Halloween is one of my favorite “holidays” of the year. It falls on in the middle of the best season and encompasses one of my favorite genres, horror. I wanted to contribute to the festivities with a little story I conjured up based on a real home I walk by nearly everyday. And yes, the photo accompanying this story is the house that inspired this tale…
Just north of the city, amongst the miles of winding roads and the millions of people, is Ravenswood Avenue. Adorned with stately homes complete with perfectly curated yards and tree-lined sidewalks, a pleasant autumn jaunt amongst the falling fire-colored leaves is a common occurrence. A strolling pair would tell you of the beauty and majesty of the old brick and stone abodes along the street while warming their bodies with a large cup of coffee at one of the cafes on one of the corners. But listen closely, because there is always a house they will acknowledge wearily, however brief it may be.
In jarring contrast to the polished stone enclosures or matte wooden fencing surrounding the other homes, one cannot help but notice the intricately woven iron bars that encompass the house’s wild and untamed front yard. The rows of neatly manicured trees along Ravenswood Avenue falter briefly when replaced by dense, untrimmed branches that grow so thick they practically blot out the sun in front of the home. So low do the branches hang that the vines that wrap and constrict the speared iron columns creep up along the twigs and leaves, created a most uncommon fusion of foliage. Along the sidewalk, where the twisting vines and canopy of trees create a shadowy world to the urban explorer, there is an ominous break, for there stands a thin, gated entrance to the yard, and the only full view of the hauntingly magnificent home.
The work of a master, no doubt, an iron Raven, standing tall and proud, its beak pointing south, is perched on a thin stone arch above the walkway. Beyond the Raven’s guard is a home so grand and terrifyingly beautiful that even the locals, the ones that know the legends, cannot help but stop momentarily to catch a glimpse. Once the chills have completed their course down the walker’s spine, their steps quicken, carrying them to safety, far from the mouth of the home.
An array of grand geometric shapes make up the chilling façade of the old Victorian structure. Rounded roofs reaching high into the sky cap the numerous circular turrets, accompanied by steep triangular peaks that run along the top of the home. A wide porch, expertly preserved in dim gray and white hues, wraps along the side of the home before disappearing somewhere into the wild vegetation that consumes the rest of the yard. The home looks inviting enough, menacingly so, but doesn’t everything look more innocent, more safe, more natural in the daylight?
It’s what the legends suggest that makes one’s body quiver, one’s neck hairs stand on end, and keeps kids and adults alike at bay. As legends go, no one storyteller agrees when the horror began, but all agree that it was long, long ago. Back when the house on Ravenswood Avenue was one of only two on the block. Back when fears of the occult ran rampant and the results of the fear bred violent reactions. The legend began with the most notorious of names, one celebrated at the intersection of every street that ran through this part of the world, a few miles north of the city: Matilda Ravenswood.
Little is known about her earlier life, only fanning the flames of intrigue and mystery, but all renditions of the legend begin the same way: …after her husband died. Mr. Ravenswood derived his fortune from a long line of other Ravenswood men after becoming a staple in Chicago’s meatpacking industry. Hundreds and thousands of pounds of beef would pass through the family-owned factories every week and month, solidifying the Ravenswoods as some of the wealthiest and most influential families in the city. After years of success, philanthropy, and a high society lifestyle, Mr. Ravenswood would meet a peculiar end when he choked to death on his dinner one evening, a steak straight from one of the meat packing facilities that enthroned his family among the city’s elites. More peculiar still would be the inexplicably high levels of arsenic discovered in his blood shortly after his untimely demise, a detail Matilda kept quiet with the help of her coin purse. And so, we must now say… after her husband died.
For some length of time, long or short, only history can remember, Matilda Ravenswood hid away in her mansion, stewing in her insanity, forgotten by the city that was growing with dramatic vigor around her. It wasn’t until one Halloween when, seemingly all but abandoned, a singular jack-o-lantern appeared on the porch of the Ravenswood home. The thick iron gate, practically rusted shut from lack of use, swung open in the early evening mist as if by a ghost. Before long, the first of several older children, dared and prodded by their peers, garnered enough bravery to sprint up the steps to the front door of the mansion. Whether for effect or because of something more supernatural, the door creaked open before any doorbell could be rung and before any child could call out the sacred words “trick or treat.” On a small table immediately inside the foyer, a large bowl, overflowing with all the colorful and sugary candies a child could dream of, sat within eager arms’ reach.
The bravest of children would grab a handful of candy, not daring to look around, for they heard the legends that the murderess lurked in the shadows of that home. The loot safely deposited in their candy bags, the brave child would turn on their heels and sprint down the steps, onto the curved pathway, through the wild thicket, under the iron raven perched on its thin stone arch, and into the safety of the streets of the neighborhood north of the city. But Matilda Ravenswood was clever. She would never be so brazen as to sink her wicked claws into her victims so conspicuously. Which is why, the next morning, when news of several trick-or-treaters meeting an untimely death was splashed on the front of the Tribune, no one would ever suspect the outwardly empty shell of the mansion on Ravenswood Avenue. Even when the trusted coroner discovered alarmingly high dosages of arsenic in each of the unfortunate victims, no one suspected the old shut-in living just down the street.
As they say, as the legend goes that every few years, just enough time for a new group of kids, unaware and naïve of the wickedness of Matilda Ravenswood, a similar fate would befall the small neighborhood a few miles north of the city. Dozens of kids, desperate to test the validity of the rumors, would fall deathly ill the morning after Halloween. But they were the lucky ones. For every three children that fell ill, one would succumb to the inevitable toxicological conclusion: arsenic. This went on for decades. Every few years, just as the legend began to drift, abandoned, from the neighborhoods’ consciousness, a spate of inexplicable deaths would again take over newspaper headlines and ring out the souls of heartbroken families.
It took a long time, too long, for authorities and seething neighbors to march up to Matilda’s door, demanding a gruesome justice more violent than the accusations against her. If it hadn’t been for old man Pritchard noticing the lonesome jack-o-lantern on the dim porch on each of the years the plague struck the neighborhood children, their suspect may never have been caught. When the vigilante mob stormed the home, it was said they came across an empty collection of cavernous rooms in the once grand mansion. Dust as thick as the sole of a shoe laid undisturbed on the floor and, save a few sheet-covered items of furniture, the building was empty. There was no sign of Matilda Ravenswood inside and it didn’t look like she’d been there for however long it takes inches of dust to collect on a polished wooden floor. Had the murderess escaped in the deepest of darkness on that Halloween night? Had the murderess ever even been there?
That is where the legend ends. Or at least, that’s the version that I know. Legends are silly things; I’ve never known if they were meant to teach the reader or listener anything, sort of like a fable, or if they were created purely for entertainment purposes. Whatever the reason, they are fun to tell and fun to listen to, and, as morbid as it sounds, the legend of Matilda Ravenswood has been one of my favorites for years. Or, at least, it used to be. You see, I got off the train tonight, Halloween evening, and started walking up Ravenswood Avenue towards my house. As I passed the old mansion, its paint peeling and its once beautiful columns now being invaded by vines and ivy, I looked up at the iron raven, as I always did. But it was something behind the fence that caught my eye. A flicker at first, until I got closer to the old gate. Peeking through the layers of vines I spotted a jack-o-lantern, freshly carved, sending shadows dancing along the molding porch. I stood there frozen for a moment, the details of the legend rushing back to me. I turned quickly and marched away from the house, admittedly a little panicked. No more than ten steps away, I heard the squeaky grinding of an old, rusted gate swinging open, just as the legend detailed. That’s when I ran.
