'ghost' entries in directory

[Weil timothy]

This is probably a common UNIX question the answer to
which I've never seen -
 
A bundled file is sent to a user  with instructions to
'sh <file...>' which in the process makes directories
and unpacks  files...
 
However, the 'mkdir <somedir>' fails (dont know  why) &
I'm  left with unbundled files in my current directory...
 
Problem -> the 'mkdir <somedir>' command did create a
directory entry in '.' (current directory) BUT this 
new directory cannot be entered (via cd <somedir>) or
recognized for deletion (rmdir <somedir> yields the
error, 'directory does not exist'.
 
What next?  The <somedir> entry exists via 'ls -l'
& I've tried changing owner, access rights, etc.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions here...