France Profonde

So, whether we have a ghost or an owl, it turns out to be very much the same thing. The owl under our eaves is just as spooky as any ghost would be. And just as baffling. Any time of night, her cries may pierce the quiet of our deep rural darkness. The sound is eerie and foreboding. And even when the source is known intellectually, on an emotional level, the screeching still elicits a heart pounding apprehension. It still sounds like someone is heaving out there, somewhere.

Our first couple of summers, our screech owl seemed to get into a number of territorial battles, and the shrieking and swooping would last late into the night. Two shrieks moving in opposite directions around the grounds make an even more ghoulish impression. For some reason, the winter we lived in the house, the car pulling into the drive would often roust her from her niche and she would swoop low to greet us, or to scare us to death, accordingly. Her bleak color scheme matching the grey and white scenery. In summer she stays up later. And wakes us up more. Till we generally scare her away with our noise.

Houseguests have to be warned, while she is with us, not to be frightened. “It’s just an owl.” And this inevitably launches one of us into the telling of the tale of “our ghost” who, it turns out, is only an owl. But then again, this is not really a concession. It may be that our owl is a ghost or that our ghost is an owl. It is hard to say. And as I said earlier, it doesn’t really matter.

There is a castle near here which seeks to distinguish itself from all the other castles near here by proudly claiming to be the “haunted” one. A spooky white nightshirt rises out of one of its towers on the brochure. The text declares the presence of “La Dame Blanche” and her “mysterious apparitions.” I haven’t been on a tour of this historic site myself, but I think I know the punch line. We don’t sell tickets to tour our haunted mansion or charge to hear tell the spooky tales of our dame blanche, but we could.

We share the story of our ghost as we share aperitifs. We are generous that way. Our ghost and our ghost story along with the history attached to this ancient demure and its past residents are real crowd pleasers. And so whether we admit it or not, we love our ghost, and this damn “dame blanche” who continues to embellish the story with us.

For me, the owl and the ghost are indistinguishable. La dame blanche has so much in common with Mme Tooth, Mme Romanoff Tooth, the past tense princess who inhabited this demure till her death in 2000. Both of them grand and imposing dames with stories to tell in their very particular voices.

In these early summers, the presence of Mme Tooth, nee princess was still very strong. We got to know her little by little through the echoes of our neighbors, from the titles on her book shelves, from the photos in the bottom of the cabinet that her husband had evidently developed and printed repeatedly, seeking the ideal contrast and grain. In the best one, she is a perfect peasant in a headscarf and modest skirt, eyes tilted down. Her aquiline nose hints only subtly at her regal heritage. The ancient stair way in evidence. The skirt in the photo is hanging in an upstairs closet. And her white slip hangs next to it, glowing in the dim hallway light at night, as would her ghost.

It is in that closet, now my closet, that I once found an 1860’s halfpence, with a picture of Queen Victoria mysteriously waiting for me in one of my old river walking tennis shoes and a 1890’s kopek in the pocket of an unworn pair of jeans. Pennies from heaven? I can’t be certain. I will ask Mme Tooth upon her next visit.