“The only thing is that he’s old. He’s over ninety, and weak in the head. He gets confused; he always mixes the future with the past. To him it is the past, and it’s all equally blurred. But when he says anything as clear as a date, it’s so. You wait and see.”
There were too many words; and the concreteness of them, the colloquial twang of them on the still air, built an oddly insubstantial picture. Kent began to feel less startled. He knew these country folk; and the conviction was suddenly strong in him that, in some obscure way, he was being made the victim of a practical joke.
It wouldn’t do, of course, to say so. Besides, there was the unaccountable episode of the gate.
“This Mrs Carmody,” he said finally. “I don’t recall her. Who is she?”
“She came to look after the farm when her sister-in-law, the old man’s grand-daughter, died. No blood relation, but—” The driver drew a deep breath, tried hard to look casual, and said: “She’s the one, you know, who murdered old Wainwright five years ago. They put her in the crazy house at Peerton for doing it.”
“Murdered!” Kent said. “What is this – the local ghost story?” He paused; then: “Just a minute. He talked as if he was still living with her.”
“Look, Mr Kent” – the man was pitying – “let’s not go into why the ghost says what he says. People have tried figuring out what’s going on, and have ended with their brains twisted into seventeen knots.”
“There must be a natural explanation.”
The driver shrugged. “Well, then, you find it.” He added: “I was the one who drove Mrs Carmody and her two kids from Kempster to the farm here. Maybe you’d like to hear as much of the story as I can tell you the rest of the way to the hotel.”
Kent sat quietly as gears shifted; and the machine moved heavily off. He turned finally to look at the farm. It was just passing out of sight behind a long spread of trees.
That last look showed – desolation, deadness. He shuddered involuntarily, and did not look again. He said: “This story . . . what about it?”
The woman saw the farm as the car slowed at the lip of the hill. She was dimly aware that the car was in low gear, with brakes on, slithering down the loose gravel of the steep incline.
The farm, she thought with a greedy intensity that shook her heavy body; safety at long, long last. And only a senile old man and a girl standing between her and possession.
Between her – and the hard, sordid years that stretched behind her. Years of being a widow with two children in a tenement house, with only an occasional job to eke out the income from the relief department.
Years of hell!
And here was heaven for the taking. Her hard blue eyes narrowed; her plump, hard body grew taut – if she couldn’t take the treasure of security that was here, she’d better—
The thought faded. Fascinated, she stared at the valley farm below, a green farmhouse, a great red barn and half a dozen outhouses. In the near distance a vast field of wheat spread; tiny wheat, bright green with a mid-spring greenness.
The car came down to the level of the valley; and trees hid the distant, rolling glory of the land. The automobile came to a stop, its shiny front pointed at the gate; and, beside her, the heavily built boy said:
“This it, ma?”
“Yes, Bill!” The woman looked at him anxiously. All her ultimate plans about this farm centered around him. For a moment she was preternaturally aware of his defects, his sullen, heavy, yet not strong face. There was a clumsiness of build in his chunky, sixteen-year-old body that made him something less than attractive.
She threw off that brief pattern of doubt; she ventured: “Isn’t it wonderful?”
“Naw!” The thick lips twisted. “I’d rather be in the city.” He shrugged. “But I guess I know what’s good for us.”
“That’s right.” She felt relieved. “In this world it’s what you get, not what you want. Remember that, Bill . . . what is it, Pearl?”
She spoke impatiently. It was the way her daughter always affected her. What good was a pasty-faced, twelve-year-old, too plump, too plain, and without the faintest promise of ever being pretty. With an even sharper annoyance, the woman repeated:
“What is it?”
“There’s a skinny old man coming across the field. Is that Mr Wainwright, ma?”
Mrs Carmody turned slowly and stared in the direction Pearl was pointing. And, after a moment, a current of relief surged through her. Until this instant she had felt a sharp edge of worry about the old man. Old, her sister-in-law had written in her occasional letter. But she hadn’t imagined he’d be this old. Why, he must be ninety, a hundred; utterly no danger to her at all.
She saw that the driver had opened the gate, and was coming back to drive the car through. With a new confidence she raised her voice at him:
“Wait!” she said, “wait for the old man. He’s been out for a walk, and he’ll be tired. Give him a lift to the house.”
Might as well make a good first impression, she thought. Politeness was the watchword. Iron hands within velvet gloves.
It struck her that the driver was staring at her peculiarly; the man said: “I wouldn’t count on him driving with us. He’s a queer old duck, Mr Wainwright is. Sometimes he’s deaf and blind, and he don’t pay attention to no one. And he does a lot of queer things.”
The woman frowned. “For instance?”
The man sighed. “Well, ma’am, it’s no use trying to explain. You might as well start learning by experience, now as later. Watch him.”
The long, thin figure came at an even, slow pace across the pasture to the south. He crossed the road, passing the car less than three feet from the fenders, seemingly completely blind to its presence. He headed straight for the gate.
Not the open gate, wide enough for the car to go through, but the narrow, solidly constructed wooden gate for human beings. He seemed to fumble at some hidden catch. And then—
The gate did not open, but he stepped through as if it had.
