Tales Around the Jack O'Lantern

by Terri Reid

  “Yes. Yes, I am very fond of history,” August replied, “Especially the history of this part of the city. It has quite a colorful history.”

  “Well, I would love to hear more,” Sean said, deciding the old man was harmless and seemed to be in full possession of his faculties. “But I really have to continue to patrol.”

  Sean stood and, surprisingly, the little man stood too. “Do you mind if I walk along with you?” he asked. “I promise not to be a bother.”

  “No problem,” Sean said. “And maybe you could share a little of that history of yours with me. It’ll help me to get to know Lincoln Park a little better.”

  “It would be my pleasure,” August replied.

  They walked along in silence for a few minutes and then the old man cleared his throat. “Well, the first thing you should know about the park is that it was once a cemetery,” he said.

  “No!” Sean said, halting and looking at his companion with disbelief. “A cemetery.”

  “Yes, it was the very first city cemetery,” he replied. “Back when the city didn’t stretch quite as far to the north.”

  “Was it a big cemetery?” Sean asked, looking down at the ground below his feet.

  “Oh, yes,” August replied. “It stretched from Diversey Parkway to North Avenue and held the bodies of thousands of the dear departed. They were from all walks of life. There were those who died from the cholera epidemic, those who were just poor who were buried in Potter’s Field, those who actually bought cemetery plots for families members and the soldiers.”

  “Soldiers?” Sean asked.

  August nodded sadly. “There were six thousand Confederate soldiers who died in Camp Douglas whose bodies were buried here too,” he replied.

  “Six thousand soldiers,” Sean repeated, surprised at the number. “How many people were buried in the park?”

  “About thirty-five thousand,” August replied, shaking his head. Then he leaned in and whispered. “And some of them are still here.”

  A cold chill ran down his spine and he took a deep breath. “What do you mean, still here?”

  “Well, the folks in the city decided that they didn’t want the bodies this close to the water, they said it was a health hazard,” August said, contempt in his voice. “If you ask me, they just didn’t like the idea of a graveyard built near where they wanted to build all their fancy new homes.”

  “So, where did they put the bodies?” Sean asked.

  August began walking again and Sean followed along. “Well,” August said, picking up his cane and pointing it in a westward direction. “Most of the bodies were moved over to Graceland cemetery. They got fine new plots and markers there. The city did a fine job of making sure people were satisfied with the move.”

  He continued to walk, moving further into the park. “But the sexton of the park,” he began, and then he stopped and looked at Sean. “That was the fellow who was in charge of the cemetery. He dug the graves and kept things neat and clean. He ran the place.”

  “The sexton,” Sean repeated.

  August nodded with a smile. “Yes, the sexton was responsible for the graves of all those who were buried,” he said, walking down a narrow path that was surrounded by trees on both sides. “And he knew that they didn’t take them all. They didn’t move them. They just moved the important ones and left thousands of bodies here under the park. No markers, no gravestones, no one to remember them.”

  Sean shook his head. “No, someone remembered them,” he replied. “It seems to me that any sexton worth his title would have remembered them no matter if they were rich or poor.”

  August turned to Sean and smiled brightly. “You are a bright young man,” he said. “And you do understand. Yes. Yes, the sexton would remember.”

  “But, what I don’t understand is how you know all those graves weren’t moved,” Sean said.

  The air grew still and heavy. The noise from Lake Shore Drive faded away and the whining from the boats in the pier intensified for a moment, as if thousands of lost souls had cried out.

  August met Sean’s eyes and his smile turned sad. “Because, my dear, young man, I’m still here.” And then he vanished from sight.

  Chapter Six

  “The next morning, when I got off shift, I went onto the computer,” Sean added. “And sure enough, Augustus Bates had been the City Sexton during the time the old City Cemetery had been closed down.”

  “Did you ever see him again?” Mary asked.

  “A couple of times I thought I caught a glimpse of him,” he admitted. “And I thought he waved at me. But it was always dark, so I guess I could have imagined it.”

