A Twist of the Knife

Gifts in the night

During my research for the spooky novels I wrote in the late 1980s and the early 1990s, I interviewed a large number of people, from all walks of life, who believed they’d had a paranormal experience of some kind. Some years back, seated next to HRH Princess Anne at a charity dinner — she’s a sparky lady and great fun to talk to — she told me a very convincing story about a friend of hers who had a poltergeist in her home. And the late great comedian, Michael Bentine, made my hairs stand on end with stories about his father who carried out exorcisms.

I talked to mediums, clairvoyants, scientists, psychologists, psychiatrists, and became good friends with a truly extraordinary character, the late Professor Bob Morris, who had been appointed as the first Chair of Parapsychology in the UK, heading up the Koestler Parapsychology Unit at Edinburgh University. What made Bob Morris a fascinating man, to me, was that he was a scientist — a physicist — who had had a paranormal experience early in his life, which had opened his mind to the existence of the paranormal.

I learned from him an astounding statistic: that a survey was taken, in 1922, of scientists in Britain who believed in God. The results came out at 43 per cent. The same survey was repeated in 1988 and, very surprisingly, the results showed exactly the same percentage. But there had been a significant shift: fewer biologists now believed in God, but more mathematicians and physicists proclaimed themselves believers.

I listened to a large number of views and stories of strange experiences, and I talked to leading sceptics as well. For eighteen months, in 1990 and 1991, I hosted a regular Friday night radio phone-in show, taking calls from members of the public who had experienced something uncanny, or inexplicable, ranging from sightings of apparitions or bizarre coincidences to past-life memories or a sense of déjà-vu. In 1993 I was commissioned by the BBC to present a show in Scotland, in which I was given carte blanche to travel around interviewing people who claimed to have had paranormal encounters.

Many of the stories I was told were chilling, some were distressing, but the majority, when I examined them further, turned out to have credible rational explanations. I learned that both the Anglican Church and the Roman Catholic Church employ diocesan exorcists — although they are given the less dramatic titles of Ministers of Deliverance.

The role of a Minister of Deliverance is to investigate any apparent paranormal occurrence brought to the attention of the local vicar or priest, and for which they had no explanation. But of major importance in this role is to rule out the paranormal wherever possible and produce rational explanations. As an example, there was a papal edict in the Catholic Church, issued over two centuries ago, warning priests not to confuse demonic possession with the tricks played on people’s minds as a result of grief, and stating that no exorcisms should be carried out on anyone within two years of them suffering a bereavement.

I became good friends with one Minister, a senior clergyman with considerable experience of people who claimed to have had paranormal encounters, and who is himself an extremely caring and rational man. I will call him Francis Wells. He is a modern-thinking clergyman, with a distinguished university background in psychology, who has deep faith but once confided in me that he had problems with the conventional biblical image of God. His primary objective in all cases brought to him was to try to find a rational explanation. For instance, he was regularly called in to investigate people deeply disturbed by occurrences following Ouija board sessions. His view of such sessions, after over thirty years of investigations, is that the Ouija does not open up channels to the spirit world, but rather opens up the Pandora’s box of demons that each and every one of us carries in our psyche.

I asked him if he had ever, in his career to date, experienced something that could not be explained in a rational way. ‘Yes,’ he replied. ‘Twice.’

This is the first story. At his request, to respect their privacy, I have changed the names of the people involved.

In 1987 a young married couple, Geoff and Kerry Wilson, had recently had a baby son, Darren. Geoff worked as a plumber and Kerry was on maternity leave from her local council job in Croydon. They had been living in a rented basement flat in Croydon and had saved enough money to put down the deposit on a small house on a brand new housing development in the area, built by a national brand-name company.

They moved in when Darren was three months old, and were blissfully happy to finally be in a home of their own. Kerry was a keen gardener, and was happy to be home alone with Darren, who was a delightful, happy and calm baby, while Geoff was away much of the day, and often late into the evenings, working his butt off now that he was the sole breadwinner of the family.

Four weeks after they had moved in, early on a late November morning, Kerry woke suddenly, feeling concerned that something was wrong. She looked at the clock and saw it was 7 a.m. The baby monitor was silent and she realized she had missed Darren’s normal 3 a.m. feed. She went through into his room and was confronted with every mother’s worst nightmare.

Darren lay face down against the mattress. She felt total panic as she gently turned his motionless body over. He was cold, and solid as wood, and his face was a deep mottled blue. The paramedics, who arrived twelve minutes later, were, tragically, unable to resuscitate him.

