“I would love to,” said Ethan. “This is a fascinating place.” Zelma sat down on a cast iron bench with chipping white paint, the only seat on the porch, and Ethan sat down beside her. “I want to hear everything,” he continued. “You are one of the most interesting and coolest people I’ve ever met.”
“You are a wonderful boy,” said Zelma, lightly touching his cheek for a brief moment. “I’m so happy that you came to me. I believe that some people are sent to each other, for whatever reason. There is so much about life I want to tell you, things that would otherwise be lost. Every day things are lost, people are lost, people and the knowledge they spent their lifetime obtaining, gone forever.
“It makes me think of an auction I went to once, many years ago. Rummaging through the items to be sold, I found a box of old photographs. There were photos of birthday parties, Halloween parties, Christmas parties, photos of people living full and happy lives. I thought surely someone would bid on the box, but no one did. I raised my hand on an impulse and purchased the lot for a quarter. How sad, I thought. Were there no family or friends who would want to cherish all the memories captured on the bits of yellowed paper? For a time I tried to find someone who had known the people in the photos, even put an ad in the classifieds. I desperately wanted to give them to someone who would appreciate them, but no one ever surfaced. How could so much life, so many good times, have all been reduced to a small box of forgotten pictures? I don’t know why it bothered me so, but it did.”
“Do you still have the box?”
“Yes, it’s in a drawer in my bedroom. Sometimes I get them out and look through them, trying to imagine what the people in them were like. They look like such a fun bunch of people. It sounds silly, I know, but I guess we’re all crazy in our own special ways.
“But I was telling you about George. You asked me how we met. You must remind me to stay on topic. I have a tendency to digress at times.
“I met George at a Halloween party, not unlike the Halloween party pictured in one of the photos I spoke of. Perhaps that’s why they haunt me so. Anyway, my cousins, Minnie and Samuel Courts, lived in Russellville. They were twins, you know, obviously not identical. They lived in a very large red brick home, and if you go there today, you will immediately notice it. It rises above its corner lot like a castle, even has a tower on one side, a very grand home, for sure.
“I kept my interest in George to myself. Times were much different then, and people pretty much dated and married within their class. You see, George wasn’t one of the party guests. He actually worked for the Courts, a handyman of sorts, though at seventeen he was nearly a boy. He did whatever needed doing around the house, perhaps more of a go-for, as they call it, than a handyman. Having a very charismatic personality and a love of talking, George had been asked by the twins to help entertain the guests at the party.
“I was enamored from the first moment I saw him. I hadn’t seen him prior to the party because he had only recently been hired. Minnie rang a bell and told everyone to gather around. We were all dressed in costumes: I as a court jester, others dressed as ghosts, hoboes, or whatever else they had pieced together. Back then costumes were simple and made at home, as none sold in the stores the way they are today. ‘We have a special guest tonight,’ Minnie said. ‘Tonight a scarecrow from Flintridge has come to life and will be telling ghost stories.’ People gasped or laughed nervously in anticipation. It was really a very spooky affair, the house being illuminated solely by candles for the occasion. The party rooms were decorated with corn stalks, hay bales, and Jack-o-lanterns. The glowing mean-looking faces of the Jack-o-lanterns really did have quite a frightful appearance in the darkened house.
“George entered the room, and everyone fell silent. And though he was dressed in the rags of a scarecrow, wearing an old straw hat, his face smeared with charcoal, I had never seen anyone more handsome. When he started talking my heart melted completely. He had a beautiful voice that today would have made him a great radio personality, and he spoke with animation as he told stories spooky enough to make your skin crawl. He told of premature burials, of dead war soldiers returning home, of houses haunted by restless spirits. At the conclusion of one of his stories, someone at the back of the room suddenly screamed. This had been planned, of course. Everyone jumped in fright. It was a wonderfully good time. I wanted desperately to speak to George that night, but he left after the storytelling. He was hired help, you know, and his job had concluded for the evening.
