Eleven New Ghost Stories (31 page)

When they arrived at the house,
his mother was still writhing, crying tears of torment. She had
purged into the waste paper basket. Benjamin’s father was standing
over her, helpless as to what to do.

“She’s gone mad, doctor,” he
said. “I cannot calm her down.” As the doctor came in, Benjamin’s
father ordered him to his room, uttering ominously: “I will deal
with you later.”

Those words sent a chill down
his spine. He ran up to his room and dived in amongst the sheets,
crying his heart out for what seemed like hours. He was overwhelmed
now with guilt, if he’d have known what would happen, he would
never have done it. His mother was in agony and it was his
fault!

But of course it wasn’t really
his fault. It was the boy in the well; it had been his idea – it
was really his fault! He should never have listened to him. They
were supposed to be getting the vicar back, how was this hurting
the vicar?

After his mother had stopped
crying, Benjamin waited tensely for his father to come to him, and
in time, the moment came. He heard his father’s heavy footsteps on
the stairs and he trembled as he came in through the door.

“Is Mum all right?” he asked in
a panic.

“She is sleeping,” his father
said. He held up the card and all Benjamin’s hairs stood on
end.

“Where did this come from?”

“It came in the post; she picked
it up from the doormat this morning with another letter.”

“This writing,” with one hand he
held open the card in front of Benjamin, and with the other, he
grabbed hold of Benjamin’s hand. “This writing looks to me to be a
lot like your writing. Did you write this?”

“No, I swear, I swear. It was on
the doorstep this morning, I never saw it before. I never saw it.”
Tears poured across his cheeks. He shook free from his father’s
grip and buried his head in his bed sheets.

“What did she mean? About her
baby being dead?”

“I don’t know, I don’t know,”
Benjamin mumbled in amongst his tears.

His father was calmed somewhat
by the sight of his son’s tears, but only for the briefest of
moments.

“I know you know something about
this,” he said through gritted teeth. “If you know something you
had better say so now young man or else there will be hell to pay
later. I’ve been patient with you, by God, I’ve been patient. But
if you are mixed up in this, whatever it is, you will be banished
from this house. Do you hear me? I will be through with you once
and for all.”

Benjamin didn’t say a thing as
his father slammed the door behind him. Though he was still crying,
in his head, he was already making plans. He would need to be
patient; he knew he might have to wait hours. He waited restlessly
and hungrily. He kept creeping out to the top of the stairs,
listening in to hear the sounds of movement, of stirring. He
listened carefully until he heard the sound he had been waiting for
– the sound of his father snoring.

He walked carefully down the
stairs and into the sitting room, and sure enough, in keeping watch
over his mother, who was passed-out on the settee, his father too
had fallen asleep; his head hanging over the back of his old arm
chair.

Now he was sure he could get
away, Benjamin took his chance and darted sharply to the back door
and made his escape.

Tired, but determined, he made
his way back through the fields, through the woods and back up to
the hillside where his friend, the boy in the well, would be
waiting for him. Or at least, it would normally be so. As he
approached the stone circle, the boy offered no greeting. Just as
well, as Benjamin was in no mood for pleasantries.

“You lied to me!” he cried. “You
said I was out to get the vicar, when all the time you were trying
to get my mother!”

Benjamin waited for the boy to
answer, but there was no sound, no response from the well.

“Do you know what you’ve done?
Do you know what you’ve done to her?”

There was still no answer. The
well was silent. There was no voice.

Or was there… at that moment
Benjamin suddenly heard a voice, not from the well, but inside his
very own head. And that voice said to him: “Me? I didn’t do a
thing. You did it all. You did it to your mother. You did it all
yourself.”

“You’re a liar.” Benjamin
screamed. “I hate you! I’m never coming up here again. You’re not
my friend. I hate you!”

He turned and began to run back
down the hillside, when suddenly the boy in the well finally spoke.
“I’m not done with you yet Benjamin,” he cried.

Benjamin ignored it and did not
turn back.

