Special treat, from the
Misty Annual for 1981. You can't believe how tempted I was to spice up the original, but that wouldn't be at all fair.
HERE’S a ghost story with a difference! It’s from the traditional nightmare world of shadows and shudders, but we ask you to choose your own details at certain ominous points in the story . . . and at the end we’ll tell you something about yourself that maybe you thought nobody else knew about!
So, make quite sure you’re alone (is the door completely shut behind you?), have a pen ready to record your score (filled with bats’ blood, of course), and be prepared for the shiver of your life!***************
IT HAD been a beautiful evening when Arlene set out for her solitary walk, but slowly the clouds had covered the pale moon and a bitter wind arose, and when she shivered, pulling her shawl around her, and turned to retrace her steps. She realised she was lost. She had walked for some time, looking in vain for a landmark she could recognise, when the path between the tall trees turned sharply and she found herself walking beside an old wall, so ancient that in places quite large shrubs and small trees grew through broken places in it.
She was tired now, and when she came to the door in the wall she reached out a hand to open it, thinking only that here, at last might be someone she could ask for help. The door was (A) heavy, made of oak and hard to push open: (B) covered with strange carvings and opened surprisingly easily: (C) thick with moss and squeaked protestingly as she swung it wide; (D) so small and narrow she had to bend her head and turn sideways a little, to enter.
INSIDE, she seemed to be in some kind of formal garden and a very narrow path twisted away from her, leading, she supposed, to the big house she could dimly see somewhere ahead. There seemed to be a light in an upper window, and she stepped forward briskly but almost at once she stopped short, listening, straining her ears intently. No, there was nothing but the wind sighing outside the wall. But as she moved on again, perhaps more hesitantly, she heard it again . . . footsteps. She was sure she was right. It was as if someone . . . or something . . . was following her, step for step, as she move along the narrow path and yet, however many times she glanced quickly over her shoulder, she never caught sight of anything behind her.
The footsteps had only begun since she had come through the doorway, and she was tempted to turn back, but it seemed silly, now she was almost up to the house, where she could ask for help and directions, perhaps even phone for a taxi to take her back to her hotel. And then the little path gave another unexpected turn, and she found herself crossing a tiny courtyard, with a statue on plinth set in the middle of it. She couldn't resist going close enough to see what it was, and felt strangely uneasy when she found herself looking at (A) a horned devil. grinning at her and beckoning her towards the house: (B ) the head and shoulders of a woman. with a screaming mouth but no eyes: (C) a hand with a heavy ring carved on it, held up as if in warning; (D) the full-length figure of a weeping woman, and on the plinth, the name . . . Arlene.
THE PATH that must lead to the house seemed even narrower now and the vegetation growing on either side seemed to reach out to her, catching thorny tendrils in her skirt and hair, at every step. The footsteps seemed closer, and when she held her breath, so as to listen more intently, she felt she could almost hear breathing too, just a step or two behind her . . . .
She was almost running now, and turning her head at every step, eyes straining through the gathering darkness, to see what followed her, and it was with a shock that she felt her hand stretched out before her, come to rest on something solid and she realised with a start that she was at the very front door of the house, in fact her hand lay on the knocker itself. She withdrew her hand with a shudder. For the knocker was in the shape of (A) a hand, carved as if it were a dead hand, the fingers curving limply downwards; (B) a grinning satyr's head; (C) the sign of the evil eye: (D) a bat.
T0 HER surprise, her light touch on the knocker had opened the door, and it swung silently inwards and remained invitingly open. The hall was brightly lit, and she could hear music coming faintly from within. Anything seemed better than the horrors of the mysterious garden with its eerie footsteps, and she stepped quickly inside, calling out nervously as she did so, "ls anyone at home ?" without really expecting an immediate answer, so it was with a tremendous shock that a voice replied JUST behind her - and she turned to see a tall, dark, handsome man in the act of closing the front door. As he stretched out his hand to push the door shut, she couldn't help noticing the heavy gold ring he wore. It was (A) set with a strange jewel that gleamed dully in the light: (B) in the shape of a serpent twisted round his finger; (C) carved with magical signs; (D) a snarling Leopard 's head.
SHE BEGAN to explain her predicament, but he raised a pale hand, indicating that she should follow him, and again the ring caught her eye. He led her across the hall, and as she passed the foot of a broad staircase leading to a narrow gallery, from the corner of her eye she felt someone watched her from the shadows at one end of the gallery. She looked back, over her shoulder, and saw the shadows move, and heard soft laughter, and then a door closed.
She felt uneasy. and called out after the man. ' If I could just use your telephone—?" but he was striding ahead and gave no sign he'd even heard her. Her own footsteps clattered briskly across the tiled floor, but the man ahead of her seemed to move almost silently and each of his soundless paces took him further away from her, so she was hurrying to catch up. But already he had disappeared through a small door at the end of the hall and when she followed, expecting to find herself in a room where the telephone was kept, she was surprised to find she was in another narrow hallway — alone. With growing panic she looked round, but there was no other door, and no window, and no sign of the man. Looking round, she now saw that the queer, greenish light came from a dozen or so guttering candles set in niches in the wall, and between them the bare stone wall was covered with old-looking pictures.
