Kentucky Hauntings (11 page)

“The storm hit fast,” said Mary's mother, sitting up now, too. “Maybe he thought he could beat it and got caught out in it. I think you should go see if something is wrong.”

“I'm sure nothing is wrong,” Mr. Sinclair insisted. “Andy will be home as soon as the storm is over. Now let's get some sleep!”

“Mary's been right before,” Mrs. Sinclair pointed out. “What if something is wrong and you ignore it?”

“I tell you, he's all right!” Mr. Sinclair bellowed, thinking how miserable he would be if he went out in that storm. “He'll be home any time now.”

As if to confirm what he said, the sound of hoofbeats approached the house. Mary ran to the window and looked out as the lightning lit up the sky and the yard. She could see clearly, but it was not the sight she wanted to see. Andy's horse ran by the house and headed for the barn, but there was no rider.

“It's Andy's horse, but Andy's not on him!” cried Mary.

This was information that Mr. Sinclair couldn't ignore. He knew something had happened to Andy, and he couldn't waste any time now. He had to go look for him. Mary ran back to the kitchen to look out the back window. Mr. Sinclair got out of bed and dressed quickly for the storm. He hurried to the barn and turned Andy's horse into his stall. He saddled his own horse and rode into the stormy night.

Mary and her mom waited in the kitchen as the storm finally blew itself out. Finally, dawn broke and Mrs. Sinclair made breakfast. They ate in silence as they waited still. At last, a familiar sound came to their ears. A horse was coming! Mary and her mom ran to the door and opened it as Mr. Sinclair came riding up alone. He pulled up the horse, but stayed mounted.

“Did you find him?” asked Mary.

“Is he all right?” Mrs. Sinclair wanted to know before her husband had a chance to speak. He put up his hand to silence them.

“Yes, I found him,” he said. “He'll be fine. He's resting over at the doc's house right now. He rode into a limb in the storm. It knocked him off his horse, and he hit his head on a rock when he fell. He was knocked out and bleeding when I found him. The creek had flooded from all the rain, and the water had almost reached him when I got there.”

“He could have died!” said Mary.

“Thank God you found him,” said Mrs. Sinclair.

“Yeah,” said Mr. Sinclair, “the doc said he might not have made it if I hadn't come along when I did.”

“Put your horse up while I fix you some breakfast,” said Mrs. Sinclair. “You must be starved.”

Mr. Sinclair took care of his horse and returned to the house just as his wife put biscuits, eggs, bacon, and hot coffee on the table. While he ate, he told his wife and daughter more details.

“You were right about his thinking he could beat the storm,” he told them. “I never would have thought that he'd be out in a storm like that, but he said it came up faster than he thought it would. Mary, he would have died if it hadn't been for you. I would never have gone to look for him. His girlfriend's folks would not have gone to look either because they would have thought he beat the storm and got home safely.”

“I had some help from Aunt Martha's ghost and Andy's horse,” said Mary, smiling.

“I'll believe you from now on,” her father told her.

Mr. Sinclair told that story many times at the old country store where people gathered to shop and visit. Some believed him and some didn't. He really didn't care. He didn't understand it himself. He just knew his little chime child had a special gift.

The owners of the restaurant in this story told this tale to us. They were very sincere, and we didn't doubt them for a second.

Carla and Christy had been friends for several years when they got the idea to open a restaurant together. They didn't have a lot of business experience, but they were both good cooks and good with people. They found a small building in downtown Louisville and went into business, serving lunch only. Everything went well, but it wasn't long until the two owners began to feel that they had a silent, invisible business partner.

The previous owner, a man who had worked well past retirement before he died, had operated a bar at this location. Sometimes the ladies heard a tinkling of glasses in the area where that bar had been, and they felt as though someone was with them as they closed for the day. Sometimes knives that belonged in one area would show up mysteriously in another part of the kitchen. At other times, food would appear in the refrigerator when they were certain they had not put it there themselves. They sometimes joked about whether or not the previous owner approved of two women owning a business where his used to be.

