Living Ghosts and Mischievous Monsters

by Dan SaSuWeh Jones

  Billy Goat shook his head.

  “At sunrise,” he continued, “I strapped on these snowshoes and stepped outdoors to find my dog. I left the others shut in the cabin. It didn’t take long until I found the largest footprints I had ever seen. This monster had come right up to my fireplace, where I could see the struggle had taken place—right where I heard the loud thud that shook the cabin. That monster must have thrown the dog against the outside wall and stunned it. I can’t believe I was just a few feet away, inside. The struggle lasted maybe five seconds. I could see where the beast had then leaped fifteen feet from the cabin into the woods. By the time I had stepped outside, he was moving away through the trees, breaking limbs and somehow holding a big, struggling dog. He must have been able to see in the dark, because it was pitch-black that night.

  “Now, as I followed his tracks, I saw that each footfall was about eight feet apart. That meant he had been moving fast. In my mind I could still hear my dog crying, yelping. I continued into the woods, clutching my shotgun.

  “Then I found what would break my heart and send a cold chill through me to this day. Hanging in a tree limb was a long strip of blood-soaked hairy skin—a strip of my dog’s hide—no mistaking the color of his hair. That beast was skinning my dog while he was running away with it—like peeling an orange! I tried to remember how long I heard the dog that night. Had that thing killed my dog quick, or was he skinning him alive? My head was spinning. I had seen enough. I turned and headed back to the cabin.”

  By the time Billy Goat finished his story, I had chills. Now I saw this old man in a new way: It must take great personal strength to still live here, knowing that such a creature could be out there.

  I broke the silence. “Where are your other dogs now?”

  Billy Goat took a long sip of coffee. “I don’t know. After that I kept them in the cabin at night, but over time all I can think is that during the day when the dogs were out, the creature must have gotten them. One by one they disappeared.”

  “So you think this thing might still be around here?” I said.

  Billy Goat looked me straight in the eyes. “I know it is.”

  The Great Horned Serpent

  TRADITIONAL MISSISSIPPIAN MOUND BUILDERS TALE, TOLD BY DAN SASUWEH JONES, PONCA

  Few stories date as far back in time as this one. Or are as chilling. This tale may first have been told by the “Old Ones,” known to many as the Mississippian Mound Builders. These ancient people built an empire from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. They left behind massive dirt mounds, likely used in ceremonies. Today, many tribes believe the Old Ones are our common ancestors. This would explain why tribes many miles apart share similar languages, arts, and stories. One story is of the great serpent called Champie by northeastern tribes, and Bozho or Man-i-too by others.

  A long time ago a group of five boys were playing on the banks of a great lake. Here, a river poured into the lake. It was a beautiful spot. The powerful muddy river that flowed into the lake formed giant whirlpools as it pressed against the calm blue lake water.

  According to the boys’ people, you were not supposed to swim here. “It is taboo,” the elders had told the boys ever since they were old enough to understand. Now they were twelve years old.

  Why was it taboo? It was a mystery to the boys.

  What the boys did not know as they played along the bank was that the giant whirlpools extended deep down into the water with enough force to drag a whole floating tree to the bottom. No one had the power to swim out of such a whirlpool—especially not a twelve-year-old boy! But there was another secret. Right under their feet were underwater caves, stretching far back into the mountain, carved by the powerful river over thousands of years. And something lived there.

  These five boys weren’t just any boys. They thought they were the smartest boys in the tribe.

  The boys knew that because the place was taboo, no one ever went there. That meant the waters would most certainly have lots of fish—and those fish would be big!

  They said to one another proudly: “Who but us would figure out that this spot must have the best fishing around?”

  So, one afternoon the boys slipped away to fish at the spot. They didn’t bring any fishing gear, no lines and hook, no nets or traps. They didn’t want to arouse suspicion back in the village.

  What the boys intended to do was to catch the fish by the old style, with their hands. One or two boys would hold a boy by his legs and lower him into the water. There he could feel for fish hidden in crevices along the rock shelf.

