Since his divorce, James Richardson found that he needed a break from the frantic pace of his life, and the endless calls from friends and relatives asking him if he was all right. Their concern was touching, but what he really needed was to have some time away – to sort through his thoughts and feelings without interruption.

He took a leave of absence from his job, and rented a cottage near the village of Meadowhall, deep in the Wiltshire countryside. The cottage was situated roughly two miles outside of the village, and backed onto extensive woodlands, where James spent most of his time.

Walking in the deep woodlands was a simple joy that he had never experienced, spending most of his life in the city. James spent day after day exploring the hidden paths of his new environment, often until late in the evening.

Two weeks after his arrival at the cottage, he became lost in the network of paths, and made the journey back home much later than he had intended. It was already dark by the time he arrived at a clearing close to his home, containing a small pool overhung by a single weeping willow tree. A bright autumn moon hung in the sky, and the soft breeze moving through the trees had a crispness to it that he had not noticed a week ago.

The moonlight illuminated the clearing and the pool in a flat monochrome, accentuating the shadows cast by the willow tree surrounding the pool, and shimmering across its surface. At the edge of the water stood a young woman, crying softly into her hands. Her dark hair fell loosely around her shoulders and across the back of the light summer dress she wore.

The girl was translucent, only visible when bathed directly in moonlight. Her left side, partly caught in shadow, did not appear to exist. She turned and walked along the edge of the water, fading in and out of existence as she passed through the dancing shadows.

Her face was distinctive – she would have been beautiful, but for her bright blue eyes, which were a little too far apart, and a nose that was a little too large. The expression on her face was one of sadness and seemed utterly devoid of hope. James felt his heart ache for the girl.

It was then that she noticed him, or at least seemed to. Her eyes met James’s and he felt suddenly disoriented, as if suffering an attack of vertigo, his heart pounding in his chest and his head spinning. Her mouth opened and she appeared to speak, although the only sounds he heard were those of the woods. The silent words on her lips were unmistakable though - “Help me”

As the girl began to move towards him, James’s courage evaporated, and he fled back along the moonlit path, towards the sanctuary of his cottage.

It took a few minutes, and several shots of scotch, before he managed to steady his nerves and to examine the events of the evening.

There was no doubt in his mind – he had actually seen a ghost by the woodland pool, and the ghost appeared to have seen him. He cursed his cowardice – the fear having now being replaced by a burning curiosity. He promised himself he would find out more, and that he would return to the pool in the woods on the next moonlit night.

Finding out more about the ghostly woman the next day proved to be more difficult than James imagined. He had thought that a search of the Internet or a visit to the local library would have been sufficient to locate all of the background information he needed, but so far he had found nothing to suggest the identity of the woman.

There had been a reference to a death by the pool in the archives of the local newspaper, but it had been a young boy named Michael Flanagan, over 60 years ago.

Michael had been 8 years old when he had been evacuated to the countryside in 1939, at the start of the Second World War. He had been taken in by a family called the Williams, on the outskirts of the village, where he had stayed until he was found dead in the pool in the autumn of 1943, apparently due to massive head trauma.

The police questioned his guardian, Mr Richard Williams extensively at the time, but no charges were ever brought against him. Richard Williams was found beaten to death in his home in 1971, a rusty claw hammer lying beside him, apparently discarded by the killer. Again, no arrests were ever made in connection with the murder.

As these had been the only two murders in the village in over a century, and were both unsolved, they passed, after a fashion into local folklore, and most of the older residents spoke happily of them. Of the girl, however, no one seemed to know anything.

It was late in the afternoon that he managed to speak to the keeper of the parish records – a lady called Margaret Johnson, who seemed to take her job very seriously, and was reputed to know as much about the history of the area as anyone alive.

Mrs Johnson had seemed friendly enough when he arrived at St Andrews church late that afternoon. She was a large woman, in her mid fifties, who enthusiastically spoke of the history of the village and the surrounding area – all the while holding his gaze with her bright blue eyes. The lady seemed familiar to James somehow, despite his certainty that they had never met before.

However, her demeanour changed when James mentioned the pool in the woods.

“Places have memories, just like we do. When bad things happen, the place remembers. This village has its memories, both good and bad, but that pool – all it remembers is sorrow and pain for the things that have happened there. Don’t go stirring up the past. Some things should just stay forgotten.”

She had then made her excuses and ushered James from her office at the rear of the Church. Once outside, James had turned to thank her for her time, but was left facing the solid oak door as it closed behind him. From within came the sounds of the door being locked and bolted.

“Charming woman” he muttered to himself as he made his way out through the church graveyard.

There was one other way, he mused, to get the answers he needed. He would return to the woods that evening and prove to himself that he was not going mad.

The autumn sun was just beginning to set as James set off into the woods. He was excited, and more than a little scared, but, as he made his way through the darkening woodland, he resolved to see the experience through this time.

The evening was not as clear as the previous night, the moon being mostly hidden by clouds, although there were a few patches of open sky. James took up a concealed position on the edge of the clearing and waited for the moon, nervously running his fingers over the camera in his pocket.

He did not have long to wait. Within 20 minutes, a gap appeared in the clouds, and the clearing was illuminated in soft moonlight. There was however, no sign of the phantom girl.

James scanned the clearing, searching for any sign of her, but all he saw was the long shadows cast by the trees, and the light on the surface of the pool.

“Maybe I did imagine it,” he muttered, suddenly feeling a little foolish.

Then he saw her. She was walking from the far side of the clearing, where the shadows were deeper. At first, all James could see were flashes of illumination, where parts of her body were caught in the silver light. As she made her way across the clearing however, she came into full view.

James took shot after shot with his camera, hardly daring to breathe, let alone move. The girl was walking right for him this time – a sense of purpose in her stride. Then, as the moon moved behind a cloud, she disappeared.

James inhaled deeply and tried to steady his trembling hands. There had been no doubt at all this time - the ghost was real and he had got everything on film, or so he hoped.

The moon broke free of the clouds once more, and suddenly the girl was right beside him. James gave a start and uttered an involuntary cry. Her mouth moved silently once more – the words “Help me” on her lips. Spectral tears rolled down her face, and she looked at him imploringly.

James could not move, or even speak for a moment, then, swallowing the hard knot of fear, whispered, “How?”

The girl slowly leaned over towards him. Her bright blue eyes were the last things he saw before she kissed him. James was sure he had seen eyes like hers before.

The vertigo James had experienced on his last visit returned in a flash, much worse than before. James felt as if he were falling, there was a sharp tearing pain, and then he felt nothing at all. James opened his eyes, and to his horror, realised he was looking right back at himself.

His mirror image opened its mouth and spoke.

“I am sorry James, you don’t deserve this – but then, neither did I.
Its taken me over thirty years to come to terms with what I needed to do – to take another persons body, and leave them here in my place. Just like Michael Flanagan did to me.”

James watched as his body opened the camera, removed the film and threw it into the centre of the still pool, and then walked out of the clearing, into the woodland.

“Goodbye James and thank you”.

He opened his mouth to scream, but there was only silence. Then the moon passed behind a cloud once more, and James faded from sight.

Margaret Johnson was not happy as she trudged downstairs to answer the insistent knocking on her door

“It had better be something serious” she grumbled to herself as she pulled back the bolts, and cautiously opened the door

She was not happy to find Mr James Richardson standing there.

“I really don’t think..” she began, before trailing off into silence.

It was not James Richardson, not anymore.

“Hello Michael” said James’s body as he strode purposefully into the hallway, pushing the woman standing in the doorway aside. His expression widened into a grin as his fingers tightened around the shaft of the rusted claw hammer, hidden behind his back.