To add to the hell of the following hours, they then had to deal with the police interrogations. Whilst they were allocated a Family Liaison Officer, a kindly, sympathetic woman PC, they were also subjected to the house being treated as a crime scene, and grilled by two CID officers. They faced the further agony of knowing little Darren was to be subjected to a post-mortem in the mortuary. Police interviews, as well as interviews with a forensic psychologist and a forensic psychiatrist, continued for several days, making them feel — through their intense grief — like criminals and distracting them from the funeral arrangements.

Kerry, who had stopped drinking from the moment she had learned she was pregnant, took to the bottle; Geoff was arrested for drink-driving and faced losing his licence — and his livelihood. He was dependent on his van for his work.

Eventually, they were left alone. Darren’s body was released by the Coroner, and he was buried in a tiny white coffin. In the days following the funeral, Kerry and Geoff, occasionally joined by their parents, sat in desolation in the front room of the new house that had, just a short while ago, seemed so full of promise. The little garden at the rear, where Kerry had dug beds on both sides of the lawn with an ambitious planting plan, looked increasingly sad, with the grass growing unkempt and weeds sprouting.

To make them feel even more isolated from normal life, most of the units on the estate were still, as yet, unsold, so they had few neighbours to talk to and share their grief with. Kerry’s best friend, Roz, put on a brave face but was totally freaked out, and kept giving excuses why she could not come over. There was just one other young couple, directly across the close — Rob and Mandy King. Mandy was seven months pregnant, and she and her husband felt a kinship with Geoff and Kerry. Kerry’s parents were as supportive as they could be; but they were almost equally grief-stricken and, after a while, they began to avoid contact as much as they could because they just distressed Geoff and Kerry more. Their neighbours, Rob and Mandy, became almost their sole lifeline.

Geoff ignored the brown envelopes of bills that fell daily onto the doormat. He really didn’t care about anything. He could function just sufficiently to make the occasional three-mile round trip to the supermarket, with his wife driving, to buy basic food and cheap wine. They were each drinking a bottle a day.

The doctor prescribed tranquilizers for Kerry, and also sleeping pills after her seventh consecutive night of lying awake crying. Geoff tried to cope without either. He spent his days sitting in front of the television, watching anything that was on, absorbing nothing. He used to like reading, but the pages of any book he picked up contained a meaningless jumble of words.

At 2 a.m. on a Wednesday night, three weeks on, Geoff woke, badly needing to pee and his head throbbing from the booze. He climbed out of bed without turning the light on — not wanting to wake Kerry — pulled on his dressing gown, found his slippers, and shuffled out onto the dark landing, heading to the toilet.

And he stopped in his tracks.

In his own words, this is what happened next:

I saw an endless stream of people, all in white robes, each carrying a small parcel wrapped in white cloth. They were coming out of the wall in front of me, to the right, crossing the landing, and disappearing into the wall on the left.

They were oblivious to me. One after another. Then another, then another. Silent, serious, men and women, some young, some not so young. All in these strange robes. All carrying a white parcel.

For some moments, I thought I must be dreaming. But I was awake. I did that cliché thing of pinching myself, and realized that I was very definitely awake. I stood there, quaking with fear, unsure what to do. I don’t remember for how long I stood there. Some of them seemed to half turn towards me, as if there was something they wanted to communicate, but then they carried on, fading into the wall on the left hand side.

I backed away, turned and dived into our bedroom, slamming the door shut, the noise waking Kerry.

‘Wossat?’ she murmured, sleepily.

I turned on the light. I had to wake her fully. She needed to see this — or convince me that I was hallucinating. I told her to go and take a look at the landing.

‘I’m so sleepy,’ she said.

I felt really bad about disturbing her. But I had to be reassured I wasn’t either hallucinating or going mad. Every inch of my flesh was covered in goosebumps. I’d never, ever, felt so spooked in my life.

‘Please go and look on the landing,’ I pleaded.

Finally, very reluctantly, she slipped out of bed, in her nightdress, padded across the floor and opened the door, with me right behind her.

Then she just stood there, mesmerized. I will always remember her face as she turned to me for as long as I live.

It was the face of someone who has stared into the pit of Hell.

We clutched each other, and stared at the procession of people. It went on and on and on. I don’t know for how long we stood there. These eerie people in white, carrying their parcels of white, all looking serious, purposeful, on a journey, heading towards a clear destination.

‘What’s going on?’ she murmured, terrified.

‘I don’t know,’ I replied, equally terrified, but trying, unsuccessfully, to remain calm. I was having a dream, a nightmare, that was the only possible explanation.

Then Kerry lit a cigarette. That was another thing — she had given up smoking — her thirty-fags-a-day habit — for Darren. I’d given up too, in support. She handed me the Silk Cut, and I took a drag, inhaled the sweet smoke, and that was when I knew this was for real.

