A Trick I Learned From Dead Men Page 3

  What d’you want for dinner, baked potato or omelette?

  No answer. Lately he doesn’t reply. Gets on my nerves. Deaf is a political party in this house. Lester is tired of news since receiving the worst news he could have imagined. His plan now is to receive no news whatsoever, not even TV or radio. Easy to knock it, but. Seems to work for him. Just the job, as he would have once said.

  I do omelette. I add peas and mushroom. Les has his with the reality people. Ned and me have ours with each other. Ned stirs his tea on and on, ting-a-ling. Jesus. Does your head.

  I sign him.

  Stop tinging fuck!

  He burps. I love my family but. Ned will push you to the edge and pick his nose while you fall off. He has always got away with murder, it’s his middle name, whereas mine seems to be You couldn’t do those dishes could you, Lee?

  Legend has it Ned learned to lip-read overnight. He started signing aged three and a half. Made his own signs, redesigned it like he owned it. He’s got shapes no one’s heard of. He always had a big head. Ned would be a genius in any language. She said that. Fair play to him, but. He still can’t iron his clothes. Or get a job. His dream is to be a landscape gardener. Fat chance, as Les pointed out before he gave up pointing things out, There aren’t any landscapes left.

  OK, there is a certain Je ne sais quoi to Ned. I can see why she thought he was beamed here by some supernatural force: his laughing elves, his flying hands, his noting of things no one else can clock. And OK, he’s not a bad bloke, I can see his plus points. We have the odd laugh, granted, and no way does anyone lay a finger on him while I’m around, but. The world and him is a private party, only one VIP. Ned is king in the silent land. I don’t begrudge him, I’m just saying. If I had been the supernatural one would she have preferred me? I don’t dwell. No point. I am no fool. She’d have gone anyway.

  Lee and I have an understanding, she used to say. Lee is my soldier.

  I take care of things. I took it as a compliment.

  3

  Cloud at first but drier and brighter conditions developing throughout the day

  YOU HAVE TO tick everything off, make sure they have everything. You wait till their clothes arrive before you prepare them. Once their clothes arrive they’re on their way, as if it’s a journey, which it is. Gown is easier, done in no time. No need to manoeuvre the client, two flared sleeves and a long bib, clever, you’d never guess that’s all there is to it. Whereas your self-clothed client you often have to alter garments to get them on, snip snip. You don’t want to drag the skin, especially the oldies, you don’t want skin-slip.

  Waiting for the clothes can hold you up. Derek says they never had these troubles at the Royal Opera House. That could either be a joke or p’raps he used to work there before he had The White Stag. Ever the dark horse, I’ll probably never know. That’s how we found out Howard wanted to be a pole vaulter, a chance remark. When I told Derek, he said, Gordon effing Bennett. We all looked at Howard different after that. I’m going to ask him why he dropped pole vaulting and entered undertaking. I’ll choose my moment. People are never what you think. Till they’re dead, that is.

  At Rest. The engraver makes light work of it. Gravograph is a nifty machine, you begin to think of all kinds of things you could engrave. Only drawback is the noise, like a drill through metal, which is what it is. At Rest is my preference. Rest in Peace is longwinded compared. Derek veers between the two, Depending on my mood, he says.

  There are motifs: the men get the swirl, women get roses. Babies have Asleep. I haven’t had a baby yet, one to dread. I have a few work firsts left to come: newborn, immolation, suicide. All in good time, ready or not.

  Everyone dreads a baby. Fortunately they are few and far between. Derek says he can count them on two hands, which is good. Still, you can’t shirk if one comes in. Derek does them asleep, sheet folded under their chin. Small children are prepared in a flash. No death mask for them, the skin is plumper, tricking you, making it harder to take. The eye sockets alone let you know they are gone. Children are buried with their freckles fresh on their face. Christening dresses are popular, undone is easier; we’ve had Buzz Lightyear, skinny jeans. We never say no. Philip Cuell died of spina bifida and took his light sabre with him. Soft toys, iPods, juice. The parents’ request is our command. We don’t answer the phone. The radio goes off. The satins are white.

  *

  THE WOODS KNOW me these days.

  Evening, Lee. Buenos tardes.

  I startle a bird snoozing in a tree.

  Hello, Mr Pigeon, not expecting me were you? Fear not, I am unarmed.

