The Funeral Makers (6 page)

“But Jesus called them unto him, and said, Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not: for of such is the kingdom of God. Verily I say unto you, whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of God as a little child shall in no wise enter therein.”

—Luke 18:16–17

There was a time when she could run through the field that edged the forest, scale the steep path through the pine trees, with her hair billowing behind her like a veil.

When she was five and an only child, the Reverend Ralph would grasp her small hand in his and walk briskly from house to house preaching the word of Jesus whose blood spewed from his open wounds and gushed down the timbers of the cross for her sins. She understood this at the age of five. That she was a sinner. And often on the black road that wound through Mattagash, the Reverend Ralph practiced his sermon, using her as his tiny audience. Getting caught up in his own fervor, and walking briskly to keep pace with the fire in his words, it seemed he had forsaken her there beside him. Her small legs ached with the adult steps she took to keep up. Sometimes when he shouted outright at the devil, “Get thee behind me, Satan!” his free hand formed a fist that he shook at the invisible man of darkness, and the hand that held her fingers tightened so around them that she thought she heard them crack like kindling. Sometimes it seemed as if the
Reverend
was making
her
pay for the sins of the world. But she'd as soon bite the tongue from her mouth as let him know that. So they flitted, like an awkward, deformed bird, from house to house to warn the sinners, while the Reverend's Bible pages flapped in the wind like wings.

There were times when she ached to hug him. Only once had she tried, but he pushed her away saying: “Then spake Jesus to the multitude, and to his disciples, saying, call no man your father upon the earth for one is your father, which is in heaven.” And he had deposited her upon the cracked leather of the ancient chair in his study with his fat Bible on her lap and had said, “Now you read chapter twenty-three of Matthew. These words that are typed in red are the words that Jesus spoke.” After he had gone, she stayed silent, with the Bible pressing against her thighs, looking down at the words she could not read at five, the red words of Jesus, until they ran into each other like blood and were lost upon the page.

But there were times when the harshness of her father's religion seemed to engulf her, calm her, and she would turn her child's face up to heaven with her thin arms stretched above her head. And thinking of her grandmother, of the sweetness of the old woman's breath, how warm the drooping muscles of her arms were as they encircled the child, and knowing her grandmother was up in the house of the Lord looking down, it was then she would feel the power of the Lord enter into her like a warm, steady stream of water that ran into the top of her head and out her toes.

When she was ten, the visiting missionaries began to come. Four times a year the Reverend invited one to come to Mattagash and tell the stories of the heathen world. The whole house quivered in excitement as lamps were dusted, rugs shook, and the floor of the parlor was clean enough to reflect the very face of God. She was caught up in the expectation. Her whole body breathed and digested it. Standing on a prune box in the kitchen, she helped her mother make cupcakes and fruit pies. The Reverend would unfold his root beer recipe and begin concocting a batch of it, calling it moxie to avoid the word
beer
. And when he talked of the man who was coming, of the tribes he'd saved from hell, the kitchen grew silent, and she fell upon each word as if hearing language spoken for the first time. Even the geraniums in the bright windows bent away from the sun to hear, and the rafters of the ceiling pulled close together as the house stopped breathing to listen.

Everyone wondered what he'd look like, this man of God, what stories he'd bring to Mattagash that would leave it buzzing for months after he'd gone.

