Ghost on Black Mountain

by Ann Hite

  Owen ran his fingers through his head full of dark hair. “You want to walk to the cemetery so I can show you the family plot?”

  I shook off Nellie’s talking and pointed to the blue-gray bird. “What kind of bird is that?”

  “That’s a blue heron. Mama always said that if you’re seeing a blue heron for the first time, it’s because you’re standing on shifting sand and you need balance.” He looked at the marsh.

  “What about me, Owen?”

  He cocked his head at me. “What about you?”

  I took a deep breath and watched the heron. “Where am I going to be buried if you’re down here? Husband and wife are normally buried together.”

  “I figured you could be buried right beside me if that’s what you want. I always got the feeling you didn’t much want that, Josie. We ain’t been much of a couple.” He walked in the direction of the street. “Come on and we’ll look at our resting place.”

  The whole thing didn’t make a bit of sense to me. “Let me get Nellie.”

  All was quiet in the house. “Nellie, let’s go walk with your daddy.”

  Nellie came through the door wearing her pink sleeveless jumper. “What kind of walk? Are we going to look for some gators, Daddy?”

  Owen winked at her. “I bet you could catch one.”

  “Who were you talking to, Nellie?” I ignored Owen.

  “A lady who used to live in this house.”

  Owen snorted and walked up the path to the street.

  “Don’t make up stories, Nellie. You’ll make your daddy mad.” But I knew my girl wouldn’t fib.

  Her hurt showed in the way she wrinkled her nose. “I ain’t lying, Mama. She said her name was Pauline like my middle name. She lived here for a long time.”

  Lord Jesus in heaven, my baby was talking to ghosts. “What was she doing in this house?”

  “She’s stuck.” Nellie looked at me with a serious stare. “I think someone killed her. She’s a ghost.”

  “Nellie, I don’t believe in ghosts.” I nudged her to move down the path.

  “What about Grandma? You said she came to see us after she died.”

  “She was a soul on her way to heaven. She wasn’t no ghost stuck here on this earth.”

  “Pauline said she can’t remember what happened. She asked me all kinds of questions about Daddy.”

  A chill spread through my whole body this time.

  In the cemetery Owen showed us where his daddy was buried. “I’ll be right here and you will be there.” He pointed to the space that wasn’t marked by stones.

  Nellie was running all around. “This man here was in the Revolutionary War, Daddy.”

  “Plenty of them. There’s a fort not far from here.”

  “Where’s your mama buried?” I held my breath.

  Owen frowned up.

  “I’m your wife. I don’t know anything about your life here.”

  He took a deep breath. “There’s some things that don’t need to be pulled out of someone.”

  Dread welled up in my stomach.

  “Mama wasn’t buried here because it wasn’t right. The church refused her.” He watched Nellie moving away from us.

  “Why?”

  He waited so long I figured he wasn’t going to answer me. “She hung herself. The church can’t abide someone killing themselves. Neither can the fishermen. I was considered tainted.” The air was still, not like at home where the heat bugs started singing before the sun got behind the trees. She killed herself. This explained mostly everything about him.

  “I know you don’t believe in such, but Nellie was talking to someone this afternoon that she called Pauline.”

  He looked like the saddest person in the world. “Folks say they see her walking down on the dock at night. I’d hate to think she’s still here. She hated this town and wanted nothing more than to go back to Atlanta. Then Daddy died and I became a fisherman. It was way too much.”

  “That must’ve hurt real bad, Owen.”

  His face fell into a pitiful look, and he turned from me and walked to the next family plot. There’s always something more to a person’s story, things held deep inside too painful to tell.

  Nellie stood near the Episcopal church in deep thought. It was time to take my girl out of that haunted town. Owen’s mama was so lost she hung herself. She was stuck in the place she hated the most. Spirits were real, and I could only pray that they left my baby alone. But I knew that was pie in the sky.