Stepped through the solid wooden gate.
For a long second Mrs Carmody was aware of a harsh woman’s voice screaming. With a terrible shock, she realized it was her own voice.
The effort to choke that wild cry was so horrible that she fell back against the seat, the blood hammering at her temples. She sagged there, sick, cold as ice, her vision blurred, her throat ash dry, every muscle in her body jumping with tiny, painful surges of nervous convulsion; and, for a long moment, her mind wouldn’t hold thoughts.
“Just a minute!” Kent interrupted the driver. “I thought you told me the old man was alive at this time. How come he walked through the gate?”
His narrator stared at him strangely: “Mr Kent, the only reason that old man hasn’t made us all crazy these past twelve years is that he’s harmless. He walked through gates when he was alive just as he does now. And not only gates. The difference is that we know we buried him. Maybe he’s always been a ghost, and killing him don’t do no good. All we know is, he’s harmless. That’s enough, isn’t it?”
Kent nodded, but there was a world of doubt in his voice as he said:
“I suppose so; anyway, go on.”
The dark blur of fear in the woman’s mind yielded to an awareness of tugging at her arm; and then she realized that the driver was speaking:
“It’s all right, ma’am, he’s just a queer, harmless old man. Nothing to get excited about.”
It was not the driver, but the boy beside her, whose words pulled her together; the boy saying rather scornfully:
“Gee, ma, you sure take on. I seen a trick like that on the stage last year, only it was better than that. It don’t mean a thing.”
The woman began to feel better. Bill was such a solid, practical boy, she thought gratefully. And of course he was right. Some trick, of course, and – what was that stupid little fool of a girl saying. She found herself repeating the question out loud:
“What did you say, Pearl?”
“He sees us, ma – look!” the girl said.
The woman saw that the old man was peering at her over the gate. A thin, long, gentle, wrinkled face it was, bright with gathering interest. He said with an astonishingly crisp voice for one so old:
“You’re back from town rather early, Mrs Carmody. Does that mean an early dinner?”
He paused politely; then: “I have no objection naturally. I am only too happy to fit myself into any routine you desire.”
The deadly thought that came to her was that she was being made ridiculous in some way. Her face grew taut, her eyes narrowed, then she mustered an uncertain smile, and tried to force her mind past his words. The fierce whisper of the driver rescued her from that developing confusion:
“Begging your pardon, ma’am,” the man said hurriedly, “don’t let on you’re new here. He’s got the gift of seeing, and he’s been acting for months as if you were already here, and, if you contradict him, it only puzzles him. Toward the end, he was actually calling Mrs Wainwright by your name. He’s just a queer old man.”
Mrs Carmody sat a very still, her blue eyes brighter, wide with abrupt calculation. The thrill that came was warm along her nerves. Expected!
One of the several things she had feared was this moment of her arrival; but now – expected!
All her careful preparation would go over smoothly. The letter she had forged so painstakingly, in which the dead woman, the old man’s granddaughter, asked her to come to look after her daughter, Phyllis – that prize letter would merely be a confirmation of something which had already been accepted as inevitable. Though how—
The woman shook herself firmly. This was no time to worry about the curious actions of an old man. She had a farm to take over; and the quicker that problem was solved, the better.
She smiled again, her thick face smirking a little with the comfortable glow of her inner triumph.
“Won’t you ride to the house with us, Mr Wainwright? You must be tired after your walk.”
The old fellow nodded alertly. “Don’t mind if I do, madam. I was all the way to Kempster, and I’m a little tired. Saw your sister there, by the way.”
He had come through the gate, this time the one that was standing open for the car, and he was heading for the front door of the machine when Mrs Carmody managed heavily:
“My – sister?”
“Sssshh!” hissed the driver. “Pay no attention. He’s mixed up in his head. He thinks everyone of us has a living image, and he’s always meeting them. He’s been like this for years, perfectly harmless.”
It was easier to nod this time. The episode of the gate was a vague unreality in her mind, becoming dimmer by the minute. She smiled her smile as the old man politely lifted his hat, watched as he climbed into the front seat beside the driver.
The car puffed along the yard road, rounded the house and drew up before the veranda. A girl in a white dress came to the screen door, and stood there very quietly staring at them.
She was a pretty, fragile thing, Mrs Carmody noted with a sharp eye to detail, slim, with yellow hair, about fifteen or sixteen, and – the woman’s mind tightened – not very friendly.
The woman smiled sweetly. “Hello, Phyllis,” she said, “I’m so glad to see you.”
“Hello,” said Phyllis; and the older woman smiled comfortably at the reluctant greeting. Because – it had been a greeting. It was acceptance of a sort.
The woman smiled a thin smile to herself. This simple country girl was going to learn how impossible it was to fight a friendly approach, backed by an iron purpose.
She could see the whole future smoothly fitting in with her wishes. First, to settle down; then to set about throwing Bill and Phyllis together, so that they’d consider marriage a natural and early conclusion to their relationship. And then-It was night; and she had blown out the lamp in the master bedroom before she thought again of the old man, and the astounding things he had said and done.
