The path that answered back

Text: an original contemporary personal-account-style practice extract.

The guide asked us to walk the old canal path without speaking. I kept to the back, where the others' torches made a broken line on the towpath. A click came from beyond the bridge. I turned towards it; the line of lights continued without me. When I caught up, the guide said it was probably the gate swinging in the wind. I nodded, though I had not felt any wind.

At the next stop, we were asked to record a sound. I held the recorder above the water and waited. The others had moved on before the low knocking began, so I stayed until it came a second time. On playback, it sounded close and hollow. I asked the guide to play it again. She did, then said it might be a branch against the bank. I put the recorder away. A few steps later, I took it out again.

In the lit room at the end, the guide named a bell in one recording and a latch in another. Mine was still listed as “unidentified”. People were already discussing the walk as they collected their coats. I rewound my recording once more, but did not ask for another guess. On the way back, I chose the path beside the water rather than the lit road. At the bridge I slowed down. Nothing clicked. I kept the headphones in my pocket, though the recorder was still playing.

In this extract, the writer tries to convey an experience that may attract the narrator even as it unsettles them, while leaving the source of some sounds uncertain.

Evaluate how successfully this is achieved. Support your views with detailed reference to the extract.