A slightly more macabre one for bedtime:-
The old mansion stood at the top of a large gravel sweep, its dark windows gazing blankly down upon them, the frames now bare of paint and rotting. Water stains crept down the red brick walls from where the roof gutters had collapsed, and large slates hung drunkenly from the edges of the roof. The huge elm trees at each side cast a dark shade and lent an air of brooding menace.
The two men stood looking at the old house in silence for several minutes, then George said "So this is the place then. This is the house where Sir John Over lived, and where he died, and where his ghost still walks. And you`re prepared to bet me a hundred quid I daren`t spend the night there?" "Yes" said his old friend William, "But I must warn you that at least a dozen people have tried it before, and with two exceptions. they have all been so badly affected by the experience that they have died within a few weeks afterwards, so if you want to back out I shall not blame you" George thought for a minute. "But what about the two exceptions. How did they go on?" "Well, I managed to track them both down and ask them all about it" said William, "and they both told me that Sir John`s ghost is pretty terrifying, but the first chap is a Mozart fan, and while he was waiting for the ghost to appear he was humming the Exultate from Mozart`s Requiem Mass in C, and when the ghost appeared it seeemed to pacify it, so he kept on humming it over and over again and the ghost just faded away again. The second chap heard all about the first chap, and he did exactly the same, and he had no problem either". George laughed. "No problem then. I`ll go out and buy the CD tomorrow and listen to it over and over again until I know it backwards, then I`ll come back here and take your hundred quid. Let`s say a fortnight today".
Two weeks later George sat in the upstairs gallery of the old house. He was much more nervous than he had expected, and in the last few hours he had been chain smoking to calm his nerves. But he was sure that he knew the Exultate backwards, and as midnight approached he began to hum it quietly to himself, and he was half way through when the ghost suddenly appeared. The ghost of Sir John Over was indeed a terrifying sight, his features - dissipated in life - bore a frightful scowl of the most menacing aspect, his glowing coal black eyes blazed with unmitigated fury, and his whole form appeared to be surrounded by fire. George, although horrified by the apparition, kept his nerve, and humming now more loudly, continued with his Mozart rendition, and after several more bars the ghost appeared to be listening intently, its features less menacing, and the fury of its gaze starting to lessen. George finished humming the piece, and immediately started again, the ghost became even less frightening, and George was starting to think to himself that this was a piece of cake. Unfortunately George had not realised that a few minutes humming is one thing, but for one who has smoked a packet of cigarettes in two or three hours humming non-stop for half an hour or more is an entirely different matter. As he reached the final few bars of his second rendition his voice cracked and gave out, and before he could recover the ghostly figure regained all its malevolent aspect, and extending its hand towards him unleashed a force of such spiritual violence that George was hurled over backwards, senseless, and it was thus that William found him still lying the following morning.
Three weeks later George lay on his death bed. The doctors had been unable to find any cause for his illness, but he had steadily lost his strength and his appetite, and his emaciated frame now lacked the strength to raise his head. William, in a last attempt to try and raise his friend`s spirits was by his bedside. "I`ve brought round that Goons record that we both used to laugh at so much all those years ago when we were kids" he said. "Would you like to hear it?" and without waiting for a reply he started the hi fi. And five minutes later George died, with a smile on his face, as the voices of Peter Sellars, Spike Milligan, and Harry Secombe sang:
"Did your shooing hum lose its quaver on the dead ghost Over Knight?"
