The Brass Bell on the Landing

The old Wentworth house sat at the top of a hill, a three-story Victorian with a turret and a wraparound porch, now a museum of local history. My fourth-grade class from Maplewood Elementary trudged up the gravel path, our backpacks bouncing. I was Leo, and I’d been to the town library and the post office on field trips, but this place was different. It had a smell—not just old wood and dust, but something like wet wool and cold iron, as if the house itself had a memory.

Our guide, a stern woman named Ms. Hargrove with a voice like a rusty hinge, led us through the rooms. First, the gun room, with its glass cases full of Civil War muskets and a spiked grenade that looked like a metal pineapple. I pressed my face to the glass, imagining the boom and smoke, when I felt a chill on my neck, like someone had opened a window. But no window was open. The others were crowded around a case of sword hilts, and I was alone, save for a little brass bell on a shelf, its handle shaped like a serpent. It was almost too dusty to make out, but I could have sworn I saw it tremble.

Then we climbed to the attic to see the slave quarters, as Ms. Hargrove called them. The stairs were narrow and creaked like old bones. The attic had a low ceiling, and the windows were small, letting in a milky light. There were iron pots and a spinning wheel, a small bed frame with a thin mattress, and a wide, black hearth. Our teacher, Mr. Dolan, stood by the door, telling us to be careful. I lingered near a washboard, running my fingers over the grooves, when I heard a faint scratching, like a match being struck. I spun around, but no one was there. Just a bundle of old quilts in the corner, which looked like they’d shift if you stared long enough.

When it was time to go, we lined up at the top of the attic stairs, waiting to head down. I was the last in line, hemmed in by the chatter of my classmates. Ms. Hargrove was already at the bottom, holding the door. Mr. Dolan motioned for us to follow. Just as I stepped forward, a hand pressed firmly between my shoulder blades, and I stumbled, catching myself on the railing. I looked back, expecting to see a classmate, but the landing was empty. Then I heard it: a little girl’s laugh, high and sweet, like wind chimes in a draft. The sound came from the open attic doorway, from the shadows of the quilts.

I didn’t say anything to my friends because they’d call me silly, but I couldn’t shake it. On the walk back to school, that laugh stayed with me, tickling the back of my neck. At home, I told my mom, and she said it was probably the wind. But that night, as I lay in bed, I heard the same laugh, muffled, as if from inside my closet. And I saw the brass bell from the museum, sitting on my nightstand, though I had never touched it. It rang once, soft and dusty, and the sound was exactly like a girl giggling.

I tried to tell my dad, but he just patted my head and said I had an imagination. The bell followed me, though. It moved from my nightstand to my desk, to the window sill, to the hallway. And one night, I woke to find the attic door of our house—which had been always locked—standing open, and from the dark above, I heard a voice say, ‘You can come up now. It’s almost time for the counting.’

I never went up there, and I told my mom the story again, this time with the bell in my hand. She turned pale and said it was the museum’s property, and she took it back the next day, but she wouldn’t tell me what she found. And now, weeks later, I still hear the laugh sometimes, but it’s fainter, like a bell being rung far away, and I know that on the landing of that old house, something is still waiting for a child to finally come down the stairs.