Dead Man Talking

  Chapter 2

  My chair crashed against the wall and toppled a cast-iron lamp. Trucker and Miss Molly surged to attention. The snarl in Trucker’s throat and Miss Molly’s irritating meow mingled in the air, and a chalkboard screech shudder crawled up my spine.

  “Shush!” I ordered. Not that it did much good. “Look." I pointed at the patio doors, gripping the sea salt tight. They looked. Nice when they obey.

  A white shape floated from behind the live oak, through the fog, towards the woods. It wasn’t in any hurry. It stopped and smelled a late-blooming Tyler rose — then snipped the rose off and let it fall to the ground! “Damn trespasser!”

  Cautiously I crept toward the patio doors. The ghost disappeared behind a young magnolia, bushy, to-the-ground branches invisible in the ever-thickening mistiness. Tense as I was, the unexpected squawk of a glider in need of WD-40 startled me when I slid the patio door open. Jumping back and stumbling over Trucker, I landed flat on my butt — lucky for my tailbone, on the braided rug. The sea salt flew from my hand, scattering a river of white crystals.

  “Now look what you did!” I barked at the dog. He barked right back and slurped a drool-wet tongue across my lips. While I rubbed and scrubbed my face, Miss Molly fastidiously bathed salt granules from her fur and flicked out a pink tongue in distaste.

  Rubbing my tailbone, I clambered upright. “At least we probably scared off that darn ghost, so maybe we’ll get some sleep.”

  The white shape flittered near a lilac bush. This ghost hadn’t scared. Another rose bloom bit the ground, and the culprit glided onward. This called for action! Gathering handfuls of sea salt, I clenched them in my fists. “You both come with me,” I growled at my pets.

  Miss Molly slit her blue eyes in disdain, shivered to shake off the last salt vestiges, then padded off, no doubt headed for her water dish in the kitchen. Trucker eagerly wagged his stubby tail and whined.

  “What changed your attitude? You’re never that darned eager to meet a prankster ghost.”

  The misty shape emerged from the lilac bushes, but disappeared immediately behind a rose trellis. “Hey,” I called. “You better hie yourself back to your own dimension!”

  The ghost didn’t answer — or reappear, so I eased out the patio door. Cold concrete curled my bare toes, and a shroud of mist enveloped my comfortable caftan. Past the protective cabin, a lake breeze carried a hint of water and the night-blooming jasmine beside the patio.

  “Hey, ghost!" I muffled an “ouch” when I stepped on a half-eaten pecan shell and kicked it aside. A huge Texas tree roach skittered behind a potted azalea. No time to fix his clock; I’d spray in the morning. I slid onto dew-wet grass, then glanced back for Trucker...as he hiked his leg against the azalea!

  “Get your butt out in the yard and do your business!” I hissed. He tossed me that innocent look he’s perfected, but dropped his leg.

  A hint of solid white above the fog-line disappeared behind a cedar near the back hedge. The ghost was moving further and further away, towards the woods. Maybe I wouldn’t have to confront it. Maybe it would go play with the bears and panthers in the East Texas Piney Woods.

  No such luck. It stayed behind the cedar.

  “Okey-dokey! You and I are gonna have this out here and now!" I haven’t really been afraid of ghosts for a long while, but it pays to be cautious. I couldn’t tell much about the apparition — male or female — old or young. Ghosts play by their rules, too. Nothing forces them to materialize into firmer, more seeable shapes until they feel darned well good and ready.

  Trucker padded to me and sat, waiting for my next move. I was waiting for that decision, too. Breathe, I reminded myself. To be safe — as safe as possible when confronting a strange ghost — I pulled down white light around Trucker and me from my realm of psychic powers. It only took a second. That important protective skill deserves timely practice, which I respect.

  “Hey, ghost! You’re not scaring me! Come out or get outta here!" I approached the cedar, the sea salt now clumpy pebbles in my sweaty hands. Still, the pebbles would pepper the ghost like gravel. Go straight through it, but remind the ghost of the salt’s power.

  Now what? I nudged Trucker with a clenched fist. “Sic 'em.”

  Trucker cocked his head.

  “Sic!”

  He sat.

  “Not sit. Sic!”

  Trucker looked at the cedar, then back. He whined and didn’t budge.

  “Shit,” I gritted. I started around the tree. Stopped just as quickly as I’d made the decision — a foolish one perhaps, with the dog leery. Then a sound erupted in the eerie silence. A harrumph, as if someone had cleared his throat. The ghost, getting ready to speak?

