The House on the Hill

We were desperate to get out of the rain and wind, both soaked through and shivering with cold. We had been wandering around in the darkness for what seemed like hours, but in reality was nowhere near as long.

The storm had come on suddenly, several hours before. We had tried to wait it out under a overhang of rock out on the moor. It started to get dark, though, and we began to worry we would end up spending the night out there.

So, I looked at Sylvia, she looked at me, and then we stepped out into what seemed like a gale trying to blow us back under the rock. The darkness seemed to fall out of the sky, one minute it was evening with everything grey and washed out, then it was pitch black.

Usually, I have a good sense of direction. I thought I knew where the car was. After all, it should have been a matter of just walking straight down the hill back to the car, but the night, the darkness, the wind and the rain changed everything.

Soon, for reasons we could not understand we seemed to be walking back uphill without ever reaching the car, or even – knowingly – setting foot on the narrow winding road the car was parked beside.

Then we saw the pale yellow light in the distance and headed that way, even though it seemed the wind and the rain were doing their best to stop us.

It was a house, a farmhouse, up on the hilltop. Under the meagre shelter of its porch, we hammered on the door, but there was no reply. The light in the window had faded out once we were in sight of the house.

‘Perhaps whoever lived here has gone to bed!’ Sylvia managed to gasp out, her breath taken by the wind and the rain bettering her face.

I hammered on the door again… and it just opened. We inched cautiously through it, whispering ‘hello’ and so forth, but there was no-one there. As soon as we were through the door, it slammed shut, its heavy solid thud making us both jump and clutch each other in the dark.

Then I noticed there was no knob, handle or anything on the smooth flat surface on the inside of the door; shut fast and with no way to open it from the inside.