Jessie Goes….

There was not another soul to be found on my way home from the restaurant as the road turned down the steep slope to the old mansion, and the wind was picking up significantly. Chilly! I parked at the iron gate on the side of the house, as the owner had insisted; it was ajar and slowly making that metal on metal groan that old gates do in certain weather and on Scooby Doo cartoons. I grabbed the heavy latch as I passed quickly through, and pulled the the gate shut with a solid clank behind me. “Good luck, ol car, you’re on your own”.

I crept as silent as possible up the back brick pathway in the heavy gloom, through the garden and towards the glass enclosed conservatory, the keys clutched in my hand. As I made it to the door, looking through the glass walls I could see little lamp lights all on, scattered throughout the house, as if I were late for a dinner party! There was definitely not a light on when I’d left earlier. I looked at my watch, 8pm. “Hello?” (echo echo), Hello? My footsteps bounced into the long hallway, there was nobody here but us chickens. Hmmm, I though, that is one heck of a timer system they’ve got worked in here for such an old house. I wonder if they all go off at a certain time too?

The house was quiet and empty. Really quiet and really empty, and lit in a fashion that was positively forelorn. I hightailed it to my room and locked myself in. Which, of course, was ridiculous, as we all know… THERE IS NO ONE ELSE HERE. But the hall the conservatory and the parlor all seemed creeky, and I still had that feeling that somehow the guy from the bar was waiting outside. Unfortunately, before I had realized he was a mega scary, the bartender had asked where I was staying and I told him (and anyone else who might be listening). Good grief, I would be the first one dead in a slasher flick…could I do any more stupid things? I looked at the ridiculous boltlock on the door thinking if he was in the room I was so screwed.

I sat on my bed, in the dim light, briefly trying to recall which room had the secret passage to the library in Clue. What would the place have been like if other guests had been here? Would we have gathered in the drawing room for brandy, telling tall tales until the lights went out in a crack of lightning, to find moments later that the butler was now dead on the floor? Maybe its better that I am the only one here. I was smiling to myself at this bit of ridiculousness of course. I really couldn’t get over how amazingly spooky this place was acting, it seemed almost a set up.. and I’ll be d@mned if it wasn’t starting to get FREEZING in here. Shivering I pulled out my computer and cellphone and pulled down the covers. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do for the next hours, but staying right here wasn’t seeming that bad. Going out to find the air conditioner control seemed a bit out of the question at the moment.

My heartrate had ratcheted down, as no crazed lunatic from the bar was smashing an ugly mug in the window, nothing was under the bed or in the tub, but I called Rob just to go through the tale, as I was feeling that a good talk to someone while I was in here would make things seem back to normal.

Ring. Ring. The receiver picked up. “hello?” but before hello could actually get all the way out, the phone dropped dead. I looked at my phone, curious faced, and it seemed all well, 4 of 5 bars, power on, bright blue screen all aglow. I dialed again. It picked up, but went directly to voicemail. I dialed again, 2 minutes later, then 5 minutes later. Voicemail voicemail, voicemail. I finally left one “hi honey, its me, for some reason I’m not getting you, give me a call when you get the message”. A half an hour went by, no call back. It was getting unbearably cold in here, and aside from being annoyed that I couldn’t call out (its like the old house had faulty wiring that was affecting my boyfriends phone), I was getting restless. It also turned out that there wasn’t a single three pronged plug in the entire room. My computer was going to boot up and have about 2 minutes before shutting itself back down again.

I was going to have to go back outside.

The wind was rattling the mullioned window panes all around the house as I stepped out of the Library.. it was 20 degrees warmer out here, so I left the door wide open, computer and cable under my arm in search of a 21st century plug. After 2 hours in the house with no bad happenings, things weren’t looking so creapy afterall, so I decided it was time to take a video of this place to capture ‘the ambiance’.

Walking slowly into each of the dim rooms with the camera I did a double take when I came to one room… not only did it have the most haunted picture of a girl dressed in white in it, but it also had a gaslights?? I could have sworn there were none in here. At that moment a heard a clank and what sounded like a few steps. I stopped, heartrate back up again and looked around the corner at the back door.. nothing. Nothing at the front door either.

