‘Do you need a hand with that thing?’ Evelyn asked as Ciarán and Danny were making a complete arse of furniture removal, not helped at all by Ciarán’s bunny slippers.

 

‘It’s alright. We can handle it.’ Danny assured her, as the headboard crashed into the wardrobe.

 

Ciarán was definitely not going to sleep in that bedroom on his own after seeing the monk in there, the monk that he had touched, with his bare hand. ‘That wasn’t the worst thing,’ he said as he sat trembling on a chair afterwards. ‘It was cold. Like a real living arm, but as dead and cold as stone.’

 

‘To be fair, it is a bit parky in this place,’ Evelyn said, pulling her fleece tighter to keep warm.

 

‘Does it not bother you at all?’ Ciarán asked, huddled in his dressing gown under his coat to keep out the chill of shock.

 

Evelyn sighed. ‘If I let every encounter with a poltergeist monk with a whisky stealing habit bother me, I would be out of a job.’

 

‘It’s whiskey, with an E, Danny corrected. The Irish spell it with an E, like the Americans.’

 

‘Oh, sorry,’ Evelyn apologised.

 

And so it was that Evelyn said Ciarán could move himself and his stuff into her room, and Danny too, because he didn’t want to be up in the attic on his own after their encounter with Boris the booze lifting monk ghost of Doomlake Priory. Which was fair enough, because since the battle of the bottle, the dead dipsomaniac monk had been a bit pissed off.

 

They had still been in Ciarán’s room, wondering what language they had heard Boris speaking, when the ghoul himself appeared, rapidly ransacking Ciarán’s stuff as he looked for the bottle, before disappearing into a solid wall.

 

‘I reckon it has to be Old English,’ Evelyn said, completely unphased by the assault on the room by the deceased Augustinian. She had casually watched as he looked under the bed, lifted the mattress, and emptied out Ciarán’s overnight bag. ‘People hardly travelled at all in those days, remember, so local dialects were very distinct.’

 

Danny and Ciarán had watched this outrage with startled eyes, both of them flinching out of the way when the spook got too close, not listening to a word that Evelyn said.

 

‘Evelyn,’ Danny eventually said when his power of speech returned, ‘d d did you not see what just happened there?’ Ciarán merely made a small whimpering sound.

 

‘You mean sixteenth century Father Jack hunting down his wee dram? Of course I did. What do you think we should do about it?’

 

‘Well, I was thinking that leaving would be quite a good plan.’ Ciarán said as he started putting everything back in his bag with shaking hands.

 

‘Ach, don’t be such a big girl’s blouse,’ Evelyn said. ‘You’ve spent years looking for one of these things, and as soon as we find one, you’re off like a cat with its arse on fire.’

 

‘Well, I’m not sleeping in here tonight,’ Ciarán said as he zipped up the bag with half the contents still hanging out.

 

And that was the point at which it was decided that for strength in numbers, they would all camp in Evelyn’s room. ‘I suppose we should do something,’ she said, when the boys were finally settled in.

 

‘Like what?’ Ciarán asked.

 

‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘You’re the fancy pants university type with all your ideas of research and testing things. Think of an experiment or something. Isn’t that what you do?’

 

‘What sort of experiment?’

 

‘Oh, come on Ciarán. Show him some ink spots, or try to make him move stuff about using telepathy or something. You must have some ideas.’

 

‘Why don’t we see if we can communicate with him?’ Danny suggested.

 

‘There you go,’ Evelyn said triumphantly. ‘Danny’s just a useless podcast host, no offence Danny, but he’s come up with something already.’

 

Before Danny could say anything, Ciarán started thinking aloud. ‘We need something to attract him with.’

 

‘Well, that’s a no-brainer,’ Evelyn said. ‘We just head to Marjorie’s room and borrow one of her bottles of hooch. That should attract him like a bloody magnet.’