  Instead, it spit. And my temper flared over my cowardice. I marched around the cedar. “Don’t spit on my — !" Twin screeches split the air — mine and the ghost’s!

  Trucker bounded up, butt wagging his stubby tail and barking enthusiastically. He circled, then took off across the yard, as eager for playmates as if it were morning. Granny Chisholm and I stared at each other, both with our hands on our hearts, me with the sea salt clenched in tight fists. We screamed again at the same instant.

  “What the heck are you doing?”

  “Alice, you tryin’ to give me a heart a’tick?”

  We burst out laughing, and Trucker galloped back, urging us to let him share our fun. Granny sniggered and slapped her knee, and I sat down with a whomp, legs giving out in relief.

  “You thought I was a ghost!” Granny cackled through her snickers. My shoulders heaved and laughter tears brimmed as I opened my fists to show Granny the globs of sea salt.

  “What was you gonna do?” she asked with a wrinkled smirk. “Brain me with it?" She wore a white flannel gown, the hem soaked with dew. Frizzy white hair haloed her head and dangled down her back, the gilded hairpins that normally held a large bun lost somewhere during her night rounds. She carried her pecan-picker-upper in one hand, a pair of scissors in the other.

  “What on earth were you doing out here this time of night?” I asked.

  “Hey." She cocked her head in imitation of Trucker. “Shush up, dog!" Trucker minded her. Now I knew why he wasn’t afraid of the ghost in my back yard. Instead, he’d wondered why I ordered him to attack. He and Granny Chisholm were old friends.

  “The pecans could have waited until daylight,” I said.

  “Wasn’t looking for no pepper. Why’d you think I’d be lookin’ for pepper out here in your yard this time a’night?”

  I wiped my eyes with the backs of my hands and glanced at Granny’s ears. Ah, there was the problem. No hearing aid. I stood and said close to her ear, “I said pecans, not pepper.”

  “You don’t havta shout!” she shouted. “I just put in new batt’ries!”

  I brushed the sea salt from my palms. Taking her hand and transferring the scissors to mine, I lifted her hand to her ear.

  “Oh,” she said. “Fergot the dad-blasted thing again, huh." She dug in the pocket of her gown and came up victorious. “Didn’t neither!" With a toothless grin, she plopped the hearing aid in place. “Now, where was we? You got any coffee on?”

  “I can make some.”

  “What? Gosh dang it, Alice, you don’t bake coffee. No wonder you can’t cook.”

  Well, she didn’t have to be so blatant about my lack of cooking skills. I sighed and reached out to turn on the hearing aid. Granny winked, deepening her face wrinkles.

  “Thank’ee. Now, where was we?”

  “I was going to make coffee.”

  “Now that you mention it, it’s a little late for coffee. How 'bout a drink instead?”

  “That sounds even better. Let’s hit the bar.”

  Granny followed me across the lawn, pecan-picker-upper for a cane. She won’t admit it — will deny it to high heaven — but she needs a tad of support. One rainy day I took her arm, and had to dodge the beautiful walnut walking stick she carries at times. A gift from her long-departed husban
d, she keeps the walking stick close in remembrance. But it makes a wicked weapon if a neighborhood dog mistakes Granny for easy prey when she strolls down our private road in the mornings to check the shared mailbox post.

  Flicking on a lamp in the study, I headed for the bar. Granny smacked her lips as I reached for the Crown Royal. Tonight’s adventure called for strong stuff. Briefly I tuned into the atmosphere, but didn’t detect an unwanted presence. Probably it was just a passing spirit.

  Granny limped over to the loveseat, the clump of her pecan-picker-upper muffled on the braided rug. The picker-upper is an ingenious device, something I’m sure a lot of Texans wish they’d patented when they discovered it after seasons of aching backs. A lever on a long handle triggers a basket the right size to grasp a pecan. Voila, another nut.

  I poured a double shot over ice in one glass, then added a tad of Diet Seven-up. Granny cleared her throat in warning when only one jigger landed in the second glass, so I dumped in another shot. If I had to help her home, maybe she’d be too mellow to care. As I handed Granny her drink and we settled in the loungers, Miss Molly padded back in. Granny sipped, smacked her lips again, and gazed sternly at the fireplace. After a gulp of my drink, I rose to add another log to the fire, then closed the fire screen securely.

