There are three generations of Stratford-Smyths ‘living’ in Bede Hall.

THE FOURTH IS THE GHOST OF A NINE-YEAR-OLD GIRL, WHICH MAKES THEM FOUR GENERATIONS SPANNING FOUR DIMENSIONS.

Bede Hall is old. The word ageless barely covers it, and the word timeless is an outright lie. Older than time is closest to the truth. But even then, strictly speaking, the Hall is older than history. The Hall hovers in and out of this world, visiting its past and future which means that

EVEN IN THE BLISTERING HEAT OF AUGUST IT COULD SNOW AT ANY TIME.

As the only daughter of a grand house, young Beryl Stratford-Smyth was assigned a series of governesses who routinely fled in tears after experiencing frights in the cold spot outside a room near the attic nursery. It was dubbed the Winter Room.

WINTRY WIND EMANATED FROM THE KEYHOLE OF ITS BLUE DOOR EVEN WHEN THE REST OF THE HOUSE SWELTERED IN THE EXTREME HEAT OF SUMMER.

And sometimes, when a crying child was heard, the wind took the shape of a blue mist and drifted through the nursery wall… or so Miss Beryl, said.

But then, grownups dismissed Beryl as a strange child whose moonbeam mind was filled with featherheaded notions of magic. She remained bored and out of sorts until she made friends with Bede’s resident child ghost – a kindred spirit, her own age, who ‘lived’ behind the locked door of the Winter Room.

The two were inseparable until Beryl grew up and married a fortune hunting scoundrel. Her responsibilities as a young mother and chatelaine of a grand estate, consumed her entirely.

BERYL’S BUSY JANGLE OF HOUSE KEYS RANG THROUGH THE HALL’S CORRIDORS LOUDER THAN ANY GHOST DRAGGING CHAINS.

And much later as an eccentric grandmother of precocious twins, and because she flatly refused to be called Granny, Beryl accepted the title Lady Nan, a more dignified name in keeping with her position as the family’s matriarch.  

Later still, during the Hall’s ‘troubles’ Lady Nan lapsed into a fog of pleasant daydreams to block her painful memories in a retirement home in a town called Withering. In desperation, Bede Hall summoned Lady Nan like an angry father to stave off the predator developers keen on turning it into an hotel.

BUT IT WAS THE PLAINTIVE CALL FOR HELP OF HER CHILDHOOD PLAYMATE, SNOW, THAT STIRRED LADY NAN INTO HER OLD SELF.