  Twenty-eight

  On November 20, 1930—some dates just stick in a person’s head—Owen was sitting in the kitchen before work, reading the newspaper. I was frying his bacon and eggs while Nellie ate her oatmeal before she took out for school. She was in the fourth grade and smarter than a whip. It was nearly Thanksgiving. Nellie had been studying on gifts she wanted Santa to bring. Santa was going to have a tough time visiting a lot of the kids. The bottom had dropped out of the whole country, and it all started with a bunch of stocks in New York City. People everywhere were losing their jobs because whole companies were going under. Folks in Asheville had been living high on the hog for so long they couldn’t see the bad coming. The city had built the fancy new library out of Georgia marble brought up here on trucks. Owen had been put out about that, seeing how he worked for the quarry and they had fine rock. Then the city went and built a brand-new courthouse, shipping in Tennessee limestone. What a waste when the old courthouse was fine and dandy. Mostly everyone was living way beyond their means. Shoot, if a person wanted a new house they just went to the bank, got themselves what was called a loan. The bank gave them the money right then. Owen didn’t believe in monthly payments.

  “Did you hear that the county is in money trouble?” I tried not to let my worry show. The county was a big customer of the quarry.

  I had started me a laundry business in the year since we’d come back from Darien, and Owen wasn’t a bit bothered. There were so many women in the big fancy houses who didn’t want to do their own clothes. I filled the need by giving extra detail to their fine things. Washing, mending, and pressing was my gift. “Eagerly, that’s Mrs. Hamilton’s maid, told me she heard Mrs. Hamilton talking about how the whole county government might shut down.” I was worrying on my business. See, I was making some good money off those bundles of clothes delivered by colored maids in chauffeured cars on assigned days. Mrs. Hamilton had Mondays, a prime day, because she paid the best. Mrs. Tiller sent hers on Tuesdays and so on. I was pretty good at sorting things out. I kept Fridays open for those ladies who had emergency needs.

  “We don’t have a thing to worry about, Josie. Our money is right in that old jar under the bed. You know that. My job at the quarry don’t depend on the county. Other folks need rock. I’ve been there long enough to make it through a slowdown. And your colored-maid friend is still in good enough shape to gossip. It’s the foolish who is hurting right now. Hard workers like us will be fine.”

  But something told me that was a bunch of hogwash, that things was about to break loose and hurt everyone.

  As Nellie and Owen headed out the door, I didn’t even get a tingle of something bad coming. I waved and then set to work on my own laundry before Eagerly showed up with Mrs. Hamilton’s bundle.

  By lunch word had spread all over town, even on Settle road, that Central Bank and Trust Company had shut their doors for good.

  A soft little peck on my back door made me jump. Marge Marks stood there on my step, wringing her hands. She’d grown so old since Mr. Marks had passed. I worried on her a lot. She was just like family.

  “All my money’s there, Josie. What am I going to do? The city is going to have to close down.”

  “Don’t you worry none, Marge. I ain’t going to let nothing happen to you.” I put my arm around her bony shoulders and led her back to her house. “Me and you are family. Things will be okay.” I only hoped I could keep that promise.

  She looked at me with watery green eyes. “Aren’t you glad Owen would
n’t put his money in the bank?”

  “You’ll be okay. What’s mine is yours.” A secret satisfaction welled up in me. For once I was proud of Owen thinking backward. “Lord, here comes Nellie early from school. They must have shut the school down. You go on in your house, Marge. I’ll be right here.”

  Nellie had a scared look on her face. “Mama, teacher says all the money is gone. She was crying, all the teachers were, even the principal.”

  “We’re fine for now. Daddy doesn’t keep our money in the bank.”

  Her shoulders relaxed.

  A bad feeling took up a place just under my ribs. “Still, I think you need to run over to the quarry and let Daddy know what has happened. We might need to make a plan.”

  Mrs. Hamilton’s car moved slowly down the street.

  “Go on and tell him about the bank. Ask him if I need to do anything. Tell him that Widow Marks’s money is gone. She’s crying and carrying on.” A desperate feeling spread through my chest.

  “Okay, Mama.” Nellie ran up the road.

  “Where’s she off to?” Eagerly wore her starched white uniform and black shiny shoes. The bundle of clothes was in her arms.

