The Pit

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one night, a candle burned in the window. And it had cast a shadow on the land.

“Ain’t no one stupid enough to set foot in that shack o’ shite,” The Overseer declared.

He spat on the ground for good measure, the saliva quickly drying on the barren pit yard where a throng of workers had curiously gathered. He examined their blank faces, looking for answers underneath the layers of grime.

“Or, at least that’s what I thought,” he continued. “Gew’on then. Which one of you saft buggers is playing tricks?”

Silence. The uncomfortable stillness only amplified the absence of labour one would expect to find at a coal mine. The regions busiest, in fact. And the lack of hard work was not lost on the Overseer, the mental clink of each coin from a day’s pay fading away into the silence with every passing minute.

“It ay one of us, gaffer.” Danny may have been one of the younger men to work the shafts, but his impressive build meant he carried a lot of weight not only in the mine but amongst the opinion of the pitmen. “We wouldn’t be caught dead in there”.

“Too right you wouldn’t,” the Overseer barked. “Because if that cursed cabin didn’t get you first then you’d better believe I’d have your guts for garters after.”

“Honestly, sir.” From the back of the crowd, the earnest voice of Tagger, the pits Lampman, interjects. He approaches the front and resumes, “We’ve been on site for what, the best part of half an hour. Right, chaps?”

The workers mumble in agreement. Finding confidence, Tagger points to the cabins candlelit window and guides the Overseers gaze, “And I dare say that that there candle has been going since late-supper yesterday”.

Realisation rippled through the men and, from a distance, the boy.

Ollie had been watching from the comfort of the Horse Gin, welcoming the early disorder as it had afforded a break from the morning graft. Although, he’d be enjoying the disruption more if it didn’t concern that place. Through the smog of filthy men and noisome air, he stared at the cabin in the woods.

A thicket of trees hugged the northern side of the mine, a pocket of dull green that crested a web of grey roads surrounding the coal pit. This scant bit of nature should have been a welcoming sight for a miner’s dusty eyes. A breath of fresh air for their sooty lungs. If not for that cabin. If not for the stories. If not for the accident.

Ollie watched the candle, flickering in the strong spring breeze but, somehow, holding strong. The candle had stood in the window for years, untouched following the disaster. A leftover reminder of what was the pits original opening site.

Candles, you see, were quite useful in those deep, murky shafts. They were cheap. They provided light. They gave a little warmth. And, if they suddenly extinguished without known cause, they were a great indicator that it was time to hightail it out of there.

The flame of the wick danced on a thick, curling lip of wax. And the build-up had pooled beneath the sill, creating a telling skirt of wax.

It was obvious that Tagger’s eye was right. This had been no quick mischief before the start of a shift. This candle had been lit for hours, most likely when the yard was closed for the night.

The workers were nervous. They all knew the cabin was off limits. This was surely a bad omen.

The Overseer closed his eyes and took a deep breath, seeming to draw the raucous rabble straight out of the air until there was once again silence. He pointed an accusing finger across the crowd.

“This is beyond recklessness; it’s disrespectful. For shame on your brothers. To the one’s here and the ones resting there.” The Overseers finger now rested on the cabin.

“You can forget about your pay for today. That’s unless whoever’s responsible comes forward. Now.”

The Overseer held the men’s gazes, praying that the severe threat would betray the troublemakers resolve. Ollie sure hoped it would. A morning break be damned if he didn’t get his shillings for the day.

The pitmen considered each other and only stared back at the Overseer. Some confused. Several, irritated. All of them, scared.

The Overseer took another deep breath. The men wouldn’t work, regardless, even if he told them to. They were superstitious and for good reason, he supposed. The wounds from five years ago were still too fresh. It was rash of him to think it was one of them. After all, they…

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

Low underground, resonating from deep within the cabin in the woods, came leaden, ominous strokes. They filled the air like damp death but pierced the ears of every man present like hooked barbs.

The rabble erupted again.

“What was that?”

“It’s them! Old Arthur and the lads!”

“That She-Devil never left!”

“We should have burned that cabin to the ground…”

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The Overseer sat hastily next to his tired workstation, fumbling for the drawer latch. He took out his logbook, alongside a fifth of brandy and a soot-smeared tumbler.

“We’ve told you for weeks something was scampering about those tunnels” exclaimed Danny. He sat across from the workstation, his large frame countering the wiry build of Tagger, sat next to him.

“Aye,” sighed the Overseer, “but it’s a working mine, ay it. Imagine if I stopped a days shift for every paranoid plea. There's nowt unusual about bumps, Danny. They're just…livelier bumps than usual”.

Ollie listened stealthily through a crack in the doorway. The Overseer and the two men had retired away from the rest of the workers into the new colliery cabin. The one built to replace the abandoned husk in the woods.

