The Haunted Traveler Vol. 1 Issue 1

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new abode. He juggled or tumbled or made doggerel rhymes
for them sometimes, and they clapped or smiled politely, but
the light went out of his eyes. There was nothing for him to
satirize or expose other than the occasional drunken valet or
rapacious younger son, and they were always forgiven anyway.
Within a year he died, just as the king was finding out
what a lying witch his sweet-faced mistress - now his queen
- was. Fero’s recall to Court came a week too late.
As for the aristocratic family, they flourished as only the
unimaginative and dull can. They never gained enough political
prominence to be in danger from any faction, never loved
unwisely or too well. They plodded along stoutly through
changes of monarch and government, saved from risk by a
stolidity of nature verging on stupidity. Any sufficiently unimaginative
peasant could have done as well. In fact the most
exciting thing about them was the ghost of Fero, turning up
every so often in his cap and bells to caper, laugh and make
jests.
When Andy bought the Hall he gave the ghost its own
page on the website, careful to suggest much without promising
anything. There was a photo of a model in jester’s motley,
all red and yellow and shining as only polyester satin
does; he looked as if he were about to tell a joke into a microphone.
It drew ghost-hunters from all over the world, and for
a while spooky weekends became all the rage.
“Yes, it was very popular,” groaned Andy, “For a while.
Until it became apparent what caused the ghost to appear.
A ghost ‘expert’ would say that he was the greatest living
expert on ghosts and had seen a hundred of them, and Fero
would appear and laugh at him, and say that he was the first,
not the hundred and first. No one wants to be mocked by
a ghost. After all, how can they retaliate? And the sincere
ghost fans would be horrified at the denouncing of their expert,
and wonder if it meant that everything was fake, and
not know what to think.
But the worst occurrence was at a Halloween event. We