Again, I didn’t know what to say.
“I could have warned you,” he continued. “But then you probably wouldn’t have believed me. And the chances are you wouldn’t have seen anything anyway. I hope you understand.”
I told him that I did, and that, up until that day, I had never believed in ghosts. I’m still trying to think of a logical explanation for what I saw and heard that stormy, early evening in October. I don’t think there is one.
A few days later, we took the Grade Four students to the church and graveyard. It was a bright and sunny fall morning. Not a day for ghosts.
But I did make sure I was first one into the church that day, just in case.
~~~***~~~
The Ghost Truck of Russiantown
Janet McGinity
On a crisp late-October day, two men in orange vests parked their pickup truck on the gravel shoulder of a road in rural Albert County, across the Petitcodiac River from Moncton. The two men dropped the truck’s back gate and drew out gun cases holding .30-30 rifles plus extra ammunition. Two large rucksacks carried their water bottles and food for the day.
Jack and Fred Sinclair weren’t familiar with the area. Usually, the brothers hunted near the Bay of Fundy coast, looking for deer-yards, tree-encircled fields where the white-tails gathered for shelter and food in late fall. But this year, they’d had no luck in their usual spots.
Bob McKinley, an acquaintance, had suggested an area called the Russiantown Road.
“You walk in about a mile on an old lane off the Mitton Road,” Bob told them. “It should still be visible. Talk to George Geldart at the general store in Elgin; he knows where it is.”
On their way, the Sinclairs stopped at the store to consult George.
“Where you going, boys? The Russiantown Road? Sure, I know where that is,” he said. “Used to be a settlement in there, on a stream called the Calamingo. We don’t know much about the people who lived there. They stuck together, only came into the village for supplies. Folks heard they were having a hard time, and then after a while, nobody saw them anymore. They say these people came from Russia, that’s why the road was called the Russiantown Road.”
George’s father had once checked out a piece of land for sale up the Russiantown Road, but decided against it.
“Dad saw or heard something weird back there,” he continued. “He said it was a place best left alone. That was years ago. I haven’t heard of anyone going in for a long time—60, 70 years. If there are any deer, they won’t be skittish. Good hunting to you, boys. Drop by later and let me know how you made out.”
A hazy sun shone weakly through thin clouds as the Sinclairs got their hunting gear ready for the trek into Russiantown. White birch, beech, and pasture spruce lined the roadside and the abandoned meadow beyond. A ragged opening was visible where the tree cover thinned out. Overhead, a Northern Harrier soared in loose circles, watching for the tiniest movement of mice and voles in the dried meadow-grass. Other than the papery rustle of beech leaves, it was silent.
“Let’s hope we find some good hunting here,” grunted Jack, as he shouldered the gun case and slammed the truck gate closed. “What I wouldn’t give to bag an eight- or 10-point buck! That’d be enough to keep a family in venison for months.”
“Looks like decent country for deer,” Fred answered. “Woods aren’t too thick. Deer get around better where there’s a mix of open and wooded areas. At least we might have better luck than we did by the coast—that was three days of tromping for nothing.”
The brothers cradled their rifles in their arms and lifted the rucksacks over their shoulders. Crunching over dead leaves, they started along the lane and passed into thicker woods. The ground gradually rose as they tramped. Grasses grew knee-deep along the lane, which was little more than a wide space between the birches and young maples.
After half an hour’s walk, Fred and Jack came to a shallow, rocky stream where the lane ended. Hoof marks pocked the wet mud near the water’s edge, a sign that deer were drinking there.
“This must be the Calamingo Stream,” Jack said. “Looks like that’s where we are, according to the topo map. Let’s take a look around.”
The brothers pushed their way through knee-high grasses. The stream narrowed, and then meandered in an oxbow curve. That shallow area was the obvious crossing point for a bridge or a ford. The water was only a few inches deep. A level plateau was visible on the far side of the stream. They sloshed through the shallow water.