He knew about bumps: it’s when the strata underground moved suddenly, creating loud noises. His da’ warned him about them, as young miners would be scared witless by the frightening bumps. Or knocks.

“Come off it, gaff,” decried Danny. “Bumps are one thing but they’re sparse. Random. These ay random.”

“You heard ‘em,” continued Tagger. “Those bumps have…purpose. They be a knockin’ alright.”

The Overseer gulped his brandy, grimaced, and chose his next words carefully. “I think it’s someone knocking on the door of trouble. And they’ll bloody well get it. Especially if I find out if it’s them that’s been causing havoc lately.”

Ollie was all too familiar with the recent troubles. It’s why he, at the ripe old age of 12, had started to work on the pit. Men had started to leave. Some by choice, others through misfortune.

“I’m reckoning it’s some bastard causing trouble to put us behind,” declared the Overseer, tapping a finger on his logbook. “Charter Masters going to be pissed when he sees how far back we are this month. Well, not on my watch.”

Danny considered his bosses words, “Your watch? The men won’t work now, gaff. A job’s a job, sure. We know the risks of a mine. But not these sorts of risks. That pit, it’s…it’s…”

“Cursed.” Tagger contorted a forced smile. “Ruddy cursed”.

It was peculiar, living in a mining town where nobody wanted to mine. But word had travelled fast about what had happened to old Arthur and the lads five years ago.

It all started with mysterious sounds. Scraping. Moaning. Wailing. They would all say they could feel something in those tunnels, watching them. That, when they were in tight spaces and couldn’t move, the whisper of some evil would steal behind them. Breathing down their necks.

And, when alone, some men had met with terrible misfortunes. A broken leg here. A gaping wound there. Sometimes, loose rock would tumble onto some poor souls’ head. And the ramp path it fell from would then have to be closed.

Bad luck, folk like the Overseer would say. Save for the laughter that followed. Whenever something terrible happened, the men would hear her. Her maniacal glee, carrying throughout the cavernous caves, letting them know it was no accident. The signature of the Banshee.

“Hogwash,” dismissed the Overseer.

“Oh?” Tagger replied. “I’m only repeating your words, gaff. You said it yourself, in the yard earlier. Cursed.”

“Sharrap, you. I knows what I meant. That cabin’s a danger. Nothing but bad luck, I give you that. But, that Pit Bitch…”

“Banshee,” corrected Danny.

The Overseer glared. “That Banshee is nothing more than a tall tale. And I won’t have the memory of those boys sullied with blether”.

Ollie remembered the day. The weeping wives. The mortified mothers. The forlorn fathers. The tears of a town mourning the loss of those 8 brave men.

Witnesses outside of the cabin recalled the men’s screams deep within. Wails of terror depicting a pain unnatural. They say a black mist arose from the entry hole before disappearing back within. Their bodies were never found. Just the blood.

“Blether?” questioned Danny. “It ay blether if I’m telling you I’ve ‘eard it myself. Felt it. It’s happening again. All of it.”

The Overseer scoffed. “Poppycock…”.

“Gew’on then,” asked Tagger. “What else could it be?”

“Maybe one of the Master’s competitors? They know how much we shifted last quarter.”

“You think a competitor would do this? Joel Litchfield lost his hand last wik. You think they’re lobbing the lads hands off?”

“To get ahead, I wouldn’t put a few limbs past them. I know I wouldn’t.” The Overseer pondered a moment before speaking loudly at the door, “Or, perhaps, it’s one of your scruffy friends, boy!”

Ollie froze. He’d see the back of a belt for eavesdropping, for sure.

“Come, come”, beckoned the Overseer. “What say you?”

Ollie entered the room. Danny and Tagger nodded a greeting and let the Overseer continue, “Aren’t we a sneaky one? Could it be you or one of your urchin mates trapesing through my shafts?”

“No, gaffer,” answered Ollie. “We wouldn’t dare.” He eyed the trio of men and continued, “But, maybe…it’s…”

The Overseer’s eyes narrowed, “Gew’on”.

Ollie exhaled. “It’s the miners. They’ve become Tommy Knockers”.

The Overseer slammed his palm on the table, jolting everyone upright. He pointed a calloused finger at Ollie, “Bollocks! First Banshees, now bloody Tommy Knockers!”

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

The sound resonated through the cabin, the bass of the blows shaking the dust off the walls. Outside, in the distance, the pit workers could be heard bellowing in fear.

The Overseer’s face bent into ball of exasperation. After a few moments, the rage dropped, and he opened his eyes.

“Enough,” he seethed. “Gather your things.”

He rose from his chair and made a start for the door, collecting his overcoat and lantern. He turned to the unnerved workers and commanded. “We’re doing something we should have done years ago.”

“You can’t be serious?” Danny panicked. “You can’t expect us to go down there?”

