Out of the Mist (6 page)

“
The skull was found right
near here, at the bottom of the hill, near the shore. So he was
probably an early settler or a soldier in the Halifax area. But the
strange thing is we didn’t find any of his other bones or anything
else, like a belt or uniform buttons that we could have identified
him with.”

Ned and Marjory stood back from the crowd.
They exchanged slightly startled and meaningful looks, but didn’t
say a word.

Later, on the way back to
school, Ned was excited. “It must be Henry’s skull!”

Marjory agreed. “No bones were found with
him because they weren’t there!”

As school let out, many of the kids were
calling back and forth about Hallowe’en:

“
What are you going to be,
tonight?”

“
I’m going to be a
witch!”

“
A zombie!”

A bunch of boys were calling out to each
other. “I’ll meet you for trick or treating!”

“
You’re scared! Bet you
won’t show up!”

“
I’ll be at the Old
Cemetery, but I won’t see you! You’ll be home hiding under your
bed!”

“
Dare you to walk through
the whole grounds!”

“
Double-dare!”

Marjory asked Ned, “Are you going to the
graveyard to scare those guys?”

“
I’m going to wear an
all-black outfit,” Ned said, “and glue a paper skeleton on it, but
I’ll take off the skull! I’ll be the skeleton without a head! That
ought to shock them.”

“
I’ll come with you. I’ll
be a ghost in a white sheet.”

The problem of how to stay
out late was solved by each of them telling their parents that they
were going to a Hallowe’en party at the other’s house. Neither took
bags to hold candy with them.

“
It’s tricks for me
tonight, not treats,” said Ned, when they met up later.

Marjory nodded. Marjory was carrying a
sheet, and when she put it over her head, she could see out of the
holes she had cut for the eyes. The sheet draped down over her, so
that nothing showed except her shoes.

Ned’s white paper skeleton contrasted quite
well against his black outfit, and he wore a black ski-mask over
his head so that it would not be seen in the dark.

In the Old Cemetery, they
hid behind Henry Ainsworth’s stone to wait for the boys from
school. At first, it was scarcely dark enough, but as the night
closed in Ned and Marjory peered around the stone every few minutes
to see if the boys were coming. They could see the other graves,
lit by faint moonlight—the little children with lambs, the carved
angel with outstretched wings. It was too dark to read the
inscription on Henry’s grave, but they could recall it without
having to read it.

“
Where my head lies, none
can guess!” said Marjory. “But we know, don’t we?”

“
Right there in the
Museum! They say that dead men who lose their bones constantly seek
to find them,” said Ned. “I wonder if Henry’s
skeleton….”

“
Hush,” shushed Marjory.
She had heard something.

“
Are the guys coming?”
whispered Ned.

But the creaking noise did
not come from the cemetery entrance. It came from the other side of
Henry’s stone. Marjory peered around. Something funny was going on.
The earth of the plot was rippling, the way it does when a mole is
digging under a lawn. Marjory grasped Ned’s arm.

“
What is it?” hissed
Ned.

“
Look!”

Not only was the grass heaving, but a crack
opened between the grass and Henry’s tombstone. Ned and Marjory
froze. Marjory’s heart beat fast as a long bony finger reached up
out of the crack, followed by the whole hand, and then an arm-bone.
As the children held their breaths, a whole skeleton clambered out
of the narrow crevice. There was a rib cage, hip bones, long thigh
bones and lower legs, and feet with big bony toes. But as the
skeleton stood up, they saw above the rib cage and spine—nothing!
No head! The spine ended at the neck vertebrae.

Ned and Marjory huddled together behind
Henry’s stone, too terrified to run. They hoped the skeleton didn’t
see them. Did you die if a skeleton touched you?

Henry’s skeleton took a few steps, but his
stance appeared wobbly. Ned and Marjory saw spaces between the
bones. There was no flesh and no tendons to hold the bones
together. Only a pale phosphorescent light, like an electric gleam
or a magnetic pulse, joined the bones.

