# CONJURELLA MEMORIES:

### SPIKE HORN WRESTLES DAVID FERRIE FOR THE LIFE OF JOHN KENNEDY AND LOSES

by T. Casey Brennan

Someplace between Avoca, Michigan, and the Straits of Mackinac, lay Spike Horn's. There was a huge mural of the bearded Rip Van Winkle-like figure of Spike Horn either on the window, or on the door, I forget which. Spike Horn's was a motel and a bar, in deer hunting country in norther lower Michigan. Such bars were frequently rowdy, but there was a saying in those days, that "If you can make it to Spike Horn's you're all right."

This is about the night it wasn't all right.

No, this is about the Conjurella dream about the night it wasn't all right. Spike Horn was a hunter, a woodsman, a Grizzly Adams type accustomed to keeping order in his bar and his motel, as the saying went. I know we were at Spike Horn's that night, but I don't know if Mama came with us or not. I know Daddy and I were there, and, at some point, there was David Ferrie, with men with him. I don't know if he'd arranged to meet us, or if he'd just showed up, or if he'd just entered by using one of his keys that would open any door. David Ferrie could do that.

I only have the dimmest, vaguest memory of it, but I know something got Spike Horn upset. I was about seven or eight years old at the time, and I hadn't seen Linda since around the time of the incident at the Old Covered Bridge, but I knew they had her also, somewhere. They had given us both a whole battery of tests, and we had passed with flying colors. We were the chosen ones. There was no escape. When the MK-ULTRA program began, David Ferrie discussed the expense with his commanding officer, he said, "If we pay them anything, they'll think they run it." So it was to be run by fear alone.

Something got Spike Horn upset. Sometimes when they would put me in front of Dr. Earnshaw's screen, they would put needles in my neck, so that something ran into me while I watched the pictures. I couldn't move. I don't know if they brought anything that elaborate with them or not to Spike Horn's, but I think Spike Horn caught him doing something, giving me an injection I think.

Anyway, Spike Horn was in our motel room, and mad, I remember, and said he was coming back. He came back in, I was so groggy, they must have drugged me again, that's what he must have caught them doing. At some point, Spike Horn grabbed David Ferrie, and they both fell on the floor wrestling. Everybody, especially Daddy (who didn't know what to do) was standing back. Spike Horn and David Ferrie were rolling and grunting on the floor, when suddenly Spike Horn said:
"He stabbed me! He stabbed me in the stomach!"

Daddy had this silly grin on his face, like he wasn't sure which side was going to win, so he wasn't sure which side to be on.

"What should we do?" Daddy said, staring straight forward, careful to address the question to no one.

David Ferrie pulled the hypodermic needle out of the unconscious Spike Horn's stomach. Spike Horn's staff were there, and they hadn't lifted a finger to help him against David Ferrie. David Ferrie orders them: "Carry him out of here. He'll be all right in a few hours."

And he was. But John Kennedy wasn't, because I had to do what I said I did in Conjurella, and so did Linda, she was at another window.

The End