§647

‘This account might better be explained by the possible second sight that I believe my wife, Frances (one ‘s’ her father got it wrong registering her birth), named after her grandmother possesses. Scots family tales of fortune-telling and the like are common, albeit there is more scepticism in recent times. Frances owned a small crystal ball that belonged to her maternal grandmother, Francess Denham (née Ludlow). She informed me that her grandmother Francess would act as a fortune-teller (I don’t know if there was a charge for this service?), reading tea leaves and using her crystal ball. Frances’ mother, Violet Malloy (née Denham) told her that this ‘fortune-teller’ was the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter. There is a belief in Scotland that such a person has second sight. I was highly sceptical of the whole thing and was not buying into any of it. During the early years of our marriage Frances mentioned on very few occasions events/things that were going to happen, and generally shortly after did in fact occur. I was still sceptical and set out to prove that her grandmother Francess was not the seventh daughter of a seventh daughter. I have a strong interest in genealogy, so this was likely to be a simple matter of proving that there were not fourteen girls born to meet the criteria. I was possibly/probably wrong! I discovered seven daughters, followed by six daughters, however I may have missed one who perhaps was an infant death, or maybe not recorded (variety of reasons e.g. illegitimate). I was now beginning to believe in Frances’ powers. We lived in East Kilbride, and I was a keen hillwalker which meant usually about a two-hour drive to the hills and the same back. I had hankered over the country life, kind of Lord of the Manor illusions, and began looking for a house in the country much closer to the hills. This exercise went on for about two years (with no predictions from Frances about anything) and finally found the ‘perfect’ house ‘***’, just outside Aberfoyle on the shore of Loch Ard, in a spectacular location. I put an unsuccessful offer in for the house, and Frances said ‘you’ll get that house’, to which I replied ‘what makes you think that?’. She responded: ‘I don’t know why, I just know that you will’. I had now fallen in love with the area and looked at a few more houses over the next year or so, and a friend who lived there informed me that the family who bought *** were having a hard time and might sell the house. I contacted the owners and in due course the sold me ***. By co-incidence I had recently printed a book The Enchantment of the Trossachs for the author, Louis Stott who lived in Aberfoyle. In discussions with him I told him that I thought the whole thing was a load of nonsense. He was adamant that there was credibility to the story. The book centres on the Rev. Robert Kirk being trapped in fairyland. Shortly after settling into *** (it took around six months to renovate the house, or at least half of it), whilst sitting in the drawing room (yes it was one of the types of house!), either looking at the view or watching television I sensed something passing to my left. I did not see anything, just sensed it and thought it might be a reflection and dismissed it. This happened on numerous occasions, and I finally mentioned to Frances ‘Have you ever sensed a presence in the room?’. She immediately replied ‘You mean the Fairies? Yes, I’ve seen them’. I explained that I have never seen anything, but strangely if asked to describe this apparition, I would say they are about eighteen inches high and travel about two to three feet above the ground and nearly always across the bay window area of the house. Don’t ask me to explain how I envisaged this without seeing anything, I don’t have an explanation, but Frances confirmed that was similar to what she sees, although she has seen them travel up the room and then across the bay window. I had never sensed that until one night, to use an expression used by Glaswegians it was like ‘Argyle Street on a Saturday’ in other words there was a great deal of activity. We both sensed it and for the first time I sensed them moving up the room, however the most astounding thing that happened was that we had two cats, that were not allowed in the drawing room. However, for some unknown reason we had allowed them into the room and the both sat on the windowsill (not the bay window) and their heads followed this apparition and when the ‘Fairies?’ crossed over the bay window area both cats leapt off the windowsill and run up the curtain at the bay window! Neither cat had ever climbed any furniture or soft furnishing anywhere in the house before. At this point I contacted Louis Stott to apologise about not believing in fairies. Louis dismissed my theory that there were fairies present in my house. He reminded me that millions of years ago the earth split pretty much exactly between Aberfoyle and Loch Ard and there are magnetic forces still active today and that is a more likely explanation. I genuinely believe there was/is a presence in that house. What are fairies? ‘Apparitions’.