To Sell A Manor Haunted.

‘Ok, you can do this.’
Simon closed his eyes and breathed in as the sound of the approaching car
creaked and grumbled upon the loose stone of the sloping driveway. An ill-wind
in that moment passed by, drawing a dusting of rain in its spectre and caused a
chill to run up the real estate agent’s nervous spine.

The townsfolk—no, the charming neighbours, he corrected himself—had
warned him of the ill-wind that encompassed the estate. The gutsful gale of woe
and ruin that would howl amongst the pines, the rime-sharpened storm
of fog and mist that would encircle those unlucky enough to be out at night,
turning them around, guiding them always back to the manor.
Reinvigorating winds from the northern ranges, he thought wringing his hands
together and breathing in for a second time. The gentle rain of an early spring
that would fill the already lush gardens with herbs and dazzling wildflower.

Opening his eyes, the gardens appeared to Simon to patiently linger more than they
were inclined to dazzle.
Moss and lichen grew healthily amongst the tangled vine and the verdant, albeit
well-manicured, lawns were hemmed by a suspiciously well fertilised hedge.
Delightfully eerie, he thought clicking his heels and waving genially as a red
Porsche pulled into the circular greeting area. Restful, perhaps would have been
a more suitable word, he decided.
‘Hello! You must be the Thomsons, well met, well met. Sorry about the grey day,
but I must say, it does bring out the greens of the garden, how was the drive
from town?’

Climbing from the Porshe a well-dressed couple took in the surrounds impassively and appeared to Simon as if to be skirting the edges of unsensible wealthiness. The man, who had presumably begun his day as neatly combed, seemed to be agitated, a morning spent driving upon a country road while wearing tweed taken its toll, and had taken a short walk back down the driveway as a matter of aeration.
His wife, Kait, was wobbling across the gravel driveway and appeared to seem
indifferent to her poor choice of footwear for what was obviously her first
country estate open home.

‘Good to meet you.’ she said, shaking Simon’s hand in a way that he
immediately took to be that of a hotel owner, ‘What an impressive building. It
almost loomed over the whole village last night, didn’t it Michael? We were
surprised how long the drive took despite how close it seemed.’

‘And what a fantastic view on a clear day,’ Simon added, sweeping to his
side and opening the manor’s door with a welcoming bow. ‘The valley and the
village trembles before the manor at night.’
Simon paused, unsure why he had used the word tremble and looked to the village
below. How fragile it seemed from the mountains above.
Guiding the couple into the lobby, Simon cleared his throat and decided to
begin again.
‘Built in the 17th century, this well-tended to estate has a history
dating back to a single owner and has since been meticulously maintained by a
select group of caretakers and guests.’

‘One owner? Who’s paid for all the candles then?’ the man, Michael,
interrupted, too clever and apparently too confident for his own good.

‘A very dedicated butler, I believe.’ Simon answered cooly while trying to
forget the visage of the dour man who had given him the keys when the property
was first put on market. Those deep-set eyes that had seen so much. The vice
grip of a handshake that felt much more of a contract than the paperwork he had
then signed with a quill.
17th century, one owner, a deceased estate. Not only was this manor
lacking a few puzzle pieces but the whole box was also missing from the collection
as well.
‘And speaking of a butler,’ Simon resumed while briskly walking into the
adjoining dining room, ‘you will see a spacious butler’s pantry is built into
the wall between this room and the smoking parlour beyond.’ Pushing open the
hidden door as if it were a magic trick, Simon smiled, repressing the memory of
its accidental discovery and the hour that he had been trapped within.

‘There’s no kitchen?’  Kait asked.

‘Kitchen?’ Simon replied, hoping that his surprise would put an end to the
subject somehow.

‘Yes, where did they cook.’

‘Um, well there’s no kitchen as such, but the servant’s quarters does have a
small stove and a fireplace. And of course there is unlimited potential for
renovation. I must show you the wine cellar, it is frankly amazing.’

‘How can a home be without a kitchen? Even the local folly has a cooking
area.’
Kait had a dangerously well-researched air and Simon suddenly hoped for a distraction.

‘This door here,’ Michael called from the lobby, ‘why is it nailed shut?’

‘Oh yes! The well!’ Simon shouted happily while gesturing for Kait to
explore and making his way back to the lobby, ‘Yes, the manor is built upon a
natural spring and has its own access to the font via the door that you have
correctly identified as being nailed shut. An interesting quirk of its
construction has led to a charming legend in the village that the echoes of
past voices will occasionally bump around and whisper out of their taps at
night. The curse of whispering well it’s called, which is a delightful bit of
local storytelling. Unfortunately, there’s no handrail so the estate agency is
not allowed to unfasten the door.’

‘Yes, we’ve heard that.’ Michael said with some obvious incredulity.
‘Listen, it seems strange that one building can have so many legends attached
to it. Like the name, last night, Kait dared even to ask what the manor was
called and the whole tavern took off as if there was talk of a plague.’

‘Small villages and their quaint superstitions, that’s just a tradition of a
story started in a time that that no one here can recall. They also say that
the road changes its path through the forest, but you made it here, I made it
here. Logically, the road never changes.’

‘But the first owner, surely they had a name.’

Simon had seen the name, but on each occasion when he attempted its recall,
he felt a sharp pain and shapes dotted his vision until he thought of something
else.
He begun to search for a reply but was thankfully saved by a scream from beyond
the parlour.

