CANDLELIT CHRONICLES: HISTORIC HAUNTS

March 8_Free Read 3416 word count

Chapter 38- - -

         Deeper into The Big Forest drove I, feeling now under impetus, under some kind of deadline. I had work to do here in The Big Forest, I had all these files and papers to peruse, I had to finish the Greenhouse-quickly. I had to travel to Madison Mills and discover what I could of the nature of the elusive yet ubiquitous Testament Corporation. Why all this had to be accomplished-now-was yet another mystery to me. I only knew I must, and soon.





         Deeper and deeper into The Big Forest I headed, and I began to notice branch roads leading off in various directions to the left and right of this road, which seemed to increasingly narrow at the same time it increasingly curved. I slowed to about 25 mph, just in the rare event that some other vehicle might be approaching me, though I heard no sounds, not even birdsong. I could not see around most of the tight, twisting curves, so I wished to take no chances. On some of them, passing a passenger car or pickup would have been a tight adjustment, but if I encountered a log truck, I would surely have to find some room to pull over. I was not anxious to encounter such an experience, so I kept to my slow speed and cocked my ear to the open window, to be prepared just in case.





         The road seemed to keep angling right, although it was difficult to discern any direction due to the constant curves. However, I had been cautious to stay on the road by which I had entered The Big Forest, so that I could find my way out again. Glancing down at the gas gauge (thankfully it worked properly), I saw I still had half a tank, and besides I always kept two five-gallon metal cans in the trunk, full. Nevertheless I would turn around soon, could I just find a stopping place, and return, unless the road soon appeared to lead on back out of the woods. I kept moving and followed a particularly sharp turn to the right. I had no watch of course but I estimated I had been traveling more than half an hour since I first entered The Big Forest. I had gotten only maybe five minutes into the woods when I encountered the “vision” or whatever it was of the girl I took to be Alice, and nearly spun off the road. So I had driven possibly twenty-five minutes to a half hour since that point. (Rory, I thought, did you consider looking at a map before entering this?) No of course I had not, I had as so often acted without thinking, and now here I was, not lost, but far deeper into The Big Forest than I had intended. Just then out of the corner of my right eye I spotted a tree, or thought I did, that seemed to have a face, mouth impossibly wide in a scream, eyes terrorized, and just a hint of fine-textured hair just the brownish side of dark blonde. I blinked and looked over again, and could not even find the tree I had been watching. Then back at the road, which suddenly curved precipitously to the left, for a sudden change; if I had not looked back when I did, I probably would have left the road, as I almost had earlier. Just beyond this left-hand snaky curve was an open plot, not carved out of the forest so much as seeming to grow there naturally, and it was bathed in sunlight, oddly enough, and carpeted with leaves rather than with pine needles. Very strange, inside a pine forest. It did however, provide a place to pull over, and after checking the road ahead, I did so, pulling on to the hard dry ground and stopping the Merc. This would be a lovely spot to go over these papers, I thought, and I reached over and rolled down the passenger window as well, then the rear window on the driver's side. Surely there weren't bears here, or if there were, they would announce themselves in time for me to crank up and roll back out onto the road and be away before they reached me. Other than that, I'd just spend a few enjoyable moments sitting in the Merc in the sunshine and read these papers, then I'd back up and go out the way I came; or possibly, since the road had so persistently wound to the right, except for the one left-hand curve I had just negotiated, I might just go on through. Surely by now I was considerably East of where I had begun, at Knox.





