“This is too much please, I just have to sell, I am desperate. My husband… well we really do need the money.” Julia Cassidy pleaded.

The estate agent leant back in his chair and sucked on his pencil. The foolish silly woman was beginning to annoy him. She came in every day demanding that her late uncle’s house be sold, as if any circumstances would have changed.

“I am sorry Mrs Cassidy, but the few buyers who have shown an interest have all pulled out for one reason or another.”

“The house is sound, you said so yourself…”

“Yes, yes, but its has not been modernised since,” he glanced at his notes, “1901. When we advertised original late Victorian and Edwardian features, we were being literal.”

“But my uncle must have done some work on it.”

“Basic maintenance only. Your uncle never even saw the place to my knowledge and his grandfather never lived there. His wife refused by all accounts. It was rented for a while after the war, right up until the 1980s, but since then it has been used for storage. Lady Chance was the last person to live there as an owner occupier and she died in,” again he consulted the notes, “1926.”

“Yes my great great-grandmother, I know this.” Julia sat back deflated. Then after a pause she asked, “why did the last offer fall through? They seemed so keen.”

“I have no idea. The wife, she changed her mind.”

“But she was so enthusiastic. What happened?”

The agent shrugged.

“Wasn’t something said, we must have some idea?”

“The husband asked about ghosts when he dropped off the keys. But he was laughing. I don’t think he had any real concerns in that direction.” The agent shrugged and looked longingly at the door.

“Old house collect ghost stories like…” The sentence was left unfinished, but Julia took the hint and stood up. “I’ll drive out there myself and see if I can think of a way to make the property more attractive.”

*

The drive was a little overgrown with weeds pushing through the gravel and the sound of the car’s tyres seemed intrusive. A large flock of mocking crows seemed to think so and took flight as she pulled up.

The house itself was large and imposing. There were signs here and there of disrepair, paint peeling on the sills for one, but the aspect was pleasing and not the least creepy or unwelcoming. Julia half expected to see a face at one of the many windows. There always was in all those Hammer Horror movies. She laughed.

The door opened easily. But again, the echo of her entry sounded intrusive in the empty house. Maybe that was it? Every stick of furniture had been sold some years back. Maybe if it were furnished? Julia thought.

It took Julia half an hour to walk through every room and open all the doors. There was a musty unlived in smell and always behind her there was a rustle of something or a flickering dash in the corner of her eye. Mice she guessed. If she didn’t actually see one then she wouldn’t freak out.

The attic was the last place she went. It had a solid floor and high ceilings, the sort that could be converted into a flat in its own right. Perhaps we could develop it ourselves? She wondered.

There were some cardboard boxes in one corner. They had Fifes Bananas written on the sides and the word ‘Tim’s stuff’ was scrawled upside down in marker pen. All depressingly modern, no more than 30 years old, so little chance that they would contain long lost heirlooms or diaries. Life was rarely like books or films.

She rifled through them anyway. There were some newspapers and old football programmes. She also found a pipe rack of all things. She remembered that after the war the house was mostly occupied by young men, a tradition that continued up to the 1980s. Mostly anyway, she remembered her uncle saying that young women never seemed to stay too long, she sighed.

She turned to leave and stood back with a start. There at the door of the attic was a young girl watching her. She was oddly dressed in a grey smock dress, no more than 23 or so with a far away look in her eye.

“Oh god.” Julia gasped clasping her chest. “You gave me a scare. Who are you? Did I leave the front door open?”

The girl executed a terse curtsey and stepped back through the door.

“Hang on.” Julia called running after her.

The stairs were long and straight. From the top Julia could see right down the hallway of the upper floor. There was no one to be seen. She thought of the earlier mention of ghosts.

“A fleet footed local.” She said aloud.

The unexpected visitor unsettled her, but she was determined to walk slowly and calmly to the front door. This was after all, her house. By the time she reached the top of the stairs to go down to the ground floor, she was laughing at her brief unbidden thoughts about being haunted.

She was about to go down when she noticed the carpet. She frowned. Through one of the doors she had left open off to her right, she could see a well-preserved carpet on the floor. She could have sworn that all such fixtures had been removed and she didn’t remembering noticing it before.

