GHOSTS

The Ghosts Appear

Have you ever had any experience like these? You are sitting in a room at night by yourself when you hear a noise outside. You open the door but there is no one there. Or you are sitting in a room when the door slowly opens. Again, when you investigate, there is no one there. Or you put something down and go out and when you come back it isn’t there anymore it has vanished. Talk about this experiences.

Things like this happen to most of us, and usually there is a sensible reason for them. It might be the wild blowing, or a cat, or an object which has disappeared has been taken by someone else. But sometimes there seems to be no explanation, and it is at times like there that we may think there are ghost about.

Or imagine another situation. You have woken up suddenly in the middle of night. It is pitch dark all around you. Then you hear a noise – it is thin and squeaky like a floorboard creaking, but it isn’t a floorboard. You listen intently – and there it is again. Would it ever cross your mind that it might be a ghost?

Or you have been reading a weird ghost story or been watching an eerie film on television, and it is time to go to bed. Have you ever been afraid to go upstairs? Why?

Some people believe strongly that there are no such things as ghost. Others believe equally strongly that ghosts exist. What are your views? What evidence do you have? Do you know of anyone who has seen a ghost?

Look again at the situation and experiences suggested above. When do people expect ghosts to appear? What factors about the situations and experiences above would almost lead you to expect to see a ghost?

With that in mind, read the following extract from The Amazing Mr. Blunden.

The wet daffodils shone in a golden heap in the grey trug as Lucy cam e up the path from the lake. The gravel that crunched beneath her feet was full of sprouting weeds and moss grew in the shady patches. The whole garden was badly neglected but it still had a wild beauty. Now that the summer is coming, thought Lucy, I’ll get Jamie to help me tidy it up a bit.

She took a short cut through the overgrown ruins at the east end of the house and stopped to look up at the pointed window arches that stood out like bones against the sky. Like the bones of the bird in the gutter, she thought; all that in left of a long-dead building. She could see that it had once been a wing of the house, but the soaring arches seemed to be of some older style, perhaps some old abbey, destroyed by Henry the Eighth. Clumps of herbs had spread from the garden into the ruins: thyme and marjoram which gave off a sweet, wet scent under-foot. There were wallflowers too, high up on the stonework, and she added to her basket and few that were with reach.

Beyond the ruins, a gravel path wound its way into the shrubbery and she went on in search of the rhododendron. She smelt it before she saw it, a thick, honey scent filling the air, and then round a corner she found the big pale-pink blossoms against dark leaves.

She picked half-a-dozen and then stood idly, breathing in the rich perfume. The air was noisy with birds and she could see through a gap in the bushes the bright green on the lawns with the crowding trees beyond. The heat of the spring sunshine was drying up the heavy rainfall which rose in parches of mist above the grass.

Lucy began to feel strangely drowsy as thought the scent of the rhododendron were a sweet, heavy drug. Her mind seemed to be growing still and empty almost as if it had stuck in a groove from which she was unable to move it. Her eyes seemed to focus somewhere short of the point she was looking at. She felt that she ought to make some movement, to break the growing sense of stillness that was creeping over her, but the effect was too great. A blackbird was calling, a single note repeated, a warming note; but she could not turn her head to look at him. It was as if she were concentrating all her mind upon one thing, but against her will and upon something that she did not understand.

Then she sensed that there was something moving through the mist on the lawn, just beyond the point at which her eyes were focused. She could not see very clearly, but it seems to be two pale figures and they were moving towards her, slowly and with purpose.

Fear gripped her. She dropped the basket and her mind leaped from its groove. She looked wildly around her but there was nothing there. The columns of mist were dissolving above the lawn; the blackbird was singing, a full, bubbling song, as though he might burst at any moment.

Everything was perfectly normal and yet she was afraid. She felt convinced that she had narrowly escaped something. With swift, nervous movements, she gathered up the scattered flowers. Then she ran as fast as she could towards the hoist only to crash headlong into Jamie who was coming the other way.

‘Now then,’ said Jamie soothingly when he had regained his balance, ‘what’s the matter with you? You look as if you’d just seen a ghost.’

Lucy hesitated for a moment before she said, ‘I thought I had, or rather, two ghosts.’

Jamie was delighted. ‘Where?’ he asked. ‘What were they like? What were they doing?’

Lucy tried to explain but it sounded pretty feeble and Jamie was clearly disappointed.

‘Is that all?’ he said. ‘Just the mist over the grass?’

‘It wasn’t only that …’ Lucy struggled for words.

‘It wasn’t so much what I saw as how I felt; as if something else had taken charge of me. Oh, I can’t tell you what it was like but I was frightened. And somehow I was sure that they were ghosts.’

She shuddered and, watching her, Jamie was irritated. Why should something interesting like a ghost happen to Lucy, when she only got into a state and ran away? He had been looking for some sign of a white shadowy figure every since they had come to the house and he hadn’t seen a thing yet.

‘Now look, Lucy,’ he said firmly, ’if you did see some ghosts, it was a bit mean to run away. After all, we did tell the old man we wouldn’t afraid. He explained all about them needing help. Now let’s go back and you can show me where it happened and I’ll see if I can see anything.’

Lucy had already begun to feel foolish. So, after a moment’s hesitation, she took Jamie back along the path until they stood beside the heavy, scented pink blossoms.

‘It was just here,’ she said. ‘I thought I saw them over there on the lawn.’

But everything had changed. The sun was warm and bright and the mist had almost gone. Lucy stood by the bush and watched Jamie as he hinted around foe any sign of footprints and grew increasingly scornful when he found none. As if ghosts would leave footprints anyway, she thought crossly.

And then it happened again.

A cloud passed in front of the sun and it was suddenly cold. Lucy became aware of the monotonous single note of the blackbird, the warning call, and again she sensed that her mind was slipping out her grasp. She heard Jamie chattering as he hunted nearby, but she could no longer make out what he was saying. She called his name suddenly, in fear, and reached out her hand to him……..