“Pops loved this place so much,” the man said, “even though the winters got harder and harder for him. He never wanted to move away. He said his heart was here and he wanted to be buried here.”
The man stopped and looked down at the coffin. “You made us promise, Pops, that we’d never take you away from here. We kept that promise.”
Another man came up next, a slightly smaller version of the first. He looked a few years younger. He tried to speak but he couldn’t say a single word. His brother held on to the back of his neck and told him it was okay. He walked him back to the first pew and sat down with him.
Then a woman stood up. She walked up to the pulpit, and as soon as she turned around, I knew who she was. God damn it all, I thought, it’s the woman at the house. Chris Woolsey’s mother.
She said a few words about her father, about how he was the strongest person she’d ever known. As I listened to her, I felt a little sick to my stomach. I had gone to this woman’s house and asked to talk to her son about something that happened at the Ojibway Hotel.
The obituary in the newspaper, I thought. It probably listed her as one of the surviving children. Why hadn’t I noticed it? God damn it, I’m such an idiot.
“It’s a hard day,” she said, looking out at all the people in the pews. “But I’m glad you’re all here. Thank you.” She looked back in my direction. For one instant, it seemed like she was looking right at me. Then she sat down.
The priest conducted the rest of the funeral mass. As it drew to a close he raised his hands and gave us the blessing. I got up and slipped out the door before anyone else.
I went back to my truck and got in, firing up the engine and the heater. “Okay, now what?” I said. I watched everybody gather by the church steps. After a couple of minutes, the coffin was brought out the front door, carried by four men. What a cold and bitter day to be doing this. Two were the sons who had stood up during the service, another I didn’t recognize, and the fourth was Chris Woolsey. They carried the coffin down the steps and into the open doors of a hearse.
I should talk to them, I thought. Just go over to Chris and his mother, tell them I didn’t realize it was Chris’s grandfather.
The whole family was standing around in the parking lot as they closed the doors to the hearse. People filed past them and hugged them and kissed their faces. I got out of the truck and crossed the parking lot. I’ll tell them how bad I feel, maybe ask them about what had happened if they seem up to it. Maybe they’ll have an answer for me. Yes, Mr. McKnight, he was doing that all the time. These past couple of years, he was always confused. He kept seeing people all over the place and believing that he knew them.
The biggest son was standing there with his wife, along with two teenage children. Then the other son with his wife, and a young boy hopping up and down in the cold. Mrs. Woolsey was there with the man I hadn’t recognized, one of the pallbearers. It had to be her husband.
And Chris Woolsey, looking a lot younger without the hotel uniform. His face was bright red from the wind, or the grief of this day, or God knows what else.
“Pardon me,” I said as I approached them. I wasn’t sure who to talk to first, but Chris was closest, so I stuck out my hand. “Chris,” I said. “I’m so sorry.”
He shook my hand, but his mouth was hanging open like he had forgotten how to speak.
“And Mrs. Woolsey,” I said, quickly moving down the line. “I have to apologize. I just didn’t realize-”
“You’re the man,” she said, her face calm. “From yesterday.”
“If I had known,” I said, “of the… I mean, that this was your father, I never would have bothered you.”
“Mr. McKnight is it?” Her husband stepped forward and shook my hand. “You’re the one who plowed our driveway yesterday?”
“Yes. As long as I was there, I thought-”
“I appreciate the gesture,” he said. “It made the day a little easier.”
“I was at the hotel the other night,” I said. “I saw Mr. Grant. That would be your father-in-law, right?”
“Yes,” he said. “Let me introduce you to Michael and Marty, Simon Grant’s sons. His daughter, I see you’ve already met. And his grandson.”
Chris hunched his shoulders against the cold wind and looked down at the ground.
“I don’t want to keep you,” I said. “I just wanted to offer my condolences. And, well…”
“Yes?”
“There’s something else I wanted to ask you about, but it can wait, believe me.”
“No, no,” Mr. Woolsey said. “Here, come with me.” He turned to the rest of the family and told them to get the cars warmed up. Then he put a hand on my back and steered me toward the side of the parking lot. “It’s so damned cold out here,” he said. “Let’s get out of the wind.”
“Actually, it’s about Mr. Grant,” I said, walking with him. “Something he said that night. Or rather, something he wrote in a note to me.”
“Yeah? So maybe you’re thinking one of his sons might be able to answer your questions?” He pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his coat pocket. “Do you smoke?”
“No, thanks,” I said. “And yes, I mean obviously his sons might have a better idea-”
“You saw how they were in there,” he said. “They’re kind of in a bad way today. Maybe if you tell me what you want to know, I can pass it on.” He took one of his gloves off and tried to shake one cigarette out. “God, could it get a little colder, do you think?”
“I can’t imagine.”
He looked behind him as he fumbled with the lighter. “I’m feeling a little self-conscious lighting up here, eh? Come on back here a bit.” He took a few more steps toward the back of the building. I hesitated, and as he came back to me, I had just enough time to hear the little alarm bell ringing in my head. He threw the lighter and the cigarettes at my face, and as I reached up to block them he grabbed my arm and swung me around hard. He stuck his leg out in one smooth, practiced move that sent me falling backward onto the hard pavement.
I tried to roll right through it and back onto my feet, but the other two men were all over me before I even knew what was happening. They came from behind the building-they had obviously sneaked around the other way to meet us. They each grabbed me by one arm and dragged me all the way to the back so that nobody in the world would see what they were about to do to me.
They didn’t say anything at first. They just went to work on me, methodically pumping their fists into my ribs. I tried to fight back but I didn’t have a chance against three of them at once. They knocked the wind out of me and I started to go down, but they pinned me up against the red brick wall of the church and kept hitting me again and again, in the face now and then back to the body and then to the face until I couldn’t do anything but try to roll myself into a ball, anything to cover myself. That’s when they finally started talking to me.
“How’s this, tough guy?” one of them said. “Little different than roughing up an old man, eh?”
“Stop,” I said, trying to catch my breath. “What are you talking about?”
I took another blow, then heard a voice that might have been the same or different-it was all just noise now, mixed in with the ringing in my ears. “We were gonna come find you, McKnight. Right after we buried him. Who’da thought you’d actually show up at the fucking funeral?”
“No,” I said.
“You’ve got some balls. I’ll say that much.”
“Stop,” I said. “You’re making a mistake.”
The voice came closer. “You think we’re making a mistake? That’s a good one.”
It wasn’t making any sense. I tried to say something else. I tried to breathe.
“We should kill you,” the voice said. “We should kill you right here.”
“Take it easy,” another voice said. “Come on, guys. Don’t do something stupid.”
“We should do it, man. We should kill him and dump him in the river.”
“Think about what you’re doing, guys. Come on.”
I felt someone grab me by the shoulders. His voice was hot in my face. “You bother my sister again, or my little brother, or my nephew, or anybody, man. My fucking next-door neighbor, and we will find you and we will fuck you up. You got that, man?”
The other man stepped in close to me. I ducked and heard him hit the brick wall just above my head. He let out a quick scream of pain and then another man was battering me with uppercuts one after the other, some hitting me in the elbows and others finding their mark until the last one cut me right in half.