On the plateau, about 20 fallen-in cellar holes gaped where houses once stood. Bits of weathered timbers, long-rusted metal and raspberry canes filled the holes. Lilacs and rhubarb gone to seed straggled along the edges. The brothers poked through stone rubble, finding broken glass from an old canning jar, pieces of china, and a twisted fork.
It was very quiet. The brothers found themselves looking nervously over their shoulders. Even the air seemed hushed, as if it was holding its breath.
“I wonder what happened to them,” mused Fred. “Who were these people anyway? Why did they abandon the place? Where did they go?
A sudden, harsh cry cut the silence. Overhead, the harrier hurtled to the ground, and swooped upwards with a meadow-vole grasped in its curved talons.
“What the heck is that?” Jack pointed.
Piles of rock lay at intervals on the plateau. There must have been 50 of them. Each was about two feet high, five or six feet long, and rounded on top like a whale’s back. Curious, the brothers moved in for a closer look. Fred spied something on top of one of the larger piles. It was a pair of white birch branches, tied in a rough cross shape with a piece of twine. Beneath it appeared the dull glint of metal.
He brushed away bits of loose birch bark to reveal a twisted picture frame, containing a tintype of a seated, unsmiling woman in a headscarf and full-skirted dress. In her arms, she held a tightly wrapped baby. Beside her stood a tall, thin man with a bushy moustache, wearing an ill-fitting suit. Fred handed the picture to Jack, who shook his head slowly. They looked around at the symmetrical rows of rock piles.
The hard noon-day sun beat down on the silent field. Water pattered in the nearly-dry stream. A thin breeze rustled dead leaves on the white birch trees. Fred scratched his head under the hunter-orange cap and grunted. He replaced the picture frame.
“I think it’s time for lunch,” he said. “Let’s find a spot to eat. This place gives me the willies.”
The two brothers followed the stream a short way to the lane. They found two large smooth boulders with flat tops, which would do for a lunch table.
Each man took a sandwich from a waxed paper package and opened a thermos. The crackle of the paper seemed unnaturally loud. After their lunch, Jack lit a pipe and lay back on the boulder, puffing. Fred sipped his tea and meditatively watched clouds drift past.
A shimmer appeared in the air, like heat haze on a hot summer day, but this was October. Off to their left came a faint rumbling noise, like a stone rolling on rough ground. Puzzled, the brothers sat up on the boulders, ears cocked.
“Did you hear that?”
They looked at each other. “Must have been the wind.”
The rumbling grew louder. They stared, but the road was empty. Something was approaching. In the still air, they heard the chugga-chugga-chugga of an old engine. The invisible vehicle clattered along the bumpy lane. About 20 feet away from them, the engine sound stopped. They heard the sound of a door opening, a squeak of hinges needing oil, footsteps crunching on gravel, a heavy whump, and then another whump. Again they heard the sound of a door opening and closing with a bang. The chugga-chugga-chugga noise started again, at first loud, then faded as it moved away from them.
Fred and Jack looked at each other in consternation, then stepped off the boulder and walked to where they had heard the noises. There were no tire marks in the damp earth.
“What on earth was that?” Jack said. “There’s nobody but us for miles. But I sure as hell heard an old car or a truck.�
��
The light breeze died down, and the air felt suddenly oppressive. The weird sounds, the birch cross, a metal-framed picture, and piles of rock along the stream… something was very wrong. Even the wind seemed to whisper, leave… leave… leave.
Fred and Jack hurriedly picked up their belongings and found their way back to the stream and the half-grown lane into Russiantown. It took them an hour to walk to their truck. They drove back to the Elgin store.
Pickup trucks lined the front of it. A white sign in the window advertised hunting and fishing licenses for sale. Inside, the store carried everything rural folk needed: cold glass bottles of cola in a red metal cooler, hardware, rubber boots, sturdy clothing, tools, ammunition, a few limp vegetables, and fruit in a fogged refrigerator cabinet.
