Comments
Another entry in our Ghost Stories Blog Contest, this one comes from forum member Nancy W.
Once upon a time I had WAY too much furniture (still do) and decided to sell a couple pieces (not the family heirlooms) to an antiques dealer. The dealer and I arrived at the house at the same time. We entered the side door and had to walk across the entire length of the house to get to the oak buffet I had decided to sell, located in the side entrance hall I also forwarned her that she would see lots of things she would want to buy that were NOT for sale. As we walk through the first floor, she is of course asking about various items, we talk about them but slowly move on; taking about 15 minutes to walk the 50 or so feet to the main hall.
Once we are there, we discover the front door is sitting wide open and the skeleton key normally in the lock on the inside is missing. We wonder if someone has broken in, but see no sign of forced entry on the door. She asked if she could see the rest of the house, and I agreed. We talked very loudly saying if someone was still in the house they should go down the back stairs, and that we would be going very slowly to give any burglar time to escape. We never did see anyone. However I did notice that the rolltop desk that had accidentally been locked six months earlier and for which I do not have a key was open with the top rolled up. It locked when I was carefully rolling the top down to hide the clutter from company and the top suddenly took off and slammed shut. I had not been closing it all the way since I don’t have a key. (I now keep a note pad over the lock on the desk top to prevent “accidents” in the future.) Looking back now, I wonder if Uncle Trueman (the ghost) pulled the top down. The dealer and I went through the rest of the house uneventfully.
I called the Sheriff’s Dept after she left. The deputy came but could not find any sign of forced entry on the doors or windows. The lock on the desk was not damaged. He said it would be easy to force open, but there would be scratches on the tarnish of the brass lock or the wood around the lock would be splintered. As he knelt at the desk, looking at the lock, her turned to me and said, “Do you have a ghost?” I told him I had many unexplained happenings, but had not seen anything I could call a ghost. The only thing missing, and still missing, was the front door key.
We often have cousins, nieces and nephews of Uncle Trueman stop to visit (they are all elderly and dying off now). So I decided to refer to him as Uncle Trueman, and blame the unexplained things on him. I had been blaming things on all the kids that visit, but there were somethings, the kids just could not do. Example: My gravy making spoon disappeared after Thanksgiving, and was not available to make gravy at Christmas. I took everything out of the drawer several times and could not find it. Then in June when I went to get an ice cream scoop, there was the spoon, right on top of everything else. Where was it all those months?