After a few weeks, business began to fall off. Carla and Christy began to worry that perhaps they had made a mistake. They had invested their savings in the restaurant and had nothing to fall back on if this venture failed. They considered cutting their losses and moving on. They could sell the restaurant and find jobs as cooks for other people.

One day after all the customers had gone, Carla and Christy sat down to discuss their future plans seriously and make a decision about what they should do next.

“We're just breaking even,” Christy said. “Do you think we should try to stick it out?”

“I'd like to stay,” said Carla. “I like working for myself. On the other hand, if we are going to go, it would be better to do it before we get into debt.”

“Right,” said Christy. “So what do we do? Do we go or do we stay?”

Just then, each woman felt a strong hand on her shoulder. Both heard a male voice whisper distinctly, “Stay!”

Somewhat taken aback by this unexpected advice, the ladies thought it might be a positive sign that things would get better soon. They decided right then and there that they would keep the restaurant open. They considered ways to make business better. They hired a singer and guitarist to play live music, and they implemented some smart advertising plans. The changes worked, and soon business was booming.

The ladies did some research on the previous owner and discovered that he, too, had once experienced doubts about staying in this location. He had decided to stay and had made a success of it.

The ladies still see signs that the late owner is there with them. They feel him standing behind them as they clean the floor, or they find silverware moved around in the kitchen. When this happens, they just smile and say a silent thanks for a business manager that they don't have to pay!

This story happened to neighbors and was retold often on stormy nights when the wind would shriek like a banshee
.

The banshee is a ghost that often attaches itself to an Irish family, sometimes following that family to a new country when it moves from Ireland. The banshee appears outside the family's home and wails to let the people know of a coming death. There is much complicated folklore about the banshee and the roles it plays with families, but in the south-central part of Kentucky people connect it to a death warning only.

To encounter a banshee was certainly not an everyday occurrence, but a banshee probably came into the lives of two neighbors who lived along Damron's Creek.

It was a late spring day, and Logan Carter and his son, Clyde, were on their way home after hauling gravel all day. It was almost dark, and the woods along the road were already filling up with shadows. The old truck engine sputtered along, sounding almost as tired as Logan and Clyde felt. Clyde was thinking about the hot supper his mom, Lindy, would have ready. He could almost taste the beans, green onions, hot cornbread, and cold buttermilk. They drove past Dennis Sullivan's house and soon pulled into their own driveway. The younger Carter children were playing in the front yard.

Lindy was outside with her neighbor Maggie Sullivan, the youngest girl in the Sullivan household. They were talking and picking herbs from Lindy's garden just beyond the driveway.

“Just brew these herbs into a tea for your mother,” Lindy instructed the girl. “It should help her rest and feel better.”

“I hope the tea works,” said Maggie. “Momma's awful sick at her stomach. She can't keep anything down, and she hardly sleeps at all.”

“Tell her I'll bring her some chicken soup tomorrow,” said Lindy. “That usually stays down when nothing else will. It seems to give a person strength.”

Maggie opened her mouth to reply, but she was interrupted by something from the woods that none of them had ever heard before. A sound cut through the warm spring air that chilled their bones. It was the combination of a wail and a scream—a keen, piercing shriek. It left all of them in stunned silence for a moment when it stopped. Then Clyde spoke up.

“What on earth was that?” he asked.

“Maybe a wildcat,” said his dad.

“It didn't sound like any wildcat I ever heard,” Clyde disagreed.

Maggie turned deathly pale, a look of realization spreading across her face.

“Oh, my Lord!” she said. “It was a banshee! It's come for Momma! I've got to get home. Momma's going to die!”

She started toward the woods, clutching her herbs tightly. Lindy stopped her.

“Wait, child,” she called. “You can't go into those woods by yourself! We don't know for sure what that was. It could have been an animal that would hurt you. Let Logan drive you home.”

