The Little Girl's Ghost

I decided to take some time away from traffic controlling with my best friend, whose name I am changing over to Heather. Heather and I have a platonic relationship. She's like a big sister to me. I've known her since I was 17, nearly forty years now, we've been very close. Heather has this fantastic wee mini-Foxy named Pippa (you know her from the old church in the woods, this is her) and the three us go adventuring. Anyway, it's about a month back, in June, cold as cold it can get where I live so we decided to take a week drive out over the Border Ranges, out towards Tenterfield - where Peter Allen is from... You must know who Peter Allen is...'Going to Rio'?

Anyway, from where we were it was a good six and half hour drive, bar from the traffic controllers, some whom I knew, that held us up. We got into town about an hour later than we expected and stayed the night in one of the local pubs before setting out the next morning.

It was late that morning when we found the old cemetery. It was run down, uncared for but still fascinating. I wondered why this was untended to since it wasn't that far off the beaten track, just an old dusty dirt road with partial opened land but mostly regenerated forest. We wandered around the old boneyard and saw some of the headstones were exposed to the weather that the names were erased but dated back to the very early 19th century, Pippa was having a ball sniffing this out this and now new smell. Most headstones were now overgrown from lantana and ivy, and lichen. We followed a path and found ourselves what looked to be a children section, judging by the headstones, which were small, and only had either a name or a year when that child died, mostly stillborn.

It was here I suddenly felt a tug on my jacket, like someone was anxiously trying to get my attention. I turned but there was no one there. I walked on, and again, that tug on my coat. I again turned sharply, quick as I could but...nothing.

Might've been the wind I hear you say but it wasn't windy enough to tug at my coat. This was a tug from a person. Like some child, perhaps, playing a game with me.

Heather turned and looked at me.

'You right there?'

'Dunno...thought I...' then I noticed Pippa doing something odd, lying on her back, wagging her tail. 'Uh...Heather, what the f**k is Pippa doing?'

She turned and saw the same thing. The dog was on her back, looking up at something (or someone) wagging her tail then quickly stood up, still wagging her tail excitedly and yapped, which she doesn't do normally. She looked over at Heather and I then looked about for whoever played with her belly but saw nothing. An idea suddenly occurred, well, more like an experiment, to see if she can detect anything for curious old me. I'm no ghost hunter nor am I interested in being one. But what I had here was a golden opportunity. Heather was against it at first when I told her. 'No effing way are you using Pippa for some effing fantasy you have with ghosts and goblins. No, I'm not effing letting Pippa to be involved.'

She finally relented (because she realized that she had to walk back through the graveyard back to the car, which was a fair bit back) and decided to come along and see what happens. We followed Pippa along the now overgrown path, passed old, broken headstones and graves, doing her usual doggy thing when she suddenly came to a stop. She sat down before a small headstone. Heather went over and read out loud: 'I think her name is Ameila, hard to tell, but she was only seven years old when she died. 1867,' Heather looked up at me with tears in her eyes, 'such a short life. But why Pippa?'

"Why not? Perhaps she had a dog like her and used to rub bellies with. Who knows?'

Pippa wagged her tail then Heather went looking for some flowers and soon came back with some Banksias and laid upon her grave. I took Pippa's collar off, placed it on the grave then we left.

I guess the moral to this story is not all ghosts are bad.