Slow Funeral

by Rebecca Ore

  “Seventy-five dollars the pair,” the man said.

  “I’ve got some forty-five,” the man at the other counter said.

  Maude shook her head and said, “Just looking. He don’t have any chickens yet.” She wondered how they’d react to Doug’s California voice.

  Doug said nothing. He looked at Maude and they went back to the bleachers. “What a cross section,” he said.

  “You’re the only foreigner,” she told him. The man beside her took off his windbreaker. He had on a T-shirt with the sleeves ripped off and had fat arms. On the arm next to Maude, the man had tatooed born to lose. He didn’t look defiant about it. He must have put that label on himself so nobody would bother to hit him.

  On the other side of Doug was a cancer farmer, with fields and drying houses full of lethal fun, fun a man couldn’t have if he farmed cancer and couldn’t afford to miss one of the steps needed to keep the cancer from getting him during the growing. Cancer always brought a premium on the market.

  The Doc Holliday imitator seemed posed in his clothes. He finally went up to one of the piles of crates and helped strap razors on one of the chickens, a black and red cock.

  One man held the cock while the dentist pulled its legs back and strapped on the spurs.

  “Who is he?” Doug asked, looking at the program.

  “A dentist.”

  “He looks like a character. Is there time between bouts to bet? I’d like to bet on his birds.”

  “I’ve just heard about them,” Maude said. She noticed a tough old woman taking photographs. The Grit editor was a woman.

  The cock kicked convulsively when the dentist let go of his legs. The handler swung the armed bird in front of his body. Maude saw another man across the pit holding another chicken, multicolored and glistening under the lights. A man stepped down into the pit with the two men and their birds. The handlers stepped to the center of the ring and moved the birds at each other, then stepped back and dropped the birds.

  The cocks crowed and jumped for each other, neck hackles flared. One spurred foot hung for a second, the spur stabbed into a wing bone. The cocks thrashed free of each other, then the black and red bird’s spurs pierced the other cock’s head. Blood spewed out. The multicolored cock shrieked and fell. The black and red bird crowed and tried to spur his handler, sidling around the pit with one wing down. The handler grabbed his neck, then picked the bird up, hands over his wings. The other handler slung the dead bird out.

  Maude looked over at Doug. His eyes glittered, his pupils dilated. The men around them seemed to be yelling, but during the fight, Maude had not heard a thing.

  Doug said, “Over so fast?”

  Maude felt her pulse hammering, sweat dripping down her sides. “They’re not pit bulls, but some fights do last longer.”

  The man tatooed born to lose said “Dogs…” as though that word, breathed out on lots of air, explained something profound.

  More bouts. Screaming. Crowing. Bleacher seats boomed underfoot. Two birds, both viciously wounded, stalked each other on crippled feet. Their handlers swung them out of the main arena. One handler sucked blood from his bird’s throat and then both handlers dropped the birds in the smaller ring on the left of the main pit.

  Doug said, “It’s pretty intense.”

  “It’s the secret real America, the cockfight world.”

  During the break, Maude and Doug wandered between parked pickups and travel vans. They heard someone behind them say, “And Luke sent you?”

  The man wore the suit and the vaguely familiar face. Maude knew she would recognize him if she saw his photograph in a news article. He said, “So, do you think you’ll become an afficionado?”

  Doug didn’t say anything. Then he answered, “Yes, Luke sent me.”

  “You might be interested in this,” the man said. He led them over to a new four-wheel-drive pickup with a camper back. His fighters, Maude thought, but then he switched on a light and opened the doors in the back of the camper. Inside were two small modern buildings set among trees and grass. Over them, as large as the bigger building, was a video monitor.

  “What’s it the model of?” Doug asked.

  The man—the name Follette came to Maude’s mind as if inserted—picked up a remote control and flashed different scenes on the monitor. Most were of empty rooms, but in one room, people were arguing with each other. Follette turned up the sound. “We have an obligation to our patrons,” one man said. “You pure science people make them nervous.” He wore a tiny vested suit as if suits were a disguise. Maude realized these were people inside the buildings. Real people who didn’t know they worked in miniature.

