The Eagle and the Rose (3 page)

My husband and our friend Susan had both leapt up from their chairs and rushed to help me even though I had uttered not one sound; they had watched as my face had drained completely of color, and my distress was obvious to them. Maxwell's arm shot out, his voice commanding that I not be touched.

I could see and hear all of this even as I sat, my terror mounting, as the terrible weight seemed to increase and push me down even farther. Maxwell's voice was coming across to me, quietly but insistent, trying to reassure me that I was all right, that he would help me … but the truth was that he was totally out of his depth. Nothing like this had ever happened to him before, but he remained calm, although my husband was yelling at Maxwell to “do something.” I was totally involved now with my own struggle as I tried yet again to lift my hands to my face, which seemed to be being peeled off like a mask. Then, just as suddenly as it had begun, the force was gone. The pressure left me and my hands flew to my face. Now I was so scared that I really cried. Susan fetched me a drink, and slowly I forced myself to “feel” normal. Maxwell took me for a walk around the garden, and the fresh night air brought me round and I felt so much better. But when I went back indoors and everyone wanted to talk about what had happened, I was so scared that I just could not bring myself to tell them. Twice more during that same evening I momentarily had that awful creeping sensation, as if my face were slowly being peeled away, and I just burst into tears.

My husband, Maxwell, and Susan had all been witness to an unexplainable and paranormal experience. They had all noticed that the temperature had dropped and the atmosphere in the room had changed dramatically during the hour that this event had taken place. The next morning Susan called to see if I was okay and told me how strange I had looked and how scared she had been; but apart from that one time neither she, Maxwell, nor my husband ever mentioned the incident again. It was brushed away, too difficult to deal with, too scary to contemplate, and the possibilities of what “it” might have been, oh no … no one in his right mind would ever want to consider.

And of course, it could just be that I was more than a little crazy, more like Grandma Eliza, than I dared think. When would it be my turn … when would they take me for treatment … when would my inherited madness be discovered? Never, I resolved, never; so I too swept the incident away, along with all the others that I had had over the years. It was just a game that had gone badly wrong, and I was never to talk about it again … until much later—much, much later, several years, in fact. And it was even later still when I came to understand what it had all meant.

After fourteen years of my husband's womanizing and continual financial messes, I was driven to seek a divorce. Not being able to understand that I had simply had enough of a one-sided marriage, he swore that he would see me starve before he paid me a penny to support either me or Samantha, our daughter.

He very nearly succeeded … but not quite. We didn't starve, but it was no thanks to him.

There are many kinds of loneliness in the world, but living with someone and being lonely is for me the worst kind. To lie in bed next to somebody and not be able to reach out and touch that person, not to talk or share the little things in life, seems a worse fate than having no one at all.

One day I came home to find him gone, and the money with him. All that was left of this tattered relationship was a string of debts and a ten-year-old child. The debts took years to settle and caused me much worry and heartache, but it was worth it just to be free at last. Although at one time I must have loved this man, to be rid of the weight of unrest and insecurity caused by his lying and cheating was wonderful.

My now ex-husband kept his word about not supporting us, and neither my daughter nor I have seen or heard from him since that time.

But I am the lucky one. Samantha and I have a very special and close relationship, and there is a tremendous feeling of love and affection between us. If I had to go through the pain and sadness of that time again in order to have my daughter, I would do it gladly.

So living now in the north of England, where I had moved with my husband some five or so years earlier, I found life was by no means easy. I was an emotional wreck, everything seemingly in tatters around my feet, and struggling financially. On top of all that, my visions, voices, and strange sensations, which had followed me through my life, started to become more vivid and to occur more frequently than before. I was once sitting alone in the living room at home, reading a book, when I looked up to see a man sitting opposite me on the settee. He didn't say a word, just stared at me intently. I heard myself talking to him, quite naturally, and remember thinking later that I must be mad. I knew that he was what some would call a ghost, even though he looked just like you or me and not as one would imagine a ghost to look. No wispy bits around the edges, not a bit pale or illuminated, just very ordinary. I knew with that telling instinct born to me that he was of another world, not because of his looks, but because of a recognition I find impossible to describe, the recognition of a soul free of earthly restrictions, of a soul born free.

Another time I woke up in bed to find two strangers, men of the spirit world but so real they could have been burglars, standing just inside the bedroom door. Again, not a word was said; they just looked at me. I scrambled up, struggling in my terror for the bedside lamp, which I switched on. When I looked back they were gone, and I was left shaking and alone.

My terrible fear of the dark stems from my childhood experiences. I still remember how I would hide underneath the bedclothes, sweating and trembling with fear, to escape from those awful faces. My mother refused to give in to what she considered to be my overactive imagination, and never did she allow me the comfort of a light. I was never to recognize those faces; never to know if they were the same or different each time; never to recognize the voices, whispering, calling; never to understand what was being said or what they wanted. I could only pray that they would go away. After I left home I always slept with a light to comfort me.

This particular night, when my two “visitors” came, the landing light was on and the bedroom door was ajar. But instead of the light giving me a feeling of security and comfort, it seemed to add a ghostly glow to the whole scene, and I was really scared. I remember scrambling around in the direction of the bedside table, trying to locate the lamp, which I knew was there … somewhere. When I eventually found it and switched it on, the men had disappeared and I was left all alone, wondering, Was it a dream? In my heart of hearts I knew that it had been much too real, that I hadn't been dreaming. I lay awake for the rest of the night, terrified that “they” might be back—and what then?

Many times I have been awakened in the early morning hours, experiencing a sensation I can only describe as a feeling of having two faces—as if I were wearing a mask that someone, or something, was attempting to pry from my face. The physical sensations are so real as to make my face seem misplaced or lopsided. Always I was left shaking and terrified.

