The Haunting of Autumn Lake (22 page)

A big owl hooted as it flew overhead, startling the three women and causing them to link arms for comfort.

“Oh, I hope we don’t find nothin’,” Myra rather whined. “I think I’d drop dead if I was to walk out there and see that ol’ cowboy sittin’ up in his grave.”

“Oh, now, Aunt Myra,” Vaden reassured. “It’s just an old frightening story. It’s not real.”

“Then why are we all seein’ the Specter ridin’ here and there all night long?” Myra asked.

Autumn shrugged. “I don’t know, Auntie.” She smiled then and added, “But isn’t it just too fun to be out here, creepin’ toward an old graveyard, and not knowin’ what we might find?”

“I hope we don’t find anythin’,” Myra mumbled.

But Autumn frowned. “Oh, I hope we do. I’ll be just devastated if we walk into that old graveyard to find it’s all nice and grassy with no bones stickin’ out of the ground.”

And then they were upon it. The old graveyard stood silent, the October breeze lifting the drying leaves that had fallen from the oaks and maples planted around the graveyard, sending them softly swirling among the tombstones.

Autumn had never, ever cared for the old graveyard. To her, it had always looked rather neglected and spooky. But as she gazed upon it now, looking as if the trees had intentionally sifted their lovely leaves to drift down and adorn the earth with color, the old graveyard didn’t look so daunting.

“Oh, good heavens!’ Myra exclaimed in a whisper. “However did I let you two talk me into this?”

“Oh, settle down, Aunt Myra,” Vaden whispered. “I think it’s very lovely…in a frightening sort of way.”

“I think it’s lovely in any sort of way,” Autumn whispered. “Look at the leaves, Mama! They’re beautiful! And the squirrels haven’t stored away all the acorns yet. Oh, let’s collect up a few and take them home.”

“Autumn Lake,” Aunt Myra exclaimed in lower whisper than before, “you have enough acorn hats at home to build a house with! Whyever would you need any more?”

“I think I see it!” Vaden softly said then. “I think I see the old cowboy’s grave! I think I see the Specter’s very restin’ place!”

“Where?” Autumn and Myra asked in unison.

“Look over there,” Vaden said, pointing west. “There. Do you see it? Over there all by their lonesome are two matchin’ tombstones. You see there? Under that big maple.”

Autumn’s heart began to hammer with trepidation, for she did indeed see the two tombstones that stood separate from the rest.

Gulping the lump of fear that had risen in her throat, Autumn said, “Well, we’ve come this far. Let’s go see if that ground looks disturbed at the old cowboy’s grave.”

“Oh, sweet heaven!” Myra whined. “I’m too old for this!”

“Just settle down, Auntie,” Autumn said. “Chances are it’s just two graves sittin’ over there. Chances are we’ll brush the leaves away to find nothin’ at all has been disturbed.”

Gulping once more and looking to her mother for encouragement, Autumn linked arms with Myra’s on her left and Vaden’s on her right. “Come on, ladies. Let’s show a little backbone here.”

Slowly the three women crept closer and closer to the two lone tombstones. As they approached, Autumn was somewhat relieved by the fact that leaves covered the ground like a warm, golden blanket. The leaves had not been disturbed, but they could have easily just fallen during that very day.

“
Here lies Catherine ‘Cat’ Russell
,” Vaden read aloud in a whisper. “
Weep, oh reader, weep…for Catherine buried here so deep…was murdered in her sleep
.” Autumn held her breath a moment as her mother continued, “And there’s the date she died. It’s sad no one knew when she was born.”

“Th-then that’s the Specter’s grave next to hers,” Myra stammered. “The cowboy lies there.”

Vaden nodded, and Autumn followed her mother’s gaze. “You read it, Autumn,” Vaden whispered.

“All right,” Autumn said. “
Here a cowboy lies
,” she began. “
Beware if you are wise. For vengeance, he will rise
.
Here lies Ritter ‘Ritt’ Houston…murdered where he slept
.”