“
He’s going to seek his
head!” gasped Ned. “I told you dead men look for their
bones!”

As they watched, Henry’s
skeleton set off from his grave along a cemetery path. Where the
path turned, however, Henry went straight ahead into a ditch and
fell down in a clatter.

“
He can’t see!” exclaimed
Marjory. “His eyes are in the skull! He’s blind!” Impulsively, she
stood up and ran around the tombstone to follow the
skeleton.

“
Wait! Marjory!” Ned
followed her. Marjory ran along the path to where the bones were
piled in a ditch. They had come apart, but under Marjory’s
astonished gaze, they joined together again, like drops of mercury,
pulled by some secret force. Within half a minute, Henry’s skeleton
stood up and tried to find his way out of the ditch.

“
Oh, the poor thing!”
cried Marjory. She reached out her hand and took the bony fingers
in her grasp. She winced at the coldness of the bone, but she
couldn’t leave Henry’s blind skeleton to stumble into ditches.
“Come on, this way!” She guided him back to the path. “Ned, come
on! We have to help him find his skull!”

Ned only hesitated a
second. He wasn’t going to let Marjory see he was afraid of the
skeleton. He reached for Henry’s other hand. The two children, with
Henry between them, took the path that led to the cemetery’s
entrance. Ned found he wasn’t afraid any longer. It was quite like
helping his granddad to his rocking chair on the porch. Henry’s
hands loosely grasped Ned’s and Ned helped steer him along the
path. As they approached the cemetery gate, a piercing shriek rang
out, followed by cries of, “A Skeleton!”

“
Two
Skeletons!”

“
And a Ghost!”

They caught a glimpse of a
group of boys, turning and running for dear life in all directions
away from the cemetery.

“
The guys!” said Ned, and
he began to laugh. “They saw Henry, and they thought I was a
skeleton, too!”

“
I guess I made a good
ghost.” Marjory grinned. “Henry, you sure made them
run!”

Henry’s bony hands pulled at them. His one
purpose was to find his head!

“
Maybe we should try to
hide him,” Marjory suggested. “He’ll likely scare the whole
street!” But the skeleton insisted on walking right on down the
street, and they had to go with him to keep him from running into
lamp-posts and crashing into garbage pails.

Halfway down the street to the Museum, a
group of costumed kids approached, running, whooping, and
hollering. They were ringing doorbells and collecting treats. As
they came closer, Marjory and Ned expected them to scream and run
away, but surprisingly, nothing of the sort happened. The costumed
witches, pirates, and zombies paid little attention to the two
skeletons and the ghost, except one girl who said, “Great
costumes!” as she rushed by.

“
I can’t believe it!”
Marjory exclaimed. “They think he’s just someone dressed up as a
skeleton!”

“
Better costume than
mine,” laughed Ned, studying Henry’s detached limbs, held together
by little gleams of light.

At the Museum, they had to help Henry climb
the steps, lest he fall over backwards. Once they reached the top,
Marjory groaned, “Of course, the doors are locked!” But that did
not stop the skeleton. Without even trying to open the doors, he
just slid through them without breaking them, like water through a
sieve, leaving the two children outside, amazed.

As Henry disappeared into
the galleries, Ned and Marjory were left open-mouthed. Was this
really happening? They were not left to question long. First, they
heard a crash of glass. Then bony footsteps
click-clacked
as Henry returned,
holding his skull in his hands. He came out through the door the
same way he went in. “Sliding through the atoms,” said Ned, who was
a science freak.

Once outside the Museum,
the skeleton lifted the skull, and put it back on his neck
vertebrae, where it seemed to fit. “As if made for him,” said
Marjory. Ned noticed the hatchet sticking out of the back of
Henry’s skull as the skeleton walked on his own down the Museum
steps. He needed no guidance this time, and seemed to know his way
back to the cemetery. He didn’t pay any attention to Ned and
Marjory, for which they were thankful. They weren’t sure that a
skeleton, however indebted to them for their help, might react. In
fairy stories, the “Little People” were supposed to entice mortals
down into their barrows underground. Neither wanted his bony hands
to pull them into his grave.