“I didn’t see George very much again until the next spring, though it wasn’t for lack of trying. On the occasions I did get to town, he was always busy somewhere away from the house. I saw him a little when I visited for Thanksgiving, but I couldn’t get up the courage to say anything to him, gasping in awkward silence at every attempt. He must have thought me an idiot. But May of the next year changed everything. That May I stayed at my cousins’ for a week or so, and again I was disappointed by the lack of opportunity to get to know George better. My fascination with him had never waned since the Halloween party.
“As had been planned previously, the twins were to accompany me back to Flintridge to stay for two months. On the last day of my visit, the servants secured our trunks onto the top of one of the family’s fine Landau carriages. It was a beautiful dark blue carriage with black leather seating. My heart nearly skipped a beat when I walked out of the house and saw George waiting for us. His beautiful sky-blue eyes seemed to glow in the bright sunlight, and his shiny black hair glistened like ebony. Although his facial features were soft, he had a masculine nose like Rudolph Valentino, and he wore a slight smile that never seemed to leave his face. I thought I’d faint as he opened the carriage door and assisted me to my seat.
“My cousins talked enthusiastically as we rode the bumpy way to Flintridge, but all I could think about was George perched up on the drivers seat. Trying not to sound overly interested, I asked Minnie if he would be staying at Flintridge.
“‘Yes, Samuel requested that he stay,’ she said.
“‘I didn’t want to be the only boy around,’ Samuel said. He explained that even though George was older than he and was just a servant, they were great chums, all the same. The twins were about thirteen at the time. I was sixteen, a little younger than George. That was in 1896, I believe.
“‘You don’t seem well today; you’ve hardly spoken a word,’ Minnie said, as we rolled along the countryside.
“Her words gave me an ingenious idea. ‘You’re right,’ I said. ‘I don’t feel well. I wonder if George would mind terribly if I rode beside him on the driver’s seat. I fear I will be sick soon if I don’t. The air up there will do me some good. It’s so stuffy in here.’
“‘I’m sure he wouldn’t mind, though I’m not sure how proper it would be,’ she said.
“‘Oh, stuff proper,’ I said. ‘I’m dying in here. Samuel would you ask him please?’ Samuel stuck his head out the window and yelled for George to stop.
“‘I’d like nothing better,’ George said when Samuel told him my request.
“‘This is just scandalous,’ Minnie said laughing, as George assisted me to the driver’s seat. ‘We will certainly have to keep this to ourselves. I hope we don’t meet another carriage along the way.’
“‘There’s nothing scandalous about it,’ I said. ‘It’s for my health, so don’t be ridiculous.’
“Oh, what a wonderful ride to Flintridge that was. George and I talked the whole way, and I learned so much about him, devouring his every word, blushing when he told me that he wasn’t used to driving with a pretty girl by his side. He had been orphaned at a young age, you know, and orphaned again when a loving, though poor, aunt died. By the age of thirteen he worked odd jobs to support himself and slept in a barn. One day he convinced my cousins’ head housekeeper to let him run an errand for her for a small tip. More errands followed, eventually leading to bigger jobs, until one day he was hired to work fulltime at the Court’s mansion. He quickly became a
favorite of everyone.
“I was disappointed as we pulled up the long driveway of this old mansion. I could have been happy riding through eternity sitting on that seat beside George. ‘It’s been quite the honor, beautiful Madam,’ he said, assisting me down from the carriage seat, kissing my hand when I had reached the ground. It was all I could do to keep from fainting.”
She paused for a moment, as though reflecting deeply, then said, “I hope you don’t mind the way I’m relaying my past to you, Ethan, quoting people as though I were reading a book. I want to tell my story as vividly as possible, and that’s the best way, I believe, to do so.”
“I’m enjoying the way you tell things very much. It makes what happened back then seem so much more real. I can almost imagine myself being there.”
