Black and grey shaded tattoo of a haunted Victorian house with bats, a weathervane and a pumpkin, across the side of a thigh.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Haunted house and bats on a thigh

Other · Black and grey · Photo

A large Victorian-style haunted house fills the design, with a tower, a rooftop weathervane, two bats in a cloudy sky, ghostly figures in the windows and a carved pumpkin on the steps. The bare, twisted tree and a small pine sit to the right of the house. Fine linework outlines the architecture, and soft grey shading gives the building and clouds depth, with a few reddish-brown tones in the skin and ground.

Other Bat Cloud Ghost Pumpkin Bare tree Pine tree Tower Halloween

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Maud,

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You will not believe what Aunt Ivy has done. She has booked Harrowgate House for Daniel's wedding, the one with the copper tower and the rooster on the roof, and she insisted on an October date so the pumpkins would be in season. The agent sent us a photograph of the staircase and I thought it was a joke until I saw the lantern hanging from the balcony rail.

The place has stood empty since the Ashdown sisters died there in 1911, or so the parish records say. The caretaker, a silent man called Pell, showed us round on Thursday. He walked us past the bay window on the upper floor and said, without looking up, that the pale shape in the third pane was only a reflection. Then he counted the windows along the left side aloud, twice, and got a different number each time.

The bats came to the terrace while we were measuring for the marquee. Two of them, circling the weathervane, and the rooster swung round to face the lane as if someone had called it. Daniel laughed and asked whether the sisters would be invited. Pell said they had been invited already, when the old deeds were signed, and that they liked a good dance.

I have decided we will hold the ceremony on the lawn beneath the bare tree, and I have asked the florist to leave a pumpkin on the steps where it can keep an eye on things. Come early. Bring your dancing shoes and your sense of humour. If you see a lady in grey on the balcony, wave. It would be rude not to.

Love, Bea