Congratulations !
You have been awarded points.
Thank you for !
- Story Listed as: True Life For Adults
- Theme: Drama / Human Interest
- Subject: Ghost Stories / Paranormal
- Published: 04/30/2024
Let’s not go there!
Born 1948, M, from Kent - garden of England, United KingdomLet’s not go there!
Sometimes one finds a place which looks fine, and settles down there, for better or for worse. Sometimes it is for worse! We bought the house as a wreck, primarily because it was cheap and we are both practical people. When we viewed it, it had been on the market for three years at a price of £ xxxxxx, but at that price it was much too much, in view of the work involved in order to improve it, and to make it liveable in the twenty first century, so that we could really get down to doing our respective work.
We wandered around the house anyway, as we had come some distance to view it, and were taken by its possibilities if fully restored. But the price was the stumbling block to making an offer, certainly in view of the wrecked condition inside and out - the house had been neglected for forty years!
The vendor, a lady of late middle age, had lived there since childhood, and was now cramped by having her adult children living with her, along with their kids.
She took little interest in us looking around, she had apparently done the same thing many times since the house had first been put up for sale, it seemed. She was more interested in the large TV than she was in us.
On our way out she asked if we were interested, and I jokingly said that we would offer £xxxxxx ( less than half the price ) and pay cash, immediately, if she wanted a quick sale.
She closed the door abruptly, and that was the end of that.
We went for coffee at the local café, before starting our long journey home, and were taken by the friendliness of the locals, it seemed a nice area to live in, but obviously was not for us.
We drove over towards the motorway through rural lanes but even before we had arrived at the slip road, the phone started to ring. It was the owner of the house, accepting my paltry and joking offer. We told her we would think a little and get back to her in the morning, then discussed the ins and outs as we drove back home. We decided it was an opportunity too good to miss.
Well, the sale went through quickly, as we stipulated that, as paying cash, we wanted to be in the house within the month, and give or take a few days, and an extra couple of thousand which she squeezed out of us for odds and ends around the garden and garage, we were.
Or more correctly I was.
As soon as I was reasonably settled, camping alone with an inflatable mattress and sleeping bag on the top floor, I started work - the place was in a really terrible state! My partner had disappeared abroad for a few weeks - I was on my own, well, just me and the dog.
There was no cooker, so I pinched the one from my boat as an emergency effort, one pot cooking being a specialty of mine when sailing single-handedly, just simply chuck the whole lot in the pot to cook, and a few minutes later eat the resulting mess - usually delicious, and the boat still on course with the helm roped up!
As an aside here, if you sail and cruise, do not forget to use a Sharpy to mark what is in your food tins. The paper labels have a habit of falling off of tin cans when at sea, the air usually being damp, leading to interesting meal combinations like baked beans, soup and pineapple rings - waste not, want not!
Now back to the story -
Both my partner and I would need an office each, so that we could quickly get back to work, so this was where I started.
I chose the top floor for my office, it was a decent sized room next to my new temporary camp site, and had a walk in cupboard which extended into the roof space - plenty of space for my junk, and a window overlooking a rural view beyond. We were in, and making a start.
Over the next few days I met a few of the locals, who seemed surprised that the house had actually sold, and, so suddenly too - I had found five or six different estate agents had left ‘for sale’ signs stashed beside the garage, which told the tale of long periods of non sales.
Apparently the house had a ‘history’ though nobody was keen to tell us what it was, and we still do not know to this day, as those who probably could tell the tale were elderly then, and are certainly dead now, fifteen years later.
But I am rambling, so let’s get down to the nitty gritty.
The house has an aura, though now we are quite used to it, and rarely even consider it, though visitors often make some comment about shade, shadows or cold, or even the odd strange sound. Actually the house is bright, and in my view welcoming, my partners office being the most lavish room in the house, though once, and maybe now too, the centre of unusual attention. This ground floor room was damp, the chimney blocked, and three carpets were on top of one another on the floor, almost two inches having been cut from the bottom of the door to cope with the thickness of the three rugs.