The next few minutes were a blur. I don’t remember us leaving the house and running across the road. All I can remember is hammering on the door of our neighbours, then finding the bell and ringing it, and a minute or so later seeing light come on behind the glass panel at the top of the door. Moments later, it opened and Rob stood there in his pyjamas, with a quizzical expression I will never forget. I almost hugged him in relief.

‘Need to use your phone!’ I blurted. ‘Police. I’m so sorry. I—’

Suddenly, away from the madness that our house had become, none of what we had experienced seemed real any more. I’ve never had any truck with God, or the supernatural, none of that shit. My dad died when I was twenty, when an Army truck rammed the back of his car during a motorway pile-up. My mum died of cancer two years later — triggered by shock and grief, my sister always reckoned. Thanks, God!

I dialled the 9s, then was struck dumb when the operator answered, asked me which service I required. When a Police operator came on the line, I suddenly felt very foolish. ‘We’ve got... well... I sort of think... intruders in our house,’ I managed, finally. And I felt a right dickhead as I replaced the receiver.

Rob’s wife, Mandy came downstairs in her dressing gown, wondering what the commotion was. ‘I’m sorry,’ I blurted out. ‘There’s something strange going on in our house — I’ve just called the Police.’

Kerry suddenly collapsed on the sofa, sobbing. Mandy, bless her, sat down beside her and put an arm around her. And in a sudden moment of normality said, ‘I’ll make us all a cup of tea, shall I?’ She got up and went into the kitchen.

It seemed only moments later that streaks of blue light were skittering off the front windowpane. We heard a car pull up and I opened the front door to see two male uniformed officers standing there, one a middle-aged Sergeant, the other a much younger rookie constable, holding their caps in their hands.

Rob invited them in, and I stood in the little hallway, explaining what we had just seen to looks of extreme incredulity from Croydon’s finest. When I had finished, all too aware that what I had said sounded like the ramblings of a crazy, the Sergeant took a step forward and sniffed my breath.

‘Been drinking, have you, sir?’ he said, with extreme sarcasm.

‘No more than usual,’ I replied.

‘Walking out of the wall, are they, sir? All carrying something?’

I nodded.

‘It’s nearly Christmas,’ he said. ‘Maybe they’re bringing you Christmas presents. Was one of them dressed in red robes, with a long grey beard? I didn’t see any reindeer on the roof.’

Both their radios crackled into life. Both listened to the message. ‘We’re just attending at Ecclestone Close. We’ll be on our way in a minute,’ the Sergeant said.

‘Go and take a look,’ I said. ‘I’ve left the front door open.’

The Sergeant nodded at the rookie and pointed across the road with his finger. The young constable went out. Mandy came into the hall. ‘I’m just making a cuppa — would you both like one?’ she asked.

‘No, thank you, ma’am,’ the cynical cop replied. ‘There’s an accident on the A23 we need to attend.’

That made me feel bad. That I was keeping these officers from something far more important. Rob, the Sergeant and I stood there in awkward silence.

‘Nice development this estate,’ the Sergeant said. ‘Not been here before.’

‘We’ve only recently moved in,’ I said.

Moments later the front door was pushed open and the rookie stood there. His face was sheet white and he was shaking like a leaf. He could barely speak. ‘Sarge,’ he said. ‘I... I... I think you’d better go and take a look. I think I’m imagining things.’

Both officers strode back across the road and entered our house. I went into the living room and sat down beside Kerry, who was still sobbing, and tried to comfort her. Mandy brought us mugs of tea and a moment of normality returned as she asked us if we wanted milk and sugar.

Then there was a rap on the front door. I followed Rob as he went to answer it.

The Sergeant stood there, looking as shaken as his colleague, his face ashen. After some moments, the senior officer spoke. ‘I don’t know what to say Mr... er... Mr Wilson?’

I nodded.

‘It’s not someone playing a prank on you, is it?’

‘What do you think?’ I replied.

‘I didn’t... didn’t see... didn’t see any projector,’ the rookie said.

‘I don’t know what to think, sir,’ the Sergeant said. ‘I’ve not seen... not experienced... nothing... nothing like this in all the years I’ve been a police officer. I’m at a loss what to suggest. Has this happened before?’

‘No,’ I said very firmly.

‘I... I approached the... the intruders,’ he said. ‘I walked right through one and it was like stepping into a freezer. I think you’d better not go back to the house, not just yet.’

He was quivering all over, so much that I broke out in goosebumps myself at the sight of him.

‘They can stay the night here,’ Rob said kindly. ‘We’ll put them in the spare room.’