  But once the boys arrived at the place, they realized the rock ledge was too high above the river for the boys to lower another boy down by his legs. One of the boys, called Possum, had a bright idea. They’d cut a vine from the trees and tie it around a boy’s waist. Then the other boys could lower him down.

  First they had to find the best place to lower a boy into the water. As they walked along the rocks, they found a long tree branch and used it to probe the depth of the water. To test the current, they threw sticks into the water and watched them disappear as the powerful water dragged them under. As they walked, the muddy river met the lake, and suddenly the water was crystal clear, and so deep they could not see the bottom. They saw something else, too.

  A massive underwater cave appeared to extend forever, back into the mountain. It was filled with the fresh, clear water. Possum, being especially smart, said, “An underground spring is coming out of the mountain and flowing fresh water into the river!”

  All the boys knew at once: This was where the fish would be. Big fish!

  Now, who would go under the water to catch the fish? Possum spoke up: “I will! But first take that vine over to that tree and soften it up.” He was in charge, and two of the other boys acted quickly. They seesawed the long vine around a tree until it was limp, but still strong. Now they could tie it around Possum’s waist.

  “This will work!” he cried. “I won’t jump in, but I’ll climb down and hang on to the rocks so I can pull myself along the wall above the water and go deep into this cave. That’s where the big fish will be!”

  Possum lowered himself down the rock until his feet and legs could feel the strong current pulling them outward. He felt around for cracks in the rock he could grab with his hands, and he pulled himself into the cave entrance. Then he ducked his head underwater upside down so he could peer inside.

  A beam of sunlight struck the clear water, and Possum saw that the cave was enormous. It sent a shudder through him as he hovered there. As far back as he could see, the cave twisted deep into the mountain—into another world. He completely forgot about fishing.

  That’s when he saw it.

  Something moved. Deep inside the cave. Still submerged, he was running out of air, but he had to see what it was. He grasped the rock, fighting to hold his breath. Straining, he peered far back, where it was dark. One of the large rocks seemed to be moving toward him.

  Then there it was. A flash of light glinting upward as a shimmering pattern slid along the rock face beneath him and into a side cave.

  In a flash he scrambled upward and burst to the surface, gasping for air. Hand over hand he grasped chinks in the rock to pull himself sideways along the wall, away from the cave and toward the other boys.

  “Pull me up! Pull me up!” he screamed, sputtering as he clung to the rock ledge, his head barely above water, his grip slipping. The current was pulling his legs and body outward.

  The boys looked over the rocky ledge and saw the fright in Possum’s face. Frantically they pulled on the vine to bring him up, but they had let it out so much that it was long and loose. Pulling it taut took forever. “Pull me up!” Possum screamed again, gripping the vine with both hands.

  Then he felt it. A rush of water against his legs. He turned to look behind him, and not six feet away, a massive head emerged. The boys on top could not see it. But Possum did: the head of a giant serpent, five times the size of a horse’s head, its hug
e eyes, narrow slits like a serpent’s, focused on him. On its head two long horns swept backward.

  Suddenly the boys gave a hard tug on the vine and it jolted Possum upward, onto the rock shelf.

  “Don’t look!” cried Possum.

  But they were curious. Two of the boys peered over the side. The monster peered upward, a sinister smile curling its lips. The boys stared back.

  Then, just as suddenly as it appeared, the serpent slid down and away, through the river’s turbulent, muddy waters toward the clear bubble of water in the cave. Its long, shimmering body disappeared inside.

  The boys stumbled over one another as they ran from that spot. They ran and ran. When they finally stopped, gasping for breath, Possum grabbed each one by the shoulder and ordered him, sternly, “You can’t tell anyone, not anyone! They will punish us if they know we were down there in that thing’s cave! Promise me!”

  And they all did.

  The boys went home and didn’t talk about the serpent, even among themselves, for many years.

