08 Aug The Howl And The Wail

Posted at 14:22h in Strange and Unexplained by CreepypastaStories.com 0 Comments

📅 Published on August 8, 2025

“The Howl And The Wail”

Written by Matt Martinek
Edited by Craig Groshek
Thumbnail Art by Craig Groshek
Narrated by N/A

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🎧 Available Audio Adaptations: None Available

⏰ ESTIMATED READING TIME — 10 minutes

Rating: 10.00/10. From 1 vote.

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“Grace, I’m so sorry about all of this. I’m behind you, the community’s behind you, and we’ll do whatever you need us to do and help in any way we possibly can. You and John are not alone. Don’t ever forget that.”

Dr. Corcoran’s leathery face gleamed with slow-drying tears as he spoke these words of consolation to me. He fixed his spectacles back onto his nose as they slid from the wetness. He proceeded to inch closer for an embrace of some kind, but I turned quickly and moved back towards the house, with my tired eyes focused upon the stony path before me. My little girl was dead. And the silent birds of mourning were already circling as the casket descended. Words and well-wishes no longer meant a damned thing.

The official prognosis was typhoid. Our neighbors, Mr. Robbins and old lady Eleanor, also came down with it a little beforehand, but they pulled through, strangely enough (given their ages). There were other cases, as well, but those were more than a few miles away. The first thought was the well water, but no one was ever really sure. My little Martha started having stomach pains on a Sunday morning, and by Tuesday, things were already looking grim. It’s truly remarkable how life can turn upside down at the drop of a hat. How do you go from a happy, running, jumping little girl to a stricken, bedridden corpse-to-be? What kind of god would allow for such a thing? No god of mine, I can tell you that.

John and I struggled to find comfort as the days passed and Martha’s condition worsened. Dr. Corcoran tried to alleviate the pain as much as he could, but it was clear that Martha was going through something that none of us could wrap our heads around. No amount of medicine seemed to help. My little girl was so brave. You could hear her moan from rooms away, but as soon as we would enter her bedchamber, the noise would disappear. She didn’t want us to worry. She would lie there, drenched in sweat, her blonde hair now a stringy brown from all of the moisture, and try to stay as coherent as possible. For us, not for her. She was only 9, but she had the demeanor of a soldier, lying low upon the battlefield, but refusing to give in to the wounds. She was a magnificent child.

The sheepies (our two male sheepdogs) remained at Martha’s bedside the entire time as she went through a hell no person should ever have to endure. Their names were Benny and Bill, and we owned them ever since Martha was a baby. Black and white, beautiful creatures they were, and as furry as you could imagine. They were gifted to us by John’s father, and right away they became the protectors of the child. It was truly a sight as Martha learned to walk by grabbing onto their haunches, balancing herself as she went. A household full of barking and laughter was the one we enjoyed best, and it’s a shame it couldn’t last. After Martha was pronounced deceased, and I, as well as my husband, fell to the floor in disbelief and anger, Dr. Corcoran and his assistant attempted to remove the body from the premises. As soon as they laid a finger upon the child, Benny bit into the doctor’s hand with such force that it drew blood onto the floorboards. The dogs would not let her go. And neither would we.

It’s difficult to describe the terrifying haze of preparing for your child’s funeral. I kept thinking about our last words to each other. “Mama, I’m not going to die, am I?” I could barely process the question. “Oh, honey, you will be just fine. You are prettier than the angels! They would be jealous! Have you ever heard of jealous angels?” I guess sheer beauty amongst the angels wasn’t an issue, as my child was scooped up by their wings nonetheless. John took the time to carve out a wooden cross for the interment, until he could get a proper stone to use for her marker. The inscription was the worst thing I had ever read: Martha Winthrop, Loving Daughter – 1884-1893. A beginning and an end of a story that was criminally unfinished. I insisted on preparing her hair and her favorite white dress, as she liked them done in a very particular way. I suppose, in some fashion, it was my final goodbye. I made myself believe that she was only sleeping, because that was the only way that I could go through with it at all. For a moment, I actually thought that I had seen her eye twitch, but I knew it was just wishful thinking, as if she would just jump up into my arms like she was playing a child’s joke. I finished with the flowers in her hair, kissed her goodnight, and handed her off to the very heavens themselves.

