Ghosts of Graveyards Past

by Laura Briggs

  She didn’t see him again, didn’t look back to see if his gaze followed her through the paths. Quick steps carried her to a far corner of the yard where a pair of weeping willows stood guard over tombs as old as the 1880s. The slabs of limestone and slate were impressively preserved, sunlight reflecting off the gilded lettering.

  The stones changed to the more durable marble and sandstone the further she moved into the 1900s, implying a shift in the town’s fortunes. Instinctively, she raised her camera, focusing the lens on hand-carved designs that seemed far more varied than those of modern tombs made by machines.

  Winged skulls with gap-toothed smiles. An angel with a scroll and another with a trumpet; a hand that reached to snuff a candle. Lambs, butterflies, and hands folded in prayer. Her finger traced the beveled edges, lips forming a sad smile. Angling the camera lens so that no sunlight obscured the carvings, she snapped a picture.

  Footsteps crunched behind her, and she turned, half-expecting to see the stranger with the wildflowers.

  Instead, an older gentleman strolled, a trash sack in one hand as he collected withered bouquets and pieces of ribbon shredded by the wind. “Good morning,” he said, one hand doffing his cap in a gentlemanly manner.

  Jenna smiled, hoisting her camera as she said, “These headstone engravings are beautiful. I couldn’t resist a few pictures.”

  “Yes, they are impressive,” the man agreed, his voice pleasant as he studied the ones she had just photographed. “Taking care of them is an honor, though my knees are getting a bit weak for the job.” This was said with a chuckle as he patted the worn patch in his corduroy trousers.

  “You work here, then?” Jenna asked. She wondered if he had an inkling of the wooded burial ground or if those rumors were mostly for the tourists.

  “Robert Kendrick,” he said, extending a hand. “I look after the place during the week. My retirement job, I call it.”

  Shaking his hand, she said, “Jenna Cade. I’m here researching a book—a history narrative about cemeteries in the Deep South.”

  “A young lass interested in history.” Humor sparked in the gentle gaze that studied her beneath the cap. “That is a rare thing these days.” With some difficulty, he bent to yank the stray weeds from the base of the stone with the lamb engraving.

  Stowing her camera back in the knapsack, Jenna crouched beside him. “Do you know how far back the stones date? I noticed some from the 1880s and wondered if there were any older than that.”

  “The oldest I know of are about ten years before that,” he said. “Some of them my own family. My great-great-uncle, Lucas Kendrick, traveled here from Georgia to make a homestead in the 1850s.”

  “Did he fight in the Civil War?” she asked, realizing she hadn’t seen any military emblems among the rows, although some men from the town must have enlisted.

  “Ah, not Lucas, A farming accident mangled one of his legs as a boy. Others served, though, and were killed in battle. Their resting place became a mass grave, with those who shared their fate that day.”

  Her fingers stopped plucking the weeds with the somber thought. The image was not a new one; she had learned of the battle conditions from text books and the history documentaries she viewed obsessively as a college student. It never failed to impress her with its sense of loneliness, the wounded and dying, stranded so far from a home they would never return to, even in burial.

  Her companion rose to his feet, extending a hand. “Don’t trouble yourself on my account, dear. The youngsters from the high school volunteer on the weekends and catch the odd weeds these blurry old eyes miss.”

  She dusted her hands, remembering the question she should have asked before. “I wonder if you could tell me…if you’ve ever heard stories of another cemetery in this place. An old one that hasn’t been taken care of by anybody in the town. Somewhere in the woods, I think, near the spring. “

  His look of confusion told her that he hadn’t, even before he answered. Though he did have some advice to offer as they moved slowly back through the stones. “I do believe there’s a local fellow around who does some gravestone carving by hand. If anyone could tell you about local gravesites, it might be him.”

  “I thought carving stones by hand was a lost art,” Jenna said. She had developed a special fondness for the craft in her recent travels, learning to distinguish the skill of the expert from the amateur. The beauty of the former could still amaze even beneath the thickest layers of grime.

