CELEBRATION OF SPECIAL HOLIDAYS

Black Aggie
A Maryland Ghost Story

retold by

S. E. Schlosser

When Felix Agnus put up the life-sized shrouded bronze statue of a grieving angel,
seated on a pedestal, in the Agnus family plot in the Druid Ridge Cemetery,
he had no idea what he had started. The statue was a rather eerie figure by day,
frozen in a moment of grief and terrible pain. At night, the figure was almost
unbelievably creepy; the shroud over its head obscuring the face until you were up
close to it. There was a living air about the grieving angel,
as if its arms could really reach out and grab you if you weren't careful.

It didn't take long for rumors to sweep through the town and surrounding countryside.
They said that the statue - nicknamed Black Aggie - was haunted by the spirit
of a mistreated wife who lay beneath her feet. The statue's eyes would glow red
at the stroke of midnight, and any living person who returned the statues gaze
would instantly be struck blind. Any pregnant woman who passed through her
shadow would miscarry. If you sat on her lap at night, the statue would come to life
and crush you to death in her dark embrace. If you spoke Black Aggie's name
three times at midnight in front of a dark mirror, the evil angel would appear
and pull you down to hell. They also said that spirits of the dead would rise
from their graves on dark nights to gather around the statue at night.

People began visiting the cemetery just to see the statue,
and it was then that the local fraternity decided to make the statue of Grief
part of their initiation rites. "Black Aggie" sitting, where candidates for membership
had to spend the night crouched beneath the statue with their backs to the
grave of General Agnus, became popular.

One dark night, two fraternity members accompanied new hopeful to the cemetery
and watched while he took his place underneath the creepy statue.
The clouds had obscured the moon that night, and the whole area surrounding
the dark statue was filled with a sense of anger and malice. It felt as if a storm
were brewing in that part of the cemetery, and to their chagrin,
the two fraternity members noticed that gray shadows seemed to be clustering
around the body of the frightened fraternity candidate crouching in front of the statue.

What had been a funny initiation rite suddenly took on an air of danger.
One of the fraternity brothers stepped forward in alarm to call out to the initiate.
As he did, the statue above the boy stirred ominously. The two fraternity brothers
froze in shock as the shrouded head turned toward the new candidate.
They saw the gleam of glowing red eyes beneath the concealing
hood as the statue's arms reached out toward the cowering boy.

With shouts of alarm, the fraternity brothers leapt forward to rescue the new initiate.
But it was too late. The initiate gave one horrified yell, and then his body
disappeared into the embrace of the dark angel. The fraternity brothers skidded
to a halt as the statue thoughtfully rested its glowing eyes upon them.
With gasps of terror, the boys fled from the cemetery before the statue could grab them too.

Hearing the screams, a night watchman hurried to the Agnus plot.
To his chagrin, he discovered the body of a young man lying at the
foot of the statue. The young man had apparently died of fright.

The disruption caused by the statue grew so acute that the Agnus family finally donated
it to the Smithsonian museum in Washington D.C.. The grieving angel sat
for many years in storage there, never again to plague
the citizens visiting the Druid Hill Park Cemetery.

Ghost in the Stacks
A Pennsylvania Ghost Story

retold by

S. E. Schlosser



I saw her out of the corner of my eye while I was studying in a remote corner of the second-level stacks in the library.
She was pretty, with reddish hair and pensive, wide eyes in an intelligent face.
I straightened up, patted my hair to make sure it was smooth, and took another look.
She was gone. I felt my shoulders sag a bit as I turned back to my books. Oh well.
There were more important things, like studying hard so that I got into medical school when I graduated next year.

Still, I kept seeing the girl's pretty face whenever I closed my eyes, and I was still thinking
about her as I left the library. A few of my friends shouted to me and I walked over to their gathering place.

"Where've you been, Tony?" my friend Jeff called.

"At the library," I said, patting my backpack for emphasis.

"You have been studying?" Jeff asked incredulously.

I grinned. "I've gotta crack down now so I can get into med school,"
I replied to his jibe. "Can't always be partying with you losers!"

That set them off, as I had intended, and kept the jokes flying until dinnertime.

