Moving Serafina

37

Clay walked up from the hotel to the cemetery at five o’clock on Sunday morning. He had slept hardly any, worrying about Gus and Perfidia. Gus had said he would park as far out of sight as possible on the backside of the cemetery, behind the old ranch wagon where they could get a few hours of sleep. When Clay arrived at the cemetery, he saw just the top of Gus’s truck. He walked back and tapped on the window. Gus lifted his head from the seatback, blinked and rolled down the window. “All set?” Clay said. Gus nodded and yawned and Perfidia rose from the seat where she had slept bent sideways, her head resting on Gus’s thigh. “Sorry about this,” Clay said. “Y’all shoulda just come on inside and got a room.” “We’re fine,” Gus said. “Didn’t want to raise any suspicions late at night. Or any eyebrows, either. People know me but they don’t know her. And we didn’t need immigration knocking on a hotel door this morning.” He turned to Perfidia, who pulled the silver combs from the sides of her hair, used them to push back her long black locks and then reset the combs. “We still got lots of things to do,” Gus said. “Yeah,” Clay agreed. He straightened and took 345 C H A P T E R 37 in a long breath of morning air. “Well, I see some showing up.” Several people had walked through the wrought iron gate and were wandering around looking for what they all expected to be a freshly opened grave for Serafina. “They’ll all be pretty confused.” Gus nodded. “Yeah, guess they will. You still okay with all this, Clay?” “See you over there,” Clay said. “Okay,” Gus said and smiled. “Can’t promise I’ll shave but I’ll take care of my hair.” He picked up his hat from the dash and covered his disheveled hair with it. “I ain’t worried about that,” Clay said. “And neither will Sera.” He walked toward Dobb and Yebbie, who meandered side-by-side along the narrow gravel road that wound through the cemetery, inspecting each gravesite. “Morning,” Dobb said and Yebbie echoed this but then he added, “What’s up?” “Just a few memorial words,” Clay said. “Where?” Dobb said. “I don’t see no . . .” “Over here,” Clay interrupted and walked away. “Over here,” he repeated, louder to Locket and Jovita, who had just entered through the gate with Bea in front of them. Several more people came in, some dressed for church, some still in chore clothes. Clay went over and stood at the foot of Henry Bennett’s grave and waved back to Gus, who started his pickup and moved into the narrow road. Slowly, he brought the truck in front of Henry’s grave but stopped with the tailgate in front of Adelita’s, the crushed white rock atop the mounded earth glowing in the orange rays of the rising sun. Gus got out on one side and Perfidia 346 Bob Cherry on the other. They walked back to the tailgate and Gus lowered it. Clay moved away from Henry’s grave, came behind Gus and Perfidia, and stood with his hands folded in front of him. The entire crowd had now gathered around the pickup watching Clay, but neither Gus nor Perfidia turned to Clay. Clay took off his hat and then moved forward and gave it to Jovita. Then he took one of the shovels from the bed of the truck and dug a small trench at the foot of Adelita’s grave. He went back and stood next to Gus and Perfidia and said, “Okay. Let’s do it.” Every face there seemed puzzled by what was happening, all casting furtive glances at Perfidia, whom most of them had never seen. The men followed Clay’s movements and took off their hats too and the women moved closer to look inside the bed of the pickup. As Perfidia watched, Gus and Clay lifted Serafina’s white headstone from the bed of the pickup and struggled with it to the foot of Adelita’s grave, where they bent forward and allowed it to slip from their hands slowly into the trench Clay had made. Then Clay righted it, and Gus scraped the fresh earth back around it and packed it...