Extract fromThey Do It With Stringspodcast
‘The Tin House’: Episode Three
[Music: Rona RX’s last hit single fades in and then out]
Noah:So, I’ll just ask a few questions and you answer into the microphone there.
Rona:This is not my first rodeo, Noah.
Noah:Of course not, but I suspect technology may have changed a little since then. What do you make of what we know of the White Lady of the Moor, so far?
[Audible exhale]
Rona:Well, obviously, she visited Charles Atherton to punish him.
Noah:Perhaps Charles could have been a psychic, able to access the higher frequencies that spirits operate on.
Rona:Yeah, but he ended up dead, didn’t he? More likely, he was the one who could see her because he was the one who had wronged her.
Noah:Well, that’s a bit of a leap...
Rona:Believe me, I know what I’m talking about. I’ve spent my whole career being exploited by men. Even now I can’t get away from them. Some sodding weirdo has been stalking me for the past year. Sending me letters in rehab when no one was supposed to know where I was – telling me he loves me and we’re meant to be together.
Noah:How do you know it’s a man?
Rona:Because he’s been quite explicit about what he would like to do when we meet and parts of it involve specifically male anatomy.
[Pause]
Noah:Have you always been interested in the paranormal?
Rona:God, no. I mean, I suppose I’ve always thought I was a bit psychic and stuff, you know, when I was younger, knowing when things were going to happen before they happened – that sort of thing – but as I got older, after being in the band for a bit – then it got more intense. Like, a feeling like I was surrounded by things trying to speak to me but not quite managing to get through. I was always having out-of-body experiences at parties. That’s when the colours around people started as well. Course, thinking about it now, some of that could have been the drugs.
Noah:And have you ever seen a ghost?
Rona:An actual ghost? No... wait. Actually, yeah. I did. Once, when I was little. I’d come home from school early and I heard all these noises from Mummy’s room. Anyway, just as I was going up to see, this person came running out of the room and passed me in the corridor. When I called, she cameout and said it was the gardener who’d been helping her move some stuff.
Noah:And?
Rona:We lived in an apartment building.
[Long pause]
Noah:Umm, I’m not sure that was really a ghost, Rona.
Rona:I’m pulling your leg, Noah. Of course it wasn’t a ghost. Mother always had some side hustle on the go... No, in all seriousness, though, I suppose I did once think – when I was very young – that I saw a ghost. It was a little girl, dressed all in red with a white bow in her hair. She looked just like me, so much so that at first I thought I was looking in a mirror. She was sitting on my chair in the sitting room, and she said my name, then she was gone.
Noah:Did anyone else see her?
Rona:No. It was just me. The thing is, I had a twin, but she died when we were born. I like to think it was her.
[Silence]
Rona:I’ve never told anyone that before.
Chapter30
That night, Midge dreamed of a Ouija board.
