

### Ghost Hunting Diary

### Volume I

### T. M. Simmons

Copyright © 2011, T. M. Simmons.

All rights reserved.

Dead Man Talking Excerpt:

Copyright 2004, 2011, T. M. Simmons

Cover Art Copyright Copyright 2011:

Angela Rogers, misadmom @ yahoo.com

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With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing now or in the future without permission from the author.

### Dedication:

For all my ghost hunting friends over the years.

# Dear Reader Letter

Dear Reader:

A phone call from a dear aunt changed my life path and sent me down the ghost hunting trail. Due to the closeness of our ages (only four years separate us), we are more like girlfriends or sisters than aunt and niece. We're both fond of saying that we caused each other to get kicked out of different bars during our drinking years, but that's another tale.

Aunt Belle, who later became the model for Twila, one of the female protagonists in my Dead Man paranormal mystery series, said she had decided to spend some time traveling...and hunting ghosts. I didn't know a person actually hunted ghosts, but it sounded like fun to me. Of course, both of us have always been prone to wackiness.

Since then, I've been, at times, scared silly and, at others, awed by encounters with another dimension. On various occasions, I've gone ghost hunting with other friends, but Aunt Belle and I remain a tight pair in these adventures. Eventually, after months and years of study and experience, I realized I had become a paranormal investigator.

As a writer, I kept a series of what I ended up calling my ghost hunting diaries after many of the more interesting investigations. Over the years, I've collected dozens of these. Sometimes I shared them with friends and family; other times they resided in one of the numerous files I now have of my ghost hunting life. Now I'll be sharing them with you, my readers.

I want to caution anyone who reads these stories: Do _NOT_ try ghost hunting on your own, without the guidance of an experienced paranormal investigator like my aunt. Do not think it's all a game. If not for Aunt Belle, I'm am absolutely sure I would have run into more danger than the few close calls I did have. We ventured on numerous fun and exciting ghost hunts. However, we also ran across some bumps in the night that scared the silliness right out of us and sent us hightailing to learn as much as we could about protecting ourselves from hazardous experiences in our interactions with these entities.

Have no doubt: there is another dimension out there. There are both sad and lonely, as well as malevolent beings in that world across The Veil.

Read on for the diary of the very first ghost hunt Aunt Belle dragged me on, as well as a few other spine-tingling encounters we had... if you dare.

# Down the Ghost Trail

**The Myrtles Plantatio** n

St. Francisville, Louisiana

I had no idea that I could "see" ghosts. Oh, I'd had the usual glimpses, thinking I saw someone who disappeared immediately, rubbing my eyes in disbelief. "Hearing" someone call my name when no one else was around. Once in a while I'd have a vivid experience that I passed off as surely a dream during the half-awake state. Not as easy to shrug off were the times I knew for a fact something woke me from a sound sleep and...someone else was in the bedroom with me. I couldn't begin to count all the unexplained happenings that I made allowances for one way or another.

Then one day in late 1993, my aunt, Belle Brown, called from Ohio and said she was coming to Texas for a visit. We hadn't seen each other for several years, but we'd kept in touch through phone and letters. That was back before e-mail became an accepted part of our daily lives. Call it Fate or whatever, I had recently been talking to another author friend about a haunted bed and breakfast in St. Francisville, Louisiana.

I knew Belle was psychic. We're more like sisters than aunt and niece, since she and I grew up next door to each other and she's only four years older than me. Therefore, each knows lots about the other. We like to say that we got kicked out of different bars together, which is true. But I digress...

As soon as I mentioned The Myrtles, Belle insisted we plan an overnight stay there during her trip. She had heard a lot of ghostly tales about The Myrtles, and she laughed at me when I said that she was welcome to see as many ghosts as she liked, but I knew for a fact that I wouldn't join her in that experience. Like I said, we know a lot about each other. I was wrong; she was right!

St. Francisville, where The Myrtles is located, is about a half-hour north of Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and has been called the most haunted plantation in the United States. In 1794, General David Bradford fled Pennsylvania, on the run from George Washington due to Bradford's participation in the Whiskey Rebellion. Bradford ended up in Louisiana obtained a Spanish land grant of 650 acres, of which only 10 acres remain today. He began construction on his home, named Laurel Grove, and completed the house in 1797. The history of The Myrtles over the years, a mixture of legend and fact, is fascinating. Fact: Ten people have been murdered in the house or on the grounds. Fact as far as I'm concerned: There are ghosts at The Myrtles.

Many people have supposedly experienced the ghosts and spirits at the plantation. Rooms are vacated in the middle of the night. Some guests leave the manor house and spend the remainder of the night in the modern rooms behind the Carriage House. Some leave and are never heard from again. Some finish out the night, yet tell tales of their experiences in garbled or awestricken tones. Psychics tell of wall-to-wall spirits in the rooms. Employees describe "excuse me's" from the spirits, hearing their names called when no one else is in the house with them, doors opening and closing, locking and unlocking, all on their own. The piano in the entrance foyer plays after all the guests have gone to bed. In the evenings, two little girls peer in the windows. Should you dredge up the courage to visit, The Myrtles will definitely make a believer out of you.

We arrived about 11:00 a.m. on a beautiful spring day in May. With Belle and I were three other friends. Linda drove with us from Texas to New Orleans, and there we stayed with Leslie and Shirley, two published author friends. Those three were to drop us off and then leave that afternoon, since not one of them wanted to deal with the ghosts of The Myrtles. In fact, Linda refused to even venture into the house; she waited in or near the van. She admitted that she'd been sick at her stomach ever since we got close to St. Francisville, and it grew worse the nearer to The Myrtles we drove. We did notice her pale and paler complexion. Linda is one-half Native American, and The Myrtles encompasses an Indian burial ground. Perhaps this explained some of her uneasiness?

We checked in at the Carriage House, and Belle "felt" something at the door. I got my first lesson on how to determine if there was something supernatural near us. I looked at Belle's arms and saw the hairs standing up, goose bumps covering her skin even on this warm day. Then lo and behold, I felt something myself! I came to understand that there is a form of energy that ghosts or spirits emit, and those sensitive to it can feel it. I felt! Even the hairs on the back of my neck crawled, and the ones on my arms waved like tiny, headless snakes.

"Feeling" a ghost is somewhat like walking into a bunch of spider webs. Even though I'd shaved my legs, I felt those hairs standing up! Always before, I'd explained something like this by repeating an old adage I'd heard from my great-grandmother: "A goose walked over my grave." Not this time.

After registration, Leslie and Shirley accompanied us into the manor house to see the room we'd reserved. At that time, our room was called the Peach Room, although names have changed since then. The Peach Room had also at one time been called the Voodoo Room.

As the then-current name indicated, the Peach Room was decorated in peach and white. There were exquisite satin curtains at the windows, and the curtain hems pooled on the floor. We already knew the reasoning behind the supposed indifference to the curtain material: Pre-Civil War southerners flaunted their wealth. The disregard indicated that the family had enough money not to worry about extra curtain material, as expensive and as hard to come by as it was. There was a gorgeous marble fireplace, but this time of year it only held an antique coal bucket filled with shiny green magnolia leaves. To the left of the door was our closet; on the right, our bed. It was a double bed, but we didn't mind that at all. After my experience a few minutes earlier, I planned to sleep very close to Belle!

Leslie felt something tug at her blue jean pant leg. There was nothing there, of course, but it scared her for a couple reasons. One, like me, she'd thought herself definitely un-sensitive. Two, with this first bit of proof that maybe she wasn't immune to ghosts, her fear heightened. I suppose I should have been fearful, too, but in contradiction, I was enjoying myself...albeit a tad uneasily, since this was all new to me, also. We all stuck pretty close to Belle, the experienced one in our bunch.

On the wall outside the Peach Room was a portrait of a somewhat mousy woman, whose name we never learned. In fact, later one of the employees admitted that some of the portraits in the house were not necessarily ancestors; they had been bought from antique stores merely for decoration. I felt uneasy whenever we walked past this portrait. Leslie said the face faded in and out to her. Belle and I are camera addicts when it comes to recording our trips together, and we were already taking pictures. Back then we used 35 mm. cameras and had to get our film developed, so we had to wait until after our trip to see what we caught on film.

Shirley had her own experience with at least one spirit inside the manor house. An employee we later befriended told us that the spirits there definitely did not like to be mocked. Dianna, one of the maids at that time, said that when she first came to work there, she teased the little girls. She wouldn't say what happened but said she soon learned not to do that!

There is also a portrait of a stern-faced man in that hallway. Shirley made a mocking comment about the man, and she was carrying her purse with her at the time. We'd picked up some literature, and when we returned to the van, Shirley dug in her purse for her reading glasses. No glasses. She knew she had them with her, since she had used them during the drive from New Orleans that morning. We notified the employees in case someone turned the glasses in to their lost-and-found. However, to this day they are still missing, and Shirley insists that the man in the portrait stole them in retaliation for her comment.

We sat on the back veranda for a few minutes, just absorbing the beautiful grounds. Linda did deign to come that far and joined us in the rocking chairs. Suddenly Leslie yelled, "Ouch!" and jumped out of her chair. She swore someone had pulled her hair, but there was no one behind her. We checked the chair back, but it was smooth. There was no splintery place where her hair could have caught and pulled.

Now perhaps the things that had happened thus far could be easily explained by our "haunted-house jitters," since none of us besides Belle had ever intentionally set out to "see" ghosts. However, what happened next defied any logical explanation.

There is a caretaker's house in an open area behind the parking lot, and all of us noticed a man in bib overalls come out the side door. He walked toward the back of the property and disappeared into the woods. We asked a passing employee about him, and the employee said there wasn't anyone in residence at the caretaker's house that day, so she had no idea who—or what—we'd seen.

Later on, we decided that man must have been the overseer we heard about from another employee. This overseer managed the plantation crops during the 1940's, and word was that he was a crusty old man. He was murdered during a robbery at The Myrtles, but evidently didn't feel like leaving. Many people have called The Myrtles from nearby phones, asking when they are open. Now, this information is on a large sign at the entrance of the property, so when this first started happening, the employees were confused. However, they would respond that they were indeed open right then. The callers would next ask why this mean man in bib overalls had met them at the entrance, cursed them, shook his fist at them, and told them to leave, since the plantation was closed.

We went on down into St. Francisville to explore. Linda was still uneasy and pale; she ended up sitting in the van while we walked around town. Belle and I explored a graveyard behind a church, but our friends refused to venture in there with us, claiming they'd already had enough encounters for a lifetime. We drove down to the Mississippi River, then decided it was time to eat. We'd seen a sign for the Magnolia Café, which sounded like an utterly appropriate place to fill our stomachs. Besides, it was the only place in town open to eat that day.

The Magnolia Café is a quaint restaurant, partly enclosed, but also with an outside patio area, covered by one of those old tin roofs prevalent in the south. Since it was a nice day, we chose to eat outside. While we were eating, it began to rain...only over us and our table! The rain splattered and pinged on the roof, but though we glanced out the open sides, not one drop fell in the street or on the dusty ground. We saw our waitress glancing at us with a weird expression. The rain continued for perhaps five minutes, and during this time our waitress approached us. She asked if we heard that rain over us. Of course, we said we did. She then asked us what we were doing in St. Francisville, and Belle replied, "Two of us are staying at The Myrtles." The waitress nodded, murmured, "That explains it," and walked off.

Before we left the town, we visited a gift shop. As soon as the owner learned where we were staying, he told us about two elderly ladies who'd been in his shop the day before. They had spent the night at The Myrtles, and in his words, "were unable to talk about it without babbling." We later learned from Myrtles' employees that these two ladies had stayed in the Peach Room.

A while later, Linda dropped Belle and me off at The Myrtles and hightailed it out of town with Leslie and Shirley. Linda was to come back and pick us up the next morning at 11 a.m. So there we were, no transportation, no cell phone back then, no phone in our room, and we'd already been informed that there were no employees on the grounds at night.

We couldn't wait!

Rather than go to our room, we walked around the grounds for a while. The manor house has a front and back veranda. A separate, smaller house is built at an ell from the back veranda. This was once used for the family to live in while the manor house was constructed. Later, it was used for the kitchen house, which was always separate back then due to the risk of fire, as well as the heat that resulted from cooking. When we were there, it was only used for storage. There is a courtyard area in the back, landscaped and covered with flat stones for walkways. The Carriage House, which was also the restaurant, sits on the far side of the courtyard. A small pond is further back behind the courtyard, with a gazebo on the bank, a wooden walkway to the gazebo. In front, lovely centuries-old live oaks provide shade, and there are more walkways and plants, as well as several marble statues scattered about. A small storage shed sets on the far side of the house. In keeping with the historical time period, it has been constructed to mimic a slave cabin.

Around 3:30, the tour guide noticed us and asked if we'd like to join her. During the tour, she explained that the manor house had initially been four rooms downstairs, four bedrooms up. Downstairs, on the right of the stairs and at the rear, is the dining room, which has beautiful furniture. In fact, the entire house had absolutely gorgeous antique furnishings and oil paintings. There was even an original tatted lace sampler on one wall, done by the wife of one of the early owners. Past the dining room is the game room. On the right of the entrance way, at the front of the house, are mirrored men's and ladies parlors (the exact reverse of each other). The game room is also off the men's parlor.

The house was enlarged to include two more bedrooms downstairs and one upstairs in 1834 when the Stirling family purchased the plantation. The addition was built on the left of the entrance, and downstairs consists of the French Room and a suite, then called the Bradford Suite.

In the main foyer, there is a chandelier that weighs 600 pounds. In the French Room, the chandelier has angels on it. A piano sets in the entrance foyer, against the stairwell. We were allowed to take pictures, but not use a flash, since camera flashes can damage the priceless antiques.

Tours weren't allowed upstairs, and rather than use the front staircase, since another tour had started, Belle and I climbed a steep rear stairway, which the guide had explained had been used by the servants. With no other guests yet in residence, we were able to look at all the other bedrooms. Our Peach Room was back in the far corner of the house, the Green Room across from it. The Blue Room was next to the Green Room, and across from it, the old nursery, which contained twin beds. The Bridal Suite, constructed during the addition, was behind the stairs, with a small room connected to it containing a single bed for the couple's servant. The Peach Room, the Green Room and the Bridal Suite had their own bathrooms. The Blue Room and nursery had private baths, but they were in the hall rather than attached to the rooms.

A while later, we again relaxed in the rocking chairs on the rear veranda, and the tour guide joined us briefly. We immediately started asking her about the ghosts, but she explained that she was the historical tour guide and wasn't free to talk about that. She said the "Mystery Guide" worked on Friday and Saturday nights, and this woman told the tales of the ghosts and also organized the Murder Mystery plays around Halloween. However, after the last tour left, and the guide realized we were spending the night, she opened up some with us.

The Green Room is haunted by a Confederate soldier, but for some reason, he only appears in the summer. He had been wounded in the Civil War and found his way to The Myrtles, where he died from his wounds.

There are tales of people seeing six red-coated British soldiers carrying a coffin out by the pond. A lady in white walks around the grounds, and both guests and townspeople have reported seeing her. The most famous story about The Myrtles, though, is the story of Cloe, the black slave.

Clark Woodruff owned the plantation in the early 1800's. By 1823, he and his wife had three children, two girls and a boy. There was a portrait of Woodruff in the game room, and stories say that people have actually seen tears flowing down it.

In those days the southern plantations were worked by slaves, and at times, the masters took mistresses from the workers. One of Woodruff's mistresses was Cloe. Proud and protective of her status, since it kept her in the house and out of the fields picking cotton and other crops, Cloe intended to maintain her position. Thus, she tended to eavesdrop in order to store up any information that might assist her.

As Cloe feared, another female slave caught Woodruff's eye as a bed companion. The plantation master took this young slave into one of the bedrooms, and Cloe stood outside the door, listening and worrying about what would happen to her now. Even in the throes of his passion, something caught Woodruff's attention, and he threw open the bedroom door to find Cloe spying on him. He ordered Cloe's ear cut off and banished her from his bed. From then on, Cloe wore a scarf around her head to hide her missing ear.

At first, Woodruff didn't banish Cloe from the house slaves, but she was desperately frightened that he eventually would. She thought hard about how she could regain his affections. On the birthday of one of Woodruff's daughter, Cloe had a plan. She baked the birthday cake and added some oleander leaves. Oleanders are poison; Cloe knew that. But she thought she would be able to nurse everyone back to health and Woodruff would be grateful to her.

Unfortunately, Cloe's nursing attempts failed. Sarah Woodruff, her son James, and her daughter Cornelia died of the poison. The baby, Mary, lived, since she was too young to eat the cake. Then somehow the other plantation slaves found out what Cloe had done. Fearful that Woodruff's rage would extend to them, they went after her. Cloe fled down the bayou path, but they caught and hanged her.