I was later working in this room when, as I stooped to remove a floorboard, I was roughly poked in the center of my back from behind - even now I shiver a little as I write this. It felt very much as though a finger had been jerked into my spine, to the degree that it really hurt, temporarily I just could not move at all. And then the key dropped from the lock of the door, clattering upon the bare boards and spinning around, seemingly pushed by a hidden force. The very next moment the doorbell rang, and there was a firm rap upon the window, the postman had arrived to deliver a package. We chatted for a minute or two while I signed his form, and mysteriously my previous experience went out of my thoughts. The postman asked whether he might use our toilet, and as I had a flask of tea handy he had a drink and a look around before he left. It is always useful to be on good terms with your postman, a localised font of all knowledge and gossip, in my view.
Returning to work, I noticed that my hammer, which had been on a shelf, was now on the floor, and then I thought back - perhaps that falling hammer had hit me in the back as I stooped down, the vibrations shaking the key from the lock - yes, a likely explanation.
I unblocked the fireplace, after removing the defunct gas burning heater, knocking the old mortared bricks out, only to find the space behind filled with rubble and rubbish. I cleared this away, along with fourteen bird skeletons, crows who had entered the chimney and then not been able to escape again. We now have a wood burning stove here, so no more falling crows. There were bones under the floorboards too, maybe a fox or dog, I could not tell.
At night the house is curiously different in feeling, and like all old houses, generates creaks and squeaks here and there as the temperature and humidity change with night and day. We have a clock, a modern radio controlled type, always right and, being battery driven is quite silent. But still we hear a chime from time to time, echoing quietly between the walls, and on really quiet nights in summer, the gentle but continuous and distinctive tick, tick, tock, of a phantom clock can sometimes be sensed.
One night, after an intensive day of plastering, I awoke to an overwhelming smell of perfume, somewhat familiar but also quite strange, it’s aroma invoked a faint memory of childhood, but I had been working hard and soon drowsed off again, as though it had been a dream, infused with memory of the plaster work, performed earlier, down on the ground floor. Next morning I entered the bathroom - a large room at the back of the first floor, and more suitable for a double bedroom - but really just containing an old stained bath, roughly plumbed in and absolutely nothing more, to discover the stained and mouldy carpet strewn with a thick covering of white powder and smelling like, as my neighbour later suggested, ‘a tart’s boudoir’. The powder turned out to be scented talc, or baby powder - there was none in the house, we never use it, but it was this smell which had inspired in me the memory of being a small child. I cleared the mess away, by the simple expedient of cutting up the carpet and disposing of the whole lot, enamelled iron bath included, this I smashed to pieces with a club hammer, just to get it out easily. I should have saved it, our local salvage place flogs them for around £500!
The room is still a bathroom, but now with a heated marble floor, gilded mirrors and a chandelier, a place of luxury and relaxation.
But now my curiosity was on fire, and I changed the weak and feeble locks upon the front and back doors, in case a forgotten key had been used by an intruder who was playing some sort of foolish pranks on me, whilst I slept on the upper floor.
The kitchen was my next project, and the old servants entrance having been bricked up in past times, I opened up the upper section and installed a double glazed leaded window, in a style that suited the mid Victorian house. This brightened up the kitchen area considerably, and a few days later I knocked out the ancient sink and plumbing, I later made a few quid on the lead piping as scrap metal.
It was while I was bagging rubble from this that the light in the room suddenly changed, and looking up to the new window as a reflex action, I had the fleeting impression of a figure in a large hat having just passed by. I rushed to the front door, but both the gated access to the side of the house and the street were empty. To this day a figure often passes the window, never ever recorded on our security cameras, but very fleetingly caught by eye alone.
We call it Clara, but it might equally be Claude, we never get a good look!
