THE CUPBOARD
A CASE OF HAUNTINGS NEAR BIRMINGHAM
People often wonder why new houses--houses without any apparent
history--should suddenly begin to be haunted, often by a variety of
very alarming phenomena, and then, just as suddenly, perhaps, cease to
be haunted.
Of course one can only theorise, but I think a very possible and
feasible reason is suggested, in the case I am about to relate.
Five years ago Sir George Cookham was living at "The Mayfields," a
large country house some ten or twelve miles south-east of Birmingham.
He was greatly interested in criminology, inclining to the belief that
crime is almost entirely due to physical malformation; and used to
invite all the great experts on the subject to stay with him. It was
one week-end, towards the middle of September, that Dr. Sickertorft
came; and he and Sir George had some very heated arguments. Sir George
was one of the most eccentric men I have ever met, and one of his many
idiosyncrasies was to carry on his discussions walking.
On the morning of Sickertorft's departure he and Sir George were
arguing--Sir George, at the same time, perambulating the corridor of
the ground floor of the house, for about the hundredth time--when Dr.
Sickertorft suddenly remarked: "I wonder if this house is haunted?"
"Haunted!" Sir George laughed. "Why, of course not. It's new. My father
built it only sixty years ago. A house to be haunted must be old, must
have some history. And the only tragedy that has occurred here was when
a servant I once had, losing control of his temper, killed one of my
most valuable dogs. That was a tragedy, both for the servant and the
dog. There has been nothing else to my knowledge--nothing beyond one or
two quite peaceful deaths from natural causes. But why do you ask?"
"Because," Sickertorft replied, "that cupboard over there, opposite
the foot of the stairs, to me, strongly suggests a ghost. Something
peculiarly diabolical. Something that springs out on one and imparts
the sensation of being strangled."
"The only ghosts that haunt that cupboard," Sir George chuckled, "are
boots and shoes, and, I believe, my fishing rods. Ghosts are all a
delusion--a peculiar state of the brain due to some minute osseous
depression or cerebral inflammation."
"I don't agree with you," Sickertorft said quietly. "I am positively
certain that there are such things as ghosts, that they are objective
and of many kinds. Some, in all probability, have always existed,
and have never inhabited any human body; some are the earth-bound
spiritual egos of man and beast; and some we can create ourselves."
"Create ghosts!" Sir George cried. "Come, now, we are talking sense. Of
course we can create ghosts. Pepper did, Maskelyne and Devant still do,
and so do all the so-called materialising mediums."
"I don't mean spoof ghosts," Sickertorft responded. "I mean real ones.
Real superphysical, objective phenomena. Man can at times create them,
but only by intense concentration."
"You mean materialised thought forms?"
"If you like to term them such," Sickertorft replied. "I believe they
are responsible for a certain percentage of hauntings, but not all."
"Well, I've never seen any of your ghostly thought forms nor, in my
opinion, am I ever likely to," Sir George growled. "Show me one and
I'll believe. But you can't."
"I don't know so much," Sickertorft muttered, and, with his eyes still
on the cupboard, he followed Sir George into his study.
* * * * *
A week later Lucy, a maid at "The Mayfields," was walking past the
cupboard on her way to the dining-room, when something, as she
subsequently described it to the cook, came over her, and she ran for
her life.
"I didn't hear anything nor see anything," she explained. "I only felt
there was something nasty hiding there, ready to spring out."
The following night she had the same experience, and her terror was
so great that she ran shrieking into the dining-room, and it was some
moments before she could make any coherent statement. Lady Cookham was
very angry with her, and said it was all nonsense. There was nothing
whatever wrong with the cupboard, and, if it occurred again, she must
go. It did occur again, the very next night, and Lucy, without waiting
for her dismissal, gave notice. She said this time she heard a laugh, a
low chuckle, very sinister, and suggestive also of the utmost glee. The
door of the cupboard creaked and, she believed, opened a little; but
on this point she could not be absolutely certain. She only knew her
horror was infinitely greater than it had been on former occasions, and
that when she ran, she was convinced something very dreadful ran after
her.
