Christmas vacation was approaching, and my dad and Pop planned and made another Christmas visit a reality. Pop was coming to Texas to see the mountains of Tennessee.

On the day of my grandparents’ arrival, it was good to not have the trepidation that was a part of their last visit. The feelings this time were warmth and love of family. It was wonderful. Aunt Katy picked them up at the airport this time. Dad was at work, so the viewing of the window was delayed for his arrival. We chatted while we waited for him, but Lisa and I were on ‘needles and pins’ to show Pop and Mama the window. It seemed like twice as long for my dad to get there.

When Dad finally got home, we all escorted my grandparents to the room with the first window. They both stood silent, looking at the mountains. Mama had tears in her eyes. “Beautiful!” she whispered.

Pop turned to my dad. “Dr. Brooks … under the circumstances, I feel I should call you that. I’m glad I picked you for a son in law. I couldn’t be prouder if you were elected president, eliminated poverty, cured cancer, and brought peace to the world! I will never doubt you when you say you’re going to do something!”

Mom had to add, “In view of all the goodwill that I’m feeling in this room right now, I’m gonna let the phrase ‘picked you for a son in law’ slide.”

I had to pose the question burning on my mind, “So, are you moving to Texas?”

“Yes!”

“Really!” Lisa and I jumped up and down.

Mama spoke up. “We had already decided to move. We’ll be moving as soon as the weather gets better. It’s not so bad here, but it’s awfully cold in Tennessee right now, with a lot of snow.”

“Well,” said my dad, “I didn’t need to do all this”. He pointed toward the window. I’ll just tear it ….”

“NO!” Lisa and I protested in unison.

Dad looked surprised. “Girls! You can’t believe I was serious! After all, this is going to make a bgzillion dollars for our family.” He turned to Pop. “Kim, Katy, and I get credit for this window. If you’ll come upstairs, I’ll show you a window that was done by Lisa and Sarah … with a little help and advice, of course.”

We went to Lisa’s old room to see the second window. Pop said,” I think this one is actually better!”

Dad smiled. “It wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that it was done by your granddaughters, would it?”

It was Pop’s turn to smile. “Well, I’m not even sure myself.”

“It’s Ok, Pop. They’re intelligent and talented girls. We also tweaked this one in places to make it better, so you’re right. It is slightly higher quality. I’m not sure if you picked up on that, or you’re showing a little grandfatherly bias.”

“Actually, if I’m biased, I’m proud of it!”

“That’s the way to be, Pop! Now tell us about the move!”

“Well, Nashville has the stars, the stars that are famous. We decided it didn’t have the right stars, the stars we wanted to see.”

“What stars would that be, Pop?” I was wondering what famous people they still wanted to see.

“Are you kidding? We wanted to see Kimberly, Katherine, Lisa, Tr… Sarah and James! Those are the stars that are important to us!”

I hugged Pop. “Pop, we’re all gonna be together, just as God intended!”

Lisa added, “We might even let you share in our bgzillion dollars when we get it! Can we share it with them, Daddy?”

Pop held up his hand. “Hold it right there. We’re not coming here as gold diggers. We don’t need a share of your zillion dollars.”

“It’s a bgzillion dollars,” Lisa corrected him.

“Oh, that much, huh? Mama and I have enough. You kids enjoy your money. By ‘kids’, I mean all five of y’all are kids to us. Just don’t expect any amount of money to give you happiness. But I sense that there’s a lot of love in this family, and someone said … who was that now? … ‘All you need is love.’”

Lisa was right on top of that, “John Lennon. You knew that Pop, didn’t you?”

“Oh yeah, John Lennon. He had a little band, didn’t he?”

“Pop,” I finally spoke up, “you say anything bad about John Lennon or the Beatles and you’re gonna find your approval numbers dropping!”

“I’m only kidding! I love the Beatles, too!”

Lisa raised her voice just a little. “Anyone here who doesn’t like the Beatles would be advised to keep it yourself for your own personal safety!”

“Wow,” Mama said, “serious fans!”

The biggest fan in the family, my dad, had to speak up. “Yep, we’re all fans of the greatest rock group of all time!”

(General agreement all around)

I decided to try a little white lie. “Pop, I just heard on the news that the weather in Nashville has all of a sudden turned unseasonably warm and dry. Guess y’all can go ahead and make the move.”

“They said that, did they? Sarah, we have to look for a house before we can move.”

“There’s a house that’s near here, it’s unoccupied, and the rent is free, right Daddy?”

“That’s right, Pop. Would you like to look at it?”

