Beban House has a reputation as a haunted house. It has been featured on Creepy Canada and several paranormal societies have investigated the odd events that have happened here. Around Easter time in 2009 the Tourism Nanaimo staff at Beban House witnessed a very weird occurrence.
On this particular long weekend in April 2009 the staff closed up the Information Centre on Thursday night as usual. We were going to be closed Good Friday, open Saturday and closed again Easter Sunday and Monday. Every night before we leave, Slater, our black house cat is put in the front office with his food. Back then, the door to this office would not stay shut unless it was dead bolted and since there was only one key to the office and people were in and out on a regular basis the key was left in the deadbolt in the door at all times. On Saturday morning (after Good Friday) our summer student opened up the Centre and unlocked the office to let Slater out for the day as usual. Before she left at the end of the day she picked the cat up, put him in the office, made sure to give him enough food to last until Tuesday, and then locked the door behind her. She set the alarm at approximately 4:00pm that day. Minutes later the janitor arrived, disarmed the security system, and completed his usual Saturday night cleaning. When he left Beban House he specifically remembered picking Slater up, putting him back in the office, locking the door (leaving the key in the deadbolt), arming the security system and locking the premises as usual.
On Easter Monday morning our Executive Director came in to check on Slater because he didn’t like him being alone for too many days in a row. When Mark went to unlock the office door he noticed that the key was missing and the door was locked. Assuming Slater was locked inside he turned to go and find the key. As he turned around, looking up at him was Slater – outside the door. Now Mark was in a hurry to find the key since he did not know how long Slater had been out of the room with out water, food and most importantly a litter box! He looked everywhere and could not find the key and as a last resort he decided to try the windows. Surprisingly the window to his office was unlocked and he was able to climb in and unlock the office door from the inside.
The next morning Mark called the weekend employees to try to determine where the key might be. Both staff swore they left the key in the door and neither knew where the key might be. Mark then called the alarm company to see if anyone had been in or out of the building between the time the weekend staff had left and he arrived. Nobody had been in or out of the building. We tried to rationalize how this event might have occurred and, while it’s possible it may have been human, the behaviour would be highly illogical and just plain strange. Why would someone come in through a window, open an office door from the inside, remove the key from the other side, close and lock the door, and climb back out through the same window? Why not just leave through the door? Nothing had been moved or taken from the office or from the rest of the house. And all of this would have occurred without setting off any motion detectors — which would be virtually impossible.
The following week comes and goes and we gradually dismissed the incident from the previous weekend. We were still closing Slater in the office overnight but we were unable to lock the door since the key never materialized. All is normal until the following weekend. On Friday as Mark prepared to leave for the weekend he made sure to check that all the windows in his office were locked (something he had apparently neglected to do the weekend before). He closed the door and left Slater for the night. On Saturday morning our summer student arrived and let Slater out of the office for the day. At the end of the day she filled his bowls full of food and water (more then he could possibly eat in two days), closed the door and left. That night our janitor arrived, completed his work, and made sure to close the office door with Slater in before left. Of course the door was not locked because the key had never materialized.
On Monday morning when Mark arrived he went to open his office door and discovered that it was inexplicably locked! This time Slater was meowing like crazy from inside the office. Mark was 99% sure the windows would be locked but decided to try them anyway before he called the locksmith. Once again, inexplicably, the window slid open and Mark was able to climb through the window and unlock the door from inside the office. Once again, the key was nowhere to be found and nothing had been moved or stolen. Strangely, however, every morsel of cat food and drop of water was gone. Follow up phone calls to staff and alarm companies provided no enlightenment as to how these events could have occurred.
We still can’t explain these events but many of us think perhaps Slater has a ghostly friend that can operate doors, windows and keys? For more thrills and chills of the paranormal kind, visit Beban House for an update on the story or maybe you can have your own ghostly encounter!