The following evening, just about the same time, the butler went to the
cupboard for a pair of shoes. He had just picked them up, and was about
to go off with them, when someone breathed in his face. He sprang back
in astonishment, striking his head somewhat badly against the edge of
a shelf, whereupon there was a laugh--a short, sharp laugh, expressive
of the keenest satisfaction. This was too much for the butler. Dropping
the shoes, he dashed out of the cupboard and never ceased running till
he was in the servants' quarters.
He told the housekeeper, and the housekeeper mentioned the matter to
the head parlourmaid; so that in a very short time the whole household
got to know of it, and the cupboard was given as wide a berth as
possible.
The next victim was the governess. Sir George had two children,
both girls, and at present they were too young to go to school. The
governess was a Cambridge graduate, who boasted of being utterly
materialistic and of having a supreme contempt for weak nerves, and, to
quote her own words, "poor simpletons who believe in ghosts."
She was passing the cupboard one evening, three nights after the
butler's experience, when an irresistible impulse came over her to
explore it. She opened the door and stepped inside, then someone closed
the door with a bang and laughed.
"Who are you?" the governess demanded. "Let me out at once. How dare
you!"
There was no reply, but when she stretched out her hand to feel for the
door, she encountered something very cold and spongy, and the horror of
it was so unexpected that she fainted.
In falling she struck the door violently. It flew open, and she was
found some seconds later in a state of semi-insensibility, lying half
in the cupboard and half across the corridor.
When Lady Cookham heard of what had happened, she was furious. "The
cupboard can't be haunted," she declared, "it's ridiculous. Someone is
playing us a trick. I'll call in the police."
The local inspector being summoned, examined the cupboard and
cross-questioned the servants. But he discovered nothing. Lady Cookham
now determined to unravel the mystery--if mystery there were--herself.
She gave all the servants save one--the new maid Hemmings, whom she
had engaged in the place of Lucy--a fortnight's holiday, and got in a
supply cook from Coventry. The governess was allowed to remain, but she
was strictly forbidden to go anywhere near the cupboard after midday.
When evening arrived, Lady Cookham, arming herself with a revolver and
horsewhip, commenced to watch. Her first vigil passed uneventfully; but
the next night, just as she had arrived at the cupboard and was taking
up her stand facing it, the door slowly began to open. Lady Cookham is
about as good a specimen of the thoroughly practical, strong-minded
English sportswoman as one could meet anywhere. Up to the commencement
of the present war she rode regularly with the Pytchley hounds, had a
cold douche bath every morning, and spent a month at least every summer
yachting in the English Channel.
She had never known fear--never, at least, until now. "Who's there?"
she demanded. "You had better speak sharp, or I'll fire!"
There was no reply, however, and the door continued opening.
Had she seen anything, she doesn't think she would have been so
frightened, but there was nothing--absolutely nothing visible. Her
impressions were, however, that something was coming out, and that that
something was nothing human.
It moved stealthily towards her--and she could define a soft clinging
tread, just as if it had tentacles that kept adhering to the boards.
She tried to press the trigger of the revolver, but her muscles refused
to act, and when she opened her mouth to shout she could not articulate
a sound. It was now close to her. One of its large, clammy feet touched
her, and she could feel its clammy, pungent breath fanning the top of
her head.
Then something icy cold and indescribably repulsive sought her throat
and slowly began to throttle her. She tried to beat it off and to make
some kind of noise to attract help, but it was all to no purpose.
She was powerless. The grip tightened. All the blood in her veins
congealed--her lungs expanded to the verge of bursting; and then,
when the pain and horror reached its climax, and the identity of the
hellish creature seemed about to reveal itself, there was a loud crack,
and with it the acme of her sufferings, the final conscious stage
of excruciating asphyxiation passed, and she relapsed into apparent
death. She supposes that, for the first time in her life, she must have
fainted. The crack was the report of her revolver. In her acute agony,
her fingers had closed convulsively over the trigger, and the weapon
had exploded.