I collect various things, an old obsession, and the room on top in which I camped for weeks, is now a music room, full of my mandolins, guitars and other instruments. Among these is an early Viennese zither, a multi string instrument played laid on a table, either plucked by finger tip, or lightly hammered with two short shafts of wood. The other instruments are hung around the walls, some used regularly, some are just too old or valuable to be handled often.
We often hear ‘music’ from this room, and particularly when listening from my office which is located next door. I used to put this down to drafts, as on an aeolian harp, or flies maybe, lightly brushing the strings, as they settled momentarily or buzzed past too close, but then a quiet but simple melody started to be heard, now and again and often briefly, and, hauntingly pleasant - the gentle sound of the old zither. However, the zither is boxed in its original case, and is rarely removed for use, and anyway, a yellow duster lays across the instrument in its case, which protects the new strings from tarnish, a full set being too expensive to replace, and thus the duster would muffle the strings.
It seems that our now lovely, completely restored and modern Victorian home is haunted!
But I can live with this. Let’s not go there!
A neighbour told us that, according to his mother, the house was once full of fun and joy back in the nineteen twenties, when young folk and children used to visit to take dancing lessons from the then owner, a young single continental lady - a Miss DeAth, it seems. We have one of her visiting cards, found beneath the floorboards in the main room of the house, the room still, to this day, fitted with a floor to ceiling mirror, where apparently she taught young girls ballet, and young men to waltz or Tango.
She also had a dark side apparently, but I have already covered that story, elsewhere.
We are not troubled by our ghosts, if indeed that is what they are, we live among them and accept the strange and weird occurrences, the opened books removed from shelves, the keys that find their own way to other doors than the ones they fit, the close watching of our dog as something or someone invisible to us makes its way across the room, the chandeliers swinging slightly and casting shadows from their arms, or the lights, often switched off suddenly at the stroke of ten at night, and then, flickering back on again.
It is a happy house, now finished, the ninth most expensive in the village, and as I write this, sitting quite alone, I can hear a faint rustle beyond the door, as if heavy silk is being brushed along the wall - maybe Ms DeAth is walking in our house, or silently watching us, the satin of her dress lightly heard as she moves about.
I wish her well, we live together in perfect harmony, the ghost and I, and in relative peace, we are both owners of a place to enjoy in life, and in her case, death.
Maybe I will join her soon, in living here in eternity, too.
I am really looking forward to haunting my partner!
Copyright, Ken DaSilva-Hill 2024
All intellectual rights reserved
No reproduction in any media
without authors permission.
Let’s not go there!(Ken DaSilva-Hill)
Let’s not go there!
Sometimes one finds a place which looks fine, and settles down there, for better or for worse. Sometimes it is for worse! We bought the house as a wreck, primarily because it was cheap and we are both practical people. When we viewed it, it had been on the market for three years at a price of £ xxxxxx, but at that price it was much too much, in view of the work involved in order to improve it, and to make it liveable in the twenty first century, so that we could really get down to doing our respective work.
We wandered around the house anyway, as we had come some distance to view it, and were taken by its possibilities if fully restored. But the price was the stumbling block to making an offer, certainly in view of the wrecked condition inside and out - the house had been neglected for forty years!
The vendor, a lady of late middle age, had lived there since childhood, and was now cramped by having her adult children living with her, along with their kids.
She took little interest in us looking around, she had apparently done the same thing many times since the house had first been put up for sale, it seemed. She was more interested in the large TV than she was in us.
On our way out she asked if we were interested, and I jokingly said that we would offer £xxxxxx ( less than half the price ) and pay cash, immediately, if she wanted a quick sale.
She closed the door abruptly, and that was the end of that.
We went for coffee at the local café, before starting our long journey home, and were taken by the friendliness of the locals, it seemed a nice area to live in, but obviously was not for us.
We drove over towards the motorway through rural lanes but even before we had arrived at the slip road, the phone started to ring. It was the owner of the house, accepting my paltry and joking offer. We told her we would think a little and get back to her in the morning, then discussed the ins and outs as we drove back home. We decided it was an opportunity too good to miss.
