No Halloween party is complete without at least one scary story. Usually one person talks in a low voice while everyone else crowds together on the floor or around a fire. The following is a retelling of a tale told in Britain and in North Carolina and Virginia.

　　"What Do You Come For?"

　　There was an old woman who lived all by herself, and she was very lonely. Sitting in the kitchen one night, she said, "Oh, I wish I had some company."

　　No sooner had she spoken than down the chimney tumbled two feet from which the flesh had rotted. The old woman's eyes bulged with terror.

　　Then two legs dropped to the hearth and attached themselves to the feet.

　　Then a body tumbled down, then two arms, and a man's head.

　　As the old woman watched, the parts came together into a great, tall man. The man danced around and around the room. Faster and faster he went. Then he stopped, and he looked into her eyes.

　　"What do you come for? she asked in a small voice that shivered and shook.

　　"What do I come for?" he said. "I come for YOU!"

　　The narrator shouts and jumps at the person near him!