She lay in the darkness, nestling into the special comfort of the great bed, frowning. Finally, sleepily, she shrugged. Harmless, the driver had said. Well, he’d better stay that way, the old coot.
Mrs Carmody wakened the following morning to the sounds of movement downstairs. She dressed hurriedly with a sense of having been outmaneuvered on her first day; and that empty feeling became conviction when she saw the old man and Phyllis eating breakfast.
There were three other plates set with bowls of cereal; and Mrs Carmody sank down before one of them in a dead silence. She saw that the girl had a notebook open in front of her; and she clutched at the straw of conversation it offered.
“Doing your homework?” she asked in her friendliest voice.
“No!” said the girl, closing the notebook and getting up from the table.
Mrs Carmody sat very still, fighting the surge of dull color that crept up into her cheeks. No use getting excited, she thought. The thing was, somehow – somehow she had to make friends with this quiet girl.
And besides, there was some information she had to have – about food, about the house, about – money.
Abruptly, breakfast was a meaningless, tasteless act. She got up from her half-finished cereal; in the kitchen she found Phyllis washing the dishes.
“Let me wash,” said the woman, “you dry.”
She added: “Pretty hands like yours shouldn’t be in dish water.”
She sent a swift glance at the girl’s face, and spoke for the third time: “I’m rather ashamed of myself for getting up so late. I came here to work, not to rest.”
“Oh, you’ll get used to it,” said the girl; and Mrs Carmody smiled her secret smile. The dangerous silence strike was over. She said:
“What about food? Is there any particular store where you buy it? Your mother didn’t mention such details in her letter. I—”
She stopped, startled in spite of herself at that mention of the letter. She stood for a moment, hands rigid in the hot water; then forced on:
“Your poor mother! It was such a tired letter she wrote. I cried when I read it.”
From under half-closed eyes she saw that the girl’s lips were trembling – and she knew her victory. She had a brief blazing exultation at the way every word, every mood of this moment was under her control. She said swiftly:
“We can talk about those details later.”
The girl said tearfully: “We have a charge account at Graham’s General Store in Agan. You can phone up. He delivers this far.”
The woman walked hurriedly into the dining room to get the dishes that were still there, and to hide the irrepressible light of triumph in her eyes. A charge account! The problem of obtaining control of the money had actually made her feel sick, the consciousness that legal steps might be necessary, the conviction that she must first establish herself in the household and in the community.
And here was her stepping-stone: a charge account! Now, if this Graham’s store would only accept her order – what was the girl saying?
“Mrs Carmody, I want to apologize for not answering your question about my notebook at breakfast. You see, the neighbors always want to know what great-grandfather says about them; so, at breakfast, when he’s strongest, I ask him questions, and take notes. I pretend to him that I’m going to write a book about his life when I grow up. I couldn’t explain all that in front of him, could I?”
“Of course not,” said the woman. She thought sharply: So the neighbors were interested in the old man’s words about them. They’d be interested and friendly with anyone who kept them supplied with the latest titbits of news. She’d have to keep her ears open, and perhaps keep a notebook herself.
She grew aware that the girl was speaking again: “I’ve been wanting to tell you, great-grandpa really has the gift of seeing. You won’t believe that yet, but—”
The girl’s eyes were bright, eager; and the woman knew better than to let such enthusiasm pass.
“Why, of course, I believe it,” she said. “I’m not one of these skep
tics who won’t face facts. All through history there have been people with strange powers; and besides, didn’t I see with my own eyes Mr Wainwright step through a solid gate. I—”
Her voice faltered; her own words describing that incredible action brought a vivid return of reality, and she could only finish weakly: “Of course, I believe it.”
“What I meant, Mrs Carmody,” the girl was saying, “don’t be offended if he seems to say something unpleasant. He always thinks he’s talking about events that have already happened, and then, of course, there’s the way he talks about your sister, if you’re a woman, and your brother if you’re a man. It’s really you he means.”
Really you—
The woman’s mind spun curiously; and the memory of the words stayed with her after the girl had ridden off to school, even after Graham’s accepted her order on behalf of the Wainwright farm with a simple, utterly effective: “Oh, yes, Mrs Carmody, we know about you.”
It was not until nearly noon that she went out onto the porch, where the old man was sitting, and asked the question that had been quivering in her mind:
“Mr Wainwright, yesterday you mentioned you had seen my sister in Kempster. W-what did she have to say?”
She waited with a tenseness that startled her; and there was the queer thought that she was being utterly ridiculous. The old man took his long pipe out of his mouth, thoughtfully. He said:
“She was coming out of the courthouse, and—”
“Courthouse!” said Mrs Carmody.
The old man was frowning to himself. “She didn’t speak to me, so I cannot say what she was doing there.” He finished politely: “Some little case, no doubt. We all have them.”
Kent was aware of the car slowing. The driver nodded at a two-story wooden building with a veranda, and said:
“That’s the hotel. I’ll have to leave you now and do some chores. I’ll finish that story for you some other time. Or, if I’m too busy, just ask anyone. The whole district knows all about it.”
The following morning the sun peered with dazzling force into his hotel room. Kent walked to the window and stared out over the peaceful village.
The Mammoth Book of Modern Ghost Stories Page 62