Well, the sale went through quickly, as we stipulated that, as paying cash, we wanted to be in the house within the month, and give or take a few days, and an extra couple of thousand which she squeezed out of us for odds and ends around the garden and garage, we were.
Or more correctly I was.
As soon as I was reasonably settled, camping alone with an inflatable mattress and sleeping bag on the top floor, I started work - the place was in a really terrible state! My partner had disappeared abroad for a few weeks - I was on my own, well, just me and the dog.
There was no cooker, so I pinched the one from my boat as an emergency effort, one pot cooking being a specialty of mine when sailing single-handedly, just simply chuck the whole lot in the pot to cook, and a few minutes later eat the resulting mess - usually delicious, and the boat still on course with the helm roped up!
As an aside here, if you sail and cruise, do not forget to use a Sharpy to mark what is in your food tins. The paper labels have a habit of falling off of tin cans when at sea, the air usually being damp, leading to interesting meal combinations like baked beans, soup and pineapple rings - waste not, want not!
Now back to the story -
Both my partner and I would need an office each, so that we could quickly get back to work, so this was where I started.
I chose the top floor for my office, it was a decent sized room next to my new temporary camp site, and had a walk in cupboard which extended into the roof space - plenty of space for my junk, and a window overlooking a rural view beyond. We were in, and making a start.
Over the next few days I met a few of the locals, who seemed surprised that the house had actually sold, and, so suddenly too - I had found five or six different estate agents had left ‘for sale’ signs stashed beside the garage, which told the tale of long periods of non sales.
Apparently the house had a ‘history’ though nobody was keen to tell us what it was, and we still do not know to this day, as those who probably could tell the tale were elderly then, and are certainly dead now, fifteen years later.
But I am rambling, so let’s get down to the nitty gritty.
The house has an aura, though now we are quite used to it, and rarely even consider it, though visitors often make some comment about shade, shadows or cold, or even the odd strange sound. Actually the house is bright, and in my view welcoming, my partners office being the most lavish room in the house, though once, and maybe now too, the centre of unusual attention. This ground floor room was damp, the chimney blocked, and three carpets were on top of one another on the floor, almost two inches having been cut from the bottom of the door to cope with the thickness of the three rugs.
I was later working in this room when, as I stooped to remove a floorboard, I was roughly poked in the center of my back from behind - even now I shiver a little as I write this. It felt very much as though a finger had been jerked into my spine, to the degree that it really hurt, temporarily I just could not move at all. And then the key dropped from the lock of the door, clattering upon the bare boards and spinning around, seemingly pushed by a hidden force. The very next moment the doorbell rang, and there was a firm rap upon the window, the postman had arrived to deliver a package. We chatted for a minute or two while I signed his form, and mysteriously my previous experience went out of my thoughts. The postman asked whether he might use our toilet, and as I had a flask of tea handy he had a drink and a look around before he left. It is always useful to be on good terms with your postman, a localised font of all knowledge and gossip, in my view.
Returning to work, I noticed that my hammer, which had been on a shelf, was now on the floor, and then I thought back - perhaps that falling hammer had hit me in the back as I stooped down, the vibrations shaking the key from the lock - yes, a likely explanation.
I unblocked the fireplace, after removing the defunct gas burning heater, knocking the old mortared bricks out, only to find the space behind filled with rubble and rubbish. I cleared this away, along with fourteen bird skeletons, crows who had entered the chimney and then not been able to escape again. We now have a wood burning stove here, so no more falling crows. There were bones under the floorboards too, maybe a fox or dog, I could not tell.
At night the house is curiously different in feeling, and like all old houses, generates creaks and squeaks here and there as the temperature and humidity change with night and day. We have a clock, a modern radio controlled type, always right and, being battery driven is quite silent. But still we hear a chime from time to time, echoing quietly between the walls, and on really quiet nights in summer, the gentle but continuous and distinctive tick, tick, tock, of a phantom clock can sometimes be sensed.
