When I was a little girl, Grandma used to tuck me into bed every night. She was dead, of course, so the blankets always gapped, allowing little puffs of air to invade my warm cocoon. It was her voice, soft and sweet, which lulled me to sleep, and I knew I was safe. We lived in the Big House then—Momma, Grandma and me. Everyone called it the Big House, for ours was the largest and oldest on High Street. Momma said it was once called High Wine Street, back when the whiskey barons made their homes there, and the now-creaking mansions stood on the bluff gleaming like pearly sentinels.

Grandma had been born in the house, and she whispered its secrets to me. She told me of the narrow, carved door to the attic ballroom where she stayed, and the brick-lined tunnel in the basement. The passage burrowed through the bluff, leading to the rotting carriage house at the bottom of the hill. Grandma told me her driver used to walk the long tunnel to fetch the car so he wouldn’t get muddy during the rain. Once, I thought to wander that dark path, with its smell of moldy earth and wet worms. Before my first step fell on the powdery red brick, I heard Grandma’s soft voice behind me:

“Never there, Maggie my dear. Dark things dwell where once was fair.”

The tunnel was abandoned in favor of the attic. Grandma would sing me songs of her youth, her gentle voice mimicking piano notes, hollow and grainy like the sound of an old record. We would dance around the ballroom, with its faded floral wallpapers and water-stained floorboards, weaving around the shafts of sunlight penetrating the shuttered windows.

The attic, too, had a secret; a door, heavily bolted and welded shut with fifty years of paint and heat. It was the old elevator shaft. When Grandma’s family held parties, the guests would ride the elevator to the fourth floor reception hall. The men would retire to the billiard room, while Grandma and her friends danced into the wee hours of the morning. Occasionally as she and I played, I thought I would see some of her friends, waltzing in dark corners, their slippered feet never touching the ground. There were other nights, as I lay in my bed, I swore I heard the sounds of many dainty footsteps shuffling across the weathered floor, and I knew Grandma was not alone.

Aunt Alice had been a favorite with the boys, even at a young age. She was twelve years older than my mother, and Momma’s memories of her were like mine, all torn photographs and faded memories. In her pictures, Alice was always bright and gay, with thick brown hair curling down her back, sparkling sapphire eyes, and big breasts. Aunt Alice ran away when she was sixteen, visiting only when her money or her man ran out, or sometimes both. Momma said Alice was wild and broke Grandma’s heart. Grandma didn’t talk much, but on the darkest nights, I could hear in her attic, softly crying, “Alice. Alice.”

Aunt Alice returned to the Big House when I was eight, this time with a man named George. The curls were cropped, the breasts had sagged and her full red lips were hard slashes of gray. George was pale and pudgy, as if he never walked in sunlight. His thin blond hair was falling out, and his eyes were as flat as flint. He spoke little to me, but was always watching. Momma and Grandma both warned me to stay away from him. Momma threatened to throw him out of the Big House, but Aunt Alice always begged her to let him stay.

When Alice and George fought, their shouts would shake the walls, leaving the glass chattering like teeth in the window frames. Then I would escape down High Street to Oak Park. The tree there had sprouted from its acorn before Columbus sailed from Spain. Over the centuries, it had collapsed onto itself, the thick, heavy branches looping and folding to touch the ground, leaving the tree standing hunched and gnarled like a giant troll. The oak had a fence around it, to protect it, so I never could rest in its branches, but I would see Grandma there, perched in the tree like a nightingale, talking to her friends, the girls she had grown up with on High Wine Street.

She looked different, younger somehow, with her dark, short-cropped hair and low-waisted dresses. As I passed, her friends would smile or wave, floral-printed teacups held in their white hands, the wind carrying away their whispered gossip. On a fair day, the breeze would carry their girlish laughter, and I would see the members of the living raise their heads, and I knew for a moment, they heard the ladies, too. Then the laughter would subside, leaving the mortals frowning in confusion, wondering why the tinkle of china seemed to emanate from the ancient oak.

One morning Alice came to breakfast, her eye fat and purple like a plum. Momma gave Alice a harsh look, but my aunt said nothing. All around, I could feel Grandma’s anger. When George came down, Momma had already left for work, so Alice scurried to the kitchen like a squirrel when he demanded eggs.

“Grandma doesn’t like it when you’re mean to Alice,” I told him.

“What kind of stories are they telling you?” he asked, his lip stretching into a sneer.