“It’s unoccupied, huh? It can’t be your house, would it happen to be the ‘servants’ quarters’ out back?”

Lisa was getting excited. “Pop! It’s perfect! Sarah and I can go bug … I mean we can go visit y’all the time … maybe not all the time, but a lot.”

“I would feel like I’m sponging off my daughters and son-in-law.”

My dad allayed his fears. “Tell you what Pop; I’ll draw up a rental agreement. I’ll make the rent affordable, and the whole family will be together. We really want y’all here. A long way down the road, y’all will be getting … not so young, and may have health issues. Y’all being here will make things a lot less cumbersome. As I say, that’s a long way off!”

“Yes,” replied Pop, “I hope so. Let’s think about it. I don’t like to make major decisions so quickly. Why don’t we go look at the place?”

▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬

Lisa and I had been to the ‘servants’ quarters’. When we first moved to the property, we unlocked the door and took just a few steps inside. The small amount of furniture was covered with sheets, which added to an overall oppressive feel to the place, as if it was haunted by the spirits of long-dead slaves who, during their lives, were the targets of gratuitous abuse and misuse. We wondered what the place was like at night, but we were not about to find out for ourselves, for we were pretty sure that if we did we would find ourselves in the presence of spirits who had long waited to visit vengeance upon the ‘crackers’ who had long mistreated them … or take revenge against the descendants of those cruel taskmasters. Our ancestors were not, as far as we knew, slave owners, but we were white, and we figured a spirit could easily mistake us for someone who had beaten him mercilessly sometime in the brutal past of the Confederate States of America.

I headed for the door soon after we got there. Lisa stood still as if she were in a trance, studying the layout of the hall and an adjacent room. I didn’t want to study. “Come on Lisa. Let’s get out of here!”

She snapped out of her trance, and we left. “Something’s wrong,” was all she told me.

That was no surprise to me. “Yes, the place is haunted!”

Lisa didn’t explain what was wrong, but I got the feeling that she saw or felt something that most people would not sense.

We were not in any hurry to go back, but we decided to visit the house with Dad and Pop. We wanted to see if they felt what we had felt. Dad unlocked the door and stood aside and let Pop go in first, then motioned for us to go in.

“You go first, Daddy, please.”

Dad shook his head and followed Pop into the gloom. The two of them stood and surveyed the main room. We went in and stood behind them waiting for a reaction. They stood silently for what seemed like an eternity. Then, Pop said, “Servants’ quarters, huh?”

“Yes, but the people who own it said they didn’t use it at all when they first bought the property. More recently, they used it to store a few things.”

Pop stood another several seconds with his arms folded. Then he turned around and asked us, “What do you girls think about the place?”

Lisa opined first, “It’s awful”.

“I think it’s haunted by slaves,” I added. Neither of us wanted to go any farther into the house.

Pop looked at my dad and said, “I can feel it!”

Lisa and I responded in unison, “You can?”

My dad asked him, “Seriously? This place is ‘servants’ quarters’. It was never occupied by slaves. The slaves were freed in the 1800s.”

“Still, James, there’s something about this place. I don’t guess you feel it.”

“I can’t say I feel anything, but I’m in the minority. I think we should bring Mama, Kim, and Katy over and see what they say. Don’t say anything about haunts or anything like that. Let’s just see what they have to say.”

“OK, but not today. They’ll suspect something’s up.”

“Daddy, are you gonna go into any other rooms?”

“No, I don’t want to scare away the spirits before everyone gets a chance to ‘sense’ them.”

“Good! We’re leaving!”

“Right behind you,” Pop said as he followed. Dad came too, locking the house behind him. I guess he didn’t want the spirits escaping.
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬
The next morning, Daddy left for work, and Pop asked Mama, Kim, and Katy to come to servants’ quarters with him. “Kim and Katy, you’ve never even been in there?”

They told him they hadn’t been in there and agreed to go with him. Lisa and I tagged along to see what would happen. “Pop unlocked the door, and let the women in first. Like all of us before, they took a few steps inside and stopped. Pop tried to get them to go farther. “Let’s go to the back of the house.”

No one moved. Finally, Aunt Katy said what we were all thinking. “There’s something wrong with this house.”

Pop pretended not to understand. “What do you mean? It’s a well-built house, a fine house.”

My mom spoke next. “Katy’s right. There’s an oppressive feel to this house … an oppressive spirit”.

“What do you think, Mama?”

“They’re right. There’s a spirit here. This place is unhappy. I wouldn’t stay here for anything. It just feels … evil.”

