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Nobody lived in this new establishment, but there was a bedroom with kitchen facilities, and a shower. This was in case Bruce Shore found it more convenient to stay overnight instead of driving fifteen miles to the country place where he and his wife raised horses.
Last night had been one of those nights because of the accident north of town. A car full of teenagers had crashed into a bridge abutment. This sort of thing-a newly licensed driver or one not licensed at all, everybody wildly drunk-usually happened in the spring around graduation time, or in the excitement of the first couple of weeks at school in September. Now was the time when you looked more for the fatalities of newcomers-nurses fresh from the Philippines last year-caught in the first altogether unfamiliar snow.
Nevertheless, on a perfectly fine night and dry road, it had been two seventeen-year-olds, both from town. And just before that, in came Lewis Spiers. Bruce had his hands full-the work he had to do on the kids, to make them presentable, took him far into the night. He had called up his father. Ed and Kitty, who still spent the summers in the house in town, had not yet left for Florida, and Ed had come in to tend to Lewis.
Bruce had gone for a run, to refresh himself. He hadn’t even had breakfast and was still in his jogging outfit when he saw Mrs. Spiers pull up in her old Honda Accord. He hurried to the waiting room to get the door open for her.
She was a tall, ski
“Sorry. Sorry,” he said. “I just got back from a little exercise. Shirley’s not in yet, I’m afraid. We sure feel bad about your loss.”
“Yes,” she said.
“Mr. Spiers taught me Grade Eleven and Twelve Science, and he was one teacher I’ll never forget. Would you like to sit down? I know you must have been prepared in a way, but it’s still an experience you’re never prepared for when it happens. Would you like me to go through the paperwork with you now or would you like to see your husband?”
She said, “All we wanted was a cremation.”
He nodded. “Yes. Cremation to follow.”
“No. He was supposed to be cremated immediately. That’s what he wanted. I thought I could pick up his ashes.”
“Well, we didn’t have any instructions that way,” said Bruce firmly. “We prepared the body for viewing. He looks very good, actually. I think you’ll be pleased.”
She stood and stared at him.
“Don’t you want to sit down?” he said. “You did plan on having some sort of visitation, didn’t you? Some sort of service? There’s going to be an awful lot of people want to pay their respects to Mr. Spiers. You know, we have conducted other services here where there wasn’t any religious persuasion. Just somebody to give a eulogy, instead of a preacher. Or if you don’t even want it that formal, you can just have people getting up and voicing their thoughts. It’s up to you whether you want the casket open or closed. But around here people usually seem to like to have it open. When you’re going for cremation you don’t have the same range of caskets, of course. We have caskets that look very nice, but they are only a fraction of the cost.”
Stood and stared.
The fact was that the work had been done and there had been no instructions that the work was not to be done. Work like any other work that should be paid for. Not to mention materials.
“I am just talking about what I think you’ll want, when you’ve had time to sit down and consider it. We are here to follow your wishes-”
Maybe saying that was going too far.
“But we went ahead this way because there were no instructions to the contrary.”
A car stopped outside, a car door closed, and Ed Shore came into the waiting room. Bruce felt an enormous relief. There was still a lot he had to learn in this business. The dealing-with-the-survivor end of it.
Ed said, “Hello, Nina. I saw your car. I thought I’d just come in and say I’m sorry.”
Nina had spent the night in the living room. She supposed she had slept, but her sleep was so shallow that she had been aware all the time of where she was-on the living-room sofa-and where Lewis was-in the funeral home.
When she tried to speak now, her teeth were chattering. This was a complete surprise to her.
“I wanted to have him cremated immediately,” was what she was trying to say, and what she started to say, thinking that she was speaking normally. Then she heard, or felt, her own gasps and uncontrollable stuttering.
“I want-I want-he wanted-”
Ed Shore held her forearm and put his other arm around her shoulders. Bruce had lifted his arms but didn’t touch her.
“I should’ve got her sitting down,” he said plaintively.
“That’s all right,” Ed said. “You feel like walking out to my car, Nina? We’ll get you a bit of fresh air.”
Ed drove with the windows down, up into the old part of town and onto a dead-end street which had a turnaround overlooking the lake. During the day people drove here to look at the view-sometimes while eating their takeout lunches-but at night it was a place for lovers. The thought of this might have dawned on Ed, as it did on her, when he parked the car.
“That enough fresh air?” he said. “You don’t want to catch cold, out without a coat on.”
She said carefully, “It’s getting warm. Like yesterday.”
They had never sat together in a parked car either after dark or in the daylight, never sought out such a place to be alone together.
That seemed a tawdry reflection to be having now.
“I’m sorry,” said Nina. “I lost control. I only meant to say that Lewis-that we-that he-”
And it began to happen again. All over again the chattering of her teeth, the shaking, the words splitting apart. The horrid piteousness of it. It was not even an expression of what she was really feeling. What she felt before was anger and frustration, from talking to-or listening to-Bruce. This time she felt-she had thought she felt-quite calm and reasonable.
And this time, because they were alone together, he didn’t touch her. He simply began to talk. Don’t worry about all that. I’ll take care of it. Right away. I’ll see that it goes all right. I understand. Cremation.
“Breathe,” he said. “Breathe in. Now hold it. Now out.”
“I’m all right.”
“Sure you are.”
“I don’t know what’s the matter.”
“The shock,” he said matter-of-factly.
“I’m not like this.”
“Look at the horizon. That helps too.”
He was taking something out of his pocket. A handkerchief? But she didn’t need a handkerchief. She had no tears. All she had was the shakes.
It was a tightly folded piece of paper.
“I put this away for you,” he said. “It was in his pajama pocket.”
She put the paper in her purse, carefully and without excitement, as if it was a prescription. Then she realized all of what he was telling her.
“You were there when he was brought in.”
“I looked after him. Bruce called me up. There was the car accident and he had a bit more than he could handle.”
She didn’t even say, What accident? She didn’t care. All she wanted now was to be alone to read her message.
The pajama pocket. The only place she hadn’t looked. She hadn’t touched his body.
She drove her own car home, after Ed had returned her to it. As soon as he had waved her out of sight she pulled over to the curb.
One hand had been working the paper out of her purse even while she drove. She read what was written on it, with the engine ru
On the sidewalk in front of her house there was another message.
The Will of God.
Hasty, spidery writing, in chalk. It would be easy to wipe off.
What Lewis had written and left for her to find was a poem. Several verses of scathing doggerel. It had a title-”The Battle of the Genesisites and the Sons of Darwin for the Soul of the Flabby Generation.”