The Haunting of Ashburn House Read Free Page A

attention but refused to tilt his head the way he normally did. “I know you don’t like this, but trust me, it beats being homeless.”
    A low, discontented grumble answered her.
    Adrienne gave her cat a tight-lipped smile then rose and went to collect their cases. As little as Wolfgang realised it, she hadn’t been joking. The last four years of Pat’s life had been a stream of specialist appointments, stints in hospital, and experimental treatments for the autoimmune disease that had ultimately claimed her. When her mother’s health deteriorated too far for her to be alone during the day, Adrienne had left her job to stay with her and picked up whatever freelance writing work she could find online. She was proud to say they’d managed okay right up until the final hospital stay.
    Pat had always tried her hardest to give Adrienne a stable home. She’d worked two jobs when she’d been healthy enough, but the appointments and treatments hadn’t been without cost. By the time she passed, her house had been mortgaged twice and their savings had been converted into debts.
    The weeks following the funeral had been a whirlwind of stress and financial problems digging through the grief. Pat’s house, car, and furniture were sold to pay her outstanding debts. Adrienne had temporarily moved into a friend’s apartment, but it was clear it couldn’t be a permanent solution; the two-room space was far too small for four people, an irritable cat, and the friend’s aggressive dog.
    Adrienne had spent her free time looking for a new place to live, but the search had been demoralising. Her freelance work would only support a cheap apartment, and none of the places she’d viewed were welcoming towards cats.
    The friend had suggested she give Wolfgang away. She might as well have asked Adrienne to cut off her own arm; she loved her fluffy monster too much to surrender him to a stranger. The letter telling her she’d inherited Ashburn had been, in Adrienne’s opinion, a bona fide miracle.
    Adrienne picked both cases off the grass and carried them back to Ashburn. The sun was close to the treetops, and its red glow spread across the horizon. Long shadows followed her back into the musty hallway, and the angry bird chatter swelled as the fowl prepared to nest.
    She’d tried to keep her absence brief, but by the time she backed through the lounge room doors and turned towards the cat carrier, Wolfgang had already disappeared. She shut the door so that he couldn’t escape and peered into the shadows that gathered around the room’s corners as she opened the heavier of the cases.
    “Hey, buddy,” she called as she set out his litter box, poured a bag of chalky wood pulp into it, and laid his bowls beside the door. “Are you hungry? Hmm?”
    She rattled the food tin, but the grey beast remained scarce. Adrienne sighed, poured the food into one of the bowls, then picked up the second to fill with water. As she let herself out of the lounge room, the light caught across scratches in the opposite wall’s paper. Adrienne frowned at them. They almost look like words.
    She took a step closer and inhaled. Someone had carved through the wallpaper to expose the wood underneath. They were hard to see at an angle, but the words became clear when looked at head-on:
    NO MIRRORS
    Adrienne glanced along the hallway reflexively. It was cluttered with furniture but didn’t include any mirrors. She hadn’t found it unusual before, but the words felt disquieting, almost menacing. She shook her head and crossed to the kitchen.
    The sink was a huge, old-fashioned installation, and the handle screamed when she turned it. Pipes rattled above her head, and Adrienne gazed at the ceiling and imagined she could see the wooden boards shudder. Icy-cold water spewed out of the tap, ricocheted off the bowl, and sprayed over her.
    Adrienne shrieked a series of very unladylike phrases as she fought to turn the tap off. Then, drenched and grumbling, she