Voodoo Boodoo Dolls

Dedicated to my work colleague who took the time to tell me lots of creepy stories!I have asked permission to use the stories of experiences that people told me. The Names and location have been changed in order to protect the people in the story.

Simon who was nineteen got a part-time job as a painter and plumber to refurbish a beautiful villa with big balconies. The owner had asked him to see and make a price for all the work that had to be done to her villa. She was an old lady who was in her 70's.  She was old but was still young at heart. She joked and wore jeans. Her eyes where ice grey, very uncommon. He thought about what she said in her phone call. She said she had one daughter but she lived in Alaska, so he could go to work whenever he wanted as she lived alone. He tried to imagine the younger version of her, her daughter. The old lady seemed to have had a beautiful face when she was young so he thought her daughter would be very attractive, from a young man's point of view. The woman took him round the huge villa the first floor was a big ballroom, an en suite and a back garden. The back garden had a secret hidden entrance to the main bedroom on the first floor and escape ladder that had plants and cacti on it. It was used as an extension of the balcony ledge that was crammed full of small plants.

The view from the back reminded Simon of a painting that had caught his eye, as every floor had Victorian all round balconies white and champagne although flaky faded paint left a lot to desire. He had seen that painting on a wall of a very sinister Antique Pawn Shop in a very old road in Valletta.He had felt fascinated although he did not know the reason he felt absorbed by it. Without knowing it he had gone inside the shop and stared at it. Every small brush stroke meant a world to him. It depicted an old time scene of a noble young woman of barely twenty years. Looking out from the balcony as if saying farewell to her loved one maybe her beloved sailor husband. Her eyes were sad and at the same time filled with hope and felicity.

His thoughts went back to the work he had to do he asked her if she would like to make a few changes to the balconies. He drew a sketch from some thought that had originated from that painting and she looked wondrously at it. She told him that that was exactly how it looked like when her mother had bee alive, she used to repaint it like that using those exact colors. The frame unpainted wood and the middle old rose and the outside champagne. She was so happy to see the sketch she remembered her mother and although in disbelief accepted. She asked him where he had seen that or from where had the thought come to him. After taking some time to think about it, he decided to answer that h had seen a similar balcony in a painting. She stared at thin air for a moment than she asked him where he had seen such painting. He told her about the Pawn Antique Shop and she told him that that was her mother's painting her great great grandmother was the person portrayed in it, it was dated 1912 like the Titanic disaster year. That figured the lace dress with long neck collar maid of delicate lace. She had a tear drop in her eye. She fell silent, took a few minutes and a breathe of relief. She told him to take a short tea break and took him to the coffee table and made some tea. While  sipping some sweet tea she told him a sad story that was at the same time an answer to all his puzzling thoughts about the story of the painting. 

That woman was her great great grand mama the young bride of a renowned Captain Finney who was thirteen years her senior but love made the forget the age gap. They were under a spell of love. They played cricket and spent long hours in the sun in their back garden on deck chairs sipping iced tea. The summer weather was very nice, the soft breeze from the nearby sea and warm days where the best to sit on the swing bench they had. The days where filled with happy laughter and small children's chuckles. Until the day they sent for him to go to the sea again...The two lovers where  devastated they had not been separated for six years and she thought of the chance that, that day would come. She did not know what to do so he thought and had an idea to paint her in her favorite frock looking out to say bye to him and he told the finest artist at the time to paint her. He painted every day until the day arrived so he would take it with him in his cabin for the long journey. He left and she said good bye this time for real. A day passed and there was a storm the sea level went up and she was very worried for her love. A telegram arrived at Four o'clock that the ship had sunk and the items including the painting had washed to shore. From that day she wore green as he had told was his wish. He told her that if he had to pass to a better life if he had a chance to see her again he did not want to see her wearing black. Although her heart was now as black as coal as her heart  was broken as her love was missing. For her her husband had died.  She was so devastated that she did not eat for more than a month. She drank only milk and suffered a depression. She made some courage because of the children. She never married again although she had a lot of admirers and marriage proposals. Her daughter married and her dated she felt everything was alright and all things sorted out everyone was happy everyone had found a purpose in  his life. One day she went to take a relaxing bath  as she suddenly felt very tired she dosed off  in the bath and died in her sleep with a smile on her face. Maybe her lover had come to meet with her again and took her with him? Mysteriously enough both lovers died in the water. Her daughter's love story wasn't a very  long and healthy one either it ended in three years, she separated him with three children to live the best she could and give her kids a good future. The son on the other hand married after six months and had a very strong relationship. It was his daughter that had the owner's grandma and after she had her mother. One day the owner's father fell sick he had a chronic illness that was making him become fully paralyzed and her mother had to pawn the painting although very valuable to her, for the doctors fees, but never returned to buy it back. 

She asked him if he could buy it back for her. He accepted and took her money, she told him to go that evening. He went and found it and when he asked the owner he told him it was not for sale.  For more than fifty years he felt obliged to keep it. Simon told him that the daughter of the original owner had sent him to buy it back, than he was happy to give it to him. He said he was waiting for a family member to go for it as it was a family heirloom. He said lots of antique collectors had asked about it. They had said the painting had a captivating power on them they could not resist looking at it and not making an offer. One of them in especially had been going to see it  every week as if to say hi to it two or three times a week the least. He was an old noble man his name was Count De Maltese he had even left a business card and an open check sighed so the owner could put any sum of money he wanted for it he talked millions in case he changed his mind or if no one ever showed up. The reason he said was that he was a relative of the signed artist who had painted it. The last 20 years he sent his butler to ask if he had made up his mind. He passed away and his relatives took the Palazzo Corto Maltese so they started showing up as they said the palace was the rightful place to hang it not in some small old dusty shop. They where nothing like the Count they had an arrogant and selfish behavior. They sometimes even attacked him for being a cripple. The owner had lots of large sums of money the avid  collector would offer but the owner always told them it was a great offer of money but could not give it to them as it had a greater value,a sentimental one. It sometimes seemed happy and sometimes sad. Now when he looked at it it almost looked as if it had an evil glare in her eyes.
To  be  continued