Volume 8, Issue 6, page 11

This feature is open to readers who can do and do do things that
are not readily explained by orthodox behavior
patterns. Here yqu'll find no skeptics when you relate incidents
of telekinesis, thought reading, teleportation,
use of the pendulum dowsing, automatic writing, prescience, ~se
of the Ouija board, etc. How did you do it? When
did you start? or discover you were "different'? Can you help
others duplicate your feats? Maybe your 'facts" will
prove nothing --except that so-called "science-fictionw writers
are kidding somebody-maybe only the editors of so-
called "science-f ict ion" books.

CHILD GETS HER "FILL OF" VOODOO

When I was ten years old, I was promising my childhood Mammy all
the tortures of hell
unless she took me to one of the dark-of-themoon rituals of
voodoo that were held in the
swamps behind our house.

For months, she had tried to tell me that 94white chillun don't
goto no sech goin' on",
but I wouldn't listen. All I could hear was the call of voodoo
drums. I HAD to go. It was a
fever, an obsession. I finally won my point.

It was a chilly night in early March. Even the stars were
reluctant to shine. Mammy
darkened my face and hands with charcoal, and tied my hair in
varicolored pigtails like a
pickaninny. As we started off thru the, lowgrowth, she cautioned
me, upon the safety of my
life, not to speak a word to anyone at any time.

Holding to her skirt-tail, I was amazed at the surety with which
she traveled thru the
swamps. I thrilled with fear every time a branch brushed my face,
and each time something
snagged my skirt hem.

The drums beat steadily until my heart was a pounding rhythm
keeping time. I was lost in
another world of deep secrets in a darker time than our own
civilized America. At various
points along the trail, I saw the painted faces and torsos of
naked males standing guard with
head-tall spears, the shafts of which were dyed, or painted,
blood-red.

Suddenly we came into a small clearing, in the center of which
was a mound of stones about
three feet high. Within the hollowed apex of these stones, a fire
burned brightly, casting
red shadows on the naked ebony bodies that wreathed and twisted
around it.

Mammy stopped so quickly that I bumped into her. She pulled me to
the front of herself and
dropped cross-legged on the ground, settling me in her roomy laD
with my shoulders against
her bosom. I was only partly aware of the already accumulated
spectators sitting thigh to
thigh, and shoulder to shoulder.

My eyes were glued on the one girl who seemed to be the central
attraction among the
dancers. Her sweat-glistened skin was the golden-brown that
proved her to be either a mulatto
or quadroon. I watched the dancers manipulating their
double-headed torches and wondered how
they kept from burning themselves and each other.

As impossible as it sounds, I dozed off in

hands would reach and snatch at the gourds each time this was
done.

The drums had settled to a steady hypnotic throbbing. One by one
they became stilled until
only a single drum was left beating. Just as the last flame died,
the man who beat this lone
drum made it cry out like a wounded panther. As the dying gurgle
faded to silence. the
slobbering crowd tookup a murmur that rose to a high-pitched
wailing. A scream! Silence. A
new muttering and groaning from the crowd.

The stench was making me sick. My fear had returned a
thousandfold and I shuddered on
Mammy's laD.

A gourd was pressed into myhands. "Drink!" Mammy commanded. I
took one swallow. It was
blood -hot, sticky - and I retebed as Mammy's strong arms carried
me away to safety and a
degree of sanity.

Was it the dancer's blood? Was it that of an animal? I don't
know. I only know that for
the next few months, until the drums were silenced forever in
thatpart of the swamp, Mammy
would give me a dark bitter drink on each night of the dark-moon
ritual - a drink that would
make me sleep. And dreaml

-.houana Julaine, Tampa, Fla.

0

CONNIE HAS HER LUNCHEON SPOILED

Several Years ago, a strange and amusing thing happened I've
never been able to explain.
in fact, if there hadn It been four witnesses , I probably would
attribute it to an
hallucination.

my husband and I I ived at the time on a place we owned,
occupying a house on the front of
the plot, while relatives lived in the house back of us.

When my husband was working, it was my
cusnightmarish sleep. When I opened my eyes, a tom to Prepare a
lunch each day for myself.
large flat stone had been placed on top of the This usually
consisted of two boiled eggs .
mound. The girl was dancing onthis stone while This particular
day, I cooked the eggs as
usual I a few flames licked out at her feet from among removed
them from the stove, poured off
the hot the crevices under it. The flames highlighted water at
the sink, poured cold water
into the her beauty, which even then I realized was un- pan to
cool slightly. poured this
off, and'was earthly, unhuman - beyond the dreams of men. about
to Dick up one of the eggs
when I was

Torches had either gone out, been put out I balted by an odd
noise. Something- it sounded

or added to the flames. I didn't see a single like the eggs -
started beep! beepi beepingl
I
thing to prove there'd ever been a torch. thought it couldn't
possibly be the eggs, so

The dancers held a gourd in each hand while ran outside to see if
the sound might be
comthey advanced and retreated from the girl. Her ing from
beneath the kitchen window.

writhing was carrying her closer and closer to But there was only
silence out there, so I the
flooring on which she danced. In their ad- rushed back into the
house. The beeping was
vancing, the gourds were held close to their getting louder
now-beepl beeP1 beep! I looked
chests; as they retreated, their maneuvering all over the room.
but was drawn back to the
would bring them in position to thrust the sink. it was the eggs
making the sound-but it
gourds into the faces of the crowd. Eager couldn't bel I picked
one up, holding it to my

OCTOBER, 196 The RBERREE

11