One night, after an intensive day of plastering, I awoke to an overwhelming smell of perfume, somewhat familiar but also quite strange, it’s aroma invoked a faint memory of childhood, but I had been working hard and soon drowsed off again, as though it had been a dream, infused with memory of the plaster work, performed earlier, down on the ground floor. Next morning I entered the bathroom - a large room at the back of the first floor, and more suitable for a double bedroom - but really just containing an old stained bath, roughly plumbed in and absolutely nothing more, to discover the stained and mouldy carpet strewn with a thick covering of white powder and smelling like, as my neighbour later suggested, ‘a tart’s boudoir’. The powder turned out to be scented talc, or baby powder - there was none in the house, we never use it, but it was this smell which had inspired in me the memory of being a small child. I cleared the mess away, by the simple expedient of cutting up the carpet and disposing of the whole lot, enamelled iron bath included, this I smashed to pieces with a club hammer, just to get it out easily. I should have saved it, our local salvage place flogs them for around £500!
The room is still a bathroom, but now with a heated marble floor, gilded mirrors and a chandelier, a place of luxury and relaxation.
But now my curiosity was on fire, and I changed the weak and feeble locks upon the front and back doors, in case a forgotten key had been used by an intruder who was playing some sort of foolish pranks on me, whilst I slept on the upper floor.
The kitchen was my next project, and the old servants entrance having been bricked up in past times, I opened up the upper section and installed a double glazed leaded window, in a style that suited the mid Victorian house. This brightened up the kitchen area considerably, and a few days later I knocked out the ancient sink and plumbing, I later made a few quid on the lead piping as scrap metal.
It was while I was bagging rubble from this that the light in the room suddenly changed, and looking up to the new window as a reflex action, I had the fleeting impression of a figure in a large hat having just passed by. I rushed to the front door, but both the gated access to the side of the house and the street were empty. To this day a figure often passes the window, never ever recorded on our security cameras, but very fleetingly caught by eye alone.
We call it Clara, but it might equally be Claude, we never get a good look!
I collect various things, an old obsession, and the room on top in which I camped for weeks, is now a music room, full of my mandolins, guitars and other instruments. Among these is an early Viennese zither, a multi string instrument played laid on a table, either plucked by finger tip, or lightly hammered with two short shafts of wood. The other instruments are hung around the walls, some used regularly, some are just too old or valuable to be handled often.
We often hear ‘music’ from this room, and particularly when listening from my office which is located next door. I used to put this down to drafts, as on an aeolian harp, or flies maybe, lightly brushing the strings, as they settled momentarily or buzzed past too close, but then a quiet but simple melody started to be heard, now and again and often briefly, and, hauntingly pleasant - the gentle sound of the old zither. However, the zither is boxed in its original case, and is rarely removed for use, and anyway, a yellow duster lays across the instrument in its case, which protects the new strings from tarnish, a full set being too expensive to replace, and thus the duster would muffle the strings.
It seems that our now lovely, completely restored and modern Victorian home is haunted!
But I can live with this. Let’s not go there!
A neighbour told us that, according to his mother, the house was once full of fun and joy back in the nineteen twenties, when young folk and children used to visit to take dancing lessons from the then owner, a young single continental lady - a Miss DeAth, it seems. We have one of her visiting cards, found beneath the floorboards in the main room of the house, the room still, to this day, fitted with a floor to ceiling mirror, where apparently she taught young girls ballet, and young men to waltz or Tango.
She also had a dark side apparently, but I have already covered that story, elsewhere.
We are not troubled by our ghosts, if indeed that is what they are, we live among them and accept the strange and weird occurrences, the opened books removed from shelves, the keys that find their own way to other doors than the ones they fit, the close watching of our dog as something or someone invisible to us makes its way across the room, the chandeliers swinging slightly and casting shadows from their arms, or the lights, often switched off suddenly at the stroke of ten at night, and then, flickering back on again.