The two police officers looked like they could not wait to get away from here, but not because they needed to attend the other incident, the crash on the A23, the main London road. It looked to me as if they wanted, right then, to be anywhere but here. They seemed totally out of their comfort zone and, if nothing else, at least it gave me some reassurance that Kerry and I were not mad.

The Sergeant was holding his notebook in his hand and he tried to jot down some details, but his hand was shaking so much that after a few tries, he stopped. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Williams — I mean Wilson,’ he said to me. ‘I think I’m as shook up as you are. I... I don’t know... are you and Mrs Wilson of any religious persuasion?’

I told him we were both sort of lapsed Anglicans. I’d been confirmed as a child, and so had Kerry. But neither of us had had much time for religion since, although both of us had had parental pressure to have little Darren baptized.

The Sergeant said, ‘The only thing I can suggest is that you contact your local vicar in the morning and see what he has to say about this, Mr and Mrs Wilson.’

We stayed the night in our kind neighbours’ spare room, and in the morning ventured home. All was quiet there, back to normality. We packed some of our belongings into a suitcase and moved, temporarily, to Kerry’s parents’ home in Surbiton. Later that morning we drove to see our vicar — who we had never met before. He was a young clergyman, who although a tad sceptical at first, listened intently to our story. While we were sitting in his house, he phoned the police and asked to speak to the Sergeant who had attended last night, and was told he was currently off duty and to call back that evening.

At around 7 p.m. he called us at Kerry’s parents’ home, sounding shaken, telling us the Sergeant had verified our story, and that he was going to contact his diocesan Minister of Deliverance, Francis Wells, for advice.

A week passed, during which we heard nothing, and Kerry and I began to doubt our sanity, despite the fact that the two police officers had witnessed what we had witnessed. Then we received a phone call from Francis Wells, asking if he could come and see us at our house. He was insistent that both of us should be there.

We did some research on him, and learned that he was a highly respected clergyman, with particular interest in the paranormal, and came from an academic background. Both his parents were medics, and he had achieved a double first in psychology from Oxford. He seemed exactly the right person, with a practical mindset, to investigate the phenomena we had encountered, and Kerry and I felt reassured.

Kerry drove us to the house in my van, but refused to go in. Although it was the middle of the day, I was also too scared to go in alone. We waited outside, and after about twenty minutes, a bright red Alfa Romeo saloon pulled up, and out clambered a very good-looking man in his early thirties, dressed in a business suit, with a very pleasant and gentle demeanour.

Francis Wells was far from what we had been expecting — perhaps a priest in robes, holding a bell, book and candle, like something out of The Exorcist. He was so normal, so ordinary, and warm-hearted, instantly putting us at our ease and expressing his deepest sorrow at our loss. He asked if he could go inside and take a look at where the apparitions had appeared.

We agreed, although neither Kerry nor I would go further than the front room. We sat on the sofa, feeling very uncomfortable being back in the house, while he went upstairs. After what seemed an eternity, he came down and sat in a chair opposite us. Kerry found the strength to make us all a coffee and when she had handed out our cups, together with a plate of biscuits, he told us his findings, smiling benignly at us, as if to reassure me and my wife that we were not bonkers, and speaking in a soft, gentle voice.

He started by offering us prayers, and did not seem at all offended when we thanked him but told him that both of us had a problem with religion. He was totally understanding. ‘That is absolutely fine,’ he said. He sipped some coffee then continued. ‘Well, Geoff and Kerry, I’ve just been upstairs and all seems quiet, for now. I’ve been researching into the background of your home, and I’ve discovered something that may offer an explanation, however strange it might seem to you, for what has been happening. I’m assuming you both studied history as part of your curriculum at school?’

Yes, I told him, but it had never really grabbed me. Kerry, however, said it had been one of the few subjects she had loved.

The Minister of Deliverance nodded approvingly at her. ‘Do you remember the Great Plague? The bubonic plague?’

‘I remember a ditty we learned at school,’ Kerry said. ‘1665 no one left alive. 1666 London burned to sticks.’

The Minister smiled. ‘Indeed. But before that — three hundred years earlier — the bubonic plague started; it was called the Black Death. It wiped out over 30 per cent of our population. Towns and villages had plague burial pits. My team has discovered that this housing estate, where we are now, is on the site of an ancient plague burial ground. And the precise location of your house is over a pit where infant victims of the plague were buried.

He went on to tell us that he could not say whether it was the negative energy from all the young babies buried here that had caused the cot death of our baby son, Darren, or whether his death had for some reason triggered this eerie replay of parents bringing their dead infants here.

We put the house on the market, without ever telling prospective buyers about our experience. To our relief, the eventual purchasers were a middle-aged couple with grownup children. We now live thirty miles away and have never been back.