  He clatters away.

  So. Irene says to me on Tuesday, Are you happy, Lee? I’m happy when I’m here in these woods. I should have told her that, I didn’t.

  I said, ’course, Reen. Kind of a question’s that!

  And she says, OK, my love.

  Sometimes, a woman can see right through you. Derek wouldn’t ask that in a million. He calls women the female of the species. Sums it up: species. Freaks me when she calls me My love. Like we’re having it off in one of the hearses.

  I wish I could name the birds. I could google them, but it’d take till kingdom come. I wonder what Irene meant. People expect too much. Time to get real, but. Reality is on TV nowadays, while everyone lives in fantasy-land. For example, my girlfriend Karen and I went out for nearly two years before she said, Lee, I can’t see where this is going. This was before I got the job at Shakespeare’s and I’ve often thought she might have taken me more seriously if I’d been an undertaker, but still. Water under the bridge.

  I look out for Crow. I think on, nothing too clever. My thoughts tangle up with the weather and the hedges and we go along like we’re the same thing.

  When we were kids I used to push Ned along here in the pram. I had to fold him in from age eight, knees up. He loved it. If he kicked too much I had to smack him. He enjoyed our little jaunts. I used to push him all the way up Furlong Hill and back. Miles, we went. He wanted to swap over. I explained he was the baby, that was the way it was. He accepted it. I pushed him up to the woods the long way. When I got to the footpath I tipped him out. We had a walk together. He loved being out and about, made a change. Then I’d carry him on my back till he got too heavy. He has never blamed me for his being deaf. He has many faults but blame is not one.

  The field is shadowed down the east side, brass-coloured in the middle. The light has elongated the trees. No birds. They must have gone to Fellings Farm, they might have been harrowing. Just a dead pigeon. Buongiorno; not looking his best: headless, gutless, wing torn clean off. Something’s given him a good old seeing to. The feathers go under the fence and into the field. I wait by the fence, watch the clouds.

  A vista, is what Lester called this view when he first saw it, A marvellous vista. Those were the days when he spoke for the hell of it. He could surprise you with his outpourings, quite articulate then. People change, sometimes they disappear right in front of you.

  There is wildlife in these parts, you just have to wait for it to turn up. I am not here for the wildlife, per se. I am merely here, waiting for nothing.

  I sit by the spot. Not a grave exactly, is it? I sit there anyway. She is here because she’s nowhere else. They start to slip away, the dead. You don’t notice at first. It gets hard to remember. That’s how it begins: you can’t remember something you always knew. That’s the beginning. They slip away, they have to. Bit by bit you let them go. You think you won’t but you do. You hold on at first, you make yourself remember, pull it all back, but they go. That’s the way it is.

  *

  IN THE BEGINNING was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by Him and without Him was not any thing made that was made. Derek has typed up his own cut-and-paste Bible extracts so that they fit on a sheet of A4.

  In Him was life: and the life was the light of men.

  It is stuck on the workshop wall with Blu-Tack. All your we
ll-known quotes, top twenty Bible hits. God’s indefinite wisdom, Derek calls it.

  He keeps meaning to frame it but deceased clients keep arriving and, as Derek says, there’s only twenty-four hours in a day.

  Saying that, Derek points out, God did the lot in six. What have I got to complain about? He jinks an eyebrow at me.

  The brass. Like him and God are the same. Derek Almighty. Talk about getting above yourself.

  Derek, I say. Shouldn’t that be infinite wisdom?

  Derek looks at it again, looks at me.

  Says indefinite here, he says.

  Reckon that’s wrong, I say.

  He looks again. I’ll change it, he says. He does, there and then, with his pencil. Infinite, indefinite, he says, Splitting hairs, he says. Hardly the point, is it?

  He’s in a huff now.

  Depends, I say.

  On what?

  If you believe in God, I say.

  It’s not as if it’s written in stone, he says. No one cares if God is infinite or indefinite, people haven’t got time to worry about it.

  Howard pops his head round the door, ending the argument, giving Derek the final word. Derek’ll have the final word after they’ve screwed down his lid.

  Lee? Got a minute?

  Think on. I’ve cocked something up. Yesterday, the day before. The bruise on Mrs Wright’s hand. We sit down in Relatives 1, like we’re relatives.

  How do you feel about paging, Lee?

