The Society for the Investigation of Spectral Phenomena
The Weight Beneath the Croydon Rehearsal Hall
Fairfield Halls, manor house, Broad Green, London
I.Background & History
Fairfield Halls is an arts, entertainment and conference centre in Croydon, London, which opened in 1962. It contains a theatre and gallery and a large concert hall, regularly used for BBC television, radio and orchestral recordings. It closed in 2016 for a redevelopment costing some £30 million and reopened in 2019.
The Society's dossier lists the premises under the heading of manor house, a classification the Society has retained for its own convenience, and places it in Broad Green, in the London Borough of Croydon. The Society records no further particulars of the ground before the present building, and does not presume to supply any.
Source: Fairfield Halls, Wikipedia
II.The Entity
The Night Sitter
It is felt first as a slow, even pressure across the breastbone, as of a sleeping child laid down upon the sleeper. Those who open their eyes find above them a face assembled from the faces of an audience, row upon row, each with its mouth closed in rapt attention. The eyes are never turned to the stage; they are turned only to the sleeper.
Assessment of Peril
Class IV: Malignant
Of eleven persons known to have woken beneath it, four were later found dead in their beds with their eyes open and the others were never again themselves. It appears to mark those who speak of it.
III.The Account
I write this to the Society knowing it will be read after I am past answering questions. I was in 1941 a young clerk to a firm of concert agents, billeted in a requisitioned house at Broad Green, where the town's musicians were sent to sleep when the raids drove them from their lodgings. The ground on which the Halls now stand was then given over to other uses; I will say only that a hall of assembly stood near it, and that the sirens found us all there one winter night, some two hundred, lying in rows on the floor.
I was the one who counted them in, and I was the one who counted wrongly. A woman in the third row asked me twice to open the doors, because she could not breathe, and I told her that the Warden had forbidden it and that she was to lie still. I had no such order. I wished only to be thought dutiful. She lay still. In the morning she was found upon her back with her eyes open and an expression of attentive calm, and nothing was ever settled as to the cause. I signed the register and said nothing.
The weight came to me within the week. I woke in the dark unable to move, and above me hung a face I knew, for it was hers, but it was grown wide, and in its cheeks and brow were pressed a great many other faces, small as seeds, all turned toward me and all silent. It lay upon my chest as she had lain upon the floor, and it breathed for me, slow and shallow, until I wept. It was gone by grey light. It has returned every night since, and each time it stays a little longer.
IV.Recorded Manifestations
- ✦A pressure upon the breastbone of the sleeper, of the weight of a small child, increasing each night.
- ✦Inability to move or cry out, with the eyes held open.
- ✦A face above the bed composed of many small faces, all turned downward and all silent.
- ✦A warm, shallow breathing in the room, keeping time with the sleeper's own and then outpacing it.
- ✦Doors found unlocked in the morning, though bolted at night.
- ✦The victim's name mouthed, without sound, by the apparition.
Testimony of Witnesses
“"I found her on her back with her eyes wide, and such a look of listening upon her that I did not like to close them. I cannot say why, but I did not like to be in that room alone afterwards."”
“"The gentleman begged me to sit by him till morning. I sat. At three he went rigid, and I swear to God the blanket sank, though there was nothing on him. He was never right again."”
“"Four deaths, all supine, all open-eyed, no mark upon any. I wrote 'failure of the heart' and have not slept on my back since."”
V.Rite of Expulsion
Difficulty: Perilous
Requisites
- ☐A key to every door of the building
- ☐A white sheet, newly laundered
- ☐A clock with an audible tick
- ☐A tallow candle
- ☐A written list of the names of the sleepers of 1941
The Rite
- I.Enter at midnight with the full company of those who survive, and unlock every door and window of the hall, leaving them wide.
- II.Light the tallow candle and place it at the centre of the floor, where the third row once lay.
- III.Read aloud the list of names, slowly, and pause after each until the clock has ticked seven times.
- IV.Spread the white sheet over the floor and let no person stand upon it.
- V.Say plainly, 'The doors are open; you may go,' and repeat it until the candle gutters.
- VI.Withdraw backward without turning, and leave the doors open until dawn.
Caution. No person who woke beneath the Sitter may lie down within the building during the rite. The Society's agent, Mr. Hale, lay down to rest at the fourth hour and was found at dawn upon his back, eyes open, perfectly composed.
VI.Hauntings of the Surrounding District
Select a bar to filter the register.
Ashcroft Theatre · Old Theatre · a few paces
The Stalls Emptying, phantom procession. At the close of an evening no one has performed, a silent audience files out of the dark auditorium, each member glancing back at the same empty seat.
The Spread Eagle Theatre · Old Theatre · 0.2 miles
The Eagle's Doorman, spectre. A figure in a faded greatcoat takes tickets that no one has bought, and those who hand him one do not remember leaving.
Warehouse Theatre · Old Theatre · 0.2 miles
Flat-Hand Hobbs, poltergeist. Scenery is shifted in the night, and on each canvas in the morning is the print of a hand with one finger too many.
St Andrew's · Church · 0.4 miles
The Lady of the Lych Gate, white lady. She stands at the gate each Advent with her face turned away, and she is never seen to arrive or depart.
Croydon Minster · Church · 0.4 miles
The Bellrope Man, revenant. A man in a grave-cloth is seen hauling at the tenor rope before dawn, though the bell makes no sound, and the rope is warm.
St Mary's Church · Church · 0.6 miles
The Pew Cat, spectral animal. A grey cat is seen to sit upon the pews at evensong, and those who stroke it find their hands cold for a week.
Nestlé Tower · Old Tower · a few paces
The Forty-Floor Tread, unclassified entity. Footsteps climb the empty stair at night, one flight after another, and stop at the door of whoever lies listening below.
Dog & Bull · Old Inn · 0.3 miles
The Drover's Cur, phantom hound. A lean hound with eyes like wet coals follows late drinkers home, and the door it stands before is the next to be hung with crape.
