It’s time for the second installment in our Annual Halloween Story Contest. We have more great entries in store for you this week!
We’ll also be holding a Halloween photo contest on Facebook; you can email your favorite Halloween photo to support@wanderer.com. Deadline for entry is November 2, so plan ahead for a chance to win. If you haven’t already, you can check out our Facebook page at www.facebook.com/wanderer.
Online voting is now taking place fro our Cover Contest and will continue until to October 27. The winner will be on the cover of the October 30 edition of The Wanderer. For details on entering, visit www.wanderer.com and click on Halloween Contests.
Here’s this week’s selection from our Halloween Story Contest!
Halloween Story Contest #7
The Fisherman
It was dark, eerie, and very foggy night 100 years ago on Halloween. John Barstow lived in a sleepy town called Mattapoisett. He was at the Ned’s Point light house walking home from his friend’s house. As he looked over the water, he made out a trail of footprints in the cement leading to the end of the road where the harsh waves encountered the solid land. John, being curious, followed them. When he got to the edge, he was surprised to find the footprints suddenly stop. There was no trail back, but still nobody was there. That was why John was startled when he heard the sound of footsteps behind him. He turned suddenly and examined the almost empty beach. All he saw was an abandoned dingy. Creeped out enough for one night, John decided to go home. That was when he was pushed into the water. As he gasped for breath trying to get out of the water, he got a glimpse of a fisherman rowing away and disappearing into the waves.
Five years later, he was seen again in a dingy one stormy night by the captain of a tugboat. The tugboatman tried to rescue the fisherman who kept disappearing off of Strawberry Point. The waves were wild. The tugboat stalled, and a massive wave capsized the vessel onto Winnatuxett Beach in front of a deserted shanty house. No one ever found the fisherman. The captain’s name was Elijah Barstow.
Ten years later, the shanty on the beach lay untouched. A teenager named Michael decided to see what secrets the house held. He had lived in the town all his life and was curious why the house was empty. He stood at the bottom of the porch as he took his first step up the stairs. A loose floorboard creaked like it was sending a warning message to the rest of the house. He had to force himself to walk to the door. It was painted black and was scratched up. He was paying close attention to it, because he did not know what to do next. He opened the door and walked down the hallway. When he turned a corner, he was knocked off his feet. When he woke up, he looked up and saw a picture of a fisherman. Then he realized something. It wasn’t a picture, but a mirror. He turned around, but no one was there. He turned back to the mirror, and saw the fisherman reappeared. He started to run for the door, but he didn’t make it. He didn’t know what happened to him when he woke up on the beach the next morning. Michael’s last name was Barstow.
The fisherman chose his next target who was a boy about 7 years old, his name was Evan. He was scared by this figure. Though everyone knew about this mysterious fisherman, nobody knew him. Evan Barstow had heard the legend about the fisherman but never knew why he had targeted his family until one fateful day. Evan was on a field trip to the history museum and saw the document. It was the journal of Welch O’Bran who was on a boat designed by a Barstow ancestor. The vessel sank due to a mistake in the design. Welch survived, but his wife drowned. He lived for several years later, but he lived in anger. On his deathbed he promised that he would avenge his wife by haunting the Barstow family. And he did. Every generation of the Barstow family felt Welch’s touch after his death.
From the time that Evan learned about Welch, Evan saw the fisherman every night before he went to sleep. He saw him sitting on the bench at Ned’s Point from his bedroom window. When Evan married and had children, the fisherman had taken advantage by trying to spook his children. Evan learned this and decided to move but the memory of the fisherman haunted him no matter where he went. And til this day the fisherman has still been waiting on the bench for the Barstows to return.
Halloween Story Contest #8
The Last Halloween
Neighbors claimed the house was haunted, but Avery and Ken thought it looked it okay. Ken stood on the porch of the decrepit, abandoned house afraid to ring the doorbell on this Halloween night. “Avery … something isn’t quite right about this house. I don’t need my candy that much … We should just go to the next house,” Ken stumbled over his words as a cold shiver ran up his back.