  “I sent her to tell Owen about the bank.”

  “You got all your money there?” She looked concerned.

  “Naw. Owen doesn’t abide by banks.”

  “Good thing.” Eagerly looked over at Carl, Mrs. Hamilton’s chauffeur and Eagerly’s husband. “Miz Hamilton don’t seem too worried for herself—I figured she’s got her money in some other bank—but Miz Tiller has been beside herself ever since word came early this morning. She be waiting for Mr. Tiller to come home. He’s a bigwig in the mayor’s office, you know.”

  I nodded.

  Eagerly had been with Mrs. Hamilton since she turned twenty. She was kissing fifty. “We never put our money in the bank. Carl said if they won’t let us coloreds eat at the lunch counter, why would we give them our money? We’ll make do as long as Mrs. Hamilton needs us.” There wasn’t a trace of worry in her face.

  “Looks like that other shoe has finally fell,” I said. “I’ve been reading my tea leaves and it don’t look good. I see nothing but hard times. When I cipher them, I can’t tell who for. That’s real foggy. This bad feeling is bigger than just my family and smaller than me and you. Maybe it means Owen’s going to lose his job. Or maybe it’s Nellie. I just don’t know.” I gave her that look women give each other when they know the burdens each other carry. “Come on in and have a cup of tea.” I took the bundle of clothes, knowing full well Eagerly wouldn’t come in. I liked this woman better than any woman I’d ever met and I didn’t care what color she was, but us sitting down and having a nice cup of tea wasn’t done. She could lose her job or worse.

  “Naw, can’t today. You keep reading those leaves. You got the gift. If not for you Carl would have been bit by that moccasin. It was your warning that made me go look after what he was doing. He wouldn’t have seen that snake.”

  I couldn’t take no credit. I told her that. But she insisted my warning saved his life.

  “Let me know what you hear after Mrs. Tiller.”

  “I will.” Eagerly turned to leave.

  A ripple of dread spread across my chest through somewhere deep in my body. Why had I let Nellie go to the quarry alone on a day the town was let loose with grief? I couldn’t concentrate on Mrs. Hamilton’s clothes. I stood in the kitchen window, watching the street.

  When the strange truck turned into the road, I was still there. The truck had ASHEVILLE STONE printed on the side. My heart turned over as it slowed to a stop in front of the house. Still I stood in my place. A man with a round belly got out of the truck. He was Owen’s boss. Then I seen my Nellie. The air left my lungs as I ran out the door. Little sounds of grief pushed from my chest.

  Nellie’s eyes were rimmed in red. “Mama,” she sobbed, burying her face in my stomach.

  Owen’s boss—I couldn’t place his name in my mind—took off his cap. “Mrs. Clay, there’s been an accident.”

  Those words echoed in my ears and down my spine. Part of me went weak with relief because my baby was safe. The other part of me became tight and rigid.

  “Owen was killed, ma’am.” There it was, the picture the tea leaves kept trying to form. “The chain broke and a big stone fell. He never understood what happened.”

  But I knew Owen had been understanding this for over a year. He’d been waiting. “Did my girl see her daddy die?” The words began to spin.

  The man nodded. “Yes ma’am.” The words were quietly tearing my mind apart. I had no deep love for Owen, but all the same I felt part of my soul was missing.

  “There’s something we need to talk about.”

  Nellie sobbed. I had no one but her. No one.

  “Can we talk later? I got to think.”

  Owen’s boss took a step closer. “We got to do something with the body, Mrs. Clay,” he whispered.

  Yes, the body. Oh God, his body. Something had to be done.

  “You want me to send him to the funeral home? It’s a right nice place.”

  What did a huge rock do to a man’s body when dropped from that high? “Yes.” I whispered into Nellie’s hair, “Why don’t you go wash your face. I’ll be right there.”

  She never looked at me, only nodded and walked in the house with her head hanging down.

  “Owen took out a big life-insurance policy a year ago. That should help some. I’ll get you the paperwork.”

  Oh Owen, you knew. All the times I hated him for his coldness seemed a sin. “Thank you.”

