The old man, who no longer seemed feeble or particularly old or even an Indian any longer, nodded saying, “They obey my every command, they cannot die and they cannot get lost and they cannot forgive any trespass against me.”
“Perhaps, we can go one step farther with our agreement,” said Tom. “One more daughter, and I get to command the worms for one night.”
The old man laughed. “Need I remind you, that you cannot command them to devour me, that they shan’t ever do nor can they do anything to harm themselves. They will obey every command to the letter and you cannot use them against me. But ask, ask away and I assure you that when the time comes, I will have your three daughters and then I shall have three more worms.”
“Oh I agree all right,” said Tom.
“What will you do? Make your neighbors fields barren? Increase your own crop by having the worms renew the desert? All these things are possible but I will have your children.”
“I am deciding, hold on a moment.”
The old man held out his hand that looked much more crimson than before and was it possible that the slightest amount of horns were sprouting from his head? Tom wondered, did a spade shaped tail just whip back and forth beneath the old man’s coat tails?
No matter.
Tom weighed his choices and said, “Very well, I accept, let us shake and you give me command of the worms for one night.” Only too swiftly the old man’s hand was in Tom’s grasp and the bargain was sealed.
“Now give your command then Thomas Dabney and they will fulfill your demand and I will have thy children soon as they completed thy bidding.”
“Worms!” Tom called, and the great green worms did hearken to him. “Get lost!”
The worms wavered a moment, then dove back into the earth and disappeared.
They were never heard from again.
Thwarted, the old man, you know who he was, screamed aloud with a great wailing and gnashing of teeth and he too disappeared in a cloud of brimstone and ash.
And Tom Dabney, he had many daughters many years later and never lost a single one of them.
“An idea, like a ghost, must be spoken to a little before it will explain itself.”
— Charles Dickens
Devil Takes the Hindmost
Statement of R. Whortleberry: February 15th, 1896
Now some might have said Jeremiah Mertz had always been a fool, but far be it from me to be so unkind. He wasn’t exactly slow-witted, mind you, but he was quite self-absorbed and never did have a lick of common sense in the way that most folk do. He would readily let both his temper and tongue slip through his teeth and speak when he should have been silent and kept his damn ears open—and that has always rubbed people the wrong way. On top of all of that though, I can’t say I ever thought him a liar neither, so when he told us how he lost my horse I have to admit to being surprised yet willing to let him pay it back in due time.
This was not a story he had the imagination to make up on his own. After all, Julie had hand stitched his fine tweed coat[47] and there’s no way he would have just let anything happen to that if he could have helped it. Besides that his young love Julie made it, he was also a great lover of fine clothing. He always tried to dress his best whenever possible. That fine piece of cloth was shredded to ribbons and Jeremiah was certainly lucky to be alive after his encounter.
Here it is as he told me, I just regret that I could not have kept him from being so cock-sure and I further wish I could have averted what happened afterward.
Jeremiah Mertz’s Account as told to R. Whortleberry
I borrowed Mr. Whortleberry’s horse, Goliath, to ride from St. Thomas on up to Overton for the St. Valentines dance. I was looking mighty forward to my time with the lovely Julie Frost.
We had a grand time. We shared the punch and enjoyed the music. At one time Brian Cook did try to cut in and I wouldn’t have it. Julie on the other hand said to allow him one dance with her and leave it at that just to keep things civil. I have always known that Brian wanted her and was incredibly jealous of me. Some people said that he had even paid a visit to the Witch of Rioville[48] in an attempt to make Julie fall in love with him but I never believed any of that rot until last night. He did try to slip Julie some kind of drink from a small vial about a month ago, probably a witches love potion, but she saw him do it and had her father ask him to leave their premises. He swore he would get revenge, but has done nothing more for the last month.
I was allowed by Julie’s father to give her a ride home and speak with her afterward upon their porch swing. Time rolls on as we spoke and before I knew it, t’was well past midnight. I said my goodbyes and started for home.
It was late and I was sore tired and decided to cut through the swamp by the Muddy [River] to save a little time. In hindsight t’was foolish but I was sore tired. Yes, I had been drinking, but not too much.
I heard a baby’s squalling and my first thought was that it was a painter [panther]. But it continued on in a solid cry and I soon found it was a small human baby in the swamp. This was indeed strange but I could not leave a baby alone at night in the swamp. I picked the child up and proceeded to try and put it on the saddle with me but Goliath’s [the horse] eyes flared wide, he snorted and panicked and it was all I could do to keep control of the skittish animal. I must say he has never behaved like that afore. I finally mounted him and carried the babe in the saddle in from of me as Goliath acted as crazy as a loon.
We hadn’t gone through the swamp for more than a quarter mile when the babe looked up at me and spoke with a deep voice, a saying, ‘I don’t ride in front. Let me behind you.’
This was the queerest thing I had ever heard in my life but I’m telling you I was compelled to oblige the dark childe. I was still fighting Goliath for control on account of he wanted none of this.
The babe held onto my waist jes fine with its wee hands and we kept heading back to St. Thomas.
