Southern Gothic, Chapter 1 (cont'd)

iii

Percy Powe forgot what it was exactly he'd done to Horace Arnett to land this smelly slew of a job, but it had to have been something awful.

And Widow Bumiller banging a hole in his front door wasn't close to the worst of it. It was a goddamn walk in the park compared to cleaning up some of Arnett's messes. Which, come to think of it, was what this was, if you could think at all in this racket. The widow's approach had set Pookie off. Between the two old, cranky bitches, it was far too much racket for a Friday afternoon.

And yet still he lay sprawled on his small couch, dog barking, widow banging, and he tried to drown it out, all of it, even what he knew they would find. He could see her, strands of Irish red still burning through her grey hair, fat and dumpy, mouth set in a permanent cast of anger and judgment. She began calling him by his full name, something she'd learned teaching the whole town science and math in the third grade, and banging at his small trailer door with what sounded like a crowbar. Pookie woofed and howled out her, and then suddenly stopped. The widow Bumiller brandishing a tire iron was something that would even test Horace, much less a stringy mutt with burrs between her toes.

"Percevel Gartrell Powe." Again the pounding started. Damn her, he grimaced, even though this was his own damn fault. He'd seen the damage through the gates that morning and not even gone inside.

"What is it?"

"So you aren't too drunk to respond. Good. It's only 4:00."

"Still Friday."

"I don't rightly care if it's Wine Cask Tuesday or Paint Thinner Thursday, Percy. Let me in to see Munnie."

"Cemetery's closed, Mrs. Bumiller."

"The hell it is, Percevel Powe. Two full hours until the posted hours expire." The pounding began again, rattling the windows. A picture fell off the wall, the only one he had of his poor mother. "Get off your couch of drunkenness and unlock that gate."

"All right! All right -- I mean, I'll be right there, Mrs. Bumiller." He sat up, wondering what he could say to head this off. He picked up the keys from the coffee table and then got it. "Uh, Mrs. Bumiller, I cain't find the keys."

And then things started happening quickly. She was in the door before he got the sentence out. He only had time to gawp at the intrusion before she started in on him, "There they are in your damn hands, Percy." He had a second to look dumbly at his hand before the keys disappeared, snatched away by Mrs. Bumiller, who oddly enough was only holding her umbrella after all. She took a brief second to sneer at the cleanliness of Percy's domicile, which may have sent an English cleaning woman screeching into the night. And then she was gone, out the door, across the dirt road and walking alongside Percevel Road to the gates of the old cemetery.

"Mrs. Bumiller, I had just found them..." Percy babbled out whatever came to mind as he chased after her. Pookie was nowhere to be seen, which meant she was cowering in her accustomed spot. He wasn't feeling well, could he please have the keys back, it's getting late. There was no time to call Horace, and Percy truly had no desire to at that point. Mrs. Bumiller unlocked the gate with the first key she came to, tossed the ring into the dirt, threw open the gate, and headed in. Percy thought he could go no lower: the old bitch had watched him every time he'd let her in over the past two weeks. God damn, she might have been planning this ever since she found her old damn husband sprawled across their bed.

She probably killed him herself to do all this.

He picked up the keys, knowing he should go back and call Horace now, right now, damn Mrs. Bumiller, but she was halfway to her husband's grave now, the first dug in this cemetery for almost 25 years. And she was already slowing, because she could see from there what had been done to the grave.

"Percy," she said, in a tone so hushed, it surprised him. "Percy, come here now."

He followed her down the small road. The old cemetery was a long rectangle, until you got back to the truly old part, where the Arnett mausoleum kept watch over the graves dug in the first days of Deufreres. This section was right by the river, right where the Austerlitz Canal moved away from the Tombigbee and into the heart of the town. The cemetery stretched out beside it, with two roads leading from the gate along its length and towards the back, where they converged into a circle enclosing the mausoleum. Railroad tracks used to be the only demarcation of territory here, between old and older than that, but that was before Horace built the walls around this place. The railroad was long gone by then.

He followed her down the riverside road of the cemetery. Because her pace had slowed, it was only a moment that she had stood at the foot of Edmund Bumiller's grave before he stopped beside her, keys loosely dangling from his hand.

The funeral flowers had been flung here and there in the assault. Dirt was scattered here and there in a frenzy, handfuls of sod wadded and cast aside as whatever it was had dug -- there was no other word for it -- dug down into the earth, down to the very grave liner, visible in white patches here and there at the bottom of the pit. The stench of urine and worse drifted up into the afternoon air, stinking of frustration.

He looked over at the old woman. She was almost panting with the effort to maintain her composure. What could he say? There was nothing he could say. They stood there in the afternoon light, staring down at the savaging of Edmund Bumiller's grave, until finally Henrietta spoke:

"It is time to end all of this, Percy."

And Percy replied, "I try to keep that damn dog out of here, but she just --"

"A dog? A dog did this?" Henrietta had wheeled around to face him, eyes of liquid fire, and she jabbed an umbrella point at the ragged edges of the pit. "Show me the dog that has paws the width of a human hand, Percevel Powe."

Percy looked down at his feet but could not switch off his mouth. He stammered, "Well, them teenagers'll jump the fence, too, drinking and carrying on..."