  But of course the story did come out, and it’s been told for generations. To this day no one goes near that place where the muddy river meets the great lake with its secret cave. Except, perhaps, for one boy.

  When Possum’s grandson was twelve years old, he thought he was very smart. And he loved to fish.

  Then one day he disappeared.

  The Chenoo: The Cannibal with an Icy Heart

  TRADITIONAL MICMAC AND PASSAMAQUODDY TALE, MAINE AND NORTHEASTERN CANADA

  The Micmac people of northeastern Canada tell of the feared Chenoo monster, also called the Giwakwa by the Passamaquoddy tribe of Maine. This man-eating giant was once a human, perhaps a powerful shaman. He may have committed a terrible crime, like refusing to share his food so another person starved—or even eating a person. Possessed by an evil spirit, his heart became a lump of ice shaped like a little human with perfect hands, feet, and head. The Chenoo prowls snowy forests eating any living thing it can find with its enormous fangs. It is always starving and even eats away its own lips. Humans beware: If a Chenoo does not eat you, its scream can kill you. The only way to conquer it is to melt its heart.

  A man, his wife, and their little boy left their village in the south and went north to hunt for the winter. When they found a good spot, they built a wigwam. The man brought home deer and bear, the woman prepared the meat, and the boy played outside, chasing after birds and squirrels. Life was good.

  One afternoon when the man was away hunting and his wife was gathering wood, she heard rustling in the bushes, as though some beast were brushing through them. Looking up, she saw with horror that it was something worse than the worst she had feared.

  An awful face glared at her—an ancient man with wolflike eyes, some combination of devil, man, and beast in their most frightening forms. He rose up above her and bared his teeth, and she saw that his shoulders and lips were gnawed away. She gasped. He had eaten his own flesh. His clothes were rags hanging from his body.

  The woman had heard of the terrible Chenoo, the being from the far, icy north—a creature who was once a man but had turned into a devil and a cannibal.

  “It is one of them,” she said to herself, trembling. Then she thought, He must not see that I am afraid.

  She ran up to him, calling out in joy and surprise: “My dear father! My heart is glad to see you. Where have you been for so long?”

  The Chenoo was amazed at such a greeting. He had expected yells of fear and prayers for mercy. In wonder, he let her lead him into the wigwam.

  She was a wise and good woman, and she felt pity as she took him in.

  “Father, I am sad to see your flesh so raw and your clothes so ragged,” she said kindly. “Come! Let me wash you.”

  The Chenoo sat silently as she cleansed his wounds. Then she brought a suit of her husband’s clothes and told him to dress himself. In his new clothes he sat by the side of the wigwam and looked surly and sad, but he kept quiet. It was all so new to him. Nearby, the little boy played.

  Throughout the day, the woman took the little boy with her to gather sticks to feed the fire. It was winter and each day the wind grew colder. The Chenoo watched them go.

  On their last trip for the day, the Chenoo rose and followed them. The woman was filled with fear.

  Now, she thought, my death is near; now he will kill and devour me and take my child.

  “Give me the ax!” commanded the Chenoo.

  She gave it to him, fearing she was handing him the weapon that would end her life. But he began to cut down the trees as easily as if he were snipping off tiny branches. The huge pines fell right and left, making neat stacks of firewood.

  She cried out: “My father, that is enough!”

  The Chenoo laid down the ax, walked to the wigwam, and sat down, always in grim silence. The woman and her son gathered the wood and fed the fire. They, too, remained silent.

  Soon she heard her husband coming home. She ran out to meet him and told him all about the Chenoo’s visit.

  “Follow me and do exactly as I am doing,” she told him. Her husband agreed.

  He went inside and spoke kindly. “My father-in-law, where have you been for so long?”

  The Chenoo stared in amazement as the husband told him about their family and about all the things that had happened among their people over many years. The monster’s fierce face grew gentler as he listened.