  “It is a dying trade,” Robert agreed with a sad smile. “But I’ve seen this fellow’s work advertised in the paper sometimes. What’s his name again? I haven’t spoken to him in some time, but then, I don’t get around much.” He patted his stiff limb and gave a faint chuckle. “You might ask the funeral home—I’m sure they could give you his business address.”

  “I will,” she said, with a small wave of thanks as their paths parted near the cemetery’s entrance gate.

  There was no sign of the other man, the one she’d glimpsed when she first arrived that morning.

  A bouquet of wild flowers was draped across the stone with the ivy vine chiseled around its edges.

  

  The director at the funeral home knew of only one stone carver who worked in the town, a Mr. Sawyer. He worked in Sylvan Spring as a freelance craftsman for some fifty odd years, and he may have once restored some stones that were shattered in the old section of the town’s cemetery. But Mr. Sawyer died some ten years ago, a sudden stroke felling him as he carved in his workshop that was now a garage at the east end of town. “Hand-carved tombstones are an expensive venture,” explained Mr. Stroud, the funeral director. “It has been our practice here for many years to order stones from a company in Mobile.”

  Tall and thin with hair that swept his temples, he resembled the kind of mortician children sometimes made up stories about. His accent, soft and precise, might have charmed, if not for a slight hiss at the back of the throat. His smile was intended to soothe customers, she perceived, although it seemed out of place at this moment, as if he was practicing for future grieving visitors.

  “Sylvan Spring is already rich with history,” he informed her. “A lost cemetery—that would be a fine contribution to its legacy. If you can find it out in those overgrown woods.”

  “Are you certain there’s no other stone carver in the town?” Jenna asked, her fingers toying with the strap of her knapsack. “Or maybe Mr. Sawyer had a child or grandchild, someone who might remember his work.”

  “Mr. Sawyer was a widower, I believe. As for children, I’m not sure.” He offered a look of sympathy. “I’m truly sorry, Miss—”

  “Cade,” she supplied. “And I could really use any information you can give me on the stone carver. Anyone who knew him, worked with him…”

  “There may have been an assistant,” he said. “A young man who worked at the shop.” He looked uncertain now, as if trying to recall something beyond his reach. “I don’t know if he continued in the trade, but if we ever commissioned a piece from him, it would be in our records.” He moved towards a narrow hall, motioning for her to follow. “I may be of little help concerning the stones themselves, but ask me anything else regarding the dead in Sylvan Spring. I can tell you the traditions, from coffin bells to covering mirrors and wearing veils to ward off the spirits.”

  “They aren’t still practiced, I hope,” she said, her boots soundless against the carpet.

  The hall seemed oppressive with its odor of musty drapes.

  “No, indeed.” Mr. Stroud’s chuckle sounded more natural as he pushed open the door to a small office, the walls adorned with a series of framed photographs and newspaper clippings. “But you’ll find the old traditions are still very much alive in our stories and legends. The festivals bring many of the former practices to light, especially those of a spiritual nature.” Sitting at the desk, he opened a business ledger and began to scan the list of dates and names in search of a local mason.

  Jenna’s glanc
e wandered to the wall where the framed images paid homage to the town’s celebrations. Christmas in the square with a lighted tree and patriotic floats for the Independence Day parade. There was also a Scottish-type fair with costumed men and women dancing to a bagpiper’s tune.

  “Can you tell me about the Hallowed Days Festival?” she asked, turning back to face him at the desk. “I heard something about a curse on the town. Is it a ghost story of some kind?”

  “Not a ghost story,” he said, glancing up from the ledger. “The trouble back then was real enough, though its cause may have been embellished a little from one generation to the next. After all, it was in the 1800s. Those kinds of stories get changed every few decades.”

  “What sort of trouble?” She took the seat across from him, unable to help the journalist-like stance after weeks of interviewing historians on similar subjects. Though none of those stories had puzzled her as much as this one, with its allusions to past lore.