  Howard folds his hands, smiles, drops his head to the side. I look at his overhang of teeth. I pretend to think. I do not know how I feel about paging. I can hear Howard breathing, it puts me off.

  OK, I say. Not a problem.

  Good, Howard says. He nods. He smiles. Teethfest. More teeth than he needs, by the look.

  Excellent stuff, he says.

  Not a problem, I say.

  I have shaved Mr Martindale, as requested. He looks buff. Old gents look better after a shave, even dead ones. Hair and nails do not continue to grow after death, I can hereby defrock this old wives’ tale. Skin shrinkage gives the impression of growth, it’s an illusion. Mr Martindale is to have his prayer book in his hand. He’ll look just the job.

  Gents are coffined wearing wristwatches, ladies in their jewellery, but it all comes off if they are to be cremated. After the viewings, everything off including wedding rings, though our crem allows them, if requested. Gold melts with the deceased. All those I Do’s. All those promises. All those Till Death Do Us’s. Where they go we knoweth not.

  You hear people say how they seem asleep and true there is a restedness, but a dead face will show you its skull, I never saw a sleeping face do that. Everything sinks. What you see in the naked dead is a skeleton draped. Not to say that it’s spooky, just different. It’s natural as. Nothing to be scared of.

  Derek holds up a photo of a lady smiling, raising her drink to the camera.

  Hot date? Mike enquires.

  Match.com? I say. Joining in.

  Show some respect, Derek says. It’s Mrs Barry.

  Mrs Barry is in the chiller, tray 5. Derek trollies her down and parks her in front of me. Well? he says.

  It is a fact that Mrs Barry has aged a bit in the last two decades. The picture supplied by the son must be twenty-odd years old, or more. I don’t know what to say.

  I take it as a compliment, Derek says, but this is not a beauty salon and neither is it the Shrine of Lourdes, are you with me?

  I don’t answer. I don’t know the Shrine of Lourdes. But I can see Mrs Barry has lost her joie de vivre. We have to assume it’s the same woman in the photo, but. Finally I think of a comment.

  We’ve got our work cut out, I say.

  Derek rubs his face, blinks. He holds the photo at arm’s length, squints.

  I am not a miracle worker, Lee, he says. We are men not gods.

  I don’t agree or disagree. Sometimes Derek sounds like he stole his words out of a film. Then again, he says, she’s come to the right place. He winks, tucks the photo into his waistcoat. It’s now or never, as the great man sang, he says.

  Fancies himself, does Derek. If he did his own burial plate he’d be on the Gravograph all day.

  4

  A grey start but brightening up in the morning with some patchy cloud later on

  I WALK HOME. Shake off the day’s woes. Highways and byways. Flyover, lanes, woods: gives you peace of mind. Let the dead men sleep. Spend all day with the deceased you’ll feel alive on your way home, trust me. Not that I’m complaining. I enjoy my job. I am the eyes and ears for those who see and hear nothing. I keep them up to date with weather, goings-on. I let them know the forecast for their funeral. No joke. Wait till it’s yours. Will the sun shine? Snow? Gale force winds? Plain old pissing down? We’d all like to know. On the day you return to dust how about a blue sky? Some prefer a belting storm. Point is people like a forecast.

  If I was at B&Q I might have won Employee of the Week by now. We don’t do Employee of the Week at Shakespeare’s. We should. Good scheme. Keeps everyone on their toes. A customer is a customer; service is service, I see no difference because customers are deceased. Splitting hairs, as Derek would say.

  Which would you prefer? Old knobby fiddlesticks at W. D. Brookes Funeral Services on the High Street showing you the best view up his nostrils? Not to mention his other propensities, as yet unproven, but. Or me?

  I’d want a friendly face. A good morning Mr Hart, looks like rain, not to worry, dry as a bone in here.

  Mental, yes. But then it’s you lying there. Who knows what the dead catch hold of? Not me, not you. Not yet.

  I’m home! Old habits die hard.

  Ned is watching TV in Lester’s chair. Lip-reading Sky News. I switch it off.

  He throws back his head, blows through his mouth. The deaf are noisy. Ned slurps, chews, smacks his lips. Stands to reason, not his fault. Like a whale shoots air out the top of his head, Ned blasts it out his mouth. Like he has been at great depths when he is, in fact, a shallow person. Funny, because when he’s going mental on the trampoline you’d think he wants to go up and never come down. When all he has to do is hold his breath, float off like a hot air balloon. Adios.