It is a happy house, now finished, the ninth most expensive in the village, and as I write this, sitting quite alone, I can hear a faint rustle beyond the door, as if heavy silk is being brushed along the wall - maybe Ms DeAth is walking in our house, or silently watching us, the satin of her dress lightly heard as she moves about.
I wish her well, we live together in perfect harmony, the ghost and I, and in relative peace, we are both owners of a place to enjoy in life, and in her case, death.
Maybe I will join her soon, in living here in eternity, too.
I am really looking forward to haunting my partner!
Copyright, Ken DaSilva-Hill 2024
All intellectual rights reserved
No reproduction in any media
without authors permission.
- Share this story on
- 4
Cheryl Ryan
05/09/2024This story being a true life experience is thoughtful and artfully written with some well-deserved shivers. I love the depth and captivating narrative of the strange happenings within the house and that of the ghost Ms DeAth, it brings the shiver and life to the story.
Thank you for sharing!
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Ken DaSilva-Hill
05/09/2024Hi Cheryl, thanks for your comments, I am writing this in the house right now. There is another story about the house, again set when I was restoring the building, it shows a much darker side to Ms. DeAth, and is titled ‘The outside Bolt’. I hope you enjoy that one too! Best regards, Ken
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Lillian Kazmierczak
05/07/2024Ken, how lucky are you to have pleasant ghosts! A fantastic, descriptive story on your house renovation and its occupants! A ghostly, delightful short story star of the day!
ReplyHelp Us Understand What's Happening
Ken DaSilva-Hill
05/08/2024Hi Lillian, thanks for the comment. Our house is old, but our neighbours house next door beats it by about five hundred years, and has seen plague, many kings and queens, a civil war, the birth of America and Australia, and two world wars. Not only does it have history in plenty, but also anti witch spells, a deep well, and a few more ghosts than ours, which is only an infant in comparison! Enjoy your day, best wishes, Ken
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Ken DaSilva-Hill
05/08/2024Hi Gerald, thanks for your comment. Yep, spooky but great fun to live in - see the story ‘The outside bolt’ for more about Ms. DeAth and her dancing academy! Weird too! Have a good day, Ken
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Shirley Smothers
05/07/2024Enjoyed reading this. Well written. I could see this old house and it's being transformed to a modern home. Congratulations on Short Story Star of the Day.
ReplyHelp Us Understand What's Happening
Ken DaSilva-Hill
05/08/2024Hi Shirley, yep, it is a nice place, I am writing this in the oak beamed extension which I designed myself to look original with the period of the house, built using reclaimed Victorian bricks. A bit of a labour of love, the entire house has been restored by me alone - but never quite finished! Have a look at the story ‘The outside Bolt’ for a bit more about the restoration. Best wishes, Ken
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Ken DaSilva-Hill
05/08/2024Hi Ben, glad you liked the story, there is more about Ms. DeAth, in the tale of ‘The Outside Bolt’ . Best regards, Ken
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Ken DaSilva-Hill
05/08/2024Hi Joel, very happy you enjoyed the story, and thanks for your comments. Best regards, Ken
Help Us Understand What's Happening
JD
05/06/2024You definitely seem to be steeped in history there, Ken! Thanks for sharing your home and Ms DeAth with us. Happy short story star of the day.
ReplyHelp Us Understand What's Happening
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Ken DaSilva-Hill
05/08/2024Hi JD, yep, history is all around us here, and I never get tired of hearing the local legends and gossip. At some point I will actually finish the house, if it doesn’t finish me first! Best wishes to all, Ken
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Help Us Understand What's Happening
Ken DaSilva-Hill
05/06/2024Hi Reno, glad you liked it, I am sitting in the kitchen now, our dog asleep and the cat on my lap. No flickering lights tonight, Ten passed a few minutes ago, but it will happen, during the week! Best regards, Ken, and probably, Ms. DeAth, too.
COMMENTS (8)