Last weekend, I went back to see Ida – I call her Queen Ida – in her shack deep in the woods, in sight of country dirt road. Ida has been around a long time – she won’t say anything but that it’s older than 80 and younger than 100. I asked her to help me with my ghost story. To figure out Rose’s role, the reason I found my inkwell and bottle and grave marker, why I didn’t see the farmhouse and barn foundations for six years, what this means for me.

Ida describes herself as a little witchy, and something of a shaman. I believe it. I told her my story, how Rose and I encountered Alexander on the path one night soon after I came to the farm. And how I never saw him again.

How Rose would never stop or explore the woods where the foundation was.

How she stopped there and stared into the woods one day and led me to find the inkwell.

How Alexander’s wife left letters for him to find as she and her three children died of fever.

Ida loves this story, and other ghost stories. On Halloween, before her arthritis got back, she used to go to Halloween parties in local farmhouses and scare the wits out of the farm kids. She asked me a hundred questions, including whether anyone or thing I loved died recently. I told her the story of Rose. Why was the inkwell left for me?, I asked. What was Rose’s role? what is mine?

Ida said there are four elements to the story. Me, the ghost we call Alexander, Rose and Alexander’s wife. By word-of-mouth, says Ida, she was an educated woman from New York City. Rose did not like Alexander, she said, mostly because he was a restless man, once a farmer wedded to the land, now a spirit without a home or place.  Rose was afraid of that. Rose connected with his wife, not with him. Rose connected with this brave and heartbroken woman, not with her husband. But because she saw him, confronted him on the path, then she became part of the family’s spirit life, in the way of animals. Because she was grounded forever in the house where her children died, and could never leave. Rose did not fear her there, only the wandering spirit of her grief-stricken husband. She would not go near the foundation when he occupied it, but the woman came to her and showed her the inkwell, she led me to it because she wanted me to find it.

What is the point of this? I said. It is the wife’s request, sent through Rose. After her death, because Rose is in the spirit world now also. That is why I found the barn foundation now.  And she showed me the inkwell because I write, and would understand its message. And Ida said the message of the grave marker is clear, loud, unmistakeable. The message the wife gave Rose to bring me, the reason she left me these things to find and showed me where they are is this:

I can never leave here. I will stay with my children. But you must release my husband. He will never stop looking for us, and he can never find us. You set Rose free, and you can do the same for him. That is the message. That is what she is begging you to do.

I love the story. I will think about it. I don’t believe in ghosts. Except the one I saw on the path with Rose.