Highland Spirits: "Pine" by Francine Toon

"Pine" by Francine Toon

A review of a haunting debut novel

The Old Palazzo

The Old Palazzo

 A ghost story

Buying a palazzo in Valletta had been her husband’s idea.  Susan had never fully fathomed why a Yorkshireman born and bred should want to spend his retirement years and their hard-earned pension on a tiny Mediterranean island.  Perhaps Jim yearned for a whiff of the exotic after a generally dull and uneventful life.  Perhaps he wanted to recapture the magic of those months he had spent in Malta during his brief, youthful stint in the navy...or the memory of a first love, she thought, not without a dull throb of jealousy.

Call her old-fashioned, but Susan had never been one to contradict her husband, even when, as in this case, she had her own misgivings. She convinced herself that, as long as he took care of all the practicalities, his choice would be fine by her. Anyway, she knew only too well that, if she voiced any doubts, Jim’s reaction would be a curt “Don’t worry yourself silly, Sue!” underlined with a chiding, conclusive grin, as if he were addressing a wayward child. Better let him be. She was happy enough seeing him browse real estate websites, comparing the merits of this and that building with a new-found enthusiasm which took her somewhat by surprise. And when Jim bought their flight tickets to “embark on a property expedition”, as he put it, Susan did not disappoint him, feigning a keenness which, frankly, she did not share.

The palazzo they had travelled so far to view teetered over a cobbled alley in a quiet part of the city.  A young and pimply estate agent led them into the roofless central courtyard and enthusiastically pointed out the building’s traditional features – the winding stairs with poky rooms sprouting off unexpected landings (“plenty of character, eh!”), the high ceilings of the second floor (“how spacious! how imposing!”), the underground cellar with its well hewn by hand centuries before (“back-breaking job, wouldn’t volunteer for it myself!”).  In the few years he had spent living there, the previous occupier had spent a small fortune renovating the place, with mixed results.    In the lower levels the plaster was flaking off in patches, fighting a losing battle against the rising damp.  In the cellar, the walls were covered with unwanted junk accumulated over the decades.   But the rooms at the top floor were comfortable enough and tastefully decked out with some judiciously chosen antique furniture.  It was quickly decided. This would be their retirement nest and Sue should not “worry herself silly”.

Well, she consoled herself, it was not as if they would be leaving any close relatives behind them. In the early years of their marriage, her husband had been adamant that they should not have any children as “they were enough company for each other”. That was exactly how it had been so far, and that was how it would be in this final chapter of their life.

Tragedy struck just a few months after they moved to Malta.   One dark winter morning, Jim got out of bed uncharacteristically early. It was Susan who found him a couple of hours later, sprawled lifeless in the courtyard. “Massive heart attack,” the doctor decreed. 

Massive heart attack – a death sentence in which Susan stood as co-accused, condemned to become the lonely mistress of her husband’s final folly.  

Truth be told, there were times when she believed she would be able to adapt to the life thrust upon her. In summer, for instance, she spent whole days in the upper balconies, from where she could get a glimpse of white sails lazily crossing the harbour, whilst a salty breeze caressed her face.   Summer brought with it the festa season, when the streets of Valletta would be thronged with revellers and marching bands celebrating the feast of the city’s patron saints, and even this sleepy side of town erupted into hundreds of coloured fairy lights. 

***

Tonight, summer seems so distant. It is a dark and wintry evening, and Susan longs to be back in England.  She listens to the gusts of wind, whining as they wind their way around the jagged rooftops, the rain pattering dully against her bedroom window.  No doubt about it.  Better the harsh yet familiar winters of home than this clammy sort of cold which seeps through the thick walls and seems to drain your soul.  Rest does not come easy to her lately and Susan feels that this evening will be no exception.  She tosses and turns in a four-poster bed which has become too big for her until, finally, her body succumbs to yet another fitful night. 

A cry nudges her out of her sleep. 

At first, drifting in the no-man’s land between dreams and wakefulness, Susan isn’t even sure she has heard anything at all.  But here it is again, that plaintive sound, somewhere between a wail and a whimper.  She shudders and buries her head under the blankets.  Funny how a couple of layers of bedding manage to instil in her a childish sense of security. 

That cry again. 

Susan switches on the lamp and the shadows leap back to the farthest corners of the room.  The sight of familiar objects comforts her: the hands of the clock pointing to just after two, the solid bulk of the wardrobe, a glass of water standing on the bedside table beside a half-unread novel.  She crawls out of bed, pulls a dressing gown around her shoulders and goes to the window.  The storm has abated.  The alley is deserted.

