Elena set down her knife and fork, listening with interest as the young man vividly recounted a ghost story. According to him, he was around seven or eight years old when he went to visit his aunt. On a stormy night filled with thunder and lightning, he couldn't sleep from fear, so he sat on his bed, staring out the window, hoping the storm would pass quickly.
"You'll never guess what I saw," he said, taking a deep breath, his expression distant, as though reliving the moment — clearly a story he'd told many times, judging by his practiced tone and gestures. "It was astonishing: a group of men and women dressed in clothes from the last century, dancing in the courtyard."
Gasps echoed around the table as the crowd was pulled into the eerie, mysterious atmosphere. The hall fell silent, the only sounds the occasional wind and the crackling of the fireplace.
"It was raining heavily — how could anyone be dancing outside?" he continued. "I was so terrified I didn't dare make a sound. I hid under the covers and eventually fell asleep. The next morning, I asked my aunt about what I saw. She told me that back in the last century, the manor used to host grand balls. But during one tragic fire, everyone attending the ball perished. The manor was rebuilt, and that courtyard used to be the main reception hall — the very place where the ball had taken place."
For a moment, the room remained utterly quiet. Then someone asked, "And then?"
"Then I went home," he said, shrugging. "I never visited my aunt again. I don't know if those ghosts still dance in the rain."
"That's incredible," the others exclaimed. "Did your aunt ever say anything else about it?"
"No. She didn't like to talk about it," he replied, shaking his head. "A few years later, she passed away."
Her death added a layer of mystery to the story.
The young man's tale sparked a round of storytelling. The guests began to share their own terrifying childhood memories, each trying to outdo the last with strange and unsettling tales — some rivaling tabloid headlines like *"90-Year-Old Woman Comes Back to Life," "Hundreds of Sows Screaming at Midnight,"* or *"Why Girls' Dorm Keeps Getting Robbed."* Yet none were quite as captivating as the young man's ghostly ball.
When Elena finally finished her dinner, the young man who had invited her over asked, "What about you? Surely you have some unusual experiences too?"
Everyone turned to look at her with curiosity. Clearly, they had all exhausted their own stories. She was the only one who hadn't spoken yet.
Sensing their anticipation, Elena rummaged through her mind, piecing together a suitably spooky story. She cleared her throat and began solemnly, "What I'm about to tell you is something I experienced personally." (It wasn't. She made it up.)
"It happened about two or three years ago, one night when a companion and I stayed at a small, remote inn. The innkeeper was a slightly chubby man."
As she spoke, all eyes naturally drifted toward the plump innkeeper present in the room, who looked utterly baffled, as if they were trying to spot any hidden resemblance to the characters in her tale.
"We stayed in the room at the very end of the hallway," Elena continued, improvising as she went. "That night, after we went to bed, we quickly fell asleep. But in the middle of the night, I heard a low sobbing sound from the next room. Half-asleep, I opened my eyes and thought I saw my companion sitting at the edge of the bed, watching me. I was so scared I woke up instantly and lit a candle — only to find him lying there, fast asleep, breathing steadily."
"I woke him up and asked if he had heard the crying too. He shook his head and said he needed to use the bathroom. So he left the room on his own. I tried to go back to sleep, but then I heard a knock on the door and someone whispering, 'Open the door.' I thought it was my companion who had forgotten his key, so I got up to open the door — but no one was there. I shut the door and lay back down, but not long after, the knocking returned, along with that same voice: 'Open the door.'"
The room held its breath.
"I was terrified. So I went out to find my companion and saw that he was still in the bathroom," Elena said with a helpless gesture. "We decided the room was too weird and went to the innkeeper to ask for another one. Strangely, he was still awake and immediately apologized, saying his wife had disappeared during the inn's construction — and that the room we stayed in used to be hers."
The traveler currently staying in the end room frowned deeply.
"Though it was all very suspicious," Elena went on, "we didn't have anywhere else to go that late, so we accepted another room and managed to sleep until morning. But when I went down for breakfast and saw the person behind the front desk, I was shocked — it was a young man."