After his wife and children's deaths, Woodruff moved to New Orleans with his baby daughter and became a circuit judge. In 1834, he sold the plantation to the Ruffin Stirling family, who enlarged it and renamed it The Myrtles. Whatever the name, Cloe still haunts the plantation, trying to regain favor. She's been captured on film several times. Her ghost is said to mostly haunt the Blue Room.

The story about why the Peach Room was once called the Voodoo Room is vague. No one seems to know which family it pertains to, but that doesn't stop people from repeating it. The family who owned the plantation at the time had two daughters who fell ill from yellow fever. Hysterical, and against her husband's wishes, their mother sent for a local voodoo priestess. The husband did, however, inform the priestess upon her arrival that if his daughters died, she would die also. The priestess nursed the daughters in the Peach Room, and when they died, she didn't immediately notify the family. Instead, fearful for her life, she fled, leaving behind her satchel of medicines and charms. After she herself died, she returned to the bedroom over and over again, searching for her satchel.

Two little girls have been both seen and captured on film at The Myrtles. The gift shop sells a postcard with a picture of a female black slave ghost on it, standing in front of the kitchen house. You can see the wall right through her. In the same postcard, a little boy and girl are sitting on the back veranda roof. At night, long after they've gone to bed, guests hear children giggling and little feet pattering in the hallways and on the stairs.

One story is about a guest who was leaving one morning. He noticed two little girls in party dresses playing on the lawn, and he spoke to them and took their picture. They didn't answer him, however. When he got his film developed, the two little girls weren't in the picture. Curious, he called The Myrtles and asked about the girls. The staff informed him that the only children "living" there at that time were those of the manager, who occupied a separate caretaker's house on the grounds. But...the family had been on vacation at the time the man stayed there.

Another story about The Myrtles involves Sarah and William Stirling, who owned the plantation during the mid-1800's. Their marriage was "the" social event of that season, and the two were deeply in love. Then one day William heard someone calling him from the front of the house. When he went out onto the veranda to greet his guests, a man on horseback shot him in the chest. William managed to crawl back into the house, gasping for his wife. He made it partway up the stairs, to the seventeenth step, where Sarah grasped him while he died in her arms. Despite numerous scrubbings, the blood still appears on the steps. Indeed, it even stains through a carpet runner tacked to the stairs. Numerous guests have reported seeing Sarah on the stairwell, weeping inconsolably. She wears her blood-stained period clothing from the day she held William as he died.

One last thing we learned: One ghost in the Peach Room liked to tuck people in at night. She also didn't like people to sleep with their feet outside the covers. If a bare foot slipped out, she would tuck the sheet or cover back around it. Hearing about that, we thought it would be cool experience. The actual incident didn't prove to be that great!

Well armed with history and ghost stories, Belle and I had dinner at the Carriage House. Naturally, since it was the only place available to us without transportation. However, the food was delicious, and one of the waitresses even fixed us each a Mint Julep after dinner. Our table was beside a window overlooking the courtyard, and we could see the back veranda of the manor house. Since we hadn't had our Mint Julep's yet, we couldn't blame alcohol for seeing one of the chairs rocking back and forth for several minutes. No one sat in it; no one else was even around. There was no wind blowing, since none of the tree or plant leaves moved. Also, only this one chair amidst several moved.

We relaxed after dinner in those rocking chair again, but we both avoided the "rocking" one. We'd checked with the employees as to what we could and could not do, and there was little off limits. Since no one would be on the grounds with us overnight, we were informed that we could have the run of things. We could roam the halls and take flash pictures then. The two parlors were ours to use in the evening, but we couldn't sit on the furniture in the other rooms.

For a while, it seemed we would be the only guests that night, but after dinner, two other couples arrived. One was an older couple, who did not speak English. The other was a young couple. We truly didn't see much of them that night, and didn't say much more to them at first than hello. However, then something else weird happened.

There was a large gray cat with funny-looking eyes that we'd been seeing. The cat would come up to both Belle and me and let us pet it. It even sat on Belle's lap at one point and purred. But when the older couple came onto the veranda, the cat hid from them. The younger couple came by a few minutes later, and the cat laid down in some plants by the veranda, apparently trying to hide again. We asked the couple if they could see the cat, and they responded that yes, they could. However, when they called, "kitty, kitty," it refused to come to them. We took pictures of the cat, so we know it was real and not a ghost. However, in each picture the cat's eyes glow strangely.

At around 8 p.m., we took our cameras and went inside the house. I asked Belle to go up the stairway to the seventeenth step so I could take her picture. We did see the blood stains on the carpet, and she avoided them as she ascended. When I tried to snap the picture, though, my camera malfunctioned, and I got my next lesson from Belle. She informed me that sometimes in a haunted place, we have to ask permission from the ghosts or spirits to take pictures. That advice came in handy several times after that as we roamed the downstairs area, but right then, I just shrugged and didn't try another picture as we prowled around the rest of the downstairs.

After a while, we came back to the stairwell, and I asked Belle to go up to the seventeenth step again. On the third step, she stopped and said that there was something there and it wouldn't let her go any further. She came back down, and I felt it, also. The hairs stood up and goose bumps spread over me. We talked to the entity and said we just wanted to get a picture. However, he apparently didn't want to pose for us. Belle said that he wanted us to get away from the stairs, so we walked toward the rear foyer door. There, he "left" us, and this time, our cameras worked fine at the stairway, although Belle refused to try to climb it again just then.

We finally went to our room, where I went into the bathroom. When I sat down on the commode, my arm hairs stood up. By now I was starting to understand how this communicating with ghosts worked. I told the ghost that I'd appreciate being able to pee without her watching me (somehow I sensed she was female). She left, but when I walked out the bathroom door, there she was again...at least, her energy, since I didn't see her. I got the impression that she was just letting me know that she hadn't vacated the entire room. I talked to her again, and then we left the bedroom to explore more.

We went downstairs and out on the back veranda once again. We really liked that rear veranda! It was so peaceful and serene, whereas in front of the house, you could hear traffic passing on the road. By now it was total dark, but there were a lot of security lights burning...at least around the house. Elsewhere, especially under the huge trees, it was black as pitch.

Belle started down the steps and I asked her where we were going. "Exploring, of course," she said.

"It's dark!" I said.

"Best time to feel or see ghosts," she replied, and started walking away. It didn't take me long to decide whether to stay by myself or follow her. I followed!

We walked around the house to the front. Down one of the paths, Belle said, "He's back," and we felt something again. The spider webs covered us and our hairs stood up. She mentioned at first that she thought it was the man from the stairwell. I was getting into this, at least as long as I stayed close to Belle, and I said, "We just want to get some pictures." With her psychic abilities, Belle then deduced this wasn't the entity we'd "met" at the stairs. Instead, he was the ghost of the overseer, whom we had learned died in this area. He cooperated and let us shoot our cameras.

We eventually wandered around back again. Beside the steps, I felt something, but Belle didn't feel this entity. This was something new to me, feeling something that she didn't. So I returned to that area, with Belle, and felt it still there. Again Belle didn't. She explained to me that this happens sometimes; that entities will announce themselves to one person but not the other. Other times, as I'd experienced, we could both feel the same thing. I was learning! This was a fainter feeling than before, and my arm hairs didn't stand up as tall, but it was there.

Around 10 p.m., we went back up to our room. Earlier, when we'd washed our hands before dinner, we had plenty of hot water. I wanted to take a bath, but no matter how long I let the water run, it wouldn't get hot. Even when I opened the hot water spigot alone, the water remained cool. We knew the other two couples were also staying in the upstairs bedrooms, but not which rooms they were in or which baths they would be using. We didn't have any way of contacting anyone to report any problems, so I decided to take my bath in the morning, when maybe there would be hot water.

There was a lamp beside the bed, but it wouldn't work. We changed into our nightgowns, and I turned out the bathroom and room lights. It was so dark that I immediately turned the bathroom lights back on! I compromised with Belle and shut the bathroom door until only a small slit of light emerged. The only clock in the room was one with a digital face on it, on the end table on Belle's side of the bed. She informed me that when—not if, when!—anything happened, she would make note of the time.

There we were: full of ghost stories; having experienced for ourselves that the plantation was haunted; no phone; no transportation; no one to call if we needed them. We were all ready for a haunted night! Oh, and lest I forget, while we were getting ready for bed, a storm blew up. The night was filled with lightning and thunder, totally appropriate for my first adventure into a paranormal night. So...we went to bed.

I didn't think I'd sleep, but at 11:58 (according to Belle), I woke up. I couldn't move and I couldn't talk. Something was sitting on my chest, immobilizing me. I kept struggling to speak and tell it to get off. It seemed like five minutes that I laid there, but was probably only five seconds. Finally I realized that my left foot was sticking out from under the covers and somehow managed to move it back. The presence on my chest left. I poked Belle in the side to see what time it was, then I told her to "tell that thing to get the heck out of here!" She called, "Goodnight," and it left. Then I realized I could smell a pretty floral scent that hadn't been in the room earlier. I guessed this was a female spirit, maybe the same one who'd accompanied me into the bathroom.

At 1:34, Belle sat straight up in bed. Something had screamed her name (Belle!) in an eerie tone, which she described as sounding like a saw vibrating. It scared the daylights out of her, and she looked over to see if I was awake; if it had been me who screamed. I was snoring soundly, so she laid back down.

At 2:02, Belle woke up and the room was deathly hot. It had been really cold when we went to bed, so cold we pulled the covers and bedspread over us. Belle realized one of her legs was out from under the covers, and...something was sitting on it, holding it down! Finally the presence left, and she covered herself and went back to sleep. Again, I slept through this.

I woke up sometime later (forgot to check the time), and had the same experience of the room being deathly hot. I didn't wake Belle, since this time, she was snoring. Hot as it was, I still kept my entire body under the covers! I thought about going out into the hallway where we'd seen the thermostat, but no way. I'd sweat rather than confront that house without Belle.

The next morning at 6 a.m., I woke up and woke Belle. The first thing she asked me was whether I had asked her to tell that thing to get out of there last night. I said yes, I had. Then we discussed our experiences during the night and made some notes.

We still didn't have any hot water, so we decided to take a chance and use one of the hall baths. We chose the one just outside our room, and it had plenty of hot water for both of us. Ready to face our new day and whatever ghosts we encountered, we went downstairs and walked around for a while until the coffee was ready on the back veranda at 7:30. "No one" bothered us this morning, but we enjoyed the privacy to roam the rooms and notice things we hadn't paid attention to the night before, as well as walk around the grounds.

At 8:30, we had a delicious breakfast in the Carriage House. By then, all of the employees had come on duty. The older couple never came to breakfast. We found out they'd spent the night in the Bridal Suite. At 9 a.m., they showed up, but they got in their car and left without speaking to anyone. The younger couple sat across from us at breakfast and said they had locked themselves in and never left their room. They asked us if we had experienced anything, and we said, "Oh, yes, the ghosts walked all night." We repeated our experiences, and their eyes were huge. They admitted that they'd heard footsteps on the stairs during the night. When we asked them what time, it was well after Belle and I had gone to bed.

After breakfast, the maid, Dianna, opened up to us when she found out that we had actually experienced the ghosts. Dianna said the same hot water heater served our room and the hallway bath we had ended up using. There was no explanation as to why, if we had hot water in that hall bathroom, we shouldn't have had it in the Peach Room. However, she said other guest had complained of the same phenomena: no hot water in the Peach Room. And even right before we checked out, there was still no hot water in our room.

Dianna asked us if we had seen Cloe in the Blue Room. We said no, and she offered to "call Cloe up" for us. The three of us went to the Blue Room, and Dianna walked over to the mirror above the fireplace. She pecked on the mirror and called out to Cloe and the little girl. Mist began forming on the mirror! She pointed to the left and said it was the little girl; to the right, Cloe. I could see the mist forming and the little girl's face. I could slightly see Cloe's face. Belle and I both took several pictures of this mirror. Dianna chuckled and left us alone.

Then...one of the spirits came out of the mirror! We could feel the energy once again. Even the hair on our heads crawled this time. Belle told the spirit that it was all right; that we would leave, which we did.

In the hallways, we took more pictures of the two portraits, the mousy woman and the man. The woman kept fading out and blurring when Belle looked through her camera lens. Finally she walked over to the portrait and placed her hand on it. She said, "It's all right. I only want to take a picture." She had no problem after that.

Later, Dianna told us some of her experiences in the house, as well as a few other tales. She confirmed that the Peach Room guests who had stayed there right before us had trouble. However, she said they didn't even spend the entire night in their room. Instead, they asked to be moved out to the more modern rooms separate from the manor house. I guess they had been informed how to contact someone if they had trouble or problems, or else they moved before nightfall!

Dianna had heard her name called numerous times while she was working alone in the house. One day she was in the men's parlor, cleaning the mirror over the fireplace. Behind her, she heard footsteps that sounded like men's boots crossing a hardwood floor. She also heard spurs jingling and swords slapping against legs. She froze and looked down at the floor in front of her. She was alone again, and she had no desire to look in the mirror and perhaps see who was crossing the room behind her! The footsteps went on into the game room. Dianna decided it was time for a break.

Dianna informed us that she had a picture of Cloe, which she took with her 35 mm. camera, but she didn't have it with her. She had also seen the lady in white on the grounds. She confirmed that Stirling roamed the stairs in the foyer between 8-9 p.m., which is when we experienced him. Dianna still wouldn't tell us what had happened to her when she mocked the little girls, however!

Linda picked us up on time at 11 a.m. She was still uneasy, but her uneasiness faded the further we got from St. Francisville. After a while, she even let us tell her what had happened to us.

After we got back to Texas, we dropped our film off to be developed at the Wal-Mart one-hour photo. We couldn't wait to see our pictures, so we looked at them right there at the counter when we picked them up. Suddenly I gasped and dropped one picture. Belle immediately rushed over to see what had made me cry out, and the picture was lying face-up on the counter. She also gasped, then said, "That's Cloe!"

It was. I had my very first ghost picture! It was a picture of the mirror, and in the lower left corner was a woman's head and shoulders, her face in profile. The woman was black, and she wore a green scarf around her neck. People who have seen Cloe's ghost report that the scarf she wears to cover her ear is green. However, in this picture the scarf is lying around Cloe's neck and you can't see her left ear.

We had some other very interesting pictures. In a picture I took after dark of the gazebo, it looks like it's on fire. My picture of the mousy woman is clear; the one Belle took is very faded. In Belle's picture of the man's portrait in the upstairs hallway, he appears to have blood all over his face. My picture of him is clear.

In one of Belle's pictures of the mirror in the Blue Room, you can see the reflection of a short wardrobe behind us, against the wall to the left of the door. There is a shiny object in the exact center that looks like a tiny chandelier. The picture taken when my camera malfunctioned at the stairway, with Belle on the seventeenth step, is extremely dark. The one I took the next morning is clear, but there is an eerie streak of white mist up the side of the carpet runner.

We went back to The Myrtles several times after that. In fact, The Myrtles is where my husband experienced his first ghost! But that's a different diary.

# Crossing Over

Is there truly life after death? Is there really another world—another _existence_ —across The Veil? If any ghost hunter is honest, I believe he or she will admit that's part of the reason paranormal research fascinates us. We glimpse other entities, even communicate with them at times. We have experiences that would send other people running for their lives, but which enthrall us. This is a large chunk of the motivation for us pursuing ghosts.

Early September, 1996. I'd been chasing ghosts a little over four years, including studying under some experienced paranormal professionals, when I received a call from one of my teachers. She asked if I would like to accompany her to a client's house to investigate reports of a possible ghost. Since I'd never been on a ghost hunt with her, to me this confirmed her verbal assurances to me that my psychic powers were developing. So of course I quickly accepted the invitation.

The client said she and her husband had been living on this isolated country rental property for a few months and believed they must have a ghost. Among other things, the stereo would turn on and off with no one near it, a set of crystal glasses had been, one by one, disintegrating for no reason, and on several nights someone had knocked on the front door at exactly three a.m. The husband would usually grab his shotgun and go to the door, but for some reason, he was afraid to open it. When he would call to ask who was there, no one would answer.

The happening that frightened them the most, and led to them calling my teacher, was that their two dogs absolutely cringed in terror when the couple tried to force them into one of the bathrooms for their weekly bathing. The dogs were perfectly contented anywhere else on the property and in the house, but scared to death of that one room. Since the woman was a client of my teacher, she knew that animals sensed the paranormal and that sometimes there could be evil attached.