  “But you don’t think so, do you?” Mary asked.

  Sean paused for a moment and then shook his head. “No, I think what I saw was real,” he said. “I never thought I’d actually believe in ghosts. But there it is.”

  Mary nodded. “Yes, there it is,” she repeated. “And I never thought I would believe in ghosts either. But sometimes—”

  She looked over at her mother and smiled shyly. “So what is the statute of limitations on not quite telling your parents the truth?”

  Margaret studied her daughter for a moment and then sighed loudly. “Seeing that it’s Halloween, you have one free pass,” she replied.

  “Thank you, Ma,” Mary said with a slight nod of her head. “So, let me tell you how I came to believe in ghosts.”

  The noon bell had just rung and the young girl stood in the doorway of her sixth-grade classroom watching the flurry of students, all dressed in the green and blue plaid of their Catholic school uniforms, rush towards the staircase that led to the lunch room on the ground level. She waited until their noise had died down before she pushed herself off the door jamb and made her way downstairs to eat her own lunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwich, homemade cookies, carrot sticks and ranch dip that her mother had lovingly prepared.

  “How are you this morning, dear?”

  Mary paused to smile at the elderly nun coming from one of the rooms at the end of the hall. It had become a daily occurrence for Mary to greet the woman every school day.

  “I’m fine, Sister,” she replied. “How are you?”

  With a twinkle in her aging blue eyes the Sister would always smile at Mary and repeat the same phrase. “It’s always a good day when you get to meet a friend. Have a good lunch, dear.”

  With a smile on her face, Mary would climb down the stairs to the lunchroom and wait in line to buy a carton of milk before she found an empty spot at one of the tables in the corner of the room.

  But today was different. Once the milk was purchased, someone across the room called her name. “Mary! Mary O’Reilly! Come here and sit with us.”

  Mary looked over to see Janice Heppner standing at a table on the other side of the room, waving at her. Janice and her friends had been in Mary’s class since first grade. Even then there had been a distinct separation of the girls who would be popular and the ones who wouldn’t. Even back then Mary was one of the girls who ate alone and played alone at recess. She looked at the other girls at the table; their heads all turned in her direction and wondered if she had to strength to just walk away.

  No. She had to admit that a part of her dearly wanted to be one of them. So, curiosity and peer pressure forced her feet to move her from the quiet side of the lunchroom to the table where Janice and her friends sat. They slid over and opened up a spot for her at the end of the bench. Putting her sack and milk down in front of her spot, Mary sat down.

  “Hi Mary,” Janice gushed. “Guess what? I’m having a Halloween party on Friday night.”

  Mary unwrapped the plastic from around her sandwich and picked up half. “That’s nice,” she replied before biting into it.

  “Don’t you want to know who’s coming?” Janice asked.

  Knowing that her name would not be on the list, Mary shrugged. “Sure,” she said, and bit down again.

  “Everyone who’s cool is coming,” Janice sai
d.

  Yes, Mary thought, that would leave me out.

  “We were all thinking that it would be nice if you could come,” Janice added.

  Mary nearly choked on her next bite of sandwich. “Me?” she coughed.

  Janice nodded her head. “Yes, and maybe your brothers could come with you.”

  Ah, here was the real purpose for the invitation, Mary sighed. Her twin brothers, Art and Tom, were several years older than she and they were star athletes at the high school. If Janice could get them to come to her party, she would have been in the same league as the high school popular girls.

  “Yeah, well, they don’t go to parties much,” Mary hedged. “They mostly practice and work out.”

  “But it’s Halloween night,” Janice argued. “There wouldn’t be any work outs on Halloween.”

  She had a point, Mary thought. However, she couldn’t come up with a polite way to tell Janice that her brothers wouldn’t be seen dead at a middle-school girl’s party. “Well, I’ll ask them and see if they want to come,” she finally said.