There is no mistaking it this time.  Susan can distinctly hear a moan, and much as she hates to admit it, whoever … whatever… is making this anguished sound is inside the house.  She shudders, a sense of unease creeping upon her.  She considers calling for help, phoning the police. But what will she say?  That she is spooked by odd noises in an old house?  No.  She has to brave the night alone.   Despite her mounting fear, she also knows that she has to face this intruder.  That cry, terrible as it was, feels like a siren song, taking hold of her will, drawing her towards its source. 

Slowly she makes her way out of the bedroom and stumbles down the stairs, steeling her body at every turn, scarcely able to breathe.  The beckoning voice iss growing louder, seemingly more desperate.  With each step, her feelings of dread grow, as does her conviction that what is calling her is no living thing.   She hears confused whispers tumbling around her, their meaning ungraspable.   She closes her eyes and steadies herself against the wall.  Come on Sue, what on earth is happening to you? Scaring yourself silly, aren’t you?

When she reaches the internal courtyard, a rush of cold air brings her to her senses. Shivering in her nightgown, she struggles to make sense of what has come over her.  She is still in time to leave the building, to run out and bang on a neighbour’s door and ask for help. In the light of day, they will probably have a good laugh together over her nocturnal escapade. 

But then another sound catches her ears.   In the cellar, a child is sobbing.  Her head spins.  How can a child have ended up in her house? Some inquisitive boy perhaps? Or a prank in bad taste?  She leans against the massive cellar door, putting all her weight behind her.  If this is a sick joke, well, she’ll show them.  Oh, yes she will... A dank, musty smell overpowers Susan as she sets foot inside the entrance.  She gropes around for the light switch, only to realise that the basement is already bathed in a bluish light, as if a full moon has made its way into the bowels of the building.  Falteringly, she descends the uneven steps. 

An unearthly sight stops her in her tracks.  Before her, as on a badly-lit stage, a scene is being played out.  A figure in a long black dress is hitting a toddler cowered beneath it.  The boy, not more than a couple of years old, is hunched on the ground, uselessly covering his face with his arms, unable to ward off the violent beating.  

Anger and pity well up inside her.   The boy looks like the son she never had.  She longs to reach for him, hold him in her arms, nurse him to health.  Her body has grown leaden and, in her heart, she feels… she knows… that tragedy is inevitable.  Saving him is beyond her, or any mortal’s, powers.  The blows persist mercilessly until the boy falls, immobile and lifeless, on the cold flagstones. 

Only then does she regain her strength and rush towards the murderer.  The figure turns. What horror is this?  The apparition standing before her has no human countenance.  Facing her is an eyeless skull, clad in pale skin drawn like taut parchment, from which dangle a few locks of straggling, sooty hair.  Dried, black lips pull back to reveal yellowish teeth, locked in an eternal evil grin. In a flash she realises that what she had mistaken for a dress is a coarse, earth-stained shroud, rotting with age, hanging from skeletal shoulders.

The cry echoes around the house.  It is a scream at once of terror, of guilt, of utter despair.  And, this time, the cry is hers.

***

Susan’s body was found a few days later, after an inquisitive neighbour noticed her absence and reported the matter to the Police.  Mrs Benson, miskina, had suffered a heart attack, just like her poor husband.    Who said one couldn’t die of a broken heart?

At least, that is the official version doing the rounds of the city.  The locals, however, know a couple of tales which they dare not repeat.  They have all heard the half-forgotten tale of the tragedy which had cursed the old building.  A young woman had been seduced by a respectable and well-connected family man. When she gave birth to his child, the mother, barely grown up herself, had killed her son in a fit of insanity and had then taken her own life by hanging herself in that very cellar.   Her lover, in a late show of contrition, or more likely, to protect his reputation, had contrived to hush the scandal. 

Maybe the story is true.  And then again, maybe not.  But if you look carefully among the cast-off junk in the cellar of the old palazzo, you might well find an old, decaying cot and, behind it, a coiled length of rope.

Haunted by Old Forms : Contemporary ghost story anthologies by "The Fiction Desk" and "Shadows at the Door"

 Haunted by Old Forms  

two ghost story anthologies

As October starts, many of my more Goth-minded friends start a countdown to Halloween. Or so it seems from my twitter feed, which right now is rich in suggestions for horror novels, ghostly tales and scary movies.  Here’s my own small contribution to this ghoulfest – reviews of two collections of contemporary ghost stories which reveal that the form is alive and kicking.  Or should I say, undead? 

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New Ghost Stories III : A Fiction Desk Anthology

The heyday of the "classic English ghost story" was in the 19th and early 20th Century, when a host of authors - some brilliant, others clearly less so - shaped the genre as we know it. The ghost story is, of course, a much wider cultural phenomenon, with its roots in the folklore and traditions of different societies. Even within the supposedly limited confines of the literary genre, the sheer variety of supernatural manifestations portrayed is surprising. There are the "proper" ghosts, souls returning from the dead to communicate with the living, complete unfinished business, wreak vengeance or, on occasion, for purposes as elusive as their diaphanous shapes. In the folk-horrorish works of Arthur Machen and Algernon Blackwood, the otherworldly beings have pagan overtones or are closely related to the faerie folk. Some apparitions are "demonic" and monster-like in nature - in M.R. James, the horrors are often unexpectedly physical - whilst, at the other end of the spectrum, the reader is occasionally left wondering whether the supposed hauntings are "all in the mind".

New Ghost Stories III is the eleventh Fiction Desk anthology and the third one to be exclusively dedicated to this genre. It features seven tales - six of which are the winners of the latest two ghost story competitions organised by the publication. Editor Rob Redman provides an introduction to the collection, as well as a brief preface to each story.

Refreshingly, the featured pieces are authentic supernatural tales, rather than exercises in “magical realism” or metaphorical interpretations of the “ghost” figure. They also owe much to the literary canon. Look closer, however, and you will realise that the same horror tropes which make them familiar to the reader are subtly being undermined. A case in point is The Crypt Beneath the Library by Barney Walsh. The setting is one which M.R. James would have recognised – a crypt housing a collection of medieval illuminated manuscripts possibly haunted by a spectral monk and/or a demonic figure. The protagonist, however, couldn’t be more different than James’s male professorial types. Bethany, in fact, is a young undergraduate “atheist medievalist” and the story itself can be read as a protest against the patriarchal university and college hierarchies implied in James’s stories. Similarly, Jerry Ibbotson’s The Intruder and Richard Agemo’s The House Friends both explore the “haunted house” genre and take it into new and intriguing directions. The Archivist, by Philippa East, evokes a different tradition – that of American scary movies. It is set in the sanatorium of an abandoned boarding school which will soon be pulled down. An archivist sent to catalogue the old school files comes across past horrors in the old documents, but also faces other terrors in the shape of an uncanny doll and strange nocturnal noises. It’s all very unsettling, but can we rely on the narrator?

Two of the tales struck me for their originality. Des Nuits Blanches by Will Dunn starts off as a sports story, a tale about an ambitious French cyclist and his strict regime of night-time training. When the supernatural element does kick in, it evokes ancient Alpine lore and its tales of evil spirits lurking in the mountains. Reads like Machen on a skiing holiday. Seth Marlin’s "The Dead Lie Dreaming", on the contrary, ventures into science fiction and presents us with a society in the near future where memories of dead persons are kept electronically alive. Like one of the oldest (Biblical) ghost stories – Saul’s meeting with the Witch of Endor – it is a cautionary tale which suggests we should keep away from the spirits of the dead, even when summoned by science.

This anthology shows that the ghost story is still very much alive, even if haunted by old forms. It is indeed telling that the collection ends with the most primeval fear of all. When the lights go out and the candles splutter – in other words, “When the Dark Comes Down”, as in Amanda Mason’s concluding piece of the same name – our oldest terrors are rekindled. And we get an idea of how the 'ghost story' might have begun.

Published September 2017 by The Fiction Desk

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The website Shadows at the Door is a digital platform where horror writers are given the opportunity to publish their supernatural tales. Curator Mark Nixon himself a writer of ghost stories, took this concept to another level with the publication of an anthology featuring authors associated with the website. Launched  following Kickstarter crowd-funding, the book is a joy to hold and behold – a high-quality hardback printed on glossy paper, with beautifully atmospheric black and white illustrations by Barney Bodoano.

But what about the collection itself? Shadows at the Door prefers its horrors subtle and favours stories with an old-fashioned touch. The thirteen tales in this anthology are mostly in the tradition of M.R. James and other purveyors of the “classic ghost story” – K.B. Goddard in particular (represented by A Macabre Melody) even manages to evoke the language beloved of late-Victorian authors. This is not to say that there are no grisly moments or sudden eruptions of violence (for instance in Mark Nixon’s own contributionQuem Infra Nos or in J.C. Michael’s Gytrash), but the emphasis is on atmospheric storytelling, where the horrors are implied rather than crudely spelt out. The types of haunting portrayed are varied – whilst some of the tales are clearly ghost stories (including one of my favourites – Caitlin Marceau’s moving Run) others touch upon dark fantasy (Christopher Long’s The Gallow Glass), fairytale (Deep by M. Regan) or folk horror (Pete Alex Harris’s Under Shiel Croft). Most of the stories have a strong sense of place. Indeed, the various settings range from English towns to the Scottish Highlands, New York and Melbourne and provide not just the backdrop to the action but, in some cases, a folk legend or tradition which serves as a germ of inspiration.

Published December 14, 2016 by Shadows at the Door Publishing

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I'll leave you with a track by composer Stephen Montague:  A crippled ghost at Halloween.  Sweet dreams.