by Eva Pohler
First, Patty Cole needed to be convinced that her grandfather had led Ellen and her friends to his personal effects in the basement.
On the Monday before Thanksgiving, she called Sue to suggest that they needed to have a séance and use the Ouija Board to communicate with Van Hurley.
“We need to get information from him that will persuade Patty that he spoke to us—something only she would know about her grandfather,” Ellen said.
“When we spoke to him before,” Sue said, “he came to us. He initiated contact. If we’re going to summon him, we’re going to need something of his, something we can burn.”
“What if we tear off a corner of one of the pages from his original affidavit?” Ellen suggested.
“Good idea. That just might work.”
“We could do it here, at my place. Paul always stays in the den.”
“Tom’s not going to be home tonight,” Sue said. “He’s driving up to Stillwater to pick up his mom, so she can be here with us for Thanksgiving, since Tom’s brother had to go to Europe for his job. We could do it at my house after dinner. Sound Good?”
“Why can’t Lexi and Stephen bring Tom’s mother down?”
“They’ve chosen to spend their first Thanksgiving with Stephen’s family.”
Ellen could imagine how hurt Sue must be, especially since Lexi and Stephen lived in the same town as his parents and could see them whenever they wanted. “I’m sorry to hear that. I bet you’re disappointed.”
“Believe me, my feelings would have been terribly hurt if we weren’t going up to Tulsa the week after. Lexi and I will spend some time together then.”
“What time should we be there tonight?”
“Let’s shoot for eight.”
“I’ll call Tanya and let her know.”
That evening, Ellen made lasagna for her and Paul, and then after they had eaten, she put the dirty dishes into the sink to soak and took a pan of brownies down the street to Sue’s. Tanya was already there, setting up the three candles on Sue’s kitchen table.
“Want a margarita?” Sue asked. She was wearing a boot on her foot and using a cane to help her get around.
“Sure.”
They each had a drink as they caught up on what they’d been doing since they’d returned from Tulsa. Like Ellen, her friends had been busy getting ready to have family over for Thanksgiving, just a few days away.
“Even if we succeed in contacting Van Hurley,” Ellen finally said, “and even if he gives us the information we need to convince Patty that we’re sincere, how will we approach Patty about this? Do we call her up and say, ‘Hey, we’ve been talking to your dead grandpa’?”
“We don’t want to frighten her,” Tanya said.
It seemed like an impossible task to Ellen, but they’d already gone this far—too far to give up now.
“We’ll send her a handwritten letter,” Sue said. “That way, she’ll have time to process everything and not feel caught off guard, like she would with a phone call. Then, when we go up after Thanksgiving to prepare for the hearing, we’ll ask her if we can meet with her.”
“We should meet someplace neutral, like a coffee shop,” Tanya said.
“Okay,” Ellen said. “I’ll write the letter.”
“Ready to begin?” Sue asked.
Tanya and Ellen nodded. Sue turned out all the lights in the house so that the candles could better attract the spirit. They set food and drink on the table with the candles, put the Ouija Board and planchette in the center, and then Ellen and her friends sat around the table.
“How can we use the Ouija Board and create a circle by holding hands?” Ellen asked as she passed Sue the corner of the paper she’d torn from Hurley’s original affidavit. “It’s impossible.”
“True,” Sue said. “Thanks for reminding me. I need to create a circle of protection with salt, so nothing evil will come and pretend to be Van Hurley.”
“But will Van Hurley’s spirit be able to cross into the circle?” Ellen asked.
“Only the spirit we summon by name may enter,” Tanya explained.
Sue got up and hobbled over to her spice cabinet, pulling out a carton of salt. Then she poured a line of it on the hardwood floor around the table. “If I would have remembered about the salt, I wouldn’t have offered to have it here. Now I’m going to have to sweep again.”
“Poor thing,” Tanya teased.
Sue sat back down and picked up her phone. “Let me find the words.”
“I memorized them,” Ellen said.
“Good for you!” Tanya laughed. “Go ahead then. Close the circle, Ellen.”