Pop finally admitted that he felt it, too. “I felt it when I came in here with James. Lisa and Sarah can feel it. James is the only one who claims not to know what we’re talking about.”

“I’m leaving,” Mama said.

“Wait a minute,” Lisa announced. “There’s something else.” She walked into the hall. We all stood amazed at her boldness. She inspected the hallway and then walked into the room right next to it. After a couple of minutes, she told us the problem. “The size of the hallway and this room don’t add up. This wall has to be about 18 inches thick.”

Pop had a supposition, “Someone hid something … a body?”

Now Lisa was ready to leave. “I did my part … bye bye.” She went out of the door, followed by the rest of us.

“I’ll talk to James,” Pop continued, “and see if he wants to investigate.”

“Oh, he will.” My mom was certain. Then she turned to me. “Sarah, maybe it has something to do with the person you saw in your room”.

I had to update Pop and Mama about the specter I had seen in my room. “I don’t know, mom, a ghost from that house sees that some people have moved into the master’s house and says, ‘This place is dead. I’ll think I’ll go see what’s going on there’? Doesn’t sound like something a ghost would do.”

“Maybe he went looking for help,” Lisa suggested.

“Fashion advice, maybe,” I suggested. Someone from 100 years ago would need some help in that department. The ghost was about my size, and I think it’s a girl, and I could give fashion advice to a girl better. If it’s a boy, I would just say, ‘What you’re wearing is fine. Nobody cares what boys wear. It doesn’t even have to be clean’.”

My mom had listened to enough. “When you two girls get started, there’s no telling where the conversation will go. I guess that speaks to your creativity. I doubt that a ghost has ever needed fashion advice. Sarah, just ask her what she wants and we’ll work from there.”

“OK, Mom, if she even shows up again.” I couldn’t believe we were talking so matter-of-factly about consulting a ghost about her wishes.

“Well, maybe all of us going into that house woke her up and she’ll come back.”

“OK, I’ll chat with her. If she has a cell phone, I’ll get her number and we can text anytime. Maybe we can ‘Facetime’, and y’all can see her.”

My mom cut off our silly talk. “Pop, there’s loads of room in the main house. Don’t let this stop the move. I know James doesn’t want y’all to have to go looking for a place. We’ll figure out what to do about this place later. You know, if this place housed slaves, it would have to be over 150 years ago. The slaves were freed in 1863. I don’t think this house is that old, after all, it’s called a ‘servants’ quarters’. Still, I think James will want to investigate.”

We all went back to the main house. It felt good to leave the gloom behind.
▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬▬

After being told about the ‘thick’ wall in the servants’ quarters, my dad took some tools and measured the hallway and the room in question. Sure enough, things didn’t add up. He waited until his first day off, and he and a reluctant Pop headed there with axes, saws, and other tools of destruction. After only about 20 minutes, Lisa and I headed there to see if they were still alive. Pop and my dad met us at the door.

“You girls don’t want to see,” Pop advised us. "This is a problem for the police."

“A body?”

“Well,” said my dad,” just something wrapped in some kind of cloth. I suspect it’s the mummified remains of a small person.”

We took off running to the main house; partly to get away from ghosts … partly to be first to give the news to the rest of the family.

Dad called the police, and they arrived almost before he hung up the phone. City administrators would deny it, but River Oaks gets a priority when it comes to security. Before long, our driveway was a parking lot for police cars (marked and unmarked), two ambulances, and a firetruck (?). Soon the press showed up. Something in River Oaks involving all these services was rare. Dad showed the police the scene and asked them to keep the press away from the main house. Then he came into the house with the rest of us to let everyone work. Lisa and I watched from a window until we decided we wouldn’t see much.

After about 2 hours, everyone began leaving. The body was removed and put into an ambulance. The police asked my dad a few questions and told him that we could go into the house, but asked that we please not go beyond the tape they had around the scene. He assured them that he would keep the house locked and no one in the family would even go in there until this matter was cleared up.

The story made the television news, with a cameo of my photogenic dad. It also made the newspaper; which nobody reads except the few who don’t use the internet. We bought three copies to keep in scrapbooks that we might start keeping some day.

Later, Dad found out from the police that the wall had concealed the remains of a white female, probably a teen or pre-teen, and had been there more than 50 years. The owners of the house were interviewed. That family had resided there about 50 years, and remembered that they bought the house from a family named “Baker”. The police told my dad that they would continue their investigation, but would likely find that anyone involved would be dead.

So, hopefully, the “specter” incident was finished

Next: Maybe not