The Tale of Sharrock's Pond

'...So he opened the door to the basement because that was the only place that the woman could have gone - there were no other doors at that end of the hall. The sound was much louder now; and it definitely sounded like a baby crying. He had to use a Lumos charm because it was pitch dark, and the stairs were really narrow and steep and they seemed to go on forever.'

Ron paused and took a breath. He shuffled into a cross-legged position on his bed and looked around at his audience's expectant faces.

'Did he find her? Did...did he find the woman?' stammered Neville, wide eyed and gripping his cocoa mug more tightly.

Ron gave him a meaningful look. 'Oh yes, he found her all right,' he said quietly. 'When he was almost at the bottom of the steps, the crying stopped suddenly and everything was absolutely silent. He looked down at the floor near the foot of the stairs and that's when he saw her...or what was left of her.'

Dean's hands shot to his mouth in horror. 'What do you mean? What happened to her?

Ron's voice was now almost a whisper. 'Nothing much had happened to her - at least not for a very long time. She was lying exactly where she'd fallen, fifty years before. All that was left was her bones and hair, and a few scraps of clothing...and the skeleton of her starved baby, clutched in her arms.'

Silence filled the Gryffindor boys' dormitory. None moved as their minds absorbed the final twist in Ron's tale.

Harry stared at the floor, looking thoughtful. Eventually he looked at Ron and said, 'So the woman he saw when he looked out into the corridor was...'

'Well, that's where you can make up your own mind,' Ron replied enigmatically. 'But I will tell you this: The last thing he saw before he turned and fled back up the stairs, was a silver locket hanging from a scrap of frayed black ribbon. It was engraved with a star.'

Ron sat back and surveyed the effects of his story. Harry and Dean were staring at him, open- mouthed. Neville was nervously chewing his lip. Seamus was eyeing Ron shrewdly, and a slow smile was creeping over his face.

'Ah, that's bollocks, Ron,' he scoffed.

The other boys groaned in exasperation and Harry threw a pillow at him.

'No, listen!' laughed Seamus. 'It was dark in the basement, right? And he was looking down from the stairs, so how could he possibly have seen what was engraved on the locket? And how could he know it was the same one that the woman he saw was wearing?'

Ron sighed and rolled his eyes. 'I don't know. Maybe he had his Omnioculars with him. If you're going to pick holes in everybody's stories, what's the point in us telling them?'

'Sorry, mate, but your story just wasn't scary.'

'It was better than yours!' countered Ron. 'The ghost of a goblin haunting a vault at Gringotts? I was more scared the last time I got a whiff of Harry's Quidditch socks!'

'Actually, I thought it was quite scary,' Dean admitted. 'And with all the ghosts around here, you'd think I'd be used to it by now!'

'Yeah, but your story wasn't frightening either,' Seamus scoffed. 'I mean, a guy who comes and kills you if you say his name five times to a mirror? Where did you get that one?'

'Oh, that didn't scare you? D'you want to try it, then?' said Dean. He gestured to the mirror.

Seamus stood up and shot him a defiant look. He strode over to the mirror and glared into it with his hands on his hips.

'Candyman!' he shouted. 'Candyman, Candyman, Candyman...'

He paused. Ron pulled a blanket over his head. The other boys watched, open-mouthed. Harry subconsciously closed his hand around his wand. Seamus winked at them in the mirror and grinned.

'CANDYMAAAAN!' he bellowed.

Nothing happened. Ron peeked out from under his blanket.

'Sit down, dear,' said the mirror. 'And wipe your face - you've got cocoa on your nose.'

Seamus flopped back down his bed and looked bored. 'See? I don't get scared. Not by stories, anyway.'

Dean crossed his arms and looked sulky. 'Well, maybe you should see the film. That ought to do it.'

'Alright, stop your bickering,' said Harry. 'It's Neville's turn to tell us a story.'

Neville started to protest but Harry was having none of it. 'Of course you know a few ghost stories - you're a wizard! You must know at least one that we haven't heard before.'

'Well...I know one, but you'll probably think it's stupid,' muttered Neville. He glanced doubtfully at Seamus, who had a strained expression on his face, as if he was trying not to laugh.

'I'm sure it'll be great,' said Harry, settling himself comfortably on his bed and glaring at Seamus.

'Okay, then,' said Neville reluctantly. 'Uh...it's not really a story, well it is...but I mean it's true. It was in the papers - well, some of it was anyway...'

'Go on, Neville, let's hear it,' said Ron encouragingly.

'Right,' said Neville, clearing his throat. 'Well, near where I live there's this lake. I don't know what its proper name is but everyone around our way calls it Sharrock's Pond. It's kind of in the middle of nowhere; there's just this old house near the shore, but nobody lives there any more. I'm not really surprised because I went there once and it's horrible. The lake is really deep and still. On a cloudy day it looks like a big cauldron full of tar.'

Neville paused. When nobody interrupted him or complained that the introduction to his story was not very original, he gathered a bit more confidence.

