The Haunting of Elsinore Manor

▪︎ Five ▪︎

Oct. 28th, 1907

Dear Diary,

The lost items have been found.

Their finding has resulted in more questions than answers.

At a loss of where else to look, mother decided to search the red room.

That room was my grandmother's. Her bedroom while she lived here. Everything is exactly as it was, including the red walls, drapes, and duvet. My father had protested, calling her desire to saturate the room in scarlet "macabre," but grandmother had begun to go blind, and she swore that red was the only color she could still see with any clarity. I'm not sure what that means. But she insisted, and my father agreed. Her room became the red room.

She died in there.

That is the only room in the manor that my brothers and I are not allowed to enter.

And that is where my mother found the shakers, the napkins, the tablecloth, the candlesticks, her teapot, several of her books, her hand mirror, a painted portrait of our family, and Rosen's wooden horses. All neatly packed into boxes.

Mother was beside herself. She came out of the red room in a trance. Rosen, Gilly, and I watched as she put each item back in its rightful place, her movements robotic and laden.

At last, she handed Rosen his horses. With chilling intensity, she looked at each of us in turn and said, "You stay out of there."

I've never heard her voice like that. It terrified me. Not because she sounded angry, but because she sounded like she was trying to convince herself that we were responsible. As though any other explanation was too frightening to consider.

Yours,
Ophelia

~ * ~

I cried last night.

When he appeared, I told the boy I didn't want to play with him anymore.

"Why?" he asked.

"Because I got in trouble!" I cried. "My mum is angry with me for moving things around the house, but I didn't touch them! None of them! This is your fault! You and your ghost family! Go away and leave me alone!"

He looked sad, and his lip trembled, but he left.

Once he was gone, I felt warmer. I stopped crying.

~ * ~

Oct. 29th, 1907

Dear Diary,

At breakfast, Gilly announced that he would no longer be playing with Chester. He said the words in a low grumble the likes of which a six-year-old should not be capable. He glared down at his toast like it had taunted him.

For my part, I'm not sad to see Chester go. Late last night I heard the sounds of a child crying. It was an anguished, echoing cry that made me feel cold all over. I got up, certain it was Gilly. But the moment I stepped out into the hallway, the crying ceased. Silence. There was only silence. The kind that makes your head hurt because you're trying so hard to hear something. Anything. I don't believe Chester is a ghost, but I was scared. I remember shivering.

To add to the strangeness of this day, Uncle Claude had a visitor early this morning. A solicitor of some kind. They were in father's study, the door an inch or two ajar. I listened. Most of what I heard didn't make sense to me - the solicitor spoke in such odd jargon. But my uncle asked him more than once about inheritance.

"...in the event of your elder brother's death, Elsinore Manor and all inventory within would go to you." I believe that's what the solicitor said. I'm not sure if I'm remembering the wording correctly.

I don't know why Uncle Claude would be asking about such things, but I think I should tell mother.

She hasn't come downstairs yet this morning.

I saw Uncle Claude coming out of her bedroom last night. Before I went to bed. Before I heard the child crying. My uncle looked irritated. Angry, perhaps. He muttered something, but I only caught the word "stubborn." I know mother feels about him as I do. She will believe me.

But what will he do? I cannot read him the way I can mother and father, and that frightens me.

Yours in worry,
Ophelia

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