  The girls around the table burst into excited chatter about the twins, taking Mary’s polite response as sure thing. Didn’t any of these girls have brothers? Didn’t they know the last thing older brothers wanted to do was anything that made their younger sister happy? Sighing, she took another bite of her sandwich, which now tasted a little like sawdust, and tried to keep a smile on her face.

  “Oh,” Janice announced as a polite afterthought. “Even if they can’t, you know, come to my party. If you want to, you can just come by yourself.”

  # # #

  Why is it, Mary wondered nervously as she stared at her costume in the mirror on Friday evening, that when you want time to fly by it never does? But when you want it to just stand still, it flies by?

  She was dressed as witch; black stockings, black tulle skirt that went to her knees, a black turtleneck and a witch’s hat. Her brown hair had been caught back in a bun and she actually had been allowed to wear make-up. Not the kind that made you look like a clown, but real make-up that accented your eyes and made your cheeks appear more distinct and rosy. She felt older and a little braver than normal, she felt sophisticated. The crowning accessory to her costume was the glittering, black domino mask. It was just beautiful in its simplicity; silver glitter and sparkling beads outlining the edges and the eye holes. It covered enough of her face that she was disguised.

  “Mary, you need to hurry or you’ll be late to the party,” her mother called up the stairs.

  She sighed. Her mother had been more excited than she was when Mary had told her about the invitation. She had gone shopping the next day to put together a costume that would make her daughter feel comfortable in the midst of the other girls.

  “Coming,” Mary called back. She slipped her jean jacket over her costume and jogged down the stairs.

  “Oh, no, it’s a lovely night. It’s Indian summer,” her mother said, sliding the jacket from Mary’s shoulders. “You won’t be needing that.”

  “But Mom, I’m more comfortable wearing it,” Mary complained.

  “Hiding inside it, I’d say,” Margaret replied, with a no-nonsense look on her face. “You go to the party and have fun. You’ll be the belle of the ball.”

  “Fine. Thanks, Mom,” Mary sighed, reaching up and giving her mother a kiss on the cheek. “I won’t be too late.”

  “Just have fun, that’s all that matters,” her mother replied.

  The walk to Janice’s house was actually fun. Young trick-or-treaters lined the sidewalks, their bags heavy with their candy and their eager faces ready for more houses and more doorbells to ring. They dashed from house to house as tired parents waited on the sidewalks, calling to their children and reminding them to say thank you as the treats were dispersed. Mary grinned, it wasn’t that long ago that she was one of the children on the doorstops, bag held out eagerly, looking for her favorite treats. She really wished she was still that age.

  She finally reached Janice’s house. Janice’s dad was a doctor and their house was huge. It was the last house before the forest preserve on Foster Avenue and took up several city lots. The front lawn was decorated with orange pumpkin lights, an animated coffin and trees filled with hanging ghosts. White luminaries lined the sidewalk that led to the front porch and the deck on the side of the house.

  With a sigh, Mary started down the sidewalk towards the house. Maybe I shouldn’t be so negative, she thought. I might have a good time. I might discover that I do have something in common with these girls. They might decide they like me and want me to hang out with them.

  “She’s coming, but her brothers aren’t?” the loud voice drifted towards Mary from over the deck rail. “Uh, that’s so lame. We should have known she would ruin things.”

  Mary froze.

  “Well, it won’t be that bad,” another voice said and then there was a pause, followed by a giggle. “Okay, yes, it will.”

  “Well, we don’t have to be nice to her,” the first voice laughed. “We can just sit her down in the corner and give her some food. Just like in the lunchroom.”

  The resounding laughter caused a pit in the middle of Mary’s stomach, she felt like she was going to get sick right there on the front lawn. Oh, yeah, that will make my popularity rise at school, she thought bitterly. There goes lunch-corner puke girl.