Many times during investigations, people agree to have their story told...only if their identities are disguised. Therefore, we will call this couple June and Kevin, although I will use the location, which was in Keller, Texas. This one teacher and I have since parted ways, so we will call her Colleen. Since she lived in Dallas, I met her at a convenient place where I could leave my car and she drove us to Keller. In what I came to understand over the years was normal procedure, Colleen did not explain any more about the situation we would encounter, other than that if we did find a ghost in residence, and if the ghost wanted to cross through The Light, she would assist it in its quest. In fact, she hadn't let June tell her any more information after she agreed to take on the investigation. Paranormal research professionals with psychic powers want to have the mostly-telepathic communications with ghosts or spirits confirmed, either during or after the investigation. One way to do that is verify some of the information they receive. Slim as this proof is, it still validates the existence of another dimension to many of us.

September 16, we started out. It was a pretty drive after we got out of Dallas. In Keller, we eventually came to a winding, tree-shaded country road just as the sun set We drove down a fairly long driveway, common back in the days when people farmed their property. This being my first real investigation, I expected a Munsters-type house, and I geared myself up to hide my fear. We rounded a curve in the driveway to see a small, wooden, average-looking house. There were weathered shingles on the sides and one of those tin roofs that I'd always envisioned would make sleeping in a downpour a pleasant experience. I breathed out a silent sigh of relief. Maybe this would be interesting rather than frightening.

A porch ran across the front of this small house, and the couple evidently heard us approaching, since they met us out there. After greetings, we went inside for a short tour. Short, because the house consisted of a living room across the front of it, a bedroom and bath to the right, a living room behind the kitchen, and behind that, another bedroom and bath.

During this tour—in fact, from the first moment I entered the house—I felt a very heavy, pressing atmosphere. I kept quiet, though, and listened and learned, which was my job here, along with keeping notes. We ended up back in the living room and sat for only a moment before Colleen said she needed to walk around. She rose, and immediately said there wasn't just one ghost there; there were two. One was a man, one a woman. Neither of them knew about the other one!

The man was 57, 58 or 59, an older man, with gray hair. At first she said he died 8-10 years ago, but that could have been someone else, because as she continued, he came through clearer to her. First she got the initial "W", then the name Walter. He said he'd been an owner of this property were on. Then she got the last name "Hunt".

This happens frequently during investigations. For some reasons, it's extremely hard for ghosts to communicate, especially when they first find someone who is aware of them and can talk with them. One theory is that it takes a lot of energy for a ghost or spirit to interact with a living person. Therefore, we sometimes get a version of a name rather than the exact name. Usually, though, the name is very close to what we find when we do our after-investigation research. Also, as the investigation runs its course, the communication level heightens and becomes clearer.

With Colleen's attention on him, Walter excitedly began "talking" to her. She passed on what he said and asked Kevin and June for confirmation while I took notes.

Walter said there was a barn in the rear of the property, built in the early 1900's. Kevin confirmed the barn was there.

Walter gave the date of his death as 1917, and Colleen explained that the ghost was wearing jeans, a work shirt and boots. Walter said his wife's name was Annie, and they came from Tennessee in 1888. He also said there was a pond on the property, where he used to fish. Kevin confirmed the pond, but said it was in a little different location than what Walter indicated. He also said that this house we were in was not here then; the original house burned.

Sometimes at various points during a chat with a ghost, a psychic will pick up other things that don't pertain to the conversation with a certain ghost. I was glad that Colleen had let us know there was another ghost present. I'd been involved in this ghost hunt business for long enough now that I could tell when I was having sensations of my own experience. The other ghost, the lady, was frustrated. She wanted Colleen to talk to her. She had things she wanted to say and it had been a long while since she'd been around anyone who was aware of her existence. Colleen kept her shield up against this ghost in order to concentrate on Walter, but I was still a neophyte enough not to have perfected that power. This woman ghost evidently figured out that I also had some growing powers, and she began demanding me to acknowledge her. I call this "being all over me." It's the energy these ghosts radiate that I can feel. It's a sensation like walking into a spider web, making your skin crawl with the feeling. Only this feeling goes on and on, with not much you can do about it. That's what I began experiencing in a stronger and stronger way the longer Colleen talked with Walter.

Colleen was also picking up some other things besides Walter. She asked if June knew a George, who died of a heart attack. Astonished, June said yes, it was her uncle.

Then the name Louise came through to Colleen, and June said that was her mother's best friend's mother, someone who was like an aunt to June. Louise was very old, and lived back in Boston, where June grew up. It was possible Louise was now in spirit.

**I have a note here that says "one knew George". Guess that means that one of June's "aunts" knew George.**

Colleen turned her attention back to Walter: Walter said he broke horses, and Kevin confirmed they have horses there now. Walter seemed to really relate to Kevin and like to do the same things as Kevin did, like hunting and fishing.

At this point, Colleen asked if June or Kevin wanted to ask Walter some questions about some of the happenings in the house. They did:

Was Walter the one making the crystal glasses break? They said almost all of them had broken in the set, one at a time. Walter denied doing that.

They asked Walter if he was turning the stereo on and off, and he said no.

They asked him about the knocking in the middle of the night on the front door. Instead of telling them what Walter said, Colleen asked if they had coyotes. Kevin said yes, and that they had heard them howling many times. Colleen then told them that Walter said he would knock when the coyotes were coming around (usually about 3 a.m.) because he wanted Kevin to get his shotgun and shoot them, so they wouldn't hurt the horses. Kevin confirmed that several times he'd heard the knocks on the door about that time of morning, and taken his shotgun to the door, but not gone out.

Walter said, no, he hadn't stolen the missing carton of Cokes.

Yes, he had knocked on the window.

No, it wasn't him in the garage around the first of July, when June saw a man in there.

No, he wasn't the one who made the door shake and paralyze June with fright.

When asked if he was the one moving Kevin's wedding ring, Walter didn't want to confess.

Colleen got the name "Nana" coming through. Italian. She said she was there (alive) when June was born and that she was around June now.

Next the name Frank/Francis came through, along with the thought that it seemed to be the name of a place. June thought it might be the place where her grandmother was from in Italy.

Walter was anxious and still wanted to talk. He said he used to walk to town, and there used to be a town where the railroad crossing was. There was an old school or store there. Kevin was going to check on that, because he thought the closest place like that was pretty distant and would be quite a walk.

Walter said they always had a large garden; an acre or so, or at least a half acre.

Walter than said June was going to have a child soon. Dumbfounded, she confirmed they'd been thinking of it. She did not think she was pregnant right now, however, but might be. They were married Catholic.

Walter kept relating to Kevin, and started discussing all his broken bones from breaking horses. He really didn't want to go, so we could talk to the woman, but Colleen began to discipline him into minding his manners.

Colleen walked into the little hallway beside the living room and told us all that this was where Walter stayed. Although the others felt a strong cold spot there, at that point in my development, I didn't usually feel these cold spots. Mostly, I feel the goose bumps covering me and my hairs on my arms and legs rising up and standing up. I did feel a slight coldness around my feet in this spot, however, and over the years, I have felt many cold spots.

Colleen asked me how I was feeling. I told her that I wasn't afraid of Walter, but the woman was all over me, demanding attention. My flesh was crawling like it always does whenever I'm in the vicinity of a ghost or spirit. At times it was like this woman was engulfing me with her presence, with the goose bumps all over my arms and legs, and even the rest of my body. She followed me around, and when I would go to another part of the room, it wouldn't take her very long to find me again. I was very certain that it was the woman, also, and not Walter, who I was "feeling." I felt a lot of pressure on my chest, also, and had trouble breathing.

Finally Colleen said it was time to talk to her.

Almost at once, Colleen said the woman's name was Sarah, and that she'd come from Boston with June. In Boston, she lived in a gray house with three trees. The trees were very distinctive for some reason that the woman wasn't able to get across to Colleen.

Again astounded, June said that her house in Boston had white siding, but it looked gray. There were apple trees around it.

Sarah said she had drowned, but that it wasn't really murder. It also wasn't an accident. We didn't figure this out completely at first.

June said there was a pond behind the house where she lived. It froze in the winter, and they would ice skate.

Despite Sarah's insistence that she wanted our attention, she backed off for a while and seemed reluctant to tell us more about herself.

Colleen wandered through the kitchen and into the back bedroom. She had done this once before, but only briefly. This time we followed her. June repeated what she had told Colleen earlier, that the dogs refused to go into that bathroom without force. Colleen admitted to us that she absolutely did _not_ want to go into that bathroom for some reason. She said there must be an evil presence in there, and that we would get rid of it before we left. However, she needed some preparation before she did that.

When Kevin, June and I all followed Colleen into this bedroom, we felt something very strongly. All of our arms had the hairs standing on end on them, and Kevin and June both admitted they could feel some sort of presence. Colleen mentioned there might be an air conditioning vent causing it, but we couldn't find one in that room.

Sarah finally let us know she was around again and appeared to Colleen. Colleen said Sarah had on a long dress, a maroon or cinnamon color, and a gray coat with fur around it.

Colleen asked about the name Jake, and June said it was one of their dogs. But Colleen said this Jake was a man, and he'd quarreled with Sarah at a rendezvous they had at the pond.

We were still in the back bedroom now, and I couldn't stay in that room any longer. Colleen had to sit down on the bed once, too, and she said her stomach was upset and her head hurt. My stomach was, too, and getting worse. I didn't want to upchuck, so I went out into the kitchen area and sat on a stool by the bedroom door, taking notes.

Sarah said her name was Sarah Trueheart, and she was a schoolteacher. In 1890-01, she lived in the house that June's parents now occupied and that June had grown up in. Sarah's lover's name was John, but sometimes they called him Jake. When she fell in the pond, he wouldn't help her out of the water. He showed his true colors.

We were still a bit confused about Sarah's story, but suddenly I began getting impressions about Sarah. I told Colleen that I was sure Jake was married and Sarah was pregnant.

Sarah kept saying that June cold help her; June knew the answer. June asked her what she wanted her to do, but there was no answer.

Then Sarah told Colleen that the man's name was John Allen.

Sarah told Colleen to look at the Buddha faces in the wall. While I was standing outside the room, I thought I saw a face in the paneling, too, but it looked like the Sun God, Ra. When we looked this time, we could see the Buddha faces, and also buffalo faces. Colleen said Sarah stayed in this room because it was a very sacred room; her protection.

Sarah finally admitted that wanted her history and death researched. She didn't mean to cause Colleen stress, but that's what she wanted. She came with June because June was opening up to a more metaphysical level.

To this, June told us that her mother believed in ghosts, also. Therefore, it had always been a part of her life, and she had continued that interest when she moved to Texas. That's how she had found Colleen.

Sarah then started talking about John. She said he lived on the connecting property, not in June's house. There was a path between the two residences, which they used to meet. June said there used to be paths and trees around the pond behind her house. Now it was all developed over. Sarah said she followed the path to meet John/Jake.

June gave us some information about the house where she grew up, in Medford, Massachusetts. It was built back in the 1600's. North of Boston, it was at #254 Willis Avenue. The surrounding streets are Hicks Avenue, Exchange Avenue, Liberty Avenue, Sumner Avenue, and Ellis Avenue. For some reason, she said it was two-to-two-and-a-half hours from Hartford, Connecticut. [THIS WILL BE DELETED FOR PUBLICATION] Kevin lived in New Hampshire, forty-five minutes away. There are colleges in the area; many of them. When she said this, I got the impression that John/Jake was a professor.

Kevin wanted to discuss Walter again, specifically the knocks in the middle of the night. He said they were three distinct knocks, at three in the morning. He grabbed his shotgun only that last time. June heard the same thing. Once the dog was in bed with her, and the dog barked.

Colleen finally said it was time to lead Walter and Sarah to The Light. We all sat down and closed our eyes. She told us to imagine a light in the center of the room. Then to extend it out to the walls of the room. Then extend it all around the house.

Then we were to imagine a door in the middle of The Light. She started talking to Walter and Sarah and called them forth: "Walter Hunt, come forward." "Sarah Trueheart, come forward."

Walter came first, and I had everything I could do to stifle my excitement. I saw Walter in my mind! He was a little man, dressed in gray, and very happy go lucky. I definitely could not stop the huge grin from spreading across my face when I picked up his attitude. Walter stopped by the door, clicked his heels together, saluted, then went on through!

Then Colleen called Sarah again, and I saw her glide into my mind! Sarah moved more slowly. She had on a long dress and seemed rather hesitant. She looked at us, then turned toward the door. She would take a step or two, then hesitate. I heard Colleen whisper, "It's all right." After one last glance at us, Sarah went through the door.

After we opened our eyes, Colleen said: "They both went on through to The Light. Walter was real chipper about it. He clicked his heels and saluted. Sarah was more hesitant, but she went on through."

I looked at Colleen and said, "That's exactly what I saw!" She asked if it really was, and I said yes, it sure was! That she had described it exactly as I'd seen it in my mind. This is the first time anything like that ever happened to me. Later, Colleen told me that was my third eye seeing this happen; my psychic eye.

The atmosphere in the house was completely different now. The pressure was gone, and it was very peaceful. When I mentioned this to Colleen, she said it was always like that whenever the spirits went ahead and crossed over.

Yet we weren't done. We still had that bathroom to handle.

We all gathered in the back bedroom by that problem bathroom. Colleen asked Kevin to open a window that was in direct line with the bathroom door. After he did, she went into the bathroom and indicated for me to join her. When June and Kevin took a step forward, she said, "No, you two have to stay out here."

Then she shut the door, enclosing us in a small room that was barely large enough for the tub with the shower stall on it, a commode and tiny sink. She stood there quietly for a few moments. When she turned to me, I saw the serious intent on her face.

"What we are going go do in here is dangerous," she said. "But necessary. What's here is definitely evil. All you need to do is stay with me and lend your mental support. Whatever you do, don't run scared and open that bathroom door until I tell you that it's all right."

I gulped and nodded, giving it my best shot to trust her...albeit, frankly, it was hard to do. I'd heard about evil entities, but this would be the first one I'd ever dealt with.

Colleen began murmuring prayers, her voice rising at times, although never loud enough to be heard outside the door. Suddenly the shower stall began to shake violently. I backed up against the sink, but, stubborn and loyal, I didn't make a break for the door. This went on for probably twenty to thirty seconds.

Suddenly the shower stall fell quiet. Colleen opened the door and shouted, "Out!" Even from where I stood in the rear of that tiny room, I felt the rush of cold air exit the bathroom. I looked past Colleen and saw June and Kevin staring at the window.

"Hurry. Shut the window," Colleen said, and Kevin raced over to do her bidding.

"There...there was a strong rush of really cold air," June said. "I felt it."

"So did I," Kevin confirmed.

"It's all right now," Colleen said. "It's banished, and won't bother you again."

FOLLOWUP: On September 20, Colleen called me to update me on what June had found out: June called her mother up in the Boston area and talked to her about what Sarah had said, asking about the house where she grew up and where her parents used to live. Her mother said that at one point, they had taken the wallpaper off the wall in that house. Beneath it, they found Sarah Trueheart's name, along with John Allen's name right under it. The names were written on the wall and enclosed in a heart. Her mother also said that when June was two or three, she kept saying she couldn't sleep in her room. That she felt like she was drowning.

June also remembered something after we left. She said she was once engaged to a man. The day before the wedding, he asked her to go for a ride, and he was acting very strange. They went out by a lake, and he told her that he couldn't marry her. She immediately asked her to take her home, because of the weird way he was acting. She recalled being afraid that the man would hurt her if she didn't get away from him.

Colleen also reported that the dogs had no fear of bathroom now.

As to Walter, Colleen did some research in the public records of downtown Fort Worth. She found that the property in Keller had indeed once been owned by a man named Walter Hunt, but his wife's name was Alice, not Annie. Still that's close enough for ghost communication!

# Casino Carouser and Lakeside Lurker

Casino Carouser

There are times when I plan our vacation trips around ghost hunting, researching where I might run into, or track down, some disquiet spirits along the way. In June of 2008, however, all I had on my mind was a family reunion with my brother and sisters in Wisconsin and Minnesota. The ghosts could appear, or not, whatever their choice. They chose _to_.

We'd stayed at the attached hotel on prior trips, so I'd been in this casino in a small Wisconsin town dozens of times and thought I knew every inch of it, every machine on the floor. But this certain evening on June 15, Father's Day, I found another ladies restroom way back in an far corner. It was amazing that I hadn't noticed it, since it was within six feet of my favorite slot machines, Mr. Cashman. I love those one-armed bandits because they play really catchy music whenever one deigns to give you a few points in return for your money. Anyway, that night I used those facilities, although I'll admit to a funny feeling inside the somewhat quiet room, in contrast to the jolly noises in the casino. Eager to get back to the fun and excitement, I didn't pay much attention right then.

The next morning, while my husband got moving slowly, I visited the casino alone...and sure enough, had to call on that restroom near my Mr. Cashman slots. There was one other woman in there when I entered, and we both nodded sleepily at each other as we passed, her on the way out the door. As we women do, I checked the other three stalls and found I was now alone. And, as far as I could tell, no one else entered during the time I was in there. However, a few minutes later, as I was washing my hands before I left, I _felt_ someone walk behind me. I looked in the mirror...but there was no one there. I turned around...just as the door opened as though someone were walking through it. But no one walked out, and the door slowly closed on its hydraulic hinge.

"Huh," I mused. As a ghost hunter with many years experience, I wasn't afraid. Well, not _too_ afraid. I mean, there I was alone in an isolated room off in a corner of the casino, early in the morning, with hardly any other souls about, and I'd encountered a ghost. I hurriedly dried my hands and went back out where there was a bit more activity.

~~~

Lakeside Lurker

Don't let anyone tell you that new buildings don't have ghosts. On this vacation, my sister insisted on reserving us a room in a beautiful new hotel in Duluth, Minnesota, for our June 18 through 20 stay there. It was indeed a gorgeous place, built on the shore of Lake Superior, with what the town named the Lakewalk passing by. In the evenings, the hotel laid out S'mores makings and built fires in outside kilns for the guests to sit around and eat graham-cracker/chocolate/marshmallow sandwiches while they watched people stroll or jog past, many with their dogs in tow. I couldn't imagine a place that would be less susceptible to a haunting.

Our room was on the first floor, seven or eight doors down from the lobby. It was far enough away to be out of the activity, but close to the morning breakfast area. The first morning we enjoyed one of the hotel's famous hot-waffle breakfasts, and I headed back to our room while my husband stayed to eat a bite more. About halfway down the hallway to our room door, probably ten feet away, a man walked out of the room across from ours. Only...the door on that room never opened, nor did the door on our room as the man crossed the hallway and entered it. I saw him very plainly, unlike the invisible ghost in the casino. He was about five-foot-ten and had a bit of a potbelly. He wore a pale plaid shirt and blue jeans. I was too amazed to pay any attention to his shoes when his full-bodied apparitional self strode right across the hall and into our room.

Now, in my early days as a ghost hunter, I would have turned around and waited for someone to go with me into our room. This morning, I hurried on down the hall, plastic key in hand, and opened the door as quickly as possible.

Nope, no one in there. I even looked in the bathroom, behind the shower curtain. Our room was just outside the pool; in fact, another door opened out into that area, but the man wasn't out there, either. Perhaps the ghostly guest was taking a shortcut to watch bathing beauties. If so, I imagine he was disappointed, because all we ever saw in the pool during our stay were young children.

# Cry Baby Cry

Goshen Cemetery

October 10, 2008

It was a perfect night for hunting ghosts, although the moon was still five days from full. The Veil tatters and tears during the month of October, and by Halloween Night, or Samhain, as it is known in Wiccan lore, the barrier between the two dimensions is nearly transparent. Still, it remains unpredictable whether or not the spirits will grant us a visit or the ghosts will make their off-kilter presence known. This year by nearly mid-month, they were already out in force, especially those sad and bemoaning.

Goshen Cemetery is an often-visited location for members of a paranormal group to which I belong: NTPRS (North Texas Paranormal Research Society). It lies five miles down a lonely, dark road and it's one place where I, and anyone who accompanies me, wears one of my protections packets, which I'll explain in a moment. Our packets were welcome on October 10, and more than once, we touched them for reassurance.

This night was also the culmination of a somewhat dry spell for NTPRS. Personal matters had interfered with time for investigations for a long while, but I connected with a couple other members at a chance meeting and we were determined to find time for our favorite activity. We even took one new member with us, and someone who'd been a member for quite a while, but whom we hadn't managed to hunt together with until this night. This is one of the diaries where I do have permission to use folks' names, so it will be.

I bumped into NTPRS's founder, Billy York, in that chance meeting. His wife, Lucy, and his son, Thomas, were also there. I'd been staying in contact with a nice young man named Timmy Smith out in Eustace, Texas, near where Goshen Cemetery is located. I'd met Timmy one night when I led another group to Goshen without Billy and Lucy, and we'd formed an instant bond—as well as a ghost hunting rapport. It would be the first time, however, that we'd all hunted together.

Billy, Lucy and Thomas picked me up a little before 6 p.m. The weather was wonderful: cool, clear except for some white, puffy clouds, pretty much calm winds, and in the mid-60's. Then we proceeded to where Timmy lives and added him to our group. Due to an unavoidable delay, we arrived at Goshen somewhat later than we normally do. I didn't check my wristwatch, but it was probably around 8:30 or so, and after dark. It appeared the mist that always precursors the activities at Goshen had already emerged from the copse of trees in the corner by the actual entrance to the cemetery.

There was a bonfire burning several hundred yards away, and we could smell the smoke. Also, at first we thought the smoke had settled into some of the low-lying areas around the graveyard, but eventually we realized it was only night-fog—distinctly different than that eerie mist that crawls out of the dark to herald the tearing open of The Veil.

As hinted in my opening, we consider Goshen a cemetery that can be dangerous, even extremely hazardous at times. Various member of our hunting parties have fallen at times, then insisted that they were pushed or shoved. For years, there were numerous iron crosses about three feet high in the cemetery, and I don't stretch the point at all when I say that more than once, these falls culminated near those crosses, almost as though in an attempt to impale someone. One dark night, my cousin became very upset when she insisted that something had hold of her upper arm and would not turn loose. She finally got free, and we found what looked like dark fingerprint bruises on her arm.

This was Billy's first time back at this cemetery — in fact, his first ghost hunt — since he had doubled over one night with the sensation that he was being choked by some invisible entity attempting to kill him. This happened not only once, but twice, and Billy could not fight it off. That night two years ago, Lucy and I battled that entity with everything we had. I can recall standing nose-to-nose with a dark entity once it had freed Billy, cursing and screaming at it. I could actually see this dark presence. Finally, it backed away from us. Billy had bruises on his neck from that experience, and the lingering trauma effected him for a long while.

Our experience with that dark demon sent me to the internet to research protections from evil entities. To this day — or night — none of us will enter Goshen without these powerful packets of protection. I learned my lesson the first time I went back to Goshen after the attack on Billy. I insisted everyone else wear their packets, but I decided to experiment with my own psychic protection powers — and they failed. I noticed a dark shape that appeared to be dressed in cowboy garb — an entity I believe was the same one that attacked Billy and we fought the previous trip. He was leaning up against a dead tree. At nearly the same instant as I saw him, he disappeared, then I experienced the sensation that he was trying to possess me. Luckily, Aunt Belle carried two protection packets that evening and immediately pinned one on me. The entity backed off, although it hung around just outside the protected area surrounding us.

Thus, given our previous experiences at Goshen, we all donned our protection packets as soon as we got out of Lucy's van, pinning them over our hearts. Timmy already had his, which I'd given him long ago. He, too, always protects himself at Goshen after his own dangerous experience before the cemetery commission removed those hazardous iron crosses.

We walked down the long driveway to the entrance gates, always a dark walk, far different than when we reach the white, reflective sands in the actual cemetery. There, especially with the moon shining, we only need our flashlights occasionally. New gates had been installed, so we couldn't climb through as we used to do. But there was another gate, open and unlocked. We started slowly, as we always do, near the entrance to the graveyard and where the open-air building and benches are. I had mislaid my infrared thermometer (which registers the temperature in Fahrenheit degrees), so I borrowed Timmy's, and I also carried my digital camera. Billy had one of his high-tech digitals with night vision. Timmy was using his night scope, and Thomas used Timmy's EMF meter.

I wandered over by the cowboy's grave, where we usually get some spikes on the EMF or, at the least, drops in temperature. This time nothing showed up on the infrared until...I got to the front of the grave. Or...maybe it's the bottom; I haven't figured out yet which way the cowboy is buried out there. Then the infrared dipped down to between 40 and 50 degrees. However, that soon changed.

We started encountering extremely cold spots. They seemed to affect Billy at first, and he was experiencing goose bump crawls on his arms and back. When I got close to him, I could feel the change in temperature. The infrared began registering lows of around 30, but the EMF did not react at this point.

We hadn't gone far when Billy encountered yet another cold spot. This time, the infrared registered 19 degrees! Also, when I was behind Billy and breathed across his shoulder, the others noticed that they could see my breath in the air. At 65 degrees air temperature, that should not have been possible — but it happened. Of course, everyone else gathered around Billy and yes, we could see their breaths, also. Rather cool.

As the night wore on, all of us experienced those extremely cold spots and the drastic drops in temperature in various areas. At one point, Billy was shivering so badly that all of us could see him shaking from head to toe. We could only escape those icy cold areas by moving away from them. The EMF meter that Thomas carried also started spiking... but mostly only briefly or when he held it far above the head of whoever was encountering the cold spot. Each time all of us felt those changes in temperatures, but the cold always sent one of us into more intense shivers than the rest.

It's always interesting to watch a new member of our group on his or her first hunt. Thomas appeared fascinated with the EMF meter, but more fascinated with the fact that he was actually seeing and experiencing some of the same things as his father. Timmy is an old-hand at Goshen, and he was catching glimpses of some of the entities we ran across.

Although all of us underwent some of the phenomena at Goshen, this night pretty much turned into Billy's night. Soon, he was telepathically hearing names, something that had started occurring for him during a trip to Dry Creek a couple years earlier. He would start searching among the gravestones, led in different directions by the strength of the sound of the name in his head. He would nearly always end up at a gravestone with that name on it.

This night, the first name he heard was Mary Lynne. Within a few seconds, he was standing by a gravestone with the name Mary L. on it. Then Mary L. appeared to Billy, walking back and forth, wringing her hands. We tried to communicate with her and see what her problem was, but she didn't appear aware of our presence. We'll return to Mary L. in a moment, but first we wandered on toward the back of Goshen.

Since Billy and Lucy had last visited, a new section had been appended. The back fence was removed and the land cleared. The area already contains a few recent graves that Timmy pointed out as he and I led the group: a young man who lies at the farthest corner of this section; a policeman killed in the line of duty; and a few other resting places of some locals. At one point, Billy told us a young child had joined our group, a boy named Ryan. Again, we tried to communicate with this child with no result. I talked to him, telling him that he would be able to see his parents if he crossed through The Light, but he wouldn't acknowledge me. He appeared to know that we were there, since he walked with us for a ways, but he didn't want to communicate. Also, as we walked further away from Mary L.'s grave, Billy told us that at first he kept hearing her wails and sobs, but soon they disappeared.

I was starting to believe that my protection packet was interfering with my ability to hear and talk to the entities at Goshen, but I wasn't about to take it off. Should I go back with Aunt Belle, I might take that chance, but not without her presence.

At one point while we walked toward the new section, Lucy, Thomas and I all heard a baby cry. I even turned around and looked back when I heard this. I asked, and the other two confirmed that yes, that was what they heard, although Billy and Timmy did not hear it. As near as I could tell, this was somewhere around 9:30, since we spent an additional hour or longer in the cemetery. Again, there will be more about this baby cry later!

Then...we saw something moving along the ground. This time, each and every one of us halted and gasped, no doubt in our minds at all that we were seeing something. A moment later we all saw a poor little puppy. It whimpered and slunk closer to us, but it took several moments to get her to trust us, to let us pet her. Soon she joined us and her little tail came out from under her tummy. She was probably three-four months old, a blonde and white puppy that looked like she might have some pit bull in her. She stayed with us for the rest of the evening.

As we started back into the old part, the baby cried once more.

Then Billy saw and heard Mary L. again. This time, he could make out something she was saying. She was searching for James. She desperately wanted to find James. Billy examined the graves beside Mary L.'s. Sure enough, two gravestones down was a stone with James on it. We kept talking to Mary L., telling her that James was close to her, and she finally appeared appeased and faded away.

We were getting some orb pictures by now, although some of them were obviously dust. Others, however, were in the areas where we saw shadow movements and very possibly could be spirit orbs. Over the years, we have seen a dark entity at Goshen, although I'm not sure if it is always the same one. However, from various descriptions, it appears to be. It's a man, and he wears black. I've seen him as a black shadow walking back and forth across the graveyard. I don't believe he is the same entity that tried to possess me that one night, since that other entity was dressed as a cowboy. This one is wearing a dark coat or cape... or at least, that description fits the one I saw this night and which others have reported.

Billy had been seeing this man for a while, at about the same time he saw and heard Mary L. At first, he was in the lower part of the cemetery. Billy said it seemed the man wanted to move elsewhere, but he was somewhat afraid of us. So he stayed where he was. Later, as we walked back from the new section, Billy saw the man again. Without our interfering presence, he had crossed to the other side of the cemetery. Still, he appeared wary of us and didn't want to get close. It could have been the protection packets we all wore. In fact, at one point, Billy mentioned how unafraid he was this night; that he'd never felt so unafraid before out at Goshen. I reminded him that this was the first time he'd visited this graveyard wearing a protection packet.

Billy took a picture of the area where the man was standing. A huge orb appeared in it. I, also, took a picture, and what looked like the exact same orb showed up. By then, there were also orbs crossing the viewing space on Billy's night vision digital and we caught a few colored ones on film. Plus, now and then we could see some with the naked eye.

About this time, Billy got another name: Lillian. He searched around, and near a tree where wind chimes hang, he found a gravestone with a variation of Lillian on it. Since names can get garbled when ghost or spirits try to communicate with us, I have no doubt that was the name he was hearing.

Then...we heard a car door slam. More than once on our trips to Goshen, this has meant we are about to get invaded by some of the area teenagers, who truly ruin the evening for us. We waited for a while, hoping whoever had showed up would leave. No such luck. We saw a flashlight bobbing down the driveway toward the gate. We gathered together to wait and see what would happen now. The last time something like this happened, I'd met Timmy, which was a good occurrence. I found myself hoping this incident would prove to be the same sort.

Whoever held the flashlight trained it on our faces as he or she got closer. It blinded me and hurt my eyes. I said somewhat loudly: "I wish whoever that is would get that darn light out of my eyes." Then I turned on my flashlight and shined it back at that person's face!

Uh oh. The next words we heard were : "Police!" I dropped my light fast, and the policeman also had the courtesy to keep his light shining on the ground.

Timmy started forward first. "Hello, Officer," he said in a calm, reasonable voice. "We're with North Texas Paranormal Research Society and we're out here doing an investigation."

"Oh," the policeman said. "I've heard of y'all. Don't you have a web site?"

_Whew_ , I breathed, then joined Timmy to chat with the officer, who introduced himself as Officer Riggel. Turned out, Officer Riggel had some experience himself with the paranormal from an English teacher in high school, and we had a nice discussion. He informed us that the various law enforcement offices patrol in the Goshen area several times a night, trying to limit the damage to the tombstones. He was with the Athens Police Force himself, but the county law enforcement offices all cooperated with each other and we might encounter an officer from any one of the various jurisdictions. I informed him that Timmy lived near the cemetery and was someone who tried to correct as much damage as he could when he found it. The officer appeared to think that was a really decent thing to do on Timmy's part.

I also asked the officer if he could perhaps take the puppy with him, since I knew there was a no-kill shelter in the area. However, he said he wouldn't be able to do that, since he wasn't equipped to handle a puppy in the patrol car.

Before Officer Riggel left, he asked us to let him know if we encountered anything really interesting that evening. He also said we could call ahead whenever we were going to be hunting Goshen and let the law enforcement officials know that we'd be in the cemetery. None of them had any problem with us investigating here, since we were a well-known group.

After the officer left, we realized how late it was. To this point, none of us have ever had the nerve to be in Goshen at midnight, although Timmy continues to urge us to do so. But he was out-voted, and we started wandering toward the gate. Again, we encountered extreme cold spots with temperatures on the infrared dropping into the lower teens. Billy would actually call Lucy over and ask her to stand with him. One picture I took during this trip out showed a snow-white orb... perhaps an icy cold spirit? Also, again, Thomas would hold the EMF meter above the head of the person experiencing the cold and it would spike. The infrared thermometer at times fell to nearly zero degrees.

On the walk back to the gate, Lucy and I discussed how we hadn't been able to communicate across The Veil as we had on other trips together. She was afraid that she'd gotten "rusty," but I told her the same thing had happened to me that night, so that wasn't it. My impression was this was all Billy's night; the energy had centered around him for some reason.

We dropped Timmy off, then drove on home, as usual, discussing the evening's happenings. I arrived home around 11:30 p.m... and here the baby drops back into our story.

I found my husband awake in bed, although it was far past his normal time to fall asleep. He immediately asked me if this was the first time I'd been home since leaving earlier that evening. Of course, I told him yes it was, and wanted to know why he asked.

"Well," he said, "I've been watching TV, but drifting off now and then. One time when I woke up, around 9:30 or so, I heard people talking out in the dining room. Then I heard a baby cry. I assumed that you had all returned and thought maybe Lucy had brought her children over for some reason."

"No, we've been out at Goshen all this time," I said. "And besides, Lucy and Billy's kids are older now. The little girl is two."

"I figured that out... or at least, that you weren't in the dining room. I fell asleep again, then woke up and realized you weren't in bed. So I put my robe on and went out into the dining room to see if you were still out there. There was no one there at all! But I swear I heard people talking about a half-hour earlier, plus I know I heard that baby cry."

I told him about the baby cries in the cemetery, which occurred around the same time, and also emailed Billy and Lucy.

Hopefully, NTPRS will continue to hunt ghosts. When we do manage to get together, we all realize how much we miss our ventures. And, although I doubt we'll ever find another place as active as Goshen, there are still numerous cemeteries to prowl and haunted places to investigate.

# The Pissed-Off Ghost

"I think I pissed this ghost off," Aunt Belle said when I finally returned her phone call. "So we may have some trouble with him."

"Just what did you do to antagonize him?" I asked.

"Well... I tried to reason with him by myself. I told him that he had to behave and quit scaring the man who lives in the house and his daughter. He told me to mind my own business. So I threatened him with you. Told him in no uncertain terms that as soon as you got here, we would combine our powers and banish him."

_Uh oh._ We already had a touchy situation here. Experienced ghost hunters by now, Aunt Belle and I believe in discipline for the ghosts we encounter. But ghosts carry their living personalities with them into death. A crotchety, ill-mannered person in life will continue to be that way as a ghost, and past incidents had shown that these ghosts could be aggressive, stubborn, and defiant. And here I was way down at our deer camp in the boon-docks of central Texas, where coyotes howl at night and deer and vicious wild hogs abound, along with the occasional bobcat and mountain lion. We have rifles and pistols to take care of any animal danger, but I'd left the ghost-busting supplies we use when we confront an antagonistic paranormal entity a hundred and fifty miles away. _Double uh oh_. This could turn nasty.

After I found out where this ghost "lived" — a short ways down the road from Belle's house on an isolated sand-and-gravel road — I assured my aunt I would drive over in the morning. Then I reflected that this ghost had somehow already started putting up his defenses. I'd left home that morning with no idea I would encounter a ghost on this trip, missing Belle's phone call in which she asked me to bring our ghost-busting supplies to do another house cleansing. We'd have a hard time getting new materials out here where the closest stores were fifteen miles away, in a town with one traffic light, and definitely no new-age store.

Nothing else for it, though. We'd been called upon, Belle had promised our help, and we _would_ confront this ghost.

I continued to feel the ghost's defenses as I tried to get to Belle's house the next morning. She lives about five miles from our camp, if I go the short route. No problems at first, but a mile from my destination, a huge gravel truck was stuck at an intersection, blocking the road I needed to turn onto. _Huh. This ghost is determined I'll have as much trouble as possible routing him out of his haunting._

A young Hispanic guy stood by the gravel truck, looking hot and miserable. Since this is country and I didn't feel apprehensive about this young man, I rolled down my window. As he approached, I asked, "How long do you think it will be before you get your truck out of that ditch? I'm on my way to my aunt's, and she lives down that road that you're blocking."

The young man explained that he had come out there with another man who drove "the blade" (the road grader) to work on the roads. They had been given the wrong directions, and when he tried to turn around, he got stuck in the ditch. Since he was out here all alone, I didn't feel it prudent to tell him that he was less than a mile from a haunted house with a ticked-off ghost, so I stayed silent about that. He shrugged and explained that whenever "the blade" got back, it would pull him out. However, "the blade" was supposed to have been there by now, and he had no idea what had happened to it.

I offered to take him down the other road and find "the blade." He was extremely grateful, and we drove down another narrow sand and gravel road looking for signs of the blade and driver, but nothing had disturbed the road surface. Finally, we found the road grader a few miles away. The man in it said he had also gotten lost and couldn't find his way back to where the gravel truck was stuck! I left the two of them together, gritting my teeth at this ghost's attempts to thwart my journey, and drove the long way around to Belle's house, giving the ghost that tally on his side.

When I arrived, I informed Belle what was going on, adding that I felt this ghost down the road really was pissed off and, "It's all your fault." We laughed about that, but it just made us more determined to see this confrontation through. Then I found out more on this situation.

There are several rental properties down these isolated sand and gravel roads, where there is privacy, peace and quiet. The houses are scattered on thousands of acres of long-held family land, now owned by an elderly lady in her 80's, and have been used for both slaves and migrant workers for generations. There is a lot of history associated with the houses and the families that occupied them.

Belle rents one of these houses, which has its own spiritual boarders, but that's another story. The haunted house down the road a ways is a wooden frame, with two bedrooms, a living area, kitchen, laundry room and an attic. It's fenced, with a gate and lock on the end of a long, sandy driveway that leads up to the house. Dana, the man who currently rented this house, was getting a divorce. He wanted a place where he could have his daughter with him on the weekends. However, he soon realized the house was haunted.

Belle's daughter, Shari, cleans house for Dana, and Dana started telling Shari about the weird events in the house. He insisted that he'd always been a non-believer, but this house and his experiences had changed his mind. Belle and I are well aware that not everyone is as comfortable with ghosts as we are, and we understood Dana's fright.

Dana explained to Shari that he always had an eerie feeling in the house, and one night, he woke up and saw a man standing at the foot of his bed. Of course, he was the only one in the house at the time. Then when his daughter stayed with him one night, she was totally freaked. She said something bothered her all night long, interrupting her sleep and giving her the willies. Dana talked to someone who had rented the house before him. There is a trap door over Dana's bed, which leads to the attic. The other man said that he would wake up and find that trap door open. He would shut it, but the next time he woke up, it would be open again. He finally put duct tape on the door to seal it off. That didn't work. When he woke up the next time, it was again open.

It finally got so bad for Dana that he didn't want to sleep in that house at night. He added that his daughter refused to return. Even though he understood why — if a ghost upset a man in his early fifties, he could imagine how it would effect a teenage girl — that distressed Dana even more. He wanted to spend time with his daughter, stay close to her, and he couldn't do that under these circumstances. Well, he told the right person, Shari being Belle's daughter. She informed him about her mother and cousin, ghost hunters who also did house cleansings, and said we'd be glad to check things out for him.

Since I wasn't available, Belle decided to go over alone and see what she could pick up. She definitely felt the presence of two ghosts. One was a little old lady in the kitchen, who seemed friendly enough. But the other one was a man whom she didn't care for at all. She went ahead and tried to reason with the male ghost, but he refused all her attempts to get him to behave. She finally threatened him with the aforementioned banishment as soon as I arrived. That's when she said she got the feeling that she had pissed him off. She also got a strong feeling that someone had been hanged there, but she wasn't sure if it was this man or someone else. Additionally, she felt that the house was two-story; however, she concluded that sensation might pertain to it having an attic. Since she decided she'd done enough damage alone, she retreated to wait for me.

