Free Night Stalks The Mansion: A True Story Of One Family's Ghostly Adventure by Constance Westbie, Harold Cameron

from New Mexico for
a visit, I phoned Elda Clare and asked if she had confided
in them regarding her experiences in the house. She had not.
    "I didn't tell them a word, Harold. You know them as
well as I do. They simply wouldn't have believed me-so I
thought it best to let well enough alone."
    However, the first night they were with us, we explained
the situation.
    My dad had been a pastor in Dodge City in Kansas, in
Hutchinson and in Kansas City. He was loved and respected.
Mother was a person in her own right and had led an interesting life-as well as a practical and espectable one. In
addition to being a pastor's wife with all the attendant extracurricular activities, she had served as matron and assistant
superintendent of the Missouri Penitentiary for Women.
In that capacity she "sat" with Bonnie Brown Headly, a
convicted murderer, during her last thirty days on earth.
Mother was efficient, mentally alert, and at the age of
eighty-one, was to publish a book entitled Looking Through
the Windows. She was compassionate and practical and her
emotions were always under control. After the now-familiar
recital, my parents stared at me with mixed emotions.
    Dad shook his head solemnly. "This has to be a case of
mass-hallucination," he said at last. "I'm a little surprised at you, Harold. But I suppose it is more or less natural to
be overly imaginative in an old place like this."

    I was slightly nettled. "What do you mean? I've been in
a lot of old places before. This is something entirely different."
    "But you haven't lived in those old places," he pointed
out. "This house has an entirely different atmosphere."
    "I grant you that," I retorted. "But what created this
atmosphere in the first place?"
    He was thinking up an answer to that when I looked over
at my mother. She had the same expression on her face that
she wore when, in my boyhood, she'd felt it necessary to
wash my mouth out with soap.
    "Tsch, tsch, Harold," she said reprovingly.
    I shrugged in resignation. Elda Clare had been right.
"Well, I just thought I'd tell you how things are around
here," I said weakly.
    Dorothy had remained silent through my recital and she
now ushered my parents up to their room. When she came
back I lifted an eyebrow in silent interrogation. She only
shook her head.
    "They wouldn't even discuss it," she replied. "Maybe
things will go all right. We can only hope for the best."
    There were no footsteps to their room during their visit,
nor did the odor bother them. There was one incident,
which seemed out of character, but still unbelievable.
    We had a heavy snowfall the second day they were with
us and that night we all stood at the window admiring the
beauty of the unblemished white landscape. The next
morning Mother came down to breakfast absolutely beaming.
    "You dear children," she smiled. "What a sweet thing
to dol"
    "What do you mean?" Dorothy asked.
    "That lovely vase of flowersl How did you find such
beautiful ones at this time of year? They are a perfect spring
bouquet." She stopped then and looked puzzled. "Where did you get them? Did you have them flown in just for me?
Were they delivered during the night?"

    Dorothy and I exchanged bewildered glances.
    "We had nothing to do with it," I disclaimed. Mother
looked over at Hal and Bob who shook their heads, equally
mystified. We trooped up the stairs after her to see the
flower arrangement that had so pleased her. There was a
flower-filled vase on her dresser and it was as lovely as she
had described.
    Dorothy fingered the fluted vase and I suddenly remembered where I had last seen it. It had been on the dressing
table in the master bathroom which was just across the hall
from our bedroom, but quite a distance down the hall from
the suite we had assigned to my parents.
    "Isn't that your vase?" I asked Dorothy.
    "It certainly isl I keep it in the bathroom to hold my imported soaps. It's been empty fora week now."
    Mother was perplexed.