Haunted Houses

by Nancy Roberts

  THE DREADED MEETING

  WHITE OAKS, CHARLOTTE, NORTH CAROLINA

  White Oaks, a historic Charlotte house where a promise resulted in a startling, macabre experience.

  It is hard to live for a quarter of a century in a city the size of Charlotte, North Carolina, and not hear some fascinating ghost stories. But when that city is home, you know its family connections, and you are aware that others do, too. Will they recognize someone or even themselves, and how much embarrassment will a story cause?

  Keeping to the facts, but with some disguising of names, we will take that risk and relate a story for those interested in the supernatural. Since I was a confidante of the woman in this story, I was able to keep up with the events. She was a writer, and her occupation caused her to meet many well-to-do Charlotteans—but it would be far better if I were to let the young woman, whom we will call Karen, tell the experience in her own words.

  I had an assignment to do a story on an historic house called White Oaks. My interview was set for late in the afternoon, and the hostess had told me that there would be a party going on for a performing-arts group.

  “Your presence won’t be any inconvenience at all, Karen. In fact, why not plan to just be one of my guests and enjoy yourself,” she suggested graciously.

  When a story subject had to cancel, I decided to go home early and change from a tailored suit into a new red cocktail dress that was infinitely more flattering. I remember thinking how foolish it was, but something overruled my usual practicality, and as I drove down Providence Road in all my finery, I was excited about the evening ahead.

  When I first saw the colonial mansion, I thought that Scarlett O’Hara would certainly have felt at home here. Once owned by the late James Buchanan Duke, this stately sixty-five-year-old house in the heart of Charlotte’s Eastover section stands almost as tall as the branches of the towering trees that surround it. White Oaks, as it is called, was part of that grand scale of living to which Duke, a tobacco king, was accustomed.

  I knocked, thinking the butler would answer. The door opened almost immediately, and there stood not the butler, but the most handsome man I had ever seen. He had dark, curly hair with a distinguished hint of gray, expressive blue-green eyes, and a dazzling smile. In a charming and amusing fashion, he pretended to be the butler. We were both laughing as we walked together down the white-and-black-marble entrance hall. He introduced me to a group of other guests, who stood chatting and sampling hors d’oeuvres at one end of an elegant room the size of a ballroom.

  My impromptu escort was obviously the center of the women’s attention, and he had no sooner introduced himself to me as Jon than two plump ladies came up and, with an arm through each of his, carried him off. He appeared to be drifting away on a pair of water wings and looked back as if reluctant to go.

  “Oh, here you are,” said my hostess, appearing at my elbow. “Everyone seems to be entertaining themselves. This is a good time to take you on a tour of the house. It has changed considerably since Nanaline Duke lived here, but I doubt if she would mind the changes we’ve made.”

  “Oh, did the Dukes live here long?” I asked.

  “Only for about six years, and Nanaline far less than her husband or daughter. She made no bones about finding Charlotte dull, and when they visited here, she usually left before the rest of her family.”

  I gazed admiringly at the hand-carved marble fireplace at one end of the room. The gold leaf in this room was lovely. “That was applied by the Dukes. We used masking tape to protect it while we were repainting,” my hostess commented. A round oak table looked almost lost in the oversize kitchen, and along one side wall was an immense, hooded gas range that had been used by the servants of former families.

  There were beautiful classical mantles, marble hearths, and tiles around the fireplaces. Bathroom fixtures were early ceramic castings, and there were elaborately detailed brass fixtures. Some of the lighting resembled Colonial candles or oil lamps. In the dining room was one of the most magnificent crystal chandeliers I had ever seen.

  My hostess suddenly turned and asked, “Have you and Jon Avery known each other long?”

  “I met him tonight. Why do you ask?”

  “It’s just that he is married. His wife has been in a sanatorium for the last three years.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that, but, really, that is the first conversation I have ever had with him, and probably the last.” As if to make me out a liar, there was a masculine voice at my elbow, and it was Jon’s.