  Follette said, “It’s not a model. It’s my research institute. State and federal money I got for Bracken.”

  Doug said, “They’re too tiny. I mean, so tiny.” He wiped his face. “It’s magic, real magic, isn’t it?” He smiled with a twitching mouth.

  Maude said, “They don’t have funding enough to expand.”

  “Lot of big fish in a small pond here,” the miniature man who’d spoken earlier said. “You’ve got to respect them, not speculate about how stupid millionaires must be to stay in Bracken County.”

  Doug reached his hand out and touched the building. “I can’t move it,” he said. “Like it’s as heavy as the real thing. How can your truck…”

  “What are they researching?” Maude said.

  “Tax write-offs,” Follette said. “Doug, since you’re not a witch, the buildings will be heavy to you. Maude’s told you about magic, hasn’t she?”

  “But I didn’t think you could do things like this to scientists,” Doug said.

  “You can trap anyone who doesn’t understand what his principles should be,” Follette said. “But I’m right proud of my little researchers. We’re the smallest county in Virginia that has a fully staffed research institute and an art museum.” Follette’s trophies, Maude thought.

  The little researchers came out of the little building and got in their miniature cars. The cars drove out of the parking lot and disappeared back into a city where they and their drivers were life-sized in private.

  Doug said, “All I do with engineering is give aid and comfort to people stupider than I am. And you’ve got people like me on the back of your truck.”

  Maude said, “You weren’t born to magic.”

  Follette asked, “Do you bet on chickens, Doug? Some of us bet on people. The entities bet on us.” He came back to their seats with them. The two men on either side of them didn’t protest.

  Doug said, “Luke told me he’d explain more about how this county worked after I went to the cockfight.”

  “Perhaps you’d like to be one of my researchers,” Follette said to Doug before the next two birds tried to kill each other. “I speculate you don’t like the idea of working on the back of my pickup, but as long as I’m alive, you’d be safe.”

  Everyone stood up screaming at the birds. Most exciting thing that happens for these people, Maude thought, and it’s illegal A message from your local establishment: the laws are there to be evaded. She sweated and stared at Follette. He was as excited as any of them, his face turning pale when his bird died ten minutes later.

  Doug looked like he felt betrayed. Follette said, “Well, that’s chickens. What about my offer, Doug?”

  “I’d like to see what Luke says.”

  “You can see the place without making a commitment.”

  In the third pit, another pair of cocks crept at each other. In the second pit, a handler wrung a bird’s neck and tossed him out.

  When the last cockfight was over around three a.m., Follette walked out with them. The dentist in Australian rig came up to him and said, “Ever thought of running for national office, George?”

  Follette looked sick. “If I left Virginia, I’d lose my power.”

  He means that literally, Maude thought.

  The night seemed filled with feathers, soft tatters of wind bumping against them. Bl
ood scented the air. Follette walked off toward friends teasing him about his cock’s poor performance. Maude thought she heard him reply he had to sacrifice a cock to Aescapulus, but wasn’t sure she hadn’t found words in sounds.

  Doug said, “Everybody goes to chicken fights, don’t they?”

  “All the guys and some of the women,” Maude said.

  “I’d like to go again. I’m beginning to see the fascination in blood sports.”

  Maude wondered how miniaturization would affect Doug. “I think you ought to go back to Berkeley and design better artificial limbs.”

  “Don’t you want me to stay?”

  “I’d rather go back to Berkeley myself,” Maude said. “You have a tribe here. Family.”

  Maude shrugged. “A duty to my grandmother, but I’m not sure she couldn’t take care of herself better without me. I remind her of her daughter.”

  They got in Maude’s car. Everyone was leaving quickly, not staying to chat. As they went by the gatehouse, Maude saw a deputy and the pit manager standing beside the prisoner, counting money.

  Doug said, “I wasn’t sure what I thought of Follette. He’s got a certain weakness to him, yet… I don’t know.”

