I got off the bus swearing at myself in a village in the middle of nowhere where only a few poor sods could understand English. It was in December 1947 and the quicksilver would have shown minus 40 if it had been able to. It had been a very long journey and the worst part had been the last. 4 hours on a rickety bus that didn’t even pretend to be a coach! I had to remind myself why the hell I was there. Sure, the case interested me but the real reason was that Boston wasn’t big enough for both me and the men in black.

I’m Willie by the way. Usually called Fast Willie. Some believe I got my name for my skills in my former line of business, other think it’s because of the ladies. The name really is short for fast-talking Willie. I’ve got a silver tongue. No, stupid not a real silver tongue. Don’t you understand more advanced expressions? No, it’s only the piercing stud that is of silver.

Anyway, there I was sitting in my favorite Irish pub in Boston with my two best friends, Pat and Professor Schultz. Don’t ask me why Prof had decided to haunt an Irish pub but he was good company. Pat and Prof were the only two souls I’d never been able to help. Perhaps because they didn’t want my help. I had just read the cable from an old friend that had stayed in Europe after the war describing the case and was busy formulating the one-word reply (NO) when the men in black entered the pub. They were led by Father O’Duglig. I had hated Father O’Duglig ever since I was an altar boy. He, if anyone should be called Fast Willie.

Of course, he treated Pat and Prof as thin air. Not surprising since Pat passed away celebrating his big lottery win in 1903 and had existed in a state of extreme happiness ever since and Prof, who had died only the year before, only stayed on because being a ghost was “such an interesting experience”.

Anyway, Father O’Duglig made clear that I should leave town for health reasons. When the men in black had left, Paddy, the bartender, brought me the tab. The entire tab. Until then my credit had always been good with Paddy. Looking at him I understood that this was my last time in that pub. I got on the first ship to Europe.

Actually, it had started not in 1947 but in 1940, the first time Boston got too hot for me. That time it was because I was too bad and not too good. A turf thing. I went to the one legit mob that accepted a natural born killer. The Army. Not that I had killed anyone yet but there was a killer in me. Oh yes, the killer was just clamoring to get out.

I liked the Army and the Army liked me. I felt at ease in battle in a way I never had done since I was very little. The strong emotions blanked out my eternal unease. I fought, and fought well, in Northern Africa, Italy and Belgium, often behind enemy lines. Yes, I liked the Army and the Army liked me.

That is until December 25, 1944 in the Ardennes. We had a new captain as of three hours before when the Germans hit us. The captain was just beside me when a bullet passed through my arm and his brain. Not that I’d ever had had a high opinion of that brain but anyway. The fighting must have numbed me more than I realized since I just noted that his soul, or ghost, if you prefer, stayed on and started to talk to me. He wanted to beg my forgiveness for the “grievous harm” he had done me. He could say that again! Surprisingly I started to talk him through all that. I was surprised at myself. At the time I was NOT a forgiving man. I finally managed to put him at rest and then we talked for two hours before he finally left. We had much to catch up on, me and my big brother who I hadn’t seen for ten years. I finally met the person (if not in exactly in person) and not the big brother who had made my childhood hell (aided and abetted by Father O’Duglig of course).

I wound in hospital with my arm. Fortunately my brother’s ghost was good at first aid so I recovered quickly. I didn’t go back to the fighting though. The doctors pulled strings to keep me there. No one had such a good hand with the terminal cases. They claimed that each and every one I attended passed away happily. I sometimes wondered how to interpret that. Personally I thought was what I did after they died was more important. Not all of them stayed on but many did. In many cases they only needed their heads sorted out. I have on good authority that the only demons are in people’s minds (another point I and the men in black differ on) Sometimes I had to perform often minor things to put their troubled souls at ease. Sometimes I had to promise to do things when I got back to the States. I never promised what I wouldn’t be able or willing to do. You can’t lie to dead people! Most of 1945 and half of 1946 I spent making good on those promises. Then I continued to work as a social worker.

Oh, I labeled myself ”Exorcist” but I really considered me a social worker for poor lost souls. Of course I got paid better than ordinary social workers - for my paid cases. I was good, really good. I believe that was what really got to the Catholic church. That and the fact that I never bothered with all that mumbo-jumbo of crosses, holy water and relics. Most ghosts are basically nice. Sure, they often are grumpy. Wouldn’t you be if a lost and tormented soul? Very seldom evil and even those you usually can get through to with patience. I had never not lost a lost soul (excepting Pat and Prof of course).

