Sparring Partners(70)
Two deputies arrived with an injured drunk driver, and their presence emboldened the doctor. He asked Bolton again if he could photograph his wound, and when he angrily declined the doctor nodded at a deputy. The two came over and had a look at Bolton’s left hand.
“Looks like a snakebite,” one of them said. “Nonpoisonous. A rattler and you’d have two deep fangs and swelling out your ass.”
The other deputy concurred and said, “A perfect row of tiny teeth. Big constrictor. I’d say either a corn snake or a king snake.”
Bolton waved them off with “Please, guys, I’ve just lost my wife. Could I have some privacy here? I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Sure. Sorry.”
“Yes, sir. Sorry.”
They left and Bolton puttered around the hallway, waiting for someone to tell him what to do next. The hospital wasn’t busy and he grew irritated at the delay. About an hour after he’d arrived, the same doctor pulled up a chair and asked if he wanted coffee. It was almost 2:30 in the morning, not his usual coffee hour. The doctor explained the protocol: At around 8:00 a.m., the funeral home director would come to the hospital and discuss the death. Bolton would be needed to verify the identity of the deceased and discuss her medical history. When satisfied with the cause, the funeral home director would then prepare a death certificate.
“She wanted to be cremated,” Bolton said gravely. She did not. Tillie wanted a full-blown Catholic Mass, with communion. Bolton was secretly opposed to this because he was afraid of a sparse crowd.
The doctor replied, “Well, under Missouri law you have to wait twenty-four hours before you can cremate a loved one.”
“I know Missouri law,” Bolton said rudely. “I’ve practiced it for forty years.” Which was true, though he had never specialized in cremations. He was now sharp on that little niche in the law, because he had mentally rehearsed this scenario a hundred times.
The doctor was patient and said, “Okay, why don’t you get some sleep and meet me and the funeral home director here at eight?”
“I’ll do that.”
He left Poplar Bluff and returned to his cabin. Fifty-one minutes, no traffic at all. He was trying to anticipate trouble. The EMTs had left a sticker on the cabin door giving the times of their arrival and departure. Bolton tiptoed through the house, holding a broom as a weapon, searching high and low for the damned snake. It was quite possible he had returned home and slithered up through the walls to the attic, but Bolton wasn’t about to poke around up there. He closed the doors and turned off most of the lights. He gathered all of Tillie’s shoes and clothing and packed them into her suitcase. Her other stuff—old pajamas, a bathrobe, underwear, toiletries, hiking boots she’d never worn—he loaded into a cardboard box and placed next to the suitcase in the trunk of his car. He wanted no sign of her left in his cabin.
Though he was calm and in no hurry, he felt a bit on edge and needed a strong shot of bourbon. He stretched out on the sofa in the den, sipped for a while, got sleepy and almost nodded off, then remembered it was the snake’s first stop when he was fleeing the scene. He jumped up and walked around the cabin and finally eased onto the bed, but he smelled something odd and was certain it was an oil or some other bodily fluid left behind by the slimy reptile. Convinced the house was uninhabitable, he got a quilt and retired to a wicker rocker on the porch where he, with the help of a second bourbon, fell asleep in the chilly air.
Promptly at six a coyote howled from somewhere close and Bolton jumped out of his skin. He showered, changed clothes, loaded the car, and left at seven. It was early Sunday morning and no one else was awake. Near a country store, he stopped at a county dumpster and threw away all evidence of Tillie, as well as the crate the snake had lived in for the past four months. Lighter now, he hurried back to Poplar Bluff. Fifty minutes even.
At the hospital, he met with the same doctor and nurse, along with the funeral home director. He showed them his driver’s license and swore he was the husband of the deceased. He even produced their current passports that he had packed just in case his scheme got this far. Once they were convinced he was indeed the husband, they asked him about her medical history. Without a doubt, in his opinion, the cause of death was cardiac arrest. In great detail, he listed Tillie’s health problems: the coronary disease, the two heart attacks, the long list of doctors who had treated her, the hospitalizations, the avalanche of meds. His recall was impressive and he proved his case. His only embellishment was a fictional account of their last hours together when she complained of chest pains and he insisted on rushing her to the doctor. But she wouldn’t go. At the end, at the most crucial moment, she had gasped and flung both hands over her chest as she fell to the floor. He tried mouth-to-mouth but it didn’t work.
Of course, the snake was never mentioned.
The doctor, nurse, and funeral home director unanimously agreed. The cause of death written onto the certificate was cardiac arrest.
They loaded her into a simple metal casket, one used for such occasions, and rolled her into the back of the hearse. Bolton followed it to the funeral home across town where she was put on ice while time passed. Bolton’s idea of a productive day was not one wasted hanging around a funeral home.
The director had a busy afternoon planned because there were three “clients” waiting to be viewed that afternoon, after church let out. All three had been properly embalmed and two of the wakes would involve open caskets. Bolton managed to ease into the visitation rooms and take a peek at the corpses. He was not impressed with the mortician’s talents. After killing an hour, he managed to catch the director in his office and said, “Look, I know the law requires you to wait twenty-four hours before cremating someone, but I’m in a hurry. I need to get back to St. Louis and start planning a funeral. My family is waiting for me now and everyone is terribly upset. It’s sort of cruel to make us wait. Why can’t we do the cremation now and I’ll be gone?”