When a missionary visited in the fall, the Reverend built a fire big as the sun in the parlor which had been filled with neat rows of wooden folding chairs. The children sat on the floor in front and squirmed in excitement, waiting for tales of tribes that would terrify them. When the parlor had filled and the lecture hour drew near, a Sabbath hush befell the crowd as if they were about to witness the Second Coming itself. And when Reverend Ralph pushed open the heavy oak doors, necks twisted and eyes squinted so that they might catch a glimpse of the mysterious stranger who waited in the dim hallway. And then the Reverend would turn to face his flock and, with all the radiance of the forerunners before him, would thunder the introduction: “Ladies and gentlemen. Good Christians and neighbors. We have in our midst tonight the noble, the dedicated, the humble Reverend Wallace B. Cody, who has given many years of his life so that he might lead the souls of the heathen Tapir pygmies from the mountain ranges of New Guinea in the western Pacific Ocean and into the arms of our heavenly father.” And the man of God, the man of the world, the man almost as new and strange to Mattagash as he was to the wide-eyed pygmies, strode down the space left him between the chairs, and when the room broke to applause, even the orange fire swelled and stretched to welcome the stranger in. When he opened his mouth, red and green and blue words rolled out to tell of the mud huts, of the leg bands and jangling beads. Every word he spoke was Gospel. His stories of poison darts, hanging spears, and woolly heads became as significant to the ears that took them in as the Sermon on the Mount. And when his fragile wife, pale as an angel, unrolled a yellowed map of that pulsing, exotic country and pointed a tired finger at the very spot where she had followed the man she loved, the women looked at her as though she were Mary, mother of God. A gangling daughter with buck teeth passed around crinkled photos of pygmies pasted on cardboard and told how even little pygmy girls of ten had their very own gardens. Having been born in the belly of New Guinea, her debut was an instant success, and mothers strained to touch her braids and pinch her cheek. And when her father ran out of his own stories, he told of other missionaries who were captured by cannibals and eaten, all except the bones. These they used as spears, or little heathen children made them into toys, or women wore them around their necks. One pious missionary is still there, walking from village to village, talking to tribe after tribe, collecting his daughter's bones.

By nine o'clock the other children were as good as drunk with the intoxicating visit. But she would watch her father's face and see it fill to the brim with desire. And she knew that he held nothing so dear to his heart as the spirit of God in the form of a missionary. She knew that he wanted his own stories to pour out to the people like wine. He wanted to glide into parlor after parlor across the country with sagas even the venerable, dedicated Wallace B. Cody would envy. And she was sure that her father would become a great missionary one day. Then the three of them could pack up their belongings and ramble the countryside all their lives, bringing breathtaking tales to warm parlors full of listeners. She could see her mother unrolling the map and pointing out some tiny country in North Africa, while she herself passed around menacing pictures of men with rings in their noses as women kissed her and wished their own daughters were as clever.

Later, when the guests fell upon the food and full mouths repeated the stories they'd heard, popping out bread and cookie crumbs as they spoke, only the Reverend Ralph C. McKinnon pushed the food away and refused to eat. Even as a child she had seen the empty pit inside him that no earthly food could satisfy. For years she had watched this hunger consume him, long after she became too old to pass the pictures around and had given up any hopes of finding a father hidden inside him.

Marge felt the weight of her body pressed back against the bed, as though it were being hurled through space. Drifting in and out of, consciousness and blackness, the colors of the room came to her, although her eyes were closed. The room was spinning. The curtains that moved in the breeze were not curtains but crouching pygmies poised to throw their poison darts, and the din of crickets outside her window was the war chant of the heathens. She tried to move, to run from that exotic, frightening place, run back to the safety of her house in Mattagash, but the deadness of her swollen limbs nailed her to the bed as though it were a cross and outside the river beat against the rocks like blood coursing through the veins of Christ the Redeemer. She was trapped in her own body, trapped in a small dot on an aging map where no one in Mattagash would think to look for her. Not even the illustrious Reverend Ralph C. McKinnon, who gave his life to do God's work, would ever find her now.

Her eyes opened softly and saw only what was in front of her: the flowered pattern on the curtains, small magnolia blossoms that grew into each other. A garbled voice came from the bedside, as twisted and tinny as the Reverend's old gramophone. It was a voice not of this earth and Marge strained to hear, pushed every muscle to turn her head sideways and see who or what owned it. But nothing moved. She had broken down. Fear settled around her like wet leaves in a deep black jungle as the magnolia petals became smooth bones sucked dry by cannibals.

***

The nurse stopped humming and put down her embroidery work. She had noticed perspiration on her patient's forehead and was afraid that with the cool evenings it would give the old woman a bad cold.

“I don't need you catching pneumonia on me,” she said to Marge, who had already drifted back into the dimness of her memory as she carefully, lovingly collected the Reverend's bleached-out bones and clasped them to her bosom.

“I remember once, when I was little and we lived up over the funeral home—I still do, by the way—I went creeping down the stairs one night and unlocked the door like I was told not to and snuck into the little chapel where the body is kept. It wasn't like I wanted to do disrespect to anyone. It's just I was told
not
to and you know how kids can be. Well, it was an old man and he was all ready for mourners. I have to say that. It wasn't like it was the embalming room and he was discolored or anything. No, he was ready to be seen. Like it was Christmas morning. I was scared, I guess. And embarrassed. Yes, embarrassed. Like I had no business seeing him. Because he looked so sad, I guess. Because he looked like he should be with some old woman on a porch rocking their lives away. I think that was it. Just that he looked so disgusted with it all. You get over that, though.”

—Marvin Ivy Sr. (to a Disinterested Woman in the

Hotel Bar), Funeral Directors' Convention, 1956

The family gathered at Sicily's to begin the painful but necessary funeral preparations. Ed, and even Sicily, felt it was much too soon to delve into such final measures, but Pearl convinced Sicily it was the best thing to do. “You got to get on the wagon as soon as it's about to roll downhill,” she said. “And from what the doctor says it sounds like Marge is already picking up speed.” It
was
the Ivys' field of expertise, so Sicily invited them over that evening.

Unused to company, Sicily couldn't help smiling as she hugged Pearl, took everyone's jacket, and served coffee and sandwiches. Thelma, still not convinced that her children were safe around Pearl, sent them briskly out into the backyard to play on Amy Joy's abandoned swing set. And to disturb the dust in the empty playhouse that had been deserted when Amy Joy received the premature call to womanhood. Through the living room window, Thelma could keep an eye on them and still partake in the family conference.

Ed and Marvin Sr. shook hands stiffly, as if their arms had no joints. As if they were tin soldiers. Marvin felt quite superior to Ed. After all, Ed was a man with a good deal of education, yet he was destined to exist within a principal's salary and answer to the whims of a semiliterate school board while Marvin, a college dropout, sat at the head of his own business. Ed, on the other hand, felt smug around Marvin, who was, after all, an undertaker.

Comfortable on sofas and chairs in the living room, the family began with the usual preliminaries.

“Mattagash has changed so much each time I come back,” said Pearl, “that one day I won't know the town.”

“Old Mrs. Buber finally moved to the Watertown Nursing Home,” Sicily told her.

“How's the Packard on gas?” Ed asked Junior.

When Sicily inquired how the drive up from Portland had been, a deathly lull fell over the group. Sicily, thinking it was in deference to Marge's condition, said, “Oh, you're right. We really should get on with it. Poor Marge in there on her deathbed and us out here laughing.”

The preliminaries ended so that the details of funeral-making could billow into Mattagash's finest send-off.

“You Ivys are the undertakers. Where do we start?” asked Sicily.

“
Funeral
directors
, Sicily. Marvin and Junior are
funeral
directors
, not
undertakers
,” Pearl said, reminded of one of the many reasons she could never readjust to living in Mattagash. City subtleties were lost on ruralists.

Marvin Sr. was on his own ground, for once, in the presence of Pearl's family, and he happily opened the ceremony.

“It really helps to have a head start like this,” he said. “Most people don't know one of their loved ones has died until the last minute, and by that time they're so shocked that they make all the wrong decisions. But don't you ladies worry yourselves with the unpleasant details such as the coffin and burial. Junior and I will handle all that. You just decide on what she'll wear and the kind of church service you want.”

“I'd like to see her wear something besides black for a change,” said Pearl. “Something nice and colorful.”

“Pearl, I don't really think we should.” Sicily spoke as though Marge had an ear to the door, listening for the first signs of subterfuge. But Pearl was enjoying her position of matriarch now that Marge was indisposed.

“She won't know what she's wearing,” said Pearl. “She's supposed to be joyous and going to Jesus. Do you want St. Peter to think she's a nun and send her to hell?”