  He laughed, another soft chuckle of amusement. “Depends on who you ask. There’s some who believe it was a sickness that caused a series of deaths. Others say it was a possession of sorts or a haunting. There were legends that a Celtic curse had been levied on the town for the wrongdoings of its people—probably the old folks’ idea of things back then.”

  “No one knows for sure what it was?” She was surprised, given how proud the community seemed of its past. Surely, someone had researched the strange event, combing through whatever documents were preserved in the town’s historical society.

  The funeral director offered an apologetic smile. “I’m afraid the answer is pretty much a mystery, even to our ancestors. All we really know is that people were dying, terror had a grip on the community in general, and many feared a judgment was upon mankind for the bloodshed in the fighting.”

  She nodded, feeling foolish as she posed yet another question. One that had stayed on her mind since she first arrived last night. “The banner for the festival has some interesting symbols,” she began, unsure how to describe the scrawls that seemed so primitive. “Someone told me they were —”

  “Celtic,” he answered, finishing her sentence. “And Druid, I suppose. Symbols for harmony, energy, mortality…any number of things. Many of our native families trace their roots back to the Celtic culture with all its legend and lore, and to Scotland, in particular. You’ll find that both have influenced our stories and arts. It’s very much a part of us as a town, even with our Southern pride.”

  Pulling a ring from his right hand, he held it up to reflect the light. “A Scottish thistle ring, passed down from my father’s side of the family,” he said. “The local jeweler produces similar designs, as well as the knots of the Celtic region. Just one of the ways our town reflects the ancient customs.”

  “And the old superstitions,” she wondered aloud, “did those carry over, too? I mean, nobody believes it was a Druid curse that struck the town, do they?”

  He frowned. “These days, we see the festival as more of a celebration of history or as a cultural memorial. To those who suffered the trouble and those who survived. It was a dark time in so many ways, with the war going on, and the town was lucky to survive so much turmoil.”

  Jenna stayed silent as the funeral director scanned the rest of the ledger. Her thoughts were focused on this strange piece of the past, and the way it seemed to be etched into the lives of the modern-day citizens.

  A curse. Rumors of ghosts and malicious spirits wreaking havoc at home while a battle raged miles away. Nothing about the legend made sense to her, but every new facet flamed her curiosity as much as the possibility of a lost burial site from the same era.

  Sylvan Spring seemed laden with secrets. Like a time capsule buried in the earth, the remnants of its previous civilization were lingering somewhere just beneath the surface.

  “I’m sorry,” Mr. Stroud told her a moment later, flipping the folder’s cover closed. “But we have no records of business with a local craftsman. It appears your friend was wrong.”

  Disappointed, she shouldered her knapsack. The caretaker must have confused his memory of the stone carver as being more recent then was actually possible. Not a surprise, really, considering he seemed to know of the man mostly through word of mouth or old newspaper advertisements.

  “Thanks so much for checking,” she said. “Sorry to have bothered you.”

  “It was no trouble.” He rose to see her to the door. “You know, if it’s old gravesites you’re looking for, you might try the Lesley homestead. It’s a half mile south of the spring, a favorite spot for hikers to visit. A few have mentioned seeing some family headstones behind the house’s burned remains.”

  Family headstones—not a community burial ground. It would do for a start, though, and she scribbled the directions down for lack of a better clue.

  3

  The stretch of wilderness known as Crooked Wood must have become a popular hangout for the local youth. Jenna guessed this from the numerous cigarette stubs and rocks that were arranged in a campfire circle. Plastic bottles littered the ground, a pile of coals nearby from a recent campfire.

  She had parked her car in a clearing off the main road, striking off down the footpath with only a vague sense of where she was going.

  Thunder trilled overhead and Jenna hoisted her knapsack higher as she wished for a compass like the one her father used to carry on family camping trips. It would have to be guesswork and the satellite maps from her cellphone’s on-again-off-again wireless coverage.

