"HOMEBODS" - читать интересную книгу автора (Paul Barbara)

Weldon had to go down and shovel in coal three and four times a day.
One day last winter Aunt Annie evidently tripped over the shovel or
something, and she fell headfirst into the furnace. Just the top half
of her, you understand. It was a shock for Weldon to find her like
that, ashes from the waist up." She smiled apologetically. "Aunt
Annie always was a bit clumsy."

"Damned stupid way to go," Brother William repeated.

Jake didn't have another word to say the entire drive.

The funeral was to be a graveside ceremony. The cemetery
was a large one, beautifully kept. Only five chairs had been placed
by the grave, for the nearest of kin. Everyone else was expected to
stand--including Mama June, who, Jake was mildly surprised to see,
was on crutches; she'd been seated when Annie introduced her back at
the house and Jake had noticed nothing wrong. The five chairs were
occupied by Grandma Kirkland, one middle-aged woman, and three middle-
aged men, one of whom was leaning heavily upon a cane. The widow and
her four children. It struck Jake that he'd not yet met Annie's
father; he must be one of the three men sitting with Grandma Kirkland.

The minister began to speak, and Jake quickly concluded that
either Grandpa Kirkland had been the saintliest mortal ever to walk
on the face of the earth or the minister was the biggest liar he'd
ever come across. Jake stole a look at Annie; her face revealed
nothing of what she was feeling. Cousin Bette started snuffling
into a handkerchief. The kids got fidgety as the minister droned
on, but on the whole they were well behaved. Once Grandpa Poole
told the minister to speak up, but that was the only unusual thing
that happened.

When the minister finished his hyperbolic eulogy, Grandma
Kirkland stepped forward and scattered a handful of soil over the
closed coffin. One by one, her four adult children followed suit.
The coffin was not lowered into the ground; that would be taken care
of after the family had left.

"I've never actually seen that done before," Jake said to
Annie as they walked back to Brother William's car. "The scattering
of soil on the coffin, I mean. I suppose that's why the coffin was
kept closed."

"Not really. It was just that the remains were in no
condition to be viewed," Annie replied.

"A long, wasting illness, was it?"

"No, Grandpa Kirkland was a robust old man until the day
he died. Didn't I tell you? He slipped and fell under a street-