Shortly after Belle visited the house alone, the evening before I arrived at deer camp, Dana stopped by the house to put a load of clothing in the dryer. He wasn't as afraid in daylight, but he still didn't intend to spend the night there. Leaving the dryer running, he locked the house and drove off to stay with a friend. He came home the next morning and the dryer door was open, the clothes flung all around the laundry room. The moment he saw this, the hairs on Dana's body all stood up, and he ran out of there. He called Shari, who called Belle, confirming the fact that Belle had antagonized this ghost with her threats. _I'll show you,_ the ghost appeared to be saying defiantly. _I'm_ living _here now, and I intend to stay. I'm stronger than you are!_

Had the ghost known Belle and me better, he would have realized that he'd done exactly the wrong thing in showing off his powers. We can be a lot more stubborn than a ghost, and we've handled other defiant ghosts in our career.

Belle informed me that we were scheduled to go over to this haunted house late that afternoon and confront the pissed-off ghost. Then we decided to try to gather up a new set of our ghost-busting supplies around there, since it was clear we needed to cleanse this house sooner, not later. From past experience, we knew that this ghost was angry now, and it would continue to wreak havoc, each instance getting more and more violent. I happened to have one of my protection packets with me in the car. We use these when we go to a haunted place where we have sensed evil or a very strong, disruptive presence. It could be a nasty ghost, but sometimes it's an entity of another sort.

The packets contain a variety of herbs and other materials, including quince seeds, which we have researched and found by experience will deter ghosts and protect us from evil. Everything in the packets has been blessed and consecrated, both by me and through a Wiccan consecration that a friend does for us. We needed a few other things, though. Shari had some sea salt, Belle had some sage, and we bought some olive oil and a white candle that afternoon on our shopping trip to town. I took everything we had scrounged up and performed a consecration ceremony over it. _There._ We were as well prepared as possible — although we never make the mistake of feeling over-confident when we're on one of these ventures. Each experience is different; each set of ghosts as varied as living people; each situation potentially hazardous to our health and well-being if we go into it with a cocky attitude.

We could almost see the haunted house from Belle's porch, and I passed it on my way back to camp, since several hours later, I figured the gravel truck would be gone. So I drove back the short way this trip. I didn't slow down as I passed by the driveway that led to Dana's house, though. I didn't want to confront this ghost alone.

When I arrived back at camp, I breathed a little sigh of relief. Our friend Donna was there. Donna also has strong psychic powers, and without hesitation, I decided to see if she would like to tag along on this cleansing. Another set of psychic powers would be welcome when we confronted this ghost and its defiance of our abilities.

"I'd love to go!" Donna said. "I've never been involved in a cleansing, so this will be a new and interesting experience for me."

I cautioned her this ghost wasn't going to be an easy cleanse, but that just made her more determined to join us. I'll admit, I was smirking a bit inside at the thought of the three of us together on this venture. _Just you wait, Mr. Nasty Ghost!_

A little before 4 p.m., Donna and I headed back over to Belle's. Shari soon arrived, and Belle's other daughter, Sammi, was also there. As we gathered on Belle's porch, Dana called and informed us that he'd been delayed at work (another ghostly deterrent?), then asked us to wait for him before we went over to the house. So we ended up sitting around for another hour or so. We finally heard a pickup engine roaring down the road hell-bent-for-leather, a cloud of dust trailing it. Dana had arrived.

He pulled into Belle's driveway, and we could tell that he was extremely nervous. The first words out of his mouth were: "I've been a total non-believer for fifty years — until these things started happening to me. Now I believe, and I want y'all to make this stuff happening in my house stop. Preferably, immediately."

He jabbered on for a few minutes, but we finally got him calmed down by telling him that we couldn't do anything from a distance, we needed to go over to the house. He grew silent at last, rather tense, and his gaze drifted across the field separating his and Belle's house. He was a trooper, though, and said he would lead the way so he could unlock the gate.

We piled into two other vehicles. Donna, Belle and I went in my car, Shari and Sammi in Shari's truck. Dana led us down the road and opened the gate. His beautiful roan horse, Rooster, came out to meet us. I noticed that Rooster didn't appear upset at the haunting. At times we encounter animals who are nearly as upset at the other-world presences in their territory as the humans are, but Rooster was a calm, friendly horse. This ghost must have liked animals, a strike in his favor in my mind.

We all parked and everyone else piled out to greet Rooster before they headed for the house. I lagged behind, because I wanted to see what I could sense, and Donna stayed with me. I'd already felt something as soon as I pulled in the driveway, but all I could confirm was that it was a man, not a woman.

I'd parked a little farther from the house than the others, and as soon as I got out of the car, I experienced a huge cold spot that encompassed quite a bit of area around my car and out through the field in front of us. It was the largest cold spot I've ever encountered. I asked Donna if she felt the cold spot, and she did.

Suddenly, almost as though I were watching a movie through a fog, I saw a man and woman about 20 feet in front of me. The man was dark-haired, the woman blond, and they wore clothing that seemed to be from the late 1930's or early 1940's. The man gripped the woman's shoulders and shook her violently.

"You've been cheating on me!" he screamed.

"No, no, I haven't," she pleaded in a frightened voice. "I haven't!"

"Liar!" he yelled, then grabbed a rock in the driveway and smashed it into the woman's head.

She crumbled to the ground and lay there without movement, bleeding into the sand from her head wound. I knew without doubt that she was dead. The man stood there, his anger gone now and horrified at what he had done. He whispered her name, but I couldn't make it out. He reached down and touched her, then straightened with tears running down his face. Then he dropped the rock and ran. The scene faded.

I didn't mention this to anyone else at first, even Donna. The two of us joined the others on the porch and met Dana's young border collie, which he'd only adopted a few weeks earlier. Now this animal acted somewhat apprehensive and shy, which could have had to do with the fact that she didn't care for whatever entity was around her. Or, she very well could have been overwhelmed with all the new people entering her territory.

"How does she act when you let her in the house?" I asked Dana. However, he informed me that she wasn't allowed in the house. I'd asked this because we've found numerous instances where animals won't enter a room that is haunted, but after we do a cleansing or help the ghosts in residence cross through The Light, the animals roam the house unafraid.

We all entered the house through the front door into the living room. Dana was still terribly nervous and kept talking and talking. There was a heavy, somewhat threatening atmosphere in here, something we find time and again before we start a cleansing. Dana was definitely bachelor-ing, since he didn't have much furniture in the house, no pictures on the walls and no personal items scattered around. The heavy atmosphere seemed denser on the left side of the room, and although I slowly gazed around, I didn't _see_ anyone else in there besides the living people.

To the left of the living room was Dana's bedroom, and we went in there next. He did have a bed and dresser, as well as stereo equipment. There was a noticeable temperature drop, and there above his bed was that trap door, closed. Dana explained the bedroom his daughter had used that one night was through the next door to the left. Since everyone was still chatting beside Dana's bed, I wandered on into this other bedroom and Donna followed me.

In here, the only piece of furniture was another bed. Goose bumps immediately chased themselves over my body, a positive indication of paranormal phenomena. These aren't necessarily cold chills, although sometimes cold does accompany them. These are more like an energy traveling around, and sometimes through, your body, lifting the hairs on your head, arms, and legs. Something like a breeze without any wind behind it, just energy. At times, I explain it as though running into invisible spider webs.

"Whatever's in here is very strong," I murmured to Donna. "I think it's the man."

"I feel it, too," she conceded.

Then I got a somewhat foggy picture of the man in there, the same person I had seen in the driveway. I think it baffled him that I didn't confront him right away, since he'd been so adamant about making his presence known to me via his energy. However, these things take preparation, and I wasn't quite ready yet.

I was drawn to the closet and stuck my hand inside.

"Donna," I called. "Come over here. Stick your hand in the closet and tell me what you feel."

"A definite cold spot," she confirmed.

As I started to leave this room, the ghost mentally said to me, _So you're the one that other one's been waiting for, huh? You think you can make me leave._

Just to aggravate him a bit more, I ignored him and walked on out of the room. I could mentally hear him huff in irritation behind me.

Donna and I walked on through Dana's bedroom, into the laundry room. Yep, there was the washer and dryer, but no clothes scattered around. Dana joined us from wherever he had been and chattered on again about the morning he had found the dryer door open and his clothes thrown all around the room. We just smiled and nodded at him, and continued on.

Donna got involved with a conversation with the others in our group, and I walked into the kitchen alone. All at once a huge smile spread over my face, growing from the inner feeling there was a happy woman in here — although at first there wasn't a sign of anyone else in this room with me. There was a small table, lots of windows and light, and one wall lined with cupboards. As I opened cupboard doors, though, the only thing I found was a bottle of Crown Royal. Cool, since that's my drink of choice. As I walked around, I realized the lady in there was a friendly ghost, a happy person when she lived. She was a bit leery of me at first, but eventually I could visualize her and she started to mentally communicate with me.

_I'm sorry that they are afraid of me,_ she said. _All I want to do is bake some cookies for his daughter._

For then, I just nodded and continued into the living room, where everyone else had gathered. I looked at Belle and since we can communicate without words ourselves sometimes, she knew what I wanted.

"I still feel two of them," she said. "The lady in the kitchen and the man who's here. And he's still pissed off at you and me both."

"I agree," I said. "He was all over me in that second bedroom, making sure I knew he was there and that he wasn't leaving."

"We'll see about that," Belle said.

"Yep."

Finally, we were prepared to get to work. We wanted to make sure we cleansed everything, so we had Dana open the attic trapdoor. Then we asked him to open one window in the second bedroom, since we need an exit place for ghosts we chase off.

Dana, Sammi and Shari went out onto the porch and we closed the door behind them. Donna, Belle and I started the cleansing. Most of the time, we leave whatever we feel is the most haunted room in the house until last. However, this time, something told me that we should do the two bedrooms first, and I always follow my instincts in these situations. During our cleansings, Belle carries the sea salt and I use our sage and olive oil. I gave Donna the white candle to carry. We entered Dana's bedroom, lit the candle and after several more matches, got the sage burning. Sage is always hard to start, but once it flares, it will continue to burn. Then we closed the door on Dana's bedroom. I traced olive oil crosses on it so nothing could escape behind us, and we set out to either discipline or banish this defiant ghost.

I made sure the sage smoke got into all the corners of the room, as well as up into the attic, and also traced crosses on the top and sides of each window. Belle sprinkled sea salt around the baseboards and across the windowsills. Donna carried the white candle for additional purification.

Despite the fact I knew this ghost had killed his wife, I wasn't afraid of him. Fear can be detrimental, feeding the entity's own energy. We were just determined he leave, because his presence had turned into a haunting that frightened others. I was also on guard against the ghost perhaps trying to attack us, since he'd made his defiance clear, but the longer we worked, the less this bothered me. Part of this, I believe, was that we also had Donna with us, as I'd anticipated. That gave us three-fold psychic energy, when the energy between Belle and me is pretty powerful in and of itself. We've proven this over and over again across the years we've ghost hunted together. Our attitudes meshed, also, confidence in our abilities. We're never unsympathetic to the ghosts, especially ones with tragic stories to tell. However, we firmly feel that their place is across The Veil rather than here, especially if they are causing trouble and seeming to enjoy frightening people.

We cleansed Dana's bedroom, then the went into the second bedroom. All three of us shivered slightly when we walked into the ghost's energy. At first, we continued to refuse to acknowledge him, and I sensed his confusion. Ghosts are torn at times, delighted that someone recognizes their presence, since they have been invisible for so long, yet unsure what we intend. This ghost had been warned, however, so he was also defensive. He stood off in a corner at last, _watching_ us while we worked.

After we had cleansed the far side of the room, including the closet, I walked toward where the ghost stood in the corner. When I got behind him, I approached the open window. The ghost was on the run; we could feel his presence in front of us, moving toward the window. But he wasn't done yet and tried to thwart us, as usually happens. Instead of going out the window, he evaded us and we felt his energy behind us. By then, the ghost was aware that yes, we could get rid of it, and it was his turn to be somewhat frightened.

At these points in our cleansings, Belle and I always wrap our arms around each other, get behind the ghost and herd it toward the window again. This time, we also had Donna join us. The ghost balked again and laid down on the floor to try to escape us. We could feel it around our legs. When I glanced at Belle, she confirmed this by saying, "He's still here. He hasn't left yet."

It was time to do some talking to this entity.

"We know you're still here," I firmly told him. "And it's time for you to leave. The reason you have to leave is that you've been causing trouble here, frightening people. We don't tolerate that. You will leave this house and never return." We tightened our arms around each other, concentrating our energy.

The ghost was finally defeated. He gave up fighting us and flowed out the window. We closed it, and voila! He was gone... at least, from the house. I traced olive oil crosses on each side of the window, and Belle sprinkled sea salt on the windowsill. Neither this ghost nor any others would ever cross this threshold again.

We cleansed the rest of the house, telling the little lady in the kitchen that she could stay, if she behaved. We'd mentioned her to Dana earlier, and he agreed that if she was friendly, he had no problem with her. However, Belle informed the lady sternly that she was not to appear to the daughter or cause any problems that would make her afraid. If she did, we would return and she'd have to go.

Once we were done, we walked back through the house. As always, the atmosphere was light and pleasant. Then we opened the door and told the others they could come back in. Even Dana admitted that the house felt much more homey. We walked through again and encountered no cold spots. Even the very prevalent one in the second bedroom closet had vanished.

We gathered on the porch to chat for a while and exchange stories, opening up a bit more with Dana. Earlier, we hadn't wanted to frighten him any more than he already was. Belle finally told him that she had felt someone was hanged in the house. I started thinking about my experience in the driveway and wondered if maybe the man hadn't escaped. Perhaps he was caught and hanged. The hanging didn't necessarily have to have happened there at the house. His presence when he returned after death could have given Belle that sensation, the sensation of how the man had actually died.

I then told them what I'd felt in the driveway, what I'd sensed and seen. Dana asked me when this incident had occurred.

"Around 79 years ago," I said, which was exactly the words I sensed flow into my mind. Then I realized this confirmed the clothing style. "The reason he's staying around is because he's looking for his wife," I explained. "But I'm sensing now that he's ready to cross over." Belle added that she believed Dana's daughter resembled this ghost's dead wife, thus the reason the ghost made his presence known so strongly to her.

I felt pulled out into the driveway again, so I left the others talking and asked Donna to come with me. The substantial cold spot was gone, confirmed by Donna, but I wasn't sure if the ghost had crossed over or not. I started communicating with him again, out loud rather than mentally.

"Your wife is on the other side of The Veil," I said. I wasn't lying to him. I did sense that his wife had crossed over after she died. "She's happy, and she's forgiven you. There are no quests for revenge on the other side, and no sorrow. You'll be much happier if you cross over. You'll also get to see your wife again."

I could sense him standing off listening to me, although I couldn't see him this time. I explained that just because he hadn't gone through The Light when it first opened for him didn't mean he was tied here on earth forever. He could still cross over, if he would just do it. Then I looked up at the sky.

"There are people here who want to cross over," I told the forces of the Universe. "We need a door opened for this man here and anyone else here who wants to cross over."

Amazing me, as always, a strip of golden light appeared in the sky and slowly widened. Donna saw it, also, and she and I stood there for a while. When I felt that everyone who wanted to go had crossed through, I said, "The door can be closed now." The Light in the sky vanished, and the sense of peace was palpable.

Back on the porch, Dana asked us about the lady in the kitchen. I told him about smiling and feeling happy when I entered, and Belle also confirmed that this was a nice ghost. He asked how old she was, and I said 60 at the same time Belle said 58. We laughed again about the fact that we both guessed such a close age for her. It helped confirm that we had _seen_ the same woman. I said that she was short and chubby, gray-haired with a bun, and smiling. Belle agreed. Dana once again said that she could stay, if she continued to be a nice ghost, and Belle told him about her warning to the lady.

Dana finally mentioned something else that he said had been bothering him.

"Why does this man who appeared at the foot of my bed dislike me so much?" he asked. "He made it clear that he didn't want me here, and no one else that I've talked to has had the experiences that I've had in this house. No one has actually seen this ghost."

"Your daughter resembles the ghost's wife," Belle repeated. "And the ghost somehow got it into his mind that you were his wife's lover. He was determined to run you out of his territory."

Dana tried to rationalize this away, saying that his daughter slept in the other room, for pity sakes. Then he paused and sort of blushed. "Well," he said, "there have been a couple other women in my bed here." We just smiled and nodded.

Dana was so grateful that he wanted to pay us for the cleansing. However, we don't charge for that. He then offered to barbecue for us, and we told him that would be fine. We'll go back some weekend this fall and have a good feed.

Update a week later: Word from Dana is that he feels we were definitely successful in cleansing the house. He's had no more problems or eerie experiences since we left. He admitted that he continued to be a little on edge for a while and kept waiting for something to happen. After all, he lived there for nearly two months with these strange events, each one more and more frightening. However, he's starting to relax more now, since there's just nothing going on. He's even spent the nights alone since we left, and nothing — physical or supernatural — has bothered him. Dana continues to be a believer!

As to Belle and I, we continue to be respectful of the ghosts we encounter, although we're firm about the discipline we mete out. The ghosts all have stories to tell, always interesting, but sometimes sad and tragic. This ghost committed a crime and continued paying for it even after he died. He didn't realize that he was prolonging his punishment himself.

We also continue to be in awe of the abilities we have, both as to cleansing a haunted house of recalcitrant and disruptive ghosts and the capacity to help them cross through The Veil and find peace. We've talked about this many times and are adamant that we will never lose this wonder. Our abilities are very special to us, and we will never take them for granted.

# Midnight Ferry

_Ding-dong, the witch is dead!_ But this witch was still causing trouble, even from beyond the grave.

The Veil is thin during Halloween month. This culminates in a paper-thinness on All Hallows Eve, which makes it easier for ghosts and spirits to interact with those of us yet in need of breath. Perchance Miss Witch decided to toil up a bit of boiling trouble this year... or perhaps I inadvertently threatened her into it.

We all hate those dark-of-the-night phone calls. We can't _not_ answer, though we push that _talk_ button with dread. On October 19, 2010, I woke up a few seconds before the phone rang, drawn by another call: one of my nightly bathroom trips. I instinctively checked the clock; the red, digital numerals spelled out 11:30, and that was p.m., a half-hour prior to midnight. I never even got my pj panties pulled down in the bathroom before the phone rang.

I hurried back to answer, peering without my glasses at the dim caller-id. My young cousin, who had just married a week before, and who had been at my house earlier that day. _What the heck can he want this time of night? Please don't let anyone be hurt...or dead._

"Hello?"

"Were you sleeping?" he asked.

_Might as well be truthful._ "Actually, I'd just gotten up to go to the bathroom...which I still haven't done."

I found out the reason for the few seconds of dead air, but not until later. Finally, he said, "Sorry. But I...I have a...a situation over here. Remember what I told you about earlier today? What I said I'd found out about her?"

"Uh huh."

"Well, she's here and she's mad. She said I had no business telling you about her. She's standing down at the foot of the stairs, threatening me. The only thing keeping her from coming after me is that she doesn't seem able to come any farther than that first step down there."

"Hmmmm." His barely-held-in-check, panicked voice left me no doubt he was serious. I sat down the bed, dropping my need to pee to number two in my priority list right then. "She can't come up because we've consecrated and blessed your apartment up there, so don't worry about that. What else did she say?"

"She said that she was going to make me pay. That after we go to sleep, she's going to hurt my wife."

"Like hell she is," I replied. "She's just mad and trying to scare you."

"Well, she's doing a good job of it. I don't think it's a ghost, either. It's a demon. You should see what she turned herself into. Imagine the devil but ten times uglier and more scary."

I could tell he meant that. However, something else made me ask, "Have you been drinking?"

A few more seconds of silence was followed by his admittance. "Yeah. I've had five beers over the evening. The person you know who's in spirit was here, and we watched the game together."

_Ah,_ I thought. _Sports were an important part of my grandson's life before he left us._

"Then he came out here with me and saw her, too," he said. "He's the one who told me to call you. In fact—" He drew in a deep breath and I found out the reason for the few seconds of dead air a moment ago. "He said you were awake. That you were heading for the bathroom."

"Oh," I replied, completely understanding.

He went on, "So yeah, I've been drinking. But this thing's scared me sober. Believe me."

I rather did believe him. I've known him for over twenty-one years, his entire life, and he sounded stone cold sober.

"I hate to ask you this," he said, "and I wouldn't if I wasn't really afraid of her. Plus, both he and I agree that I need to ask. Can you come over and get rid of her?"

"Now?"

"Yeah, if you can. I can come get you. I'm just really scared to go to sleep and have something happen to my wife."

I sighed. "She can't get up those stairs. We cleansed your apartment."

"I know. And no, she can't get up here. I don't know what she means, but she's serious."

Just how serious was another thing I found out a while later. It takes a lot to scare this unflappable senior citizen ghost hunter, but this did.

"Can you get down the stairs past her to come get me?" I asked in resignation.

In a determined voice, he said, "I can. I will."

"All right. Let me get dressed...after I go pee."

When I hung up, my husband, who'd been awakened also, asked, "Now what's going on?"

"That ghost in the garage below my cousin's apartment is causing havoc, maybe because she's more active this month with the thin Veil. I'm going to have to go over there and get rid of her, even this time of night. She's scaring him and his wife horribly."

"Oh." At first he turned over as though going back to sleep. Then he sat up and found the remote to click on the television and wait up for me. I actually smiled at that show of concern for me, a nice smile.

While I took care of the bathroom business, dressed, and gathered my ghost-busting supplies, I ran the conversation I'd had with my young relative that afternoon through my mind — at least, the part that pertained to this late-night call. The rest of it wasn't relevant...or so I thought at the time. This young man has very strong psychic abilities; he has vivid dreams and also visions, as well as being able to see and communicate with both ghosts and spirits. We'd actually made an appointment that day to discuss some of the dreams and a possible vision he'd had about my grandson, who was killed in a hit-and-run that continues to go unsolved. My grandson, in spirit now, since I helped him cross through The Light, also visits this young man from time to time. I believe this is partly due to the fact they are, and were, close in age and both enjoy watching sports on television.

Anyway, as that conversation drew to a close earlier in the day, my young cousin said he had something else to tell me. He lives in a garage apartment, the lower level of which is a dirt-floored, two-car garage. No one has a key to the lower area except my young cousin and the landlord, and it is used only for storage. My cousin said that he had noticed the area was haunted by an elderly woman, but hadn't paid much attention to her, since she seemed harmless. Then this month, as The Veil was thinning, he started noticing things he had stored in the garage had been moved. He'd placed a weed-eater and a sack of cans next to the door and closed it. No one had been inside since then. Next time he went in, these things were both in a far corner, next to the street side of the garage.

"I did some checking around," he said, "and found out there were rumors of a black witch living there some years ago. She was supposed to have done some pretty bad stuff. I'm fairly sure it's her, because of a couple other things that happened."

More than once when he went into the garage and found the stuff moved, he turned The Light on and went to retrieve it. The door slammed shut. Once he also found himself surrounded by a bunch of shadowy people, probably more than a dozen, he said.

"The coven," I murmured with a nod.

Then, on a recent night, he and his wife were lying in bed, watching television. Suddenly, he felt like the apartment was swaying back and forth. Not wanting to scare his new wife, although she is aware of his abilities, he scooted over to her side of the bed. The swaying stopped. Back on his side of the bed, the swaying resumed.

The next morning, his wife started to leave for work at 5 a.m. My young friend heard a voice tell him to tell her to turn on The Light that shines down the stairwell.

"Turn on the stair light," he said. She didn't answer and started out the door without turning on The Light.

_Tell her to turn on The Light!_ the voice he recognized as my grandson projected to him.

"Turn on The Light!" he insisted. She ignored him and went on down the steps to get in the pickup truck they share.

That evening when she returned home, she said, "I've got something to tell you."

"What?" he asked.

"You were right to tell me to turn on The Light. When I looked back at the stairs this morning, after I got in the truck, there was an old woman standing there. A ghost. Next time, I'll do what you say."

He and I discussed the situation a bit more during that visit, and decided that yes, I needed to get over there and get rid of this ghost. "I don't like that fact that black witchcraft is probably involved," I told him honestly. "I don't like to deal with that. But we'll run her off."

We even chuckled a bit, since this sounded like a fairly normal cleansing, albeit with a bit more danger associated with it than we normally encounter. We do enjoy dealing with the paranormal and have a little fun with it now and then.

