Rushing into the kitchen I found my Grandmother sitting in her favourite chair by the old range. She was toasting her feet on the fender and flicking through the ‘Weekly Post’. Grandmother smiled as we filled the room; my three sisters, my mother and me. Grandmother loved our weekly visits and we loved coming. There was something magical about my Grandmother’s house; she lived mainly in the kitchen despite having a huge rambling Victorian house. After much kissing and patting on the heads, our coats were removed and put in pile on a chair.

‘Now, run along and play,’ beamed my Grandmother, ‘lunch will be ready in thirty minutes.’

When we returned for lunch we were all very curious about a cloak lying in the corner of the passage.

‘Grandmother,’ I asked, ‘have you had a visitor?’

‘Why do you ask Donald?’

‘There’s a cloak in the passage way.’

‘Is there?’ she said looking amused.

We looked at each other and knew a story was coming. Grandmother told wonderful stories. ‘Now this isn’t one of my stories, she said looking at Mother, ‘this is real.’ We all took a deep intake of breath as if we were being let in on a great secret. We gathered closer to Grandmother’s chair waiting for her to begin. I slid down onto the floor next to her while my sisters all sat cross-legged in front of her. Four pairs of eyes staring in expectation. A silence fell on the kitchen as we waited for her to begin. ‘Last night I was just about to go to bed when there was a knock at the door. Who could that be I thought to myself?’ she stared at each pair of eyes in turn, ‘I took my candle and walked along the passage, the light made the shadows larger than life as I walked to the door. I stopped with surprise when a silhouette of a man was framed in the glass panel.’

‘What did you do?’ asked Mary, my eldest sister.

‘I opened the door very slowly.’

There was a gasp from my sisters and I felt how brave Grandmother was to open the door.

‘Standing on the step was a man. He looked tired and worn out so I invited him in. He introduced himself as Count D; he looked familiar but I couldn’t quite place him. I invited him into the kitchen and I offered him a drink but he refused it. He noticed I was wearing a cross and chain and this made him a little uncomfortable.’ Grandmother was interrupted by a muffled snort from Mother. We all looked at her with puzzled looks and then back to Grandmother. Mother waved a hand in the air and said sorry.

‘Now where was I,’ said Grandmother, ‘are yes, I offered him a bed for the night because I felt the poor man was too tired and needed to regain his strength. I took him to the spare room on the first landing and said I hoped he would find the room comfortable. I went back downstairs and retired to my bedroom. It was about an hour later as I turned over the figure of the man was bending over me baring his fang like teeth.’

We were hanging onto Grandmother’s every word when we all shrieked as the door burst opened and in walked a figure wearing a huge cloak.

‘Don’t take any notice of those stories; it was me, Uncle Pat, wanting a room for the night,’ he roared in his deep base voice.