I blame Tom Cox. In one of his books he mentions attending an event in an old chapel lit by lanterns in which an actor recreated the experience of M R James telling his ghost stories to his colleagues. I remembered hearing about this, and it was a quick job to trace the company – Don’t Go Into The Cellar – and find that they were running an event in Dunmow. Too easy, this internet. A few clicks and we were set up for a scary evening.
It wasn’t a cellar, and it wasn’t lit by Victorian lanterns – it was upstairs in the Dunmow Maltings, a building I had passed many times without registering it was there. It’s been restored and set up as a museum and community hall. It was quiet as we went in at 7pm, and we wandered around and eventually found the audience sitting in the upstairs space. The lights were bright enough to play football in there at first. The custodian turned off two sections, leaving a strong uplight and two ‘floodlights’ beaming down from the ceiling. Tom Cox described the eerie atmosphere of the dimly lit chapel, where the sudden thud of a bag dropped at the appropriate moment made the audience jump. Well… not here.
By 7.30, there were eighteen people sitting whispering in a semi-circle and two empty chairs. The music died away and Jonathon Goodwin came slowly out of the back room and took his place in the spotlight. The light shone up onto his pale face and spiky hair, and I would not have liked to be stuck in a lift with someone looking like that. You’d want to check they were still breathing. He introduced himself as Montague Rhodes James, mediaevalist and author – “But do call me Monty.”
Just as he explained (in elaborate Victorian phrasing) that he would leave it to us to choose the story to be told, the main door creaked open. Of course, the whole audience turned to look. Three women in their twenties came in and gawked at us all. Poor old Monty was left struggling to call our attention back from this gust of twenty-first century manners. He should have waited. Three women? Two spare chairs? A lot of hushed (but loud enough) haggling over who was gonna sit where and Monty’s assistant was left to sit on the floor to let one of the gigglers sit next to me. She was shifting her chair around about as noisily as possible, nearly knocking my drink over. Monty said to her; “When you’re quite ready!”
We were given the choice of two stories. We voted for ‘Tale of the Wailing Well’, and then (close vote) for ‘Whistle And I’ll Come To You’, although the alternatives sounded just as good. I admit I have never read M R James; I find the Victorians over-dramatic at times. Still, what else do you want from a ghost story but the drama? What you don’t want is three women who missed the twentieth century altogether fidgetting and giggling around you.
There was a break for us to grab a drink from the front desk and visit the sanitary facilites. The three gigglers were first out of the door, and I happened to know that there were only three thrones in the Ladies. I nicked the Disabled loo instead, so I missed hearing what they had to say. Shame, really. That would have been a prime bit of eavesdropping.
Back we came, settled in that semi-circle, and ‘Monty’ came dead-marching back to resume. The three gigglers hadn’t come back. I was dreading it for a full five minutes, expecting them to come thudding and sniggering in, but soon the third story took all our attention. We chose ‘The Ash Tree’, a tale of Hopkins witch-finding and revenge. Not the kind of story I’d want to be hearing if I had to creep along a corridor to a dark bedroom afterwards.
Applause. The sinister Mr James bowed and took his leave of us. Those of us who were left drifted out through the museum exhibits and out into the real world. Sad to report, the three young women… were never seen again.
Update; pretty sure I spotted the three of them giggling outside the chip shop as we drove out of Dunmow. But why spoil a good spooky finish.
Julia Chalkley 