“There’s no such thing as ghosts. Just go get your candy, so that I can be home by eight.” Avery sighed in annoyance. She was frustrated by the fact that on Halloween night she had to take Ken, her baby brother, Trick-or-Treating.
The aged, moldy, musty door creaked open as Ken knocked upon it. Eager to find out what was behind the weathered door, he decided to go in. “Ken wait! Don’t go in there!” Avery hollered with shivering fright. Unfortunately, her pleas came moments after Ken already went in. Worried, and scared as can be, Avery followed. The house was crawling with all kinds of insects and even some wild animals. The wooden boards on the floor were curling up. The sound of howls came from all over. Avery was praying it was just the wind. She felt that something or someone was behind her, but every time she looked back – there was nothing.
Avery paused for a moment, “Ken, is that you?” She searched the place, and yet there was no sign of Ken. Sweat dripped down her face.
“Ken, Ken, Ken! Where on Earth are you?” Avery exclaimed, shaking with terror. There was no reply. As Avery crept up the stairs, she saw a shadow. Racing into the dusty master bedroom, she found the unexpected. Something scarier than she thought possible. Ken was sleeping there, next to someone. That someone was now a something – an aged, slightly decomposed skeleton. Ken jumped up.
“This house is haunted!” Ken whispered as the color drained from his face.
“You’re just noticing that?” Avery questioned the lack of her brother’s awareness. “Let’s get out of here before anything else happens.” They both rushed and stumbled down the stairs. Once they were on the first floor, they bolted for the doors. The doors surprisingly didn’t open. When they pushed on the doors Avery and Ken heard a strange voice.
It creepily, cackled. “Hehe, hehe, hehe, you little children aren’t leaving here for a long time, long, long, time,” the voice bellowed.
“Aghhh!” Ken and Avery both screamed as if their life depended on it. All of a sudden they saw a weird shadow. They went over to the shadow to examine further. Ken and Avery walked directly over to the odd shadow only to find Avery’s best friend in her cheerleading costume with the megaphone prop in her hand.
“How on Earth did you get in here if every door is shut?” Avery questioned.
“Um…” Avery’s friend, Katie, was hesitant. “At first I noticed you go in here, and I just wanted to talk to you. So, I followed you around until you had a free moment to talk. Then I realized you thought this house was haunted. I figured I would have some fun with it. I pretended to be a ghost, and I’m really sorry but it was incredibly humorous.”
“Oh, Thank goodness it was you. It’s okay. We forgive you. Right Ken?”Avery prompted.
“Yeah, I didn’t get my treat, but I did get a trick,” Ken responded. “How did you get that skeleton in the bed, anyway?”
Katie looked confused. “What skeleton?” The latch on the door made an audible, horrific sound as it latched into place.
Halloween Story Contest #9
Get Out of Me
I distinctly remember the moment when my body kicked me out. I hadn’t done wrong, really. I never hit myself or punished my body for no good reason – I never had the desire to do an Ironman or anything. It was the constant complaining about the little things that finally put my body over the edge. I had just taken a hot shower to ward off the aching joints that were lingering from a basketball game the night before. I looked in the mirror as I put in my contacts, grumbling to myself and saying sarcastically, “What a lovely pair of eyes I have, with the vision of a half-blind dog!”
Not that my vision was that bad. I had just missed a good percentage of my shots last night. In fact, my vision was just barely on the wrong side of needs corrective lenses to drive. But my body had had enough. ‘That’s IT!’ I heard very clearly in my mind, ‘Get out of me!’
I was startled, but not nearly as much as when I tried to look in the mirror, only to find that I didn’t actually have eyes. I could see, but it was the murky vision of those shadowy waking dreams when you’re sick, when everything is thick and heavy and friends masquerade as demons in the dark. It was a sensing that I can only describe as seeing, for as I said, I didn’t have the optical sensors that my body had.