Curious she went to the door of that room.

She was overwhelmed by a riot of colour and the all-pervasive mustiness that she had got used to, was replaced with a clean homely smell. She knew at once that what she was seeing was not real but a vision of something past.

There was a fire blazing in the grate and an elegant young woman sitting on a divan. Her hair was piled up on her head and her manner of dress was undoubtedly Victorian.

“You are late Mary.” The woman said imperiously. “We cannot have tardiness in this house there are rules.”

The woman appeared to be addressing Julia and the hairs rose on the back of neck. She was about to reply that she was not Mary, when someone else passed in front of her through the door.

Julia recognised the newcomer as the girl she had seen in the attic. Only she was a little younger, perhaps 18.

“Well? What have you to say?” The woman on the divan snapped.

“I am sorry Lady Chance I… no excuse ma’am.”

“I should think not indeed. There are rules in this house. We have a position to keep up, an example to set. You are my ward and maiden of this house not a serving girl.”

“No ma’am.” The girl looked both penitent and scared and stood with her head bowed.

“Well there is nothing else for it, you must be punished.”

“Oh ma’am please it won’t happen again. Please ma’am.” The girl fell to her knees and entreated her mistress as if she had just been threatened with death or worse.

Then Julia saw the hairbrush in the woman’s hand. Oh corporal punishment of course, she thought. Good old Victorian values.

“Come here girl.” The woman ordered in a tone that caused even Julia to take half a step forward.

The girl took a deep breath and stood up slowly. Then she reluctantly walked towards the woman.

“How many times have you been late this month already?” The older woman asked.

“Oh, oh, just twice now ma’am, really I have.” The girl was wringing her hands.

“I remember.” The woman pursed her lips. “Well if you are late again you know it’s the birch rod for you. Sins must be punished, there can be no respite.”

“Oh please.” The girl wailed.

The rather pompous woman ignored the girl and pulled her forward so that she tumbled over her lap. Julia felt like an intruder, but something told her she was meant to see this.

As she watched, the woman turned up the folds of the girl’s skirts and petticoats one by one until she came to some rather voluminous white draws. Surely not, Julia thought.

The woman untied the still pleading girl’s drawstrings and slipped the copious underwear down to bare her stark white bottom with its tight split huddling buttocks. There was an innocent beauty to the girl that caused Julia a sharp intake of breath.

“Please ma’am, please.” The girl squirmed and kicked her legs and resisted as much as she dared.

The woman raised the hairbrush up over her shoulder and let it hover for a moment.

“You sinful girl.” She exclaimed, letting her arm fall with a decided flick of her wrist.

There was an echoing crack, like splintering wood and the girl squealed. At once, the smooth whiteness of the girl’s bottom was marred by vivid red oval that crossed the divide of her bottom. As the stain spread and deepened, the woman spanked again, drawing a cry from the girl.

“Please ma’am, please.” The girl persisted with her refrain.

The spanking that followed was fast and vigorous. The woman looked practised at her art and showed no signs of slowing in her assault. The girl’s bottom went from white to a dark red across both cheeks in a few moments and the girl was beside herself with distress. Julia expected the spanking and the vision to end now, but it held her for minutes beyond counting as the penitent spanking expunged the sobbing girl’s sins.

By the time the spanking was over, the girl was howling incoherently and her bottom was the colour of Victoria plums with a dusting of white where the flesh had become distressed.

“Now you are to stand in the corner for the remainder of the afternoon. Then you will go to bed without supper.” The woman sounded imperious again.

Surely a hug at least, Julia thought as the girl limped still sobbing to the corner to take her place with her bare bottom still displayed.

Forgetting herself, Julia strode indignantly towards the woman but somehow without quite seeing, the scene faded and she was left in the empty musty room.

She felt no fear as she left. But there was a mystery here and she was determined to unravel it.

*

“What an extraordinary question.” Great Aunt Hetty paused in mid pour until she noticed the tea overflowing the cup.

“I just thought you might know.” Julia was desperately hoping that Aunt Hetty wouldn’t ask too many questions about her sudden interest in family history.

“The last Lady Chance, last of the Chances as a matter of fact was your great great-grandmother yes. She would have been born, let me think, in the mid 1880s. She wasn’t that old when she died.”

“I see.” Julia thought she sounded too young to be the Lady Chance in her vision. “Did anyone else die in that house?”

“Die? Well Lady Chance didn’t. She was in a nursing home for the last year of her life.” Aunt Hetty tapped the side of her head as she spoke, then mouthed the word ‘touched.’

“What about her mother-in-law? I mean wasn’t she Lady Chance as well?”

Aunt Hetty glared at Julia and then looked away. Her face took on an expression as if she had just trodden in something nasty on the road.

“What is it?”

“The less said about that woman the better.”

“After all this time? What did she do? Did she die in the house?”

“No. Certainly not, but it was her place to. Lord knows where she died. It certainly wasn’t at home with her husband.”

“Aunt Hetty, you simply must tell me.”

*

Julia had been taken aback by her great aunt’s strength of feeling about a woman who may well have been dead for 100 years. Especially after she heard the story. Although still sprightly, Hetty was nearly 90 herself and Julia supposed the scandal would still have been raw within the family when her great aunt was growing up.

It seemed that Lady Chance had run off with her lover, leaving two young children with their father and had never been heard from again. This had been all the more surprising at the time since by all accounts Lady Chance was a tartar and very religious.

As Julia was leaving, Aunt Hetty handed her a box of old letters and photographs. They had proved to be rather dull and shed no particular light upon the events that had been spoken of. The photographs were mostly of Hetty as a young woman in the 1930s and 40s. There were some of the extant family of that time, including the scandalous Lady Chance’s daughter-in-law, the other Lady Chance who was the last owner-occupier of the house. There were also some of her late uncle as a boy. She smiled at these.

There was also a pendant of some kind, which looked expensive. Julia decided she would return it to Hetty on her next visit. Just as she placed it back in the box she noticed the catch. It was a locket, not a pendant.

The picture inside almost stopped her heart. It was the severe pompous woman from the vision. The original Lady Chance herself.

An online check revealed that Lady Chance, Amelia it seems, disappeared from the census after 1881. However, along side three maids, a male servant, the two children and Sir Rodney Chance, her husband, a Mary Kempton was also resident at the house in 1881. Mary was described as a ward.

“Bingo.” Julia punched the air.

Then she checked the 1891 census again. It was not only Amelia Chance that was missing now, but Mary was no longer living there either.

“She would have been an adult then of course.” Julia realised she had spoken aloud. She might have married, she thought.

The next day Julia drove down to the local registry office that held the old parish records. She had low expectations of finding anything, but in the end it had been easy. There was an old newspaper cutting reporting on Mary’s death. She died in 1884 of diphtheria at Chance House.

“I have found you.” But Julia had known all along that it was Mary’s ghost she was chasing.

*

The next day she drove out to the house again and this time she had the strangest sense that it was waiting for her. She walked its rooms for an hour, but there were no more visions and Mary made no appearances. Perhaps the vision, or whatever it was, was all there was to it. She sighed and walked back to the upper staircase and made to leave.

Then it began again.

The house was as it must have been 130 years before. Somewhere someone was begging frantically, although the words were indistinct. Julia knew it was Mary’s voice.

She found the room easily. Mary was quite nude and had been secured to some sort of frame in the middle of the carpet. There were maids standing on hand, but the mistress of ceremonies was the original Lady Chance.

“You have sinned, sinned gravely my girl. You must atone. One must always atone for sin.” She said imperiously.

Mary’s bottom was already quite red. It was almost obscene the way it was turned up and presented for the birch. Then as the birch began its work, Mary stood beside Julia to watch her own punishment.

“It burned so,” Mary said in a humble whisper, “but I deserved it. Sins must be punished”

The Mary on the frame screamed. She went on screaming for the first birching and the second, as halfway through Lady Chance demanded a fresh rod from the nearest maid. Julia watched with horrified fascination. But still it was not over.

“Bring me the senior rattan.” Lady Chance said with a cruel smile.

“Oh god no ma’am, please.” Mary was frantic.

It took her all her strength to tear herself away, but as Julia did so the vision faded.