  That night the family ate their meal. They offered the Chenoo food, but he hardly touched it. Soon he lay down to sleep. The man and his wife kept awake in terror, watching over their own sleeping child.

  As the fire burned through the night and the wigwam grew very warm, the Chenoo woke and asked them to shield him from the fire. He was a creature from the land of ice, and he could not endure heat. The couple put up an animal skin to protect him.

  For three days he stayed inside the wigwam, sullen and grim. He hardly ate.

  Then he seemed to change.

  “Have you any animal fat?” he asked the woman.

  “We have much,” she replied, and gave him all that she had stored away from the deer and bear her husband hunted. It was cooking fat, and she feared he might now use it to prepare them all in a grand supper. But she smiled bravely as she gave it to him.

  The Chenoo filled a large kettle full of the fat and put it on the fire. When the fat was melted and scalding hot, he drank it all in a single gulp.

  Instantly his face grew pale and he became very sick. The husband and wife watched as he crawled outside and into the forest. There he retched and vomited up all the horrors and abominations of his life on Earth: all the humans he had eaten, his own flesh, and every other creature. The dead things covered the land. The family was appalled in every sense.

  When it was all over, he vomited up a piece of ice shaped like a tiny human. It was his cruel heart. Then he lay down. As the Chenoo slept, the husband took the heart and shattered it with his ax into hundreds of shards of ice. These he melted in the fire.

  When the Chenoo awoke, he asked for food, and the woman brought it. He ate much. From that time he was kind and good. His ragged face healed. His evil, meanness, and negativity had melted along with his heart and all the dead things that covered the Earth. The family’s fear had melted, too.

  The Vampire of Sleeping Child Hot Springs

  A TRADITIONAL NEZ PERCE TALE, MONTANA, TOLD BY ELLEN BAUMLER, FROM GHOSTS OF THE LAST BEST PLACE

  In 1877, Chief Joseph and his band of Nez Perce Indians were chased by the United States Army over the Lolo Pass in Montana’s Bitterroot Mountains. As the small band descended into the Bitterroot Valley, they split into two groups and traveled along two separate routes. One group followed a small creek and discovered a beautiful hot spring. Fearing that soon they’d meet the soldiers in battle, the mothers carefully hid their infants in the thick vegetation along the banks of the spring. Then they moved on with the band, running to escape the soldiers. But the soldiers lost their way in the wi
lderness, and the battle never happened. Several hours later, the mothers returned to the spring to find their children sleeping peacefully among the grasses, blanketed by the rising fog. They gave the creek and its hot springs the name “Sleeping Child.” But there is also another story of the springs …

  A lone traveler was passing through the Bitterroot Valley. Before him rose the Bitterroot Mountains, touching the sky. Massive ponderosa pines covered their sides like a thick blanket. He had been traveling for many days and would soon arrive home. He thought fondly of his family waiting for him.

  Now he followed a sparkling creek that led to a gurgling spring.

  “Here is a place to rest and have a drink of water,” he said to himself.

  Suddenly he heard a sound unlike the usual noises of animals calling to one another along the banks of the creek. It sounded like the pitiful crying of a young child. As he walked closer to the springs, the crying grew louder and louder.

  Carefully he parted the bushes along the creek and came upon a child huddled on the bank, weeping uncontrollably.

  “Little one,” said the traveler, “who could have left you here?” The child was much too young to walk very far, and there were no other villages or travelers in sight.

  Lifting the child in his arms, the traveler bounced him on his knee. The child began making sucking noises. The traveler knew that meant the child was starving and wanted to eat. The traveler had just enough food for the rest of the journey, but he would certainly share it with a hungry child. He opened his pack and pulled a little bread from it. He dipped it in the springs to make it soft and tried to put a little in the child’s mouth.

  But the child would not stop crying. The traveler was afraid he would choke, so to quiet him, the traveler dipped his index finger into the spring and offered it to the child as a pacifier. This worked immediately. The child grew calm, and the traveler breathed a sigh of relief. Then the child began to suck ravenously.