After adjusting to my surroundings, realizing that I was still standing, or at least existing, in front of the mirror, I tried to figure out what was going on. I looked out the bathroom window to see my body walking outside wearing only its towel! My first concern was that maybe the neighbors might see beneath the thin terrycloth … if my body gets in trouble then does the rest of me too? But then I realized a greater peril – my body was outside while I was not. I took a step toward the window, ready to call out, but there were two issues with this: one, I had not legs – that confounded body had them, and two, same with the vocal cords. Nonetheless, as I thought Hey, where are you going, my body turned to look at me, gave what I can only imagine was an unworldly cackle, and leapt the hedge with an agility I never would have attempted had I been in charge of my frame.
Now my problem was worsening. My body had acted on its own accord, leaving me physical-less and with no method of mobility. I looked and tried to feel my legs to walk, but they just weren’t there. I couldn’t see myself, not with this torrid vision. Though I tried to convince my lower appendages to be there and to get moving or my body would get away, they refused to exist. I must have stood there, legless, body-less, and helpless for an indefinite amount of time; I realized that light or dark didn’t matter; I was a shadow in the shade. I was like a mole or an earthworm in the light of day; what difference did it make? My vision was a matter of thought, not sight. And that’s when it hit me – of course I couldn’t walk!
All I had to do was think. So, I practiced thinking. Go to the Kitchen, I told myself, and somehow the world passed by me and I was in the kitchen. It was an odd sensation, not like walking or floating, but that dizzy vertigo feeling when you’re about to pass out from a high fever combined with that prickly sensation that occurs when your foot falls asleep. It would have made my body nauseous. I practiced going into different rooms in the house – I was still a bit timid of going outside – and each time I thought the woozy sensation would pass. But it never did. I decided to accept that, and since there was no danger of losing my lunch, I could live with it.
My next task was discovering what my body-less being was capable of. I had heard of poltergeists being able to throw dishes and whatnot, and I figured I was pretty close to one myself, though as far as I knew my body was still alive and kickin’. So I thought break that plate because I didn’t really want to wash it if I ever got back together with my body. But no matter how hard I thought, the plate continued to sit, nacho chunks and all, without even vibrating. Very frustrating. I decided to focus my energy on something more useful – walking through solids.
If I were ever to get out of here, I would have to first walk through a door or a wall or sink through the floor. My body had kindly shut the door behind him, so I couldn’t just wander after it. I looked at the paisleys on the Victorian wallpaper in the living room. Go through the paisleys I told myself. I felt the world melting past again, and then I was standing face to face with the wall.
What the hell? I had the right thought … so why couldn’t I? I tried several more times on different walls, windows, and doors. Nothing. I felt dejected, sinking even lower than the state I was in. And before I knew it, I was seeing close-up particles of wood as though they were in me. It took me a second to realize that my sinking thought had allowed me to sink most of the way into the basement, with only the top part of my head region above, and my face region stuck in the floor. I felt claustrophobic, dead, and strangely euphoric all at once.
I thought UP and I was back up on the floor again. I thought OUTSIDE and I was on my front lawn. Now that I could move, it was time to find my body.
My first thought was that my body would be doing something outlandishly silly that I would never have allowed it to do – like skydiving or visiting a brothel. I pondered this as I simultaneously thought of downtown, wondering where I would find either of those things. But then I wondered if my body knew what to do when it got hungry – especially since its only possession was a towel.
Scratch that. I found the towel across the road in my neighbor’s yard, currently finding other use as Bruno’s chew toy. Not an encouraging sign. Now I knew that all my parts were feeling the breeze completely unfettered and free. I’m sure my body would love that, although I was certain that the authorities would have a difficult time accepting the explanation that it offered. Actually, I didn’t even know if it could think. I was able to think but not feel. Did that mean that my body could feel but not think?
That would be the first question I asked it when I found it. Make that the second question. First, I would give it a proper What the hell? I left the dog growling at his non-existent intruder-me – and thought about where I was to go. The world floated through me gloomily for a while, houses blended into trees blended into cars blended into people. I had nothing to go by, no leads to follow.