~~~

As I got my satchel of supplies out of the closet, I thought again of my young relative's voice as he insisted this thing was a demon. I sensed this wasn't true, but just in case, I went to the bookcase and retrieved my Bible. As I waited for him to show up, I re-read some of the verses that are post-it-marked from previous encounters with dark entities. One that I'd forgotten about, a verse where a person gets in a rowboat and rides across the water towards Salvation, seemed it might be of particular use that night.

When my young cousin came to the door, the first thing I did was sniff his breath. I didn't want to be riding with a drunk at near midnight. Frankly, I couldn't smell even a hint of alcohol on him, and my sense of smell is fairly acute since I quit smoking.

"How many beers did you say you had?" I asked.

He thought for a minute as though actually mentally counting them. "Five. I'm on my sixth, in the truck."

Nonetheless, the thought of riding with him didn't bother me. He still appeared starkly sober. I did caution him, however, "You know you shouldn't mess with these entities when you're drinking alcohol. It gives them power over us."

"I know," he said, chastised. "I hadn't planned on messing with her. I was just relaxing after the game. When we went out onto the porch landing is when I saw her at the bottom of the stairs. She tried to get to us, and it really seemed to piss her off that she couldn't climb higher than that first step. She yelled at me and turned into this horrible...thing. A demon!"

"It's not a demon," I insisted. "Your mind is just weak due to the alcohol and she was able to manipulate it. Make you believe she was a demon."

When I turned to gather up my satchel of supplies, though, I didn't forget to pick up the Bible.

I got in his truck and immediately realized we weren't alone; there were three of us in that bench seat! I gasped.