“Don’t stand on him like that!” Myra exclaimed. “For Pete’s sake, Vaden! He’s liable to reach up outta that grave and pull you in.”

“Shhh,” Autumn whispered to her rattled aunt. Kneeling down next to her mother, she began to help gently brush the leaves away. “I-I don’t see that anything has been disturbed yet. Do you?”

Spurred by near panic, Autumn and Vaden hurriedly brushed away the rest of the leaves. There, stretched out before the tombstone, was not only a patch of freshly turned soil the length and width of a man’s body but something protruding from the soil as well.

“What is that?” Myra asked.

Bravely reaching out, and with a trembling hand, grasping what she now recognized as cloth, Autumn tugged. Slowly a long length of dirty white fabric, stained with something dark, began to stretch forth from the grave.

As Autumn held up the length of torn, tattered, and blood-stained sheet, all three women screamed at the top of their lungs when a deep voice shouted, “What’re you doin’!”

Once Autumn, Vaden, and Myra quit screaming long enough to open their eyes, they screamed again—this time scolding Gentry, Ransom, and Dan as they stood grinning and chuckling to themselves.

“Ransom Lake!” Vaden scolded. “I oughta skin you alive!” Vaden cried, although running headlong into his arms.

“Dan Valmont!” Myra shouted, rushing into her husband’s embrace as well. “You nearly scared me to death! Nearly to death, I swear it!”

Autumn didn’t scold Gentry, however. Instead, she stood frozen—paralyzed with frightened disbelief as she held out the strip of old, bloodied sheet toward him.

“It’s true,” she breathed. “There really is a Specter.”

Gentry caught Autumn in his arms as she fainted. “Autumn? Autumn?” he said, kneeling to the ground and gently caressing her face with the back of his hand. “Autumn?”

“Now’s as good a time as any,” Ransom chuckled. “Though none of us will be gettin’ any sleep for a month after this, ’cause comin’ clean ain’t gonna stop the nightmares this’ll cause.”

“What are you going on about, Ransom Lake?” Vaden asked.

“I think that’s Gentry’s beatin’ to take, honey.”

Autumn smiled. She could see the agitation and the guilt in Gentry’s eyes—the fear—and suddenly she knew.

“You’re the Specter, aren’t you, Gentry?” she asked.

“What?” she heard her mother exclaim.

“You just wanted to see him so much,” Gentry began. “You’d been so kind to me when I was laid up at Doc Sullivan’s. I never planned on stayin’ this long…and I just started out wantin’ to make one of your dreams come true, punkin.” He smiled, and she reached up with both her hands, placing her thumbs in his dimples. “You’re so beautiful…especially when you’re ramblin’ on tellin’ one of your stories. And that day you told me about the Specter…I could see it in your eyes. You wanted him to be real so badly. So…when I started workin’ for your daddy…I just found me an old sheet in the bunkhouse, roughed it up bit, and—”

Autumn’s heart was near to bursting with love. He’d made the Specter real for her? Just for
her
? Brazenly, she pulled his head toward hers, kissing him hard and long—tasting his mouth and thrilling as he pulled her against him.

“Well,” Dan said, “that ain’t quite the reaction I would’ve expected.”

“Looks like it,” Ransom mumbled as he watched Gentry help Autumn to her feet, gather her in his arms, and kiss her just the way Ransom often kissed Vaden. “Yep. Looks like it.”

❦

Once they’d seen Dan and Myra back to the general store, Gentry joined Ransom in walking behind Autumn and Vaden on the way home.

He smiled as he watched Autumn and her mother amble along, giggling over their terrifying adventure to the old graveyard.

“Well, I have to say it,” Ransom began. “I didn’t think you’d get away with all that Specter nonsense that easy.”

Gentry shook his head. “Me neither. But that’s one thing I love about your daughter, Ransom Lake. She loves life…even when she oughta be mad sometimes.”