“They’re not stories, and she doesn’t want you to hurt Aunt Alice anymore.”

George leaned back in his chair, his smile reminding me of a snake. “Well, I don’t see what she can really do about it.” He gave me the leer usually reserved for Alice, and I fled to the attic. That night, when Grandma came to say goodnight, I heard her click the lock in my door.

Not long after, George found the door to the attic. I was having a picnic with my dolls, an old quilt spread in a sunbeam, when I heard the footsteps behind me.

“So this is where you hide from me.” His face was flushed and his eyes greedy. “Don’t be afraid. I just want to play, too,” he said, licking his lips.

But I was afraid. The ballroom was large, but the staircase was narrow, a servants’ entrance, really. I jumped from the quilt, feet tangling in the fabric, toy dishes shattering against the floor. My eyes searched the ballroom. As long as George stood near the door, I was trapped, and he knew it. Reaching for the buckle on his belt he said, “Hold still, this will only take a minute.”

A furious wind tore through the attic, and I heard Grandma’s angry moan. There were other voices in that raging storm, and I knew Grandma was not alone. Her friends were with her, and they were no longer the elegant and refined ladies of High Wine Street. George heard it, too, for his face grew pale and afraid.

“Close your eyes, Maggie,” Grandma’s voice urged. I covered my face with my hands, but could not help peeking between my fingers.

The semblance of flesh had disappeared from their bodies, leaving empty-socketed skeletons. Clumps of silvery, moss-like hair clung to their pale skulls, and yellowed teeth dangled from rotted gums. Dressed in winding sheets and tattered clothes, they whirled around George like a spectral cyclone, skeletal arms outstretched, reaching for his heart.

George’s eyes were wide in horror, his Adam’s apple bobbing soundlessly in his throat. He turned toward the narrow door, but it was already too late. The maelstrom of grave ghouls surrounded George, their burial shrouds encircling him like a noose. As they spun, the air grew heavy with the odor of decay, a vacuum sucking the fresh air from the room. My lungs burned, struggling for oxygen amidst the poisoned fumes. Slowly, they pulled George, dragging him toward the elevator shaft.

The door bent and bowed, fighting against the paranormal tornado. There was a metallic cry as the bolts tore away from the wood, clanging to the floor with a fierce crash. A cloud of splinters filled the air as one hinge ripped from the wall. With a final gasp, the door popped open like the smacking of hungry lips.

George began to scream, clawing at the churning air, his hands passing harmlessly through the spinning ghosts. The vortex moved inside the shaft, sweeping George inside like a whirlpool. His body was horizontal, white-knuckled fingers gripping the doorjamb as his feet were sucked into the darkness.

As one hand tore loose, he held it out to me, pleading. “Maggie! Please! Help me!”

I managed one step forward before a gentle gust of wind knocked me on my backside.

The spinning cloud of gray was barely visible, descending into the shaft’s depths. The force grew stronger, and I felt the air yanked from my lungs. George’s face twisted in agony as one-by-one, his fingers were slowly peeled from the doorframe by unseen hands. With a final, frantic grab for the door, George vanished. His tortured scream echoed from the elevator shaft, before being suddenly cut off by a soft thud.

The house began to rattle and shake, the ancient plaster falling like the ash at Pompeii. A rumble sounded deep in the house’s belly, and a blast of putrid air exploded from the shaft, tearing the shutters from the attic windows. Sunlight poured into the room, and the foul air at once became fresh and clear. Around me, I heard the chime of merry, youthful laughter. The scent of spring flowers encircled me, and then drifted out the shattered windows.

I heard a flurry of activity on the stairs. “Maggie! What’s happened?” Momma’s voice was shrill and her expression panicked, the dark irises of her eyes devoured by the black pupils.

All I could do was point to the grinning shaft. Grabbing my hand, we ran together into the basement. Momma and I never found George at the bottom of the elevator shaft, but the entrance to the old carriage tunnel had been bricked in by clumsy hands, and I knew Grandma had made certain he would never hurt us again.

Alice left a short time later. When I next saw her, she had a husband, and I had a baby cousin. My aunt did not stay long, but there was something in her eyes, a peace, that I had never seen before, not even in her girlhood photos.

I saw Grandma less and less as I grew older, but every now and then, when I was frightened or in pain, I would hear the soft notes of a piano, or the clink of teacups, and know I was safe under the protective gaze of the Ladies of High Wine Street.

THE END