"Oh," he said from the driver's seat. "My wife is with us."

I'll admit, I giggled a bit in relief before I greeted her and we drove the few blocks to the haunting.

There are many ways to deal with recalcitrant entities. As to ghosts, some are only confused and appreciate everything you can do for them to enlighten their bafflement and help them cross through The Light to the other side. However, they also take their living personalities with them into death; therefore, some are just totally mean and nasty. Those types need stronger shoves. Sometimes you only need a sprinkle of salt; sometimes you need all the powers in my satchel to deal with the encounter. My senses told me that this would be one of the latter type of hauntings, and during the drive, I grounded myself firmly, keeping a solid control on my emotions.

My cousin escorted his new wife up the stairs to the safety of the already-cleansed space above the garage. And here I was, this senior-citizen-ghost hunter, standing alone in front of a haunted apartment at midnight — a place where black witchcraft was rumored to have taken place. I'll admit, I wasn't quite sure what the hell I'd gotten myself into this time. I did sense a malevolent presence, though not that strong of one, and delved frankly into my in-check emotions. Nope, no fear.

My cousin returned with the key and opened the door to the garage. It was dark in there, but a pole light shone enough light for me to see a four-by-four leaning against a wall to our right, the back wall of the garage.

"This door keeps slamming shut," he reminded me as he pushed it back and let go. It swung towards us.

"Get that board in there and block it open," I said. "I don't want to be in there with the door closed."

He did, and then he bravely told me to wait while he turned on The Lights. He disappeared into the interior, and I heard a clicking noise.

"Damn it, this light worked earlier today," he said. Then I heard his footsteps as he moved. A light came on, illuminating the interior clearly.

There were two light fixtures on the garage ceiling, the old type with strings hanging down. I walked over to the first one, the one with the still-unlit bulb, and pulled the string several times. Nothing.

"I swear it worked earlier today," he insisted.

"Bulb burnt out?" I asked, although the string pull hadn't engaged The Light; therefore, it had to be a malfunctioning socket.

"I changed it a day or so ago," he said.

"Huh. You know, she's here, but I don't see her."

"No, she's not even here — there she is!" He shuddered and stepped close to me.

I sensed her in the far corner of the garage, and heard her mentally project to me: _You can't do anything to me, damn you!_

My cousin said, "She says you can't do anything to her."

"I heard her." My voice came out strong and clear. "And yes I can, lady. I can banish you for good. But first I'll give you a choice. You can cross through The Light—" I pointed to my right, to the east. "The Light is that way, and I've opened a door for you in it. Or I can banish you and you can wander around somewhere else and try to find another person to scare. It's your choice, and your only choice."

I sensed a flurry of frantic movement and my cousin stiffened further. "She's coming after us!"

"No," I said in a steady tone. "She can't get to us. And you need to calm down. She's feeding off your fear."

"You don't see what she looks like!"

"She's manipulating your mind. And yes, I can _see_ her—in my third eye. She doesn't look like that. She's just an elderly, white-haired woman."

To alleviate his fear as much as I could — and also for safety, since I plan to be around for a few more ghost hunts — I opened my plastic bag of consecrated sea salt, pulled out a bit and sprinkled it in a half circle in front of me.

"She's mad as hell!" My cousin moved behind me and grabbed my shoulders. It hurt, but I let him stay there within the protective half-circle. "You need to start reading!" he insisted.

I sighed and gave her one more chance. "Your last chance, your last choice. Go through The Light to the east or be banished."

She only spit threats that I could hear in my mind, so I opened the Bible. At times, I will do a regular cleansing, but the witchcraft involved here — black witchcraft, I was sure — bothered me a bit. So I reached for something I knew would frighten this entity as much as she was trying to frighten me: the Bible. Research has informed me that most black witchcraft practitioners are very anti-Christian and, to some extent, afraid of the Bible.

I turned to the first marked Bible verse and began to read. Then continued on to a second, a third.

"She's not going anywhere," he said. "She's totally pissed."

"Oh, yes," I assured him. "She _is_ going."

I finally came to the verse I'd really liked while reviewing the post-it markers at my house, the one where a person crosses the water toward the other side in a boat. She didn't like that one at all. I could hear her screams of rage. I paused for a moment after that particular verse.

"Keep reading!" he yelled. "Please keep reading!" His fingers tightened on my shoulders until I gritted my teeth, but I leafed back to a couple previous verses and re-read them.

The entities we encounter sometimes communicate with us in other ways, and my cousin is also very sensitive in that manner. Suddenly he said, "She was abused by her mother. Her mother killed her father, then abused her! She been hurt bad. It's...it's making me hurt, too."

I paused in my reading again. "That's why you need to go through The Light," I told her, and I could tell she was listening. Perhaps she was impressed that we'd learned this dark secret about her. "Your pain will be gone and you'll be happy. Very happy."

"She's not going," he said. "Please, read some more."

I turned again to the boat verse. When I got to the end of it, I started to smile. In my mind's third eye, I saw that witch jump into a small gray rowboat, and off she flew, straight through the garage wall to the east, toward the door I'd opened in The Light.

"She's gone," I said at the same instant my cousin said, "She's gone!"

"Now you can let go of me before you leave bruises," I told him.

He released me, but when I turned to look at him, he was standing there with his eyes closed as though either experiencing something or...I wasn't sure what. I poked him in the stomach with the Bible, and he opened his eyes and shook his head like he was coming back to reality. "She's gone," he repeated.

"Yep. But we're not done yet. Let's cleanse and keep any other entities out of here."

He stood quietly another moment, then said, "Your grandson was here. When she told me how her mother had killed her father, how she'd been abused, I started hurting. Before the pain got really bad, he put his arm around me, told me it would be all right. That you and him would take care of me. The hurt went away immediately."

I thought back a minute or so and remembered that at one point, he'd taken a hand off my shoulder and held his arm out, as though having his arm across someone else's shoulder. I'd been a little too busy with the ghost-witch to dwell on it at the time. Now I nodded in understanding. I also thought I knew what he'd been doing with his eyes closed: thanking.

I dug into my satchel until I found my consecrated olive oil. The first thing I did was dampen my right-hand index finger with it and draw crosses on each of the three support beams that held up the apartment floor above the garage. Then we walked around with the sea salt and olive oil, saying prayers and cleansing the area. At one point, my young relative asked me to wait a second. He walked away and returned with a small can of lighter fluid, the kind people use in refillable lighters. He handed it to me and I shook it. Liquid sloshed inside.

"That can was totally empty earlier today when I was in here," he informed me, his face white with strain.

_Uh oh._ Now I understood what this witch was trying to do: strengthen her powers enough to burn down that apartment over her head, along with whoever was in it at the time. She wouldn't have been bothered herself, since she could still haunt the ground without the building around her. Over the years, I've learned to listen to my inner instincts, both as to my own life and the paranormal life I deal with. I was very glad I'd crawled out of bed tonight. She might not have been able to do it yet, but I was certain that she'd been working on it.

Perhaps my grandson saw what she was doing and did everything he could to protect his friend and his wife.

The threat of my coming to banish her had given the black witch added incentive and, possibly, the thin Veil had assisted. The can being empty earlier that day and now approximately half-full confirmed the witch had enough power to materialize the can's contents. Who knows what could have happened had I disregarded my cousin's plea and waited until tomorrow? I have no idea, either, if she could ever have been successful, since I've always believed that ghosts were unable to truly hurt us. But I haven't encountered many dark entities.

I didn't mention this to my cousin. He's very inexperienced with, and uncertain of, his powers. Right now, he still had an aura of lingering fear about him. Instead, I stuck The Lighter fluid can in my pants pocket and continued with the cleansing. At the door, I marked several more olive-oil crosses, for added security against any other entities that wanted to try to take up residence in the witch's former abode.

"We need to turn out The Light," I said after we'd cleansed the entire place and arrived back at the door. I could tell my young relative was reluctant to go back in there alone, especially since this was The Light farthest from the door. "I'll do it, but you need to go with me, since I won't be able to see once The Light is out."

That was something he could agree on. As we walked across the dirt floor, he motioned to a hole about four inches deep and a foot across, dug near the wall on our left. "There's something in that hole," he said.

"Nothing that can bother anyone now," I assured him. And no, I don't know what could be buried there, but I am very certain whatever it is, is now ineffectual.

I pulled The Light string and left us in the dark, except for the faint shine from the pole light on the other side of the open doorway. He put an arm around me to guide me, and partly for his own security, I'm sure. I still wasn't afraid, but he was dealing with a lot right now. This was the second crossing-over he'd done with me, but a lot more involved and serious than the first one. We hadn't talked about The Lighter fluid, but I was willing to bet that finding liquid in the formerly empty can just then was frightening him with the possible consequences. The best thing I could do was remain stoic and assure him by my words and actions that they were safe now. And they were, I had no doubt. The witch was gone and nothing else evil could enter here after this consecration and blessing, not even demons.

At the door, I told him to put that four-by-four back inside. After he did, we closed and locked the door. "Whew," I heard him murmur.

"She's in The Light now," I said, a smile on my face. "I always enjoy this part of it...afterwards. It makes me feel really good to help a hurting soul cross over. Even one as mean and nasty as she was."

He only nodded. As he grows and gets more experience, he'll understand.

"I need to get my wife before I take you home."

"I'll wait in the truck."

It was peaceful now as I sat there waiting for him. But the night — and witch — weren't quite done with us. When the two of them returned and got in the truck, he turned the key. The engine gave off these faint, not-going-to-start sounds.

"This never happened before," he said. "It's always started fine."

He tried again with the same result. I flicked my fingers at the ignition and said, "Now, stop that!" Then to him, "Try again."

The truck fired up with no problem, and he and his wife both stared at me in astonishment. I shrugged. "Just a little problem spell she left behind," I said.

And if you ask me how I knew that, and how I knew to flick my fingers and break the spell, I'll tell you I had no idea. Something just told me to do it, probably one of my guides that always accompany me, and it worked.

He backed out of the driveway and started down the street. "I need to get rid of this lighter fluid," I said. "I don't want to take it home with me."

"Where?" he asked.

Before I could answer and he could turn left, a white pickup came up the street.

_Uh oh,_ someone whispered to me. About then, the truck passed and we all saw the chief-of-police logo on the side of it. Had someone seen us in the garage for a long time and called him? Just what I needed, for him to turn around and give my young cousin a breathalyzer test! I had no idea if being scared-sober would negate his blowing too high on that gadget. They might haul all three of us off to jail. Good thing my husband was awake so I could call him. He never heard the phone when he slept.

The pickup continued up the street without slowing down or turning. _Thank you, Universe!_

At the next corner, again I didn't know why, I told my young cousin to turn right instead of going straight, the route to my house. He said, "Yeah, hallowed ground." As soon as he said that, I realized why I'd had that instinct.

"Left," I said at the next intersection, and he nodded as though he'd been expecting that direction. Half a block down, we passed the church. I opened the window and tossed the can of lighter fluid onto the church lawn.

"Littering," my young relative said with a nod. "But if they knew why, I don't think they'd care."

"Yep," I agreed.