Following at a safe
distance, they turned into the cemetery, just in time to see Henry
reach his tombstone, sit down on the edge of the opening, insert
his long bony limbs into the grave, and quickly drop completely
underground, and out of sight. Then from the grave-hole, two
skeletal hands reached up, and for a minute, Marjory thought with a
shudder that he was going to climb out of the grave again.
If he wants me to take him
home
, Marjory thought,
I don’t think Mother would like it
.
But no, he simply reached up, grabbed the turf, and closed it with
his bony fingers, like a blanket.

Then there was nothing but the unbroken
ground, and nothing more to see. All was quiet, and still, as if he
had never appeared.

Marjory and Ned waited a
while in silence. The town clock bell chimed 12 times. It was
midnight. Hallowe’en was over and All Saints’ Day was beginning.
Ghosts, goblins and skeletons were now supposed to be at
rest.

“
Well!” said
Marjory.

“
Well!” responded
Ned.

The whole episode left them speechless for
many minutes. “Should we tell?” Marjory finally asked.

“
They wouldn’t believe
us,” said Ned.

Back at their own homes,
when their parents asked them if they had a good time, neither said
much.
Must be tired
, the parents thought, and hurried them to bed.

The next morning, both children woke
believing that the previous night’s events couldn’t have
happened.

But the evidence showed otherwise. The skull
was gone from the Museum, where the glass case had been broken
into. No one ever found out who had “stolen” the skull.

Except, of course, Marjory and Ned. They
knew it hadn’t been stolen at all, just reclaimed by its rightful
owner.

In the cemetery, no one
but Marjory and Ned noticed the inscription on Henry Ainsworth’s
grave had changed:

I fought for family and for farm

Against the French when they did swarm

For long my bones were not complete

But now united I can sleep.

~~~***~~~

Fate

Diane
Losier

“Meep! Meep! Meep! Meep!” The alarm
called everyone to attention. “This is not a drill! This is not a
drill!”

The lower deck was rapidly filling with
hot acrid smoke. He knew that something was seriously wrong. Within
seconds, visibility plummeted to zero. He had to find his way to
the face masks and locate one of the fresh-air intakes situated at
intervals along the sides of the sub. Only trouble was, even his
flashlight couldn't pierce through the thick wall of smoke
enveloping him. He was completely disoriented as he felt his way
through the thickening darkness. His eyes hurt, his lungs were on
fire. On the verge of collapsing he yelled, “I need some air! Some
air! Help!”

Josh sat bolt upright, covered in a
cold sweat, his heart beating furiously. It took him a few seconds
to realize he was in his bed, not on the
Nunavu
t
.
He slowly got
up and shuffled to the kitchen for a glass of water. No point in
going back to bed. He knew he wouldn't sleep, so he sat at the
table and lit a cigarette. Although his flashbacks happened less
and less, and he had been encouraged not to dwell on them, he
couldn't help recalling the events of that terrible accident.

His posting on the
HMCS
Nunavu
t
had been
part of his second, four-year commission in the Canadian Navy. They
had purchased four used subs from the Royal Navy and the
Nunavu
t
was on
its way to the port of Halifax for refitting when the incident
happened.

No one had noticed the leak in one of
the hatches near the conning tower. That day, the sea had been
getting steadily worse. The sub was not yet fit to dive and avoid
the storm. Over time she had taken on a large volume of sea water.
The bigger problem, though was that the insulation around the wires
in the main control panel was worn. Water falling on those cables
caused a massive electrical short, leading to a fire above deck
near the conning tower. There was no flooding below, but the
transformer boxes blew up and caused a second fire. The underwater
decks plunged into total darkness. Billowing smoke from the fire
added to the confusion.