Ghosts along the Texas Coast by Docia Schultz Williams Page B

though a figure had moved from a chair just as they approached. There were other unusual occurrences such as low voices calling from dark, empty rooms, toilet paper rolling inexplicably across the restroom floors, doorknobs jiggling when no one was around, papers that would turn up missing and then reappear, and a radio that would turn itself on and off. Often some of the rooms would become unbearably cold, and staff members would sense some “presence” had entered them.
    The staff members finally got so nervous that many of them kept vials of holy water, crucifixes, and various icons in their offices. They even called upon a priest, Father Timothy Ellerbrock, formerly of Christ the King Church, to help. He visited the offices, but his praying and rituals did not seem to help.
    Ruben Reyna, who was fund-raising coordinator at the time the story appeared in the
Herald
, said he was playing his guitar in the staff conference room late one night when he heard strange organ music accompanying him. It sounded like an old pipe organ. It would build to a climax like in the old silent movies, then come to an abrupt stop. Yolanda Gonzalez, who worked in the same building for another firm, said she also had heard the organ music. She said it sounded like church music, but it was like the organist was practicing and never quite finished the piece. She said it was certainly a real organ that she heard! Well, there isn’t a church within a half-mile of the building complex.
    One night Reyna said he was frightened by “thumping noises” when he was alone, and as he fumbled for his keys to lock up and leave the building, he felt as if he were pushed, bodily, out of the office by some unseen hands.
    The executive director, Ramon, has seen a flashing light, a furious “tempest” raging inside the office water cooler, and other strange things that defy explanation, in addition to the black-hooded figure. One woman employee is convinced that “something” chased her down a hallway. Augustin Sauceda, a housing counselor, said a voice once called out his name from within an empty office. He thought at first it was Nick Ramon. The voice called “Augustin . . . Augustin.” When he looked inside and saw no one in the office, he then recalled that Ramon was out of town!
    Too many things happened to too many people in that building. They were more than glad to change their office address!

The Pasture of Souls
    This story came to me through the generosity of Yolanda Gonzalez, librarian at the Arnulfo L. Oliveira Memorial Library on the campus of the University of Texas at Brownsville. It appears in
Studies in Brownsville History
, edited by Milo Kearney. The story was told by Felipe Lozano in his Brownsville barbershop to his customers in 1963 and was recorded by Peter Gawenda.
    Way back, when Brownsville was still a small town, there used to be an empty area next to the old graveyard. People used to call it
el pasto de las almas
, meaning the pasture of souls. . . .
    It all started in 1849, when during an epidemic of cholera more than one hundred people died within a few weeks. As Brownsville did not have a priest yet, and as the padre from Matamoros was busy across the border, many bodies had to be buried in mass graves or unmarked graves without the blessings of the church. And as the graveyard was too small anyway, the bodies were hurriedly buried right outside.
    In later years, the 1860s and 1870s, when [Juan] Cortina [the Mexican Revolutionary guerrilla fighter] raided the town and countryside, or when bodies of unknown desperados were left behind after shootouts, they also were buried beside those outside the graveyard.
    But around 1880, the night before All-Souls-Day, several people observed a very strange phenomenon. As it is a custom to care for the graves of loved ones before All-Souls-Day, people were still planting flowers or arranging decorations on individual graves. A