Ghosts I Have Met | Page 3

months, and after several futile efforts to
wake him up, we finally disposed of him to our town crematory for
experimental purposes. I am told he burned very actively, and I believe
it, for to my certain knowledge he was very dry, and not so green as
some persons who had previously employed him affected to think. A
cold chill came over me as my eye rested upon the horrid visitor and
noted the greenish depths of his eyes and the claw-like formation of his
fingers, and my flesh began to creep like an inch-worm. At one time I
was conscious of eight separate corrugations on my back, and my arms
goose-fleshed until they looked like one of those miniature plaster casts
of the Alps which are so popular in Swiss summer resorts; but mentally
I was not disturbed at all. My repugnance was entirely physical, and, to
come to the point at once, I calmly offered the spectre a cigar, which it
accepted, and demanded a light. I gave it, nonchalantly lighting the
match upon the goose -fleshing of my wrist.
[Illustration: I TURNED ABOUT, AND THERE, FEARFUL TO SEE,
SAT THIS THING GRINNING AT ME.]
Now I admit that this was extraordinary and hardly credible, yet it
happened exactly as I have set it down, and, furthermore, I enjoyed the
experience. For three hours the thing and I conversed, and not once
during that time did my hair stop pulling away at my scalp, or the
repugnance cease to run in great rolling waves up and down my back.
If I wished to deceive you, I might add that pin-feathers began to grow

from the goose-flesh, but that would be a lie, and lying and I are not
friends, and, furthermore, this paper is not written to amaze, but to
instruct.
Except for its personal appearance, this particular ghost was not very
remarkable, and I do not at this time recall any of the details of our
conversation beyond the point that my share of it was not particularly
coherent, because of the discomfort attendant upon the fearful
hair-pulling process I was going through. I merely cite its coming to
prove that, with all the outward visible signs of fear manifesting
themselves in no uncertain manner, mentally I was cool enough to cope
with the visitant, and sufficiently calm and at ease to light the match
upon my wrist, perceiving for the first time, with an Edison-like
ingenuity, one of the uses to which goose-flesh might be put, and
knowing full well that if I tried to light it on the sole of my shoe I
should have fallen to the ground, my knees being too shaky to admit of
my standing on one leg even for an instant. Had I been mentally
overcome, I should have tried to light the match on my foot, and fallen
ignominiously to the floor then and there.
There was another ghost that I recall to prove my point, who was of
very great use to me in the summer immediately following the spring of
which I have just told you. You will possibly remember how that the
summer of 1895 had rather more than its fair share of heat, and that the
lovely New Jersey town in which I have the happiness to dwell
appeared to be the headquarters of the temperature. The thermometers
of the nation really seemed to take orders from Beachdale, and properly
enough, for our town is a born leader in respect to heat. Having no
property to sell, I candidly admit that Beachdale is not of an arctic
nature in summer, except socially, perhaps. Socially, it is the coolest
town in the State; but we are at this moment not discussing cordiality,
fraternal love, or the question raised by the Declaration of
Independence as to whether all men are born equal. The warmth we
have in hand is what the old lady called "Fahrenheat," and, from a
thermometric point of view, Beachdale, if I may be a trifle slangy, as I
sometimes am, has heat to burn. There are mitigations of this heat, it is
true, but they generally come along in winter.

I must claim, in behalf of my town, that never in all my experience
have I known a summer so hot that it was not, sooner or later--by
January, anyhow--followed by a cool spell. But in the summer of 1895
even the real-estate agents confessed that the cold wave announced by
the weather bureau at Washington summered elsewhere--in the tropics,
perhaps, but not at Beachdale. One hardly dared take a bath in the
morning for fear of being scalded by the fluid that flowed from the
cold-water faucet--our reservoir is entirely unprotected by shade-trees,
and in summer a favorite spot for young Waltons who like