         I pulled the papers and files and envelopes out, and then something impelled me to take a walk, farther back across this beautiful little clearing, almost a meadow. Something on the farther side compelled me. I could see nothing, for beyond this meadow of leaves and wildflowers stood a line of trees, maple and oak and birch, not the pines that lined the road to either side and filled up the content of The Big Forest. As I walked, I now began to hear birdsong, crickets, the rustle of small mammals like voles or field mice through the trees. That was the first sign of living nature I had encountered in The Big Forest, beyond the trees themselves, and that thought reminded me that I had encountered, still, as yet no signs of logging-no second growth or third growth plantings, no tree-cutting, no blazes painted on the sides of firs to indicate which to cut first. It all looked like primeval growth to me, except for this inexplicable clearing-it looked natural but not logical. Anyway, I decided to hike a little further back in, turning first to lock the position of the Merc in my mind so I wouldn't get lost, and thought again I saw a flutter of white-dress, sash, or ribbon, through the trees on the opposite side of the road. Then when I blinked, again nothing, so I turned back and proceeded on, again noting the tree line and making sure I walked straight back and not on a diagonal or curved path. Now it occurred to me I should have brought my compass, but just as I thought so the line of trees broke and in front of me appeared another clearing, but this one was not inhabited. On a slight rise about fifty feet from me stood the stone foundations of a building, quite probably a home at one point-the rise was sufficiently high enough to block the view beyond so that this became my horizon temporarily. Between that hill, with its foundations and leaning rear chimney, lay the frontispiece of this view: an antique family cemetery, rife with stone angels and tilted granite headstones from which age had obliterated all semblance of meaning. A cherub-infant-sized-lay tumbled off in a corner to the right. That side and the rear perimeter held a rusty wrought-iron fence with sharp impaling points at intervals, but the left side and front had no fence. Perhaps on those two sides the iron had collapsed, or perhaps something had pushed it loose. (WHAT?) I walked further on, hoping some stone here might be solid enough and limned enough to sit on for a bit, while I read these pesky papers, or perhaps the foundation stones would be wide enough for me to sit comfortably. As I approached the front of the boneyard, I saw that yes, indeed, this side had at one point had a fence, and it had been pushed over so it lay inside the plot. I walked gently, and very cautiously, atop it till I reached the inside of the graveyard, and began to study the headstones. Many of them, as I just said, were beyond antique, but a few were quite possibly late 19th century, and one or two actually had some legible words. Beneath the stone angel, which was gray with age and mossy slime, I found the family name, the carving amazingly still intact on all four sides of the pedestal:

CALHOUN

My Mamma's family cemetery, then. I had not even known there was such.











- - -


I wandered throughout the graveyard for a while, more or less in a trance, not thinking any particular thoughts. Here and there I found a legible gravestone on which I read an inscription. I thought about Mamma, interred in Champaign, and wondered if she would prefer to be here. Just then I found three newer gravestones at the front left corner, where the front and left fences had fallen over-the front had fallen in on the graves, the left had fallen out and away from the cemetery perimeter. I set the papers carefully down on one of the older tombs farther back, and tried to lift the fence off. It proved too heavy to lift, but stepping over it and pulling at the bottom rung from the other side allowed me to at least slide that end away from the graves, leaving the stones uncovered. When I went back in, I discovered that these were indeed newer-probably the newest-graves: my Daddy, and my Mamma's folks. They read:

Edison Donald Lewes


February 26 1910-May 10 1941


Beloved Husband, Father


Caretaker


of The Big Forest

Rory Thomas Calhoun


Beloved Patriarch


died May 29 1932

Ilse Maggethe Knutsen Calhoun


Beloved Matriarch


died May 29 1932

         My father, my maternal grandparents whom I never remembered knowing; but surely I must have, for I was two years and three months old when they died. I determined right then and there that I would arrange to have Mamma's casket moved right here, next to Daddy; I saw then there was a space already carved out as it were, beside his grave: a plot marked out with tiny stakes and twine, and a blank headstone. Tomorrow I would see Attorney Benton Squires and instruct him to put the process into motion to have Mamma transferred here, to lie beside Daddy and her own folks. I realized at once, too, that this must be the first of the two additional plots of land I had not realized until this past week that I owned: the Calhoun Family Cemetery, located, oddly enough, in The Big Forest.