In a manner that Simon noted to be needlessly brash, Michael pushed past and
ran towards the shout, unheeding of the low headframe that sat above the
doorjamb leading away from the lobby.
With a crack, Michael was upended and landed heavily upon the ground, a red
welt already visible on his forehead and the beginnings of what was sure to be
a rather nasty bruise sprawling out from the thin line.

Stepping over the still recoiling man in tweed, Simon calmly made his way
into the sunroom and greeted Kait, who was pacing the room with the complexion
similar to that of a bleached curtain.
‘The painting,’ she stammered,’ it moved.’

A portrait of a noble hung upon the wall of the sunroom and glowered
unemotionally from behind the cracked oil paint of its canvas. They were well
dressed, a knight standing resolutely before some kind of gallows.
‘Come sit down,’ Simon offered consolingly, ‘the willows beyond the window do
cast a funny shadow in the wind.’ He glanced at the rippled glass and took a
seat away from the glare of the painting. The shadow of a tree outside the
sunroom stood as motionless as a spring trap hidden within the undergrowth.
‘I’m told that in the summer, this room shines like the brightest star caught
within the calmest sea. You could lay here forever and not know that a second
has passed.’
The two were quiet, Simon decided to lean on the oldest real estate agent’s
question in existence.
‘Where are you living now?’

‘Dublin,’ Kait sighed, the memory of her home steeling her somewhat.
’Michael wanted to move back to the country. Raise some sheep, run a bed and
breakfast for a while.’

Congratulating himself quietly for picking the couple as hotel owners, Simon
patted Kait on the shoulder and smiled merrily.
‘Well, I couldn’t imagine a better foundation. Two storeys, spacious rooms, a
rich history, I’m sure that the count would love to hear laughter light up his
estate once more.’
The count…something about those words troubled Simon for a moment and touching
his hand to his face the real estate agent found that his nose had been
bleeding.

Michael staggered into the room and slumped against the oaken staircase.
‘Colour me a fool. Are you ok, Kait?’
The couple embraced for a moment and both sat holding hands as the drumming
rain was heard to grow outside. The day darkened as a heavy cloud loomed
overhead.

Simon saw himself upon the front steps once more. The eyes of the butler
looking beyond him and into the depths of his familial line, a woven rope that
must surely have a frayed ending.
He spoke as if only to abate the silence.
‘And of course, the views from the second storey’s balconies are the best
within the county.’

–

The air took on a chill as the three ascended the stairwell. Simon had again
and again walked up this stairwell and each time it seemed to him to grow
longer. Upon each blink he felt as though to have begun the ascent again; the
dull thud of his footfall as regularly paced as the grandfather clock that
knocked so steadily from within the lobby. A reminder of time passing, a totem
of perpetual decay.

The second floor was a maze, narrow corridors wove through chambers that
opened and double-backed onto spaces that leapt across the manor in ways that
were both disorienting and strange.

‘How many rooms are on the second floor?’ Kait asked, hugging against the
still dazed Michael and thumbing at a cross and chain that Simon had failed to
notice before.

Simon felt haggard. Unsure if had been minutes or hours since the couple had
arrived for the inspection, the real estate agent closed his eyes and again
imagined himself upon the front steps, the cool drops of scattered rain against
his face.
‘Six bedrooms, a study, and tower’s observatory. Once you see the view from the
master bedroom, you’ll agree that this—’
Confused for a moment, Simon paused and considered the corridor. Up the stairs,
left and left again. How could that be the case? This was wall, it should be a
wall. Continuing up the stairs, he remembered the last words of the sunken eyed
man who had become his client.  “Twice the lefthand path leads to his
chamber”
‘—this building could be passed down for generations.’

As if from a dream, Simon awoke, his hand upon the handle of an ashen door,
shadow pulling from its edges at a broken angle as if trying to escape from the
light that binds it to existence.
Something within his core screamed not to open the door, but a stronger power
drew him inward.
A redness seemed to tinge the air around this room. Embers of gold and of ochre
flittered in the corrosion as if rust-fire caught within unholy stasis. Within
the centre of the room a steak pierced the floor, silt and charcoal tracing the
pained outline of a wretch that once lay beneath the twisted iron’s thrust.

‘Why is the manor on the market again?’ Kait asked almost from within
a trance.

‘Who was the previous owner?’ Michael asked, equally unable to comprehend
the space that had unfolded from within the impossible geometry of the cursed
manor.

17th century, one owner, just one single owner.

Ichor-rich blood congealed from a wound that
lay at the base of the iron pike. As if from the will of giants, a pressure
descended upon the bedroom that shook violent rage at the indolence of
trespass. From the spear, a font of blood did then spring, swallowing the light
as it pooled outwards, centuries of anguish released from a single datum of
horror.

‘The space may need a small amount of renovation.’ Simon was able to cry as the
weight of ten-thousand souls wailed at the group from their imprisonment.

–

Sitting upon the front step as the taillights of the Thompson’s Porsche sped
away and were lost to the mist and gloom, Simon held his head and stared down
the sodden mess that were his ruined shoes.
‘Oh well,’ he muttered, trying to remain positive, ‘with any luck they’ll get
turned around and wind up here again in the morning. The second visit usually
is the clincher.’

J. McCray
2024