A Place on Earth (Port William) (46 page)

A great spluttering giggle bursts out of Big Ellis; as if propelled by the
recoil of it he falls backwards and lands sitting up, facing Whacker, still
giggling. "He'll stink! Big as he is, he'll stink till New Year's."

"He's stinking already," Burley says. "You don't have to be no undertaker to tell that."

Jayber at once stands himself erect at Whacker's shoulder, and pounds
on the wall. "Meeting come to order!" And as Big Ellis quiets down he
proceeds: "Fellow members of the Port William Sanitation Commission. It has been duly noted, I believe-I believe I speak for you gentlemen as well as myself-et ceterah! -that by the cooperation of the winds
of fate and the tide of victory there has been washed upon the shores of
our fair city the mortal remains of this erstwhile creature, the nature of
which in its previous state remains somewhat -uh- questionable, not to
say dubious, if not doubtful. However, gentlemen, having been entrusted
by our fellow townsmen with the removal of any and all vagrant corpses
as shall occur within the jurisdiction-that is to say, to wit, the say-soof the aforesaid Port William, I move we go forward with the business.
For let us be mindful of our mighty motto, for mightier there is none:
Keep-Our-City-Clean. Is there a second to the motion?"

"Second the motion," Burley says.

"Noted. And you, honorable sir," Jayber says, addressing himself to
Big Ellis, "I assume you vote with the majority."

But Big Ellis is lying on his back, laughing.

"He does," Burley says solemnly.

"Then it is unanimous. And, sir, have you not a suitable conveyance
close by?"

"Big Ellis," Burley says, "you know where you left your car?"

"If it ain't gone, I do," Big Ellis says.

"The commissioner attests," Jayber says, "that if his conveyance has
not strayed, wandered, decamped, fled, flew or absconded from the place
he left it, he knows where it is. Let us then adjourn until said commissioner shall seek out, and return with, said conveyance."

He gavels mightily on the wall, and then helps Burley help Big Ellis
get up. As soon as he is up, Big Ellis's feet try to walk away and leave the
rest of him hanging there between Burley and Jayber, and they all fall in
a heap. They lie as they fell for a considerable time, as though asleep, or
resting, or waiting to see what they will do next.

After a while Burley says, "If I knew which way is up, I'd get up."

"You see any stars?" Jayber says.

"No."

"Well, turn over."

`Ah!" Burley says. "That's them."

He gets up, and Jayber gets up, and again they help Big Ellis to his feet.

"The idea is to keep your feet on the bottom," Burley says, "and your
head on top. Watch this." He gives a walking demonstration, first one
way, then the other.

"That's good, Burley," Big Ellis says. "Really good!"

"You think you got the hang of it now?"

"Yes-sir-reef" Big Ellis says. "Turn me a-loose! I'm a tomcat! I'm a ringtailed twister!"

"You know where you going?"

"Yes I do! To my car."

"You know where you are?" Jayber says.

"Yep. Right here."

"Jayber's shop," Burley says. "Don't get lost."

"Never was lost in Port William but once in my life," Big Ellis says.
`And that was three or four years ago."

He goes off into the dark; his footsteps fade into the silence.

Burley and Jayber stand and wait. They lean against the building and
wait. They sit down and wait.

"Well, he's either lost, or gone to sleep, or parked his car clean outside
town," Burley says, "-or something."

The roaring of an engine rises in the darkness not thirty yards up the
street. There is a long scream of gears, the engine roars again, and they
hear the tires beginning to move over the gravel.

"Turn on the lights!" Burley shouts.

As if he was only waiting to be told, Big Ellis turns them on-to reveal
that he is backing rather rapidly away from them, heading-as nearly as
they can tell-straight for Milton Burgess's store.

"Whoa!" Burley shouts.

Again, as if grateful for the advice, Big Ellis obeys. The tires slide a little and dust rises into the beams of the headlights.

"Put her in forward!"

Big Ellis puts her into something different-high maybe-and brings
her back down the street at a canter.

"Whoa!" Burley says. "Now cut the wheels over this way, and back
her easy."

With the help of much loud instruction and a good deal of trial and
error, Big Ellis succeeds finally in backing the car up onto the sidewalk.
They open the trunk, and then gather around the still inert and snoring
corpse of Whacker.

`And now, gentlemen," Jayber says, "with deep respect, with reverence, with kind and loving thoughts of the dear departed, let us bear the
body to the grave."

All three of them tugging at Whacker's shoulders and arms, with
great heaving and grunting, they manage to turn him away from the
wall and drag him perhaps a foot before they have to stop to rest. Letting
him lie full length on the ground, they stand swaying over him, getting
their breath. He lies in massive repose, like a hill, his belly cresting higher
than their knees. They no sooner begin to rest than they begin to anticipate and dread the weight of him, but after many struggles and stops to
rest they manage to lift and drag and push him over to the car, and cram
him into the trunk.

"What we going to do with his feet?" Burley asks.

"The wagon," Jayber says. "Where's his wagon?"

They find the wagon and unload it and tie it to the bumper and put
Whacker's feet in it.

`And that's a meaningful and moving and beautiful example of the
funeral director's art," Jayber says, "if ever I saw one-and I have saw a
few

"Driver!" he says.

Big Ellis, giggling, goes around and gets into the driver's seat. And
then for many seconds nothing happens at all.

"What's matter?" Burley says.

"You all coming?" Big Ellis says. "Get in."

"No!" Jayber says. "We got to carry this out with due propriety, and a
due sense of what is fitting, and with due solemnity, and with dignity. He
must have a procession, a cortege. You drive ahead, Big Ellis, at a slow, a
stately, an elegiac, and a dirgeful pace. And we will walk behind."

Big Ellis starts the engine. He guns it fiercely to test its mettle and discipline it thoroughly beforehand. He throws it into gear. The car makes
three hunching lunges and dies with a cough in the middle of the road.

"Low, sweetheart," Burley says. "Put her in low"

Big Ellis gets her in the right one this time, and the procession moves
off, Big Ellis driving at an elegiac and a dirgeful pace, followed by the red
wagon carrying Whacker's feet, followed by Burley and Jayber, each
with an arm around the other for consolation and for help in walking,
their hats dangling in lamentation from their free hands.

`A famous cortege, if ever I saw one," Jayber says. "Drum!" he says.

And Big Ellis begins to beat with his fist against the car door the ponk-
ing concussions of a funeral march.

"Oh, a redounding and a sublime cortege," Jayber says. "Nothing is so
redounding and resounding in the history of a town as a good calamity
or a classy funeral or an event of that stripe. God knows they happen seldom enough."

Inspired by the thought of mending the history of Port William with
a funeral of unimpeachable class, he lines out the chorus of a dirge:

And they sing it a second time together. Jayber chants:

And they all sing:

They have raised around them by now a great barking and howling of
dogs. Citizens' voices are shouting out of the darkness. House lights are
snapping on. People are coming out onto lighted porches in their night
clothes. But nobody follows except four or five dogs who, though they
make a loud boast of barking and growling, keep a respectful distance.

Through it all the members of the cortege maintain an invincible
solemnity and dignity. They sing their chorus many times over with the
strength and loudness of deep conviction. In the pauses Jayber makes
hieratic and indecipherable gestures in the air with both hands, intoning:
"Et-t-ceterah. Et-t-ceterah. Et-t-ceterah."

As they bear down on the outskirts, he becomes inspired again, and
sings some new verses, holding his right hand in benediction in the air
each time Burley and Big Ellis come in on the chorus: