Who Could Have Done This?

The front hall was dark, there was not even a light left on in the main antechamber, which was unusual because Sister Joan always left it on in case someone came down the stairs in the middle of the night.

Living with two ladies of the church and another man of the cloth such as himself, wasn't a twenty-four-hour house party, but it wasn't uncommon for Sisters Joan and Gertrude to be in bed by eight, but Sister Joan on the other hand, always made sure to leave at least one light on, but this was truly strange, the house was left completely dark.

At first he figured Sister Joan may have forgotten to leave the hall light on, but even if she forgot, certainly Father McFlannery would have remembered. Father St. Moritz was convinced, someone had to be here, both Sister Gertrude and Sister Joan were usually finished with their charity work by six in the evening and Father McFlannery taught his last class at three in the afternoon; something was terribly wrong, and John could sense it.

To ease some of his worries, John decided to check upstairs. He walked slowly up the staircase. When he came to the second floor, John decided to check his room first. To his surprise he found his door was locked, he didn't recall locking the door before he left for the funeral. The young vicar took his key from his pocket and unlocked it, but if he did lock it, he needed to figure out why; no one in this house was untrustworthy, there were times when John and Father McFlannery didn't see eye to eye, but they always managed to tolerate each other. Even after John had unlocked the door, he still couldn't get it open, the door refused to budge, he decided to give it one last try, although he didn't want to knock down the door, John gave it one full-bodied shove. It took all of his limited brute strength to finally get the door open; too bad it nearly knocked him to the floor to do it.

Alas John stumbled into the room and clumsily flipped on the light switch. An unwelcome sight suddenly took hold of him, his room had been ransacked. There were chairs which had been turned over and his books lay ripped and scattered on the floor. Slowly he moved carefully across the floor, sounds of broken glass crunched under his feet. John happened to look up at the ceiling, the light bulb was broken and laying on the floor, but the base still remained in the lamp. John shook his head in disbelief. "Who could have done this?" He quietly said to himself.

Suddenly John was struck by violent images, he wondered if the others in the house had the same experience, or maybe something worse. Quietly he left his room and moved across the hall to Sister Joan's room; he wrapped lightly on the wooden door frame. "Sister Joan, are you awake?" He asked but, there was no answer on the other side. John thought this was quite odd, she was a light sleeper, the slightest noise was known to rouse her from her sleep. John thought it over for a moment, what if Sister Joan was not able to answer him, John took it upon himself and decided to go into her bedroom.