A Christmas Eve Ghost Story

There will be a festive reading of the lesser-known M R James ghost story 'There Was a Man Dwelt by a Churchyard' at 5pm GMT on 24 December by the historian and folklorist Francis Young. 

It will be broadcast from All Saints' Church, Conington, Cambs, which is in the care of the Churches Conservation Trust, an excellent body who look after disused churches. The event is free, though donations are welcome. 

Whenever out on bookshop expeditions I always try to find out what churches the CCT have nearby, as they are usually reliably open, well-kept and full of interest. It isn't always the medieval work that attracts either, though that can be well worth a detour. 

My curiosity has been stirred before by a weary old harmonium enjoying a peaceful retirement, with wonderfully-named stops inscribed in black Gothic lettering: as my colleague Mr Howard pointed out, Viola Dulce sounded like a faded Victorian poet, while there was also Seraphone, Eolian Harp, Vox Humana, Octave Couplex (the well-known French dandy) etc.

Even a vast piece of ribbed black iron Victorian heating apparatus was impressive in its stolid preservation.

It was while visiting one of their churches that I discovered a dresser in the vestry with drawers singularly full of voluminous quantities of hymn numbers. This caused me to speculate just why they had all been assembled there, which naturally led to the idea of a barbarous arithmetic, the equivalent of the 'barbarous names' in ritual magic. 

Thus followed my short story 'Zabulo', first published by Rosemary Pardoe in The M R James Ghosts & Scholars Newsletter, and then  in The Uncertainty of All Earthly Things (Zagava). 

Now, where was I? Ah, yes. Enjoy if you will this M R James ghost story on Christmas Eve from a suitably ancient location, recounted by a learned and mellifluous reader.

(Mark Valentine)