folks reported hearing "funny" noises in the night.....the old Bascombe place.........they said it was haunted...........the old Bascombe place was a dilapidated turn of the century mansion which really was built upon the top of a hill at the edge of town............a broad, formidable looking edifice constructed of wood, brick and stone, it didn't seem designed to be of any fully recognizable architectural pattern........there were hints of the Victorian, hints of the Colonial, New England style touches here and there reminiscent of the Whaling era around Martha's Vineyard and even a bit of old Southern Plantation silhouette in the rows of Corinthian columns which lined the front piazza like sentries eternally standing guard over whatever dark secrets lay within the abandoned, condemned old mansion..............the wooden planks of the great, sweeping porch were rotted in places, all creaky and mushy........one never knew where to step........never knew when the next plank under foot might give way and send the unsuspecting intrepid explorer plunging into who knows what macabre death chamber deep in the cold earth below the old Bascombe place.............it always seemed gray and foreboding around the grounds of the old Bascombe place...........the sun was perpetually obscured by some hazy ether which hung mysteriously about the vicinity of the leaning, ancient, charcoal colored house..........the old Bascombe place looked as though it had once caught flame and burned, though no report of any fire there had ever been recorded in records at the county courthouse, nor in any of the information kept on file at the public Library.........the public library had some dated newspaper clippings from way back about the old Bascombe place...........they kept them locked away in a file cabinet in the basement of the Library and anyone who wanted to see them had to sign a waiver releasing the Library from any liability should catastrophe befall the nosy whose curiosity could only be satisfied by taking a peek at the fading remnants of the eerie history of the old Bascombe place.................it seems that anyone who ever viewed the dusty documents was doomed to suffer some calamity or other only a few days later.........a writer from an architectural digest in some big city somewhere was killed in a tragic car wreck on his way back after spending 3 stormy days in a row reading everything he could get his hands on at the courthouse and Public Library about the old Bascombe place.............while in town he stayed at the Shady Oaks Motel out on rural route 30.........the walls of the motel are paper thin....the gossip at the diner across from the motel out on the seldom traveled highway was that after spending a stormy day in the backroom of the courthouse or the basement of the library perusing the odd history of the old Bascombe place, this periodical journalist could be heard typing well into the following stormy night, composing the rough draft for what would have been his article for the magazine.........it is a lonely, deserted stretch of road where the accident occurred........the highway patrol report simply stated "cause of accident unknown"......... talk around town was that he'd fallen asleep at the wheel but inwardly everyone hides a sneaking suspicion that it was the Curse of the Old Bascombe Place which led to his untimely death............ this suppressed communal fear is the reason no one has the courage to destroy the papers and documents relating to the old Bascombe place...........they could be burned or simply thrown away, yet who has such a lack of a sense of self preservation as to tempt fate and risk their own doom at the hands of the century old blighted curse? a college graduate student was writing his doctoral thesis on the old Bascombe place back in the early 60's when he was suddenly bedridden.....taken ill by a heretofore unknown disease of the mind............a psychosomatic illness which causes the corpus callosum to slowly disintegrate.......this wretched affliction results in terrifying hallucinations tormenting the patient........death occurs in less than a month.........a month of agonizing pain and violent seizures accompanied by the aforementioned ghoulish hallucinations...........this poor student from upstate university swore he was seeing visions of Lady Vellstrap, the then deceased owner of the old Bascombe place, and that she repeatedly shrieked at him, through a wall of flaming human skulls and rabid barking dogs who brandished blood stained sharp fangs and foamed at the mouth, that she had cursed his immortal soul so that he would be eternally abused in the private torture chamber she had hidden beneath her root cellar.......... the curse came about as a result of a visit from the town constable out to the old Bascombe place when it wasn't so old.........newly built, in fact............the owner, a reclusive and ancient woman named Lady Vellstrap who had lived abroad for many years, would have bi~monthly gatherings at her big, secluded, secretive house............several strange characters from who~knows~where would all arrive late in the evening, passing through town in a somber motorcade on their way out to Bascombe Hall (at the entrance to the long, tree lined avenue which led up to the estate, a stone carved sign had the words "Bascombe Hall" engraved upon it in Gothic font) and one by one they would drive up the hill to the front entrance and there, doors opened by their chauffeurs, would enter the huge, heavy pinewood front doors in the same funeral style procession............all the mysterious guests were adorned in designer Gowns and Tuxedos custom fitted from rich fabrics of finest quality...........the drugstore clerk, Milly Maudsley, who also happened to be the town seamstress, got a close up look at one of them during a violent electrical storm one evening just before closing........a brilliant flash of lightening followed