“I should go back in my room” I thought to myself, but didn’t go. I started filming again, walking with my back towards the backdoor. As I was staring at the camera LCD pretty intently, trying to keep it steady, I failed to notice the dark figure behind me. I heard a noise, a soft noise, and then what seemed like a crack of a floorboard! I jerked, heart in my throat, almost dropping the camera, and whirled around to find a figure just five feet behind me in the shadow……

Suffice it to say, I survived. 🙂

What I did:
Corners Mansion Inn, prop. Macy Whitney, 601-636-7421 (and she really is a lovely lady, and knows her Vicksburg history, and the history of the house.. I had breakfast with her in grand style, and she reports she has never seen a ghost, though many people have come to look!)

AND if you really want to get a feel for the house, check out the video posted! 🙂 Its the one I was taking right at the very end here…. complete with sudden stoppage! And keep the sound on for the full effect!

Its not really just the house thats a little creepy in Vicksburg. The whole town seems a little anxious. A poor desperate anxious. And there are a lot of poorer areas of the south don’t get me wrong, but they seem to have a gracious poorness about them. Nothing sinister or dangerous. Just not very weathly, is all.

Not here, and I’m not sure if the lady at the B&B put me in this mindframe or the town really is sending me the heebie-jeebies, but I definitely feel the inclination to look over my shoulder, like I’m in a dark alley. Like something is about to go bad wrong. And this is despite the historical buildings, pretty streets, bright sunshine and river views. It felt like getting off the subway in certain parts of Harlem, and having to walk a few blocks. Menacing even though nothing seems wrong on the surface.

There is one main street in the town which is completely refurbished, looks great, and has the old courthouse museum overlooking it on a large hill. I stopped there, parked my car, triple locked it, and went to check on the little restaurant which looked pretty upscale. I wasn’t taking chances. Eggplant parmesan was coming my way, after a few minutes at the bar, where everyone knew everyone elses name, and they were all roaring drunk. The town catholic priest was sitting on one side of me, and a guy who told me he was a pilot, a construction worker/architect, an army commando, a lawyer etc blah blah blah. You wouldn’t believe what an absolute absurd jerk this guy was… I tried to say as little as possible, as he took everything so far I stated (“oh, my boyfriend is a pilot too”) as a challenge to his manhood, he started in with “I don’t like your attitude, you are arrogant” to which I said “I haven’t said a single thing to you that was not pleasant hellos so, if you don’t want to talk to me thats fine with me, and I’m sorry you feel that way”. The man looked absolutely evil and angry. “you didn’t say anything arrogant, you just are, I can tell by the way you look. You know one day you’ll get whats coming to you” he whispered.

This man was creepy! Violent and herky jerky too. Whats funny is he did it only when the priest got up to talk to his other drinking buddy chums. Then he started with the straight staring at me, then ” I kind of like you, you are gorgeous and your about the only one in here intellgent enough to interact with me” oh brother. This guy was a psychotic, stuck on himself, lying, leerer on top of it. I wolfed down some of my eggplant, now not hungry in the slightest, and the hairs on the back of my neck were standing on end. He had both physically threaten me and come on to me, in back to back sentences. I still had to pay, and I didn’t want to go out to my car a few blocks down the street and have him follow me. This sometimes, unfortunately, is what you have to put up with when you are a girl travelling alone, just saying hello sometimes can land you in a scary place before you know it. It hasn’t happened to me in a while, but several times in NYC I was on the receiving line of similar conduct as well.

Fortunately FINALLY the drunk priest sort of realized that this guy was really being a jerk and scaring me, and put himself between us. The bartender, the priest, and I continued have a good conversation, and I learned a lot about the town, and people through him… he was a character, but a really nice guy.

The jerk on the end of the bar was getting really drunk now, I mean fall off the stool drunk. Thank god. I tried my best not to provoke him farther which meant acknowledging him every few minutes or so, lest he say something like “what, you think your too good for me?” kind of stuff, and was praying he’d just get up and leave. It was getting dark outside.

As the priest rambled on, discussing the troubles with Vicksburg, which are numerous (clearly), the man finally left, as the sun was most likely right on the horizon. I paid, and rapidly tried to extricate myself from conversation…. now wishing I’d watched the direction the guy went.
Look left look right. Nope, no guy. I practically ran to my car.

Safe, holy moly. Not what I had in mind. And I still had the house to deal with… over the Mississippi I saw the last trace of sun vanish… we were in heavy twilight. I took a deep breath and looked in my rearview window….not only was there no guy, but there was nobody else, period. Anywhere. Seriously spooked I looked in my backseat before I took off…just in case I was in the Hitchcock zone.