“You’ll see me again!” the boy
cried out to him. “You will see me again!”

Benjamin ran as fast as he could
back into the forest. He did not turn around and did not stop until
he was home. His father was still asleep; he awoke when Benjamin
arrived, but fortunately he did not realise his son had been
outside. Nevertheless, he was still unhappy with him and ordered
him straight to bed.

Benjamin slept poorly that
night; restlessly tossing and turning, reacting to his ambivalent
feelings of anger, guilt and fear, constantly awaking and falling
back to sleep.

He woke abruptly the next
morning; his father was shouting for him from downstairs. Benjamin
rushed down, still wearing his night clothes; he entered the living
room and was horrified at what he found.

There was a message written
across the living room wall; scrawled in big dark red, frenzied
letters; the words still wet and dripping down the wall.

The message read: “No present?
It’s my birthday come visit.”

Benjamin almost screamed
himself. He had been here – the boy in the well had come to the
house. But how? What was going on?

His father was looking at him,
staring down hard at him. “Did you do this?” he asked, barely able
to control his anger.

Benjamin was speechless, then
his father pointed at him: “Look at your hands”. Benjamin looked
down; they were red – covered in blood!

His father grabbed his hands.
“You did do this!” He slid up the sleeves of his night shirt and
saw two long, bloody cuts on his forearms.

“It wasn’t me!” his son
swore.

“What is wrong with you! Why you
did do this?” he began to shake him. “Why did you do this!”

“It wasn’t me,” Benjamin said
weeping. “It was the boy!”

“What boy?”

“The boy in the well!”

The front door burst open; the
two of them spun around to see the vicar standing in the doorway.
He hadn’t seemed to have expected them; he cried out “Emily” before
even noticing them there.

“I must speak to Emily,” he
demanded, walking towards them.

“Why are you here?”

“I must speak to her on a matter
of great urgency.”

It was at that moment that
Benjamin’s father noticed that the vicar was carrying an envelope,
an envelope and a card that he quickly recognised.

“What is that you have?”

The vicar mumbled, saying that
it was a private matter. Benjamin’s father struck him, hit him
square in the jaw. He was taken by surprise and fell back into the
hallway. He took the card from the vicar’s grip and opened it,
finding it to be exactly the same card his wife had received the
day before and in the same writing.

“Where did you get this?” he
roared. He wasn’t taking any chances; knowing that the vicar was a
soldier, he went quickly towards the fire place and picked up a
poker. As the vicar rose to his feet, he stood before him again,
poker raised and ready to strike at him.

“I want to know what this is all
about. For years and years the two of you have kept secrets from
me. And this will be the end of it! There’s always been something
between the two of you and I will know what it is. I swear to God,
I will be told!”

“You are imagining things,” the
vicar snarled.

“Liar – what does this mean?” he
said showing him the card again. “And what does that mean? The
vicar had not seen the message on the wall; he recognised
immediately that it was written in blood. “My God,” he said,
stricken with panic.

“I will know the truth from you,
even if I have to beat it out of you!”

“No wait,” he cried, as Mr
Morris swung back the poker. “You don’t understand; years ago,
while you were away, at sea. Emily was…” He struggled to say it.
“She was taken against her will by another. A brute, a monster; he
forced himself on her and she... she became with child.”

Benjamin’s father began to
shake. His anger was so intense, he couldn’t even speak. The vicar
knew that his life was in the balance, that the man had it in him
to kill him if he so desired it.

“She wanted to keep the child,”
the vicar continued. “But our parents wouldn’t allow it. This man;
he was despicable, evil; his issue would’ve been abhorrent and they
would not allow it in the family. So he was taken away from
her...”

Benjamin’s father scoffed.
“Well, well,” he said, “That explains plenty. They didn’t want me
near her when she was pure. But suddenly when I was back from the
sea they were ready to foist her on me. Damaged goods was she?”

The vicar took a chance and
tried to take the poker from him. But Mr Morris had firmer footing
and forced him back, causing him to fall once again to the
ground.