  “I’ve brought you some champagne, caviar, and a sandwich. I hope this will lure you into talking with me, Karen.”

  “How can I resist such thoughtfulness?” I asked, genuinely hungry. What possible harm could there be in spending a few minutes with this man?

  For the first time I noticed that he had a slight limp. Someone nearby was talking about track, I believe. At any rate, we both heard the conversation, and he turned to me, saying, “I’m sure you’ve noticed my limp. It’s the result of polio when I was a child. I used to resent the fact that I came along before Dr. Salk and his sugar cubes with vaccine in them.”

  “You met me at the door and escorted me in, and I certainly wasn’t aware of it then,” I said, which was true.

  This seemed to please him greatly, and he went on to tell me that, through hours of exercise, he had become able to play volleyball in college and since then had walked at least three miles a day. We went on to talk of current events and his hobby of photography.

  Thinking it over later, I could not deny that I found this man attractive. He had a charming smile. I had enjoyed our talk very much, but figured that was where it ended.

  The next day was Friday, and I picked up the phone at my office to hear Jon Avery’s voice asking if I would join him for dinner. I had plans for the evening with a new executive who had come to the paper from another city. We had lunched together several times, and it was just a friendship. I could have changed our dinner to another night, but I could not forget my hostess’s warning. I was polite, but my voice held Jon at arm’s length as I told him I had other plans. That should be it.

  Less than a week had passed when I was surprised by a call from White Oaks with an invitation to return. My hostess was having a few people over for drinks, and among them were a couple who had once lived in the house. If I had not finished my story, she wondered, would I care to talk to them? Of course, I accepted.

  We had been seated on the brick terrace at White Oaks for less than an hour when the doorbell rang. In a few minutes I heard the faint sound on the terrace of someone walking with a limp. For some insane reason, I could feel my heart thud. Of course, it was Jon, and I felt that he was as surprised to see me as I was to see him.

  How beautiful it was that afternoon, with the blooms of dogwoods, cherry trees, and azaleas. The other guests went off to tour the house, and Jon suggested that I might like to go out and look at the gardens and fountains. “Buck” Duke had done everything well, and there was nothing like it anywhere else in Charlotte. How long we stood talking at the edge of a circular garden near the fountains, I have no idea. But I know that when we rejoined the others and my hostess looked at me, I felt some guilt and embarrassment.

  Something had happened that evening between Jon and me, and during the coming months, it seemed to block my fear of consequences and normal feelings of guilt. When I did consider the future, it was with all sorts of romantic imaginings. His wife would probably not live long, and he was aware of it; or he would divorce her, and we would move to another city after setting up a generous trust for her lifetime care. All obstacles would somehow miraculously disappear, melted by the fervency of our love for each other.

  But in August I began to realize that Jon’s sense of responsibility would never allow him to divorce his wife, and anything other than marriage would be impossible for me. More and more I began to feel sorry for this woman I had never met.

  What was the answer to this painful situat
ion? The only right decision was to end my doomed romance.

  One night, as I left Queens Road and turned down Ardsley, I knew I must not weaken. Jon had arrived first. There was a large party going on at White Oaks, and just as we had on that fateful evening in the early spring, we walked again in the gardens. Everything about Jon’s manner—the tension, the pleading expression in his eyes—told me he sensed what I planned to tell him.

  Afterward, we were both in agony and stood silently together near a fountain. What could be said to assuage such hurt?

  “I must go now. I really must.” I looked at my watch; it was midnight.

  “Karen, do just one thing for me, please. It is all I shall ever ask of you on this earth.”

  “What is it?”

  “I will agree to all you have said. Just promise to meet me here one year from tonight at the same hour.”

  I was reluctant at first, thinking how difficult it would be to see him and how bad it would be for us both, as it would only reopen partly healed wounds. But at last I consented.

