Hampton Street, Historic District

“I tell you, it’s maddening!”

“You look pale. Have a drink.”

“I don’t drink, thank you.”

“Ah yes, I remember,” said Barry Rogers, a thirty-two year old property manager from Peterborough, New Hampshire. And that’s why I offered, he added to himself silently. Barry got up from his desk and retrieved a bottle of brandy from a nearby cabinet. “Listen, I know you have a problem with the place. Well, what's there for me to do about it?”

“It’s the house you rented me, isn’t it your responsibility?” said the Visitor who sat primly on the other side of the desk with his hands folded neatly in his lap. “You manage its affairs. Shouldn’t you have warned me about these other… inhabitants? This is not the first time I have come to call, you know.”

“I know,” said Barry, pouring himself a glass. 

“At all times,” said the Visitor, “I wonder whether I shall have a quiet evening to myself, or some new stranger will come screeching through! They always scream, and do so as if it were my fault. I had better start from the beginning.”

“No need,” said Barry, “I remember the last time you came in.”

“I really think I had better start from the beginning. The story’s better that way. And I’m a storyteller, you know. A purveyor of words.”

Barry waved his hand while he took another sip of brandy. He coughed. “Purvey, then,” he said.

“Right,” said the Visitor, and he started from the beginning. “I rented the place on Hampton Street in the historic district some time ago. That’s the one across from the silversmith—oh, but of course it has changed hands a few times. I believe it is a barber’s shop now. I have been on Hampton for some time. Long before your time, young Rogers.”

“Sure,” said Barry.

“I have always been a quiet man. I do not have a nervous disposition. Nor do I drink, as I regard it as one of the chief vices of man—ah, present company excepted.”

Barry nodded courteously.

The Visitor continued. “I am not a nervous man, and this is why I do not believe what I have seen is a ‘bit of undigested beef’ or ‘a fragment of underdone potato.’ (Dickens, you know. Oh, you don’t? Hm.) I am a librarian. Retired, of course, and finishing up a little book of my own. Indeed, the troubles arose shortly after my retirement. I do not ask for much, Rogers. You know this. I am no troublesome tenant. I do not wish to be a trouble to anyone. This must be only the second time I’ve come to you with a complaint—what was that? Ah, a catch in the throat, of course—well, I’ve no wish to be trouble. But that does not stop others from troubling me.

“One night after I had come back from a bracing walk (‘An early morning walk is a blessing for the whole day.’ No? Ah, Thoreau, you must read him my man). I had returned from my walk, yet rather than being greeted by a ‘blessing for the whole day,’ I was greeted by a blight upon the earth. What should I find but an old man, around my same age (my age now, you understand), standing in the entry hall and accompanied by much luggage!

“I had expected no visitors, so I may be excused for reacting harshly. ‘What the devil are you doing here, man?’ I said. I am a quiet man, Rogers, so it must not be lost upon you the severity of my emotion which prompted me to reference the devil in such a way. The man started at my coming.

“‘Who are you?’ he asked.

“I responded, ‘I hardly need to defend myself against you, good sir, but I am the man who rents this house. So what I might and do ask, are you doing here?’

“‘There must be a mistake, sir.’ he said. ‘I was told this house is vacant, and I myself have rented it.’” The Visitor huffed. “Vacant indeed! I ask you, Rogers. This is your line of business. How often does a mix-up such as this take place?”

“‘s possible,” said Barry. Truth be told, he had just been admiring the way his brandy glass caught the light. “I’ll bet it’s happened before. Yeah.”

“Nothing new under the sun, eh?” said the Visitor. “But that’s not the worst of it! Were this an isolated event, I should not be bothered by it. A singular, simple misunderstanding—a mistaken address, perhaps—would not agitate me. But it has happened again and again! As the bard said, ‘When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions!’”

“What are you saying?” said Barry, in a tone which indicated that he did not in the least care what the Visitor was saying but meant to humor him anyway.