“Whatever you think is best, Pearl,” Sicily said.

“Just stick some parsley behind her ear,” said Ed. He had gotten a cold beer from the refrigerator and, as he opened it, he stretched his legs out until his feet rested on Sicily's inflated hassock that was clear plastic and had artificial flowers growing out of fake grass. There had been an argument that morning with Sicily about just that sort of thing.

“You don't need me there to listen to the death freaks and plan a funeral as though it was their dinner. I never liked Marge McKinnon anyway,” he had told Sicily.

“Ed Lawler, I have asked you for few things in my lifetime. All I ask you now is to be with me and the family as we make the arrangements for Marge. And that means taking part and not sitting back with a beer and your feet perched on my new flower garden hassock.”

“I can't promise you'll be happy with my being there,” he had warned.

“No, I suppose you can't,” she had said. Now he was making sure the victory had not gone to Sicily alone. He would come out of it a partial winner. He would not acquiesce after these many years of peaceful marriage. If he did, she would want more. One night she would want to know just
what
meeting he was going to and where. Then she'd want to go with him. “The best thing to do is keep her angry about the wrong thing,” he told himself.

Sicily, who was torn between grief and enjoying herself with the new company, looked pleadingly at him.

“OK,” said Pearl, who had taken a pad of paper and pen from her purse. “She wears something colorful. Any nays?”

Ed crunched a handful of potato chips.

Pearl gave Thelma the pad. Thelma took this as an act of forgiveness for the Packard incident. She scrawled the first decision down quickly and waited for the next.

“I suppose the minister will have to be Elvis,” said Sicily. Hearing this, Pearl laughed.

“Benny Macguire is still preaching?” she asked. “He must be fifty by now.”

Next to number two on Thelma's sheet was written:
Minister, Reverend Benny Macguire
, who was known for his rock-and-roll-like sermons and gyrating hips long before Elvis came bumping and grinding into existence.

Selecting the hymn to be sung caused a bit of disagreement between Sicily and Pearl. Pearl insisted that Thelma, having attended the prestigious Portland School of Voice for several months, was much more suited to sing the last farewell to Marge. Sicily begged to differ with her older sister, but pointed out that surely Amy Joy would be the better choice, having roomed with Marge the past few months.

“They were like two peas in a pod,” she told Pearl.

“Marge should have eaten a few peas,” Ed said. “We wouldn't be doing this silly stuff if she had.”

With Amy Joy not there to help further Sicily's cause by at least feigning an interest in singing the hymn, Sicily gave in. It was agreed that Thelma Parsons Ivy, although she had never met Marge, would indeed sing at her funeral. Talent and training would win out over companionship and sincerity. It was a true McKinnon maneuver. Next to number three on her list, Thelma briskly wrote:
Mrs. Thelma P. Ivy, soloist.

“‘Old Rugged Cross' would be a good one,” said Pearl.

Thelma, her confidence renewed by the earlier victory, spoke up. “‘My Sheep Know My Voice' is a wonderful solo hymn that would be very appropriate.”

“Thelma, you're not Little Bo Peep,” said Pearl, thinking suddenly that Thelma's voice
did
have a bleating quality to it. “I think ‘Old Rugged Cross' is right up Marge's alley.”

Thelma had taken out her
Songs
of
Praise
hymn book and was looking at the classified index in the back.

“Now here are some hymns for missionaries that would sure suit Aunt Marge. Here's one called ‘To the Regions Beyond.' I know that one and it would be perfect.”

“I don't know, Thelma.” Sicily was beginning to wish the Ivys weren't so thorough in planning a funeral. “Marge wasn't a
real
missionary, you know. Some people in town might get their noses bent out of shape. They're always watching the McKinnons for a social mistake.”

“How about ‘Eternal Rest'?” asked Pearl.

“She's having her eternal rest right now,” said Ed, who was clearly annoyed with the women's lack of organization. His school board meetings ran smoothly, as anything made up of all men will.

“Edward,” Sicily said, without looking at him, “I'll ask you again to show some respect for the dying, especially when they're in our family.”

