Barnstorm (20 page)

Blink twice, it’s missed. Three times, best viewed through the rearview mirror. Still Creek, Indiana wasn’t highly regarded for anything important, other than solid family values. The locals were equally split over the village name ‘Still.’ The creek bed at village edge was drier than ole-man Craft’s sense of humor. Never enough water flowing to ever settle still in any one spot long enough to wet a frog’s lower lip. Other theory hinged on copper kettles and illegal moonshine runnin’ that required considerably more water than the first frog-lip theory.

An eighth grade social studies project had Jessie Plunkett wandering all the Still Creek back alleys in 1960, conducting an unofficial census. One hundred ten, not counting dogs and cats. It took longer to conduct the census than one might think as Jessie suffered through a feigned courtesy of decades-old stories ‘bout half a dozen blacksmith shops — three still existed in 1960 — two long-gone eateries, and the haunted hangman’s tree that moaned at the slightest breeze through its hollowed trunk.

Jessie was a patient and courteous interviewer as he knew where he could get all his blanks filled in, discrepancies resolved, the truth confirmed. He saved his next-door neighbor Charlie Knox for last. Charlie Knox didn’t mind the kids calling him kept to himself. Digger Charlie had two jobs: best strawberry patch in the county and township cemetery grave digger. Digger Charlie’s life was ordered; organized into narrow, straight rows of strawberries and perfectly dug, vertical rectangles precisely six feet deep. Since Digger Charlie dug the graves, he knew every square inch of the cemetery. Jessie got an A+ on his 1960 census project.

The Still Creek old-timers respected Digger, understood him, could carry on a conversation with him. But they were a dying breed. The up-and-coming generation was scared of him, couldn’t relate. Probably the lack of eye contact. Ya see, Digger Charlie was only three feet high. Digger had spent so much time hunched over ‘tween his rows of strawberries with a hoe, he couldn’t straighten up. He might have been six feet tall, but he was bent over into two, three-foot sections. Each section at a perfect right angle to the other. A T-square’s ninety-degree angle could be plumbed using Digger Charlie as the template.

Digger spent his entire existence looking straight down at the ground. Okay if hoeing weeds out of a row of strawberries or possibly crunched six feet deep in the cool of a perfectly-spaded grave. Talking with Digger was difficult. At eighty-plus years old, he did his share of grunting, with little to no gesticulating. Unless you laid on your back and looked up into his face, lip reading was impossible and eye contact never happened. If a stranger offered a Still Creek resident a thousand dollars to create a police artist sketch of Digger Charlie, the stranger would leave with his money in his pocket. No one knew what Digger looked like, except Jessie Plunkett. No one except Jessie could translate Digger’s gruff mumbles and grunts into intelligent thoughts and intriguing life lessons.

When Digger Charlie loaded his 1949 Ford pickup with pickaxe, assortment of shovels, burlap sacks, and perched a six-foot ladder ‘cross the back tailgate, everyone knew someone had died. No need to wait for an obituary. Just follow Digger Charlie — at fifteen miles per hour — the half mile to the cemetery, yell down the hole, “who’s gonna be sleeping here Digger?” and he’d mumble something like, “Wid’r Johnson, in ‘er sleep last night.”

Jessie’s classmate hooligans would terrorize Still Creek on their bikes. You could hear ‘em coming — baseball cards clothes-pinned — flipping and flapping in the spokes. You could also smell ‘em. Mostly because bathing wasn’t perfected or even practiced on a daily basis; but, also due to the squirrel tails dangling from each bike’s handle grips. This juvenile delinquent biker gang-of-five-in-training would loiter and watch Digger Charlie tend his strawberry patch for hours. Amongst themselves they would ponder stuff like, “How the mortician gonna lay out Digger?” “Haf ta bury him sittin’ up.” Mostly ignored, stealing strawberries from Digger’s unfenced patch crossed the line. The young miscreants would scatter like fleas off a kerosene-soaked mongrel when they heard the closing breech of Digger’s double-barrel 12-gauge shotgun from his back porch.

It was a foggy Thursday morning in July when Jessie saw the 1949 Ford pickup loaded for the cemetery. He yelled over the hedge but, out of character, he couldn’t understand the grunt that came back at him. It was late afternoon when Jessie got around to pedaling his Schwinn to the cemetery. ‘Bout halfway, he met the returning biker gang that informed him that Digger wasn’t talkin’.