After checking places like the local jail (I couldn’t rule that out, given the state of my body’s attire), the brewery, and even the club scene, I thought myself back up to my house. I didn’t know what to do. My senses, not working, had let me on a myriad of sensation-less adventures through a city I didn’t want to know existed. No wonder I had never taken my body to town. Even the fun places seemed melancholy in this dark light. Baseball stadium? Cold and dark, hotdog wrappers dragging fading trails of mustard across the stadium stairs. Not a soul in sight. Surely I thought my body would want to catch a ballgame. Or anything really. But I was wrong on all accounts, and couldn’t find my body no matter where I looked. I had to call it a day and head home, for what else could I accomplish if I had no plan?
As my house floated back into focus through the vertigo night, I stopped. The door was open. Lights on (I think). Window Broken. TV in the yard. Great. Not only was I missing my body, but now my place was broken into. I thought IN and I was inside. But no intruder.
I searched the areas of the house where my valuables were stored – office, bedroom, and even the kitchen. But all my stuff was there. Just in a mess, sometimes broken. Maybe some clothes were taken, I couldn’t tell for sure since I was never one to use the dresser. I hypothesized that the intruder had been looking for some IDs to steal, but they were where I had left them – in a bin with my other carelessly tossed valuables. I was confounded. I wished I had a chin to stroke in contemplation. This day was just too much.
I wearily thought of the bathroom, thinking maybe if I spent some time focusing on ‘seeing’ my form I could gain something. But as I materialized on the linoleum floor, I stopped. There, in the tub, enjoying what I perceived to be a peaceful bubble bath, was my body. It was relaxing, eyes closed, clearly having had a full day. If I could have held my breath I would have.
Quietly I imagined myself slipping into my body and felt that sickening sensation of movement again. Then, I was there. Inhabiting my body. My body’s eyes snapped open. I saw the back of his eyelids then I saw the tiled wall in front of him. My body let out an inhuman wail, and forcibly pushed me out. I was on the wall; a discarded snot that was flicked there inconspicuously by someone trying to avoid a boogery handshake.
You can’t live without me! I yelled-thought.
“I did just fine today, thank you!” my body shot back.
I had to admit, he did look pretty good there, in the best shape of his life, clearly in no need of whatever I was. But, don’t you miss me? I pleaded.
He flexed some pectoral muscles I had forgotten about when I owned them and said, “No.”
I fought back. I imagined being in every fiber of my body’s being, in the synapses that were connecting the thoughtless thoughts in its brain. I tried with everything I had to be me. And then I was in. But the fight raged on. I was clearly in my body. But sometimes my arms were not mine. Or the legs. And I cannot claim responsibility for the screams. My senses would come back, fading in and out of my consciousness, as I fought to retain them. At various times I could feel, I noticed the awful smell of a skunk, and saw that it was indeed night, but my body had lighted some relaxation candles that I didn’t even know I had. But I was still not in control. We waged a battle that must have looked like something out of a poorly written horror film – a man throwing himself into spasms on the floor, covered in bubbles and water, having a one-sided conversation with his mind.
At long last, as the night turned to dawn, my body was forced to recognize the limitations of its existence. Fatigue stepped in, and slowly my body released the hold it had on itself. I flexed a finger – on my own, with my body, and drifted off to sleep, content to feel the fatigue from a day well spent.
Halloween Story Contest #10
What Lurks from Below?
In the old town of Mattapoisett fishermen normally roam the docks, but on this night only the boats were there. The silence was almost disturbing considering the liveliness that usually was filling the air. The once filling silence was now filled with a clanking sound. A man in overalls and a red plaid shirt came strolling down. The man was now starting to whistle an upbeat tune. After a minute of the high pitched melody, it came to a stop. The silence was now back and as eerie as ever. The man was now breathing heavily. A creaking was heard in the distance along with a splash. This splash was utterly loud but the sound died down with echo of bubbles and the sense of Death. The wife woke up and patted the side of her bed. Tears were in the place of the empty spot. The man was dead.
