Spinetinglers: Ghoulish Ghost Stories - Softcover

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9780753461402: Spinetinglers: Ghoulish Ghost Stories

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0753461404 ISBN 13: 9780753461402

Publisher: Kingfisher, 2007

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Guaranteed to thrill and chill, this spine-tingling collection of twenty-twospooky stories includes contributions by Franz Kafka, Charles Dickens, Guy de Maupassant, and many other well-known writers. This anthology is not for the faint of heart!

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About the Author:

Robert Westall wrote 18 books for children, including The Machine Gunners and The Scrarecrows, both of which won the Carnegie Medal and the Horn Book awards.

Chapter One
THE KNOCK AT THE MANOR GATE
Franz Kafka
It was summer, a hot day. With my sister I was passing the gate of a great
house on our way home. I cannot tell now whether she knocked on the gate
out of mischief or out of absence of mind or merely threatened it with her
hand and did not knock at all. A hundred paces farther on along the road,
which here turned to the left, began the village. We did not know it very well,
but no sooner had we passed the first house, when people appeared and
made friendly or warning signs to us; they were themselves apparently
terrified, bowed down with terror. They pointed toward the manor house that
we had passed and reminded us of the knock on the gate. The proprietor of
the manor would charge us with it; the interrogation would begin immediately.
I remained quite calm and also tried to calm my sister’s fears. Probably she
had not struck the door at all, and if she had, it could never be proved. I tried
to make this clear to the people around us; they listened to me but refrained
from passing any opinion. Later they told me that not only my sister, but I,
too, as her brother, would be charged. I nodded and smiled. We all gazed
back at the manor, as one watches a distant smoke cloud and waits for the
flames to appear. And right enough we presently saw horsemen riding in
through the wide-open gate. Dust rose, concealing everything; only the tops
of the tall spears glittered. And hardly had the troop vanished into the manor
courtyard before they seemed to have turned their horses again, for they were
already on their way to us. I urged my sister to leave me; I myself would set
everything right. She refused to leave me. I told her that she should at least
change, so as to appear in better clothes before these gentlemen. At last
she obeyed and set out on the long road to our home. Already the horsemen
were beside us, and even before dismounting, they inquired about my sister.
She wasn’t here at the moment, was the apprehensive reply, but she would
come later. The answer was received with indifference; the important thing
seemed their having found me. The chief members of the party appeared to
be a young, lively fellow, who was a judge, and his silent assistant, who was
named Assmann. I was commanded to enter the village inn. Shaking my
head and hitching up my pants, I slowly began my statement, while the
sharp eyes of the party scrutinized me. I still half believed that a word would
be enough to free me, a city man, and with honor, too, from these peasant
folks. But when I had stepped over the threshold of the inn, the judge, who
had hastened in front and was already awaiting me, said, “I’m really sorry for
this man.” And it was beyond all possibility of doubt that by this he did not
mean my present state, but something that was to happen to me. The room
looked more like a prison cell than an inn parlor. Great stone flags on the
floor, dark, quite bare walls, into one of which an iron rung was fixed, in the
middle something that looked half a pallet, half an operating table.
Could I endure any other air than prison air now? That is the great question,
or rather it would be if I still had any prospect of release.