The Curfew - Jesse Ball [2]
Such explanations, of course, may only be offered later, when one side has won.
William headed to his first appointment. He pictured himself as he would be seen, a man in a long tweed coat, with a stick under his arm, with a bowler hat and a pair of sturdy black shoes. Then, he inserted himself into that image, as an actor would.
In such made and imagined clothing, he arrived.
—Mrs. Monroe is in the garden.
A servant led him down a tiled passage. The tiles had pastoral scenes: cows, gypsies, birds of different sorts, wattle buildings, haystacks. No two of them were the same. This had a disquieting effect. You would obviously never have time to sit and look at all of them, even were it possible, and so it gave an elusive impression. William wouldn’t like to be forced to give an opinion about it.
The passage opened onto a shady porch that overlooked a stand of trees and a lawn. The whole thing was walled in. An elderly woman with straight gray hair and a mauve housecoat was seated on a wicker divan.
—You are the mason?
—No, I work for him. I am helpful in finding the best way of putting things, a way that everyone can be happy with. The epitaph, you understand.
—It isn’t particularly important who is happy, other than myself. I’m the one buying the gravestone. I’m the one who knows the wishes of my husband, who’ll lie underneath it.
The woman coughed violently, covering her mouth with a pillow from the divan.
William began patiently:
—There is the cemetery to be thought of: they don’t permit just anything. And, of course, the state has been known to remove memorials of one sort or another. We would not want for such a thing to happen.
—I see.
William sat in a chair that the servant provided. He took a small leather notebook out of his pocket, and a pencil. While the woman was watching him, he brought out a knife with a very small blade and sharpened the pencil. Then he opened the notebook to a new page, wrote on it:
MONROE +
—Well, he said, what do you think, to begin with?
—Paul Sargent Monroe, said the woman. Died before his time.
—That’s it?
—That’s it.
—He was quite old, however, that’s true, no?
The woman gave him a very serious look.
—Ninety-two.
—Well, are you sure you want it to say, Died before his time, on the gravestone? I don’t mean to say that we can’t do that, because, of course, we can, if you like. It just seems a bit, well, just not exactly right.
—I see what you mean, said the woman.
They thought for a minute. Finally, she broke the silence.
—Well, we could change the date.
—The date?
—Have it say: Paul Sargent Monroe. Died before his time. And change the birth date to twenty-five years ago.
William shuffled his feet.
—I suppose that’s possible, but …
—You see, said the woman, when people are in a cemetery, and they see the grave of a young man, they stop and feel sadness. If someone lived for ninety-two years, the throng passes on by. They don’t stop for even a moment. I want to be sure of, well …
—I see what you mean.
A few more minutes passed. William looked occasionally down at his notebook. He had written there:
MONROE +
and then a line, and then:
PAUL SARGENT MONROE
Died before his time.
He took a deep breath.
—Well, he said. If you’re going to do it that way, maybe it’s better to have him die as a child. It could be that he was six when he died, and the inscription could read, Paul Sargent Monroe, Friend of cats. It would evoke his personality a bit, and certainly people would pause there.
A sort of ragged quiet was broken by another fit of coughing.
Happy tears were in the woman’s eyes.
—I see why they send you, she said. You’re right, just exactly right. That’s just what we’ll do. After all, it doesn’t matter what the truth of it was, does it? It’s just to have people stop, and