From childhood to adulthood I lived with uncertainty, never knowing when the shadows would loom close or if they would overtake me. No matter how much I tried to understand what was happening to me, I was confused. No matter how much I then tried to ignore these strange visitations and happenings, I couldn't.

I grew up in two worlds, one a world of ghosts and specters, as real as I was, the other a world where what was real was always something you could explain, or touch or see and show others so that they too could see. One world was terrifying, the other cruel and unhappy.

I can remember as a child my mother saying, about herself, quite often and usually from sheer frustration, “I must be going mad!” I know that many people, including myself, have used the same expression either in jest or frustration or perhaps for some other reason. One thing I found during this strange and lonely period of my life was this: If you genuinely believed, as I did, that you really were cracking up, that your mental state was such that someone might just turn up to “put you away,” that you were in fact “going crazy,” you didn't tell a soul!

I was now thirty-four years old, and from the first time I can remember I had been “haunted.” Real or not real, debate as you will, I was caught up in a dimension of life that exceeded that which was considered by most as normal. Afraid and alone in my confusions, misunderstood and misunderstanding, my reality was different from that of anyone I knew, my judgments clouded and my sanity definitely in question.

Now on top of all else, my husband had disappeared. Apart from my youngest sister, my family was totally nonsupportive as I struggled to raise my daughter. My state benefit was low, and I was forced for a while to work part-time behind a bar, where I had to ward off the constant and unwanted attentions of the lecherous landlord until I could not stand it any longer and left.

With a very limited education, having left school at age fifteen to work in a ladies’ dress shop, I had no job qualifications and no time to go back to school or train for anything. The year was 1980, my daughter was now ten years old, and I was not yet divorced, as no one could find my husband. I was separated and “crazy” … most definitely, to my mind,
crazy.

I found myself becoming more and more introverted, hiding my true self from everyone. I put on an act to fool people and pretended that I was quite happy and “normal,” but the strain of this soon began to show. I stopped going out of the house, even to the village shops. When I had to buy food I would go to the nearest town where nobody knew me, and that way I didn't have to put on any false smiles or pretend that everything was all right. It wasn't. I became a virtual recluse. Only two things were important to me. One was that my daughter remain happy and secure. I felt that she needed to see me as strong and stable, and it took all of my efforts to give her that security. Second, I was determined no one would separate us, take my daughter from me.

I had been on my own for a few months when one day a friend who had been watching me going steadily downhill decided to take action. She phoned and said, “You are coming out with me tonight. There is someone local advertising a talk on tarot cards. Not just a talk, but a demonstration as well.”

I told her that I wasn't going, but she insisted that I was, and because she is a very forceful and somewhat bossy lady, I knew it was pointless to argue with her. I simply said, “I'm not going,” and put down the phone.

At seven o'clock that evening a knock came at the door, and there she was. Pushing her way into the house, she declared, “You've stayed in long enough, and I'm not leaving without you.”

Luckily, although I didn't think so at the time, Samantha was staying overnight with one of her friends, so I had no reason or excuse not to go out. I felt a tremendous resentment at Jean's intrusion into my life, but at the same time an odd sense of relief that I wasn't going to spend the evening alone.

Still, I was reluctant to face the world or to meet people I didn't know and to whom I might have to speak. They might sense that I was strange. As I have already said, someone who believes that they are going mad tries to appear quite normal and is frightened in case anyone suspects otherwise.

So here I was, going to a stranger's house and having to mix with people whom I had never met before. Any thoughts as to what sort of evening it was to be never crossed my mind. Only one thing was important, and this was that they—these strangers—mustn't learn the truth about me.

All the way in the car I sat silent and brooding, feeling that this private little world I had built up for myself so carefully over the last few months was being invaded. Eventually we pulled up in front of a small white cottage, standing alone in what at first seemed like acres of a no-man's-land. Having driven down some long rutted country lanes, which were really no more than dirt tracks, to find ourselves in this wilderness was a bit of a surprise, not at all what I had expected.

I was told later that this place, called the Turbary, was a sort of nature reserve, which accounted for the air of desolation and lack of buildings.

Jean and I were met at the door by Irene and Paul Denham, a retired couple who owned the place. She was in her mid-fifties, short and dark, quite attractive; he was in his sixties, taller and quite distinguished looking. The Denhams invited us in and introduced us to what seemed to me quite a crowd of people. There were actually only about a dozen other guests, but the room in which we had all been seated was quite small and therefore seemed overcrowded.

I was placed on the only empty chair left in the room, next to a small table, behind which was seated a slim, dark young man perhaps in his late twenties. I guessed he was the speaker. Because I was seated next to him, I felt quite conspicuous and can remember pushing myself back as far as I could go onto the chair in an effort to make myself seem smaller.

There was a lot of small talk going on, everyone chatting to each other; a very friendly atmosphere was being created, and some there were obviously excited and intrigued by what was about to be discussed.

Now at that time I knew nothing about tarot cards other than that they had little pictures on them and that some people believed in using them to tell the future. I don't know much more than that even now, except that it is a subject I prefer to leave alone and something I now would advise others to be very careful and critical of. It is not the cards that I am wary of, but the ability of the reader.

Eventually the speaker, whose name was John, was introduced to us all, and the demonstration began. First he gave a talk, explaining how long tarot cards had been in use and the meanings of the pictures. Each card, he said, was different, and although a card placed on its own had one meaning, putting it with a few others in the pack could completely change the interpretation. Basically what happens is that a few cards are placed face up on the table, in a certain pattern. Someone adept at understanding the cards can then, by interpreting them “correctly,” gain a certain knowledge concerning the person being read.