At this time of year, when some believe that a veil between the world we see and the world we don't is thin, people who say they are gifted with the power to talk to spirits are especially busy.

It's Halloween, after all.

Some call such folks psychics, but those in the business prefer other titles, such as readers.

Anita Dufalla, Post-Gazette Listen in Hear the Post-Gazette's Laura Pace discuss her interviews for her story about people who say they are gifted with the power to talk to spirits.

Do not call them fortune tellers. Their domain is not that of Chinese restaurant cookies. Their domain is that of "intuitive counselor," not schlockmeister or charlatan, longtime reader William Le Tourneau said.

Readers say their faithful come to them seeking information about relationships, money, work and health. But readers believe their clients really are looking for validation of the choices they've made in their lives.

"They need to know that they're OK," said Mr. Le Tourneau, of Oakdale, a tarot card reader who uses the name "Temperance."

"You have free will," reminded Jenny VanVoorhis, a tarot-card reader from South Park. Ms. VanVoorhis, who reads as Jenny, said the cards might tell her something about the client, but that the client can always change the course of those predictions by changing his or her actions.

Then there are The Angel 2 Ladies from the North Hills. Charlotte Ramsey and Eileen Miller said their clients are seeking a connection to angels.

"People come to us because they believe angels exist and they feel their positive energy." Ms. Miller said.

Ms. Miller said there are plenty of such devout believers.

Last week's Newsweek magazine published the results of a survey by the Baylor Institute for Studies of Religion. That study found 20 percent of Americans believed the living can communicate with the dead. Women are more likely than men to believe, according to several studies, the article said.

Born with gifts

All the local readers said they knew from an early age that they had a special gift.

Ms. Miller, 48, said St. Anthony of Padua appeared to her when she was a child while she was in a Catholic church in Troy Hill.

Ms. Ramsey, 54, born in Pittsburg, Kan., somehow knew at an early age she was destined to move to Pennsylvania's Pittsburgh and made it in 1991 when one of her six brothers moved here.

The women met on Halloween seven years ago when both were doing readings at the Harmony Inn in Harmony during an appearance for KDKA radio.

Since then, the "Angel Ladies," as people call them, have appeared on radio and television shows. They currently appear on a Canadian radio show and are shopping around a television pilot called "Angel Talk."

The duo now do readings at Flowers in the Attic in Penn Hills and at the Sarah Bella Day Spa in Peters.

The women say their clients are not permitted to ask questions at the beginning of the reading. During that time, the women listen to the angels and tell the client what is going on.

Still others choose to use tarot cards to assist in connecting the worlds. While the history of these cards is up for interpretation and debate, it is generally agreed that the deck of 22 cards bearing pictures of certain allegorical figures is sometimes used in combination with other cards. The deck is believed to have originated in 14th century Italy.

The cards include characters such as The Fool, The Magician, Death and The Lovers. Others may feature suits that include swords, batons, coins and cups or wands and pentacles.

The reader shuffles the cards and then interprets their meaning, based on the vices, virtues and elemental forces that believers say are historically reflected in the cards.

Mr. Le Tourneau, 38, reads all over the area, including Moonstones in Dormont, Open Mind in Sewickley, Inner Peace in Canonsburg and Journeys of Life in Shadyside. He, too, realized he had a special talent at a young age. He said he was raised in a "haunted house" in his hometown in northern Michigan, where he learned to communicate with spirits.

Still, he honed his trade by research. Now, he says, he just trusts his special instincts.

"I don't read for shock value," he said. "I want this to be an opportunity for healing, an opportunity for reflection. A chance to sort things out."

He calls himself an intuitive counselor who can help clients get beyond "blockages" caused by problems they suffered in past lives. Figure out what happened, remove the obstacle and the client can grow and learn from it, he said.

Ms. VanVoorhis, 30, said she always had been intuitive, but that she was forced to act on it when, in her 20s, she shocked a mother-to-be when she presented her with an exact copy of the teddy bear the woman loved as a child.

Her father gave her a deck of tarot cards when she was 12 after she had asked for them.

"I just knew I wanted them," she said, and now she has collected seven sets. She learned the art by reading, taking classes and going to psychic fairs, where she met a lot of people with similar gifts.

"I'm pretty accurate," she said.

But she is quick to emphasize that readers cannot change the past, such as the death of a loved one. Readers can help one only "change how you react," she said.

She, too, does tarot readings at Moonstones, on Potomac Avenue, and at Jekyll & Hyde, a bar on 18th Street, South Side.

During a recent interview, Ms. VanVoorhis appeared neat and pretty, with minimal makeup and her long brown hair freshly brushed, ready for work at her regular job, in retail in the South Hills.

She'd love to correct any misconceptions "that we're all freaks. We're not. We have normal jobs."

She can't make a living from the readings, she said. Her rate is $40 for a half-hour.

She said the real reward was watching people become happy and excited at their readings. She finds people often confide in her more than they do in their doctors or friends, and that the spiritual connection can be strong.

"Every person is different," she said of her clients, adding that no reader is 100 percent accurate. But, "The more you are open to it, the more it will come to you."

Her charges are consistent with others' readers fees. Mr. Le Tourneau, who also works as an artist, will combine reading with his art, including making "past-life collages" for about $100. The Angel 2 Ladies would not discuss fees.

The witching hour

All the readers and The Angel 2 Ladies acknowledged that this time of year brings some novelty to their businesses as they inevitably end up reading at Halloween parties and for those who might not be serious.

Each spoke about nature's "veil" being thin, even transparent, at this time of year.

They defined the "veil" as the border that separates the everyday world and the spirit world. Some cited different reasons for this, ranging from the spiritual nature of Halloween to the changing seasons, which bring closure to some people and causes them to take stock of where they are.

"Halloween is a time that you recognize that there's more around you than you can sense," Ms. Ramsey acknowledged.

"But every day, the angels speak to you. Every day."

Religious overtones

The Angel 2 Ladies said they see the angels because of their deep faith in them, which complements their religious thinking and "pulls it out of the box." Ms. Miller grew up in the Catholic church and Ms. Ramsey's father was an Assembly of God minister.

Ms. VanVoorhis is Wiccan and is most attracted to that belief's principles of peace and nonjudgment, far from some people's assumptions that its practicers are strange or worship the devil or witches.

She said some people are afraid of tuning in to spirits because that's what their religion has taught them.

Nonsense, say The Angel 2 Ladies, who said many of their clients are baby boomers who have deep religious roots, but their age and experience is changing their thought process.

"They are starting to feel more heart-based instead of religion-based, asking questions from a spiritual perspective rather than a religious one," Ms. Ramsey said.

They said national exposure from such shows as "Medium," "The Ghost Whisperer" and medium John Edward's "Crossing Over'' have helped bring what they do into the mainstream.