Ellen held out her finger, like a wand. “Clockwise, right?”
“It doesn’t matter,” Sue said. “As long as you do the opposite when you want to open it again.”
Ellen took a deep breath, and as she waved her finger along the line of salt, said:
Guardians of the North, South, East, and West,
Elements of Earth, Air, Fire, and Water,
Bless this circle and protect those within,
Whether father, mother, son, or daughter.
No unwanted entities shall enter,
And safety shall prevail in the center.
This circle is cast.
Grant it shall last.
Ellen returned to her seat as Sue took the torn corner from Hurley’s affidavit and held it to one of the candle flames.
“Van Hurley, we summon your spirit, if you are willing,” Sue said as the paper burned. “We’ve gathered here tonight to ask your help in contacting your granddaughter for permission to use the affidavit you signed in October, 1921, which you led us to find among your personal effects. Please join us in our circle of protection, Van Hurley, and guide us to better serve you.”
Once the corner of paper had turned to ash, Sue placed her fingers lightly on the planchette. Tanya and Ellen followed suit.
Then Sue said, “Van Hurley, are you here with us?”
The indicator did not move.
Sue repeated her previous speech, calling to Van Hurley. She ended with, “If you’re here with us, please move the planchette to Yes.”
Again, nothing happened.
“Van Hurley, my name is Sue Graham. I am here with Ellen Mohr and Tanya Sanchez. You made contact with us in Tulsa and directed us to find your personal effects at your granddaughter’s house in Topeka. Please visit us now here at my house in San Antonio, and give us information that will help us convince Patty Cole to cooperate. We want to help you bring justice to the Tulsa riot victims. Please help us help you.” Sue took a deep breath. “Van Hurley? Are you here? Please move the planchette to Yes.”
Nothing.
“Do you think the circle of protection is keeping him out?” Tanya whispered.
“It shouldn’t,” Sue said.
“Why don’t we open it, just in case?” Ellen suggested.
“It wouldn’t be the smart thing to do,” Sue said, “but I guess desperate times call for desperate measures. Go ahead and open it.”
Ellen stood up and moved her hand above the line of salt in two circles, counter-clockwise.
“I might as well sweep that up now, before it goes everywhere.” Sue fetched her broom from her pantry closet and handed Tanya the dust pan. “It’s easier for you to bend over than it is for me.”
“I didn’t realize you’d invited me over to do housework,” Tanya teased.
Once the floor was clean, Sue and Tanya returned to their seats and lightly touched their fingers to the plastic indicator. Ellen joined them, and Sue began again.
“Van Hurley, we summon you to join us at our table. Please follow the light of the candles and the scent of the food. We seek your help in convincing your granddaughter to cooperate with us. Van Hurley, are you here? If so, please move the planchette to Yes.”
Quickly, and without hesitation, the indicator moved to Yes.
Ellen sat up, full of renewed energy and hope. She smiled at her friends, who appe
ared equally as excited to have finally made contact.
“Is this the Van Hurley who lived through the 1921 Tulsa Race Riot?” Sue asked.
The planchette circled around and moved back to Yes.
“Thank you for coming, Mr. Hurley,” Sue said. “We need your help. We found the affidavit in your personal effects, but we took it without telling your granddaughter. It was a mistake, and we’re sorry, and we’re hoping you can help us rectify the situation. Are you willing to help us?”
The planchette circled around and returned to Yes.
“Thank you, Mr. Hurley,” Sue said. “Can you tell us something personal that only your granddaughter would know? Something we could use to get her to trust us? If so, please spell it out for us by moving the planchette.”
The planchette did not move.
“Van Hurley?” Sue asked. “Please tell us something only your granddaughter would know, like the name of her favorite pet or of her favorite toy when she was a little girl.”
The planchette began to move: T-H-I-S-I-S-N-O-T-V-A-N-H-U-R-L-E-Y.
Sue bent her brows. “Then who is this? Is this Vivian?”
The planchette moved to No.
