This is the second part of Adam’s three-piece serial. Read Part One here, and come back next Monday for the chilling conclusion.  Mrs. Belinda Holmes, 44, widowed, mother of two grown boys both of whom were overseas serving with the British Expeditionary Force in France, was the only member of the staff who had served the Congdon family longer than Mr. James Atherton and she absolutely loathed the man. He was pretentious, overbearing, haughty, and he treated the rest of the staff like they were below him. In the strictest sense they were, but he treated them as if HE were their master instead of Mr. Congdon and that did not set well with Mrs. Holmes. So when Mr. Atherton came into her kitchen to await the call of Mr. Congdon, Mrs. Holmes was far…

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Editor’s Note: As Rod Serling, host of “The Twilight Zone,” might have said, “You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension: a dimension of sound, a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind. You’re moving into a land of both shadow and substance, of things and ideas. You’ve just crossed over into…” Beth Roper’s delicious short story of revenge from beyond the grave, “A Ghost of an Idea.” *     *     * Gavin Van Dam smiled faintly as he heard her high heels clacking down the entry way and the soft click of the door. His wife Amanda was leaving for her girl’s night out after many kisses and apologies. Van had finally assured her he would perfectly fine left to his own devices, and settled…

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This is Part One of Adam’s Three-Part Tale. Come back next Monday, and the Monday after for more beautiful, monstrous mystery.  The door swung open with the smooth, silent urgency of a practiced hand. James Atherton, the Congdon butler swiftly took in the man who stood before him. Tall, wide-shouldered, he had a broad face decorated with a well-trimmed beard that was significantly out of vogue with modern sensibilities. His brown wool suit was crisp and clean, and his shirt was white, starched, and well-pressed. He wore a wide-brimmed hat that was also out of style, but it suited him in a rakish sort of way. He removed the cap and ran a large hand with scarred knuckles through his thick mane of dark blond hair, and then produced a calling card with his other….

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  “Sunday Morning Dreamscape”   The silk umbrella that covered her head had a hole in its top, in case of rain. She was meeting her husband for a rendezvous outside a phone booth. Her daughter followed, six steps behind, reciting the only two definitions of sodomy that she knew. An elevated train on the left side of the road stopped; three men fell out onto a steel track below. The daughter ditched her at a fork in the highway, went on alone to the dock to meet an old lover who would take her away on a cruise. She had forgotten her ticket; he said she could share his: number 660266. He asked if she needed a baby sling; she predicted he would marry someone young.   “The Way She Gathered Stones”   She…

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