Mary was waiting at the foot of the stairs looking up at her. Julia froze. But before she could speak, the girl turned and walked out of the front door.

Julia hurried after her, but once outside there was no sign. Then she saw her standing patiently by the outhouses at the side of the house. As soon as Julia took a step towards her, Mary turned and walked into the courtyard.

Still there were no words or visions, just a silent leading on. Julia watched as Mary went into one of the long ramshackle buildings. Perhaps it had been a stable, but sometime in the 1930s or 40s an asbestos roof and more modern windows had been included.

Mary was gone by the time Julia entered the building.

“What are you trying to show me?” Julia cried out in frustration.

There was little in the long room but some old desks and rotten chairs. There were two tea chests and an old wooden frame from something in one corner, but on inspection, the chests contained damp cardboard, some junk and the frame was rotten with a few mouldy leather straps hanging from it.

Julia shook her head, confused.

Then it began.

As she watched the room became a stable block again and the frame stood assembled in the middle of the floor. The same as Mary had been secured to.

Then she saw the man. He was standing silently in an old frock coat and glaring at her.

“What do you want?” Julia was terrified and took a step backwards.

Then Mary was at his side, although he didn’t seem to see her. The long dead ward pointed out into the courtyard. Julia recognised the woman from her pictures. It was Lady Chance, the daughter-in-law, this man’s daughter-in-law, she realised. This was Sir Rodney, her great-great great-grandfather and husband to the errant imperious Lady Chance of her vision.

This incarnation did not see Julia, as Mary had not in the earlier vision. The younger Lady Chance was much younger than she had been in her pictures. Her husband, Julia knew, had not returned from the Great War in 1918, and from her relative youth and dress, Julia guessed that this Lady Chance was still in her 30s.

Then as she watched the Lady Chance began to undress. Sir Rodney was no longer watching her and all his attention was on his daughter-in-law. A ghostly smile played around the dead Mary’s lips.

“I have come to atone.” The woman said once she was fully naked.

She was led to the frame and strapped across it face down. Five straps held her at her wrists and ankles and one more across the small of her back. The latter emphasised the curve of her bare bottom, which the frame served upwards for an obvious purpose.

Sir Rodney moved behind her and from somewhere he produced a short heavy strap. The leather burned across her submitted bottom and she made no pretence of forbearance. She screamed. But this was only the start. The strap seared her again and again until she was lost in piteous sobbing.

Satisfied Sir Rodney put the strap down, but no sooner had done this, he pulled a birch rod from a bucket.

“She’s not your wife.” Julia cried out.

“He knows. But he is compelled, just as she is compelled to submit.” Mary whispered at her ear. “Compelled once a month, just as his wife should have been had she not fled her punishment.”

Julia gaped and would have asked more, but Mary was no longer there. Instead, Lady Chance seized her attention with another scream as the birch played firmly about her crimson bottom.

The birching was severe and went on for quite a time. When it was over Lady Chance had to endure a caning, as Mary had done.

*

Julia had thought the vision over when finally the punishment was done. But Sir Rodney fixed her with hard sad eyes even as Lady Chance faded from the scene.

“What do you want?” Julia whispered, dreading more than anything else that he would answer.

Then he looked away out to the courtyard and although vision remained the scene changed.

A young woman in an RAF uniform walked across the courtyard. Suddenly all the windows held taped crosses on each of the panes and there was a sign bearing the legend ‘Air Ministry – All visitors must report to the main office’ on the outside wall across the way.

There had been no record that the house had been used by the military during the war, certainly her uncle had never mentioned it, but it did stand to reason that a large empty house would have been commandeered.

The young woman began to undress, just as Lady Chance had, until she stood nude so that she could be attached to the frame.

Then as hours seemed to pass, Julia had to watch as she was subjected to much the same thrashing as the younger Lady Chance before.

And that was not the end. After that there was another uniformed woman and then others came.

“Most came only once,” Mary was at her ear again, “others like the second Lady Chance and Flight Lieutenant Smiley, over and over again.”

For Julia it was like watching the same movie but with an ever-changing cast. In all, there must have been a dozen, each wearing increasingly more modern clothes.

Julia recognised the estate agent who had first come with her to look at the house two years before.