  I sign him the alternatives for tea. Don’t know the sign for risotto. I have become more cosmopolitan in the kitchen. I mouth it. Ri. Sott. O. Ned has a dead face when he reads you, it’s the concentration – it’s why his smile takes you all the more by surprise. He smiles at things no one smiles at: shadows, vibrations, rain, knives. His face lets you see everything, no holds barred. Naked, you could call it. Most faces have learned to cover up their nakedness. Only little kids and Ned go as they are.

  He had a girlfriend once, Janey. She had a cochlear implant. He met her at a BDA Youth Group Night in Reigate. Les drove him there and back; the last deaf event he ever attended, as it turned out. When she ended it, Ned cut himself off. Closed up shop. Kaput.

  He thinks about his dinner. I hug him from behind, surprise him. Boo. He pushes me off. Hates it he does, hugs. I wrap my arms around, squeeze him. He kicks and squirms. I wrestle him for a hug. He can’t stand it, any kind of touching. I have to chase him, hold him down. I kiss his head. He gives in in the end. I reckon it’s good for him. I do it anyway. No harm done.

  I often eat standing up if Ned doesn’t come down. I do Lester’s on a tray. I should run an old people’s home, perhaps: Oldbastards.com. Think on. Time to consider my options. In the old days Les used to say please and thank you, now he says, Fetch us the paper, Fetch us a fresh tea. I prefer working with the deceased. They’re better-mannered and you get job satisfaction. I could never go back to the land of the living, not now.

  Water swishes upstairs and the pipes let off a groan. Five generations of farmers have lived here, all our grandfathers going back. Granted, this cottage needs some work, plumbing and electrics for starters. Over the years the fields were sold off, lot by lot. She sold the last when Ned was born. Her ashes lie in the ground her family tilled for
a hundred years but we hold no claim on it now. Somewhere out there with her rest the bones of our great-grandfather, feeding the GM crops.

  Just after she was diagnosed we lay together on the settee, her and me. We watched the fire flames – not a real fire, gas, but still. Everyone is relying on you, she says. I know you won’t let me down. Her fingers lay in mine. She stroked my hair. No one else was in the house. I think about this sometimes.

  Farming is no life for you boys, she used to say. Farming ties you down. Get out there and do your own thing. The world is your oyster, she told us.

  Sun is low, gold light spreads behind the hill. Shadows on the field. I take myself out. Crow cries on the boundary, like a human voice realising he’s forgotten something. I sit with my back to the fence. Let the day blow by. Crow always turns up in the end, glides in like a dirty thought – patience is a virtue. Vainest bird in Christendom. I spot him at the top of the highest tree.

  Good evening, Lee. On your walkabout?

  That I am. How-do?

  He bides his time. The silver blink once, twice, tells me he is thinking. Slippery customer. We have an understanding. People see Lee Hart, trainee undertaker, they think of death. People see Crow, deliverer of dark omens, they think of death. Reapers me and him both; nice to have something in common.

  The field, the house, the pylons; she used to say if she were a painter she’d paint it. She wanted to leave something behind, once she knew she was dying. I wanted to say, You’re leaving me and him behind. But I didn’t.

  I stop by the phone mast.

  Buongiorno. How goes it?

  Mast is busy getting people get connected. A job to do. Communication technology, excellent choice. This old grey pole has got them all talking. Natter natter natter. Me and mast stand there, silent like old friends.

  I would have gone with a hammer to find him, the girl-chaser. As I understand it, no one has been apprehended as of yet. Across the fields towards the woods, I would have gone straight away, before her tears dried; along the east field set-aside, where you can’t be seen from the woods. Slip through the electric fence at the broken place. Quick as a flash. If I’d caught up with him, that would have been my day. Tock, tock. Job done. Arrivederci. He won’t be bothering anyone again, no more chasing with intent on our lane. No need to thank me, it was no problem. I realise he is unlikely to repeat his behaviour at the exact same location but if he does fancy a walk down memory lane, buenos dias, here I am. I don’t see it happening, but then who sees anything coming? Only after the fact when it’s too late. That’s the trouble, the future stands behind you, waiting to say boo.