Newspapers swarmed around the story with headlines like “Local Fisherman slips and drowns” and “Unfortunate slip by local fisherman.” The wife knew this wasn’t just a slip; this was intentioned by someone or something. She wanted to investigate. That night was similar as the last night, silent, lonely and utterly creepy. As she walked along the clanking docks, she was searching, searching for the thing that killed her husband. With a torch in her hand she stopped at the spot where the man disappeared. The same eerie silence as before was haunting the area. She stared down into the shadowy depths of the water. There was a glow in the water this time not from the lamp. It was red and there were two of them. Now there was fear flowing through her veins. This rarely happened; she was never scared. A word was repeating in her head it flowed from her brain to her legs, RUN. She started off down the dock in hopes of a way out. Then she saw it, the two menacing eyes of a beast. A black cloak was covering its body covering up what awful body remains under. It started to lurk its way to the now sprinting women. In hopes of escaping she jumped or in other words a leap of faith to the shore. She was hit with a force of a bomb. The next thing she saw was the blue that surrounded her. Now she saw air bubbles that carried her once long life to an end. The news considered it as a slip or a “whoops I just fell to my death slip.” People just know that it wasn’t a person or a thing. The truth is that there is a monster sulking beneath those docks and no one knows that this demon of terror is waiting for its next victim.
Halloween Story Contest #11
The Worst Birthday Ever!
Let me warn you, the story along these pages will scar you for life! I’m just saying, but it’s your decision if you want to read this. Just to tell you, the story along these pages is fake. Or is it?
On my 9th birthday my Dad said with much excitement, “there’s one more present for you in the garage.” He jogged out to the garage to get it for me. When he went into the garage we heard a loud scream and a giant clatter. My sister Grace, my Mom and I ran into the garage and there was my dad lying on the floor with deep bloody wounds on his arms. I ran into the house to grab the phone and call 911. As I was running to get the phone I thought to myself, what if dad dies from blood loss or something worse, my heart was pounding and there were butterflies in my stomach. Just as I was reaching for the phone, someone grabbed my hand. I turned around and behind me stood a policeman.
He was tall and mysterious and was wearing a police uniform with helmet. He had red fiery hair. He was scrawny and looked about 20. He was wearing a belt around his waist with mostly weapons and had a stern look on his face. Just as I was deciding whether or not to trust him, he nervously said, “Quick, come with me, there isn’t much time.”
Now if you know me, you might think that this would be the part where I would start screaming and yelling for help, but I’m going to be honest, this guy fooled me. He was so convincing I got into his van with him.
When we showed up at what was probably his house, I knew something was up, plus my family was nowhere in sight so that was when I got scared.
When he took me out of his van, he pulled me into his house and down the stairs into his basement where my friend Chloe was waiting for me, hand cuffed to a metal chair. The tall man, who at this point I started thinking of as “tall man,” hand cuffed me to a chair too, but a different one than Chloe’s so we couldn’t discuss any “escape” plans. He said in a scarily strong booming voice, “Tell me what you know about your houses.” Chloe and I glanced at each other as if she too was thinking that we could trust him and then we nodded at each other in approval.“ I know my house is very old and used to be a train station,” I replied. Chloe said nervously, “all I know is that people used to hide slaves in my house and that it’s very old.”
