Day 14 of ‘A Scare a Day’ – ‘Elsie’s Lonely Afternoon’ by Marjorie Bowen

Today’s story is Marjorie Bowen’s ‘Elsie’s Lonely Afternoon’. You can read it here. I read this story first in the Bishop of Hell collection from Wordsworth Tales of Mystery and the Supernatural. Among a host of supernatural stories, most of which have faded slightly from my memory, this one stood out. I can still feel it.There’s no supernatural to speak off. There’s a ghost that doesn’t exist. The horror in part lies in the fact that we absolutely know he isn’t a ghost and our 6 year old protagonist doesn’t. You watch what is happening like a tragedy that you can’t stop.

This story aches to read. Elsie’s isolation and neglect are so distressingly real.

Her grandmother used to tell her to ‘efface herself’, and Elsie soon became aware that this word meant that she was to act as if she didn’t exist. She soon began to understand that she ought never to have existed.

A little girl who regrets her existence, who constantly refers to herself as a nuisance, who has no companion, and is almost completely isolated and alone in a house that cares little for her… it’s hard to read. I don’t want to give too many spoilers but the actions of the supposed ghost, the cruelty of it, the fact she’s so happy (and then so sad) because of a promised jar of jam and a couple of sovereigns (which he takes back) is heart-breaking. The fact that the tale ends with her gratitude is almost too bitter to bear.

It’s honestly one of the most effective stories I’ve ever read at just reaching into your chest, scooping your heart out, and letting it fall to the floor through indifferent fingers.

As a little aside to end on a slightly more positive note (or rather on another grander historical tragedy), I was interested to see that the grandmother had three engravings on her wall. I was most interested in that one description was particularly familiar as I think it’s based on one of my favourite paintings. John Everett Millais’ ‘A Huguenot on St Bartholomew’s Day’ which depicts a Protestant and his Catholic beloved. She is trying to tie a symbol to his arm which will disguise his Protestant identity. He is refusing. On the day of the St Bartholomew Day’s Massacre. The pictures behind the grandmother all tell tales of death and tragedy. Elsie really doesn’t stand a chance.