         I jogged back to the Merc and dug an old pocket spiral notebook and a pen out of the car pocket, then walked back to the Cemetery, making notes as I went, mentally apologizing to the inhabitants for calling it a “boneyard.” I noted for tomorrow that I first needed to stop in at the Junction to see Attorney Squires regarding moving Mamma; then I would head on to Madison Mills and locate the Testament Corporation offices. About 3 PM I needed to be in Rennald to pick up my bonus payment from Todd's Garage, and while there I would run a load or two at the Washerette. A full day indeed, and first of all I would need to set up the Toddley boys, if they showed up, at work on the plastic for the roof of the Plant Nursery. I supposed that after midnight I would be summoned to work on the Greenhouse, so I might as well enjoy the remainder of this beautiful Sunday and its temperate weather.





         I pocketed the notebook and pen and picked up the files and envelopes from the nearby gravestone. Loath now to sit on a tomb, I had instead located a fallen log and sat on that. I pulled out the County Tax Assessor's notice first: sure enough, it did appear, if I read it aright, I owned the plot of land on which I currently sat, the Calhoun Family Cemetery. I hadn't seen it before, could have sworn there was only the tax notice itself and a carbon copy stapled to it, one set for each of three plats; but now I saw all three had folded plat maps attached to each-how I could have missed something that thick I didn't know. I unfolded the first, and saw that my “homestead” land included the section on which I had built my cabin and graded my drive, the land behind-my back yard-which now contained the burgeoning Plant Nursery; but also extended a sizeable distance in all four directions: behind the Nursery; to the East, toward Knox; to the West, including the foundations on which I now was building the Greenhouse; and then for some 1000 acres on the south side of New Knox Road. To the West, it appeared, my land extended right up to the boundaries of the old Jenks Farm, an oddly wedge-shaped piece which on its other side touched Farmer Jennell's very extensive segment. Looked like Jennell and I both had much acreage, but he farmed his and I had been in ignorance of exactly how much land I had inherited. I folded that plat map back up and went on to the one that showed the Cemetery! I sat stunned and amazed-I owned the land where I sat, out to the road, and back behind the Cemetery (which here appeared to be North) for twelve hundred and fifty-eight acres, including some on either side to the East and West). Astonishing-it seemed perhaps this had all been Calhoun family land then. I noticed tiny print on this particular plat map, but try as I might, I couldnt' bring it into focus. Then I remembered I also had a small magnifying glass I kept in the Merc's car pocket; it had been my Mamma's, for use with her daily newspaper as her eyes got older and much less useful, and when I packed her possessions, I remembered now sticking the glass in the car pocket rather than into one of the cardboard packing boxes, where it might have been accidentally crushed or broken. So I jogged back to the Merc and then returned to the cemetery, by this time really wishing I had bought that RC back at the Knox General Store; and I sat down once again to examine the plat map, which I had anchored with a small stone. I bent closely over the plat map which I spread out across my lap, and applied the magnifying glass. Still couldn't see the print, till I bent even closer – and, oh, there it was-just above the location of the Cemetery, next to the clearly marked-out rectangle which must represent the foundation ruins-the single word:

Euphonia

I had discovered the Calhoun Family homestead, and I sat a mere few feet away. To my right at the moment lay the ruins of the home in which my mother had been born and grown up, where she lived when she met my future Daddy-and where both her mother and father died in agony on that night of May 29, 1932-Euphonia.





- - -


So the land on which I had become impelled to construct the Greenhouse, that charred foundation ruins, was not Euphonia. That was not my ancestral homestead; that was not the farmhouse in which my grandparents had encountered their agonizing deaths. Well, in one instance, I was relieved: now I knew I wasn't constructing my dream business over the wreckage of my grandparents' lives. In another instance, this only created that much more confusion. If “Euphonia's” ruins sat behind me-then whose home burnt on the plat just beyond my driveway, where the Greenhouse was going up at night? Well, I didn't know-but somehow I didn't think that whatever it was, and truly, except for the chimney, it might not have even been a house-a barn, a tool shed (Tool Shed??), or even a mechanic's garage. Yet one more question for the recalcitrant Attorney, Benton Squires.





