45):
house on the outskirts of the city. The name of
the house was Bocarth. It was their own and had
only been built a year. But they could not possibly
remain in it, they said, because of the ghostly disturbances
to which they were subjected. What strikes us as so
extraordinary about the whole thing, Missus Rowland said is at

(27:06):
a new house with absolutely no history attached to it,
and we can't assure you, she added laughingly, there were
no murders or suicides there during our occupancy. Should be haunted,
our neighbors say, we must have brought the ghost with us.
The couple were just beginning a detailed description of the
manifestations when I asked them to stop. I explained that

(27:28):
I would like to investigate the case, and that if
they agreed, it would be better for me to do
so without having any prior knowledge of the nature of
the hauntings. They were quite willing provided I promised not
to discuss the matter too openly, as they wanted to
let the house, that I should spend a few nights
at Bukharth. They were rather anxious to know if anything

(27:48):
unusual still took place there, Thinking perhaps that I might
not like to go alone, they gave me an introduction
to a young friend of theirs, doctor Swinton, who they
thought might be interested to accompany me. The same day,
the Rollinsons went off to Edinburgh, where they told me
they now intended living, and the following day, at noon,
I made my way to the house they had vacated,

(28:11):
as there was no story connected with Boucarth itself. I
made inquiries about the ground on which it stood, and
it made interest the reader to know my findings. As
an example of the exasperatingly negative direction in which these inquiries,
though very necessary, often lead. Instead of learning too little,
I learned too much. An old minister of about eighty

(28:34):
was sure that the ground in question, until built upon recently,
had been grazing land since he was a boy, and
that had never witnessed anything more extraordinary than the occasional
death of a sheep or cow that had been struck
by lightning. An equally aged and positive postmistress declared that
the ground had never been anything better than wasteland, where

(28:55):
made rubbish heaps galore. All the dogs in the parish
might have been seen scratching and fighting over bones. Another
person remembered upon being there, and another a nurse regarden.
But from no one could I extract the slightest hint
of anything that might account for the haunting. Then, when
I entered the house, I thought I had seldom seen

(29:15):
such a cheerful residence. The rooms were light and lofty,
and about them all there was an air of friendliness
and warmth. There could scarcely have been a more unghostly atmosphere.
Doctor Swinton joined me in the evening, but although we
sat up till long after dawn, we neither saw nor
heard anything we could not account for by natural causes.
We repeated the vigil for two more nights, after which

(29:38):
we concluded that the house was either no longer haunted,
or that the hauntings were periodical and might not occur
again for years. I wrote as much to mister Rowlandson
returning the keys to the house, and in reply received
the following letter from him in Edinburgh. Dear mister O'Donnell,
many thanks for the keys. No wonder you did not

(29:58):
see our ghosts. It is here and we are having
just the same experiences in this house as we had
in Beocarth. If you would care to stay a few
nights with us on the chance of seeing the ghost,
we shall be delighted to put you up yours, et cetera.
Robert Rolinson. I could not resist the Rolinson's kind invitation,

(30:19):
and just as soon as I could caught the train
to Edinburgh. When I arrived at their house, situated in
a pleasant crescent, it was to find the entire household
and a panic, the ghost having appeared to one and
all during the previous night. It was so terrible missus
Rowlinson told me that I cannot bear even to think
of it, and shall certainly never forget it. One of

(30:41):
the maids fainted and with soiled Afterwards, we were obliged
to have the doctor. Not all the servants have given
notice to leave. Did nothing of the sort happen before
you went to Bocarth, I asked, No, said mister Rolinson,
not a thing. We were then skeptics where ghostword comes,
but we are certainly not skeptical. Now. Do you think

(31:04):
it is possible? I said that the ghost is attached
to some piece of old furniture. There have been such cases. No,
he replied, we have no old furniture. All our furniture
is modern and new, at least it was new when
we went to Bokharth. That if the ghost is neither
attached to the house, nor to the ground, nor to

(31:25):
the furniture, it must surely be attached to some person.
I said, I suppose no one in the house has
gone in for spiritualism. I can tell you I haven't,
mister Rowlinson said, and you haven't either, mad, have you?
Missus Rowlandson flushed. The only spiritist I ever knew? She said,

(31:45):
was you know, dear who I mean? Her husband stared
at her. I don't, he said, who? Ernest Dicon decan,
he exclaimed, of course some years ago, mister Odnn explained
to me, my wife met this mister Dicon at a
ball given by mutual friend, and from that time up

(32:06):
too shortly before his death abroad, he persecuted her with
his undesirable attentions. I never knew any one so persistent.
He resented your marriage, I should think he did, said
mister Rolinson, though to everyone's surprise he came to the wedding.
I shall never forget the expression on his face. Mister

(32:28):
Dicon was as spiritualist. I asked, he was very keen
on seances. Missus Rolinson broke in to say, most keen,
and was at one time always trying to persuade me
to go to one with him. You never told me, that,
said her husband. No, said his wife. But I never went.

