Secrets

“Marissa!”
Run…
“Marissa!”
“Leave me be!”
Darkness-
“Leave me be!”

I woke up in the dark.

Catherine…Catherine…

Something crept around my heart- it had cold tendrils, gripped tighter, and tighter still.

Mother, Mother- please come! I prayed. Father, Mother, Hannah- come, quickly!

CatherineI

t was getting stronger. An unearthly voice- a voice that sent chills up my spine- a voice I could not stand any longer- a tortured voice- a human voice!I buried my face into my pillow. Perhaps things would be back to foolishness in the morning. There would be a world without- no, it would be with daylight.

Catherine!

With a muffled cry, I pulled my covers over my head. A chill wind swept through the room, throwing my covers off. I saw, momentarily, a transparent figure standing above me- beckoning, beckoning. I screamed- and all went black.

-

“Is the Miss all right?”

A damp sponge dabbed at my face.

“Grace, this never happened until we left Charlottetown, you know that to be true!”

“Be quiet, Simon, she is stirring.”

“What did the Miss see?”

With a small groan, I opened my eyes. Mother, Father and Hannah were all standing in my room, Mother holding a candle and looking shocked, Father looking worried and still wearing his nightcap. “

Catherine, what did you see?” asked Father.

I tried to tell them- I opened my mouth, but all that came out was a hoarse gush of air.

I saw a ghost, I tried to say. Let me go home- let me leave!

“I will stay,” said Mother, and held my hand. We sat in silence until the sun rose over the quiet morning.

-

“The Miss doesn’t want to go outside?” asked Hannah, concerned, as she dusted the cabinet in the seventh spare room. I shook my head, numbly. I was scared I should see the shadow again- I saw it even now, but it would be so much worse without Hannah. She was an absolute rock, and didn’t see a thing, and I had never been gladder for such things.

“The Mistress is out in the garden, and the Master is looking for more workers down in the village,” Hannah continued. Then she looked at me, half afraid. “The Miss doesn’t mind- holding th’ duster while I check on the silver?”

Smiling, I shook my head and held out my hand. Hannah gave a sigh of relief.

“One never knows when the goods’re about ter go missin’,” she said, gloomily, but after counting, it transpired that no silver had disappeared in the dead of the night. “Wonder what that thief was after,” she added, furiously, “scarin’ you like that! And what a woman the Mistress- well- to put silver in the spare room!” she muttered, half to herself. “Silver in the spare room!”

“It wasn’t a thief,” I burst out, “it was a ghost!” I was ashamed the moment I said it, for Hannah burst into laughter.

“A ghost!” she cried, “’Tis the best joke I’ve heard since comin’ here! The Miss is too superstitious! A ghost!” A sudden gust of wind rustled through the room, and I instinctively stepped closer to Hannah. The very blood of my heart seemed chilled.

Catherine, the wind called.

Catherine…

“Hannah,” I pleaded, but she merely cast me a stern look and continued dusting the cabinet.

“What a gust,” she said, “the drapes are faulty. What is the Mistress doing, not going to the village with the Master to buy new curtains?” Huffing, she set back to work. I followed her, very closely. Looking back at the room, I saw a little crack in the cabinet. Hannah had not seen it whilst dusting and polishing.

“Hannah,” I called, but she did not reply. I turned back to the cabinet-

And saw a faint cloud of dust, stationary, wavering in the sunlight.

I hurried on; making sure that Hannah was never more than a foot away from me.

-

The crack in the polish stayed on my mind, and refused to leave me alone. I thought of it, at every waking moment. I could see it with my very eye- that tiny chink in the smooth mahogany- there was nothing between the cabinet and myself.

Yet I was being foolish, I was sure of it.

As for the cloud of dust, had not Hannah been dusting the cabinet minutes before I turned to look at her?

“What’s the Miss looking at?” asked Hannah in consternation the next day, as I stood to look at the spare room once more.

“There is a crack in the cabinet,” I stammered. “I wondered if you’d noticed-“

Hannah looked offended. “’Tisn’t my job that isn’t well done, there’s a drawer! Didn’t the Miss see that it can be opened?”

I didn’t realise how hard my heart had been thudding until it suddenly went silent.

“A drawer?” I echoed, my heart turning to lead. Hannah fixed me with a steely look.

“Accusin’ me of not doin’ my job! The Mistress and Master wouldn’t ha’ kept me if I scratched their furniture!”

She marched across the hall to the room, and fiddled briefly with the cabinet. The crack sprang forwards, and left a very obvious, very blank drawer.

“Oh,” I said, and felt very stupid.

“I’m sorry, I never doubted you,” I quickly apologised, but she humphed.

As she closed the drawer, though, I noticed something in the back. A tiny line, a thin crack. And a small cloud of dust, shaped in the figure of a person- beckoning.

A/N: I’m having difficulty writing Catherine- she’s becoming very annoying. The whole mystery/Gothic genre is one that I’m just attempting for the first time, and I have a feeling that my writing is rather cliché and expected, so apologies if anyone else found the same. At any rate, I hope that you gained some enjoyment out of this!