I am a good man. She was convincing, is all. I am still a good man.

It was thirteen days before All Hallow’s Eve. Jimmy and I punched out of the mill and dragged our heels along the trail home. Before we parted, he pulled a crumpled flyer from his trouser pocket and raised his eyebrows in silent invitation.

‍ ‍Mr Maudlin’s World Famous Haunted House. Two pence a ticket. A lifetime of nightmares.

My other prospect was a solitary meal, so I agreed. I wish to god I hadn’t.

The ‘house’ was a long, windowless, rectangular wooden structure as wide as a stream after rain. ‘Four rooms, four horrors, one way in, one way out,’ Mr Maudlin proclaimed, twirling his thick moustache in an effort to procure some atmosphere.

We stood awkwardly at the entrance in silence until he swung the first door open and pushed us inside.

‘See you soon, perhaps.’ Then he cackled and locked us in.

We found ourselves in what appeared to be a circus room, trapped with a sad clown that reeked of whisky. I couldn’t tell whether his stumbling and retching was part of the show or just the actor grasping for mobility. After a few disappointing moments, he pushed the next door open. Inside was a room filled with dirt, some tombstones and a gentleman ghost in the corner.

To be fair, the ghost-man gave his darndest, but Jimmy and I remained unperturbed.

The door cranked open for room three, and that’s when I saw her.

It was as if the most beautiful girl in town was tied by the ankles and dragged behind a cart for days. Her long hair was clumped together. She wore barely anything, and what she did was stained brown. The room looked like a madman’s chamber, with rusty tools, hay bales and bloodied sacks strewn across the floor and walls. Her cage was locked in the back left corner. As we entered, she slammed herself into the metal and screamed.

‘Please, help me! Please!’

I was blown away by the authenticity of her performance. Her desperate eyes, the crack in her voice, the way she’d bloodied her knuckles. The shock of it sent me staggering back into Jimmy.

‘Please!’ she shrieked. ‘He’s locked me in here!’

Jimmy let out a startled laugh. ‘Blimey, she’s good!’

We circled the front of the cage in awe. Her eyes followed us and bled tears down her filthy cheeks.

‘What’s your name?’ I asked her.

She let out a low, pained groan. ‘I don’t remember. Please let me out. Please.’

‘Marvellous!’ I clapped my hands, overwhelmed by the sheer rawness of her performance. ‘You absolutely have me going.’

The girl shook the cage and screeched once more. ‘Please let me out.’ And then she wailed like a dam breaking, and my heart cracked right in two.

The door swung open. Jimmy shoved me through.

After biding our time in the fourth room which was dark and nothing more, the final door opened to reveal an expectant Mr Maudlin.

‘Well?’

‘It was unbelievable,’ I said. ‘The girl in the cage… she is absolutely something else.’

Mr Maudlin smiled. ‘Yes indeed. She is my special girl.’

‘What is her name? Will she be performing in any other shows?’

Mr Maudlin flashed an unreadable smile before he gestured at us to leave.

The next day I came back without Jimmy. I endured the circus and the graveyard, and then there she was. As soon as she saw me, she lunged for the bars.

‘You came back!’

I could barely contain myself. She was magnetic. And she’d hollowed her cheeks out. I supposed it would be hard to keep her makeup the same as the day before. Perhaps I was their only repeat customer.

‘You’ve come to help me!’ Her eyes were bright with desperation.

I pulled a crate over to the cage, sat down and leaned in towards her.

‘Where did you learn your craft?’

Her face fell, and she rattled the cage once again. ‘Just let me out! I don’t want to die.’

I couldn’t stop the corners of my lips from curling upward. She was an absolute revelation. The performance was as thrilling as the first time. She’d even rouged her wrists with long, finger-like bruises. 

‘He does not pay you enough dear,’ I said breathlessly. 

The wooden door was flung open, and again my time was up. The scream she let out as I walked away, I’ll never forget. 

I’d like to say that I never went back, but I did. Eleven more times. I’d finish at the mill, punch my ticket and beeline to Mr Maudlin. I went without supper so I could see her. 

On All Hallow’s Eve, she sat in a ball with her head buried in her arms. She didn’t scream, or whimper, or even look at me.  

I reasoned that putting your whole being into your performance would be taxing. Perhaps she’d given all she had to give. As I watched her, the exhilaration I usually felt as she writhed and screamed gave way to something else. An unspeakable prospect that kept me awake in my cot that night. A thing too horrible to reconcile.

After work the next day, I waved off Jimmy and the boys before doubling back to the tool shed. I quietly borrowed a set of bolt cutters and stuffed them down my trousers. It pinched at the hairs on my calf as I ambled once more to the show.

I walked in a state of feverish delusion, wondering if I’d be caught or sent to the authorities, or worse—she would think me a fool. But I had to rid myself of this feeling. I had to know.

As I rounded the trees, what I saw stopped me dead.

The show was gone. 

‍ ‍She was gone. 

All that remained were some claw marks in the dirt where the third room used to be, in the back left corner.