Ransom nodded. “She’s like her mother that way.”

Gentry frowned a moment then, wondering if he should even mention the matter to Ransom. But inhaling a deep breath of the crisp October air, he decided he might—just to see what Ransom thought of it.

“Only thing is, Ransom,” Gentry began.

“Yeah?”

“I didn’t turn over the soil on that cowboy’s grave,” he admitted. “I didn’t leave that strip of old sheet there either. I burned my sheet in your burn barrel before we left to go track the women down.”

“All right, darlin’,” Ransom said. Leaning aside to Gentry, however, he whispered, “Maybe we best not mention that last thing you just told me, son. Vaden’s gonna have nightmares for a month as it is.”

“Agreed,” Gentry chuckled. “But what about Autumn? Won’t she have nightmares too?”

“Probably,” Ransom admitted. “So you best get to askin’ her to marry you…because I ain’t gonna let her outta my sight when you’re wearing a slicker until you do.”

“Yes, sir,” Gentry chuckled, and Ransom hurried to meet Autumn and Vaden.

The moon was rising, and the world was bathed in a soft golden glow—and Gentry James thought there could be no better heaven than one that mirrored the season the woman he loved was named for.

Chapter Twelve

Autumn closed her eyes, inhaled a deep breath of aromatic October air, and smiled. Oh, how she loved the county fair—especially the scents of harvest that blended all around her. She could smell the caramel and candied apples sitting on the table before her, the warm pies women were beginning to line up on the pie contest table across the way. There were sweet scents in the air of delicious baked things—buttery scents of breads and muffins on the air. Someone was burning leaves in the distance—probably Mr. Johnson, for his property was simply swollen with maple and oak trees. The mellow aroma of smoldering piñon and cedar from the nearby roasting pit lent to the soothing smells that swirled around Autumn unseen, but lovingly appreciated.

Autumn opened her eyes, sighing as she glanced to the jelly and jam table—where jar upon jar of red, purple, peach, and every other color of fruit jams, jellies, and preserves sat waiting to be judged. She loved the sight of the morning kissing the jars and their contents, making the stacks of carefully cooked and preserved sweet spreads appear as if they were sunlit stained glass just sitting there amid the county fair.

Children laughed and played nearby, and she heard the bawl of a calf off in the direction of the stock auction corral. Someone was playing the fiddle—probably practicing for the square dancing that would take place later that evening.

Autumn glanced to her mother, who thanked a young man for purchasing a caramel apple. She looked down the way to where her father was loading several pumpkins into a buggy. A woman sat at the lines of the horse harnessed to the buggy, and Autumn giggled as she saw the way the woman blushed when Handsome Ransom Lake smiled at her and thanked her for purchasing his pumpkins.

Gentry had agreed to drive the hay wagon, and every once in a while, she would see him off in the distance, driving the team of mules at a slow and steady pace as several children romped around in the straw filling the wagon bed. She smiled—giggled out loud at the thought of Gentry James dressed up in an old shredded sheet and riding across the horizon at midnight, just for her sake.

The fact of the matter was she should have been furious at him—enraged at his having made a fool of her. When she thought of how she’d gone on and on and on to Gentry about having seen the Specter, she rolled her eyes at her own silliness. And yet how could she be angry over an elaborate gesture of such romantic proportions? He was wonderful! Gentry was everything she’d ever dreamed of in the man she would someday love—far more, in truth.

“Hey, lady.”

Autumn’s thoughts of Gentry—of the insane depth to which she loved him—were interrupted by a tiny voice. Looking over the table top-laden with caramel and candied apples behind which she stood, she smiled when she saw a small, raven-haired boy with so many freckles sprinkled over his nose and cheeks that he looked just as if someone had sprinkled his face with fresh-ground nutmeg. Just the sight of the boy and his tousled hair, the tree-branch slingshot peeking out of his front pocket, made Autumn giggle with delight.