Wager’s eye, and she nodded her head slightly, her glance going to Elizabeth with a somewhat warmer smile.
A waxy-looking Julio lay with his hands folded and a well-worn rosary woven between the fingers. His mother’s, probably. Fell asleep using her rosary to say his prayers. Dressed like he was going to a wedding. Wager tried to think of something to say to the boy’s spirit or to God or just to himself, but the only thought was that the heavy cosmetics made the corpse look awfully young. And that the mortician had done his best to hide the missing part of Julio’s skull by brushing back combed and sprayed hair. But his best wasn’t good enough, and through the stiff black hair you could see the white satin cushion where some of his head should have been. Wager filed past and down a side aisle to find seats in a rear pew.
Elizabeth, dabbing at her eyes with the corner of a tiny handkerchief, whispered, “He was very handsome.”
“Yeah.”
The sermon was brief. It was about the violence of life and the mysteries of death and God being the only refuge and peace. The half-sung words of ritual, the gray smoke rising from the swinging censer, the ceremonial movements of the altar boys and the robed priest all brought back a sharp memory of his father’s funeral, and Wager was surprised to feel once again the hurt and emptiness that had made those black days of his childhood a blur of ache and yearning. As well as a repeated realization of the absoluteness of death. Squeezing his eyes shut, he stifled the burning sensation that welled up behind his nose and governed the spasm of breath that could have been a sob. It was Julio in the coffin, not Wager’s father, and Wager felt some guilt and even self-contempt at the realization that he had milked self-pity out of Aunt Louisa’s loss.
But despite what he had told himself, the rising note of the organ echoed from the corners of the church and from his memories as well. He tensed to keep his mind on the present, on the sounds around him, on the hard cushion under his knees. His hand, spread wide on his own thigh, pressed against the cloth of his trousers as if anchoring something. Lightly resting on the back of his hand, almost unnoticed until his eyes sought them and found focus, were Elizabeth’s gloved fingers. Wager turned his hand palm up and clasped them tightly.
At the graveside in Mount Olivet Cemetery, Wager had eyed the mourners, looking for faces that he didn’t know. There had been several, but a question here and there of his cousins and uncles had identified them. It had been a long shot that one of Julio’s murderers would show up at the funeral, but it sometimes happened. Not out of remorse but, as Wager understood it, in an effort to extend the sense of power over the victim that the murderer had enjoyed at the killing. But not this time, and on the long way back down I-70 from the cemetery, Wager and Elizabeth had been silent with their own thoughts. Finally Elizabeth sighed deeply and said, “I like your mother.”
So did Wager, usually. But at first he didn’t understand what that had to do with Julio. Then he realized that Elizabeth was trying to push her mind away from death.
“She likes you too.” Otherwise, his mother would have behaved with an absolutely correct—and cold—formality. The “ la patrona face,” as Wager and his sisters used to call it.
“I think you are a lot alike.”
He had to give that some thought. “She’s older than I am.”
“Idiot,” she said affectionately. “I mean you both have this shell that you use to keep people at a distance until you’ve made up your mind about them.”
Wager had seen that in his mother but not in himself. In his line of business, the people he tended to know most about kept their own distance because they were dead. And of the ones that were alive, there weren’t too many he cared to know more about. “I hope she kept her distance about showing you pictures of my
A waxy-looking Julio lay with his hands folded and a well-worn rosary woven between the fingers. His mother’s, probably. Fell asleep using her rosary to say his prayers. Dressed like he was going to a wedding. Wager tried to think of something to say to the boy’s spirit or to God or just to himself, but the only thought was that the heavy cosmetics made the corpse look awfully young. And that the mortician had done his best to hide the missing part of Julio’s skull by brushing back combed and sprayed hair. But his best wasn’t good enough, and through the stiff black hair you could see the white satin cushion where some of his head should have been. Wager filed past and down a side aisle to find seats in a rear pew.
Elizabeth, dabbing at her eyes with the corner of a tiny handkerchief, whispered, “He was very handsome.”
“Yeah.”
The sermon was brief. It was about the violence of life and the mysteries of death and God being the only refuge and peace. The half-sung words of ritual, the gray smoke rising from the swinging censer, the ceremonial movements of the altar boys and the robed priest all brought back a sharp memory of his father’s funeral, and Wager was surprised to feel once again the hurt and emptiness that had made those black days of his childhood a blur of ache and yearning. As well as a repeated realization of the absoluteness of death. Squeezing his eyes shut, he stifled the burning sensation that welled up behind his nose and governed the spasm of breath that could have been a sob. It was Julio in the coffin, not Wager’s father, and Wager felt some guilt and even self-contempt at the realization that he had milked self-pity out of Aunt Louisa’s loss.
But despite what he had told himself, the rising note of the organ echoed from the corners of the church and from his memories as well. He tensed to keep his mind on the present, on the sounds around him, on the hard cushion under his knees. His hand, spread wide on his own thigh, pressed against the cloth of his trousers as if anchoring something. Lightly resting on the back of his hand, almost unnoticed until his eyes sought them and found focus, were Elizabeth’s gloved fingers. Wager turned his hand palm up and clasped them tightly.
At the graveside in Mount Olivet Cemetery, Wager had eyed the mourners, looking for faces that he didn’t know. There had been several, but a question here and there of his cousins and uncles had identified them. It had been a long shot that one of Julio’s murderers would show up at the funeral, but it sometimes happened. Not out of remorse but, as Wager understood it, in an effort to extend the sense of power over the victim that the murderer had enjoyed at the killing. But not this time, and on the long way back down I-70 from the cemetery, Wager and Elizabeth had been silent with their own thoughts. Finally Elizabeth sighed deeply and said, “I like your mother.”
So did Wager, usually. But at first he didn’t understand what that had to do with Julio. Then he realized that Elizabeth was trying to push her mind away from death.
“She likes you too.” Otherwise, his mother would have behaved with an absolutely correct—and cold—formality. The “ la patrona face,” as Wager and his sisters used to call it.
“I think you are a lot alike.”
He had to give that some thought. “She’s older than I am.”
“Idiot,” she said affectionately. “I mean you both have this shell that you use to keep people at a distance until you’ve made up your mind about them.”
Wager had seen that in his mother but not in himself. In his line of business, the people he tended to know most about kept their own distance because they were dead. And of the ones that were alive, there weren’t too many he cared to know more about. “I hope she kept her distance about showing you pictures of my
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