  The path before her was defined by a mat of golden-brown needles from pines that towered overhead. She could still hear the sound of car motors passing over the main road. Emboldened with this sense of direction, she moved deeper into the woods, glancing back to see the path’s opening gradually shrink and disappear in the changing foliage.

  She walked in the same direction for as long as she dared, ignoring the trails that seemed to fork in a more promising route than the one advised by the funeral home director. The homestead might not be connected to the burial ground she sought, but it was her only current location for markers in the dense growth of the forest.

  A half mile or so slipped past as she trudged on with nothing to break the landscape of hardwood, the trees growing thicker the further she went. The urge to turn back was increasing with the clouds in the sky, despite her need to confirm at least one lead before the day’s end.

  Climbing a small embankment where a stream snaked between stones, Jenna lifted her gaze to find something unexpected on the other side. Smoke billowed somewhere on the horizon, a thick gray cloud rolling across the tree tops.

  A wildfire was the first possibility to enter her mind, remembering the burned remains of the church in Georgia, the tombstones nearby damaged in the flames.

  Her steps quickened, a mixture of urgency and curiosity carrying her towards the scene ahead. Skirting thorn plants and sagging tree limbs, she made her way to a crest in the path where the ground below turned abruptly steep. At the end of this slope, a farmhouse, rustic and somewhat shabby in appearance but not abandoned by any stretch of the imagination, was visible. The smoke curled upwards from its red brick chimney. White paint was flecked in places, a tangle of ivy stretching from the roof to the picket fence below. Old garden tools leaned there as if forgotten mid-project, the weeds grown tall enough to twine around the wooden handles. It took her a moment to register what else leaned there.

  Gravestones. Old ones, judging from the condition, most broken or cracked. Others were simply tarnished beyond reading beneath the layers of grime and rust, the lichen and moss she had learned to dread when searching for an inscription.

  Confused, her gaze moved beyond the house to a smaller structure that was even more battered in appearance. Cement blocks were stacked beside a storm door, a sign hung from the rafters above with the words ‘Monumental Masonry’ stenciled in letters that peeled away. A name and phone number appeared below, too faded and far away for Jenna to make out from
this distance.

  So there was a stone carver still working in Sylvan Spring. One of her sources must have been mistaken then, leaving her to wonder if Mr. Sawyer still lived, or if this was someone else. The apprentice mentioned by the funeral director, or maybe a member of the Sawyer family in the same trade.

  Her instinct to move down the sloped path and find out was checked by the sound of a door slamming somewhere nearby. The figure which emerged from the back of the farmhouse was instantly familiar, with dark hair and a faded green jacket. Instead of flowers, though, he cradled a postage box, resting it against the hood of the truck as he unlocked its door.

  Jenna was close enough to call out this time, but stayed silent, speechless from surprise, or maybe excitement at the thought of someone who might hold the answers to the cemetery’s location. Although, neither reason could explain the intent way she studied his face.

  He was no more than thirty, but with a haggard expression that lined otherwise appealing features, a jaw shaded with stubble; a lean-muscled build evident beneath the work clothes. All this was registered as quickly as it took him to climb in the vehicle, sliding the box into its passenger seat as he started the engine.

  For the second time that day, Jenna was an intruder.

  He guided the truck down a narrow dirt lane that was flanked on its other side by a field.

  Thunder rumbled overhead, a drop of moisture landing on her face. She brushed it away as another fell, and then another, followed by a steady sprinkle of rain against her clothes and boots. She continued to stand there without reason, staring after the vehicle as it disappeared around the bend. Why hadn’t she called down to him? Now it seemed pointless to linger, with the storm gathering strength at a fast pace. She would come back in the morning, she decided, with one last glance at the display of crumbling monuments.

  

  By the time Jenna realized she was lost, it was too late to turn back. How it happened she couldn’t say, except that somewhere in the growing downpour she lost track of the scenery. The path diverged in places that caused her to backtrack more than once, and even the stone carver’s house was lost to her, its chimney smoke dissipating in the rain.