of information here?”
“Not much in the books. I can tell you a little bit about them if you want. I’m going out for a cigarette in about ten minutes; if you want I will meet you outside.” The girl spoke quietly as if there was some huge secret that she was hiding.
“Really?” Drew didn’t know whether to be excited or afraid. She had grown up around this place. How was it that moving companies and taxi cab drivers were automatically afraid of coming close to her house and that funky little librarians knew the story of a couple that died one hundred and fifty years ago and she didn’t know a damn thing.
The girl just nodded her head and went back to reading her book. Drew went back outside and sat on the steps of the library and waited. She closed her eyes and took in the smells of the city. She absent mindedly reached into her boot and pulled out a pack of cigarettes and a lighter out of her pocket. When she inhaled that first puff it gave her a headache and almost made her sick, but the taste was amazing. She hadn’t smoked in two days and hadn’t even missed it.
“Hmm. Strange.” she said as she looked at the cigarette then smashed it on the stairs.
“So, you bought the O’Keefe house, huh? Have you stayed there yet? You won’t stay long when you do.” She said as she sat next to Drew and lit her own cigarette.
“I’ve stayed there two nights actually. It isn’t so bad. Can you tell me about them? I saw their graves today.”
The girl’s eyes widened. “You have stayed the re? I’ve heard that the ghost of Brendan O’Keefe haunts that house and that Miss Lezetta haunts the cemetery. Have you met them?”
“Well, not technically. What do you know about them? Was she a voodoo queen or something?”
“Well, I don’t know if you know much about Voodoo, it was quite popular then, that was when Marie Laveau was still alive, and because Marie Laveau was such a powerful woman the law didn’t say much to anyone who practiced it. Lezetta was believed to practice something as well only it wasn’t voodoo. It was some kind of black magic. All kinds of people would go to Miss Laveau for help with love, money, sex, that kind of thing. Lezetta supposedly worked other kinds of magic, magic that caused harm to people, even death.
“From what I have heard, she was breathtakingly beautiful. Coal dark hair that matched her eyes and well, I suppose her heart too. Her skin was a gorgeous bronze. She was Creole but the Spanish obviously out shown the French. Anyway, the story is that she worked for Brendan who moved to America after his parents died in Ireland. He had been left responsible for his sister whom Lezetta didn’t get along with. They were always at it I guess. Anyway, Brendan and Lezetta evidently fell madly in love with each other, probably a spell that she put on him, and they became inseparable.
“One evening Brendan’s sister, Mary Ann, who was very popular with the gentlemen and was at the time courting several of them, went missing. Her body was found a few days later somewhere behind the house in the swamps. Her eyes were gone and she had some type of markings engraved in her skin.
“The townspeople automatically assumed that it was
Lezetta. They had been suspicious of her witchery for quite some time. After Mary Ann’s murder they were certain. Some people believe that the heartbroken men just needed someone to blame it on. Others believe that some heartbroken, jealous man did it and made it look like witch craft. Either way, they came straight for Lezetta and burned her right there where the cemetery is now.”
Drew was speechless. What a horrible story. What a horrible way to die, for both girls.
“Well, I’ve got to get back to work. I hope that helped you out some. I wouldn’t be hanging out too close to that cemetery if I were you though.”
“Wait!” Drew yelled as she realized the girl was going back inside the library. “Who burns the candles?”
“What?” The girl asked almost stumbling as she turned quickly around.
“The candles at the grave and the coins, who did all of that?” Drew watched the girl as the wheels were obviously turning in her head.
“Oh, beats me. As far as I know no one has been there for a very, very long time.