Trembling With Fear 07/25/21

The House of Dennis Eath by Tom Hooke

Mr Dennis Eath had been kind enough to tell me about the murder that had taken place in his house long before he’d put it up for sale. The wispy strands of grey hair that entwined five or six centimetres down from his chin bounced jovially as he spoke of the mystery. Like strings, to which no puppet was attached. Never having been one for ghost stories, I found the man’s pathetic little beard more interesting than his tale. But I let him get on with it, conscious of the fact that any rude interruption might cause him to up the price from its current (and uncommonly reasonable) standing.

It was a large space, the house, with an equally large garden. Plenty big enough for my wife, Kate, and I to raise Marlo and Elsa, our children.
My family had been unnerved by Mr Eath from the moment his spindly fingers crept around the frame of the front door. His mannerisms were affectionate in a way we found disturbing. To give you an insight, Mr Eath dropped his handkerchief whilst giving us a tour of the living room (remarkably spacious, so it was), and when Marlo picked it up for him, Mr Eath felt the need to bend down, place a frail hand on my boy’s forearm, and tell him: “You’re a gentleman.”

The eight-year-old pulled away, shaken. I gathered as much from the fearful look in his eyes, and his inability to stop rubbing the contaminated forearm when Mr Eath wasn’t looking. I was also told I was a “gentleman”, with just as much gruff emphasis, on two occasions: Once when I held a door open for Mr Eath, and again for offering to take his empty teacup from him and place it on a nearby table. On neither occasion, did I feel a gentleman; more a vagabond.

It was toward the end of our negotiations that Mr Eath told us of the murder. Myself and Kate were chatting with him in the kitchen, whilst Marlo and Elsa enjoyed the garden, which bore the fruits of a good spring making way for an even better summer. Allegedly, the owners before the owners before Mr Eath were a man and woman, and, later, just a man. Grown tired, had this man, of his wife, and one day killed her. Then, one night, buried her. Her remains were rumoured to be beneath the property somewhere.

“A ghost”, Eath told us. He claimed never to have seen her, “but, oh yes, she’s still here. I reckon her body’s in that garden,” he smiled, nodding towards the wooden decking where the children were playing. “Sometimes, I hear her knocking.”

Telling us such a story before I’d signed on the dotted line wasn’t the most effective business manoeuvre I’ve ever been swindled by, but the offer was too good to pass up on. And, as I said, I did not believe in ghosts. I left my signature right below the seller’s, which, I noticed, read, ‘D.Eath’, in some sumptuous font.

Thankfully, that had been the final dealing we’d had with Mr Eath. A month later we moved into our new home.

Early one evening that same summer, my perception on ghost stories altered. Marco had been creating an incessant racket. He was sat on the decking at the far end of the garden, tapping his shoes. The echoes worked their way into the house, weaving past furniture and through doorways, disrupting my wife’s reading. So, she asked me to go outside to tell our youngest to be quiet.

He sat there in a camping chair, reclined slightly, holding one of his comic books. He stopped the banging as I approached, his foot teasing just above the decking.

“Marlo, everyone can hear you stomping on the floor,” I said.

“She started it!” the boy protested.

I had hoped that, by this time, he’d have stopped taking me for a fool.

“Elsa is sleeping at Ellie’s tonight, Marlo. She’s no –’

“Not Elsa,” was all he said.

His response was corroborated by a much harder, much more vicious banging noise. From beneath the decking.