What do you do, after your life is shattered? I sat at the kitchen table and stared off into better times, as I tried to block out the sheepies’ whines and cries. John stood outside, smoked his pipe, and looked into the sky in a stupor, as if somehow he would find an answer to all of this pain. To make it even worse, John was due to return to work in less than two days, to toil away with the railroad. He insisted on staying, as any husband would, but I knew it would be good for him to go and busy himself as the emotions took their time to blossom. And, of course, we simply needed the money. Reluctantly, amongst the shedding of many tears, John walked away to deal with his own demons as I dealt with mine. It was just me and the sheepies. And a whole lot of pain.

The moments alone in the house were ones of blackness and unrest. The events of the previous two weeks played out over and over again in my mind. The sickness, the fever, the hurt, all upon my daughter’s face as she fought against the fates. I did not eat. I did not sleep. I sat there at the same kitchen table, in the same dirty nightgown, with my head in my hands. I struggled to put all these pieces together, to make them real, to make them exist. It did not seem true at all, but instead some ridiculous nightmare that I knew I would wake up from someday. It would just take time and patience. After all, nothing this bad could possibly befall a family who did exactly as God intended. We worked, we loved, and we prayed! What more could there possibly be??? What did we do wrong???

As I drowned in my sorrows and forsook the events that brought them, I eventually realized that I had not seen or heard from the sheepies since the very moment that John had left for work. I gently got up from the table and proceeded from room to room, looking for Benny and Bill. I had been sitting for so long that I did not feel my legs underneath me. It felt like I was floating, above a floor that no longer seemed necessary. Each room produced nothing, but as I approached Martha’s bedroom, I completely expected to find the dogs there, cuddled up where my sweet daughter used to sleep. But again, no sign of Benny or Bill. Eventually, I moved to the front door and cracked it open to meet the chill air of a Minnesota October. I called for the hounds, but they did not answer. My eyes fell beyond, past the stony path, back to the tree line, where Martha was. Maybe. Just maybe.

I slowly made my way up the path, my heart beating a bit faster with every step I took. I never liked going up there. Too many forgotten memories, and I was not one to dwell in the past. After all, the past can kill you, if you let it. But now the family plot held even more meaning than ever, and contained the very vestiges of my happiness, Martha herself. I trudged up the slight grade into the tree line, paused for a moment, held my breath, and stepped directly into view of Martha’s grave. And there they were. Benny and Bill, sleeping upon the fresh, loose, dirt which covered my daughter’s earthly shell.

“Oh my, you hounds! There you are! Best come back to the house. I’ll feed you both.”

I went to touch Bill on the head, and was met with a severe growl and a clear view of his teeth! He snapped at me sharply, and I withdrew with a shout. I had never seen either of the dogs act like that in all the time we had owned them. I was taken aback for a moment, but quickly realized I should have expected this. Thick as thieves, they were. Without Martha, Benny and Bill had no purpose. I knew that feeling well. I left them there, alone with their best friend.

On my way back to the house, I stopped in the barn and grabbed John’s twenty-two caliber rifle, which he had hidden in the loft for emergencies. I returned to the house, kicked off my shoes in the doorway, and floated, still weightless, into the back bedroom where I sat down on the side of the mattress and began to prepare. I knew it was selfish of me, but I just couldn’t handle it. John would be absolutely destroyed, and he would probably follow suit, but I just couldn’t imagine going through life without Martha. She was my meaning, my reason for going on. So, I decided to meet her on the other side. After a few minutes of contemplation, one lone tear dripped down my cheek, and I cocked the hammer. I placed the butt end of the rifle onto the floor, grabbed the barrel, positioned it directly under my chin, and moved my foot near the trigger. I began to inhale and exhale quickly, my chest heaving in and out, as I gained the bravery to make the necessary shot. And, right at the moment of truth, with my toe upon the trigger, I heard the front door creak open, followed by footsteps. Not just any footsteps, but the quick, pitter-patter footsteps of a child.

