Helen Phifer - The Good Sisters - The perfect scary read to curl up with this winter

Edith was in the kitchen with Lilith and Father Patrick, so Agnes went to the cupboard under the stairs where they kept the disinfectant and mop buckets. She took a big bottle of bleach, a box of rags and the mop bucket. Locking the door behind her, she went upstairs. Mary’s room was the seventh one along the landing. The door wasn’t shut properly because of Crosby’s attempts to kick it in.

Agnes’s mouth felt dry and her hands were trembling at the thought of going inside it on her own, but she needed to do this. She was in charge of running this convent and the responsibility weighed heavy on her shoulders. Mary’s family would be coming tomorrow and might want to stop here. It was the least they could do and she wouldn’t have them going into their daughter’s room if it was still stained with her blood.

Agnes was only a small woman, but she was strong. The corridor seemed to her as if it had increased in size because Mary’s bedroom door looked so far away from where she was standing at the top of the stairs. As she forced her feet to walk forwards, she began to pray under her breath. She prayed for Mary and for the rest of them because she couldn’t shake the feeling that what had happened to Sister Mary was just the beginning of something terrible.

The smell hit her as she got halfway along the landing and her empty stomach lurched. She crossed herself. How had this happened to Mary? What had happened? It didn’t make any sense to her whatsoever. They had all been fine last night.

Agnes thought she heard the sound of heavy footsteps coming from Mary’s room and she paused to listen. The police, doctor and undertakers had all left. There should be no one here. She waited, her heart racing. Stop it, woman, you’re scaring yourself . Holding herself straight she walked the last few steps and listened at the door, pressing her head against the wood to make sure there was no one still in there. She was greeted by silence.

She pushed the door open and gasped once more; the sight in front of her eyes was horrendous. Earlier had been bad enough, although the shock had numbed some of it. The blood was everywhere. It was as if someone had taken a paintbrush and splashed it all around the white walls. The bed had the white outline of where Mary had fallen, but surrounding it and bleeding into it were dark, almost black congealing pools of blood.

The stench was how Agnes imagined an abattoir would smell. That was it. Mary had been butchered to pieces in her own bedroom and not one of them had heard a sound. How had that been possible? Her eyes fell onto the book on Mary’s bedside table: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein . Something bothered Agnes about that book, but she didn’t know what. Why had Mary been reading that? Mary and Edith had been to the picture house in the town to watch it and both of them had come back scared of their own shadows for days. So what was it that had compelled her to go out and buy the book?

Agnes stepped forward and reached out for the soft, leather-bound book. As she flicked open the front page, her eyes began to stream and her nostrils flared at the strong smell that was emanating from it. It smelt like embalming fluid, but what on earth would that be doing on the pages of a book? Agnes had helped out at the undertaker’s a few times back in her younger days and although it was hard to describe exactly what it smelt of, it always had the same effect on her. Dropping the book back down she stepped away. Something strange was happening in this house and she didn’t have any idea what it was.

Agnes began to blot, wipe, scrub and wash every trace of blood away that she could find. Every couple of minutes she would twist her head from one side to the other to look behind her. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she was being watched. Mary’s room was huge, but so were all the others. It was a massive house, which had obviously been designed for a wealthy family. Not a small group of women who had given up their everyday lives to serve God.

She was kneeling on the floor, scrubbing at a particularly stubborn bloodstain, when she felt the skin on the back of her neck prickle as a cold gust of air rushed against her. She pulled herself from her knees, which made two loud clicks that echoed around the room as they straightened up. Agnes half expected that woman, Lilith, to be standing in the doorway watching her. She turned around. There was no one there.

The room was beginning to smell much better. The harsh, coppery stench of the blood was being wiped away by the strong-smelling ammonia. There was another smell coming from the corner of the room where Agnes felt as if someone was standing. It smelt like electricity. Agnes would describe it to Father Patrick as the smell in the air when there is about to be a thunderstorm. She waved her hand in front of her, expecting the air to crackle and fizz, but it didn’t.

She began to hum to herself, one of her favourite hymns. She was too old to believe what her mind was trying to say. It was being ridiculous. She was being silly. For whatever reason, Mary had done that to herself. Agnes didn’t know why or even want to know how, but there was no evidence that suggested any other explanation.

She turned back to the floor and felt her heart miss a beat to see the book that had been on the bedside table moments ago now on the floor, next to her mop bucket. How? There had been no noise, no draught. Agnes knew that she hadn’t knocked it over herself; with a hand that was shaking so much she found it hard to get her fingers to pick it up, she gripped it as tight as she could. The icy-cold leather stuck to her fingers and she shook them, almost dropping it with revulsion.

She started to read the words in front of her and the room began to spin. Frankenstein’s monster had just killed Victor’s new wife Elizabeth. Tucking the book into her pocket she left the room, unsure of what or who was watching her, but certain that someone was. She went to the bathroom to clean herself up; her clothes were ruined and smelt terrible. She turned on the taps and began running herself a bath. As she undressed she looked into the mirror, asking herself: ‘ Are you going mad, woman?’

She didn’t feel as if she was. Her face didn’t look much different. Well, apart from the few new wrinkles that had appeared around her eyes and forehead overnight. Once more the feeling she was being watched made her shiver. She turned around to check the door was still locked. Then she slowly bent to look through the keyhole and make sure that there wasn’t anyone peering through it; although what anyone would want watching a sixty-year-old naked woman was beyond her.

She squinted; all she could see through the tiny lock was the landing outside the door. Wondering where Lilith was, Agnes straightened up and walked across to step into the bath. This wouldn’t be a quick in and out like usual. She would be spending as long in here as she could. She needed to soak away the smell of dear Mary’s blood, not to mention her aches and pains from being scrunched up on the floor scrubbing.

As she sunk into the steaming water she wondered what had happened to change the whole dynamics of this house of God, and try as she might the only conclusion that she could come up with was the arrival of Lilith Ardat. Why did she feel such revulsion towards the woman? Agnes didn’t dislike many people; it wasn’t in her nature. Why had they let her in? What was it that she had said to Agnes earlier: ‘Thank you for giving me permission to come in’?

Agnes had her own horror book tucked away in her bedside table drawer. She had read Bram Stoker’s Dracula many years ago. Her copy had been a gift from her sister – just before she’d died – so even though Agnes hadn’t particularly enjoyed the story, the fact that the book was more sentimental to her meant that she kept it close to her. Agnes had been terrified of the vampire Count Dracula and his wicked, evil ways when she’d read it, but she knew it was only a story. All this talk of not having a reflection and needing to ask permission to enter someone’s house was plain ridiculous. Or was it?