“We did make it to Russiantown,” Jack announced to George, who was putting two icy cold colas on the counter. “Didn’t find any deer,” he said. “But we were glad to get the hell out of there. Kind of a creepy spot.”
George pondered a moment, and wiped his hands across the knee of his overalls.
“Why’d you find it creepy?” he asked. “Did you see something?”
“Yes, we did,” answered Jack. “But the strangest things were the sounds.”
He recounted what they’d heard, the sound of the old car or truck, and the rock piles near the stream. By then, several older men had gathered around the store counter, curious to hear the conversation.
“What happened out there?” asked Jack.
George’s face crinkled, and he shook his head.
“Wiped out,” he muttered. “They were wiped out, the whole damn lot of them.”
He remembered his father talking of a group of Russian-speaking immigrants who’d arrived to claim the land they’d been granted in the late 1800s. Most of them spoke no English, and they practiced an unfamiliar religion. The Russians worked long, back-breaking days to wring a living from the soil.
For two generations, the settlers survived, but didn’t mingle much with Albert County folk. Memories of the persecution they had suffered in the Old Country were still fresh, and they did not want to draw attention to themselves. Money was scarce. During several particularly harsh winters, they had barely enough food to keep them alive.
Then one spring day, a little girl got sick with a virulent disease. She lasted only a few weeks before her face turned blue as she gasped for breath. She died suddenly. No one knew what the strange disease was. Next to go was the little girl’s older brother.
The parents, overcome with grief, tried to dig graves for them, but hit bedrock only a foot down. They decided that at least they could build cairns to mark the children’s resting place. One of the villagers, who spoke a little English, was delegated to travel to the village of Petitcodiac to order coffins from the local undertaker. Thus were placed the first two small rock piles in the field along the Calamingo stream.
Over the course of a year, the mysterious illness raged through the small community. The arrival of the undertaker in his Model T pickup truck delivering more coffins became a weekly occurrence.
Word seeped out around the county about the illness. The locals wanted to help, but feared they might catch this disease which felled entire families in a few months. Even the undertaker was uneasy. Finally, he stopped driving down the road into the community. He went as far only as the river, stopped the truck, opened the door and dropped the coffins onto the ground, where they landed with a whump.
The number of rock piles grew. Finally, the last few Russiantown settlers abandoned the little community and travelled to western Canada, where other Russians lived. Such sorrow could not be borne.
“People didn’t want to go into the settlement, even after the last of them left,” said George. “Nobody knew where this sickness came from. They were afraid that maybe the water was bad, or that the Russiantown folks had an inherited a disease from the Old Country.”
He looked at the two hunters.
“You fellas are the first to go into what used to be Russiantown for a very long time.”
He paused.
“Dad went back there by himself. He told us later he’d heard an old truck coming by, and then a whump, like something wooden hitting rocky ground. But he only heard the one. I wonder why you heard two.”
The little group around the store counter fell silent. The two hunters gathered their cold drinks, and paid for them. They walked to their truck and drove away, past the abandoned road leading to a woods clearing with empty cellar-holes, lonely rock cairns, and a ghost truck.
~~~***~~~
Changes
Diane Losier
Gillian breathed a deep sigh of relief as she lay face down on the narrow massage table. She gratefully let herself sink under the expert hands of her masseuse, Sarah, as she kneaded a knot on her tense back muscles. Gillian practically ran to these weekly visits. The stress of being an elementary school teacher was really getting to her lately. Was she becoming less patient or were the students more difficult to deal with? She didn't remember it always being this way; the sense of entitlement, the constant need to be entertained, or problems accepting responsibility. I can't keep this up much longer, she thought. She tried to relax and focus on the soothing music while Sarah’s fingers massaged a particularly hard knot between her shoulder blades.