Jessie turned his bike into the gravel lane that meandered through the hundred and fifty year-old cemetery. Flopping his bike on the lush-green grass near the monuments remembering rich farmers, he respectfully avoided walking on the graves of the fallen from the Civil and Spanish American Wars. Nearing the last section before entering the Potter’s Field area, he dangled his feet over the edge of the newly-forming gateway to eternity. Only half done, Digger was slow but methodical. His sharpened spade left crescent-shaped indents in the strangely polished clay sides of his project. It was like every grave before it, but different: perfect. Hunched to disappear into the chill of his office, he straightened — just a tad — revealing a weathered, tanned face. A toothless grin and subtle wink to his friend Jessie communicated all that was necessary.

Jessie offered a cautious, yet knowing smile in return and retrieved his bicycle. The pedal home was measured. He stomped a clod of dirt into dust between the strawberry rows and knelt down, picking a fat ripe berry. He raised his face to a warming sun as a solitary tear softened his cheek.

The Still Creek township trustees approved the purchase of a backhoe at its next meeting. Never again would a life well-lived rest in a perfect shovel-dug grave.

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An easterly breeze flirted with the Spanish moss that graced the stately sycamores flanking the gravel lane. We had planned to arrive earlier that afternoon, but Saturday antiquing between Charleston and Savannah proved a worthwhile diversion. The setting sun cast long shadows as the roadside enameled sign pointing to the Pirate’s Cove Bed and Breakfast screeched a rusted plea announcing our arrival.

As I rounded one last bend through the wooded estate, I quizzed my wife, “You did insist on room 207?”

“Yes, dear,” came the insulted reply. After twenty years of marriage and countless weekends on our quest, she wasn’t about to dignify my inquiry with anything more than yes, dear.

Most of our friends agreed that our search for the occult and the paranormal wasn’t exactly normal. We didn’t have electronic gear. Nor did we wear ghostbuster backpacks or worry about crossing any streamer beams. We didn’t traipse through haunted houses intent on bringing Casper home in a Mason jar. A rudimentary Boy Scout compass and a not-so-simple Canon SLS 35mm camera were enough. On previous adventures, we had seen the compass go drunk with confusion over true north. Our scrapbook documented a few orbs caught on film, but a clear image of an apparition had not yet developed.

After a traditional southern dinner of shrimp and grits, cornbread, and collard greens, we settled into room 207’s four-poster bed. The compass at our bedside foretold a not-so-unexpected disappointing night. We had experienced many a bust on these weekend sojourns, so we adventured to a roll in the hay that might salvage some of the trip. The old feather bed was protesting one of my better moves when lightning struck the oak tree outside our window. Crack. Sparks. Fire.

“Oh, honey,” my wife faked a moan. “I always knew it could be like this.”

That’s when it happened. With each lightning flash, it moved closer. Closer. Crack. Closer. I could hear the compass spinning, vibrating on the nightstand. The needle scratched the glass lens. Lightning etched its fingers across room 207’s ceiling. A flowing shimmer erased the darkness. There she was. Standing at the foot of our bed. Bathed in the eerie, reflective glow of the lightning. The bride of room 207. Veiled, dark, deep-set eyes. White lace and satin wedding dress caressed the hardwood floorboards, creaking a plaintive sigh, as she swayed to-and-fro. Bare feet. A ghostly drool of blood escaping from the corner of her coal-black lips.

I slipped out of bed and tip-toed to the young virgin’s side. I slid my arm around her waist as she rested her pale, chalk-like cheek on my shoulder. Flash. Click. Flash. She vanished as innocently as she had appeared.

CVS didn’t open until ten a.m. on Sunday morning. “Do you think you got it, honey?” I asked my photo journalist wife.

She had not yet won a Pulitzer, but if a picture were to be captured, my wife would get it. “Just relax,” she retorted. “I probably got five or six good shots.”

The CVS clerk slid the packet of developed film across the counter. My fingers fumbled with the gummed flap as I arrayed the deck of photos on the cold glass countertop. There I was, my arm around the waist of NOTHING. I was clear as a bell. But no white wedding dress. No ghostly virgin bride.

“Huh,” my wife, ever the photographic technician deadpanned, feeling underexposed. “Looks like the spirit was willing, but the flash was weak.”

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