“How about ‘Look to the Lamb of God'?” Thelma asked. She had moved on from the Second Coming category, feeling they were inappropriate, and settled on Solos and Specials.

“Thelma, would you try to forget about sheep?” Pearl told her daughter-in-law. “This is a funeral, not a state fair.”

“Yes, Mother Ivy,” said Thelma, embarrassed.

“Does that damn book have a funeral category?”

“I think so,” said Thelma, suddenly rejuvenated. “Yes, it does. There's six hymns listed under funerals.”

“Good,” said Pearl, and took the battered hymn book. “All right. I'm going to pick one of these at random and we're going to settle for it. Does anyone want to argue with that?” The room was silent. Pearl touched her index finger to the first title and proceeded down the list.

“Eenie, meenie, miney, moe. Catch a Catholic by the toe. If he hollers let him go. Eenie, meenie, miney, moe. OK now,” she said, looking down at the winner, “it's gonna be ‘The Last Mile of the Way.' I know you like that one, Sicily, and Thelma, if I remember correctly, there's something about sheep in it. Now let's get on to the next thing.”

Marvin, who had been quiet, spoke up since it was clearly time for the male Ivys to show their professional worth.

“As I told you already, Junior and I will take care of the details of the burial. We'll go by and have a chat with the local funeral director, just to let him know he's not dealing with amateurs.”

“I can imagine what embalming methods they've got up here in the sticks,” Junior said, his mouth full of chocolate cake. “They probably use a chain saw and a shovel!” Junior had developed this habit even as a child, and it irritated not only strangers, but those people closest to him—he was the author of very tasteless jokes, as well as the only one who laughed at them.

“In the meantime, while we're all gathered,” Marvin continued, “it would be wise to decide on the memorial now.”

“A memorial?” asked Ed. “What has Marge done to deserve a memorial?”

Marvin smiled patronizingly but held back in earlier memories of Ed's temper, especially when sparked by a few beers.

“Ed, you probably call memorials
headstones
, or maybe even
tombstones
.”

“A tombstone? Well, that's different,” said Ed. “For a minute there I thought you meant a memorial.”

Marvin had started to sweat. He removed his navy suit jacket. The underarms of his white shirt were dark with perspiration, partial eclipses under his pits. Family after hysterical, mourning, hair-pulling, nail-biting family had come through his parlor doors and not one of them had unnerved him. Not even the stingier ones who sometimes accused him of padding the bill and not the coffin. But Ed Lawler, equipped with a silly college degree, still had the power after all these years to make Marvin lose his professional
sangfroid
.

“We've been doing business with the Rockveil Monument Company for years and they've given us no reason to complain.” Marvin pulled a booklet from his jacket pocket with a picture of the sphinx on the cover and large letters saying ROCKVEIL MEMORIALS. He passed it to Sicily, who was afraid to touch it.

“It won't bite you, Sicily, for crying out loud,” said Pearl. Her family's reaction to Marvin's profession was still a prickly issue. If she hadn't forgotten her own initial reactions to the Ivy Funeral Home, she might have shown Sicily a bit more understanding. But Pearl had made a habit out of remembering only the things she could use to her own advantage. To tell Sicily she had vomited when Marvin first took her into the casket showroom would be of no advantage to anyone but Sicily. So Pearl kept it buried, under the charred remnants of Marvin's discarded law books and the heap of other undesirables she had tossed into her subconscious mind. She snatched the booklet from Sicily and, opening it to a certain page, turned it around for the rest of the family to see.

“This is the
Gates
Ajar
model. This would be perfect except it's a double monument, or for a family lot. Now here's the one we thought would be just right for Marge. It's the
Calvary
model.” She turned the book again to the family's view. Thelma and Junior were in agreement with Pearl, while Sicily was still uncomfortable when faced with selecting something that was to actually go in a graveyard. It was clearly not as frivolous as choosing drapes, and the notion unnerved her. She would have looked to Ed for support, but he had predicted that morning that the Ivys would drag along the tools of their trade and “peddle their wares,” as he had phrased it.