“I’ll give you four-weeks wages if you help me catch whoever is responsible or we put a stop to whatever it is. Today.”

Danny and Tagger looked at each other. Back to the Overseer.

“Well,” considered Tagger. “We don’t get out of bed unless our ghosty-wrosty fee is…say, at least 6-weeks’ pay”.

“8-weeks.” The Overseer knew the time to act was now. A few weeks extra pay was a drop in the ocean compared to what he’d lose with the pit closed for days. “8-weeks. Do as I say. And we go now.”

Danny and Tagger’s eyes widened. Superstitious stories be damned with 8-weeks’ pay on the line.

As the men gathered their tools, Ollie saw his cue to leave. The knocking had shaken his very bones and he wanted nothing more than to return home. Maybe give his old lady a cuddle.

As he made a beeline for the door a thick, sweaty palm rested on his shoulder and stopped him dead. Ollie turned to see the Overseer smiling at him, his boorish eyes squinting in amusement.

“Where do you think you’re going? That invitation included you.”

“Me? You want me to go in…there?”

“Oh yes. I may be a Big Bad Wolf, but I need my three little piggies if I want to tear that house down.”

The Overseer chuckled at himself and continued, “Well, not quite a piggy in your case. We’re going into a mine…”

The Overseer leaned forward, inches from Ollie's face.

“And we’re going to need a canary”.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The smell of rotten eggs overwhelmed Ollie as he was lowered first into the cage.

The shaft had not been opened in some time and the marriage of sulphur and methane was already cruel without also being contained for so long.

Tagger had considered this when they first entered the cabin and re-opened the colliery. If the smell was this strong, it meant no one had disturbed the site. Therefore, whatever was making the knocking was already down there.

The Overseer reflected on this observation for but a moment.

10-weeks’ pay. And no more bloody questions.

Which was a shame, especially when Danny had tried to blow the candle out. A small act to try and appease the onlooking crowd who watched from the outskirts of the forest. And yet the candle would not die.

Danny blew and blew. They all had a turn, even a rigorous effort from the Overseer. And yet the flame stayed true.

The Overseer concluded it must have been a special type of wick, one that needed a singular tool to help extinguish it. A type of wick and tool that none of them had ever heard of, surmised Tagger.

With the threat of returning to 8-weeks’ pay, the thought was soon dropped.

Ollie watched the last remnants of light fade away to a pinpoint just before reaching the bottom of the shaft. Now, he had to wait.

He took a deep breath and raised his lantern. The mine was like any other, really. Dark, filthy, and full of treasure if you knew where to look.

Ollie lingered a few minutes until sure that he was, in fact, alive and not dreaming that he was stupid enough to be in the alleged Banshee mine. He pulled a rope attached to the cage to let the others know it was safe to come down. "Cheep cheep, little canary," he thought.

As he waited, a shiver ran through him when he thought about what could be down there. He didn’t mean to upset the Overseer when he brought up the Tommy Knockers. The thought of their dead friends becoming ghosts was horrific. But what else could be knocking, save the souls of those who died underground, doomed to toil forever?

Danny came down first. No doubt to act as muscle in case anything had already gone awry. Second, the Overseer, followed by Tagger in the rear.

The group surveyed their surroundings. The chocks holding the tunnel aloft creaked with uncertainty and the slightest of sounds were magnified off of the derelict walls.

The Overseer whispered, “Keep your voices low. Best not cause a…”

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

The entire mine shook with a ferociousness that knocked the party off their feet, as if they were trapped within the belly of a beast.

Ollie screamed in pain, instantly forgetting the Overseers advice. But, it did not matter. His voice was lost amongst the monstrous resonance of the knocks.

Eventually, the reverb faded away, unlike the ringing in their ears.

Tagger shook his head, turned to the Overseer, and exclaimed, in a faux-belligerent manner, “You were saying?”

The Overseer was not perturbed. He stood lively and gestured down the tunnel, “This way. It’s where we boxed the shaft in, after the accident. It’s coming from there.”

“Madness!” shouted Danny. “Let’s head back to town and get some help. Whatever’s down here is beyond us.”

“12-weeks’ pay. We keep going.” The Overseer raised his lantern and small billy club in defiance, “Let’s see who it is: the Pit Bitch, the Tommy’s, or some other silly sod. My money and the backside of this club is on the sod.”

The group walked for 5-minutes in silence. Tagger led the front with his industrial lantern, followed closely by The Overseer. At the back, Danny kept one hand on Ollie’s shoulder and another on his armament.

It didn’t take long before they came to their destination. The wall was a barricade that had been haphazardly put together by terrified men, all those years ago, to quickly seal the shaft. It didn’t need to look pretty; it just needed to separate the despair of the past from the hope of the present.

