Diary fragment · 2 min read ·
Entries from the Guest House on Marsh Road
The proprietress of a seaside guest house keeps a diary of the lodgers who stay through the off-season, and the lodgers' names in the book begin to appear one night before they arrive.
- dated: The off-season, the first week of February
- narrator: Mrs Edith Pring, proprietress
- reliability: unreliable
Monday. Four rooms let for the week. Mr and Mrs Oakes in the front, the two gentlemen from the insurance firm in the back, and a Miss Lane in the attic, who asked for the room with the view of the marsh. I told her there was no view of the marsh, the window faces the wall of the lifeboat shed. She said she knew.
Tuesday. Wrote the lodgers into the book in the morning as usual. Found that Miss Lane's name was already in the book, in my hand, on the page for Thursday. I do not remember writing it. I am tired. The sea air does that in February.
Wednesday. The gentlemen complained about the boiler again. I told them the man from the council is coming Friday. They said that was what they were told last week. I said I was sure it was true.
Thursday. Miss Lane came down to breakfast and asked whether I had been up to the attic in the night. I said no. She said somebody had been standing at the foot of her bed, looking at her, very quietly, and had written something on the wall above the sink. She had gone up and looked, and there was nothing written there. But she said the damp patch on the plaster had the shape of a hand.
Friday. Went up to the attic myself with a lamp. The plaster above the sink was dry and whitewashed. I touched the place where Miss Lane had said the hand was and my fingers came away sticky, with a smell of salt.
Saturday. The Oakes have checked out early. They said they had had a lovely time but the room was very cold and there was a woman singing in the corridor at four in the morning. I said I did not hear anything. Mrs Oakes said, "Well, you wouldn't, would you, dear," and paid in full.
Sunday. Checked the book again. The page for next Thursday now has three names on it that I do not know. One of them is my own, written in a hand I cannot place. Under it, very small, someone has written *Room 2, the one that faces the lifeboat shed. She is expected at dusk.*
Monday. Nobody has booked Room 2 for a month. I shall not let it. I am going to sit by the fire in the front parlour with the lamp lit and the book on my knee, and if anyone rings the bell after dark I shall tell them the house is full.