“I’m so glad to hear you say that. I’ve wanted for so long to tell my story, but until now I haven’t found the right person to tell it to.”
Ethan wasn’t sure he deserved such an honor. Miss Green was a rich woman who had lived a long and interesting life. He was just a poor teenage boy who had never done anything extraordinary. Yet he could tell that Miss Green saw something in him, something not so everyday and simple. He could see it in her eyes when she looked into his, almost as though he knew her thoughts and she knew his.
“Miss Green,” Ethan said, a thought suddenly occurring to him. “Why doesn’t Miss Satterfield want me to go near the cellar door?” He regretted the question the moment it escape his mouth, though he wasn’t sure why, perhaps because Miss Satterfield had made such an issue out of it. Miss Green’s reaction was not what he expected. He half expected anger and a quick change of the subject.
Miss Green laughed and said, “It’s a wonder Clara didn’t get us both locked up years ago. She gets as nervous as a cat in a dog kennel every time someone comes near the house. My guess is you wouldn’t of had a second thought about that cellar door if she hadn’t of brought it up. Am I right?”
“She did kind of make me wonder about it, I guess. I’m sorry about bringing it up. It’s really none of my business.”
Zelma turned towards Ethan, picked up his right hand with both of her hands, and said, “No, you were right to ask about that door. It matters greatly what’s down in the cellar. It’s just too soon to speak of it right now. Follow the stories I’m telling you, and they will lead you there, right down into that dark place. I want you to know everything, but the cellar must be saved for last. Life has a sequence, you know, my life included. To tell the story right, I must tell it in sequence. In my old age I was beginning to think I would take the secret hidden down in the cellar to my grave, but then you came along, and I feel compelled to tell you everything. I want someone to know it, someone young, and you seem right, otherwise my life will all be forgotten, forgotten like the lives of the people in the old box of photographs. My time left is short, so I have to tell my story now. Any day I may open that final door and cross over into a wonderful place where my loved ones await.”
“I appreciate you telling me so many things about your life,” he said. “I’m just a regular kid, though. I hope I don’t disappoint you.”
“You are not regular, remember that. Perhaps you will disappoint me. Maybe you’ll find me too strange and not show up for work tomorrow or the next day. You are young, and that is the way of young people. They are like the wind, moving towards whatever catches their interest, moving away from whatever frightens or unsettles them. You have the right to leave and never come back to my house again, which you may very well do, but I have to say, I would be very saddened and disappointed by such an event.”
“I don’t plan on leaving anytime soon,” said Ethan, “I actually really like working for you, more so every day. I don’t think Miss Satterfield likes me, though, always gets on to me about something.
“Please don’t let Clara bother you; I can handle her. I think she means well, but if she had a dog, it’d run away.” Ethan laughed at that. “Besides, Clara couldn’t fire you if she wanted to. I’m still the boss, even if she may think otherwise, and I’d never fire such a sensitive and wonderful boy as you.”
“I’m glad you think so much of me. Most people think I’m just a regular kid. That’s what I always thought I was until I met you.”
“Now, help me up,” said Zelma. “We’ll go inside the house. I know you want to see what’s inside.”
“Oh, definitely,” said Ethan, assisting her up from the cast-iron bench and handing her the horse-head cane.
Zelma opened the tall solid oak front door with a skeleton key she had retrieved from her purse, and the two walked into the large foyer of the substantial structure. Though not as ornate, it was much bigger than her house in town. A simple staircase, with a landing halfway up, was the main feature of the foyer. On either side of the foyer, four doorways, two on each side, opened into four large rooms. Although a few pieces of furniture were scattered about, the rooms were mostly empty.
“I love this place,” said Ethan. “I think it’s bigger than My Old Kentucky Home. I went there once when I was younger, on a trip with my grandparents.”
“A better name for this place would be My Old Kentucky Ghosts,” said Zelma, more to herself than to Ethan. “There was so much life here once; now it’s all faint whispers and passing shadows. If you listen closely you can almost hear the whispers, voices of another time. Some say it’s haunted by ghosts. I say it’s haunted by memories. An old house is like a living thing that feels lonely when abandoned.”
