Jennifer was not ready to sleep alone. She was only five years old and her older sister’s rhythmic breathing was a great comforter. Plus through the open door of her bedroom, she could see her parents’ room across the corridor.
But one night, something happened that was to terrify her, something which caused her to fear dark nights for years to come.
She was woken up by something – she does not remember it as noise, rather as a presence. When she opened her eyes, she felt something behind her and leapt down to the bottom of her bed. When she turned round, she saw an elderly woman hunched over her shoulders. The woman seemed to be hovering in the air, with both her arms outstretched, fingers clawed towards her. She was old and gaunt, although not ugly.
Jennifer did what any five-year-old would do. She screamed. She clambered off the end of her bed and ran across the corridor. Her sister woke up, startled, and also leapt out of bed and ran towards her parents’ room.
Because it was dark, her eyes had not yet focused and Jennifer saw her pass straight through the ghostly image. Her sister felt the icy coldness as she passed and it was only then that she turned round, by then fully awake, and saw the woman.
Jennifer’s mother jumped out of her bed as soon as she heard the screaming and met Jennifer in the corridor. Her hand instinctively went for the light switch and she suddenly found herself with one screaming child under each arm.
“It’s alright,” she muttered. “You’ve just had a nightmare.”
But the girls could not be soothed. Both swore that they had seen the woman and that her image had been sucked under a chair and faded into nothingness as soon as the light had gone on.
The mother did her best to calm them down but both the girls were haunted by the image they knew they had seen. For years, Jennifer was unable to sleep properly.
The ghost was never seen again. And yet her sister says that their cats would often get wild when she was preparing their food. All their fur would rise and they would start dashing this way and that, trying to get out of the house whichever way they could. Various other odd things happened but nothing that could not be explained away.
She was woken up by something – she does not remember it as noise, rather as a presence
When she was about 12, the family moved. It was then, and only then, that her mother admitted that she too had seen the ghost that night. She had never said anything about it because the girls had obviously been upset enough. But she too had been upset. After all, she knew who the woman was.
Years before, she and her husband had been looking for a house to buy and had gone to see a house in Sliema. The couple who lived there had decided to emigrate to Canada and had made all their plans and arrangements. But her mother still lived in the house, old and frail and in need of constant attention. They could not bear to put her into a home and so had decided to wait until she died.
But she lingered and lingered, wavering on the edge of death, and they were beginning to worry about whether the opportunities in Canada would soon slip away. The love that kept them from putting her into a home was turning into ill-concealed impatience. But eventually, the old lady died and they left, passing the house over to Jennifer’s parents. But the old lady’s spirit must have lingered just a while longer, for it was her image that Jennifer’s mother had recognised.
Jennifer’s mother had another experience with the ‘other world’. When she was young, a few years before the war, she used to go to her favourite godmother’s for tea. At that time, ouija boards were all the rage and they would often tinker with it, perhaps not fully aware of what they were doing. They were probably totally surprised and terrified when the board started responding. The spirit warned, letter by letter, that her godmother should have the ceiling checked.
They were totally bewildered. Why would a spirit contact them with such a prosaic request? But her godmother felt that it must be important and had an architect brought in. He carefully surveyed the ceiling and said that it was not in need of any major restoration but the godmother insisted and various works were carried out.
Both Jennifer’s mother and her godmother were in the house during a series of air-raids once the war started. The endless bombardment sent shockwaves through the row of houses. The tremors finally proved too much for the old buildings and they collapsed, all except for the godmother’s. Thanks to the reinforced ceiling, it withstood the shocks.
This is the sixth in a series of short stories The Sunday Times of Malta is running every Sunday. It is taken from The Unexplained Plus (Allied Publications) by Vanessa Macdonald. The first edition was published in 2001 and reprinted twice. It was republished, with added stories, as The Unexplained Plus. The Maltese version of the book, Ta’ Barra Minn Hawn (Klabb Kotba Maltin), is available from all leading bookstores and stationers and from www.bdlbooks.com.