Although I didn't admit it to myself, I chose the same spot in the stacks for my studies
the following afternoon, hoping to see the pretty girl again. I was in luck. After about an hour,
she appeared among the shelves, browsing intently. I noticed that she was wearing the same
red flowered dress with a buttoned-down white sweater. She must like that outfit.
It was time for me to do some browsing too, I thought, straightening my shirt and rising casually.
I turned to walk into the shelves and stopped abruptly. She was gone! I was astonished.
She must be quick, I thought. It had only taken me a few seconds to rise and turn,
but in that short time she had managed to move away without me seeing her do so.
I walked casually through the stacks, glancing this way and that, trying to spot her again.
No luck. With a sigh, I turned back to my seat and my studies, a frustrated man.

I didn't see the girl again for several weeks. Then one day, as I rushed out of the stacks
towards my friend Jeff, who was impatiently beckoning to me to hurry up, I saw her rising
from a seat in a far corner. I stopped abruptly and turned, hoping to catch her eye as she
moved into the stacks, but she did not turn her head. Ignoring Jeff,
who was calling my name impatiently, I backtracked in the hope of at least walking passed
her and saying hello. I stopped at the entrance of the stacks where the pretty girl
with reddish hair had just walked. There was no one there. I shivered a bit.
This was getting spooky. Was she avoiding me? Why? We had never spoken,
and I certainly could not be accused of staring at her, since I had only seen her
for a total of maybe thirty seconds! Shaking my head at the mystery,
I went back over to Jeff and exited the library.

Later that week, I decided to skip the football game to cram for a big exam.
Just about everyone else was at the game, so the library was nearly deserted
as I strolled over to my favorite study spot in the stacks on the second level.
I'd given up on seeing the pretty girl with the reddish hair.
Obviously, some things were just not meant to be.

I was deep into my studies when I heard the sound of books and shelves tumbling to the floor.
I leapt up and ran toward the sounds. To my horror, the pretty red-haired girl whom
I'd been trying to meet lay on the floor with books all around her.
She was unconscious, and my heart gave a painful thump when I realized that there
was blood staining her red dress. And then, right before my eyes, she vanished.
I sat down abruptly on the floor, my legs shaking too hard to hold me. I had just seen a ghost.

It was then that I remembered the story of the girl who had been murdered in the library
back in the sixties. I knew at once that it was her. I had just seen the reenactment of her final
moments of life. I buried my face in my shaking hands, feeling a terrible grief at the tragic loss
of such a beautiful girl. From what I had heard, her murderer was never apprehended.
It made me furious to think that justice had never been served. Slowly, I uncoiled my body
and rose to my feet. The aisle between the stacks was empty now, and so was my heart.
I was too unnerved to study anymore in this deserted place, so I grabbed my books and went back to my room.

I saw the girl one more time before I graduated. I was reading at my favorite study cartel when I felt a chill in the air.
I shivered and looked up. And there was the ghost of the pretty girl, standing a few
feet away from me. Our eyes met, and I saw fear and despair in her face.
Immediately, my own face twisted in sympathy, and I impulsively held out my hand toward her.
At the sight of my distress, she reached her hand back toward me as
if to comfort me, and she gave me a tiny smile. Then she was gone.

In that moment, I knew wherever the girl had gone after her death, she was just fine.
And I felt sure that someday, somewhere, her killer would be brought to justice;
if not in this world, then most assuredly in the next.

