The Ragman

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Then something really strange happened. It was early morning of November 28th, Sunday.

I lay there in my bed, as usual. The sound of tapping goading me to come search for it, attempting to spur me to action. As I lay there, observing the thin rays of moonlight that breached the confines of the otherwise dreary, dark bedroom my eyes began to become accustom to the lack of light. More and more of the room came into focus. The tapping in the distant corner of the house mocking my attempts at rest. I was getting agitated with the unwelcome disturbances and they seemed tame at this point.

I mean, a horror story about a man who is annoyed by a tapping sound was not enough in itself. I was starting to get bored with the antics at this point. Then I heard a loud crash. The unmistakable sound of falling wood from downstairs. The sudden, thundering ruction echoed within the entire house and caused me to sit bolt upright, the adrenaline took control and prepared my body to flee as fast as my muscles would physically allow.

The bone chilling thunderclap was followed by a slightly quieter sound of a similar nature, indicating that something had indeed fallen downstairs. It was obvious that it was the painting. That was the way my mind worked now, something went wrong, it was the painting. I composed myself momentarily and got up out of bed to confront whatever the sound maker was.

It was becoming second nature now, turning on the lights in the house to check the darkened corners. To peer into the hidden vestiges of my house of horrors. It was a nerve wrecking time indeed, but this night was different. This was different, this was aggressive and violent. I made my way into the living room and stared at the spare room door. I gathered the courage that I had inside me and I opened it. As I stood there I gazed into the gloom and noticed that the window next to the bed was opened. The wind from outside was blowing the curtains wildly, their fabric fighting against the gust as if desperate to stay attached to the window frame.

I felt the cold breeze, since I was only in my boxer shorts and T-shirt again I shuddered for a moment. I uttered my annoyance at the open window thinking that in my lack of sleep I left it open at some point. I walked over to the window and made an attempt to close it, jamming the wooden frame down hard.

It stuck half way and required more force but eventually I got it closed. I stepped over the sheet strewn across the floor and I picked up the picture, turning it over in the process. My eyes widened as a sickening shot of fear ran all the way down my spine, causing all the hairs to stand up on the back of my neck, making my limbs go numb and my whole mind shut down out of terror.

I dropped the painting and fell straight backwards into a seated position, forgetting the pain of falling as my arms lay behind me to keep me up, staring at the picture intently with a new-found horror I could barely keep contained. I was afraid to break eye contact from the picture which lay diagonally, facing me, in all its malice, empty of the Ragman. I lay there motionless as I realised that everything about the painting was just as it had always been, but in place of the figure on the left side was an empty mound.

My eyes took a few seconds to process this earth shattering information. The mound on the left of the picture, where the Ragman had been standing, watching the door to the spare room was no longer in the picture. How had this happened? Was the picture truly haunted? How could this be?

That last question was the most disturbing. After looking at the void in the painting for this extended time I noticed something else that was equally disturbing. One of the trees that lay on the outskirt of the wood, more specifically the tree that the Ragmans right hand was on as he pointed outwards had another feature.

Scratches of some kind. Etchings, from weeks of tapping against it every night.

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I got up from the floor with the unbalanced flair of a man running for his life. I left the room, leaving the painting lying where it had fallen and closed the door behind me. I flew into the living room, desperate to get away, to go anywhere but here. I bumped into the table in the living room with force and fell in a heap on the floor, pain searing through my leg as I caught my shin bone off the edge of the table. I was only down for seconds before I staggered upwards heading straight for the living room door.

A loud, powerful, devilish cackle filled the air, coming straight from the room that I had left in such a terrified hurry. My senses were in full alert as I ran into the hallway, screaming in white knuckle terror. The laugh began to die off as I got further from the spare room. I fumbled with the handle as I attempted to open it, the cackle then started to get progressively louder as whatever was making the sound was seemingly getting closer to me.

I was too afraid to look back, too scared that it may be my last time if I did. My mind attempted to prompt me to my terrible thoughts, feigning the feeling of something touching the back of my neck, causing my muscles to tense at the thought and my mouth to emit a horrified scream. I realised in that moment that the door was locked, as it always had been and that the keys were upstairs. I slumped to the ground, sobbing and with as much courage as I could scrape from inside me I turned to look down the hall, down in the direction of the living room door.

Down towards the ever increasing laugh. No evil demon, no wretched, horrible creature. I went to a motel, leaving the place locked up, just the way that it was when all that happened. That night I just stayed in the motel with my laptop checking my friends Facebook profile to see if anyone mentioned anything similar happening to them, but there was nothing. I returned to the house the next day, under the protection of the daylight. I decided to take another sick day off work. I had nearly used up all of my payable sick days at this point but it was for a worthy cause.

