Читать книгу A Graveyard for Lunatics - Рэй Брэдбери, Ray Bradbury, Ray Bradbury Philip K. Dick Isaac Asimov - Страница 13

8

We drove around on Gower Street in Roy’s old beat-up 1927 tin lizzie.

We didn’t see the black funeral hearse go into the graveyard, but as we pulled up out front and parked, the hearse came rolling out among the stones.

It passed us, carrying a casket into the full sunlight of the street.

We turned to watch the black limousine whisper out the gate with no more sound than a polar exhalation from off the northern floes.

“That’s the first time I ever saw a casket in a funeral car go out of a cemetery. We’re too late!”

I spun about to see the last of the limo heading east, back toward the studio.

“Too late for what?”

“Your dead man, dummy! Come on!”

We were almost to the cemetery back wall when Roy stopped.

“Well, by God, there’s his tomb.”

I looked at what Roy was looking at, about ten feet above us, in marble:

J. C. ARBUTHNOT, 1884–1934 R.I.P.

It was one of those Greek-temple huts in which they bury fabulous people, with an iron lattice gate locked over a heavy wood-and-bronze inner door.

“He couldn’t have come out of there, could he?”

“No, but something got on that ladder and I knew his face. And someone else knew I would recognize that face so I was invited to come see.”

“Shut up. Come on.”

We advanced along the path.

“Watch it. We don’t want to be seen playing this stupid game.”

We arrived at the wall. There was nothing there, of course.

“Like I said, if the body was ever here, we’re too late.” Roy exhaled and glanced.

“No, look. There.”

I pointed at the top of the wall.

There were the marks, two of them, of some object that had leaned against the upper rim.

“The ladder?”

“And down here.”

The grass at the base of the wall, about five feet out, a proper angle, had two half-inch ladder indentations in it.

“And here. See?”

I showed him a long depression where the grass had been crushed by something falling.

“Well, well,” murmured Roy. “Looks like Halloween’s starting over.”

Roy knelt on the grass and put his long bony fingers out to trace the print of the heavy flesh that had lain there in the cold rain only twelve hours ago.

I knelt with Roy staring down at the long indentation, and shivered.

“I—” I said, and stopped.

For a shadow moved between us.

“Morning!”

The graveyard day watchman stood over us.

I glanced at Roy, quickly. “Is this the right gravestone? It’s been years. Is—”

The next flat tombstone was covered with leaves. I scrabbled the dust away. There was a half-seen name beneath. SMYTHE. BORN 1875—DIED 1928.

“Sure! Old grandpa!” cried Roy. “Poor guy. Died of pneumonia.” Roy helped me brush away the dust. “I sure loved him. He—”

“Where’re your flowers?” said the heavy voice, above us.

Roy and I stiffened.

“Ma’s bringing ’em,” said Roy. “We came ahead, to find the stone.” Roy glanced over his shoulder. “She’s out there now.”

The graveyard day watchman, a man long in years and deep in suspicion, with a face not unlike a weathered tombstone, glanced toward the gate.

A woman, bearing flowers, was coming up the road, far out, near Santa Monica Boulevard.

Thank God, I thought.

The watchman snorted, chewed his gums, wheeled about, and strode off among the graves. Just in time, for the woman had stopped and headed off, away from us.

We jumped up. Roy grabbed some flowers off a nearby mound.

“Don’t!”

“Like hell!” Roy stashed the flowers on Grandpa Smythe’s stone. “Just in case that guy comes back and wonders why there’re no flowers after all our gab. Come on!”

We moved out about fifty yards and waited, pretending to talk, but saying little. Finally, Roy touched my elbow. “Careful,” he whispered. “Side glances. Don’t look straight on. He’s back.”

And indeed the old watchman had arrived at the place near the wall where the long impressions of the fallen body still remained.

He looked up and saw us. Quickly, I put my arm around Roy’s shoulder to ease his sadness.

Now the old man bent. With raking fingers, he combed the grass. Soon there was no trace of anything heavy that might have fallen from the sky last night, in a terrible rain.

“You believe now?” I said.

“I wonder,” said Roy, “where that hearse went to.”