  “Well, I’ll come if I’m alive,” I said, with an attempt at lightness.

  Jon grasped me by the wrist. “Don’t say that, Karen. Say dead or alive!”

  “All right, then. We will meet, dead or alive.” Thus we parted.

  The next year I was on the same spot a few minutes before the appointed time, and Jon arrived punctually at midnight. I had begun to regret the arrangement I had made, but it was a promise. Although I kept this appointment, I said that I really did not wish to do so again. Jon, however, persuaded me to renew it for just one more year, and I consented, much against my better judgment. We again said our goodbyes, repeating the promise, “Dead or alive.”

  I had begun to see a delightful man, and late the following spring, we became engaged. The summer was spent boating on Lake Norman, with occasional trips to visit Alex’s family in the North Carolina mountains at Montreat. They were prominent Presbyterians, his father active and respected in the denomination. We were planning a September wedding and a honeymoon that would begin on Labor Day weekend.

  By early July I had begun to think more and more about my promise to Jon. The last thing I wanted to do was to meet him in the gardens again. The days sped past with terrible swiftness, and the thought of that meeting hung over me like a dark cloud. I didn’t want to go, but I had promised. I supposed the only thing that could get me out of it was death. Not even that, really, for I had promised to go dead or alive. Dead or alive! What a macabre promise to ask of me.

  I knew very well that Alex wouldn’t like me meeting another man in a secluded place at midnight. Should I talk to him with the hope he would understand? Was he likely to understand me once having dated a married man, even one married to an invalid in a sanatorium? Guilt overwhelmed me.

  As the last Monday night in July approached, I became more and more apprehensive. If I were to find out about Alex meeting a woman under such peculiar circumstances a short time before our marriage, I would consider calling off the wedding. Would he feel that way if he found out? Finally, I decided I would confide in my long-standing friend and apartment-mate and ask her to accompany me. Sherry said she would go to be sure I was all right.

  That night we arrived at the gardens about ten minutes before twelve. I decided I would leave, having kept my promise, if Jon were not there by midnight. The area near the brick terrace was empty, and I did not see a soul. But at five minutes before twelve, I heard a slight noise. It came again. Finally, ever so softly, it was occurring at regular intervals. It was the sound of footsteps on the brick terrace, but they were slower than normal and had just the slightest dragging sibilance. It is he, I thought, for I had heard that walk too often to mistake it. Tonight he was right on time.

  I knew that what I must tell him about my approaching marriage would hurt, even though he had surely resigned himself to the end of our romance. The footsteps were coming closer. Soon I would have to break the news about Alex. Sherry was at a discreet distance, but close enough to see me. I stood by the fountain in the brilliant moonlight.

  On came the footsteps. Why so slow?

  I was not only ashamed to be there but was growing increasingly angry that I had allowed myself to be persuaded to come a second time. This would be our last meeting, and I would not stay long. I could see Jon now, and I watched him make his way into the moonlight at the end of the terrace. On he came, past a large azalea bush and along the drive. It would all be over soon, thank heaven.

  When he was close enough for me to see him more clearly, I noticed that he was dressed in dark, formal attire. He must be doing this for its effect, I reasoned, for he knew how handsome I had always thought him in a black coat.

  Oddly enough, he seemed about to pass me, and, involuntarily, I reached out my arm with an affectionate gesture to stop him. I was astounded when he walked right through it, and I could feel nothing. As he looked over at me, I distinctly saw his lips move, forming the words, “Dead or alive.”

  I even heard him say them, not with my ears but with some other sense, what sense I do not know. But the words were spoken as clearly as if they had been said in a normal voice. I felt my blood turn to ice. Hurrying over to where I knew Sherry was standing, I asked, “Sherry, who passed you?”

  “Let’s go. I don’t want to talk about it.”

  “Sherry, you know who I was coming to meet, and he had to pass you. You don’t mean you didn’t see him.”