Lindy accepted the ride. Tears were streaming down her cheeks when she climbed into the truck beside Logan Carter.

“That wasn't a wildcat,” she said to Logan. “The banshee has come for Momma. I need to get home as fast as I can.”

The wailing sound rose from the woods again as they drove off. It seemed to come from near the Sullivan place.

The Carter family stood in the yard, watching the truck go down the road.

“What was she talking about?” Clyde asked his mother. “What's a banshee?”

Lindy didn't know much to tell him about it. She knew that the Irish believed it was a sign of death to hear one wail. She knew that the Sullivans were Irish, so maybe the banshee had followed the family to this country. Mrs. Sullivan had talked about it briefly once in a casual conversation.

“I didn't know how much of her story to believe,” Lindy told Clyde, “but she certainly believed it.”

The trip was short, so Logan was back home in a few minutes. They heard the sound once more as he got out of the truck, and then they all went inside for supper.

“Mrs. Sullivan is in bad shape,” Logan told the family as they sat around the supper table. “She sent her thanks for the herbs, though. Maggie was brewing some tea for her when I left. I only stayed a minute to pay my respects since she was so weak, but she said to tell you that she is looking forward to your good chicken soup tomorrow.”

Lindy nodded. Chicken soup was a remedy for just about everything.

The shock the family had felt by the shrieking in the woods subdued the conversation as the Carters ate their supper. Their talk was mostly limited to requests for food to be passed. When they finished, Lindy washed the dishes while the others went into the living room and sat quietly. It was Friday night, and things were usually livelier at the Carters' home. Tonight, though, it was as if they didn't want to do anything to call attention to themselves. Something unknown and sinister was out there in the woods, and they wanted no part of it.

They all went to bed early, each one glancing at Logan to make sure he locked the door. They slept fitfully, waking up when they heard the terrible wailing in the distance. They were relieved to notice that the sound was not close to their house.

The next morning after breakfast, Lindy prepared the chicken soup and got ready to take it to Mrs. Sullivan.

“I'll drive you over,” said Logan. “I don't want you meeting up with that old wildcat.”

“Dad,” said Clyde, “you know that wasn't a wildcat!”

“Well,” said Logan, “whatever it was, your mother doesn't need to meet up with it while she's carrying that chicken soup.”

He and Lindy got in the truck and drove off. The younger children moved closer to Clyde and kept a watchful eye on the woods. No one, including Clyde, wanted to venture too far from the safety of the yard. Finally, they all sat on the porch to wait for their parents to return.

After a while, Logan and Lindy returned with sad news. Mrs. Sullivan had died just before daybreak. It was right after her death that the wailing had stopped.

In the days that followed, the Carters debated whether a wildcat had been in the woods, or whether a banshee had come to take Mrs. Sullivan away to the other side. There was a certain amount of evidence to support both sides, but there was not 100 percent proof for either one.

The Carters never heard the wailing again, so they tried to put the whole thing out of their minds. Sometimes it would come to mind, though, when they were walking through the woods at night, going to the country store, or heading off to visit friends. They all admitted that such thoughts always made them walk a little faster.

The rock quarry was just a few miles down the main road from where we lived. We heard this story as a true happening, but sometimes kids wondered if the old folks made it up to scare them away
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In central Kentucky, an old rock quarry stood abandoned with a few feet of water covering the bottom. Once productive, it was now an empty, eerie-looking place. There were several “No Trespassing” signs around the boundaries, but the site had few visitors now.

Three neighborhood boys, Derek, Aaron, and Donnie, thought the old rock quarry was mysterious and irresistible. They had been told time and again by their parents to stay away from the place because it could be dangerous, but the warnings fell on deaf ears.

“Why do you want to play there?” their parents wanted to know. “There's no fish in the water, so you can't go fishing. And the water is muddy and the bottom has sharp rocks, so you can't go swimming. What's the attraction?”