Monday 21 April 2014

Balintore Fiction

My friend Madeleine has written a short ghost story about Balintore Castle. It is based on a story that her parents made up to scare her. Because Madeleine to too young to be a blogger, she has asked me to put the story on my blog! 

The New Servant


There was a new servant at Balintore Castle. Mae was her name; she looked of the wild sort, messy hair, twinkling eyes, merry laugh but she was hopeless. Victoria the housekeeper would have to confine her to the kitchen even though she was she was the house maid. The kitchen maid was always frowning at her or shaking her head and even though Mae seemed always happy, she felt excluded from all the other servants.

David Lyon was coming to the castle for autumn shooting and the place needed tidying up. Victoria shoved Mae out of the kitchen, thinking she would trip and fall in the jelly or put salt in the cake instead of sugar, and told her to make herself useful by dusting the top room of the great tower. Mae climbed the never ending circle of spiral stairs armed with dusters and brooms. Reaching the top, Mae busied herself with sweeping away the dust.

She glanced at the window, it was a horrific sight to anyone who was a servant or had been in domestic service. You could not see anything, the dirt and grime covered the glass and filth ran in streaks over the wood. Mae set to work and after an hour there was no improvement. She opened the window thinking the problem was on the outside, the window started to clear. But lo!

The wood was slightly unstable and she slipped and fell to her death. Her ghost still haunts the tower replaying the moment just before she died.

1 comment:

  1. Well, twist at the end there Madeleine! I was not expecting such a final ending, very cool! Better than having Mr. Lyon falling in love with her because of her window cleaning skills, which would have been the old fashioned way to go. Very gripping, I look forward to reading more tales of the Castle. Thank you :)

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