         A sudden stirring, like a gentle breeze wafting between the firs, caused me to look up. On top of the foundation, where the flooring would have been, stood a woman-a girl, wispy pale gown, waist-length hair, pale ribbon holding it off her forehead, eyes like the slate grey of sky just before the storm commences. She stared at me, and I, open-mouthed, gazed in return. Was this the girl I had seen crossing the road earlier, when I'd first entered The Big Forest, and nearly went to my untimely end? I blinked, she disappeared; blinked again, and saw her now in among the graves. Suddenly the cemetery seemed much wider and deeper than I had remembered, so that even though she now appeared in the left side near the rear-the side on which were my Daddy's and Mamma's folks' graves, but much farther back-my distance discernment just didn't seem right. I had thought that the graveyard was possibly only four lines deep, but now, I saw that she remained below a wide-spreading, thick-trunked oak, that its branches bent over her protectively, and that there must be at least eight parallel rows on that side of the center, counting my Daddy's and grandparents' as the first row. Then she would be standing, as was the oak, behind the eighth row, and yet there were some stones I could see-mostly titled, only one or two near upright-behind her. Oh, wait-not just behind her-through her. Oh dear.





         And here I fainted once again, as had become my wont of late. When I awoke, the sun was only a pale reflection of itself beyond the trees which stretched into infinity behind the cemetery and the foundation ruins  of “Euphonia.” The girl was not in sight, but a worse sight was: a doll-like child, or child-like doll, playing hopscotch where the girl had stood, inside the foundation stones, with a screwdriver clutched with a death grasp in her left hand, singing her persistent little nursery rhyme: “I see, I spy, I stick this screwdriver in your eye,” turning toward me with that glassy-eyed blue grin and I screamed! Woke up holding my head in a death grip-and I was all alone. But at one point I had not been: the same stone I had used earlier to anchor the plat maps while I returned to the car for first, my pocket spiral notebook and a pen, and second, Mamma's magnifying glass, sat on top of the neatly folded papers. Mamma's magnifier sat beside, cracked once, diagonally across. And as I stood to brush off my jeans and collect the glass and the folders and envelopes, I glanced into the ruins. Inside, on the dirt, lay the screwdriver from my tool box at home. No! I wasn't going to collect it! I turned and ran, not jogged, to the Merc, looked inside at both seats and both floorboards to make sure I was alone, tossed in the papers and the magnifier and the stone (which I'd forgotten I had brought along in my haste), opened the passenger door and rolled up the window, shut the door, unlocked and opened the trunk to make sure it was empty of anything but what I kept inside. Then I closed and relocked the trunk and rushed to climb in the driver's seat, nearly ripping my jeans pocket in my haste to pull out the keys. Rolled up the window, closed and locked the door, locked the passenger door, looked over the seat to check the back floorboard once more. Keys in ignition, transmission in reverse, floored it out of there and back on to the road. I no longer thought about trying to drive any further into The Big Forest; instead, I raced back the way I came, a good trick considering the switchbacks, and eventually gained the turn on to New Knox Road without mishap. I raced along the road through the Village, scarcely noticing this time the girl Alice, who crossing in front of the store, threw up a courteous wave. I barely responded and sped down the road, slowing only when I came in sight of my driveway. Up the drive and around to the back, at the last minute remembering there was a Plant Nursery going up in the back yard, cut the wheel sharply and parked. Started to get out leaving the keys and the papers, then changed my mind and grabbed both, scurrying to the house after locking the driver's door; unlocked the back door, ran in and bolted and locked it, and went through the house closing every curtain and checking every lock and bolt.