So that’s why I was standing freezing in a godforsaken village in the middle of nowhere where practically no one could understand me. Fortunately the Municipal Manager (employee, not elected) met me. He spoke surprisingly good English. American English since he had emigrated to the States when young. He brought me to his home. That and his office was in the same haunted building as the courtroom. My friend who had got me into this mess had provided me with a thick file. After only a short while I understood why the file had claimed that while the municipality had a socialist majority it was a liberal dictatorship. Not that JP was unpleasant. On the contrary, he was charming but I also got the feeling that he had a will of steel and was very skilled at reading people and getting his will. Always in the most courteous and civil way of course. I started doubting his story that he had only left the States as a convalescent after a mill accident, which explained his limp, for short visit home in the summer of 1914 and only a minor thing like a war to end all wars had prevented him from returning. I didn’t doubt the convalescent part, only the mill accident part since I felt he penetrated my soul (still living) and understood me in a way no one with his stated background should be able to. JP hadn’t been bothered about the ghost, aka Smith-the-ghost, until the recent incident.

Smith-the-ghost had haunted the building for a very long time without really bothering anyone. He was supposed to be a judge who had sentenced an innocent man in murder case. For a very long time he had just been around. People had hard him every now and then. He often washed dished, don’t ask why. No one knew what he looked like until 1940. Then the refugees who cleaned the house, and didn’t understand any more of the local language than I, suddenly refused to enter the house anymore. When an interpreter had been found they told that two of them had entered the courtroom and there was a distinguished old gentleman dressed very formally sitting in the judge’s chair. As the refugees were about to back out of the room the distinguished gentlemen had arisen and walked out of the room – through the wall.

I also spoke with JP’s wife who often was alone in the building now when all the daughters had left for university (another thing that set JP apart from people in the village). I asked her if she was afraid to be alone in the house. I actually meant “was she afraid of the ghost?”. “No,” she answered. “Why should I? I always have Smith-the-ghost around. He’s very comforting.”

Perhaps Smith-the-ghost was comforting but his dog wasn’t. Anyone who slept in one particular room had his duvet pulled away by the ghostly dog. It went as far as a police officer spending a night there with a loaded gun. Why a loaded gun to handle a ghost? Don’t ask.

So far so good. That is until the night two small boys had dared each other to spend the night in that room. They hadn’t been there long before the two naked girls came screaming out. Girls? Girls! Very cute girls at that. No one could explain what had happened. That’s why I was there. My friend had also dug up an earlier case that had been ignored earlier. A tramp had spent the night in that room some 40 year earlier. In the morning the very beautiful lady tramp was unable to convince her hosts that she had been male the day before. She had finally married a local farmer two years later when she at last had come to accept that she was a very beautiful lady. It helped that the farmer was handsome and the nicest person imaginable (and rich). I talked with the lady in question and she confirmed everything. As soon as he had taken off his underwear he became she. She’d had a rough time accepting her sex change but now was satisfied with her life.

I talked with the damned cute little girls as well. The same story. As soon as they got out of their underwear to put on their PJs they were transformed. That put me on the right (?) track. I started to dig around and found that most certainly the police office had never been out of his uniform. Every other person that had spent the night in that room had either already been female or had never taken off their underwear.

It was time for me to meet Smith-the-ghost and his dog. I decided that the best way was to spend the night in that room. I had barely got my trousers off when the dog appeared. He helped me with my trousers. His case was simple. He worried about his fatherless puppies, by all the bitches in the village. He really was a hound! As soon as I promised to take care of ALL of them, he was satisfied. That promise was easy to give since all the puppies must have died of old age by then. If not? Well, I always had wanted an immortal dog of my own.

As soon as that business was done Smith-the-ghost himself turned up. His case was more problematic. Talk about one troubled soul. I emphasized with him. Well, I almost always do but in this case I felt very strongly. Smith was a genuinely good man who had made ONE grave error. Not a fundamentally rotten person like me. I was happy I could help him. He had died before the case he misjudged got to a higher court. I could show him notarized copies of the transcripts from that session. The man had been acquitted. As Smith faded away he looked surprised and said “Did you know that as of helping my Fido you have brought more good to the world than misery?” And that was the last I saw of him. I felt that both he and Fido had left.

Those conversations always leave me exhausted, especially two back-to-back. Then I looked down on my boxers and cursed myself. For someone called Fast Willie I sure was slow. I had forgotten all about WHY I had taken this case. I hadn’t taken my under-wear OFF!

Then I felt a presence again. Only a presence when I always can see and talk with the ghosts. I felt rather than heard something that wasn’t real but somehow sounded just like Omar in the Tunis Bazaar: “Special offer. Just for you”.

Suddenly I felt Fido’s teeth clamping on my boxers (less than an inch from my genitals) and tearing them off, shredding them in the process. THEN I felt that I was finally and forever alone in the room. I looked in the mirror and smiled.

Dear brother, you can really rest in peace now. Sally, you called me. Sally, I finally am.

The part about the village and the haunted house is true apart from the gender transformations and the ghosts departing. My mother grew up in that house. I have taken a few small liberties regarding my grandfather.