The Granny Curse and Other Ghosts and Legends from East Tennessee - Softcover

For several years, folklorists Randy Russell and Janet Barnett have taught a course about Southern folklore at the North Carolina Center for Advancement of Teaching in Cullowhee, North Carolina. Russell is also the author of several mysteries, including Edgar Award nominee Hot Wire.They live in Asheville, North Carolina.

Allie's mouth was wide open. She breathed as hard as if she'd been running.

Her cousin touched her gently with a reassuring hand and whispered, "Grandma Mac. It's Grandpa falling down the stairs."

Allie didn't say a word.

"He does it almost every night."

That's how their grandfather had died. It was a fact. He slipped in the middle of the night at the top of the stairs and fell all the way to the bottom. He broke his neck.

"Grandma says people born on Old Christmas don't completely die," Madelyn told her cousin. "She said a person's spirit keeps right on doing whatever it was doing when he died. So Grandpa falls down the stairs about every night. Nothing else happens."

"Was he born on Old Christmas?" Allie asked.

"I suppose. When is it, anyway?"

"In January," Allie said. "Twelve days after the real Christmas."

The next morning Allie asked her grandmother if she, too, had heard the noise last night.

"About every night he falls down those stairs," the old lady said. "Been meaning to do something about it. I think he does it louder on purpose. Seems like he does it louder every time."