I unlocked the front door and walked into the house. On outside inspection you would not have thought that anything had gone wrong in the house at all. I walked down the hall towards the sitting room and entered. I felt a sudden chill at the sight of the open spare room door and the fallen picture that lay opposite.

I could see, even from the sitting room doorway that the figure of the Ragman had returned to the painting. I walked over for a closer inspection. It seemed as though it was all there, as it was the day I received it. The figure was there, the trees had returned to normal.

I was both relieved and confused. I made my decision that I would stay in the house again that night but this time I was going to set up cameras around the house. I spent most of that day procuring all the equipment I could to record anything that would happen in the house that night.

I had some of it already, being an avid fan of films. I felt a little safer at the thought of all the corners being watched, but still the more time that past that day, the darker it got as it reached night, the more I felt uneasy.

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The longer that I spent in that house the more I felt supernatural eyes watching my every move, waiting for me to fall asleep. At roughly midnight I did. This time I was ready though. I was already dressed before the clock turned to 3: I had already had the lights in the house on, so that the cameras could catch everything, no matter how brief or small. I went down the stairs and into the living room.

As I reached the door the tapping sound disappeared. I opened the door to look in. The spare room had been left open, the picture returned to where it had been these last few weeks. The sheet had even been removed just to see if what happened before would repeat itself. There was a mounted camera on a tripod behind the living room table, facing the open spare room door. A light at the side of the camera shone into the direction of the room and the light in the sitting room was still on to catch whatever would be there.

It stood there staring at me. The mound empty, the plantation house alone, the trees free of their friend who had been terrorizing me. I let out a quiet wail, out of shock.

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I began to cower, reaching for a wall behind me so that I could not be ambushed. The tapping sound returned, this time accompanied by the sound of laughter. The laughter resonated throughout the house but I was close enough to discern its origin. It was coming from the kitchen. I mustered up all my available courage and slowly moved towards the dining room and then the kitchen. I could hear the sound of pots and cups banging against the counters as if someone was having a tantrum. The laughter was sickeningly twisted.

As I reached the side of the open kitchen I closed my eyes and reached out with my fingers so that I could drag the rest of my barely willing body to look inside the room. I peered around the corner and saw it. The Ragman stood in the kitchen throwing dishes around as it flailed. Its long limbs I determined to be about three times the length of mine and with its thin frame it towered at least twelve feet tall.

It moved energetically but violently, knocking over all the cutlery it could see in an anarchistic, trashing frenzy. Its laugh occasionally turned into a growl as it moved its arms in a feral motion. Then it turned and looked straight at me. It looked into my eyes and I stuttered in dumbfounded disbelief. It was only when the hunched figure frantically ran towards me that my instincts took over and I attempted to flee, my voice uttering an automatic howl of desperate fear.

There were crashing sounds as furniture was tossed around the dining room and its excessively long legs made running meaningless. I felt an icy cold hand grip my shoulder and spin me around. My eyes were jammed shut as long, nimble fingers wrapped around my throat and I was hoisted up against the wall like a rag doll. I heard the laughter mere inches from my face and felt its breath against my cheeks. I opened my eyes and looked at it then, noticing its unnaturally large face, pale skin and its deeply disturbing, incomprehensibly evil eyes.

Its smile was extended to impossible proportions and it spoke in a loud, gravely, guttural voice which shook me to my core. I simply stared, dumbstruck by its immense stature and the ease at which it was holding me off the ground. My arms held its hand as it kept me against the wall.

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My attempts to break the grip were futile. Then it spoke again. I stared at it. For a moment I had forgotten that it was pinning me against the wall and with the greatest of ease it could snap my neck. I simply looked at it, puzzled. The room began to spin and I became dizzy as the overflow of impossible information started to weigh my thoughts down and I slipped into unconsciousness. The laughter echoed in my mind until a darkness swept over me and I was consumed by nothingness.

Sounds flooded my skull, faded and distant and I opened my eyes. It took me a moment to realise that I was lying on the dining room floor.

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There was no sign of the Ragman. I sat up against the wall. My attention was caught by shards of plastic strewn across the floor and bent sticks of metal. It took me a few moments to figure out that the shrapnel that was lying on the dining room floor sharing the space with me was the remnants of the camera equipment that I had set up.

