Faithful Unto Death

Premature Burial

that he’s an adulterer, anyway. And I’d rather think that Father did the deed,” he paused and looked from Lottie to Ralph, “than one of us. Wouldn’t you?” The kettle, cooling on the stove, ticked unnoticed in the silence. Ralph inhaled slowly—the whistle of air in his nostrils sounded loud to him. “All right, Roy. What’s done is done. What will happen now? Are you going to prison now, too? Or must we . . .” the thought was bitter to him, “sell the southeast ‹eld to pay for another trial?” “You don’t need to worry your head about it. Joe Beals says that the galoshes were cheap ones so they can’t lock me up for too long, anyway.” “Joe Beals! I might have known he’d be mixed up in this. What did he steal, and how did he get you to cover up for him?” “None of your beeswax, little brother. I don’t have to explain myself to you, so suppose you just never mind!” Ralph thought Roy’s tone of reckless de‹ance sounded brittle, but forbore to comment. He knew that he should feel more concern for Roy than for worldly goods, but somehow, just now, the southeast ‹eld, green and alive under the late summer sun or even gray and stark in the winter gloom, felt more precious to him than this blustering fool who’d been caught stealing a cheap pair of galoshes. When all was said and done, Roy spent Christmas (and two weeks on either side of that day of hope and promise) in the Benzonia calaboose and in Grand Traverse County Jail, in lieu of a twenty-‹ve-dollar ‹ne. If Lottie wept when she learned of this, she did so in private. At least, thought Ralph, there was one less mouth to feed, in a month when they could best spare the extra pair of hands. Premature Burial jackson, michigan, march 1895 henry walked slowly down a tiled corridor, a guard on each side of him. His heart thudded like the hooves of a trick pony in the circus ring. The door at the end stood open, and the guards walked him through it without even a pause for prayer. A large ‹gure stood near a door in the ›oor. The ‹gure was dressed completely in black. Henry tried to memorize the man’s features—it seemed important that he commit every open pore, every ingrown follicle on the man’s cheek. It was that, or he 197 surely would break down and shriek in terror, gibbering and begging for his life. He would need to be pried loose from the guard’s knees where he groveled, and word would reach his children, reach Orah, reach Anna’s brother and sister, who would smirk at his cowardice and his children’s disgrace. He took a deep breath, ›inching only when the man pulled a hood snugly over his face. Blackness, all was blackness. The rope slid over his head, hemp strands prickling the tender skin under his left ear. The knot snugged cozily against his other ear, like a cat’s whiskers without the purr. Distantly, he heard measured voices speaking, meaningless syllables. He tried to focus, to direct his mind toward God and the next world. He’d see Anna. She’d know, then, that he hadn’t done it. Or had he? Slow down, slow down; he had been in the kitchen, preparing the mush, hadn’t he? But then so had Ralph. So had Roy, and even Lottie had entered and left once, or was it twice? And Charlotte, where had she been? She and Anna together, night after night with nobody else around. Abruptly, he dropped, fell, hurtled through blackness. “Huh!” Henry jerked awake and lay there in the darkness, the sour sweat puddling on the musty canvas cover of the thin mattress beneath him. The death sentence didn’t exist here in Michigan. Premature burial did, however, and he was experiencing it ‹rsthand. Shivering in the cold puddle of sweat, Henry began to weep again. A Stormy-Weather Friend benzonia, june 1895 the noise gradually subsided. Stillness prevailed, a stillness that rang in the ears, made one afraid to take a step, to bump into a door jam, to knock over a lantern. Hesitantly the youngsters stood up, crept to the door, peered out. The sickly green of the sky had faded to the ordinary leaden tones of a rainy...