A bone chilling and high pitched cry of a woman and a baby when I was sleeping in a room which was pitch dark.

That was year 1960 or 61, I don’t remember. That was the first day in my boarding school. I was ten or eleven years then.

This is the picture of my school building. Name of the school was Fatima Girls High School, which was situated in Kazipet.

You see three floors in the picture. But actually there is another floor under the ground.

Entire one side of the building was dedicated to school, while other side was dedicated to boarding, a chapel and sisters’ rooms(called convent).

There were big rooms called dormitories in this under ground floor. In each dormitory, there were about 15-20 beds.

So that was my first night in the boarding. In the dormitory where I was sleeping, all except me were old students.

In the middle of the night I woke up from my sleep and could not go back to sleep as I was feeling terribly home sick.

At home I was used to a small night light in my room. But there, there was no night light. It was pitch dark.

I was just tossing in my bed and then I heard this bone chilling high pitched cry.

It was like a woman crying in pain. After few minutes (or seconds) another cry was mixed with the first. It was like a baby cry.

These two sounds continued for, what seemed like very long time. But it might be for one or two minutes or may be less than a minute.

I was damn scared. I didn’t know what to do. Everything was new for me.

I wanted to go to some other girl’s bed and sleep beside her. But I was afraid that I may be scolded.

I was surprised how other girls were sleeping when there is such high pitched horrifying noise.

A caretaker was sleeping in that room, who was supposed to help the girls in the night if there was any problem. But I could not make out where she was sleeping.

The whole night I could not sleep thinking about that sound. In the morning I sat on my bed and started to weep.

One girl, three or four years senior to me, came to me and asked why I was crying.

I told her what happened at mid night and how scared I felt.

She laughed and cajoled me.

“Do you know what that sound is?” she asked.

“May be ghosts?”

“No, they are cats!”

“Cats? Are you sure?”

“Yes one male cat and one female cat. We are hearing those sounds from two years. We are used to those sounds. So we are not afraid any more. When I heard it first time, even I could not sleep that night”

“But they were very loud”

“Because one side of our building is empty in the night, and because the cats are in underground floor, the sound reverberates and makes it more horrific”

I did not believe her.

“I know you don’t believe me. OK do one thing. If in the night you are frightened for any reason, come and lie beside me”

“OK akka(elder sister)”

I heard that sound again after two three days. I went and lay beside akka.

After that I heard it many times. Gradually my fear disappeared.

But I could never forget that night when I heard it first time.

Later I learned that cats make this weird sound when they are mating. The male cat’s cry will be more horrifying.

Image source: Face book page of Fatima Girls High School Kazipet.