B. J. Harrison Reads Afterward

"You won't know till afterward. You won't know till long, long afterward."

When Ned and Mary Boyne hear that their new house is haunted, they laugh it off and joke that every good house in the countryside must have a ghost for it to be worth purchasing. They move in and forget all about its supposed supernatural quirks. But when Mary notices a strange change in her husband's behaviour, she begins to suspect a not so friendly ghost is indeed at play.

'Afterward' is a chilling and disturbing short story that starts out on a happy note and then slowly unravels. It's made all the more haunting by Edith Wharton's impeccable prose.