The Ghost House - (Chapter 6)

That night, I had a nightmare, the first one since I was in primary three, I woke up shaking at 3.25am, I could see the  luminous hands of my Timex watch, which I kept on in bed, last year’s Christmas present from Grandma and Granda.

Luckily, I hadn’t woken Mum and Dad, or so I thought.

Most people didn't remember their dreams, but I always did, I have written some of them down in a notebook which I kept in the drawer of my bedside cabinet.

It was like last night only it wasn’t,it was different, darker than usual.

I was walking down the Dachshund Hill, it was raining heavily, the lightning was flashing and the thunder was rumbling like the kettle drums in the school orchestra. I picked up pace when I heard something behind me, (although I am 10, I am still scared of dogs ) maybe the Dachshund scampering out from its owners’ garden path. Maybe some Kings North equivalent of the ‘Hound of the Baskervilles’ , or  of Dennis the Menace 's 'Gnasher' terrorizing the kids of Kings North, some hellish  dark beast from the pages of the books and comics I loved so much. An insistent rustling sound was now coming from the ‘Bushies’ as we called them ,the rhododendrons, there was certainly an animal of some sort  in there , I could see its breath in the air, and heard the noise of it all around me.

The storm was becoming  worse and I looked up and saw a light on in the Ghost House, the lightning flashed and the thunder rolled, and I was sure I saw a face up at the window of the place.

I ran up to the window, soaked through  by now, and through the cracked pane I saw, a skeleton  clad  in a black cloak, the Face of Death maybe, this apparition was moving towards me  in its haphazard way, like the  animated skeletons in ‘Jason and the Argonauts’. I could have sworn that it spoke, or groaned, I was sure I  heard the name 'Sam' uttered by the thing. Was this my ghost? Was I going to die if I was caught?

I didn’t get to find out, as I woke up. It wasn’t real, just a dream, a nightmare.

The following morning, neither Mum nor Dad mentioned it.

I was off the hook, I thought, until she announced that I was to be grounded for the next couple of weeks, and if I was to be out at night, Dad would drive me, in the new car, our second hand Morris Minor. It wasn’t as flashy as Alan’s Dad’s Ford Capri, but would get us from ‘A to B’, and that was the main thing.

Maybe getting lifts  would allow me to get Dad on his own, and ask him outright if he believed in ghosts. He had seen one when he was a kid, in the ‘40s, in the church of all places, the ‘Blue Lady’, she was called. His library books were always about the supernatural, ghosts and poltergeists by someone called Colin Wilson, books like Eric Von Daniken’s ‘Chariots of the Gods’, and books about the Loch Ness Monster. Mum was always on at him about this, and her library books were always what she called ‘family sagas’ , which I think were stories like programmes on TV like ‘Emmerdale Farm’ and ‘Coronation Street’ . They didn’t interest me, that’s what old folk liked.

If I was to be grounded for a couple of weeks , I would write some new ghost stories, I had a folder full of about twenty stories, which I thought were as good as the Fontana books, though I am always told that 'self praise is no honour', I still think they are good. ‘The Ghost House’ was my favourite, except mine was set in the 19^th century, and a bit different to what was going on in King’s North.

Alan and I would soon solve the mystery, like Shaggy and Scooby, and their pals, but our ‘Mystery Machine’ , would have to be our bikes for the moment, as neither of us would be old enough to drive for a while.

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