  “Uncle Luke doesn’t like him much.”

  “A miniature research institute in the back of his truck—that really puts science and technology in perspective.”

  A coffin is already made for someone kin. Another coffin’s coming. Doug’s in the pit with John, Luke and Follette betting. Maude would remember Doug as the sexual engineer. They drove out onto the highway and turned west under the dark starry sky.

  “I think I should warn you. Luke wants to use you against other engineers, against technological development in this county.”

  “If I worked for Follette, would I help bring in technological development?”

  “His research institute is more for show, but with the right people, you could bring it around.”

  “I like the idea of a place where magic really works. Boy, did you see those people? Amazing.”

  “But you don’t understand. Luke is a witch.”

  “Maude, I’m a good judge of people.”

  “Luke is a witch. You’re not.”

  “Was he born human?”

  “Yes, but he was also born witch.” There, I’ve warned him, Maude thought. Doug hunched his shoulders and didn’t reply. She wondered if she should have said Luke would kill all of him except the engineer bit, but she doubted Doug would believe her. His arrogance ticked her off just enough that she omitted the lethal detail.

  When they came into the house, Partridge was sitting up watching late night television. “I’m hurting,” she said to them. “I don’t understand why I’m not doing something about it.” In her lap were quilt squares.

  “I’ve got someone coming to interview,” Maude said. She picked up the cloth pieces from Partridge’s lap. One square had been picked apart, then re-sewn partially by hand.

  Doug asked, “Did you ever go to a chicken fight, Partridge?”

  Partridge reared back to look at him. “I don’t believe we had much in that line when I was younger. I remember fox hunting, the men riding to hounds.”

  “Blood sports,” Maude said. “I’m sure there was cockfighting. Maybe the women didn’t get told?”

  “I don’t remember it,” Partridge said. She stabbed a threaded needle into the chair arm. “Help me to bed, Maude. I’ll try to be good.”

  12

  * * *

  PREDESTINATION CONJURIES

  One of Maude’s father’s people brought the new caretaker, Esther, to Partridge’s house. Esther said, “I’ve got a car, but it’s in the shop. If you could carry me back, I can start work today.” She had a broad face, a flat, slightly turned-up nose, small traces of white blood. Maude recognized the man who drove her as Elehu, a distant uncle. He was thin and had white mustaches that drooped over his lip, white hair under a fedora. More dressed than usual for that side of the family, Maude thought. He stayed in his pickup truck. Doug came out and put his arm around Maude.

  “Sure, we can drive you home,” Maude said. “How many days till the car is fixed?”

  “I can bring her here,” the man told them. “I could even pick her up of an evening.”

  “That’s all right,” Maude said. “Thanks for offering.”

  “I’m kin,” the man said.

  “I recognized you from the family reunions.”

  “Kin on your daddy’s side.”

  Maude remembered more. “You’re a preacher.”

  “Right. We’re sister churches, Esther’s and mine.”

  “Segregated?” Doug asked.

  “We don’t worship quite alike,” Elehu said, “but we believe in one God. Not crystals. Not lying entities.”

  “And what’s your party line on evolution?”

  The man ignored him. He said, “Maude, your daddy’s people would like to see more of you.”

  Maude remembered them as she’d not in years: factory workers, cancer farmers, one snapped spine, a couple dozen broken bones and lost fingers between them. They’d always been those people who lived lives out of country music lyrics, on the run from dangerous women, the women abandoned or brutalized by their men, the good marriages rigid, the children faithless.

  Elehu said, “I understand you’ve been hiding from your mother’s people. The Reverend Springer said you were on welfare in Berkeley.”

  “We were both crazy there.”

  “He doesn’t seem crazy to us.”

  Esther said, “I’d better go see who it is I’m tending.” She opened the door as though she belonged there and disappeared inside.

  Elehu said, “Don’t treat her like a maid. She’s got some nurse training.”

  Maude asked, “Isn’t everything already worked out down to how I treat her? Predestined.”