“Mama! What are you doing?! Daddy said to never touch his gun! It’s not a toy!” Martha ran towards me as my mouth fell open and my eyes widened to let all of her beauty in. I placed the gun on the bed as Martha jumped onto my lap, dressed in the same white gown I had prepared her body in. I inhaled the sweet perfume of lavender from her flowing blonde hair and felt whole once again. It must have been a dream, after all! My daughter was alive and well! The doctor must have been wrong! I wept as I held onto my daughter and thanked the heavens for giving my life back to me. “Why are you crying, mommy? Everything is ok! I’m with you! Can we go pick daisies now, like we used to? Please, mama?” She tugged at me to go outside, and I gladly followed, giddy like a child myself. Martha got to the front door and stopped. “What’s the matter, dear? Are you ok?” I turned Martha around by the ball of her shoulder, and I saw my daughter, face affright, with tears streaming down her face. She was looking around, as if she couldn’t even see me. “Mama, I’m scared! Where are you? It’s so dark! I don’t like the dark! Benny! Bill! Help me, Mommy! I’m dying!” As she spoke her final word to me, the spectre of my daughter fell apart, bit by bit, into a million grains of sand onto the floor. I grabbed for handfuls as the grains spilled about, but it all slipped through my fingers, as did my sanity. I knelt upon the sand-covered wood and fell away into the dark.

I bolted upright at the sound of something peculiar. I was hazy and groggy, but those damned hounds would not let up. I must’ve fallen asleep! The .22 was still there next to me on the bed, but it was no longer the dark of nighttime, but instead the blinding brightness of a brand new day. The barking seemed to get louder as I regained my bearings and remembered the plight of my poor child. She was in the dark. She needed her mother. And her mother I would remain, until the end of time. I ran out of the bedroom as fast as I could, through the kitchen, and out the door, which was already ajar. With grains of sand still falling out from between my toes, I darted towards the barn, where I snatched up one of our shovels, and proceeded to sprint up the hill, where my poor daughter would be waiting for me.

As Martha’s wooden cross came into view, I also spotted the hounds, deep into the work at hand. They were already about a foot or so into the loose dirt, using their paws and teeth to remove as much as they could, as they attempted to rescue their little friend. The dirt flew about like a black rain and, with shovel in hand and nothing to lose, I happily joined the storm. We dug and dug for what might have been hours, but strangely, in a situation like that, the passage of time was reduced to nothing but a meaningless construct, rendered meaningless by a grieving family’s will. The sheepies’ paws and mouths were bleeding badly at this point, but they did not slow, not even for a moment. My right heel was a wet crimson, with the bone shattered as I pounded my naked foot onto the step of the shovel. The sweat burned my eyes, and my muscles were tearing from the bone, but I noticed that my cries had turned into uncontrollable laughter. I was going to see my little girl again! Shovelful after shovelful, I inched closer.

Finally, a few feet down, the tip of my shovel stopped upon the dull knock of the wooden coffin that encased my beautiful princess. I slowed down at this point, realizing that I had to get the dogs out of the hole we had created in order to remove the lid. With all of the strength I had, I hoisted Benny and Bill up and out to ground level. They snarled and bit at me, and attempted to jump right back into the grave, but I swung at them with the shovel to keep them at bay. I dropped to my knees as I carefully removed the soil around the edges of the casket, some by shovel, some by hand, until I had enough room to work. I pried at the nailed lid at each corner, bending the metal, cracking the wood of the shovel handle. It would not let loose. I began to panic, and my laughter had now turned to sobbing. My daughter needed me! With one last, desperate attempt, I jumped onto the handle with all of the weight of my body, and the lid popped off the coffin.

The hounds let out a howl, and I bellowed a wail as the birds flew from their branches, neighbors were jolted awake, and God himself took notice from beyond the clouds he hid behind. My beautiful Martha lay there, in hideous form and grotesque fashion. Her mouth was frozen agape in a painful contortion, with her eyes held open wider than I had ever witnessed in her natural life. Her hands rested upon her chest, with her fingertips covered in fresh blood and utterly bereft of fingernails. The bonnet was now crumpled at her side, exposing a nearly hairless scalp, marked with severe scarring and discoloration. Her soft, blonde locks, mixed with wilted petals, were strewn about, all over her body, as feathers caught in a strong wind.

We were too late.