  When I was back in the chair, Miss Molly leapt onto my lap and snuggled in for a snooze. Trucker wiggled over to Granny and lay down, offering his broad belly for a scratch, and she complied. She has the hard, yellowed fingernails of the aged, which I periodically help her trim, as well as her toenails, one of the few favors she tolerates. Trucker loves those nails on his belly, and he whimpered with sensuous delight.

  “Still can’t believe you was stupid ’nuf to have this beautiful dog fixed,” Granny grumbled in a long-standing bone of contention between us. Truth be known, probably between Trucker and me, too. Granny knows why I had Trucker neutered, but I reminded her anyway. Old people forget. Well, so do writers. I glanced around at the sticky notes peppering prominent spots as I responded for the dozenth time, “He has allergies. The vet recommended I not breed him.”

  Granny stared at the area of Trucker’s missing parts, gave him a final scratch, and leaned back to slurp her drink. “They got med’cine for it, don’t they? They damn sure got med’cine for every little twitch they find in me. You know how much those fool pharmacies charge me." She cackled conspiratorially. “But I just go visit Ole Maude iffen I run out a’fore my check comes in first of the month.”

  “What were you doing in my yard this time of night?” I asked Granny in gentle reminder.

  “Couldn’t sleep,” she murmured, and I nodded. At times during deadline-hell episodes I’d see her lights on. “Was gonna get some of them pecans and bake us a pie. Leave your half on your front deck, 'long with some roses in a basket." She tossed me a stern glare. “An’ I fergot the pecans out there by the cedar, what with you scarin’ the crap outta me like that!”

  “I’ll get them as soon as I finish my drink,” I assured her.

  Satisfied, Granny sipped, mind wandering off as it sometimes did. The slight palsy in her hand stilled as the alcohol took effect, and her eyes drooped. Silently, I enjoyed my own drink, as well as the comfortable company of a woman who shared my views on ghosts. Then Granny slit her eyes and stared at me with a knowing gaze. “Have a visitor tonight?”

  “Yeah,” I admitted. “But I guess it’s gone now.”

  “Mebbe not." She eyeballed the room. I scanned the ceiling and probed the corners for a flicker of dancing light or misty shape. Nothing except a few dusty spider webs.

  “Feel anything?” I asked.

  “Mebbe,” she repeated.

  The temperature dropped at least twenty degrees. Granny shivered and set her drink on the end table. Eyes widening, she reached back and pulled the afghan around her. Without a convenient afghan, a film of goosebumps spread across my neck, flurried down my spine and over my arms, where the hairs waved around like hundreds of tiny, headless snakes. Uh oh, definite signs the visitor hadn’t gone. And the sea salt was still scattered over by the patio doors.

  I rubbed my arms and hoped Howard would appear. This wasn’t a ghost I’d met before. Nor was it a previous acquaintance or former resident, now a spirit, who had crossed over and dropped back by for a visit, as they can do for short periods. My psychic senses told me that, and I’ve learned to listen to that inner voice from experiences — both bad and good.

  Trucker pricked his ears, and Miss Molly stirred in my lap. They stared at my desk. Alert, Granny shifted to follow their gazes. The silence in the room closed in like a weight, and I glanced at Casper: two a.m. plus thirty-three minutes.

  Trucker growled, and Miss Molly spat that damned weird meow-ser. The phone rang, and Granny and I both jumped. Miss Molly leapt, claws digging into my thighs through the caftan. I yelped, but the cat and dog scrambled to my desk, into their get-ready positions. Trucker sat, ears perked and tongue lolling out. On the desk, Miss Molly patted a black paw against the receiver, a chastising glare for my slowness on her cream and black face. Rubbing my scratched thigh with one hand, I hobbled over and grabbed the phone in mid-ring with the other. Not bothering with caller ID — it had to be Katy — I muttered an irritated, “Hello.”

  For a few seconds, only choking, unrestrained sobs from a woman on the verge of emotional madness were audible. “Katy? Katy, for heaven’s sake, what’s wrong?”

  She gasped — and sobbed hysterically again.

  “Katy!” I demanded. “What’s going on?”

  She gurgled and hiccupped. “He’s...he’s dead!”

  Relieved and amused, I soothed, “Sir Gary’s been dead for a long, long while. He’s a ghost, remember?”

  “No!” she burst out. “Not Sir Gary! The man in my pool! He’s dead! Oh, God, Alice. Please help me!”