The weather was miserable. After a few glorious sunny days, February's weather, now at its worst, poured sheets of heavy rain against her windshield. It took Gillian 30 minutes to drive home from Halifax. Fanny Fluff met her at the door expecting to be fed as usual. There was no one else to greet her these days. Her daughter, Mary Ellen, lived in France with her husband, and Gillian was divorced, so there was no spouse to contend with at home.
Gillian had no energy after the divorce to engage in a new relationship. “Too complicated! Been there, done that!” She sometimes told Fanny Fluff that her quiet little ways were all she could handle right now. Lately however, her solitude seeped into her consciousness. She kept a daily journal, which was like a drug for her, keeping at bay the reality of her deep discontent.
Gillian barely got through the last few weeks of school. It was her physician, Dr. Barton, who advised her to take a medical leave of absence. She considered his advice and decided to go away for March Break.
Cuba was heaven! Her body relaxed under the relentless hot sun, but not her mind. She confided nightly in her journal and each morning she recorded her dreams. Although she was in a warm paradise, her dreams were all about cold and snow.
3:15 a.m., March 18
Weird dream. I'm with people. Don't know who. Against everyone’s advice, I set off to cross-country ski into a vast white wilderness. I know it's dangerous but feel compelled to keep going. After a while, I turn and look at where I came from. The wind blew away all traces of where I've been. I'm lost and I don't care. Then I notice a pulsating silver light and head back toward it, oblivious of the uncertainties that lie beyond.
The dream woke Gillian up as dawn broke. It was the catalyst she needed to stop teaching for a while, to step out of her comfort zone and leave herself open to new possibilities.
Coming home from the all-inclusive resort was a rude awakening. She had to inform her principal, Mr. Wallis, of her decision, complete the paper work, and face the anxiety of having nothing in particular to do with her days. Dr. Barton recommended Prozac. However, Gillian deeply distrusted any medication and decided to make a go of it on her own. She knew she needed to keep busy, but she felt she needed a different kind of busyness, something to nourish her battered soul. She settled on a daily routine of meditation and yoga and enrolled in a creative writing class. Gillian enjoyed her new lifestyle so much that after a few weeks, she decided to quit teaching altogether. She had put in 25 years, enough for a modest pension. Plus she had that nest-egg from her mother's estate waiting for a “rainy day”. Well, this was it!
Gillian slept fitfully. She had finally decided to quit her job. Now she was consid
ering selling her house and moving to the country. She kept tossing and turning, caught between a life she no longer wanted and the unknown. The uncertainties kept her stomach in a knot until she finally fell asleep just before dawn.
Sunday morning dawned cloudy and cold. Her nightly worries continued to weigh heavily on her shoulders. She reached for her journal. It was a large sketchbook, big enough for her bold handwriting and thick enough to last a year. She called it her cheap therapist as she often got as much clarity from an hour of writing as she did from an expensive session with her psychologist. By the time she had noted the pros and cons of these new undertakings, she was convinced that it was a good idea.
In early May, nature was transforming and blossoming, and so was Gillian. She still struggled with the idea of selling her house, but it felt like the right time and the right choice.
Two weeks after putting the sign on her lawn, she drove to the Annapolis Valley. Life untangled itself on that glorious morning into a single stream of sheer happiness. Now that the tough decisions had been made, she felt exhilarated by the freedom and promise of new adventures. She surfed the Web daily for a country house but nothing jumped out at her, so she drove around and followed her nose, letting chance have a part in her future for a change.
The Annapolis Valley in spring was a veritable fairy tale. Gillian loved driving along the winding country roads, marvelling at the beauty of the apple orchards in full bloom. She remembered after-school picnics with Mary Ellen under ancient apple trees, their arching branches covered with thousands of fragrant white blossoms. They would lie back on the blanket and gaze contentedly at the wide expanse of blue on blue; deep blue sky over the deeper blue of the ocean below. Occasionally, they were lulled to sleep by the drone of hundreds of honey bees busily collecting pollen as they flew from blossom to blossom.
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