Still in the process of confirming a few details (a bit difficult, given that the principal actor in the story, my grandfather, has been dead for nearly a year), but I can at least share the basic outline of the tale. For obvious reasons, I'm planning on a few embellishments and alterations to make the narrative more interesting in order to make it a proper short story.
Basically, Papa was a pastor who was only ordained to conduct funerals, as well as to serve as what is in essence, a Protestant exorcist. My personal connection to the story is simply that we have his notes from those years, in addition to what he'd told us. I'm a generally skeptical person, but there's a certain reality of human emotion and experience which leaves no doubt that the person describing the events cannot be convinced they did not happen. The ending of the film Contact amply demonstrates this. I am still unconvinced, however, given the possibility that my grandfather was an extremely capable actor spinning an entirely fictitious yarn for the purpose of unsettling his grandsons.
One particular case appears to have haunted him - not because of some supernatural spookiness, but because of a very real human evil. You see, after being brought in to help relieve the suffering of a family and their elderly aunt, they found that the victim was inexplicably speaking in a deep voice with a German accent, claiming to be a certain historical figure. The "deliverance," as he called it (having been raised Seventh Day Adventist) went rather smoothly, whether through some psychosomatic action or genuine D&D-type Clerical work, and the family's immediate issue appeared to be resolved. The day and a soul were saved as it were.
Of course, a few years passed, and Papa gave up this particular practice (for reasons I've always suspected to be his own innate skepticism). Walking to work one day, he passed a young woman in her mid twenties, who reached out and grabbed his shoulder, speaking in a deep, accented voice, "Well, we had some fun all those years ago, didn't we?"
The reason why this particular case haunted him so much was because his degree, before he attended a divinity school in Nova Scotia, was in history, and he had listened to recordings of the individual that this thing, whatever it was, claimed to be. There was no discernible difference to his ears. That's what unsettled him so deeply.
Now, without any sort of proof or evidence, I'm forced to take this story as a "ghost story," but I still cannot be certain, given that my grandfather's reactions in telling this tale are profoundly difficult to fake. All I know is that this particular tale, with a fair amount of work, could be a very interesting horror short story. Whether it actually happened or not is impossible to say - I do not believe it did.
Granted, if I ever hear a deep voice with a German accent coming from a person from whom couldn't possibly naturally achieve it asking after my grandfather.... well, I'll get back to you on that.
~~~
Now for the real fun question - did *I* make this one up?
Happy Halloween.