Ghosts of the Southern Mountains and Appalachia

The Mysterious Face on the Wall

The Mysterious Face on the Wall Grant Town, West Virginia Nick Yelchick would have laughed if you had told him he would ever see a ghost. He was a big, strapping fellow who liked to brag a lot, and if he had too much to drink, it was better to stay away from him. After five years of working for the railroad , in March of 1927 he lost his job and began to find that the bottle helped him forget it. He would stop at a bootleggers in the late afternoon, have a few drinks, and then head home with his own jug. Whenever he was drunk he would get angry over trifles, beat his wife, and tear up the house. This went on for several months. In the daytime he went out looking for work and finally was able to get one of the West Virginia mines to take him on. 132 The Mysterious Face on the Wall 133 The first week everything seemed to go well. The hours were long and the work took plenty of physical strength, but that didn't bother him. He had always made friends quickly, and although the other men would wink at each other when Nick started bragging, most of them liked him. And, at home things were better because he wasn't drinkmg . But on Friday at lunch he asked one of his buddies to punch his timecard for him after work that afternoon for he wanted to get to his liquor supplier . His friend promised to do so. Nick sat down to eat his lunch, and as he was eating one of the sandwiches Anna had packed for him, he began to think of some of the other tunnels where the men had been working that might be easier to mine. He went down to the level below his own tunnel and inspected the walls as he walked. Other tunnels led off the main one and he turned down one of these, then down another and another before he realized he had lost his way. Aware he was lost, he began to panic and try desperately to get back to the main line. He had walked for several hours when the thought struck him that nobody would be looking for him because he had asked his buddy, John Avangio, to punch his timecard for him. No one would know he was still down in the mine. After he had walked until what must have been late that night, his light burned out. Now he was in total darkness and he lost his self-control, shouting and shouting until his voice became a whisper. He knew he should wait until morning but he couldn't 134 Ghosts of the Southern Mountains and Appalachia stop. Finally, he was so exhausted he was too tired to walk any further. He slumped down against the wall of the tunnel and fell fast asleep. He was awakened by a strange dream. He had dreamed that he saw his wife's face before him and as he stared into the blackness he saw a luminous spot gradually take shape on the wall of the tunnel The Mysterious Face on the Wall 135 and his wife's face stared back at him. He put his arms across his face, convinced that he must still be dreaming, and then he heard her voice and she was saying, "Follow me." Her face began to move along the wall of the tunnel and, frightened though he was, he managed to get up and walk toward it. The eyes shone out at him and the lips seemed to move again forming the words, "Follow me, follow me." Down one tunnel and then another he went, the face stayingjust ahead of him. This went on for what must have been over an hour until, at last, he found himself on the main line once more. He looked for the face but it had disappeared. When he arrived at the surface of the mine the night watchman said, "What you been doin' down there, Nick? Your wife was here lookin' for you yesterday, but I seen your card was punched and I told her you had left." When Nick got home, the first thing he saw was his wife lying across the bed. He went over to wake her, thinking she must have been up all night. When he shook her...