Not much farther on Goliath was getting even harder to control, just a panicking and snorting and I was crying and cursing him out loud for his behavior. I felt the babes hands a holding me tight to hang on and then I even felt as if he was scrunching down in the saddle as if holding even a tighter and tighter.
Goliath was side stepping as if to try and watch us like he was afeared of being attacked.
I smelt a horrid stink and was made nauseous in my guts. I wondered at the babes underclothes but then I realized it was the heavy breathing right beside my ears that smelt so terrible.
The babes wee hands seemed to reach farther than they did afore and when I looked down at ‘em, I saw not a babes’ wee hands but giant hairy paws and claws!
I looked behind me and there was the most ghastly of faces I have ever seen. It was wild and hairy with sharp teeth and yellow eyes! Its big clawed hands started a tearing at me and a ripping my coat up as I struggled to get away.
The demon’s roar I shall never, t’was awful as the devil’s own choir of imps and demons.
Goliath screamed as the great paws of the monster tore into his neck in an attempt to get and rend me. I lost all control of the animal and we busted a hump farther into the swamp near the river, all the while a fighting and a tearing atop Goliath.
We plunged into the river and the monster still cried for my blood and came after me waving its damned nails like knives.
Waist deep in the river I backed away, trying to escape its clutches. Goliath stamped and screamed and as the demon clawed him again he went under the surface, never to rise again. Then the monster came at me again crying like an ass being eaten by a wolf. I rolled away in the murk and the demon tore after me.
I finally managed to pull my gun and shot the thing straight in the right eye. It cried out and dove deep into the water. Then it was gone and so was Goliath. I crawled to the shore and waited breathless with my gun aimed at the dark water waiting for the thing to rise, but it never did.
I came straight away back to Mr. Whortleberry’s and told him ev
erything. He seen my shredded coat and he knows I don’t tell no lies ever.
I am done sure that the Witch of Rioville did this thing by a turning Brian Cook into such a beast to get me outta the way so he could have Julie Frost. He already tried to give Julie that love potion and I’m sure he paid the Witch to do this werewolfery to get to me. Everyone knows I could lick him in a fair fight. I will find him, make him pay and all the mystery is solved. Justice will be done.
Report of Randall DeWitt, Clark County Deputy: Feb 16th 1896
Upon investigation of the gunfight in Overton and killing of both one Brian Cook and one Jeremiah Mertz; we found that the two men had shot each other to death and that each of their wounds were fresh at the time of death and that all wounds were within the chest cavity. There were no head wounds as concerned citizen R. Whortleberry asked us to investigate. Case closed.
Obituaries: Rioville Gazette: February 29th, 1896
Maria Delos Santos, age ???, better known as the Witch of Rioville; was found murdered in her home yesterday. Decompositional experts from the Clark County police departments indicated that she had been deceased for at least a week. The killer is still at large. There are no suspects. She was shot dead through the right eye.
“I believe ghost story writing is a dying art.”
― H.R. Wakefield
The Groaning Desk
Recollected by B. T. Cutter: December, 1909
“It was right near around New Years, no, it must have been right before Christmas when a fancy city feller came into St. Thomas. Said his name was Wilbur Van Horn[49], or some high fallooting thing like that, I cannot recall exactly now that it has been a few years.
He came to St. Thomas to write about it, he wanted to hear all the old Wild West stories and write them down for some expensive newspaper back east, or maybe it was out west San Francisco or some such. We all had a laugh saying that St. Thomas was not that kind of place so much anymore and that most of those stories were made up or lies or lost and that he shouldn’t waste his time in our humble little town.
But then Ma reminded me of how broke we were and we thought more on it and decided that we may as well tell him a lot of stories, embellish them some and see if we couldn’t get some money out of him and later maybe some tourism going here. Lord knows we could use the money, am I right?
So we explained we had the only spare room in town and put him up. We also made a tidy sum on some overpriced meals and drinks for him, Lord did he love to eat and drink. Did I mention he was fat? Lord, he was fat as a tick and could eat a hogshead by himself. But his money was good and he was happy and so we were happy. Until he started hearing too many contradictory stories from the kids and he got mad at us and said he thought we had been pulling a fast one on him and he threatened to leave town in a hurry.
We apologized and said that we were sorry, that we were just afeared of telling him the real god’s honest truth about our wicked little town. That its gruesome history was quite the embarrassment and we were worried it would ruin any chance of anyone else ever coming here again.
He liked that and promised that on the contrary he would make sure lots more folks came to see our little den of iniquity.
So, we proceeded with caution on what stories we would tell him, but he was beginning to get suspicious and requested that we only tell him tales at his room and one at a time. He said he wanted ‘verifiables’ and also that he needed a desk, but we didn’t have hardly any desks in town for him and we sure didn’t want him going to anybody elses house or even one of the other towns and losing our meal ticker. So we told him we would make him a desk.
I didn’t have much good wood, wood being scarce in these parts and mesquite sure wouldn’t work but then I’s remembered that old Hatchfield place and its barn that was just waiting to be torn down. No one had lived there in quite some time not since the days of Black Jack[50]. I seemed to recall something happening there when I was a young un but couldn’t recollect exactly.