“Another who came more than once.” Mary lisped. “None of them were Lady Chance you see.”

After the former agent was left sobbing curled up on the floor, she too faded from view.

The next woman was the most recent prospective purchaser.

“What does it all mean?” Julia wailed. Then she ran.

She got as far as her car, uncertain when the visions had faded, before she looked back.

Mary stood at the door.

“What do you want? Revenge.” Julia was crying.

“I paid for my sins, after all her pious words she ran away from her punishment.”

“But she is dead. All the Chances are gone.” Julia riled at the ghost.

“You remain. A distaff descendant to be sure, but you are of their blood, a descendant of Amelia Chance, my guardian.”

Julia turned and began to frantically fumble for her car keys. The car engine did not catch first time, and when it did, she pulled away with the door still open. She almost crashed at the turn to the drive and it was several minutes before she was able to slow to a safe speed.

*

She could hardly tell her husband what had happened, he would think her insane and the estate agent had already made his views on ghosts quite clear. Then she remembered the woman agent who used to represent her. According to the visions, she had been part of it too.

Instead of phoning, she had decided to confront the woman face to face.

“Mrs Cassidy, what brings you here?” The former agent, Jane Hemmings, glanced around anxiously as she spoke, “you know I no longer represent you?”

“Yes of course, but I wanted to talk about Chance House, you were involved in the property for a couple of years before I inherited it?”

“Yes.” Jane said the word cautiously and elongated it.

“You met Sir Rodney I believe.”

Jane fixed Julia with a cold stare.

“That’s ridiculous he is dead.”

“You do know who I mean then? Did Mary introduce you?”

“Who’s Mary?”

Julia could see that she was genuinely puzzled. So only she had met Mary. There was a long silence.

“Did you go to the stable too?” Jane asked quietly.

“Yes.”

“I never understood about it, it was just something I had to… something I needed…”

“I think I understand. But the whole thing, isn’t it crazy?”

“Yes, that’s why I gave up.”

*

When Julia arrived at the house it was already well into the afternoon. She had stayed away for as long as she could, but she knew it would never be over until she finally confronted the ghosts of Chance House.

She realised that she had finally pieced the story together. Amelia Chance had believed in sin and punishing sins. She had so imbued her ward with her views that even death had not overwhelmed her sense of justice. Then she had committed adultery and rather than face her own punishment and become reconciled to her husband, she had fled. The betrayal had broken Sir Rodney and his ghost still searched for retribution from every receptive female visitor of Chance House.

The house was empty. She walked the rooms for hours and nothing happened. Then steeling herself, she went to the courtyard. Still nothing. It was done then, she had solved the mystery and laid the ghosts to rest.

It was getting dark she realised, so she returned to the house to lock the front door. She found Mary waiting.

“It is time.” She said.

Somewhere within the house, there was shouting, a man’s voice so full of anger. Julia was not surprised to see the 19th century house restored and a harassed maid running down the stairs.

Following the sound of the disturbance Julia saw Mary, a Mary who could not see her, standing at a door listening in wonder.

“You’re my wife damn it and you will submit. You were keen enough when others were in error.”

The door was insubstantial to Julia and she remembered that in her time it had been left open, so she entered unseen and unheard. Sir Rodney was a vigorous man and handsome, nothing like the pale shade she had seen in the stables. Lady Chance was white and trembling. She stood wringing her hands and Julia noticed that her previously immaculate hair was in disarray with various strands escaping her pins and draping across her agitated countenance.

“Please, oh please Rodney you can’t, I couldn’t… oh god.” Her hands came together in prayer, only on this night her husband was her god.

“I have stood by for years why you, in the name of justice and religious fervour mind you, have thrashed that girl Mary and your maids for the slightest error. Why I have seen you thrash that girl to blood…”

“She was seen with that baker’s boy from the village, kissing him and…” Lady Chance was suddenly indignant as she recalled the affair.

“Be silent.” Sir Rodney bellowed. “You… my god woman… you hypocrite.”

He could barely get the words out for rage and even Lady Chance appeared to see the justice of his accusation from the way she blanched. There was a long silence as Sir Rodney turned away and stood staring out of the window. Once out of his glare, his wife bowed her head as if reserving her strength for the final confrontation.