The tall man looked at us and said, “Have you two girls ever noticed anything, I don’t know, supernatural in your houses?” Chloe and I looked at each other with stern looks on our faces. “Let’s make a little deal, if you tell us what’s going on, we’ll tell you what we know,” I bargained mischievously. “OK, you got a deal”, the tall man murmured madly, so the tall man told us his story. “You know the book series The 39 Clues? Well, they’re real. So I’m the kid Dan. I’m on the thirty-ninth clue, and if I find it my sister and I won’t do anything bad, we’ll just um, well we’ll just give up our power and restore the world to normal.” I replied to him by saying “But why do you need us, exactly?” “Well, any adult would think that I’m crazy and I knew that the youngest in the family would understand and would be willing to help me,” Dan assured. “Well, I don’t know anything but Chloe might,” I hinted. Chloe explained, “All I know is that there’s a door in my basement that’s hidden with no doorknob, so that might lead to something.” Dan said, “Ooooh, that sounds … interesting. Can we go there now”? Chloe replied to him by saying “OK, but it’s kind of your choice because you’ve got us hand cuffed to these chairs.” “Oh yeah,” said Dan, “so if I unlock you, can you show me where that door is?” “OK,” said Chloe and I at the same time. So Dan set us free and brought out to the big black cramped van that makes you feel like a prisoner (which we technically were), pushed us in and drove us to Chloe’s house. When we arrived at her house, Dan pulled us out of the van and since her basement door is in the front of her house we went in that way. Since it was the day before Halloween (which I found really quite creepy) her basement was covered in fake cobwebs, plastic spiders, and mini skeletons, so getting around was really hard. Chloe showed Dan and me into a little crawl space underneath the unfinished stairs leading down to the basement. Chloe and Dan felt around the dusty gray walls for about 20 minutes until Chloe gave a hoot and said she had found the hidden door. Dan had brought a crowbar so he finally pried open the door after about 10 minutes of trying and on the other side of the door was a secret vault filled with gold and diamonds the size of my head. There were heaps of money in there and that was when Chloe and I realized it, Dan’s real name probably wasn’t Dan and the “39 clues” didn’t really exist, it was just an amazing book series. Dan, or whatever his name was, had tricked us into helping him find some poor family’s fortune. Whatever his name was snickered and said to us “didn’t see it coming, did you girls, that’s why I chose you two because I knew you would be the easiest to trick.” I had this awful feeling inside me that people like to call guilt, lots and lots of guilt. So whatever his name was packed the fortune up into one big sack and slung it over his back like Santa Claus and ran out the door. Chloe and I ran after him but when we got out the door, our parents and the cops were waiting for us. I ran into my Mom’s arms (because I didn’t want to hurt my Dad’s) and it felt good to feel her warm embrace again. Then a police officer came up to us and explained “we’ve been looking for that guy for months!” Chloe’s older sister Mia went downstairs to see what all the noise was just when he was packing the fortune up in the sack. So she ran back upstairs and called the police just in time for us to surround the basement door and catch him. His name was Rusty Court. I was speechless! A criminal mastermind had kidnapped me! It was scary and cool in some sort of twisted way!
The day after that was Halloween, so I told everybody about my amazing adventure with Chloe on my birthday.
If you are scared or scarred for life, I would recommend reading a fairytale with your parents holding a teddy bear. But if you ask me if this story was a real event in my life, remember this story is fake, or is it?
The End or is it just the beginning…
Halloween Story Contest #12
Offerings
The old man and woman sat before the fire, warming themselves against the autumn chill. “Halloween is coming,” the man said. “Why have you not yet gotten us a pumpkin to help ward off evil spirits?”
The old woman grew angry. “We are too old for such nonsense!” she snapped. “We shouldn’t be bothered with these superstitions.”
The man shifted uneasily in his chair and stared into the fire. Superstitions or not, he had always held fast to the old customs: he held his breath when walking past graveyards to prevent spirits from entering his body; he carried a lump of bread in his pocket when out walking after dark in case he met up with a hungry ghost; and at Halloween, he and the old woman always left sweets and fruit on the doorstep and a lit jack-o-lantern in the window as offerings to the spirit world. He did not wish to anger his poor, tired wife, but neither did he wish to anger any ghosts or demons, especially on Halloween. “We have always left offerings on Halloween…” he began gently.
“No,” said the old woman. “No offerings! And if this angers the spirits, so be it! I am going to bed.” And with that, she rose and walked away, with a toss of her long, silver hair as she went.
Suddenly, there came a great explosion of sound on the roof above them, as though the heavens themselves were crashing down upon the small woodland cottage. “Aaahh!” cried the old man, covering his head in fear. “What is it?!”