"I asked him where the chubby innkeeper from last night had gone, and he gave me a strange look. He told me he was the only owner of the inn," Elena neared the end of her tale. "It turns out, the previous owner — who was indeed a heavyset man — had died in an accident during the construction, crushed by bricks. His wife sold the place afterward and disappeared."
"What happened next?" a braver guest asked. "Does that room still have ghostly activity?"
Elena shook her head lightly. "I don't know. My companion and I left the next day and never returned. But rumors say that strange things continued to happen in that room. Some even claim that the fat owner was bricked into the wall."
The current innkeeper, arms folded, seemed oddly sympathetic to the fictional dead man.
"A truly creepy experience," said the young man, clearly impressed. "You must be a brave soul."
He raised his beer to Elena in a toast.
"Speaking of which, Covent Garden has plenty of strange tales too," the plump innkeeper chimed in cheerfully. "Though nothing quite as chilling as what you all shared."
The group chatted for a while longer about Covent Garden's ghost stories before returning to their rooms. Elena was about to leave when the innkeeper stopped her. She felt a flicker of guilt.
Turning back, she asked, "Yes, sir? Is something wrong?"
The innkeeper smiled warmly. "Your story was truly captivating. But I do have one small question — does that inn really exist?"
Elena's heart skipped a beat. She hadn't expected to be called out so soon. Caught off guard, she didn't know how to respond.
The innkeeper quickly added, "Oh, no offense meant. I'm not questioning your sincerity — it's just that some characters and details in your story seemed a little too familiar. Of course, that doesn't stop it from being a wonderfully spooky tale. In fact, I was wondering… if that story were set here, at the Black Horse Inn…"
Wait, what? You *do* realize you're the dead guy in that story, right?
"You want to use my story?" Elena asked. "But it's a ghost story. A scary one."
The innkeeper sighed.
The Black Horse Inn's location made it difficult to attract guests. The narrow alleyways and lack of coach access turned many people away. Even though it was near the busy Covent Garden, the inn barely managed to stay afloat.
But Elena's tale had sparked an idea. What if the inn became famous for being haunted? What if thrill-seekers started showing up, eager to experience the ghost story for themselves? Look at how popular freak shows and asylums were in London — surely some of that curiosity could be redirected toward the inn.
"Some people might be too scared to stay after hearing the story," Elena said skeptically. She'd once considered creating a haunted house, but the accompanying story had to be way scarier than this one. "And honestly, it's not even that terrifying. I doubt people would come just for that."
The innkeeper remained optimistic. "For the Black Horse Inn, this might already be enough." He looked at her earnestly, full of hope.
Seeing how serious he was, Elena agreed. After all, it was just a made-up story — not a big deal. The innkeeper was thrilled and immediately refunded her room fee, insisting she could stay as long as she wanted for free.
The unexpected generosity surprised Elena. Inspired, she began thinking of ways to help the inn draw more guests.
As she mulled it over, the winding alleys and Covent Garden legends came to mind. Suddenly, an idea struck her.
"A ghost tour?" The next day, the innkeeper was completely baffled. "What's that?"
Elena, who had visited London in a previous life, had once taken part in a ghost tour — a guided walk through allegedly haunted alleyways and dungeons. She hadn't understood much of it back then due to her poor English, but the tour group had been packed with curious tourists. Clearly, there was a market.
And if ghost tours were popular in the 21st century, a time filled with distractions, then surely in the entertainment-starved 19th century, they would be even more appealing.
"We can start by collecting stories and legends from Covent Garden and the surrounding alleys," Elena explained methodically. "Then submit them to papers like *The Strand*."
Having had success getting published before, Elena was confident this could work.
"Next, we can hire some sharp-tongued street kids," she said, thinking of the boys with torches at the alley entrances. "At night, they'll lead tourists through the alleys, telling those chilling and fascinating tales in even more vivid detail than what's printed."
"And the Black Horse Inn," she added, looking expectantly at the innkeeper, "will be one of the featured stops."
"What do you think?"