 

They traipsed up the corridor, around the corner, past Ciarán’s abandoned room, and onto the balcony around the cathedral-like great hall. Marjorie’s door was open, and the sound of slightly drunk giggling came from within. Danny knocked and pushed the door further open to find Mike and Marjorie in antique stuffed chairs either side of the fireplace, with a half-empty bottle of Jameson’s finest between them.

 

‘Ah, erm, Marjorie,’ Danny said nervously, hoping he wasn’t setting himself up for another granny attack. ‘I was wondering if we could borrow one of your bottles, and a glass please? We want to see if we can use it as bait to attract Boris.’

 

Mike’s cheeks were flushed red and his eyes sparkled with good humour. It was the first time they had ever seen him look happy. ‘You should have been in here ten minutes ago. He tried making a grab for our bottle, but I scared him away with this thing.’ He waved the scabby looking furry microphone in the air while almost pissing himself laughing.

 

‘Now that’s interesting,’ Evelyn said. ‘Perhaps it gives off some electromagnetic force that repels spirits.’

 

‘Or maybe it just looks like a manky ferret,’ Danny suggested. ‘To be honest, not even a deceased monk would want to go anywhere near that thing.’

 

‘He was very brave,’ Marjorie said, casting an admiring glance at their slightly unshaven and slightly unhygienic sound engineer.

 

‘Well, that’s good,’ Danny said, relieved that he may now be spared any more attention by the amorous septuagenarian. ‘So could we borrow that bottle and a glass, please?’

 

Marjorie stood up, grabbing the depleted bottle and handing it to Danny. ‘Why don’t you take this one, and I’ll get another for us.’ She picked up an empty glass from the dresser as she passed, tipping out a dead spider, then opened the wardrobe and took out a fresh bottle. She blew the dust out of the glass before handing it to Danny, then sat back down again and cracked the seal on the new bottle.

 

As Mike and Marjorie resumed their sozzled giggling, Danny led Evelyn and Ciarán back to where Boris had tried and failed to take the bottle through the panelling earlier. ‘I reckon this is the best place to start, so what do we do?’

 

‘Well, I’m not buggering about with a ouija board or any of this knock once for yes, twice for no bollocks.’ Evelyn said. ‘Let’s just try talking to him.’

 

‘Okay,’ Danny said. ‘We can give it a go.’ Not sure how best to go about this, he shook the bottle in front of the woodwork. ‘Oh Boris.’

 

‘He’s not going to know they call him Boris,’ Evelyn said, ‘and don’t say it like that. He’s not a bloody cat.’

 

‘Well, what do we call him then?’

 

‘Father?’ she suggested.

 

‘I can’t call him that. He’s not my dad. Anyway, do they call monks father?’

 

‘How about friar then?’

 

‘Sounds like somebody who works in a chip shop, and this was a priory.’

 

‘Prior?’

 

Before they could think of another name, the monk’s head appeared through the panelling.

 

‘Aaagh!’ Danny dropped the bottle and jumped back. Evelyn caught it and took the glass from Danny, who was trying to hide behind Ciarán, who was trying to hide behind Evelyn. The very real, and not very ghostly head of the monk watched this pantomime with a puzzled expression.

 

‘Right then monkey chops,’ Evelyn said, trying to polish the glass on her fleece jacket with the bottle tucked under one arm, figuring that not even a dead monk would want to drink out of a manky glass. ‘If you want some of this, you’re going to have to talk to us.’

 

Boris just stared back at her, his eyes fixed on the bottle. His shoulders appeared through the wall as he was drawn towards the Irish tipple. A hand and his grubby brown woollen sleeve emerged as he tried to reach for the bottle.

 

‘Ah, no you don’t.’ Evelyn held the bottle well out of reach. ‘Tell us your name and you can have some.’

 

Boris merely stared back defiantly.

 

‘Name,’ Evelyn said, giving the bottle a little shake.

 

Boris licked his lips, as if trying to taste the whiskey by merely wishing it to appear. ‘Whataveyeinyonderflask?’ he garbled.

