Apologies to Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Washington Irving and Snoopy...
Author's note:
This is my entry for the 2020 Halloween Contest, definitely written as an attempt at Humor and Satire. There's no deep, philosophical meaning... just having some fun with stereotypes. I hope you enjoy it, regardless of the contest, although voting and constructive comments are how I know how well I am pleasing you, the reader. Cheers!
*~*~*~*~*
It was a dark and stormy night...
Well, actually it was. But I suppose I should back up a bit.
In my defense, I didn't do it. I didn't create her and I couldn't get rid of her.
I suppose I could have sold the house and land, and it would've solved my problem, or
maybe
it would have, but somehow that just didn't seem right.
She
was Jacqueline Marie Albright Raczynski, French-English wife of Count Wilhelm Aleksander Raczynski, a Polish nobleman who had emigrated to the Americas in the 1700's and had become important in the banking and military supply trades, eventually providing horses and materiel to his countryman, Kazimierz Pulaski, among others.
She
was also the victim of uxoricide.
Apparently, she caught her husband in the arms and other parts of one Elizabeth Adelstone. Rather than risk damage to his reputation, his wife surprisingly died in her sleep shortly after the discovery. So did Elizabeth. All from natural causes, of course, if one can call crushed cherry, peach and apricot pits mixed with crushed Nux Vomica seeds and blossoms "natural."
I got all this after regaining consciousness, after my first meeting with Countess Raczynski.
It was a dark and stormy night... I think I said that already. Okay, so it didn't start out as a dark and stormy night.
I'd inherited the land and buildings, such as they were, from an uncle I had never met, and it would be charitable to call it a farm, although the deed referred to it as such. I had an appointment with the bank and the lawyers on the morning of November 2nd, and I was expected to be familiar with the property and ready to sign a bunch of legal waivers and such.
When do I find out about this? Friday, October 30th, at work. So what do I do? I leave after work on the 30th, throw some clothes and sundries in the car and drive all damn night, 15 hours plus stops from Chicago, getting to the property mid-morning on the 31st. Did I check ahead to see what hotels were available? Did I think about restaurants? Or grocery stores? Did I... well, obviously not.
So I eased down the long, overgrown lane to the house -- for want of a better word -- surrounded by collapsing split rail fences. I pulled into what I supposed was the front yard and parked, getting out to take a look around. If it wasn't prime South Carolina real estate just outside Jamestown and with a lot of potential, I probably would have gotten back in the car, driven to town and sold it to the first person to make me an offer.
The operative word here was potential. The place itself was falling apart. I took my cold coffee with me as I checked out the house. It might have been nice in its day. In fact, it probably was. Classic fieldstone foundation, thick cut timbers, shake shingle roof... what was left of it. Most of the siding needed major help, and a bunch of wild animals would have to be relocated. It had the basics of a living room, dining room and kitchen, and some kind of indoor plumbing -- probably septic -- on the first floor, with a stairway that led to a second floor. That's where I found the bedrooms. A big one I presumed was the master bedroom and three smaller ones.
I got intrigued by some of the furniture, I'll admit. There was a really nice old half-canopy bed in the master bedroom and some fairly solid simpler ones in the other bedrooms. There were marble-topped commodes, including washstands, highboys, lowboys and a dressing table. I was surprised nobody had looted the place. There was a really nice, huge cedar chest which, when I opened it, still had bedding in it, neatly put away. No evidence of insect or vermin damage.
I decided I'd seen enough of the house and headed on out to walk the grounds. First up was a dilapidated shed which held the remains of a tractor and a bunch of tools. 1920's or so, from the looks of them. Beyond it was a much larger barn with pens and milking stalls in the foundation and a fairly hefty hayloft above. Beyond that were a pair of silos attached to the barn and two other sheds. One turned out to be a corn crib, the other an oat bin, based on what was left scattered inside. I didn't see anything for storing wheat, so they'd probably threshed and sacked it at harvest, using it year 'round.
