The Gilded Frame at Dunmore House

My best friend Lena and I had always been drawn to the peculiarities of Dunmore House, the sprawling Victorian that her family had rented for a song. It was a place of creaking floors and drafty hallways, but we never felt fear—only a thrill. Odd occurrences became our nightly entertainment: doors that swung open on their own, the scent of pipe tobacco in empty rooms, the faint melody of a music box from the attic. We were determined to unravel its mysteries.

Our research led us to the town’s historical society, where we discovered that Dunmore House was built in 1843 by two brothers, Augustus and Theodore Marsh. They were eccentric inventors who had dabbled in optical experiments. Intrigued by the supernatural stories, we decided to visit the local cemetery to see if we could find the family plot. After half an hour of wandering among the tombstones, Lena called out. She had found a marker for Augustus Marsh, and nearby, his wife and children. We left a small stone on the grave as a token.

That evening, we had our friend Mira over. The three of us sat in the parlor, lit by the amber glow of a single lamp, joking about the day’s findings. The room was dominated by a massive gold-framed mirror that hung opposite the downstairs bathroom. Its surface was tarnished with age, but still reflected our silhouettes in the dim light. We took turns making faces and laughing, but then Mira went quiet. She pointed at the mirror. ‘Did you see that?’ she whispered. I hadn’t, but Lena shivered. ‘It’s just the shadows,’ I said, but a knot tightened in my stomach.

To break the tension, Mira excused herself to use the bathroom. As she walked past the mirror, we heard a faint scratch, like a fingernail on glass. We both turned. In the mirror, we saw a man standing behind Mira—tall, with a high collar and a pocket watch chain. But when we looked at the real space behind her, there was no one. Mira noticed our expressions and froze. ‘What?’ she asked, her voice trembling. ‘Don’t turn around,’ Lena said, but it was too late. Mira glanced at the mirror and screamed.

For the first time, we were scared. We rushed to Mira, who was shaking. The man in the mirror had smiled at her—an unnatural, wide grin. We huddled together, trying to rationalize it as a trick of the light. But the reflection remained empty, and a cold draft swept the room. Suddenly, the lights flickered, and we heard a low, guttural laugh that seemed to come from the mirror itself. We fled the house, spending the night at Mira’s apartment, but we couldn’t shake what we saw.

The next day, we returned determined to face the mirror. We covered it with a sheet, but that only worsened things. Strange sounds echoed through the house at night, and we began to see the man’s face in any reflective surface—the bathroom mirror, the kettle, even each other’s eyes. Desperate, we delved into the brothers’ journals, which we found hidden in a wall cavity. The brothers had invented a device to communicate with the dead, and the mirror was part of a failed experiment to trap a spirit. But instead of a benign ghost, they had ensnared an entity that fed on curiosity—drawing people in by making them unafraid, only to reveal its true nature when they least expected.

The journal warned that the spirit would mark its next victim by appearing in the mirror while the house was quiet. That evening, we sat in the parlor, waiting. The mirror was uncovered, and we watched our reflections. As midnight approached, a rhythmic drip from the bathroom faucet punctuated the silence. Then, in the mirror, the man appeared again, but this time he was behind Lena. He placed a hand on her shoulder, and her reflection in the mirror aged decades, her skin wrinkling, her hair whitening instantly. We screamed and pulled her away, but the damage was done—Lena was now an old woman.

We knew we had to destroy the mirror. We took it down, and behind it, we found a hidden compartment containing a family seal and a note: ‘To break the curse, the mirror must be shattered by a descendant of the Marshes.’ But none of us were. Frantic, we tried to smash it, but the glass wouldn’t break—it only distorted our faces into grotesque masks. Finally, Lena, in her aged voice, whispered, ‘We have to give it what it wants.’ She strode to the mirror and pressed her palm against it. The glass shimmered, and the man inside took her hand. For a moment, Lena and the spirit seemed to merge, and then the mirror steamed over and cracked from within, exploding into a thousand shards.

When the dust settled, Lena was restored to her youthful self. The house fell silent, and the oppressive atmosphere lifted. We gathered the shards and buried them in the cemetery, under the Marsh family plot. We never spoke of it again, but sometimes, late at night, I catch a glint in my own mirror—a gold frame that isn’t there—and I hear a whisper, ‘You were curious, and I was waiting.’ I have not looked in a reflective surface since.