I knew without thorough examination that there was nothing left that could be construed as tangible evidence of the supernatural. I felt alone and defeated. I felt that there was nothing that I could do. I gripped my knees as I sat there, leaning against the wall. I cried for just a moment. I stood up and gathered my will. I marched into the spare room beyond the living room and I grabbed the painting off the wall. Without a second thought I broke the frame and tore the canvas within into pieces.

The pieces I placed in the fire and then burned them. I then walked upstairs and got dressed to leave the house. I had the eerie suspicion that I was being watched. More than that, it felt that there was always something in my peripherals just shy of sight waiting to grab me. That there was a thousand eyes on me at all times but that I was alone.

I grabbed my keys and my laptop. I left the house, lights on and all. I had had enough of that place. I got in my car and drove away. The entire journey I spotted things in the shadows. I was jumping at every sound just waiting to be ambushed. I had passed through the looking glass and now existed in a world where everything was possible. I felt that everything that we knew as a species was meaningless and that there was an entire multitude of worlds beneath the surface of ours.

I knew that I would never be the same after that night. This is where you come in. You see, I went to a motel room that night again and I spent hours, and I mean hours searching for any details on the Ragman. I needed to know what it wanted and what I should do to rid myself of its torment. Well the good news is that I eventually did find it. As it turns out there was a very simple way to escape his clutches and save yourself from becoming one of his victims. You see the Ragman is a tale of an entity that thrives on the fears of young children. If you want to rid yourself of the fear of the Ragman you simply tell one of your friends.

You tell them every detail of the horror that the Ragman puts you through and let it fester within them. Until eventually the last one cannot find someone new to tell and the Ragman reaches out to them in the depths of their nightly slumbers to make them his. Someone must have had some problem with me or just knew that I would be attracted to horror material like that and purged themselves of the horror of the Ragman. You need to tell it yourself.

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That must have been why it did not appreciate the cameras in the house. So I have stayed up for as long is I could in this motel room writing out this story. Trying to put in all the details that I can. If you are a seller for this product, would you like to suggest updates through seller support? Read more Read less.

Add both to Cart Add both to List. Buy the selected items together This item: Ships from and sold by Amazon. Customers who bought this item also bought. Page 1 of 1 Start over Page 1 of 1. The Book of the Dun Cow. Wounds Are Where Light Enters: Stories of God's Intrusive Grace. The Book of God. Here's how restrictions apply. From the Back Cover An all new updated, definitive edition of this Christian classic. Print edition purchase must be sold by Amazon. Thousands of books are eligible, including current and former best sellers. Look for the Kindle MatchBook icon on print and Kindle book detail pages of qualifying books.

Print edition must be purchased new and sold by Amazon. Gifting of the Kindle edition at the Kindle MatchBook price is not available. Learn more about Kindle MatchBook. Start reading Ragman - reissue on your Kindle in under a minute. Don't have a Kindle? Try the Kindle edition and experience these great reading features: Share your thoughts with other customers. Write a customer review. Read reviews that mention walter wangerin deeply moving short stories great book ragman faith god heart heard inspiring spiritual christ christian cries cry soul walt. Showing of 41 reviews.

Top Reviews Most recent Top Reviews. There was a problem filtering reviews right now. Please try again later. Very spiritual inspiring short stories. I love it, because I can read a whole story before I go to bed. With my schedule it may be a week before I get back to a book. Kindle Edition Verified Purchase. The color scheme Wangerin displays in the vividly moving and pulling book, not only draws lines to your own life but also paints the difficult and more than likely self-abasing canvas of his own wanderings and in no way applauds himself for the slight victory before the fall back into confusion that God so faithfully pulls us all out of eventually.

Follow Walter through his young married life and the struggles of parenthood, into a better understanding of our Father who continually pushes us through adversity into perfection. The book includes poems, plays, sermons, and many great stories because as Wangerin writes, stories are what make a pastor. The tales are all personal and most are moving. They examine a deep and living faith that sees the work of God everywhere: This is a great book for any pastor, for anyone who has done urban missions, or for anyone looking for a book that illustrates the very real ways God is working in our world today.

Fifteen years ago I had read the first chapter of this book, then lost it. I hoped someone would find it and be as inspired as I had been. Now I have found it again and been blessed to read the whole book. Though none matches the first chapter, they all have the authors brilliant touch and profound spiritual insight. You will be blessed. I enjoyed the symbolism in the stories and the stories.

Some of them read like stories you might find sent around on mass email lists. The stories challenge you by thinking through tough issues and encourages you to live out what you believe.