Until Cuba is unfettered and free the ghost stories will be scarce. You can find sketchy Guantanamo Bay stories but otherwise the lore is silent online at least. I’m sure the spirits that whisper in the breezes at night and walk along the shores long to have their stories told to a wider audience. I’m going to try to gather as many as I can find but until then this old ebay listing of a doll from Cuba is the only offering for tonight.
Meanwhile 90 miles away:
Robert seemed sad and lonely when I saw him almost ten years ago but I’m sure the extra attention has cheered him up. I wonder if he’d remember me or I’d just be another tourist asking if I may take his picture.
Mrs. Peck is the one haunted doll in Key West that scares me . Missing since 1997 just where she vanished to is a mystery. Living in the Audubon House Mrs. Peck scared staff and tourists with her ethereal presence. Her eyes were said to move and follow you around the room. Her head, hands and feet were made of wax and over the years took on a yellowish hue. She had tiny teeth that added to her unsettling appearance and sometimes perceived change in expression. Some said she was ugly but from the picture I’d say she was really cute. Mrs. Peck was described as “eerie”, “evil”, “creepy “, “ominous” and nearly impossible to photograph. Only one picture seems to exist it was for inventory and insurance purposes. It has a black streak running across it and camera strap theories fall short because the camera used had none. The other known photos were ruined when the film unraveled from the camera. She was due for a photo session with a thwarted but determined photographer but she was never seen again.
The Audubon House, in my opinion, is the finest museum in Key West. It was saved in 1958 from being torn down and loving restored with antiques to reflect the 19th century life of the wealthy wrecker Captain John Geiger and his family. There life was one of elegance and privilege due to the misfortune of ships shattered against the shore. Wealth buys a certain amount of respect and they became a prominent family. Life was filled with heartache too. Of the twelve children they had only nine survived and lived in the house. And died there too. At least one supposedly still remains and perhaps the sounds of even more little feet running upstairs in the children’s room. And the Capitan himself is thought to drift inside and outside the grounds.
The children’s room is on one of the upper floors and certainly was the spookiest spot to me in spite of the haunted garden. There are beautiful toys and antique furniture and you feel little eyes upon you. Not Mrs. Peck’s of course. Perhaps curious children are frustrated you can’t join them as there is barrier barring the full way inside. Against one of the walls, I sort of peeked around the corner, there was a painting of a girl leaning on the floor. It was a long time ago so I’m not sure if it is still there but it is a painting is of a young girl after her death. A bit rushed and rough, it is thought to be haunted and the girl can sometimes be seen emerging from her likeness.
Mrs. Peck was long gone. Valued at about $1800 at the time of her disappearance she was not the most valuable doll in the room and certainly not the most treasured object in the house. The house is so laden with riches that her price was of little consequence in the grand scheme of things. The weeks before her departure there were all sorts of odd occurrences and sightings of someone up in the children’s room window at night. The police would be called and find no one. The alarm started going off nightly. Only in the children’s room. This caused the museum to overhaul the system. There is a said 3 and half hours in the middle of the night that someone could have slipped in and taken her. Nothing else was missing from the house but Mrs. Peck a scary, haunted doll with an unsavory reputation.
Afterwards staff reported the sinister atmosphere in the children’s room had gone and other odd little things had stopped. Light bulbs had a way of being unscrewed at night and found in the morning. After Mrs. Peck disappeared it the light bulbs stayed in place. No one else was seen in an upper story window at night. The alarm in the children’s room finally behaved and remained silent when it should have been. There was no break in the case of the missing Mrs. Peck and the police no longer were called out to search for someone who wasn’t there.
It is clearly theft to the rational. One of the Geiger children returned to take Mrs. Peck back to the grave to the romantic. And Mrs.Peck simply got up from her carriage and walked off into the night to the slightly insane. One reporter joked she dances with Robert in the moonlight. Whatever happened, when I have walked the darkened Key West streets, I feel uneasy. The rustle of the leaves could be caused by those of little feet belonging to Mrs. Peck still roaming and observing the living with her small glass eyes.
I am Heathcliff 
One thought on “aye, aye boo”