The haunting of Corbitt house

Part 1

The house stands in front of both detectives, alone, in silence, just as it has been during the last month.

"For the good location the property has, there has to be something very bad going on for people to not want to live in it" while Sherlock fights a bit to rotate the key inside the keyhole of the front door, William observes in silence their surroundings "It's a waste to not use because of some ghost stories" Finally the lock gives in and the door opens "This place has been too neglected to be abandoned for only a couple of months"

"Maybe the Macarios stopped caring about the patio and the front of the house since Vitorio went insane" He still remembers the terrified look on the man's face when he mentioned the house. It's not a surprise that he had to be admitted to an asylum with how violent he became.

Even if they didn't say it out loud, they thought that that family should be grateful. Despite that both of their parents ended up in a psychiatric hospital in less than a year, they were the least affected family compared to the other ones.

They calmly enter the property, slowly adjusting to the darkness of the place until they turned on their oil lanterns. A long hall with some doors to both of it sides can be seen and, without a word, each of them went to check each side of the house.

Behind the first door on the left, Sherlock finds a room full of things, he moves in the small space between the piles of objects from several eras while he tries to search for something to help them with the purpose of showing that whatever is going on in this house, it's not something paranormal. At the end of the room, next to a tank of hydrogen peroxide and even a bike in a bad state, he sees a sideboard which doors are closed with wood planks. He didn't think twice to get closer and search for something to help him unblock the piece of furniture.

Meanwhile, William entered the lounge. The furniture and even the incomplete tableware from the kitchen cupboard seem to be from the time of the building of the house... but, what stands out the most at this moment is the smell of something decomposing. In the room it's tenuous, but it's enough to distract him for a bit. With a more careful examination, he manages to illuminate with the oil lantern a large number of religious objects that are everywhere; crosses hanging from all the walls, a lot of them with rosary beads of all sizes and paintings of the saints, also some photographs. In them, you can see a couple with two kids; a cheerful Vitorio in love with his family, a happy Gabriela that's hugging her kids who are posing with emotion in front of the camera. Maybe, if they figure out what's going on there, their parents could recover...

He hears some noise in the direction Sherlock went. William gets out of his thoughts to go back on his steps and pop in the room Sherlock went into, finding a cloud of dust at the end, surrounded by the silhouette of the other man in front of a piece of furniture.

-"I found something" He holds what it appears to be some books on his hands and gets closer to him, going to the hall where they had a little more light by combining the beam of both lanterns "Property of W. Corbitt..."

"Walter Corbitt" William mutters

"They were inside that shelf, closed by the wood planks. Maybe Corbitt's executor secure them in there so nobody could take them after his death"

"Reverend Thomas, from the Chapel of Contemplation" he skims through one of the diaries. They seem to be simple notes, like a diary, even though there's stuff that don't seem to make sense – We should examinate them carefully later – Both of them nod and put the books in the living room.

"Where does that smell come from?" Sherlock turns up his nose a bit but soon begins to sniff out the source of the stench William sensed earlier, which leads them into the dining room in the next room.

Again, the furniture is old but, over the table from the dining room there are three plates with leftovers rotting, specially inside the tureen, where a mouse jumps off bothered by the light and runs to somewhere in the house. Both men take a quick look at the position of the chairs and don't hesitate in having an idea of what could have happened, especially with parts of a shattered glass at the other side of the room, at the foot of the wall.

"We can check the kitchen for once and then go to the basement, before it gets even darker" Before anyone could say anything, a blow can be heard above them. It's from the first floor. It's enough for them to exchange a glance to go out in sync towards the kitchen, since it connects with the main corridor.

They carefully went upstairs, trying to not make noise as Sherlock takes the lead. Taking an apprehensive attitude learned from William these last months, he slides his hands to the inside pocket of his coat to take the gun that Billy gave him when he started working for him. Meanwhile, William wields his cane, which, although not of the same design as the rapier he used to use before, also contains a sharp blade inside the sheath which, in reality, it's a walking stick.

Carefully, William peeks out the inside of the first door, finding the bathroom, while Sherlock keeps an eye on the hallway. The smell of stagnant water reveals the lack of maintenance of the place, but, besides that, it appears there's no one there. When he signalizes that that room is empty, Sherlock takes the lead again to check the next room. This one is quite empty compared to the previous rooms; it looks like a guest room that hasn't been used in longer than the rest of the house as the base of the bed doesn't even support a mattress.

They repeat the strategy of protecting each other's back while the other checks the next two rooms; the one that's in the half of the hall is the children's room, it has a pair of twin beds and a lot of toys left behind, waiting for someone to come back for them. At the end of the hallway is the master bedroom. Again, what seems to stand out is the exaggerated amount of hanged crosses and rosary beads all over the place. On the nightstand on the left rests a bible similar to the one poor Vitorio held tightly against his chest when they went to interrogate him at the psychiatric hospital, surely it was a wedding gift. He can't avoid to think on those word that he repeated over and over; "The devil will be defeated by its own weapons!".

"Let's finish checking the floor. Tomorrow we can come back to the basement" Even though Sherlock wasn't tired, he doesn't want William to try too hard. They had spent the whole morning interviewing the Macarios and huge part of the afternoon searching for records about that mysterious "Chapel of Contemplation" and even if William always hides his discomfort, he doesn't want him to end up collapsing.

Now, in another order, each one checks more calmly the rooms. In the main bedroom there are notorious signs of punches and objects thrown against the walls, just like Gabriela said, it happened often, first against her husband and then against her, if he wasn't around.

When he checks the drawers of the children's room, William finds some different drawings that have something disturbing in common; when there's a drawing of the family, besides the four members, there's a fifth humanoid dark figure that, instead of eyes, has a pair of big red dots.

He turns around when he hears Sherlock coming back to the first room and decides that is also time to get out, taking the drawings with him.

William enters the almost empty room and seems something different. There is a stain that definitely wasn't there the first time he checked the room.

"Liam" He moves closer to the window until he gets in front of it, this window shows the patio of the house. There, on the inferior corner of the glass, there's a reddish stain of, approximately 20 centimeters that, looking at it closer, looks like a handprint...

"Sherly!" As soon as he hears William call him out, he also hears the loud crash of something heavy moving on the worn wood. He manages to observe how the base of the bed slides at high speed towards him. He only catches a glimpse of William for a moment before the impact.