By May 1943, Albert Crockford – Bert to all who knew him – had already seen more of the war than he could ever have wanted to. And he was still just 23.

He had lived through Dunkirk and been wounded at El Alamein. He considered himself to be quite a tough little fellow really, not easily scared. And the three corporals he was bunked down with had their own horror stories. No, they were a tough bunch alright.

Just released from one hospital, Bert found himself posted to yet another, just on the outskirts of Alexandria, but this time it was quite different. The imposing Victorian building had once served as a school for wealthy Egyptian children and had been converted to temporary use as a military hospital.

Bert and his pals Biggy, Neville and Joe, would have been pleased to be anywhere in the imposing building with its vast, landscaped gardens, but they were especially pleased with their room. It was one of two built into the corners at the top of the flat-roofed building. It was cool up there, a breeze constantly wafting through the three airy windows. And it was quiet, too.

In the past, the rooms had been used for storage by the teachers and there was still one relic of those days: a huge, heavy, wooden box with a hinged lid. This box sat outside the window by Bert’s bed and the men used it as a seat for the odd cigarette before they went to sleep. It also made a convenient dustbin, although they had been forced to put a cardboard box inside it so it could be emptied out more easily.

All in all, it was not a bad life, considering that the war was still raging. But on May 28, something happened...

The men were all propped up on their beds at around 11pm, having a last chat and cigarette before turning in for the night, when they heard the box being dragged away.

“Some bugger’s trying to steal our box!” they yelled and ran to the door of their room. It was a clear, moonlit night. They could see all the way across the roof to the other hut and the top of the illuminated staircase. And there was no one there. But the box had been pulled five feet away from the wall.

The four did not quite know what to do. There was clearly no one around and eventually they decided to go back to bed, assuming that if it were a prankster, he’d be back. They chatted for a while, ruling out the possibility that wind blew the box – it would have taken a hurricane to move that box! There didn’t seem to be many other plausible explanations and they soon fell silent.

The minutes seemed to tick by in slow motion. Without saying a word to each other, all four realised that something else was going to happen. Twenty minutes had passed by, though, and the men were just beginning to doze off when the noise started up again, a relentless, scraping noise.

This time, the men wasted no time. Rather than run to the door, they leapt up onto Bert’s bed and peered anxiously out of the window. There was nothing. And yet the box was this time even further away, closer to the parapet wall.

The men searched everywhere, knowing how futile it was even as they did so. After all, there was nowhere for anyone to be concealed, not even any shadows for the ‘person’ to hide in. Still, they looked wherever they could, even on the roof of their room. Nothing.

Then one of them mentioned that it was getting close to midnight.

Terrific. Now they were terrified out of their wits! They shut the door and found some excuse to leave the lights on. And then they waited, deadly sure that something was about to happen.

This time, they did not have to wait long. The box again started its journey, scraping and grating against the rough floor tiles. The men sat bolt upright, hardly able to breathe, the hairs on the back of their necks bristling uncomfortably.

The dragging seemed to last an eternity. But they suddenly heard a gentle thump as the box hit the edge of the parapet and there was then a deafening silence. It did not last long, however. It was soon pierced by a hideous scream, a hysterical laugh and then silence once again.

The scream had come from outside the far window; below it there was only a 50 foot drop down to the ground.

Bert and the others thought that the prankster must have fallen over the edge of the wall, even though the parapet was at least four feet high. They snapped out of the trance that they had fallen into while listening to the box and ran outside.

There was still nobody around but the box was now further away, up against the wall. It looked perfectly normal, and yet they shuddered, an icy finger running up their spines.

They steeled themselves to look over, sure that they would see a broken body three floors below. Bert could not even begin to express their relief when they realised that there was nothing there. The sound of that horrifying scream still echoed in their ears and yet no curious lights were switched on below. The hospital slumbered peacefully.

It was a long night, the men haunted by the unexplainable noise and that scream...

They didn’t even want to think about it.

The days passed and no one at the hospital mentioned any strange noises. The men gradually forgot about it. Until a few weeks later.

Bert had gone down to the hospital laundry to collect his uniform and he got into a conversation with one of the Arabs who worked there. He was a pleasant fellow and Bert was impressed by his English. The Egyptian mentioned that his father used to work as a gardener for the school when he was still a young boy.

Thinking of the lush, beautiful gardens, Bert mentioned casually that it must have been a pleasant place to work. And the Egyptian agreed, adding that not everyone thought so, though. He said he remembered that his father had come home once, rather excited about some terrible news. It seemed that the previous night, one of the teachers had dragged a table or something from the roof hut to the edge of the parapet and leapt to his death.

Bert could get no more information out of the man. He had only been a little boy when his father had told him the story and his father had since died. And yet, Bert felt the cold shiver brush down his spine once again as he realised that he would now never be able to forget that dreadful, scraping noise.

This is the 15th 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.