Later in bed, I felt a deep satisfaction. This senior-citizen-ghost hunter had used her powers wisely once again, and another soul was at rest, a young couple safe in their bed.

~~~

**Addendum:** As a writer, the story ended well for me with the paragraph above here. But this story keeps procrastinating its ending. You may have noticed that I never quoted the Chapter/Verse of the Bible verse about the boat and water. I had every intention of doing that. However, when I went back to find it in my Bible the day I wrote this story, the verse appeared to be missing. I checked every post-it spot, and even re-read several places where I thought it might be. No luck. And I will swear on...yes, my Bible...that there was a post-it marking this verse, a verse I read three times that evening.

My sister is visiting me for a few months, and there's probably not anyone alive who knows the Bible better than she does. She's read it many times. She even gave me the Bible that I used that evening and have used on infrequent other occasions when dealing with dark entities. In addition, she gave me a list of the verses to use, the ones marked with the post-its. She does not recall that verse, although like others I contacted later, said it seems somewhat familiar to her. Still, despite numerous hours of re-reading and searching for me, she has not found it.

We also contacted our youngest sister. She and her husband are missionaries and extremely conversant with the Bible. Again, despite her vague familiarity with such a verse, she could not direct me to anywhere to find this exact one.

Using various search words, I did several hours of on-line research on Bible web sites where full copies of different versions of Bibles are on the internet. No luck.

A friend of mine came by one day, and I mentioned this to him, knowing he was very familiar with the Bible. He'd never heard of this verse. He called his priest, who also had never heard of any similar verse. The priest directed me to one of the on-line sites I'd already visited, but gave me a couple other words to use in the search box. I've used boat, rowboat, row boat, ship, barge, heaven, water, and probably some other words that I've forgotten. There is no such verse. Later, this friend mentioned a phone call from his son where they discussed my story. His son suggested the word "ark" for the search. Since it was not an ark, but a rowboat, this also proved unsuccessful.

The only conclusion I can draw is that someone put this specific verse in my Bible to use, knowing I would need it, knowing this would be what it would take to cross the black witch through The Light that night.

And that is where I'm going to leave my story.

# Ghost Hunting Rules

I wish I had a nickel for every time someone said to me: _Oh, I want to see a ghost! Please take me with you ghost hunting so I can see one._

Well, folks, it don't work that way. As Aunt Belle says, "This isn't Dial a Ghost." We can't conjure up ghosts. Actually, we have been on a ghost hunt or two where we didn't bump into even one paranormal entity. In ninety-nine percent of the other ghost hunts, we have encountered something, but very rarely do we "see" a full-bodied apparition. Even then, it's mostly a brief glimpse. Basically, our communications with other world entities are telepathic. We have our own confirmation that we are actually speaking with _someone_ , since both of us readily hear the same exchange.

In extremely rare situations, we will interact with the other side for longer periods. At times, this is with a single entity. At other times, this can happen for as long as ten or twenty minutes, and involve multiple beings. A couple of these incidents will be reported in the upcoming Volume II of my diaries, including an awesome interaction at the St. James Hotel in Cimarron, New Mexico, and an experience unlike any I've ever heard reported from any other ghost hunter at a private dwelling.

So if they don't appear to us when we ask, experienced as we are, unless they can gather enough energy or truly want to do so, they aren't going to appear to uninitiated folks on demand. This used to cause us to be frustrated and, yes, at times angry, with someone we would agree to take with us on a ghost hunt. That person would turn surly quickly, irritating the heck out of us. We learned quickly, though, and that only happened a couple times. Now, we have a set of rules that any newbie must read and discuss with us before we allow them to accompany us. Break the rules, and it is the last hunt we conduct in which you will be involved. The rules:

Be quiet! Talk in low voices or whispers.

Walk slow! Tune into the ghosts and spirits around you. Don't go racing off and spoil the hunt for others.

Only use your flashlight to see the ground in front of you, so you don't stumble or fall. Never shine your flashlight on anyone else, especially in their eyes.

Try to take your pictures away from the group. If not, and there **are** others near you, let them know you are getting ready to shoot. Give them a few seconds to turn their eyes away from the flash before you push the button. Never take a picture near a group without prior warning, and if _you are told no, do not shoot!_

If there is someone in the group with whom you do not get along, either don't go on that hunt or be courteous to that person over the night. Squabbling and arguing spoil it for others.

Do not interrupt the concentration of others. If Belle and/or Trana are communicating with a ghost or spirit, _do not take pictures during their communication unless they inform you that you can!_ This also goes for anyone else in the group who might be concentrating or communicating. Pay attention to what those around you are doing before you get camera-happy and ruin a communication.

If there is something that we want you to experience, we will _quietly_ call you over and you should _quietly_ comply. If there is something you are experiencing and you want others to know, _quietly_ inform them.

If something scares you, _quietly_ rejoin Trana or Belle and let them know what has happened.

However, if something does attack you, you should definitely cause a loud disturbance so you can be rescued. This is the only situation where you should be loud and insistent. If possible, explain what is happening. If not, you will still be shielded and protected. The attack _will_ be terminated.

If you are asked along on a hunt where Trana and Belle deem that you should wear the packet of protection that they have prepared, wear it over your heart at all times and without protest or question.

Do not ask anyone else on a hunt without clearing it with Trana or Belle first. Sometimes we will allow others along, but we must meet them first. Under no circumstances will anyone under age 18 be allowed along without a parent. Even then, we must meet the under-age person first, and he or she will be expected to be quiet and courteous, as well as also obey all the rules.

**Listen to Belle and Trana and obey them totally and without question**. Failure to abide by the rules will result in your not being asked along on any future hunts.

# Séance Rules

Aunt Belle and I do very few séances. For one thing, we just don't have that much experience doing them ourselves. We've learned over the years that some things in the paranormal world can be overwhelming without the proper preparation, which includes learning from others who have spent more time handling these areas. We did run into a bit of a problem one time, but thanks to the friends who had joined us — friends with strong powers — we averted any disaster. Now, the ones we do are private and only involve a few trusted friends.

For another thing, we've found that séances aren't as interesting to us when we are actually conducting them. However, as with ghost hunts, we have set down some rules of behavior for those infrequent séances in which we agree to conduct:

_Always, always,_ _ALWAYS_ respect the purpose of our séance and the ghosts and spirits who come through The Veil to communicate with us. Despite what you see on some of the ghost hunter shows on TV, we do _NOT_ antagonize or bait the spirits or ghosts.

Remember that Belle and I are in charge. We have certain rituals that we observe, both out of respect and for your protection.

Shoes must be removed and left outside the door to the séance room. Don't ask why, just do it.

We will be seated in a circle and we will _close_ this circle as we start the ceremony. This circle must not be broken or all communication across The Veil will be lost. If you need to go to the bathroom or do anything that might interfere with the circle, do it prior to starting the ceremony.

Do _NOT_ leave the circle once we have begun unless it is imperative, or you feel that you cannot stay. Leave as unobtrusively as possible. Do not ask permission, just fade out. _If you do leave, do not return for any reason_. Wait outside the room until the séance is concluded and people begin exiting. Otherwise, you will break the circle and ruin the rest of the séance. We will have to terminate immediately.

Communicating with the spirits: We will be communicating with both spirits and ghosts. Our personal beliefs are that ghosts are people whom have died but did not cross through The Light for one reason or the other. Spirits have crossed through The Light, but they can return for short intervals. If we observe the rituals and respect the ceremony, we should not have to deal with any evil entities.

Communication across The Veil is far from perfect. You will have to take things on faith if you feel you recognize someone. If you are wrong, the spirit or ghost will tell the psychics conducting the séance. If you are right, do not expect a clear conversation such as you might have with the person sitting next to you. You may have to reach a bit with your own abilities to identify who it is and what the ghost or spirit is trying to say to you.

Ghosts and spirits are easily frustrated. If they do not make contact within a few moments, they will withdraw and give up.

If you get a message, do say so, albeit quietly. At times there are more than one psychic in a circle. Messages will come through to people other than us. Be respectful when you mention the message, or the hints you have of one. If you feel the message is for one of the participants in the circle, ask permission of that person before you relate the message.

As with ghost hunts, if you are disruptive, you will not be included again.

# T. M.'s Personal Definitions

Please note that my definitions may not match those you might find elsewhere. However, these come from my own actual experiences over the years.

_Ectoplasm_ : A form of spiritual or ghostly energy that can be seen as a mist either visually or in photos. This can also be in actual physical form, which is cold and slimy to the touch if you reach into it, which I have done on only one occasions. It also clung to my hand.

_EVP_ : Electronic Voice Phenomenon, when voices from the other side are captured on a recording device. Many times these voices cannot be heard other than on the tape. At times, they are answers to questions posed by the paranormal investigators.

_Ghost_ : A soul who has not crossed through The Light for some reason. There can be many reasons, according to the ghosts I have talked to. Some don't realize they are dead. Some have unfinished business here on earth. Some don't want to be with one or more of the people they've known in life who are already on the other side. Some don't have anyone on the other side they are eager to see or join. Some just enjoy it here. Some are waiting around for someone they love to cross with them or, in the alternative, to help the person they love cross without fear or confusion. Ghosts are not bound to one place. I have talked to many ghosts who died elsewhere and have traveled during their existence. Research after my conversations with them has proven this to me.

_Orb_ : A ball of spirit energy that can be of various colors. It can show up in photos but some ghost hunters can actually see it with the naked eye at times, as I and several of my friends can. Moving orbs can also be captured on video.

_Poltergeist_ : A mischievous entity that can be either playful or dangerous. They are usually found where there are children who are in puberty.

_Portal_ : The opening between our world and the other dimension across The Veil. Spirits use this portal to cross between the two dimensions and can be seen as mist either leaving or re-entering the portal.

_Spirit_ : A soul who has crossed to the other side, but can come back for short periods now and then. They come back to see people they loved in life again or check on them. They can also come back to help a loved one cross over. Many times spirits will come back to their grave sites to see relatives and can even find loved ones when they move to a different home.

_The Light_ : When a person dies, a door opens for them to cross to the other side, a door which I believe opens into The Light, or the other dimension. Even of the soul does not cross into The Light at the moment of death, this door can be opened at other times to allow this.

_The Veil_ : I believe there is a Veil that separates our world and the other dimension. This Veil tatters and thins during the months of October. However, it's not impenetrable at other times, since, with proper respect and ritual, we can communicate with the spirits who abide there.

_Vortex_ : This means two things to me. For one, it is an opening similar to the Portal. In another instance, it becomes a shimmering, whirling, tornado-like column of white mist and different colored lights. The energy from this can emanate outward quite far, effecting the area around it.

# T. M. Simmons Bio

**T. M. Simmons** was dragged down the ghost hunting trail many years ago, due to her avid curiosity and an aunt who had been dealing with the paranormal for more years than that. Before, and after, becoming a ghost hunter, Simmons wrote. Therefore, it followed that she would write down her numerous ventures into the other dimensions, recording both the incidents and the ghosts and spirits she met along the way. From the numerous folders now filled with her adventures, she has chosen a few for your enjoyment.

Ah, yes, her writing. Simmons sold her first book two years from the time she started writing. After a decade and a dozen books in the romance genre, writing historical and paranormal, she now writes paranormal mysteries. The first book in her **Dead Man Mysteries Series** , **Dead Man Talking** , first saw the light of day in hardback. Now it is available as both an e-book and audio book, as are the rest of the books (so far) in the series. A preview to whet your appetite is included after her bio.

Simmons delights in scaring herself silly at times during other-worldly encounters and has been known to visit graveyards in both the dark and full of the moon. She is usually accompanied by her aunt, Belle Brown, who started her on the life path involving the world across The Veil. They talk to ghosts, and every once in a while, ghosts pop into the pictures they snap. Their experiences include: seeing whirlwinds of light; ghosts crawling in bed with them and scaring them silly...well, sillier; ghosts deciding to hitch a ride home with them; ghosts putting on a goodbye show, and many others. They've hunted in New Mexico; the Arlington Hotel in Hot Springs, Arkansas; The Myrtles in St. Francisville, as well as Natchitoches and New Orleans, Louisiana; Jefferson, and other Texas towns;, Ohio; Wisconsin; and numerous graveyards and haunted buildings all over the U.S. Their favorite trip (so far) was to Cimarron, New Mexico, where they spent two days and nights all alone in the historical and haunted St. James Hotel.

Sometimes, Simmons takes along her husband of 40+ years, Barney, to protect her from the bumps in the night, although he's been known to spy a ghost or two and retreat rather than confront. She and he live in a haunted house in East Texas, which they share with a variety of paranormal residents and a menagerie of pets. She believes in disciplining her ghosts, but visitors are forewarned to beware. Some overnight guests have left in the middle of the night; even some relatives refuse to accept her offer of a bed. But her ghosts don't only appear at night. Teddy, especially, loves to make himself known in the guest bathroom at all hours, especially to the male guests, and other paranormal boarders appear at opportune — and inopportune — times.

Simmons is extremely willing to discuss her experiences with anyone she can corner. She can be contacted in numerous ways.

Web site: http://www.iseeghosts.com

Blog: http://www.iseedeadfolks@blogspot.com

Facebook: <http://www.facebook.com/tranam.simmons>

Twitter: @TMSimmonsauthor

Read on for an excerpt from Dead Man Talking, a list of other T. M. Simmons books, and the newsletter signup.

# Dead Man Talking

### Chapter One

Weird things tend to happen when you live in a haunted house. I see ghosts. I talk to ghosts. Unlike people who scream and race hell-bent for leather the opposite direction at the first sight of a specter from another dimension, my aunt, Twila Brown, and I actually hunt down rumors of ghosts. I found my very own haunted house completely by accident—or with the help of Fate. Doesn't matter. After two years, it suits me just fine, and my paranormal residents abide by the rules—most of the time.

Two years earlier, however, all I wanted to do was curl up in my New Orleans apartment and hide from both worlds, real and supernatural. Then all the way from Yankee-land, Twila showed up on my doorstep the afternoon after the final court hearing on Jack's and my divorce. She caught me halfway through a bottle of Crown Royal and had me in the car and on the road before I sobered up. Patiently, at first, she listened to my maudlin musings.

"I thought we were being so . . . adult about the whole thing." I snuffled and wiped the back of my hand under my nose, and Twila sighed and shoved the box of tissues off the console into my lap. I ignored that in favor of the soggy bunch of fast-food napkins knotted in my fist.

"I didn't think it would be this hard," I continued in a self-pitying whine. "But walking out of the courthouse—Jack didn't even show up for the hearing! Did I tell you?"

"Several times," Twila answered.

"Oh. Well, I was remembering how Jack and I talked that first year. That log cabin we were gonna build with the porch all the way around it. Rocking chairs where we'd sit and watch our grandkids catch lightning bugs in the yard. It just all went so damn wrong!"

Westbound on I-10, we hit one of the miles-long stretches of causeway across a swamp, and the tires clickety-clanked on steel girders separating the asphalt sections. Twila accelerated and changed lanes to pass a pickup pulling a candy-apple red bass boat decked out with padded swivel seats and a huge Mercury motor. Boxes and suitcases filled the pickup bed. Before we reached the trailer brake lights, I ducked and buried my face, nose in the sodden napkins.

"What in the world are you doing?" Twila asked.

I turned my head sideways, but stayed crouched in a near-fetal position. "Jack. That's Jack's truck and the new boat he bought. He's moving to Longview. Remember? I told you."

"No," Twila mused. "I don't recall you mentioning that news."

"I've had a few other things on my mind," I pouted. "He has a new job. Detective on the Longview force. In Texas. Longview's about a tenth the size of New Orleans."

We were still beside the truck. I could hear matching clickety-clacks from it, and Twila glanced out the passenger window. Then she lifted one hand in a friendly wave. "Yeah, Jack."

"For God's sake, don't get his attention!" I hissed.

"We're in your car, Alice. I assume he recognizes it. You've had it for two years."

I bobbed up like an apple in a water barrel and swiveled around. Twila flipped on the blinker and smoothly slid into the right-hand lane—leaving me a clear view of Jack in the pickup. Leaving Jack a clear view of me through the rear window of my Buick Regal. Jack nodded and lifted his hand to favor me with a wave. I managed a sickly grin and a finger-wiggle reply, then snapped forward. "I'm trading off this darn car when I get my next royalty check!"

Unfortunately, the sunshade was down and the mirror on the back reflected my face. Half-moon mascara smudges coated beneath red-veined eyes and streaked my pale cheeks in zebra stripes. I moaned and yanked a gob of tissues from the box crushed on my lap.

We hit the end of the causeway, and Twila sped up. Another mile or so down the road, she glanced in the rearview mirror and said, "He's way behind us now. There's a rest area up ahead. Want to pull off?"

"No!" I spat. "What if Jack decides to stop there, too?"

Twila shrugged and continued on past the blue and white exit sign. "There's some baby-wipes in my satchel in the back seat."

I turned to reach for the satchel, but my eyes glued to that back window and searched the line of traffic behind us. I thought I saw a flash of red far back. Of course, there are lots of red vehicles on the road. Finally I unzipped the satchel and dug out the baby-wipes.

"I guess I don't blame Jack for moving to a smaller town," Twila said. "That last case he had . . . he finally caught that child murderer. The story was even in our paper back home."

"After six months . . . and three dead children. It burned him out. But he wouldn't even talk to me about it! He just brooded whenever he did happen to stop by to shower and shave."

"Seems to me you were on a book tour part of that time," she reminded me.

"Not all the time," I defended myself. "Where are we going?" I finally thought to ask as I faced the mirror again and scrubbed. Or maybe I just wanted to change the subject.

"I heard about this little forgotten-time town over in East Texas," she replied. "Six Gun, Texas. It's supposed to be crawling with ghosts."

"It's not close to Longview, is it?"

She shook her head. "At least a couple hours away. From the looks of the map."

"It'll be dark by the time we get there."

"Yeah," she said with a grin. "Neat, huh?"

I nodded in eager agreement. Nothing like a scary nighttime ghost hunt to lift a new divorcee's spirits. There were probably a few old graveyards, too, in Six Gun. Twila and I delight in roaming graveyards, daytime or in the full and dark of the moon. Ghosts and spirits congregate there, perhaps hoping for a glimpse of family members who visit their gravesites.

Two stops for directions later—Twila and I aren't known for our attention to road signs when we get to chatting about ghosts—and an hour after sundown, the headlights skimmed past a faded real estate sign along a back country, two-lane road. Twila slammed on the brakes, glanced at me, and said, "I've got a feeling about that place."

"Go for it," I agreed. We'd had lots of adventures when Twila got one of her feelings.

We were alone on the road, so she backed up until we could see the sign in the headlights again. Overgrown weeds nearly obscured it; the place had been on the market a while. Untrimmed yupon branches scratched the Buick as we drove down the sandy driveway, but it wasn't more than a hundred feet before the sprawling log cabin came into view. Security lights burned, one in front, another through the trees behind. It had a deck across the front, no doubt high enough to provide a view of the lake I'd noticed across the road just as we saw the sign.

Twila parked and we both slid out of the car. Landscaping had grown wild, but it could be tamed with a pair of clippers. Instead of climbing the steps to the deck, we wandered around the side, to the back yard. Ancient live oaks, pecan, and native cedar trees interspersed at least an acre, which stretched back to where the famed East Texas Piney Woods encroached. Spots of color indicated rose bushes and azaleas, two of my favorite plants.

"Beautiful," I breathed.

"Could be, with some work," Twila agreed.

We walked across the back patio and tried to peer in the glass doors, but curtains prevented us. So we headed back to the front deck—and smiled at each other when the little old man visualized at the top of the steps and shook his fist.

"If he only knew," Twila whispered with a chuckle.

"Yeah," I agreed sotto voce. "What better place for a writer and ghost hunter? All this privacy, and ghosts I don't have to hunt."

"Plenty of room for a few pets, too," Twila said. "You've always dreamed of having a dog and cat, but never had the room to take care of them."

We climbed the steps, and the elderly man backed up, a startled look on his face. No sense offering to shake hands. My grip would pass through his. Instead, I greeted, "Nice place."

"There's ten of us here already." He propped his fists on pudgy hips. "No more room!"

A month later, I moved in. The jittery real estate lady in Six Gun caved in immediately when, after a night in a nearby motel, Twila and I informed her that we preferred to examine the cabin alone. Inside, hardwood floors lay under a film of dust, and rustic beams outlined high ceilings. There were two beautiful stone fireplaces, one in the living room and one in a room I knew immediately would be my study. The kitchen was modernized—not that I do that much cooking, since I have a tendency to even burn water. We met four more of the ghosts, but they weren't inclined to welcome us either. That didn't bother me; they could be handled over time.

"Above all, ghosts need discipline," Twila always insisted. And she'd taught me the rules for dealing with recalcitrant souls who hung around, refusing to cross through The Light for various reasons of their own. Still, with the closing behind me, and before my furniture arrived, Twila returned. A ghost or two were within my fledgling realm of powers, but ten called for someone with a tad more experience in supernatural territory.

The little old man turned out to be Howard, the ghost-in-charge. Once Howard and his band of cohorts realized their scare tactics wouldn't work on us, we drew up The Howard and Alice Ghost Agreement. A copy of that all-important document is tacked up in each room now.

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Discover Other Books

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Writing as T. M. Simmons

http://www.iseeghosts.com

Dead Man Mysteries:

Dead Man Talking

Dead Man Haunt

Dead Man Hand

Dead Man Ohio

Next Dead Man: 2017

Paranormal Suspense:

Winter Prey

Silent Prey

True Ghost Stories:

Ghost Hunting Diary Volume I

Ghost Hunting Diary Volume II

Ghost Hunting Diary Volume III

Ghost Hunting Diary Volume IV

Ghost Hunting Diary Volume V

Ghost Hunting Diary Volume VI (2016)

Living With Dead Folks, Volume One

Living With Dead Folks, Volume Two

Living With Dead Folks, Volume Three

Living With Dead Folks, Volume Four (2016)

Short Story Fiction:

Grave Yarns, a Collection of Short Stories

Dragon's Dishonor, a Short Story

To All a Good Night, a Short Story

Monsters Among Us, a Novella

Upon a Midnight Clear, a Short Story

Deliver Us From Evil, a Short Story

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