“I can see what you mean, Miss Green. It’s like so many things happen in a house that, as time passes, the house kind of absorbs it, kind of like our brain absorbs things.”
“You’re a very observant and smart boy. Most people spend their whole lives never seeing the beauty in things, never seeing the depth of things. I know you see yourself as ordinary. You do so because you’ve probably never been surrounded by fancy things. The depth of our soul is not measured in the amount of fancy things we own; it’s measured in our ability to know the true value of the people and things that surround us. I hope you will remember this.”
“You make so much sense when you talk,” said Ethan. “I’ve never known anyone like you. You’re like a poet.”
“That is a wonderful thing for you to say to me, Ethan. I do like to write poetry, though I’d never want anyone to read it.”
“I’d like to read your poetry.”
“I appreciate that,” said Zelma, “but no, it’s too personal, dips further into my soul than I care to ever reveal to anyone. Now, let’s move in here and sit down. There’s not much furniture left, but the dining room table is still around. It was too big for my house in town, and no one else I knew needed such a large table, so it remains.” Ethan followed her into a large elongated dining room at the back end of the house.
“Wow!” said Ethan “This is the biggest dining table I’ve ever seen in person, twelve chairs.” He assisted Zelma onto a seat at the head of the table and sat down in a seat beside her. “I love the dark red wood. It must be worth a fortune.”
“It a mahogany Duncan Phyfe pedestal table. A lot of people your age wouldn’t appreciate its quality.”
“I’d like to own a house someday with a big dining room in it like this. I’d want my house to be in the mountains, though. I love the mountains; it’s where I grew up. Growing up in the mountains, there weren’t too many houses like this one or your house in town. It took a lot of craftsmanship to build a place like this, and they didn’t have the modern tools that people use today.”
“That’s so true,” said Zelma. “Quality was so much more important back then.”
“So you were telling me about George,” said Ethan. “What happened after you arrived here at Flintridge?”
“Oh, yes. Well, I tried my best not to act interested in George. I couldn’t really tell if he liked me or not. He stayed busy helping out around the farm and keeping Samuel entertained, as there were no other boys around. My brothers
were all older.
“One day, after visiting my bees and collecting honey, I was returning home in a most pleasant and dreamy state of mind. A part of the pathway I was walking on meandered near a beautiful and somewhat deep creek. Walking past the creek, I heard water splashing. Curious, I snuck though the trees to see what was making the commotion. In my mind I pictured some animal cooling itself off. But to my horror, I saw George and Samuel swimming and playing in water. You see, in those days people in the country didn’t wear swimming suits like they do today.
“I started to turn and leave, but then I heard Samuel snicker and yell, ‘You’ll never catch me, you ole turtle!’ He ran out of the water and right into my direction. George came running after him. Mortified, I tried to escape, but there was nowhere to go. They came right upon me. I wanted to die on the spot.”
Ethan laughed. “That’s hilarious,” he said.
“Yes, I find it funny now, myself,” she said, smiling, “but at the time I was embarrassed to tears.
“‘Pardon me, Madam,’ George said. I could tell he was just as stunned as I was. He quickly covered himself with his hands, but the damage had already been done. Samuel jumped back into the water, laughing like it was the funniest thing that had ever happened.
“‘I want you to know I wasn’t spying,’ I told George. ‘I heard a noise through the trees and decided to investigate. I thought perhaps a deer was splashing in the water.’ His answer shocked me.”
“‘I was sort of hoping you were spying,’ he said.
“‘That’s an extremely vulgar statement,’ I said and stormed away, immediately tripping over a rock, slapping George’s hand when he tried to assist me back up. Recovering myself, I paused a moment long enough to say, ‘I would prefer we pretend this never happened.’
“’You’ve got my word,’ he said.
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