And that it did. “The wall’s firm,” remarked the Overseer, giving the structure a push. “Solid as a Black Country rock.”

Tagger ran his hand over the calloused stones. “Aye. ‘Cept for these marks and indentations.” He pulled his lantern closer to the wall, angling the long shadows to demonstrate; the stone had been chipped away, craters pockmarking the whole fortification.

“Someone’s been having a good go on this,” persisted Tagger. “But why? And what are these…”

Before he could finish, Tagger tripped on a loose rock and fell straight down. And not just onto the floor, but into a strong black mist.

The vapour had risen over 3-feet and was continuing to rise. It had come on suddenly and was growing thicker by the second. Tagger’s outline had disappeared completely beneath it, save for the dim, diffused light from his lantern.

“Blackdamp!” screeched Danny. He reached for Ollie, already neck deep in the dangerous gas, and lifted him onto his shoulders, “Tagger, get up!”

The Overseer didn’t waste time in moving away from the wall, covering his mouth with his neckerchief. “It’s no use, lads!” he squawked. “Once you take a breath of the damp you’re done for! Hurry, whilst we…”

The Overseers voiced trailed off, his eyes wide with fear. Danny and Ollie followed his stare into the darkness and watched as the light from Tagger’s lantern started to move beneath the murky cloud.

Slowly, at first. Then from side-to-side, as if being shaken. Suddenly, Taggers body was thrown above and held violently against the ceiling.

As he hung above, levitated by an unknown force, the corporeal glow of figures started to emerge from the shadows.

Ollie felt a fear like no other, clutching at his throat more than the dangerous gas ever would. The figures faces were sunken, their hair mottled, eyes hollowed. They carried pickaxes and sledgehammers, their emaciated bodies somehow wielding the weight of the tools with ease.

Yet, they didn't attack the pit workers. They simply stared at the trio. And for a moment all was still.

The Overseer couldn’t believe it. He stared at one of the ghoulish faces with horror and recognition. “O…Old Arthur?”

The crude apparition of his long-lost friend could only stare back. But then answered by slightly rising his pickaxe from the floor and back down again. Again. And again.

knock. knock. knock.

With this signal, the gang of spectres sprung into action and started to make work of the shabby barricade.

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

The walls of the shaft were now bursting with the sound of otherworldly destruction. And amongst the nauseating rhythm of the knocking came the haunting melody of a feminine voice. Laughing.

Tagger’s body, still levitating amongst the madness, started to spasm before being thrown from one side of the tunnel to the other.

The trio could only watch as his body was eviscerated against the shaft’s walls, chunks of viscera cascading down into the blackdamp, still rising with deadly purpose.

Danny had seen enough. He held Ollie sturdy to his back and encouraged the boys arms to hug around his neck.

“Hold on, tight. We three can still make it out yet.” He looked around for assurance from his boss. “Oh, you bastard.”

The three were now a two. The Overseer had wasted no time in retreating, leaving his colleagues to their fate.

“Come on, lad. God help us.”

Danny ran, not daring to stop or look back.

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

Ollie closed his eyes and prayed his ear drums wouldn’t burst with the deafening volume of the thuds.

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

The walls were starting to warp, wood splintering from joists and compacted dirt starting to spill into the ever-rising smog of the blackdamp.

KNOCK. KNOCK. KNOCK.

Danny had run the length of the tunnel in record time. Was that light they could now see? And was that laughter they could hear?

Poor Overseer. He had made it back to the cage but didn’t have the prosperity of luck to get away. And, unlike dear Tagger, he was still alive whilst being suspended in mid-air by the Pit Bitch herself.

Enveloped by flowing silver hair, elongated arms held the Overseer up high. A large, rotting mouth of black teeth protruded from the fair face of the grinning Banshee.

“P-please,” the Overseer pleaded through shallow breaths. ‘Let me go”.

The Banshee laughed. Not a maniacal, haunting laugh. But a genuine, rich laugh of mockery. The Overseer didn’t have long to think about this before his head met the unfortunate end of a large rock.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The pit was in a frenzy. The yard had become a cacophony of noise from the terrified workers reacting to the knocking from down below.

The door of the cabin in the woods burst open, and out emerged Ollie and Danny. The workers were astonished to see them make it out in one piece and hurried to their aid.

Ollie collapsed in the centre of the yard, coal-stricken tears running down his face. Danny was screaming at the men: it was all true. The Banshee, the Tommy Knockers, the curse.

Before the men could rally and leave, the unthinkable happened. The knocking stopped. The hideous laughter, ceased.

Silence once again fell on the pit. And from the cabin emerged a monstrous sight: a carpet of black smoke, billowing out across the yard as if it had a mind of its own.

The cabin in the woods had been abandoned for years, but one morning, a candle burned in the window. And it had cast a shadow on the land.