(32:48):
How did mister Dicon die? I asked, suicide, said mister Rolinson.
He shot himself. I left a note stating that his
death was entirely due to the heartless conduct of my wife.
When was that, mister Rowlinson thought for a moment. We
have been married not quite eighteen months, about fifteen months ago,

(33:09):
shortly before we went to bucarth I know what's in
your mind, Missus Rowlinson said to me. Do you really
think that it could be the spirit of Earnest Dicon
that is troubling us. I told her it seemed more
than likely, and asked when the finale usually appeared at
all times and when we least expect it. She replied,

(33:31):
for example, if I am going upstairs alone, it either
springs out at me, or peers down at me from
over the banisters, or again it rouses us in the
middle of the night by rocking our bed, always some
alarming trick of that kind. Then you would hardly expect
it to manifest itself if we all sat here in
the dark. Hardly. I asked if there was a photograph

(33:53):
of mister Dacon. There was not, but Missus Rowlinson described him.
She remembered particularly the of his hands. The fingers were
long and red, and the tips were club shaped. I
am sure we'll recognize them anywhere. This conversation took place
in the evening before dinner. After dinner, we sat in
the drawing room discussing plans for the night. We decided

(34:16):
that when bedtime came, we would retire to our respective
rooms and sit there in the dark, waiting and watching directly.
Anyone heard or saw anything, he would summon the others.
We sat up late, and it was close on midnight
before Missus Rowlandson rose and we all there were two
guests besides myself, a colonel, and Missus Rushworth. Took our

(34:38):
candlesticks and followed her upstairs. We had mounted the first
flight and had turned a bend leading to the second.
The house seemed all stairs when Missus Rowlandson stopped and,
looking back at us, said, sh do you hear something?
We stood and listened. There was a thump which apparently
came from a room just at the top of the stairs,

(34:58):
Then another, and then a very cure there is sound
as if something was bounding backwards and forwards over bare
boards with its feed tight together. At a signal from
mister Rowlinson, we immediately blew out our lights. A church
clock struck twelve. We heard it distinctly as the Rolinsons,
being enthusiasts for fresh air, kept practically every window in

(35:19):
the house open. The reverberation of the final stroke had
scarcely ceased when a loud gasp from someone in front
of me sent a chilly feeling down my spine. At
the same moment, the darkness ahead of us was lighted
by a faint, luminous low. The glow speedily intensified and
suddenly took the shape of a cylindrical column of six

(35:42):
or seven feet in height, and this, in turn develt
with startling abruptness, into the form of something so shockingly
grotesque that I was appalled. It is extremely difficult to
go very accurate description of it, because, like much of
the occult phenomena I have experienced in haunted houses, it
was a laffling mixture of the distinct and yet vague,

(36:02):
entirely without substance, and apparently wholly constituted a vibrating light
which varied each second in tone and intensity. Could only
say that the impression I derived was that of a
very gross or monstrous man. The head ill, defined on
the crown and sides, appeared to be abnormally high and long,
and to be covered with a tangled mass of coarse,

(36:25):
taw colored hair. The nose seemed to hook, the mouth cruel,
the eyes leering the body. The thing was gray and nude,
very like the trunk of a silver birch. The arms
long and nodded, the hands huge, the fingers red and
club shaped, corresponding exactly with Missus Rowlinson's subscription. The baleful
apparition seemed without doubt to be the spirit of Earnest Dekhan.

(36:49):
This was the ghost which could shut and open doors,
move furniture, rap and make other noises. It could also
convey the sensations of intense cold and the feeling of
the dreadful fear. I found myself considering if it possessed
other properties, Was it sensible could have communicated in any way?

(37:10):
While I was deliberating, the figure seemed to move forward.
Then someone shrieked, Mister Rolinson struck a light, and simultaneously
the apparition vanished. The effect it had had on us
all was striking. We were all more or less demoralized.
Yet no two of us had seen the ghosts the same,
while mister Rowlandson and Missus Rushworth had not seen it

(37:31):
at all. Went back to the drawing room and discussed it.
Missus Rolinson was the first to speak. She too had
been particularly impressed by the hands and was sure they
were the hands of Ernest to Khan. I can say
nothing about the face, she said, as it did not
appear to me, But having seen the hands, I am
firmly convinced that the ghost is ernest to Khan, and

(37:53):
that it is he who is tormenting us. Can not
any of you think of a plan to get rid
of him? Cremation is the only thing I can think of,
said Colonel Rushworth. What to now have been silent? That
is the means employed by the hill tribes in northern India.
When a spirit, a spirit they can identify, begins to

(38:13):
haunt a place, they dig up the body and burn it,
and they say as soon as the last bone is consumed,
the haunting stops. They have a theory that phantoms of
dead people and animals can materialize as long as some
remnant of their physical body remains. Where did this mister
de Kan die in Africa? Said mister Rolinson. Well, said

(38:36):
the Colonel that case a we can check the cemetery.
There ought to be no difficulty in arranging for the
body to be exhumed. The officials are, as a rule,
open to bribery. Anyhow, you might try it as an experiment.
I left Edinburgh next day, but I heard some months
later from mister Rolinson. His letter was short and cheery,

(38:56):
and in it he wrote, you may recollect Colonel Rushworth's suggestion. Well,
the hunting I've ceased, and I'm glad to tell you
we are shortly returning to Bukharth, from which I gathered
that an attempt to exum and cremate Earnest di Cohn's
body had been made, and it proved successful.

All Episodes

From The Cellar It Came & Other Scary Stories | Podcast

Episode Transcript

Popular Podcasts

Stuff You Should Know

Dateline NBC

New Heights with Jason & Travis Kelce

.css-15opob5{left:0;position:absolute;top:0.8rem;} All Episodes

.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}From The Cellar It Came & Other Scary Stories | Podcast