immediately by a loud BANG! of a thunderclap caused Milly to glance quickly in the direction of the front door entrance of the drugstore.......... it was then she saw something standing there just inside the door.....a tall, shadowy, gaunt, motionless figure......Milly jerked violently erect in startled fear, for she hadn't heard the bell jingle and was shocked and surprised in bewilderment wondering how this dark figure had entered the drugstore without a sound............a moment before, Milly had been alone in the drugstore, now suddenly, this creature was but a few paces away, inside the drugstore and Milly didn't even know it had entered! ................how long had it been there? staring at Milly from behind with narrow slit snaky looking eyes that glowed with an eerie green aura............it was apparently female in gender, this bizarre looking thing.........a bald butler or chauffeur or doorman stood silently behind her, lifeless eyes gazing straight ahead, at what Milly knew not..............this strange, feminine individual was high crowned with a Buffont hair~do.......... very thin was she, with such a lanky frame that Milly wondered how she stood at all? ...........the skin of this stealthy intruder was pale as a ghost and her hair darker than midnight was pulled tightly up into that grotesque high mound upon her motionless head...........her morbid eyes never seemed to fully open, her chin was long and pointy and her fingers, bony, similarly long and narrow, had nails of obscene length painted blood red...........the high stiff collar of her exquisite mermaid gown of iridescent purple fabric seemed to prevent her neck from bending or turning so that she had to rotate her entire body to face whatever direction she looked.......... this stark madame who never spoke a single word the entire brief time she was in the drugstore placed a one hundred dollar bill upon the counter beside the cash register then pointed over head to a book of stamps on the top shelf behind the drugstore clerk's counter.........when the book of stamps was handed down to the macabre mistress, she placed it in her dark green leather bag and walked out without even waiting to be given her change..........fearful now as then and not knowing what to do with all that money in change, Milly keeps it locked in a change drawer under the counter in case the freakish woman should ever return.............such are the stories surrounding the big, abandoned house atop the deserted hill on the outskirts of town............. yes, the old Bascombe Place is an uninviting rambling wide~spread house atop old Britton Hill, the highest geographic elevation in the entire state of Florida and the lowest highpoint in the entire United States......345 feet above sea~level..........just goes to show you how low and flat Florida really is..........Jabe Hawks had been sent by the magazine he worked for, Paranormal Monthly, to write an article on this dark, Legendary homestead.........but when he rounded the corner at the edge of town where Main Street merges into the old highway leading out of town Jabe began to feel uneasy.........he could see the Widow's Walk of the old Bascombe Place in the distance..........the faint twilight of a stormy sunset silhouetted the creepy third story perch above the sparse tree line in a blood red glow.........Bascombe Place itself, the bulk as yet unseen, was dark as pitch, gloomy as midnight.........Jabe had reported on many paranormal phenomena, ghost sightings, hauntings, even demonic possessions, but there was something different about Bascombe Place..........could a cannibalistic cult be performing obscene rites and rituals involving human sacrifice in the basement? ........... was there a UFO hiding there? .........and who's to say that UFO's aren't time travelers from Earth's own future......or Earth's unspeakable past ??............ passing through the mangled, twisted leafless tree branches, the full loathsome behemoth of the old Bascombe Place came into view...... the leaning, jigsaw old estate looked as though it had been spawned from the bloated belly of some gnarled, demented, sadistic Night~World! .........stopping at the remarkably well preserved wrought iron Gate at the driveway entrance, Jabe stepped out a moment and stood beside his idling motor car......... the only real estate agent in town had provided a large skeleton key to open the massive lock on the gargantuan old gate......... pausing for a moment before using the heavy metal key, Jabe stared on in bewildered horror at the macabre mansion as the wind howled in gusts to gale force and the sudden piercing rains began to pelt down in volley after volley of needle stings upon the pate skin of his face, neck and foreamrs! ...........squall followed squall, each one of greater intensity than its predecessor! ............ what Jabe saw literally sent chills down his stiff, bony spine! ...................the facade of this miserable fortress was gruesome looking........with two protruding Bay windows on either side of the huge, pine double doors, the massive edifice gave the frightful appearance of a gargantuan Beast Bellowing its gaping mouth wide waiting to gobble Jabe up in its evil jowls! .........the thing yawned ominous portent, the very death and doom of its next helpless victim! ......Jabe couldn't believe he had to go inside this wretched place.............there was evil in there..........something evil lurked inside............Jabe could feel it...............for the first time in his entire paranormal journalism career, Jabe was scared {+} |
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the World Famous Artist Sean Terrence Best
presents............
the Old Bascombe Place !! *~V8~*+
presents............
the Old Bascombe Place !! *~V8~*+
initial date of first publication~November 27, 2010 ~*
| the Old Bascombe Place ~* a rambling prose about a ramshackle spooky old haunted mansion ~* |