“Madam. You will disrobe yourself here and now and make your way to the stable block where I have…”

“Roddy please.”

“Have erected that contraption of yours. The maids have been instructed to prepare birchen rods for your impudent and slutten behind. And I madam will avail myself of other such things and come to you presently.” He continued ignoring her. “You will submit to such on the first Sunday of the month after church until I feel able to forgive you. If you are not waiting for me when I arrive then you will leave this house never to return.”

Julia saw that imperious look descend upon Lady Chance’s face and she swept past Julia and all but through her with a false dignity.

Julia followed her as she descended the stairs and out of the front door to a waiting carriage. Mary appeared again and blocked her move to follow further.

“You must disrobe now. Everything. The shame must be exposed.”

Julia nodded understanding. Her modern clothes were quickly shed and despite the nights chill, she felt the heat of a body blush.

The gravel drive was very real beneath her feet and she wondered dimly if she ran off into the night whether she find her world or theirs beyond the trees.

When she got to the stables she saw that Sir Rodney had got there before her. Gone was the confident man, instead she was confronted with the broken one she had seen before. He knelt leaning into the wall like a discarded doll crying softly.

“I have come to atone.” Julia whispered.

He turned his head and broken smile crept across his face.

“My love you have come back.”

“I have come to atone.” Julia repeated not knowing what else to say lest she break the spell.

“I will not do it if you stay, I never would have, but you angered me so.” His voice was hoarse.

Mary appeared and shook her head and indicated the frame.

It was Mary then that held them as much as he, Julia realised. How can a ghost hurt me? She considered. But as she looked upon the punitive furniture in front of her, she quailed.

“I have come to atone.” She said again.

The Maids and the other Mary came carrying buckets and they took hold of their mistress and led her to the frame. There was no gentleness in the way she was secured and Julia sensed that there may be other ghosts here seeking revenge.

Once she was fully secured with her head tilted down and her bare bottom pointing up, Mary crouched before her and took her face between her hands.

“Sins must be punished, there can be no respite.” She breathed into Julia’s face. Or was it Lady Chance’s?

The crack of the short strap across both buttocks was real and Julia gasped. Then she knew she was trapped and must endure. She had seen the others punished and knew what she faced. She cast her eyes about for Mary, only to throw an accusation with them when she found the girl smiling back at her.

She tried to break free then, knowing that nothing held her. She cried out protest even as the strap fell again, but instead she said:

“I have come to atone.”

Lady Chance had possessed her then.

The strapping was beyond her endurance and she was crying when it ended. But she felt strangely cleansed.

“Are you ready my love?” Sir Rodney said.

The scrape of the bucket on the concrete floor answered for her and an even more bitter pain took her across her surrendered bottom. The birch did its job well.

The first set of birching strokes left her sobbing incoherently and some snot had run onto her chin. Mary gently wiped it away. But Mary smiled cruelly and glanced sideways. There were five more birch rods waiting in the brine buckets.

“Afterwards the cane is much, much worse ma’am.”

*

Julia awoke naked in a foetal position on the floor of the converted stable. In the visions, the women carried the marks on their bottom afterwards, a fact that Jane had confirmed. But as Julia reached behind her, there were none. How could there be? It was over.

The floor, however, was all too real and she was stiff as she got to her feet. The frame was back to its broken rotting self against the wall, the dust testifying that it had never moved. God knows what her husband was thinking. He would probably spank her for being out all night. The thought surprised her, but there was a thrill as well.

Her clothes were neatly folded just inside the door and she dressed quickly against the cold.

The car was reassuringly real and she took pleasure from heavy the clunk of the door. Then she noticed it. There on the seat of her previously locked and undisturbed car was a cane, no, the cane that had broken her to begging the previous night. She remembered that she had never felt so alive as she had then at the hands of the dead.

“A parting gift from Mary perhaps.” She said wistfully.

She glanced in the mirror and for a moment, she fancied that she saw Mary winking. But when she turned, she was alone. She had a feeling that someone would buy the house now and all her troubles were over.

“Except, what do I tell hubby?” She said ruefully.

Ends.