  “I heard him coming. I’d know that walk of his anywhere, and then he went right by only a short distance away. But Karen, there was something wrong, something so strange about him that it scared me to death. Then I saw him stand in front of you. What did he say?” she asked.

  “Let’s leave. We can talk at home.”

  And talk we did, for half the night, until finally we went to bed.

  The next day I phoned a relative of Jon’s on some pretext. I had not spoken to her in months, but almost immediately the conversation turned to Jon.

  “You knew he had died, didn’t you, Karen?”

  “No! I’ve been out of town.”

  “It happened last Friday while he was in South Carolina, and we buried him Sunday in the family plot. He had suddenly become ill, and actually was quite delirious toward the end. For the last hour before he died, he kept saying over and over, ‘Dead or alive! Will I get there?’ I wish I could say he had a peaceful death. But poor Jon must have had some terrible fear about reaching the hereafter that none of us ever suspected. How I wish I had known it, so I could have led him to the Lord.”

  I hung up the phone in a state of shock. Jon had been true to his promise to meet me. He had come even from beyond the grave.

  White Oaks, at 400 Hermitage Road, in Charlotte, North Carolina, was built by James Buchanan Duke and is also known as the Duke Mansion. This elegant house is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is maintained and preserved by the nonprofit Lynnwood Foundation. For information please visit www.dukemansion.com or call (704) 714-4400.

  THE PHANTOM LADY

  MORDECAI HOUSE AND THE ANDREW JOHNSON HOME, RALEIGH, NORTH CAROLINA

  President Andrew Johnson’s birthplace, where lighted candles have been seen in the windows

  Who was the phantom lady seen recently in the historic Mordecai House at Raleigh, North Carolina? Will she reappear?

  Surely a city that has no ghosts is a dull place. Was Raleigh, North Carolina, such a city? It seemed, for a while, that it might be. No one at the Cameron Village Branch of the Raleigh Library knew of any ghosts in the capital city. Its files held no clippings of recent newspaper stories reporting a local apparition. From the standpoint of ghostly presences, everything was all right in Fayetteville, Asheville, Wilmington, and even Charlotte. But not in Raleigh.

  Raleigh had politics but no ghosts . . . unless you counted the bed in the Governor’s Mansion, from which a mysterious rapping sound was once rumored to emanate. As this occurred while a Democrat was in offi
ce, however, Republicans were not inclined to regard it too seriously.

  Nor are ghostly presences enough; you also need a haunted house. North Carolina was understandably miffed by being one of the few states not included in a United States Tourist Bureau list of those with haunted houses. On one side was South Carolina, with Alice of the Hermitage; to the west was Tennessee, with the Bell Witch; and most humiliating of all, on its northern border was Virginia, with an entire register of haunted houses!

  Such a situation could make a proud state, full of colorful history and mountain scenery, seem almost prosaic. Of course, it had a beautiful ghost hitchhiker, the famed Brown Mountain Lights, and Joe Baldwin’s ghost at Maco. There was surprisingly little else, though, that was noteworthy.

  But now new specters have come to the rescue.

  Not far from the heart of Raleigh is the small historic Mordecai Park. Its most impressive building is the large Mordecai Manor itself, with its many wings. Also on the square is a quaint building once used as a law office; a village chapel; a tiny house in which our seventeenth president, Andrew Johnson, was born; and a small, early building used for an office by the Raleigh Historic Properties Commission.

  On the afternoon that I called Historic Properties, good fortune was heaped up and spilling over. Terry Myers was there, and I asked her my question: Did she know of any ghost stories in connection with any of the historic properties? Indeed, she did! But not so fast. What sort of person was Ms. Myers? Was she reliable? It was reassuring to learn that she was a knowledgeable, charming lady full of enthusiasm about North Carolina history. A former schoolteacher from Arizona who inspired her students to do special history and folklore projects, she had moved to Raleigh and begun working for Historic Properties. This next ghost-story account is her own experience.