  “Not so’s you’d see it,” Elehu said. “Only God knows what you’ll do next.”

  As Elehu drove off, Doug said, “Seems poorer than the other side of the family.”

  “They don’t work with the magic. What if they’re right?”

  “What does he say about the fairystones?”

  “They’re reminders of the Crucifixion.” Maude remembered how cheated she’d felt when she learned in California that staurolites didn’t just come from Bracken County.

  In the rear bedroom, Partridge was sitting up in bed, looking somewhat drained. As Maude and Doug came in, Esther treadled the Singer and guided two quilt pieces through. She was saying, “Even people like Aunt Betty don’t live forever. Eternity makes even a thousand years on earth look petty.”

  Partridge said, “You can go to Heaven. I’d like to stay here awhile.”

  “Same with me,” Doug said.

  Maude asked, “Can you get along with Esther, Partridge?”

  “I’ll corrupt her,” Partridge said.

  “I won’t give you scurvy and I can work your joints through a full range of motion,” Esther said. “I’ve had training.”

  “Nurse’s aide, community college,” Partridge said. Partridge was feistier than she’d been when Maude first got back from Berkeley. Maude wondered if Lula’s gobbled soul informed Partridge’s personality, proving the hippie maxim that you are what you eat. “But she won’t have me malnourished. And she can bend my wrists.”

  “Don’t work on that quilt,” Maude said.

  “Ain’t you gonna need it?”

  Partridge said, “Maude, let’s talk this evening when Douglas takes Esther home.”

  “Can we leave you now?”

  The two women looked at each other. Partridge said, “I’ll be okay.”

  “Where do you want to go?” Doug asked.

  “A city.”

  “I promised I’d have lunch with Luke, to tell him about the cockfight.”

  Esther got up and went into the kitchen. Maude looked at the desk where the old Colt revolver muttered about death. “Okay, we’ll be back after lunch.”


  “Let’s see if Terry and John want to go, too,” Doug said. “We could visit Follette’s research institute.”

  “Let’s just go.”

  “Okay,” Doug said, collapsing all the arguments Maude was going to make.

  The MiniCooper looked dwarfed in the driveway. As they drove off, Maude thought about working on Follette’s pickup truck bed. Driving up the hill where the research institute was, on Martinsville’s outskirts, Maude saw the sky glitter, a huge lens looking down. “I’m not so sure I would want to work there,” Doug said, “my brain all shrunken.”

  “Haldane’s Law doesn’t apply in a pocket universe. Your neurons are beyond physics. You won’t get stupid.”

  “Little science pixies,” Doug said. “But that’s all we ever are to the general public anyway. Most laymen are too lazy to learn real science. They figure we’ve got a weird knack that makes us geniuses with microchips and steel, but we’re supposed to be social and artistic idiots. Pisses me off.”

  They parked and Doug stepped out onto the asphalt. He scuffed it with his boot heel and said, “It doesn’t feel like the back of a pickup. The whole concept is rather cute, actually.” He began walking toward the entrance.

  Inside, a receptionist stopped him. “I met Senator Follette last night and he told me I ought to bring you my resume. I’m in fiber optics in Berkeley. We were looking at optical digital processing also.”

  “I can take your application,” the receptionist began as Follette came out. “Sir, I thought you went back to Richmond this morning.”

  “I didn’t,” Follette said. Maude wondered if he really was on the road to Richmond, watching all this by shortwave television or sheer conjuring. He could have had a small version of himself waiting in a men’s room closet, a puppet for dealing with his little science people. “Come, I’ll show you around,” he said to Doug, taking his arm and circling with his left hand, a motion for Maude to follow.

  The building they were in was light inside, stripped down, floors tiled in synthetics, ceilings lowered with lights glowing through in high-tech fixtures. One office door was opened. Maude saw it had no windows. Follette took them all the way through to a greenhouse attached to the rear of the building. Two women were setting up tables and rummaging through a commercial refrigerator on the solid wall. Through the other walls, they saw the other building at right angles to the one they were in.