The Patchwork House by Richard Salter

Let’s just stay in here.”
    “I didn’t say you had to come with me.”
    “We made a rule, remember,” I said.
    “Bollocks to your rule. If anyone wants to come up with me then be my guest. If not, I’ll go alone. I’m just going to grab the camera from the top of the stairs and come back again. I’m not going to hang out and drink piña coladas with Percy’s granddad in the library.”
    Beth, Chloe and I glanced awkwardly at each other, each hoping someone else would volunteer first.
    Derek laughed. “For God’s sake, it’s either a ghost or a hoax, and the sooner we find out the sooner we can get some sleep.”
    Somehow I didn’t think Derek really cared that much about sleeping. He was on a mission now. Perhaps this was the most exciting thing to happen to him in years. Or perhaps he longed for fame, and believed this was his chance to grab it.
    I had to admit, while part of my mind recoiled in terror at the thought of seeing that dark mass again, another part dearly wanted to get it on film. Not because I wanted to become famous and get on TV, necessarily, but because it would be pretty cool to have actual evidence of a real life haunting.
    Derek clicked on his torch and went to the door.
    “I’ll come with you then,” I said. I would never forgive myself if I let him go alone and something happened to him.
    Beth didn’t look too happy about that. “We’ll be fine,” I whispered to her. I picked up the spare lamp, turned on the gas and followed Derek into the hall.
    He was already at the foot of the stairs, using his torch to illuminate as much of the upper floor as its beam would reveal. I stood back so as not to blind him with my lamp. After a moment he seemed satisfied that there was nothing up there and he started climbing. I followed him, keeping back a few steps. Our eyes never wavered from the landing. When Derek reached the base of the guard rail, his head at floor level, he shone the torch up and down the corridor and craned his neck to see. The camera was attached to one of the wooden beams about two feet above Derek’s head. He reached up and switched off the automatic setting—the camera had likely already taken a few snaps of Derek’s torchlight dancing over the walls. He placed the torch between his teeth, climbed another couple of steps and reached out to the camera again. This time he started taking off the drafting tape holding it in place. It was very loud, the noise echoing in the long corridor running the length of the whole house. I raised the lamp to help Derek see what he was doing. It seemed to take forever but eventually the camera came free.
    Derek pulled it through the bars and then took the torch out of his mouth. “Should have brought a knife,” Derek said drolly as we headed back down the stairs.
    We made it to the drawing room without anything weird happening and closed the door behind us. Chloe and Beth looked relieved.
    “Nothing happened,” I told Beth. Derek ignored us and sat down with the camera. Quickly he began flicking through photographs.
    “What time did you hear the footsteps?” he asked me.
    “I don’t know, maybe around quarter past twelve.”
    “Okay, well your camera is screwed up, because the photos have the wrong date on them. The timestamp says they were taken around three in the morning.”
    “That is weird. I double checked the date and time when I set it up.”
    “And something else that’s weird. It took a picture of us going into the library, and coming back out again after we set up the video camera. But later on there are more pictures of just me.”
    Derek handed over the camera and I looked through some of the pictures. They were of Derek coming out of the library and going back in, but I wasn’t in them.
    “You didn’t go in the library alone, so where am I?”
    “Scroll back to just before those photos and you’ll see both of us,” Derek said. “I don’t remember going back in after we were done in the library