“The Reverend Arthur T. Bright, a clergyman of condescending air and sanctimonious smile, author of “A Joyous Fulfilment” concerning the plight of the Immortal Soul, hosted a tedious and lengthy seminar within the magnificent St William’s College. This Tudor building was a wondrous place, the construction and style a marvel to behold, albeit in a regrettable state of repair.

The strictures to preserve one’s immortal soul described in Bright’s seminar made the thought of eternity intolerable. During one of his dreary monologues concerning the satanic effects of the imbibing of alcohol, I decided I must remove myself post haste and commit sin. Making a dash for the rear of the room I disappeared into the shadows where I was delighted to find a low doorway leading into a maze of corridors. I marvelled at this ancient building, whilst feeling simultaneously bemused by its state of disrepair.

Here I found the custodian of the buildings, Mr Albert Crabtree, a frail-looking individual who, with a mischievous glint in his eye, asked if I had escaped from Bright’s Lecture. Attempting to show dismay in my voice I replied “I am merely trying to retrace my steps as I appear to have lost my way, sir”. Crabtree gave a lopsided smile and replied “The man’s a hypocrite. Any funds he gets from the collection at the end will be going down his neck in The Board Tavern tonight. Miss May is always having to turf him out for getting his hands on the serving wenches”.

I spent a good hour talking to Crabtree about plans to raise funds to renovate the old building and he described its previous uses since its construction in the mid 1400s. In the 1600s the rooms were used as lodgings for those not quite sunken to the depths of the nearby slum area of Bedern. I enquired what ghosts might frequent this ancient building and he told me of two long-forgotten brothers who had once shared one of the cramped squalid rooms and whom he referred to as “the Brown brothers”. He described how they would sit and watch the wealthy priests processing to and from the Minster bedecked in their finery. They had taken a particular interest in one portly priest of pompous demeanour who carried a rather grotesque ornately jewelled cross in his beringed hands and wore a golden necklace, visible beneath his flaccid chins. Coveting these riches, the elder brother devised a plan to rob the priest. Unfortunately his plan took a terrible turn for the worse and robbery turned into murder most foul, leaving the priest on the ground, stabbed to death by the elder’s hand. The younger brother had been reluctant to become involved in the scheme and, stricken with guilt, hid in their lodgings with his share of the loot, terrified of discovery.

Having agreed a pact of silence, the elder sibling feared his brother was wavering and would confess to the crime, deciding to pre-empt this outcome by reporting him to the authorities as the perpetrator. The younger brother was arrested, tried and hanged for the heinous crime, never disclosing his kinsman’s involvement and ignorant of the fact that it was this same brother who had revealed his identity. The elder brother’s relief soon turned to guilt and, wracked over his crime and subsequent betrayal, took to endlessly pacing backwards and forwards in his lodgings in the college buildings. His health declined and, slipping into illness, he died.

Crabtree said that, to this day, people hear the pacing of feet going back and forth within the rooms and corridors above. A brother betrayed by his own kin is a terrible crime, to say nothing of the murder that precipitated it. I surmised that the brothers would not have to spend eternity with the ponderous Rev Bright but, according to Crabtree, perhaps they would.”