We didn’t want the McCormick’s complaining that we was taking wood from their property, since the Hatchfield’s was theirs now, so we snuck over in the evening just after dark. The barn was a creaking and a groaning and ready to fall down so we just gave it a shove and down she come. I took the foremost rafter from the front and spent all the next day having it scraped and sanded a bit. We then fashioned some legs and a makeshift drawer from a broken dresser for Mr. Van Horn.
I thought once I was done that it looked mighty purty and ma was a bit upset that I had never worked so hard on anything like that for her afore.
Now, Mr. Van Horn had us move the desk into his room and he set it up all fancy like and he seemed awful happy with it. From then on he worked like a dog in his room a typing and taking notes once he had heard our tales of the old days before the railroad and such.
I didn’t bother to tell him that we still didn’t have a railroad[51] but nodded approvingly when he talked about its great use and importance.
So jest after dark as I’m thinking that life is good and the world is my ointment, Mr. Van Horn storms downstairs and complains that we are a making too much damn noise and that he can’t think to write on account of us making the floors creak.
I have no idea what is talking about as most of us had gone to sleep and the rest were quietly talking about the next day’s stories to tell him where we knew he would not hear us.
I begged his pardon and told him we would be quieter though I thought he was crazy as a road lizard. No sooner was he right back a hollering and carrying on that tweren’t funny anymore.
Now I was curious and I went on up to his room to see what was the matter. Sure enough his desk was making the strangest creaking and groaning as if a great weight was gonna pull it apart. We looked high and low and couldn’t see what was making the groaning. The only thing on the desk was Mr. Van Horn’s typewriter and notebooks and the creaking didn’t stop even when we moved everything.
It kept up like that all night and didn’t stop til daybreak.
Mr. Van Horn slept in the parlor that night.
We didn’t really talk about it much the next day but always comes evening and the desk a started groaning again. It was a long slow creak back and forth, back and forth, all night long like a pendulum clock it was.
Mr. Van Horn was mighty displeased and I think he thought we might be funning him except he could not figure out how we could pull such a trick.
I sure didn’t want to lose my golden noose so I asked the Mormon Bishop to come and bless the house and desk but he toll me he didn’t do that for folks that were as disfellowshipped as me. I asked Father O’Leary in Overton to come and bless the house and desk but he said I weren’t a good Catholic neither. So I even sent word for Old Chief John, the Paiute medicine man to come and give his Indian blessing on the desk, but he didn’t come right away neither.
I was feeling out of luck and knew for sure that Mr. Van Horn would leave us when I wondered about the old Hatchfield place and knew I should’a done remembered why it was abandoned all these years.
Old Chief John, he come up the next day and he laughed when we told him about the desk and he reminded me of the story.
Way back when, the Hatchfield place was used by some of the outlaws like Black Jack Reed for a hideout as it were. Seems sometime though ole Harry Hatchfield finally had a falling out with the bandits and they argued over how much loot he was to be paid for feeding them and holing them up in his new barn. Rumor had it that he even went so far as to throw down on Black Jack and draw his guns. Now Black Jack was mean as a sidewinder and didn’t take too kindly to being threatened by near anyone and he said something to the affect that if Harry Hatchfield cared about his barn so much he could stay there forever. Black Jack he hung Hatchfield right there on the central rafter and I doen’t know it but that was the very same rafter beam I used for Van Horn’s desk.
The groaning desk had been a gallows pole and the ghost of Harry Hatchfield was cursed to be aswinging
on it all night, every night soon as the sun went down. Just as he had that very first night Black Jack hung his sorry ass.
Well Mr.Van Horn got right sick at that development and wrote about it in the daytime at our very kitchen table. He up and left the very next day and we never did hear from him again.
I thought we ought to try and make a little money on the cursed desk but Ma would have none of it. She said that she couldn’t cotton to a haunted desk in her own house and it was either her or the bewitched furniture.
No one tells Mr. B. T. Cutter what to do, but she is a very good cook, so I decided that it would be best to get rid of the desk. We took it out and burned it, making it the biggest bonfire for New Year’s ever. I reckon old Hatchfield’s ghost finally found some peace I suppose from swinging on that spectral gallows pole for the last thirty five years.”
“All the dead men will come to life again.”
— Wovoka 1890
The Blessing Way
From the memoir of Sara Duke relating to her parents May 1915
Not a lot of things could spook Levi Duke, but fixing up his new bride Eliza’s inherited old house did. The house had belonged to Eliza’s Aunt Millie, and sat on its own ten acres of nearly treeless property. A lone palm stood tall outside the upstairs bedroom window while a few short fig trees were beside the barn. The house itself had four or five rooms and was all by itself on the outskirts of town. This appealed to Levi, but housework and honey-do’s were not his idea of marriage bliss. He agreed to look at the place if only to placate Eliza and suggest later they just sell the place and find a home in Las Vegas. But he didn’t think Aunt Millie’s place could go for much money, especially in this county and he didn’t want to look a gift horse in the mouth either.
Whispers Out Of The Dust: A Haunted Journey Through The Lost American West (Dark Trails Saga) Page 11