“Please tell us your name,” Sue said.
The planchette circled around and returned to No.
“Blow out the candles!” Sue cried as she jumped from the table and turned on the lights.
Ellen and Tanya blew out the flames and exchanged looks of confusion.
“What’s happening?” Ellen asked.
“I knew we shouldn’t have broken the circle,” Sue said. “Why did I let you talk me into it?”
“You think that was an evil spirit?” Tanya asked.
“That’s exactly what I think. How am I supposed to sleep tonight with Tom out of town?”
“You can spend the night with me,” Ellen offered.
“I may have to take you up on that.”
“We should do a sage smudge stick ceremony, just to be safe,” Tanya said. “What if it attaches to me and follows me home?”
“Good point,” Sue said. “Can you call Jeanine for an emergency session?”
“Yes,” Tanya said, turning on her phone.
Jeanine was too busy to perform the ritual herself—she’d been busy packing and finishing up some last-minute things before she needed to leave to visit her family in Wisconsin for Thanksgiving—but she offered to drop a sage smudge stick and abalone shell off at Sue’s on her way out of town that night.
Ellen and her friends were so grateful, that they sent the half-empty pan of brownies with her to eat during the drive.
Once Jeanine had left, it was up to them to cleanse Sue’s house of the bad spirit.
They began by lighting the sage.
“Lord, please don’t let me burn my house down,” Sue prayed.
Then they blew out the flame so that only embers burned at the end of the stick. Sue held the stick in one hand and Tanya held the shell bowl beneath it, to catch the ashes.
“You have to protect us with the smoke,” Tanya said. “So the spirit doesn’t try to enter any of our bodies.”
“Aren’t we supposed to open all the windows first?” Ellen asked.
“First bathe, then open,” Sue said.
Ellen caught at the smoke with her hands and washed it all over her, laughing inside about how ridiculous it had seemed to her just last year, when Jeanine had performed the ritual in the Gold House. She recalled Miguel, the locksmith, and the way he had followed Jeanine’s directions with fervent conviction.
Next, Ellen and Tanya opened all the windows, both upstairs and down.
“Start downstairs,” Tanya said, after she’d gotten the last window upstairs to open. “That’s what Jeanine does, because smoke rises.”
Tanya and Ellen returned downstairs, where Tanya said, “Now tell all the impure spirits to leave, fly away, never to return.”
“I know what to do, Tanya—unless you’d rather take over.”
“No,” Tanya said, getting the message. “You go ahead. I’ll shut up.”
“I cleanse this house of all impurities, negativity, and evil,” Sue said in a loud voice as she hobbled on her cane and waved the smoke around the bottom floor with Tanya right behind her holding the bowl. “Leave, bad spirits! Fly away, never to return!”
Ellen followed them from room to room. When it was time to go upstairs, Sue said, “Can y’all go on without me? It’s hard for me to go upstairs.”
“No worries,” Ellen said, taking the sage smudge stick. “Come on, Tanya.”
Tanya took over the talking. “I cleanse this house of all impurities. Fly away, evil spirits. Fly away, negativity. Fly away, never to return!”
They were cleaning the last room in the house when they heard Sue shouting downstairs.
“Hurry, guys! Come quick! Come quick!”
Ellen followed Tanya through the hall and down the stairs, to where Sue was sitting at the table with her phone.
“What happened?” Ellen asked, out of breath. And the smoke from the sage wasn’t helping her to breathe.
“You won’t believe this,” Sue said. “I just got a text from someone saying she’s Patty Cole, Van Hurley’s granddaughter.”
Ellen’s mouth dropped open. “What does the text say?”
Sue read:
Hi, Sue Graham. If you think I’m crazy, I won’t blame you for not returning this message, but I had to try. My grandfather gave me your name and number. The crazy part is…he’s been dead for over forty years. If you want to know what he told me, please call me at your earliest convenience.
Regards,
Patty Cole
“I’m calling her, guys.” Sue said.