Axe Murder Hollow
A Pennsylvania Ghost Story

retold by S.E. Schlosser

Susan and Ned were driving through a wooded empty section of highway.
Lightning flashed, thunder roared, the sky went dark in the torrential downpour.
“We’d better stop,” said Susan.
Ned nodded his head in agreement. He stepped on the brake, and suddenly
the car started to slide on the slick pavement. They plunged off the road
and slid to a halt at the bottom of an incline.
Pale and shaking, Ned quickly turned to check if Susan was all right.
When she nodded, Ned relaxed and looked through the rain soaked windows.
“I’m going to see how bad it is,” he told Susan, and when out into the storm.
She saw his blurry figure in the headlight, walking around the front of the car.
A moment later, he jumped in beside her, soaking wet.
“The car’s not badly damaged, but we’re wheel-deep in mud,” he said.
“I’m going to have to go for help.”
Susan swallowed nervously. There would be no quick rescue here.
He told her to turn off the headlights and lock the doors until he returned.
Axe Murder Hollow. Although Ned hadn’t said the name aloud,
they both knew what he had been thinking when he told her to lock the car.
This was the place where a man had once taken an axe and hacked his wife
to death in a jealous rage over an alleged affair. Supposedly, the axe-wielding
spirit of the husband continued to haunt this section of the road.
Outside the car, Susan heard a shriek, a loud thump, and a strange gurgling noise.
But she couldn’t see anything in the darkness.
Frightened, she shrank down into her seat. She sat in silence for a while,
and then she noticed another sound. Bump. Bump. Bump.
It was a soft sound, like something being blown by the wind.
Suddenly, the car was illuminated by a bright light. An official sounding voice
told her to get out of the car. Ned must have found a police officer.
Susan unlocked the door and stepped out of the car.
As her eyes adjusted to the bright light, she saw it.
Hanging by his feet from the tree next to the car was the dead body of Ned.
His bloody throat had been cut so deeply that he was nearly decapitated.
The wind swung his corpse back and forth so that it thumped against the tree.
Bump. Bump. Bump.
Susan screamed and ran toward the voice and the light.
As she drew close, she realized the light was not coming from a flashlight.
Standing there was the glowing figure of a man with a smile on his face
and a large, solid, and definitely real axe in his hands.
She backed away from the glowing figure until she bumped into the car.
“Playing around when my back was turned,” the ghost whispered,
stroking the sharp blade of the axe with his fingers.
“You’ve been very naughty.”
The last thing she saw was the glint of the axe blade in the eerie, incandescent light.

Bloody Mary
excerpted from Spooky Pennsylvania

retold by S.E. Schlosser


She lived deep in the forest in a tiny cottage and sold herbal remedies for a living.
Folks living in the town nearby called her Bloody Mary, and said she was a witch.
None dared cross the old crone for fear that their cows would go dry,
their food-stores rot away before winter, their children take sick of fever,
or any number of terrible things that an angry witch could do to her neighbors.

Then the little girls in the village began to disappear, one by one.
No one could find out where they had gone. Grief-stricken families
searched the woods, the local buildings, and all the houses and barns,
but there was no sign of the missing girls. A few brave souls even went
to Bloody Mary's home in the woods to see if the witch had taken the girls,
but she denied any knowledge of the disappearances. Still, it was noted
that her haggard appearance had changed. She looked younger, more attractive.
The neighbors were suspicious, but they could find no proof that the witch had taken their young ones.

Then came the night when the daughter of the miller rose from her bed and walked outside,
following an enchanted sound no one else could hear. The miller's wife had a toothache and
was sitting up in the kitchen treating the tooth with an herbal remedy when her daughter
left the house. She screamed for her husband and followed the girl out of the door.
The miller came running in his nightshirt. Together, they tried to restrain the girl,
but she kept breaking away from them and heading out of town.

The desperate cries of the miller and his wife woke the neighbors.
They came to assist the frantic couple. Suddenly, a sharp-eyed farmer gave a shout
and pointed towards a strange light at the edge of the woods.
A few townsmen followed him out into the field and saw Bloody Mary standing
beside a large oak tree, holding a magic wand that was pointed towards the
miller's house. She was glowing with an unearthly light as she set her
evil spell upon the miller's daughter.

The townsmen grabbed their guns and their pitchforks and ran toward the witch.
When she heard the commotion, Bloody Mary broke off her spell and fled back
into the woods. The far-sighted farmer had loaded his gun with silver bullets
in case the witch ever came after his daughter. Now he took aim and shot at her.
The bullet hit Bloody Mary in the hip and she fell to the ground.
The angry townsmen leapt upon her and carried her back into the field,
where they built a huge bonfire and burned her at the stake.

As she burned, Bloody Mary screamed a curse at the villagers.
If anyone mentioned her name aloud before a mirror, she would send her spirit
to revenge herself upon them for her terrible death. When she was dead,
the villagers went to the house in the wood and found the unmarked graves
of the little girls the evil witch had murdered.
She had used their blood to make her young again.

From that day to this, anyone foolish enough to chant Bloody Mary's name
three times before a darkened mirror will summon the vengeful spirit of the witch.
It is said that she will tear their bodies to pieces and rip their souls from their
mutilated bodies. The souls of these unfortunate ones will burn in torment as
Bloody Mary once was burned, and they will be trapped forever in the mirror.