 

‘Oh well done, Evelyn,’ Ciarán said. ‘What did he say?’

 

‘I haven’t a scooby doo,’ she admitted. ‘Slower,’ she said to Boris, who still had his eyes fixed on the bottle. ‘Speak…more…slowly.’

 

Boris licked his lips again. ‘What have ye in yonder flask?’

 

‘That’s better.’ She held up the bottle, his eyes following every move. ‘Whisky. Sorry, whiskey, with an E. It’s Irish.’

 

‘Be that some Frankish wine?’ Boris asked, now looking suspiciously at the amber fluid in the clear glass bottle. ‘That not of my ken.’

 

‘Oh, you say ken too.’ Evelyn was delighted at this. ‘So the English do know that word after all.’

 

‘Don’t say it,’ Ciarán muttered.

 

‘I wasn’t going to,’ Danny replied.

 

‘How would you describe whiskey?’ Evelyn asked.

 

‘Like a very strong mead?’ Ciarán suggested.

 

‘Mead,’ Boris said, his eyes lighting up with delight. ‘Mead, yes.’

 

‘He seems pretty keen on that idea,’ Danny said.

 

‘Well, if he hasn’t tasted the stuff for nearly five hundred years, I’m not surprised.’ Evelyn started to wriggle the cork out of the bottle. ‘Want to try some?’

 

‘Not for me, thanks,’ Danny politely declined. ‘I’m not really a spirits person. I mean liquid spirits, drinks. You know what I mean.’

 

‘I wasn’t talking to you. I was talking to Boris.’

 

‘Oh, sorry. Yes, of course you were. Silly me.’

 

‘Want some?’ She held the bottle up again.

 

Boris leaned further forward, almost half of his torso now visible as he emerged from the wall.

 

‘What is your name?’ Evelyn asked again.

 

‘Francis,’ the monk replied quickly, licking his lips again in anticipation.

 

‘Fantastic,’ Evelyn said, pouring a small measure into the glass. ‘You and me are going to get on just fine, Frankie.’

 

‘We are actually communicating with what appears to be a spirit entity using standard verbal speech,’ Ciarán said, feeling more like his old self again.

 

‘We most certainly are,’ Evelyn said, handing the glass to Boris, who before Evelyn could shout a warning, gulped the whole measure down in one go. Boris, now called Francis, gasped silently for air as the neat whiskey took immediate effect, and also took the lining off the back of his throat. His face flushed red, which was an interesting response for a corpse, and his eyes began to water.

 

‘I will take a guess that he hasn’t tasted anything quite that strong before,’ Danny said.

 

‘Well, we don’t know that he’s actually tasting it,’ Ciarán said. ‘It could just be that it is an imaginary reaction to what he was preconditioned to think whiskey would taste like.’

 

‘Well, it looks to me like he fancies another imaginary reaction,’ Evelyn said as Francis passed the empty glass back to her. She poured another measure of the amber liquid into the glass. ‘Just sip it this time.’ Francis looked puzzled, so she mimed taking small sips from the glass before handing it back to him.

 

‘Sippit,’ he said, before downing it all in one go. ‘Aaahhh!’ he gasped, looking very pleased with himself before passing the glass back to Evelyn.

 

‘At this rate, he’s going to get absolutely hammered in no time,’ Danny said.

 

‘Well, I’m not walking him home if he gets legless,’ Evelyn said, pouring another measure. Then, before handing it to him, she had a thought. ‘I’m just going to feel your arm, so don’t think I’m getting too friendly or anything. I just want to see how…’ She took hold of his wrist and found it to be perfectly solid, and as Ciarán had described, stone cold. ‘Wow. That’s really cool. I mean interesting, not just that it’s cold.’ She gripped more firmly and pulled, feeling Francis trying to pull his hand back. ‘That’s amazing. So how do you get through walls without wrecking them?’