Ellen and Tanya sat at the table to listen to the conversation. The sage smudge stick continued to spill smoke into the air around them.
“Hello, Patty?” Sue said.
“Put her on speaker,” Tanya whispered.
Sue nodded and put the phone on the table.
“Yes?” they heard Patty say.
“This is Sue Graham, and I don’t think you’re crazy.”
“Seriously? Because I’m not so sure,” she said with a laugh.
“Will you tell me what happened?” Sue asked.
“Well. Just a little while ago, I had fallen asleep in front of the television, and I had a dream about my grandpa,” Patty said over the phone. “In the dream, he very clearly told me I needed to contact Sue Graham, and he said your phone number. He repeated it over and over and told me to listen to what you had to say, that I could trust you. Well, when I woke up, I thought it had just been a crazy dream, right?”
“That’s what I would have thought,” Sue said.
“But then I noticed I’d written your name and number down on a notepad on my coffee table—or I guess it was me who wrote it. I don’t remember doing it, but it looks like my handwriting. So, I decided to text you and see if a Sue Graham replied. And you did. And now I’m officially freaked out.”
“Don’t freak out, Patty,” Sue said. “I can explain, but this is going to be hard to believe.”
“After this, I think I can believe almost anything.”
“Two of my friends and I are restoring an old building in Tulsa.”
“But this isn’t a Tulsa zip code,” Patty said.
“You’re right. We live in San Antonio,” Sue explained. “And while we were up there, we conducted a paranormal investigation of the building we bought, and, long story short, your grandfather made contact with us.”
“That’s incredible! How? What did he say?”
“He asked us to look through his personal effects, and he told us we could find them at 114 Elm in Topeka, Kansas.”
“That’s my address.”
“I know.” Sue glanced up at Ellen and Tanya, who nodded their encouragement.
“You’re doing good,” Tanya whispered.
“The thing is,” Sue began, “we thought you would think we were crazy if we k
nocked on your door and asked to see your grandfather’s personal effects because he asked us to.”
“Yes, you’re right. I would have thought you were looney.”
“Well, we did come to your house, Patty.”
Ellen held her breath.
“You did?”
“You assumed we were the Merry Maids.”
“Oh, that’s right! I remember you now!”
“We found your grandfather’s personal effects in your basement.”
“You went through my house?”
“Only because Van Hurley asked us to. I’m so sorry.”
“I don’t know how I feel about that.”
“And, Patty, we found a very important document among his things. Were you aware that he had signed an affidavit in October, 1921 regarding the Tulsa Race Riot?”
“No. I’ve never really looked through any of those old papers.”
“We’d like to use that document in a court hearing in Tulsa on December first, and we were hoping we could have your support.”
Patty was quiet on the other end of the phone.
“Patty, are you still there?” Sue asked.
“Yes, I’m here. But in what way would you need my support?”
“Could you come to the hearing and testify that the affidavit did belong to Van Hurley and that it’s been in your basement for x amount of years?”
“Did you say December first?”
“Yes. At eight o’clock in the morning. We’d be happy to put you up in a hotel room if you want to come the night before.”
“I guess I can do that. I guess this was important to my grandfather, or he wouldn’t have gone to all this trouble.”
Ellen and her friends broke out into relieved smiles.
“Thank you, Patty!” Sue said. “Thank you so much! I’ll make your reservation now and text you the details.”
“Okay, Sue. I’ll talk to you later.”
They hung up and had another margarita to celebrate their good fortune.
Chapter Thirty: An Unexpected Turn
Ellen couldn’t have asked for a better Thanksgiving with her family. Since Ellen and Jody still hadn’t decided what to do with their mother’s house (Ellen couldn’t believe it had already been sitting there, vacant, for a year), he and his family slept at their childhood home across town. They came to Ellen’s and spent all day at her house on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday before they got on the road and headed back to Kentucky. Nolan drove down from Oklahoma City on Wednesday and stayed Thursday night; but, he had to return on Friday morning. Lane and Alison drove down together from Austin on Tuesday and stayed though Sunday.