“I am saying that the old man was not the only one who invaded me. Several—no more, it must be a dozen—dozens of supposed renters have come to call! Not long after the old man had left me alone (a month at most) a young couple attempted to move in! Then a lady with a cat, and after a lawyer and his assistant, and after that a family with three children… There are others. But here is the astonishing part.” Here the Visitor dropped his voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “They do not seem to take notice of me.”

“No kidding?” Barry whispered back.

“No. That is, sometimes they do,” the Visitor continued to whisper. “But at others they don’t. And I always see them at strange times and hours of the night. They are a constant nuisance and make dreadful noises. You see, I believe that the house on Hampton Street… is haunted.”

The Visitor sat back impressively. Barry was gracious enough to let his eyes widen a bit and say, “You really think so?”

“I am assured it is the case. Yes, they are ghosts. ‘Doomed for a certain term to walk the night.’ But they all seem to collect around the house on Hampton Street. At times, they see me, and scream out to terrify me. At others, I am invisible, and they go about their day to day tasks in the place as if they live there. Yet none of them stay for very long. I have a theory, Rogers,” said the Visitor.

“Don’t you just,” said Barry, and poured himself another glass.

“Have you heard of a drupelet?”

“Sounds ridiculous,” said Barry absentmindedly. 

“A drupelet is the pulpy seed of a blackberry or raspberry.”

Barry coughed. “Brandy,” he said and raised his glass as the Visitor raised his eyebrows.

“I see my situation like this,” said the Visitor. “The house on Hampton Street must be some occultic locus. Something around which spirits and souls collect. Now, the house is like the middle of the berry. And the ghosts are like the drupelets which surround it. They cluster to it, moths about a lamp. Why? Well, perhaps the building was built on a church graveyard—no? Well, perhaps something more ancient, a native burial ground, perhaps—don’t interrupt, please. There must be something of significance about the site. In fact, I have the whole theory described in a little collection of personal thoughts and essays that I have put together. That’s my book I mentioned earlier. I could send you my manuscript if you would like to take a look.”

“Don’t trouble yourself,” said Barry hurriedly.

“Fine. Well, Rogers, I hope you are happy with yourself, renting out a place infested with spirits to an old man like me. I trust that you will do something about it.”

Barry shrugged and picked up his glass, thought better of it, and set it down again. “Terribly embarrassed I am.  But I mean, you signed the lease. What am I supposed to do?”

“I do not know. I do not intend to move out. Why, I’ve been there for years and years! I can’t remember a time before the house on Hampton Street. See that you fix my ghost problem. Call a priest, call an exterminator. Do something.” The Visitor stood. “I have said my piece. Thank you for listening.”

The Visitor held out his hand. Barry declined it, saying that he was feeling unwell. The Visitor nodded and shuffled to the door. He turned back and said:

“And I will finish that book. ‘’Tis a consummation devoutly to be wished.’ I know I said it last time but I think I’m really on to something now. Just you wait. This book will change the world. I can’t leave it unfinished.”

“Yeah, I know you can’t. See you around,” said Barry.

A moment later, there was a knock on the door. Barry told them to come in.

“Who were you talking to?” asked his secretary.

“Just a phone call, Marge.”

“Your two o’clock is here.”

“Thanks.” Marge the secretary left. Barry straightened up in his chair and put the quarter-full bottle of brandy and unfinished glass in his bottom desk drawer. A young couple came into his office.

After getting through the pleasantries (Barry did not offer them brandy), the couple inquired after the vacant rental on Hampton Street.

“Oh, sure, that one’s a sweet gig. Historical district, you know. Character. Our first renter was a librarian of the country’s first public library built back in 1833. Neat, yeah. The place changed lots of hands since it’s been on the market. People say it’s haunted.” Barry laughed and the young couple joined him. 

“Crazy, I know. But you might see some funny things there, just a warning. And if you go back on the lease, you’ve got to find your own replacement…oh, why did the last people leave? Hah. Said they kept hearing typewriter sounds clacking all through the night. Probably just the laundromat next door or pigeons or whatever. I wouldn’t worry about it.”