I found the small stand of sugar maples beyond the oat bin and a clear running brook beyond those. Most of the fields were overgrown at this point, although you could see the delineations from the rows of trees and low rock walls. By the time I got done walking around the property, it was getting into late afternoon and the temperature was dropping. There were storm clouds gathering to the west and I realized I'd better find a hotel or I'd be sleeping in the car. Not particularly appetizing after driving 15 hours.
I pulled out my cell phone and discovered two things immediately. One, there were between zero and one bars for the phone and two, no 4G LTE for data. No anything for data, for that matter. So Google wasn't going to be helpful in finding a hotel on Saturday afternoon. That meant, get my ass back in the car and drive the half hour or whatever it was to town and try again. I was still tossing over in my mind whether I wanted to keep the place when I stuck my key in the ignition, turned it and got nothing. Not even a whimper of the starter trying to turn over.
Several choice words escaped my lips as I tried again. And again, got nothing. Continuing to vent rather colorful profanities, I got out, opened the hood and saw absolutely nothing wrong. I walked through every troubleshooting procedure I could think of, including breaking down and actually reading the owner's manual in the glove compartment. Less than useful, that. And nothing worked. It was getting cold, it would be getting wet, and I was stuck 5 miles from where God lost his sandals.
Not one to wait for disaster to strike, because I knew it would, I started figuring out what I could do. The car would keep me dry, but without the heater it was going to get cold. I could raid that cedar chest for something to bundle up in. Actually, when I thought about it, I had time to see if the fireplace worked. God knows there was enough dry, dead wood lying around. Hell, the house was made of it. All I had to do was stay warm and dry until the storm passed. Then I could see about making my way into town.
I went back into the house and checked out the fireplace. It looked okay, but there might have been something living in it, for all I knew. So I went to the barn and found some old oil-soaked rags and brought them back. Ever the Boy Scout, I went and got my first aid kit out of the trunk and the butane lighter contained therein. One flaming oil-soaked rag showed me that there was a draft through the chimney and I didn't hear anything scurrying to get out, so I put some wood in and some kindling, and got a fire going. While it was building up, I went upstairs and emptied the cedar chest. Not quite a sleeping bag, but with one of the old mattresses as a base, it would do.
Food was going to be rough, but again, I traveled prepared. In my emergency stuff in the trunk was a surplus canteen/cup combo that I could make a packet of dried soup in, and I had a few bottles of water. If I needed more, I figured I could go raid the stream and drop some Aquatabs in it. Or catch some of the rain runoff when the storm hit.
Well, at least this isn't the camping trip from Hell
, I thought as I got my impromptu nest set up.
That was Governor Dodge State Park. The walk to town's gonna be a bitch, though...
Someday I'm going to learn not to presume like that.
The wind was picking up to a dull roar and I could smell the rain coming. My car was stuck where it was, so I pulled out everything I thought I'd need, made sure I had a huge stack of dry firewood and settled in to have some supper and consider my fortunes, which weren't feeling all that fortunate at that moment.
All in all, though, it wasn't that bad. The old stone fireplace got up to a good even heat and the bedding was okay. A couple of big cups of soup and my hunger was sated while my insides were nice and warm. I settled down to doze and dream, listening to the storm unleash its fury outside.
And unleash it did. Several times I was on the edge of falling out when a brilliant flash of nearby lightning and an earth-rocking boom of thunder would rip me out of my drowsiness and back to full waking. It was annoying, and yet it wasn't the worst I'd ever encountered. A couple of my camping experiences in the Boy Scouts and a few in college had much more severe weather and I'd done okay.
The problem was, after one particularly nasty and nearby strike, as the light faded, she didn't.
She
was standing near the stairway, translucent, white and naked. Startled the bejeezus out of me.
"Who the hell are you???" is what came out of my mouth.
"Ooo ze 'ell are
you???
" she demanded. "And what are
you
doing in