  And Owen’s boss was gone, leaving me standing in the yard.

  Mrs. Hamilton’s big fancy car turned down the street. My shoulders went slack. Eagerly got out and came to me. “I’m here.” I cried into her neck. I cried for Owen and what we never had. Somehow I had to convince Nellie to marry a man she loved and who loved her. But better yet a man with the same mind as hers. I cried because I didn’t know what I was going to do. A part of me wilted away that day.

  Eagerly gave me a squeeze. This is what friends did for each other.

  “He had a death policy and I didn’t know.”

  She nodded.

  * * *

  By the time the funeral home put Owen in his shining oak casket, I was set on my purpose, my direction. Nellie turned quiet on me and never once did we talk about what she saw that day. She wouldn’t have any of my coaxing. I took a big part of the life-insurance policy to bury Owen in Darien. Me and Nellie rode in the front of the hearse. Nobody came to stand by his grave as he was lowered into the ground. Who could I call? He wouldn’t have wanted anyone else there anyway.

  “There’s the woman I talked to from Daddy’s old house, Mama.” Nellie pointed to a clump of trees at the edge of the cemetery.

  My blood froze in my veins. A beautiful woman dressed in the prettiest pink suit watched us. When I blinked, she was gone.

  “Did you see her, Mama? She just disappeared.”

  “I didn’t see a thing, Nellie.” My words were cold.

  Nellie looked at me like I was crazy. My whole world was upside down and some old ghost wanted to make it worse. “I mean it. No more talking about that woman. You didn’t see nothing, understand?”

  “Okay.” She looked away from me.

  I had hurt her feelings. The last thing Nellie needed was to have her crazy grandmother’s spirit chasing her through life.

  “Mama.” Nellie looked at me.

  “Yes.”

  “One day I’m going to marry someone just like Daddy.”

  I wanted to correct her but shame filled my heart. Owen was her father. I couldn’t talk bad about him. “Nellie, I’m going to tell you what my mama told me. Don’t go looking for some fairy-tale marriage. They’re not real. And never fall head over heels for no man, save some love for yourself.”

  She was quiet and studied me like she was a adult. “Mama?”

  “Yes.”

  “Somed
ay I’m going to live here in Darien.”

  “No you won’t, Nellie. No reason to. We’re from Asheville, me and you.”

  “Yes I am. You’ll see.” Her stubborn look reminded me of Owen. Maybe she needed to think this to be closer to her daddy.

  “And Mama …” She took my hand. “You’re going to live here with me.”

  Of course by the time eight years rolled around and Hobbs Pritchard showed up, I had forgotten that Nellie ever said such a thing.

  When I read her letter that nice man brought down Black Mountain, I saw her plain as day standing in that graveyard. The air was cold when we put Owen in the ground. Nellie stood there watching. I caught a glimpse of the woman she would become and how she would change on me, how she would hunger after a man to replace her daddy. No one story is completely free of pain, and Nellie’s was dotted with more grief than she deserved. But I had no doubt she saw something that day besides the ghost of Pauline Clay. She saw her future. She knew that something trying was on the horizon.

  Part Three

  Shelly Parker

  Twenty-nine

  Nada was right proud of my gift. If she could have bragged on me, she would have shouted from the top of Black Mountain. But we didn’t have no one to talk to, only each other. We was the only Negroes on the mountain and that made for a mighty lonely life. All I had was Faith Dobbins, who made me her baby doll until I got old enough to be her maid. But she did teach me how to read and write real good. Nada said I had to be careful and act dumb because smart coloreds were punished. It was just a fact of the times.

  Nellie Pritchard was the first white person to treat me like a regular girl. Of course I never let on because Nada would have frowned on the whole business. She was my mama and one of the best conjures to come out of New Orleans, who happened to work for a pastor and his family. In those hard times, work was work. Folks from all over the mountain came to her for everything from a corn on a toe to catching a husband. That’s why Nada thought my gift was something special, except we had to hide it from Pastor. He was strictly Christian in his thoughts.