by Angela Sanford
Please be advised that the following story contains graphic content that may be disturbing to some readers.

It is the time of year when spooky gets lots of credit. Last week a local radio station was asking people to share a story of watching their first horror flic. I’m not a huge fan of the genre so I can likely count on my fingers the number of horror films I’ve watched over the years so remembering the context for each is easy also. I was at a good friend’s house for her birthday slumber party and we watched Friday the 13th. I can tell you that I didn’t sleep well for days afterwards – not just that night where I didn’t sleep at all.
While it may have been my first horror film, I have another friend, actually a cousin to the first (so maybe my choice of friend’s was questionable at that age), whose father conjured a holy fear in me one night, sharing a ghastly tale of lore from just a few miles up the road. He told it in vivid detail, most of which I cannot recall, only the general plot line that went like this:
There was a couple living in Maitland directly across the road from a garage. Behind the garage was, and still is, a very steep bank into the Shubenacadie River. After years of a frustrating marriage, she decided to take fate into her own hands. Late one evening, after her husband had gone upstairs to bed, she had exited the house to fetch an axe and take care of her situation.
Upon landing the axe carefully to assure there was no chance of error she dragged the body down the stairs and out into the wheelbarrow she had set by the door. Just past midnight, by the light of the full moon she wheeled her cargo across the road and through the field. At the edge of the bank, she rid herself of the corpse and set herself on her way back to her home.
She cleaned herself, the wheelbarrow, the room and knowing she rarely had company, she was certain she’d get away with murder and I suppose in one sense she did. No one questioned the disappearance of her husband and as the anniversary approached, she was feeling quite relieved. However, that response wouldn’t last much longer.
Shortly after midnight by the light of the full moon in the sky, she awoke to strange sounds of heavy breathing, swooshing hay, and a moan that grew louder and more foreboding as the minutes passed. She tried to return to sleep but the noise became too much. Next, she heard heavy footsteps, and something being dragged up the stairs, stopping just outside her bedroom door.
As she sat upright, afraid of who was now in her home, she was shocked to witness her husband enter the room, complete with an axe protruding from his neck. For the remaining years of her life she was haunted by the return of her husband – not just on the anniversary of that fateful evening but every single night thereafter until she passed herself. The home itself still stands to this day and it is said if one is ever near the trail that she took that early morning one can hear the same ominous sounds just after the clock strikes midnight.
For years after hearing this story, I disliked driving past this home on the 215 after dark, despite knowing that there was nothing credible to the story except to say that my friend’s father was an excellent storyteller.
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