 

Francis shrugged. ‘I knoweth not.’ He still had his eyes fixed on the glass of whiskey.

 

‘Oh well. That seems to be the end of that line of enquiry. Now,’ she said, holding the glass back from him. ‘Why are you breaking things in this house?’

 

Francis looked astonished, then hurt. ‘I breaketh nothing that isn’t put before me in ill-thought placement. Blameth me not if trinkets are displayed where I must appear. It art not easy being of this predicament.’

 

‘That’s a fair point, actually,’ Danny agreed. ‘If they keep putting breakables where he has to emerge from walls, accidents are bound to happen.’

 

‘No it isn’t,’ Evelyn disagreed. ‘They have to share this house, so he should be more careful.’ She held out the glass to him, then took it back again. ‘Right, Frankie. In future, before you just burst out of a wall, stop first, have a look on the other side, stop breaking things. Okay?’

 

Frankie looked confused.

 

‘I don’t think they said okay in the sixteenth century,’ Ciarán suggested.

 

‘Ah, you’re probably right,’ Evelyn agreed. ‘No more breaking things.’

 

Francis nodded his head, so she handed him the glass, which again he emptied in one go.

 

‘I think he’s got a bit of a habit, this one,’ Evelyn said as she took back the empty glass.

 

‘Seriously?’ Danny asked.

 

‘What?’ It was Evelyn’s turn to look confused, then she worked it out. ‘Ah, habit. Yes, very funny.’ She held up the diminishing bottle. ‘Right, that’s the first part of the exorcism sorted, now we need to finish it.’

 

‘Exorcism?’ Danny looked puzzled. ‘That was some sort of exorcism, was it?’

 

‘I reckon so,’ Evelyn said. ‘Come on Frankie. Out you come.’ She walked away, taking the bottle with her. ‘That should stop the poltergeist activity, no more breaking the place up. Now we make sure it works as a long-term strategy by introducing him to his dealer. Come on Frankie.’ She held the bottle aloft, and the monk pulled himself through the wall.

 

Ciarán’s bravery vanished instantly as the large, robed figure loomed in the dark passageway. He and Danny held back while Evelyn walked in the direction of Marjorie’s room, casually swinging the bottle, her faithful spectre following close behind. When there was a safe enough gap for them to make a run for it if they had to, Danny and Ciarán followed.

 

Evelyn tapped on the door, then entered the room, followed by the ghostly monk. Mike and Marjorie had reached the slightly slurred and serious conversation stage of emptying a bottle of whiskey. They both stared drunkenly, looking from Evelyn to the monk, wondering what on earth was going on?

 

‘Marjorie, may I introduce Francis, the ghost that you emailed us about. Francis, this is Marjorie, who you are going to be nice to, because all she wants is somebody she can have an intelligent conversation with, and share a wee dram to pass the evening.’

 

Marjorie’s face lit up as understanding slowly sank in. No longer would she be stuck on her own, or listening to her son and his abrasive wife with their sulking teenagers. ‘Pleased to meet you, Francis. Come and join us.’

 

Francis looked warily at the microphone that was leaning against the wall next to Mike. ‘Oh don’t worry about that thing, it won’t harm you, and neither will he.’ Evelyn looked at Mike who had passed from this veil to the next until morning, his eyes closed, and the first hint of snoring making itself heard. She pulled a chair across next to Marjorie and indicated that Francis should take the weight off, if ghosts actually have any weight, that is.

 

And that is the true story of the haunting of Doomlake Priory, and the exorcism that was performed by the Uncanny team. There were no more breakages, no more sightings of a ghostly figure searching through the house for something lost, just the occasional sound of contented voices from upstairs, and the tinkle of glasses being refilled.

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Please note. My books are not flippant nonsense like this, they are proper grown up ghost stories. Not spoof horror, proper ghost stories that leave you with more questions than answers.

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If you want to find out more about what I do, have a poke around on my Home Page.