I’d like to tell you a story my great-grandma told me. I don’t think she was supposed to be telling me scary stories at my age, and maybe that’s where I developed my love of gothic - who knows... well, whatever the reason, thanks for the cool and scary stories, great-grandma!
As a girl, my great-grandma was a country-girl with the occasional visits to town, and one time, she actually got to visit a city. She didn’t actually mention the city she visited, I suppose I assumed it was London.
She told me details of the trip during winter, rather than summer - the large coat she wore was dark blue with a black velvet collar and large, easy to use buttons. Her boots were shiny and she got told-off if they got scuffed. She even remembered the red woollen gloves. They itched a bit (I think she said ‘fridged’) and she didn’t like to wear them but it was cold that day, so she kept them on.
She wore a little blue beret and her hair was caught up in a ribbon (which she kept losing and so her mother sewed it to a hair pin (think bobby pin).
As they were going along the icy street, trying to keep their balance in the snow, they approached a large building with a high wall around it. Her father looked up at the wall and sighed. Then they went inside the wall, through a metal gate and up some steps.
Great-grandma said she did not like the building at all. She heard a scream and she stopped dead in the hallway, refusing to go further. Her father pulled on her hand and her mother bent down to ask what was wrong.
“I head someone scream,” my great-grandmother said in her little girl voice.
“Nonsense,” her father said and pulled her along with him.
Great-grandma was almost in tears by the time they got to the office where they had an appointment.
They went in and were invited to sit. My great-grandma didn’t sit down because there wasn’t a chair for her. She stood quietly by the side of her mother while the man behind the desk droned on.
My great-grandma became bored and she started looking around. The office smelled funny and she saw bookshelves filled with books from floor to ceiling and she wondered who had written them all.
She looked to the side where a window looked out onto the corridor. A man walked past, pushing a trolley. He looked right at my great-grandma and she really didn’t like him. She snapped her attention back to the man behind the desk and tried not to be bored any more.
A knock at the door stopped the man from speaking and he said, “Come.”
The door opened and it was the man pushing the trolley.
My great-grandma didn’t like the look of the trolley-man and she looked past him to the trolley. A body was lying on the trolley, covered from head to foot in a white sheet. The sheet had splotches of red on it and my grandma delighted in telling me that the splotches were probably blood.
While the man spoke to the man behind the desk, my great-grandma looked up at him and as though he knew she was looking, he turned to look at her and he grinned.
Great-grandma shrank away from him, terrified, and she hid behind her mother. As the man left the room, she heard the trolley-man say, “Room for one more.”
After her parents had conducted their business (Great-grandma never told me what it was), they went into town.
They passed a funeral carriage and her father took off his hat. Great-grandma looked up and the man holding open the door for the coffin to be put inside the carriage was the same trolley-man from earlier. My great-grandma gasped and hid again. The man nodded at her parents and in a whisper like leaves on gravestones, he said, “Room for one more...”
Later, when they had finished shopping and sight-seeing, my great-grandma and her parents went to their hotel because they had to stay over for other business the next day.
The hotel they were booked in at was a tall building and my great-grandma had never seen anything like it. They checked in and went to the elevator.
My great-grandma was fidgeting and looking around. She was tired and causing a little bit of bother. Her mother said that she would walk up the stairs to the floor their room was on but her father said he’d wait for the elevator and get the room ready for them by the time they walked up. Just at that moment, the elevator arrived. People got off and my great-grandma waited to see what was happening, she’d never seen an elevator before and she decided she didn’t want to walk up the stairs, she wanted to ride in the elevator instead.
They were making their way back and people were getting onto the elevator. By the time they got back, the elevator was full, almost and the operator wasn’t letting any more people on.
My great-grandma looked up at the elevator operator and saw the trolley-man and the funeral man. He smiled at her and nodded that she should get onto the elevator. The little girl stood frozen in terror and her father said, “Oh, all right, I shall go up as we first planned.” And he got back on the elevator.
“NO!” My great-grandma screamed. Her mother took hold of her because she was shaking badly and crying, screaming for her papa not to go.
Her father shook his head in frustration and got off the elevator.
The elevator operator nodded at my great-grandmother and smiled.
The operator said one sentence just before he closed the doors.
“Room for one more,” he said.
Then he closed the doors. My great-grandmother had to be carried up the stairs by her father because she was exhausted and still shaking.
They were not two flights up when there was the most awful crash from the lobby.
The elevator cables had snapped and the elevator, with all those people inside, crashed into the basement. Some of the people died and all were badly injured.
My great-grandma had to have the doctor come to see her and sedate her. Her mother said she wouldn’t stop crying and she told about the elevator operator.
The hotel didn’t employ an elevator operator, the manager assured them when they checked out and asked about whether he had survived.
Pictures from Google