“You killed the baby, didn’t
you? Drowned it in the well!”

“It wasn’t my choice.”

“You took her baby and you
killed it. No wonder she was so changed when I came back. She never
was the same old girl I used to know. I knew it, but I was too glad
to have her be mine.”

“It had to be done, it needed to
be done.” said the vicar, before he realised: “How did you know
that? How did you know about the well?”

It was at that moment that Mr
Morris remembered his son and what he had said. But when he turned
his son was nowhere to be seen.

“Benjamin!” he cried. “Benjamin,
where are you?” He yelled throughout the whole house, but his boy
was nowhere to be found.

“What does Benjamin know?” the
vicar demanded.

“He said the boy in the well did
it. He said he did it all, the letters and writing on the
wall.”

“That’s ridiculous!”

“Where is this well?” Benjamin’s
father demanded.

“You must know the one. The
hillside well, near the south-end of the farm.”

Both took off for the well
almost instantly, running out the door and through the woods after
Benjamin, shouting for him as they went.

Despite their years of living in
Bullham Brook, neither the vicar or Benjamin’s father knew the land
the way Benjamin knew it and both struggled through trees and
unkept fields surrounding the village and Parson’s estate.
Benjamin’s father proceeded quicker than the vicar, the two
becoming separated as they ran on.

When Mr Morris arrived on the
hillside and started to climb, he found that the sky was dark.
Clouds were blocking out the sun and the wind was racing into a
gale. The tall grass rumbled as it was swept from side to side in
the fierce gusts. He found it hard to look ahead, to walk forward
against the wind’s unrelenting force. But he marched on; he could
see the well, and to his horror, he could see Benjamin, standing
upon the stones, stood precariously facing him, teetering over the
open well.

He shouted to him, but Benjamin
gave no sound of recognition, though it would be hard for him to
hear over the roar of the wind. He climbed higher, his son still
stood motionless there, looking vacant down to the dark void
below.

Mr Morris got himself to within
just a few yards of the stone wall when there was suddenly a crack
of thunder. And above that rang out the words: “Do not come any
closer or your son will become mine forever.”

“Don’t hurt him, please,” cried
his father, frightened almost beyond his wits and looking around,
desperately hoping the voice had come from somewhere else, and not
deep within the well.

“Shut up and listen to me,”
hissed the voice.

But Benjamin’s father kept on:
“If you must hurt someone, hurt me. Do not harm him, he has done
nothing.”

“I’m not interested in you; you
mean nothing to me.” And then after a pause and another roar of
wind the boy cried out: “He on the other hand, means
everything.”

Benjamin’s father was confused
until he saw that the vicar had caught up and was now with them on
the hillside.

“You’ve finally come to visit
me. And after all this time…”

“By God,” he cried. “What are
you?”

“You know who I am,” roared the
voice. “You of all people should know me!”

“Please!” Benjamin’s father
begged. “Whatever he did to you, please, leave Benjamin alone. He’s
done nothing, he’s just a boy.”

“
I’m just a boy,”
raged
the voice. “A lost boy, forsaken by his mother and his father, the
two people who should’ve loved him the most! What’s the matter? Are
you ashamed of your son!”

“I do not understand you,” cried
Benjamin’s father.

“
I am not talking to
you
,” screamed the voice.

It took a few moments for it all
to sink in, for Benjamin’s father to realise the horror of what the
boy in the well was saying. The boy laughed as Mr Morris looked to
the vicar, his face a picture of disbelief, horror and disgust.

“He didn’t tell you did he?” the
boy laughed. “The monstrous brute, the man possessed of some evil
walks amongst you, disguised as a man of God!”

“I am a man of God.”

“You’re a filthy disgrace. You
disgrace the clothes you wear, you insult the almighty with your
stinking fawning words.”

“I repented,” said the vicar,
falling to his knees. “I have sought forgiveness and given myself
to the Lord.”

“You’re a liar and a coward! And
you don’t deserve forgiveness.”