She glanced casually at the nearest, and with a shock of recognition saw that it was (A) a painting of her own face, with eyes shut as if dead; (B) a portrait of the man who had let her into the house. smiling sardonically: (C) a knife dripping with blood; (D) not a painting but a queer kind of mirror in which her own face grimaced back at her, horribly distorted by the flaws in the old glass.
THERE was no way forward, no sign of her guide, and she turned back and was horrified to find that she could no longer see the door by which she had entered. The wall behind her appeared solid, as of roughly-hewn stone blocks, and reaching out to touch it to make sure it was as solid as it looked, she shuddered, for the stone was (A) icy cold; (B) covered in dripping slime: (C) stained with something red which came away on her fingers; (D) thick with small, creeping things that scurried away at her touch.
NOW SHE was really frightened, stepping back to the centre of the room and staring all round in a panic. She heard a rustle from somewhere above her head, and glancing up she saw that a narrow gallery ran all round, at ceiling height, and it was filled with shadowy figures leaning over to look at her. As she stared up, they began to laugh and mock and with growing horror she realised (A) that not one of them was human; (B) the creatures above had leathery wings, the bodies of strange animals and the faces of human beings: (C) the rustling noise she had heard was the sound of ghostly bodies brushing lightly together as they crowded to stare down at her; (D) she had been deliberately lured and trapped in this dreadful place.
THE LAUGHTER from the dreadful watchers above grew louder and she saw they were beginning to crowd forward on the balcony, as if preparing to descend on her, and she screamed, her hands flying to her mouth in terror - and then it happened. In her desperate whirling movement, looking instinctively for somewhere to hide, the silver chain she wore inside the neck of her dress flew up, arid the little cross suspended from it rattled against her finger. Automatically she clasped it — and it seemed as if the ghastly horde above her head was suddenly silent after one sibilant gasp of hate. She held the cross more tightly now, and lifted it slightly to menace the watchers, and then (A) there was a roll like thunder above her head: (B) the candles guttered and went out. leaving her in darkness: (C) a single voice wailed as if in torment from the crowd in the gallery; (D) she felt a light breeze, deliciously scented, lift her hair and pass across her forehead, as if in a caress.
THE NEXT thing Arlene knew was that there was a tremendous flash of brilliant light, and she shut her eyes, blinded, but still hanging on to her cross for dear life. The ground seemed to shudder an shake around her and she dimly heard a tremendous roaring noise and a whirling, as of thousands of wings, and when she dared to open her eyes again (A) she found herself standing in the lane again, with her hand on the closed door in the old wall: (B) she was standing where the old house had been. but it lay in ruins around her, and lt was obvious from the weeds growing through the cracked tiled floor that it had been like that for many, many years: (C) a door had appeared in the wall behind her, and stood open and the way clear to the front door which also was wide open, with the moonlight pouring in; (D) she saw a small white door ahead of her, which had not been there before, and when she opened it and walked through she found herself, amazingly, outside the house on a scented lawn that led down to a wide gate opening on to a road.
TEN MINUTES‘ walking, and Arlene found herself back at a point she recognised, where a country signpost clearly marked the way back to her hotel. But the strange thing was, there was no sign pointing back the way she had come, and later, when she asked about the strange house back at the hotel, nobody seemed to know what she was talking about. And though she took a walk that way again a few days later, this time in bright sunshine, she was never able to locate the lane, still less the doorway in the old wall. . . .
The End
***************
How did you do?
If you chose mostly A's . . .
You appear to the outsider to be a practical, cheerful sort of person, but deep in your heart there is a touch of bitterness because there has been some disappointment in your life which you still haven't quite accepted. Face up to whatever your disappointment was, and you'll REALLY be the happy, positive person, destined for success that everyone takes you for.
If you chose mostly B's . . .
You have a secret yearning for excitement! Maybe you should try to satisfy it by getting out of the rut you are in at present. You need new friends, new interests, or at the very least a new addition to your wardrobe, or a more interesting hairstyle, and none of that is at all difficult if you make up your mind to it, so get cracking!
lf you chose mostly C's . . .
You seem to be a confident, determined character but you are a wee bit of a coward at heart, especially over one thing in particular! When you have nightmares, it's always that one thing that comes at you out of the dark ... Your way of dealing with it is to pretend it isn't there, but one of those days you are going to have to face up to it! You’ll find that the quicker you beat your own little bogey, the easier it will be to deal with ... and than you'll never be afraid of anything again. So, go to it!
If you chose mostly Ds . . .
Your pals would say you are a pretty hard-boiled character, but in fact you are quite an old-fashioned romantic at heart! That's nothing to be ashamed of, in fact without it you could grow into rather an unlikeable person. So don't be embarrassed about your need for romance, and deep need to be loved and needed. It's one of the nicest things about you!