'Anyway,' he continued. 'Not long ago a Muggle property developer visited the area. He was looking into buying the house and grounds - which included the lake - and fixing it up as a holiday home. He drove there, on his own except for his dog, and took a rowing boat so that he could see what the fishing was like. He was only supposed to be gone for a day, but when he didn't come home that night his wife got worried. There had been a thunderstorm in the evening, just as it was getting dark, and she was afraid that he might have had a road accident, or got stranded because of flooding. So she called the - what do you call them, Harry? The Muggle law enforcement people?'

'Police,' answered Harry automatically. He was starting to get interested in this story.

'Right, the police.' Neville cleared his throat. 'Well, as soon as the roads were passable, they went to look for him. They arrived to find his car parked in front of the old house, but there was no sign of him or his dog.

'Then they noticed his boat. It was floating in the middle of the lake, upside down. So of course, they sent for assistance so that they could recover the boat, and while they waited for their equipment to arrive they searched the lakeshore. There was no sign of the man, but they found his dog.'

Ron gaped in horror. 'Was the dog all right? Nobody hurt the dog, did they?'

'No,' replied Neville gravely. 'But it was so terrified nobody could get near it. It was huddled against some rocks, soaking wet and shivering. They had to get a professional dog-handler to collect it in the end, because if any of them took a step towards it, it started snapping and snarling...and it was quite a big dog.'

'So what happened when they went to get the boat?' asked Harry keenly.

'Well, they managed to turn it the right way up...and they found the property-developer's dead body floating in the water underneath it.'

There was a collective gasp. Even Seamus condescended to quietly add, 'Ew!'

'There was a...what do you call it, Harry? When Muggles try to find out what happened when somebody's died in an accident?'

'An inquest?' suggested Harry, intrigued.

'Yeah, an inquest. The verdict was murder.'

'Murder?' scoffed Seamus. 'But there was nobody there! Who do they think did it, the dog?'

'Well, that's just the problem,' replied Neville. 'There were no suspects, and no witnesses. His boat was the only one on the lake, and there were no signs that anyone else had been on the shore. All they had to go on was what they found at the scene, which wasn't much. But there was no doubt. The examination of the body indicated murder. That was all that was in the papers. They never found out who did it.'

The boys looked at each other.

'Wow. Is that really true, Neville?' asked Dean, looking impressed.

'Yeah. Gran's friend has a Muggle son-in-law. He brought the newspaper to show her, and when she left it on the kitchen table, I read it.'

'Well, it's an interesting story, but still not very scary,' complained Seamus. 'I mean, you said there was a thunderstorm - maybe that's why the boat capsized. Or maybe he caught a really big fish.'

'Seamus,' said Harry.

'What?'

'Shut up.' He turned to Neville. 'So, what do you think happened, Neville?'

'Well, it's Gran's theory really. She's lived in the area all her life, and she remembers the people who lived in the house when she was a girl. A blacksmith called Abel Sharrock, and his wife...and his apprentice - a boy called Jeremy Peck.'

'Ah,' said Dean. 'Hence the name, Sharrock's Pond.'

Neville nodded. 'Apparently Mrs. Sharrock was a timid little thing. She'd been raised by her stepfather, and according to Gran he wasn't a very nice man. He used to shout at her a lot and make her do all the housework...and whenever he got annoyed with her he'd lock her in a cupboard.'

Harry shuddered. He knew exactly how she must have felt.

'Anyway, she got married to the first man who asked, because she wanted to get away from him. But what she ended up with was far worse. Abel was even crueller than her stepfather was. He was a big drinker. He always smelled of whisky, and Gran thinks he used to beat her because she saw her in the village once and she had a black eye.

'Whenever they came to the village, Mrs Sharrock would just tag along quietly behind her husband, as if she didn't want anybody to notice her. She'd shrink away if anybody tried to talk to her, especially men.

'Then one evening she tried to run away. She was going to sneak out while Abel was passed out drunk. But he woke up and caught her and...'

'Hang on,' interrupted Seamus. 'How can you possibly know that?'

'Seamus,' said Harry.

'What?'

'Shut up. It's just a story. Don't take it so seriously, and let Neville get on with it.'

Neville coughed. 'Well, actually, this bit is true. The thing is, Jeremy Peck - the apprentice - was a Squib. His family and Gran's family all knew each other, and whenever he came to the village he would stop by to visit. He told Gran all about it.'

'Oh,' said Seamus. 'Sorry.'

'So what happened when Abel caught his wife running away?' prompted Ron.

'Oh. He went berserk. He flew into a rage and told her he was going to make sure she could never run anywhere again, then he started beating her senseless. Jeremy didn't know what to do - he couldn't do magic, obviously, and he was no match for Abel physically, so he ran off to find help. But he didn't get far - it was a stormy night and the road was flooded. He had no choice but to go back. As he came closer to the lake he could see Abel untying his boat from its mooring, and Mrs Sharrock was lying on the ground at his feet with her wrists and ankles bound. It was still raining, and it was dark, but Jeremy could see by the lights from the house that she was still breathing.

'Abel lifted her into the boat and rowed out across the water. Jeremy began to make his way around the lake - he knew there was a small cave on the other side where Abel kept his stash of illegal home made whisky. He thought that Abel was going to leave his wife there, tied up and helpless, to punish her. He planned to make his way there on foot, wait for Abel to leave, and then untie Mrs Sharrock and take her to Gran's house over the hilltop path.