The old woman, more perplexed than afraid, went to the door and opened it. The sound overhead suddenly stopped. There on the ground before the cottage was a blanket of small green objects, some of them still rolling off the roof. “Acorns!” she said, relaxing. “It was just a shower of acorns raining down on our roof from the trees overhead.”
After she headed to bed, the old man went to the door to look at the acorns. “But there was no wind,” he said to himself. “What made the acorns all fall at once if there was no wind?”
The old woman slept peacefully that night while the man wrestled with nightmares of falling skies and collapsing roofs.
Try as he did, the old man could not convince his wife that they should leave offerings to the spirits on Halloween. “Halloween is but a day away,” he pleaded. “I am fearful for us both if we do not observe these traditions.”
But the old woman was stubborn. “Fear for yourself,” she said coldly. “I will be fine.”
A faint rapping then came at the door. Living so far from the village, visitors were rare for the couple so the old man looked cautiously out the window before answering the door. He was surprised at what he saw on the doorstep. “It is a small boy,” he said. “What is a small boy like this doing out in the woods by himself?”
“Open the door and find out,” said the old woman impatiently.
Obliging his wife, the old man opened the door. “May I help you?” he asked the child, who looked to be no more than three or four years old.
The boy was wearing clothing like none the man had ever seen. It looked to be fashioned from the woods themselves, with trousers made from grasses and leaves, suspenders braided from young vines and a sweater woven of moss. “Halloween is tomorrow,” said the boy, smiling, “and I was wondering if you might need me to fetch you a pumpkin for your window and some sweets for your offerings.”
The old man thought himself very lucky indeed. “Why yes!” he began, “We would be most grateful if you could …”
His wife appeared suddenly at the door. “We do not need your help, child,” she interrupted. “And you are too young to be out here by yourself. Be off with you!”
The boy’s smile disappeared. “Fine then,” he said, turning and skipping away down the path. “But don’t say that I didn’t warn you!”
The old man’s heart sank. He knew that he was too old to make the journey into the village by himself, especially carrying a heavy basket back with him. He slept not a wink that night, imagining that he heard whispers drifting down the chimney and scratching at the windows.
Halloween arrived and the old man felt afraid. When he placed a bare candle in the window for lack of a pumpkin, his wife blew out the flame and called him foolish. When he snuck a plateful of raisins onto the front step, she found this too and brought it inside, declaring him wasteful. As darkness fell, he took to his bed and pulled the covers up over his head, too frightened to face the night in any other way.
Sometime later, well into the night, the old man awakened. It was bitter cold in the cottage and completely dark. “The old woman must have let the fire go out,” he thought to himself, disappointed. Reluctantly, he stepped out of bed, shivering in the cold. “Wife!” he called out. “Why have you not tended to the fireplace?” but there was no answer.
Stepping from the bedroom, he was amazed to see that the front door was open, moonlight shining in from outside. “No wonder it is so cold in this cottage!” he declared angrily. Slamming the door shut, he then fumbled in the darkness for a candle and match. In the little light which shone from the window, he could just make out the figure of his wife sitting by the cold fireplace. “Wife!” he called to her. “Come and help me find a candle so that I might see to light a fire.” There was no answer so the old man moved toward her chair. As he grew nearer, he noticed something odd about her appearance and he stopped. “Wife?” he said again, but his voice was now barely more than a whisper. Spotting a candle next to his wife’s chair, he lit it with trembling hands. The vision he saw before him was enough to stop his heart that instant. Before the candle fell to the floor, it illuminated the face of the old woman frozen in death. Her long, silver hair was now gone, her head completely bald.
Outside, the figure perched high up in the tree let out a giggle. Unfurling its taloned claws from the tree branch, it jumped into the air, gliding down to earth on leathery wings. It was he who had sent the acorns crashing down upon the old couple’s roof, he who whispered down the chimney and scratched at the windows, and he who had disguised himself as the young boy, trying in vain to persuade the old couple to observe the Halloween traditions. “Foolish people,” it laughed humorlessly. “I warned them.”
And with that, the demon began skipping happily on its new amusement – a jump rope made of long, silver hair.