And then he shrieked, because Henrietta had struck him across the face with her umbrella. He stepped back from her, but she pursued him, fetching him another blow, and yet another. And as he fell, crawling back and finally curling into a fetal position, she continued to beat him, yelling, "Teenagers? TEENAGERS? What teenagers, Percy? Show me a damn teenager in this damned city! Do they drive over from Livingston? HANH? TEENAGERS??"

Finally she'd had enough. She stood lost in thought. The weeping sack of bones before her groaned and slowly unfolded itself back into the semblance of a man. Percy sat up, wiping his nose with his sleeve, and hushed himself. He didn't look at her. She'd speak soon enough.

And when she did, she was as calm as she had ever been in her life. "Percy, you are going to go right now and get your truck. It's already full of dirt, so bring it here and fill in this grave."

"Yes, ma'am," said Percy, jumping to his feet as fast as he could, happy to have something to do.

She continued, "You're going to pack it nice and tight, and then, Percevel Powe, you are going to sit watch tonight and make sure these," -- and here she sneered -- "teenagers don't come back here."

He looked at her then, and she stared back. "Yeah," he said, nodding his head quickly. "I mean, yes, ma'am, Mrs. Bumiller."

Anger flashed through her eyes again, and she barked out, "Well, let's get to it!" and Percy was off, down the dirt road toward the gate, out and back into his small trailer, looking for his truck keys.

And as he ran, he thought about the oncoming night and Horace's wrath and more than just this. He did mean well by the widow, but truth be told, it was Henrietta that insisted on burying Munnie in there, anyway. And now all of this.

And he thought as he jammed the keys into his truck parked behind his trailer, no teenagers? What the hell was she on about? Deufreres had kids left, didn't it? True, the elementary school and the high school had closed, but the kids were being bussed to Linden for the county schools. Percy tried to think about when he'd last seen a kid running around as he pulled out onto his namesake's road. Well, he didn't get out much and didn't go many places when he did. The convenience store had gas and eats and beer. He tended to the new cemetery out on 43 southbound, but Horace had the supplies delivered.

As he turned into the old cemetery, he thought about when the manager of the McDonald's had finally moved away with his family. He'd had kids. Percy had seen them standing around the locked building before they left. That was it. That was, what? 10 years ago?

He stopped the truck right in the gate at that. But before he could do the math, he saw something a bit more urgent.

Mrs. Bumiller was gone.

He stomped on the gas, rocketing up to Munnie's grave, half-hoping to find her hiding in there. He could bury her quick and be done with the whole business. But, no, of course she wasn't, and he hardly slowed as he headed on back to the older part of the cemetery. There he had to slow down, because the road was much rougher. But she was still nowhere to be seen. The mausoleum itself was secure -- she couldn't have got in there. Around he went, peeking between crooked stones spotty with algae. She wasn't here.

So he pulled back up to the front. There was a small shed right at the front of the cemetery, holding some supplies and tools. He'd never gotten around to moving the digger back to the new cemetery after digging Munnie's grave. But as he did, he realized that he'd not seen Mrs. Bumiller's car when he pulled into the cemetery just now. So instead of checking the shed and the earthmover, he pulled out of the gate slightly. Her car wasn't there. He looked up the hill to the left, past the vacant houses that dotted the other side of the road. He looked to the right, across the bridge spanning Austerlitz and curving over a steeper hill. She was gone. She'd left him to his work.

So he got to it. He backed the truck up, got out, and locked the gate. He backed the truck up to Munnie's grave, got out, and grabbed a shovel from the back. He jumped down into the hole and used the shovel to scoop up the filth in the grave and toss it aside, grimacing as he did.

And then an idea seized him, driving away some of his pain with its brilliance. He almost laughed right there, thinking of how Horace Arnett would praise him.

He started in on the grave, methodically uncovering the door of the grave liner. He took his keys, unlocking the liner, and then pulled open the door. The stench of the grave trickled up, but Percy had long ago lost any sensitivity for that odor. Using the shovel as a lever, he was able to push the coffin off-center. He then bashed the coffin locks apart with the shovel, one by one. Occasionally during all of this he would glance out down toward the road, but no one was there.

With the last of the locks, he clammered out of the grave. He tossed the shovel into the back of the truck and walked down to the gate. The sun was close to setting, and the long shadows of gravestones stretched out across his path. He let himself out, relocking the gate, and trudged back to his trailer. He stopped at the corner of the cemetery, flipped open a metal alarm box, and punched in the code.

He then crossed the small dirt road to his trailer and entered. He called Pookie in. She trotted up, some wild mix of collie, Irish setter, and a few other trips to the woodpile. He locked his door, grabbed a few cans of beer, and nestled back into his place on the couch. Plenty of time when dawn came to fill in the grave. And packed tight it would stay, after tonight. That’s what old Mrs. Bumiller would find when she showed back up tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow after that.

Cemetery didn't open until 10:00 on Saturday, anyway. The hours were right there beside the gate. He grinned at Pookie, who panted back from her pile of blankets.

It was only when the screaming began two hours after sunset that he realized he hadn't seen Mrs. Bumiller's car the entire day.