'He got about half way, but it was so dark he couldn't see where he was going. So he turned to try and make out the boat. The storm was really raging by this point, and when the lightning flashed, he saw Abel in the middle of the lake. He was lifting Mrs Sharrock out of the boat and dropping her into the water. There was something tied to her feet. Jeremy had been working in the forge for long enough to recognise it. It was an anvil.'

Neville paused to take a breath. The dorm was silent except for the patter of raindrops against the window, and the faint creak of bedsprings as Ron slid under his covers and wrapped himself in them firmly.

'A moment or so later, there was another flash, and Jeremy saw that Mrs Sharrock was conscious, and had managed to get her arms free. She was trying to hold on to the edge of the boat - but Abel was forcing her hands away. She started clutching at his arms instead and biting him in her panic. Jeremy waded out as far as he could, but he couldn't swim, so he shouted at the top of his voice. He thought if Abel knew that someone could see what he was doing, he would come to his senses and pull his wife back into the boat. But Jeremy couldn't make himself heard over the wind and rain; all he could do was watch helplessly.

'The anvil soon pulled Mrs Sharrock under, but she didn't release her grip on Abel. The last thing Jeremy saw when the lightning flashed, was the boat tipping up on its side as Abel was pulled out of it.'

'Bloody Hell,' said Ron quietly. The other boys murmured in agreement.

'Is that really true, Neville?'

Neville nodded.

'What did Jeremy do?' asked Dean.

'He ran over the hills as fast he could, and explained everything he'd seen to the village policeman. There wasn't a big enquiry or anything - his witness statement told them everything they needed to know. They found Abel's body under the boat, but...'

'But what?' said the other four boys, in unison.

'Mrs Sharrock's body was never found. They sent divers down, but it was too dark and there are deep, rocky crevices at the bottom. It was too dangerous so they had to call off the search.'

'So she's still down there...' said Harry softly.

'Yeah,' said Ron, wide eyed. 'And the night that property bloke went to the lake, she came back, and tried to get into the boat...'

'Why?' said Seamus scornfully. 'Why would a ghost try to get into a boat? It's not as if it would do her any good, is it?

Maybe it was the storm,' said Ron. 'Maybe whenever there's a thunderstorm, her spirit thinks it's that night again - the night she died.'

'But ghosts are insubstantial. So how could she capsize the boat anyway?'

'Moaning Myrtle is insubstantial, but she can make a hell of a splash when she wants to,' observed Harry.

'True,' agreed Dean. 'But what if she's not a ghost at all, but some kind of zombie? Perhaps at certain times her physical remains become animated, and try to get revenge on those that made her life miserable - men.'

'Or maybe it wasn't her?' said Seamus, rolling his eyes impatiently. 'Maybe the property guy found that stash of whisky in the cave and had a little party in his boat with the dog. I expect he got pissed, fell out of his boat, and turned it over when he tried to get back in. It probably hit him over the head in the process, which is why they thought it was murder.' He sat back and folded his arms to signify a mystery solved.

'No,' said Neville softly. 'They thought it was murder because of the fingernail scratches and bite marks on his arms.'

Silence filled the room once more.

Suddenly a bright flash penetrated the dim light of the dorm, swiftly followed by a loud crash of thunder.

Harry and Ron both yelped. Dean dived under his covers. Neville dropped his cocoa mug. Seamus began to laugh...

'You lot are such wimps! I can't believe that story has got you all jumpy! I mean, it was a good story, Neville, but I don't believe it's true. And even if it was, it takes more than a restless spirit trapped between worlds to scare me. Honestly, how do you lot ever manage to clean your teeth, with the constant threat of Moaning Myrtle popping out of the tap?'

'Seamus,' said Harry.

'What?'

'Shut up.'

'Hey Neville,' Ron said suddenly. 'What happened to the dog?'

Neville looked at him blankly. 'Uh, I don't know. I expect, um...' he paused and smiled. 'I'm sure it was fine, Ron.'

Everyone laughed.

Ron stretched and yawned extravagantly. 'Well, I think I've had enough ghost stories for one night. What shall we do tomorrow, flesh-eating monsters? Alien abductions? Evil overlords trying to take over the world...?'

'Very funny, Ron,' scolded Harry.

'Well, I'm ready for bed,' admitted Dean sleepily. Murmurs of agreement followed, and soon all the boys were tucked comfortably under their blankets.

Rain continued to thrash at the window, and wind howled among the rooftops, but soon the cosy dormitory was filled with the sound of soft snores, and the occasional nonsensical murmur from Ron.

Some time later Harry woke suddenly from a pleasant dream in which he was transfiguring each of the Dursleys into houseplants. The storm was picking up again - he could hear the rain pounding the surface of the lake. Occasionally there was a louder splash, which he thought was probably the giant squid coming up for a taste of clean, fresh rainwater.

A flash of lightning illuminated the room briefly and he frowned and sat up, realising why he had woken.

'Seamus,' he said quietly.

'What?'

'Why are you in my bed?'