The noise proved her salvation. No psychic phenomena can stand violent
vibration, and Sir George Cookham, arriving on the scene at the sound
of the report, found his wife lying on the ground unconscious, but
alone. He heard her story, and refused to be convinced.
"It's a case of suggestion," he argued. "Lucy was a highly strung,
imaginative girl. She had, in all probability, been reading spook
tales, and hearing a noise in the cupboard had at once attributed the
sound to ghosts. That was quite enough for Wilkins. Servants are ready
to believe anything--especially if it is propagated by one of their
own class. Miss Dennis is a hypochondriac. All governesses must be.
The nature of their work necessitates it. She heard a well-garnished
account of what was supposed to have happened from Wilkins, probably
from Lucy too, and the neurotic state of her nerves did the rest. Of
course when it comes to you, my dear," he said, "it is more difficult
to understand. But as there are no such things as ghosts--as they are a
scientific impossibility--it must have been suggestion."
"I'm certain it was not," Lady Cookham retorted, "and I'm going to
leave the house and take the children with me. It's not right for them
to stay."
Sir George protested, but Lady Cookham had her own way, and in less
than a fortnight there were notices in the _Field_, and other papers,
to say that "The Mayfields" was to be let furnished.
"We'll give it a year's trial," Lady Cookham said, "and, if the people
who take it are not disturbed by anything unusual happening, we will
conclude the hauntings are at an end and return."
A few days after this conversation Sir George met Dr. Sickertorft on
the platform of Coventry Station. Though the day was almost sultry, the
doctor was muffled up in an overcoat, and appeared very pale and thin.
"So you are leaving 'The Mayfields,'" Sickertorft remarked. "Has the
ghost been too much for you?"
"Ghost!" Sir George cried angrily, "what the deuce do you mean? We have
let the house for awhile, but not on account of any ghost. My wife
wants to be nearer London."
"Then the stories that have got afloat are all moonshine," Sickertorft
replied, with a smile, "and you are still just as sceptical as ever."
"I am," Sir George responded; "and if you hear any more reports about
'The Mayfields' being haunted, kindly contradict them."
Sickertorft smiled. "I will make a bet, Sir George," he said, "that you
will be converted one day."
"You may bet as much as you like, but you'll lose," Sir George answered
furiously. And turning his back on Sickertorft, he walked away from him
without another word.
The following day Lady Cookham and the children left, and Sir George
finding himself the sole occupant of the house, the servants having
left at midday, telephoned to Sydney N. Morgan, a well-known private
detective who specialised in cases of theft and blackmail, asking him
to come. On his arrival at "The Mayfields" that same evening, Morgan
listened to all Sir George had to say, and then made an exhaustive
examination of the premises, paying particular attention to the
cupboard in the hall.
"Well?" Sir George asked. "What is your opinion? Rats?"
"Not human ones, at any rate," Morgan replied. "Anyhow, I can find no
traces of them. I incline to your theory of nerves."
"Imagination first and then suggestion." Sir George grunted. Now that
he was alone there with the detective, he began to have misgivings. The
house seemed strangely large and silent. But ghosts! Bah! There were no
such things. He said as much to Morgan, and they both laughed.
Then they stared at one another in amazement, for, from afar off, there
came an answering echo, a faint yet distinctly audible--chuckle.
They were standing at one end of the corridor on the ground floor when
this happened, and to both of them the sound seemed to emanate from the
cupboard. "What was that?" Sir George asked. "The wind?"
"It may have been," Morgan said dubiously, "but there's no getting away
from the fact that it was a queer noise for the wind to make. I made
sure I looked everywhere."
"I'll go upstairs and get my revolver," Sir George observed. "It may
come in handy. Will you remain here?"
They looked at one another furtively, and each thought they saw fear in
the other's eyes.
Both, however, had reputations to sustain.
"I'll wait down here, Sir George," Morgan said, "and keep an eye on the
cupboard. You'll call if you want me."
"I will," Sir George replied. "I shan't be gone more than a minute.
Be on your guard. It's just about this time the alleged disturbances
begin."
He hurried off, and Morgan watched his long legs cross the hall and
hastily ascend the main staircase. The hall occupied a large space in
the centre of the house, and overlooking it was a gallery connecting
the east and west wings.
Sir George's room--that is to say, the room he was reserving for
himself on this occasion--was in the east wing, the first to be reached
from the gallery, and Morgan could almost see it from where he stood in
the hall. His gaze was still fixed on Sir George's retreating figure
when a noise from behind him made him turn hurriedly round, and he
distinctly saw the cupboard door open a few inches. Moving towards the
cupboard, he then saw, as the door opened wider, a huge indefinable
something emerge from it. Morgan admits that the most sublime terror
seized him, and that he shrank back convulsively against the wall,
totally unable to do anything but stare. The shape came towards him
with a slow, shambling gait, and Morgan was at length able to compare
it with an enormous fungus. It had arms and legs truly, but they were
disproportionately long and crooked, and hardly seemed to belong to the
body.
There was no apparent head. The whole thing was vague and misty, but
suggestive of the greatest foulness and antagonism. Morgan's horror
was so great as it passed him that he believes his heart practically
stopped beating, and so tightly had he clenched his hands that the
print of his finger nails remained on his palms for days afterwards. It
left him in time, however, and he watched it shuffle its unwholesome
way across the hall and surreptitiously begin to ascend the staircase.
He tried to shout to Sir George to put him on his guard, but his voice
refused to act and he could do nothing.
Up and up it went, until at last it reached the gallery and crept
onward into the east wing.
He then heard Sir George cry out, "Hullo, Morgan! Is that you?
Anything----" There was then a moment of the most intense silence,
and then a shriek. Morgan says it was like a woman's shriek--it was
so shrill, so uncontrolled, so full of the most abject terror. For
a moment it completely paralysed Morgan, but he seems then to have
partially recovered. Anyhow, he pulled himself sufficiently together to
run up the stairs and arrive outside Sir George's door in time to hear
sounds of a most violent struggle. Tables, chairs, washstand, crockery,
were all hurled to the ground, as Sir George raced round and round the
room in his desperate efforts to escape. Once he caught hold of the
handle of the door and turned it furiously. "Let me out!" he shrieked.
"For mercy's sake let me out!" and again Morgan heard him rush to the
window and pound madly on the glass.
Then there came another spell of silence--short and emphatic--then a
shriek that far eclipsed anything Morgan had hitherto heard, and then a
voice--a man's voice, but certainly not Sir George's--which, speaking
in sharp, jerky sentences that conveyed with them a sense of strange
far-offness, said: "You'll believe now, Sir George. You'll believe now.
Damn you, you'll believe now!" Then there were sounds as if someone was
being shaken very violently to and fro, and Morgan, utterly unable to
stand it any longer, turned tail and--fled.
* * * * *
When Morgan returned some half an hour later, accompanied by the
lodge-keeper and one of the under-gardeners, they found Sir George
lying in a heap on the floor--unconscious. He did not die, however,
neither did he go mad; but his heart was badly affected, and he
subsequently developed fits.
Nothing would induce him to describe what had actually taken place,
and this, added to the fact that he never again set foot within "The
Mayfields," caused his friends to draw their own conclusions. Morgan
told me all about it, and I at once wrote to Dr. Sickertorft. I was too
late, however; Dr. Sickertorft had been dead some weeks--he had died
of cerebral tuberculosis exactly three months after Morgan's visit to
"The Mayfields." I was informed that he attributed the fatal malady to
supernormal concentration.