Wanted! continues....

It was while we were taking stock of our situation that we noticed the figures in white. Outside in the grounds of the house these metallic-faced white-robed figures walked silently around the house, and were to do so for most of the remainder of the day. Mr Baxter remarked that these were the ones from his dream. The figures seemed to pay little heed to us, and Miss Kerr and the house maid did not seem to notice them.

Once we had tired of following them around we returned to the house where some old worn manuscripts had been found. These appeared to be spells of some sort and were quickly linked to the witch that was said to have once lived in the house, an assumption that was to be confirmed later. Other bizarre texts were also located which spoke of strange gods which came to earth before the time of man, but at that time their significance was lost to us.

At mid morning our absent host Dr Bumphrey arrived, looking somewhat the worse for wear. He too did not seem to notice us or the silent figures in white. Miss Kerr informed him that his guests seem to have left, but this did not appear to concern him too much. After 'the hair of the dog', he went to his laboratory which was a smaller building across from the main house. Once the doors were opened we wasted no time in entering this building to nose around.

Inside, the room was in some disarray. On a table was a large and curious machine, and various papers were strewn about. Looking at the documents they consisted of notes on those of us who attended, including the psychological evaluations which we had all been asked to complete for the 'experiment' some weeks before. Much to our concern one of these evaluations seemed to have been completed by a mad man, and written across the document in Dr Bumphrey’s handwriting was; 'Not Suitable'. Our concern was that this individual was amongst our party.

Barely had we began to take in the information before us when Dr Bumphrey returned with Miss Kerr and began fiddling with the strange machine. We all watched eagerly for the results. Bumphrey placed one of the curious helmets that were linked to the machine on his head and attached various wires to connectors on the machine. It sprung to life, with lights flashing in a seemingly random manner. He looked around the room expectantly before making a few adjustments, and then looked at me and the others with a smile of satisfaction and addressed us directly. Miss Kerr seemed annoyed and bemused at the conversation that followed and stormed out of the laboratory.

Without going into to much detail I will summarise for the reader what he told us. It seemed that we were already taking part in his experiment. The nightmare that we all shared last night was very real and that we had indeed been murdered in our beds by masked thugs hired by Dr Bumphrey. He told us in a very matter of fact manner that our bodies were currently lying in the loft of the barn that stood near the house. In short, although he disliked the term, we were ghosts.

The doctor, who was evidently quite mad despite his obvious genius, explained his theory that when people die their psychic energy, which some may call their spirit will remain, and in particular if they die in a violent and sudden manner they will remain close by, 'haunting' the place of their death. The machine he had invented was designed to tune into the psychic energies of the dead. However this was not all.

It appeared that he had already successfully used the machine on many occasions for this purpose. We were, however, to be the guinea pigs for the next stage of his research. He intended to try to bring our 'spirits' back into our bodies in order to revive us.

All this was to much for Miss Dawn who became quite distressed. Bumphrey began to fiddle with his machine and she disappeared. He explained that he could also tune the machine to destroy us if he wished and Miss Dawn was a practical demonstration of this. Once destroyed in this manner you were bowled out for good with no chance of another innings.

Despite our obvious anger and wish for revenge against this madman we put on a co-operative front so as not to upset him as Miss Dawn had. He then removed his head gear and once oblivious to us we plotted our revenge. We were to assist him until revived, assuming this was possible, and then let justice take its course. He did not have his hired thugs to protect him now.

Bumphrey prepared for the next stage of the experiment. He retrieved the body of Dr Stone from the barn and attached it to the machine. Dr Stones 'spirit' disappeared and his body jolted to life before clutching at the bullet wounds in his chest and, with a cry of pain, slumped back to the ground, his 'spirit' leaping up looking bemused and terrified. Bumphrey shut off the machine in a mad rage and rushed out from the lab to his motor vehicle and drove of.

The reason for his failure was immediately clear to us. Dr Stone could not be revived as he was still mortally wounded and had lost much blood. The only chance of success lay in our bodies being healed. A solution came to mind: amongst the spells we had found was a healing potion. It may sound a ridiculous long shot to the reader, but given the nature of our experiences so far and that we had no other options we immediately set about trying to identify and gather the ingredients, calling on the botany skills of Miss Lansdowne.

After much searching Madam Rosina claimed to have had a vision from her long dead mother no less, it seemed she possessed the psychic abilities often attributed to those of Romany blood. The information gleamed led us on a steep ascent of a nearby hill where a large box was retrieved and found to contain the final ingredients. We immediately set about making the concoction. The last macabre ingredient required us to gather hair from the corpses and mix these into the potion. It now only remained to wait and hope that Dr Bumphrey would return to his experiment and that the potion would work.

Before long the Doctor returned and from his manner he had been to the pub in the town again. He began to operate his machine and once he was able to see and talk to us we explained what we had done. He seemed happy enough and fetched our bodies one by one as Doctor Stone used the healing potion. As this was applied the wounds healed quickly before our eyes, the bloodied and hole-filled night clothes the only evidence remaining of the wounds we had suffered. During this procedure Miss Kerr came into the lab and saw the blood-covered bodies lying on the floor. She was quite understandably taken aback and rushed out, telling Bumphrey she was calling the police. He drew a gun and chased after her, my protestations went frustrating unheard as, of course, he was not 'wired' into his machine and he gunned her down while I looked on helplessly.