Unbury Carol(38)

“Very well. And thank you. Good evening to you.”

Norman left and Manders resumed his long stare out the office window.

Plot Twenty will be an improvement on where she rests now.

Through the glass he saw the diggers were shin-deep and the sky much darker beyond them. Manders rose and exited the office, then the home itself. Crossing the yard, passing the podium of plot locations, he came to the diggers.

“I told you two it was going to be a Benson?”

His voice carried across the quiet graveyard.

“Yes you did, sir. This’ll work for a Benson.”

“Oh,” Manders said, “I’m sure it will. Just wanted to make sure you knew.”

Hugh Benson was a carpenter in town. As coffin makers went, he was not Manders’s preferred craftsman.

“We’re gonna have to make sure the bearers hold tight, sir.”

Manders nodded.

“Yes we are, Lucas. It wouldn’t be the first time a Benson split on us.”

If you asked Robert Manders, Hugh Benson’s coffins weren’t much more than six pieces of wood and a few picture-framing nails. In fact, he wondered if Benson didn’t cut his wood with a dinner knife.

Certainly not the right box for a woman like Carol Evers.

“You expecting a big showing, sir?”

“No. Private ceremony. Perhaps Mister Evers alone.”

Lucas looked at Manders.

“I’d have thought the whole town would be out for this one. Missus Evers was liked by all, I reckon.”

“Indeed she was,” Manders said.

Manders watched the men work for a minute or more. Lucas’s boots and shins vanished in the shadows of the hole with the shovel-head.

Manders looked to John Bowie’s grave. Still looked fresh. Not quite one with the rest of the graveyard. And here one of Bowie’s best friends would be joining him already.

“I have some matters to attend to, gentlemen.”

It was true, but back in his office he didn’t acknowledge them.

He sat in the dark instead, the last vestige of sunlight creeping behind a horizon wide enough to distort it, sending a purple wash through the window and across his desk. He tapped his fingers upon the chair’s armrest and made to get up but stayed put. He leaned back in his chair again and then leaned forward and sighed and tapped his fingers on the desk instead. From a drawer he removed a sheet of paper, and in the waning light made notes he didn’t need to make. Things he would do without a reminder.

See Marcy Donaldson about flowers.

Talk to August Marbles; what will the weather be like?

Make sure Lucas reinforces the coffin.

Get bell from town.



He glanced out the window. The gravediggers weren’t visible now. All Manders could see were the tallest of the headstones, spiking above the tangle of crosses and stones. But the director didn’t need to see the men to know their actions in detail. By memory and imagination he watched them patting the sides of the deep hole with their shovel-heads, checking the height against their own.

Manders rose from his chair at last and crossed the office. His boots clucked against the wood floor then got quiet as he stepped on the rug before the bookshelf. He lit a candle and took the stick from the lower shelf, lifting it up and up until it was just above his head. With his other hand he reached and pulled down a heavy leather volume and returned with it to his desk.


HARROWS AND SURROUNDING AREAS: LEDGER OF REGISTRY



The black letters went deep into the thick auburn leather. Manders adjusted his glasses and opened it.

He was still reading, the candlelight dancing about the office, when the gravediggers finished and went home for the night. He was alone now, both in the parlor and on the grounds. And he was still reading when the purple wash of sky gave way to gray, then a deep blue marking another night’s arrival.

And where does she rest now?

In the cellar of the Evers home, Mister Manders. Girl saw her there herself.

Manders flipped the pages. The fine paper sounded hollow, like it wasn’t strong enough to deliver him what he desired. But still he flipped…and flipped…leaning closer and closer to the text…the words…the names…

The name Alexander Wolfe continued to sound off in his head, and Manders searched for him, searching for Dwight Evers’s doctor of choice.

Was it possible Robert Manders hadn’t heard of a doctor who lived near?

His fingers passed over the thin white pages. Looking…searching…hoping…





Dwight hung his suit coat on the chair at the vanity. He caught his reflection, thought he looked reasonably grieved, but still messed up his hair in the glass. There was no one to perform for in this room, but Dwight wanted desperately to stay in character. As if the wallpaper might tattle.

His tie hung loose around his neck, and his boots were already at the foot of the bed. Unbuttoning his white shirt as he walked, he hung it and the tie on the hook inside the boudoir door. At the sink in the washroom he washed his face and cleaned his teeth and ran his wet hands over his lips.

The morning after tomorrow, he thought, Carol will be buried.

The thought was not comforting. The date was not soon enough. What if she were to wake before then?

What if she were to wake…right now?

James Moxie hadn’t left his mind since the moment Dwight read that he was coming. Lafayette had told him not to worry; the freak Smoke would do the job. But there would be hell’s heaven to pay if he didn’t.