  Without a second thought, she turned around and walked away, not aware of where she was going or the tears sliding down her cheeks. She had walked for several minutes before she realized she was following a path through the forest preserve. She stopped, wiped the moisture from her face and looked around. The woods were quiet and the air smelled like moist dirt, it seemed to buoy her spirits. She took several deep breaths and reminded herself that she knew what those girls were like, so they just lived up to her expectations.

  Now, her only question was what to do with the rest of her evening. She knew if she arrived home early her mother would find out what happened and Margaret Mary Elizabeth O’Reilly would be marching down the street, into Janice’s house and demand an apology from all of the girls present. That would be mortifying.

  Then a thought occurred to her that had her standing up straight. The Lost Cemetery!

  She’d heard stories about the old cemetery that was hidden in the corner of LaBagh Woods. Her brothers spoke about seeing floating balls of light and hearing voices, but they had always told her she was too young and she would get frightened. She straightened her shoulders and took a deep breath. Well, she wasn’t too young tonight. And she would earn a little respect when word got out that instead of going to a stupid party; she spent Halloween in the Lost Cemetery.

  She ran down the path towards the wrought iron fence that separated the woods from its neighbor, Montrose Cemetery. The trees on her side of the fence formed a line a few feet away from the fence, creating a canopy of bare branches above and a carpet of dried leaves below. The lights from the cemetery were enough to guide her along the way without tripping.

  Finally, she came to the old chain-link fence at the far end of the park. A little way beyond the fence was the bank of the Chicago River and just before the river, in an overgrown clearing was the cemetery. Mary followed the chain-link fence until she found the hole her brothers had told her about. She pushed through it, catching her stockings on a sharp piece of link and snagging them, but continued on into the underbrush.

  The woods were darker here and she wished she had thought to bring a flashlight. But there was a full moon and most of the tree branches were bare, so she had enough light to see. The narrow path to the old cemetery was obvious, stamped down vegetation and bare dirt marked the way through the trees and brush.

  As she moved forward, her heart beat with anticipation. Would she see floating lights or hear the voices of those who had passed away?

  She slowed her pace as she entered the overgrown woods. Maybe this wasn’t such a great idea, she thought, thinking about all of the scary movies she had
ever seen. This is the kind of place where people are killed and no one ever finds out what happened to them.

  She swallowed nervously and slowly looked around. The forest separated her from everything. She couldn’t even hear the traffic from Foster Avenue any more.

  Could anyone hear me scream?

  A noise ahead of her made her jump and caused her heart to race. Someone was coming. The sound of unruly male laughter drifted down the path and slurred voices accompanied a litany of words she was not allowed to use.

  She looked around for a place to hide, but there was nowhere to go. Finally, deciding that her black outfit might hide her if she was closer to the ground, she knelt down and crawled into the brush, away from the path. Branches, thorns and rocks bit through her thin clothes, but she continued on, trying to make as little noise as possible. But when her knee came into sharp contact with a big rock in the ground, she couldn’t help it. She cried out.

  “What the hell was that?” she heard one of the voices call out.

  “A ghost,” another voice said, giggling wildly.

  “Shut up,” the first, angrier voice ordered. “If someone is out here and saw us, we need to make them go away.”

  Mary curled up next to the stone, that was flat and square, and tried to make herself as small as possible. Please God, she prayed, tears squeezing out from eyes clamped shut. Please help me.

  “Put that flashlight down, you idiot,” the angry one yelled. “You want to bring the cops here?”

  “Sorry,” the other voice replied softly. “I just thought it would help.”

  “I think the sound came from over here,” the angry voice said and Mary felt the brush near her tremble with movement.

  Please God, please, she prayed.

  Suddenly the forest was filled with sounds, like thousands of cicadas suddenly coming to life.

  “Dude, what’s that?” the giggler asked.

  “Nothing, just bugs,” the angry one replied.

  But then the sound changed. It was no longer the rustling chirp of the cicada, the sound was now more of a chant. “Leave this place, leave this place, leave this place,” in echoing voices that seemed to come from everywhere.