​The Mystery of the White Ghost at Chrisard School © Anna Jozefowicz

The Quarantine was finally over and the Chrisard students entered school on Monday at eight 
in the morning. 
Teachers were greeting them at the door with happy smiles and tight hugs. Students were 
laughing and jumping, rushing to their classrooms, almost dancing of joy. They were very 
excited to finally meet their friends and teachers in real life, and not only through the screen.
The first English class went by very quickly. Soon, the bell ring invited students to go out to 
the playground. 
Suddenly, they heard an extraordinary noise. It was like a tearing sound of a desperate cry. It 
was in the air surrounding them. They looked around to see where it came from. Then, they 
saw it…
On the stairs above the lunchroom was the most spine-chilling figure they've ever seen in any 
movie or book. It was shaped like a woman dressed in long, white, ripped sheets with a hood 
covering her face. She was floating up the stairs, with desperate movements, and emitting 
the sounds of a wounded animal, or a hungry vampire. 
The children looked at the faces of their friends and noticed they were extremely pale, almost 
translucent from fear. They wanted to scream and run, run very fast and very far away. Run 
and never look back… 
Then, something horrifying happened: the students couldn’t move at all. They were 
paralyzed, some of them still held the snacks, books and cellphones in their hands. Also, they 
couldn’t speak or scream, as they had no voice. It seemed that the White Ghost Lady had 
bewitched them and kept them under her spell. They could just observe what was happening 
around them, as if they were visitors in an unknown dimension… 
The students looked at their teachers, who didn’t seem to notice the Ghost and didn't realize 
something was wrong. It turns out that sometimes adults cannot see the same things as 
children, especially when it comes to spirits…
The situation worsened every second as the White Lady's inhuman screams grew louder and 
louder. 
Then, one of the girls named Lara remembered that her grandmother once told her a very 
mysterious story which happened in France hundreds of years ago. The scary tale now came 
to Lara’s mind:
In the thirteenth century, there was a castle in the mountains of southern France where a 
King and his family lived happily. One day, the King went to fight in the war, and didn’t come 
back for many years. His wife and children missed him so much, that they went looking for 
him all over the country. Fortunately, they found the King and after the war ended, the family 
returned home safely. But when they arrived to the castle, there was a Ghost there: a 
Weeping Lady dressed in white, ripped sheets with a hood covering her face. She wouldn’t 
stop howling and emitting the most inhuman sounds. The royal family was terrified and asked 
the Kingdom’s Magician for help. The Wizard explained to them that this particular ghost 
always comes to places that had been abandoned for a long period of time and cries because 
she suffers from loneliness. As she is a spirit, the White Lady does not perceive things the 
same way as the human beings and doesn’t realize when the inhabitants finally return to their 
homes or castles. She thinks that she is still alone and keeps shedding tears.
The King asked the old man:
- Magician, what can I do to break the spell and free my castle from this terrible Ghost?
- There is something… a secret way to make her go away. – responded the Wizard. –
But you will have to follow my instructions very carefully and precisely…
- Yes Wizard, I will do as you say, please tell me this secret way! – begged the King.
- You have to call the Weeping Lady by her REAL name: “Margaux”. It is necessary to 
pronounce this name with no mistakes, loudly and clearly, three times in a row. After 
you do this, there is something else… In order to break the spell, you and your family 
have to sing a song that comes directly from the melody of your hearts. 
- A song, which song? – the King was confused.
- I cannot tell you because the song doesn’t exist yet. You and your family will have to 
create it during a magical moment. But I can tell you this: only your own hearts know 
it… - the Magus responded enigmatically.
- We will do our best then... Thank you very much Wizard! –and as a token of his 
gratitude, the King gave the old man three gold coins.
After remembering this story, Lara thought that maybe the same Lady Ghost from her 
Grandmother’s legend had appeared in Chrisard school in 2020, since the building was 
abandoned for many weeks because of the Quarantine. After all, the spectres don’t have a 
physical body, so they do not age. The girl suspected that the White Lady was only crying from 
loneliness and needed help to understand that the students had already returned to school.
Lara wished that she and her friends could do something about this mystery. Then, she had 
the most unbelievable idea! She concentrated intensely and tried to transmit telepathically 
to other students all the things she knew about the Lady Ghost from the castle…
After few minutes, Lara realized that she was able to communicate with the other children 
without words and explained her plan to them. 
At noon, an unimaginable thing happened at Chrisard’s playground:
- Margaux, Margaux, Margaux … - all the students pronounced loudly and clearly the 
White Lady’s name with an impeccable French accent. 
Then, they began to sing the loveliest song to the rhythm of their hearts. The lyrics spoke of 
solidarity, companionship, respect, joy, honesty, courage, learning, about being true to 
yourself and loyal to your friends. 
While listening to the song, the White Lady stopped moaning and crying. Very slowly, she took 
off her hood and showed a beautiful Angel face. She smiled gently at everyone and waved 
goodbye, rising to heaven.
Little Detective Lara and her friends solved the mystery and saved Chrisard school. Now that 
they had recovered the building after the Covid-19 Pandemic and the Ghost invasion, nothing 
would stop them from enjoying it fully, studying, playing and just being themselves.