In the foyer of Albert Sidney Johnston's Memorial Library there hangs an old oil portrait of a woman who is dressed in a black dress with a high lacy white collar. Her raven hair is gathered at the back of her head and is tied back in a nice, neat bun. Her face is set in what seems permanent scowl and her high cheekbones seemed sunk in. At the bottom of the painting one would find the name of the woman. “Mercy Anna Howard '' Followed by “Head Librarian” and beside that “1870 till 1920”. The woman is not pleasant to look at, in fact many of the children who visit the library often complain to me almost on a daily basis how the portrait scares them. Some even claim they have seen the woman marching up and down the maze like shelves of books. As if she was on patrol.
Now according to the stories that have come down to me from older employees, stories we often share with each other on slow days, because let's be real here, we really don't want to go around and say that our library is haunted. Because let's face it, most people are deathly afraid of ghost and shun anything dealing with the supernatural. And the fact that you might encounter one at the your library is more than likely to drive people away than get them to come in and check out a book. Or use our free WiFi. Anyway, the stories that have been passed down from one generation to the other, does not paint a very flattering picture of Ms. Howard.
Ms. Howard was a lifelong spinster who hated children and the noises they often made. They say she hated the sound of laughter and play. She also had a strong distaste for anything modern too. According to some of the stories I've been been told even hinted that at one time she might have had a lover, but he was tragically killed in the Argonne in World War I. She was also a very old fashioned typed woman who firmly believed in the old English proverb of “Children Should be seen and not heard.'' She was also a hard boiled Southern Baptist and according to some she was also a racist as well.
The scant remaining records of her I've found tucked away, hidden almost in historical archives of this town seem only to confirm this. My research into her has uncovered that she belonged to the local chapter of “The United Daughters of the Confederacy '' and the local chapter of “The Women of the Ku Klux Klan” she firmly believed in their dogma. I shudder to think what would have happened if she had been alive and kicking when I arrived here in Benton about two and a half years ago. I also shutter to think what would happen if I ever encountered her spirit. I wonder how the spiteful woman would respond to me being among the growing LGBTQ+ crowd. Then again I often wonder how she'll respond to Benton's small, but growing transgender population. Maybe she'll conjure up a few of her Klan friends from beyond the grave.
Now, gentle readers, before I move on and tell you of my friend's encounter with the ghost of Ms. Racist, I would like to share with you some juice urban legends that seemed to surround Ms. Howard when she was still counted among the living here on earth. Yes even when she was alive, she was surrounded by a miasma of horrible rumors. Now, Ms. Howard had this well earned reputation of being a firm disciplinarian. She believed in two things, the first one was the rod or in her case a braid line of willow branches she had fashioned into a make-shift whip that she often used to flog disobedient children. And the Holy Bible and her favorite verse to quote was from the Book of Proverbs and that was the most famous one. “Spare the rod and spoil the Child.”
To that end she was famous around Benton for administering corporal punishment to children and teenagers who dared speak above a whisper or failed to return their borrowed library books back on time. She was feared and hated by many yet all respected her.
Now the most famous rumor that surrounded her was this, according to some: Ms. Howard had made a deal with the devil one moonless night down at the crossroads on the east side of town. In return for her for mortal soul and her hope for eternal salvation she was gifted a bejeweled black box that would steal and seal away the voices of children and teenagers, those repeated offenders who dared to violate her treasured “No Talking” rule were rumored to have had their voice stolen from them by the demonic magic contained within this tiny black box.
Now the tale I'm going to tell you was told to me by my close friend Cerridwen Circe Whitethorn. She is the pagan of my little tight knit circle of friends and in an oddball kind of way she is kind of like the little sister I've always wanted but never had. She is also the token Gothic girl of the group, as most if not all of her casual clothing I'm going to assume from from either Hot Topic, The Underground, or Spencer's. Don;t let her looks fool you, she really shy and often hides behind me when she scared.
She is also like me a transgender girl. Enough about that, back to the story, anyway Cerridwen comes from something of a different family. Her family does not live here in town, but out in the countryside in an area called by us local's Haunted Hollow. Most of the Hollow families as we call those who live there are not as well off as those who live in town.
And Cerridwen, well to be honest the girls an darn hard worker, she is always on the lookout for an odd job, I think she is saving for college or something or maybe she is saving up for a used car. Anyway she is always on the lookout for extra work, so with that in mind I decided to get her a little side job here at the library shelving books. That is returning borrowed books to their proper place in the stacks. And from time to time she might do a little cleaning.
The work is low-key and not at all very hard, and most importantly of all Cerridwen seems to enjoy the work. She is really good at it and always gives each job we give her one hundred and ten percent. I really think in time she is going to climb the career ladder if you will. Anyway it was one dreary, rainy afternoon last autumn that Cerridwen and I were sitting around the front desk. It was slower than molasses in winter as most rainy afternoons are. So without anything better to do Cerridwen and I were just sitting around and shooting the breeze with each other like most teenage girls do.
You know talking about the latest fashion trends going around town, gossiping about different people, talking about our boyfriends and who was dating whom, and of course the latest development in our favorite manga or light novel series. What can I say we were both young otaku's and oh yes, we were also talking about whom we were going to cosplay as for Anime Weekend, an upcoming two day anime convention that was going to be held in Ridgeland. Cerridwen was debating on either going as Kiki from the heartwarming classic “Kiki's Delivery Service” or as Sailor Mars from the retro classic anime “Sailor Moon” I mostly just sat back and listened as she weighed the pros and cons of both. Then she said something that caught me totally off guard. Like a sideways pitch.
“Hey Madeline, is this place haunted?” She asked me as her baby blue eyes started to dart around the room. She seemed on edge, like she was walking on eggshells and almost seemed hesitant to talk. And for a chatterbox like Cerridwen that was odd. It was cute however in an odd sort of way. You see Cerridwen is normally a very outspoken type of person and always, almost always says what is on her mind. She is always brave too when it comes to the supernatural, claiming as a pagan witch she could easily vanish any demon, creature of the night, and or spirit that dared to cross paths with her.
“Yes.” I remember deciding to have a little fun with her as I swerved around in my rolling chair. Her Doe-eyes seemed to be on the verge of tears though when I said that. And just like that, a mental switch was flipped somewhere deep inside of me. I went from teasing mode to overprotective big sister mode. “That is if you believe the silly stories that people love to tell around here. Which if I'm honest with you I don't believe, I mean they're just that girl, stories, silly urban legends, bored teenagers made up to scare each other.” I said, forcing myself to laugh. Okay that sounded so dumb, because at this point in my life I've had more than my fair share of encounters with the paranormal. I tried to force another laugh at this point to disarm the tension that was building in the air. Instead Cerridwen only peered at me. I sighed a little and then cleared my throat.
“Okay,” I said, pulling a little closer to her, you know, narrowing the gap if you will, “Tell me what happened.”
Cerridwen shifted her eyes all around the room. It was like she was scanning the room for somebody or something. She then sighed and took a deep breath. Slowly she released her breath.
“Okay.” She started her tale. “I was cleaning up the basement yesterday, you know that was one of the tasks I had to do. You know it's been years since anybody has even been down into the basement. And so there was a lot of junk just laying around down there.” She paused.
I nodded my head. Everyone who has ever worked here knew that that basement was nothing more than a catchall junk room. The last time anybody tried to clean the thing out was way back in the nineties. And even then they had gotten only halfway through before throwing their hands up and deciding that this job was not worth their time nor effort and that poor soul just walked away, shame faced and defeated. Yep, every time we had to get something from the basement we had to follow these narrow little trails that had been cut through the clutter by that brave soul some thirty years prior.
Anyway, since it was summer break and school was out, Cerridwen was in need of some extra pocket money that week. Something about wanting to buy a new bathing suit, it seemed her mom was finally giving the go ahead for her to start wearing a two piece instead of a one piece. Anyway, since she needs extra pocket money, we decided to make a deal with her. We'll pay her ten dollars an hour off the books, that means we'll not hold out any taxes or anything if she came in on one of her days off and cleaned the basement from top to bottom. Or at the very least tried to make a dent in the massive jungle of clutter.
Cerridwen at the time had been overjoyed at the prospects of getting to attack an looming mountain of clutter and I believe she already had the money spent before it greased the open palm of her hand. But as the old saying goes, you never count your chickens before they hatch or judge your work before it's finished, and my personal favorite, you never count your money sitting at the table, there will be time enough to count it when the dealing is done.
“Anyway, I put in my earbuds in my ear and put on my favorite anime soundtrack, cause you know I like to listen to a little music while I work, once the music was playing I rolled up the sleeves of my blouse and started to cleaning.” Cerridwen said. She paused for a moment and looked around. “After I'd been cleaning for about a hour and okay maybe two, this woman, this old woman, walked up to me and snatched my earbuds from ears.” Her face started to pale.
“But this woman! Life if you call her that. I mean her aura was hard to read, as it was black, black as tar. And the moment I touched it, it seemed to send a shock me, and the force of the shock knocked me back a few good feet, and caused me to bump into a stack of books. Of course those books landed on the ground and made a huge racket.” Cerridwen seemed engrossed in her tale at this point. “Anyway as the books came crashing down, other objects started falling down and before you blink. And it was a massive avalanche of junk all sliding down on the concrete floor making all kinds of noise.”
I nodded my head at this point in the telling. I'd been working at the front desk that day. The noise had made me jump and for a moment we had assumed that our sweet Cerridwen had met an untimely end down in the basement, her small frame having been crushed by a rocks slide of old books, discharged pieces of furniture, and piles of junk that contained all manner of things. We were just about to form a search party to recover what we expected were Cerridwen's remains from the landslide when our sweet little Gothic girl came bounding up the flight of wooden stairs. Her long legs taking the steps two at a time.
“Go on.” I said, gently encouraging her.
“Anyway the woman howled something fearsome.” Cerridwen said, shivering yet again. “I then got a good look at her eyes, they were slits like the eyes of a snake. My blood ran cold and it felt like I could feel ice cubes forming under my skin. Then before I knew it, she had conjured up from thin air this tiny little black box. The moment she flipped open the lid of that box was the moment all the noise in that room just seemed to stop.”
“Okay.” I said leaning back in my chair at this point. At this point I knew I had another story to add to my ever growing chronicles of supernatural encounters that have taken place in and around Benton.
Anyway the noise just stopped, like something had sucked it straight out the room.” Cerridwen took another breath and peered up at the ceiling. I think she was trying to zoom in on the ceiling fan trying to stir the stale air in the room. I could tell she was deep in thought. “At that point, I freaked and ran like hell. I mean dropped everything, broom, dustpan, trashcan, she could have earbuds. I brought those from the local Dollar General.” She paused. “Anyway, what was strange about that woman was the way she was dressed, she looked like an Edwardian housewife. And looked and smelled like a trapped beaver.”
I nodded my head again. But then Cerridwen said something that made my blood run cold too, at that very moment she shifted her eyes toward the foyer.
“She kind of looked like the woman whose picture hangs in the foyer. The one that always scares the children. Like I'm being real girl, she could be her twin.” Cerridwen closed her eyes, “Also I'm not going back down in the basement ever again.” She added.
At that moment I felt a chill run across my arms. And that is how the story ends.
