Nathan Coulter Read Online Free Page A

went through the gate and up the driveway. Toward the top of the rise, jutting up even taller than most of the cedars, was the Coulter family monument. It was made of granite—a square base, then a long shaft like a candle with an angel standing on top of it. Grandpa’s mother had bought it from a traveling salesman when she was old and childish. Grandpa said she must have been crazy too. It had taken twenty mules to pull the base of it seven miles from the railroad station. And the old woman had been dead about five years before Grandpa was able to pay for it. On the front of the monument was written:
    Beneath this monument
the mortal remains
of George and Parthenia
parted by death
wait to be rejoined
in Glory
    George and Parthenia were Grandpa’s mother and father. On the other side of the monument was Grandpa’s name:
    THEIR SON
    David Coulter
    1860 -
    Grandpa was the only one of Parthenia’s children left at home when she bought the monument, and she’d left the other names off—had forgotten about them, or was mad at them for leaving. But Grandpa wasn’t flattered that she’d remembered him. The last thing he wanted was to have his name carved in four-inch letters on a tombstone. The monument had been enough trouble to him without that. He still got mad every time he thought about it. It was as if she’d expected him to write his other date up there and die right away to balance things.

    It had finally bothered him so much that he’d sent Daddy to buy a new lot for the family. He said he’d be damned if anybody was going to tell him where to be buried. The new lot was way off on the far side of the graveyard. Nobody was buried there yet, and it was all grown up in weeds.
    The angel on top of the monument had his wings spread as if he were about to fly down and write the rest of our names in the blank spaces. Parthenia B. Coulter had left plenty of room for whoever might come along. Uncle Burley said the angel probably would fly on Judgment Day. That kind of talk always disturbed Grandma; she thought it was sacrilegious. And so he’d usually mention it when the subject of graveyards came up. He said he could just see that old angel flying up out of the smoke and cinders and tearing out for Heaven like a chicken out of a hen-house fire.
    A little past the graveyard gate was the Crandel Place. When we passed there Mrs. Crandel’s grandson, who had come to visit her from Louisville, was sitting in the front yard playing with a pet crow. Old man Crandel had caught the crow for him before it was big enough to fly. The boy was cleaned up and dressed as if it were Sunday.
    He walked over to the fence and looked at us. “Hi,” he said.
    We told him hello.
    â€œWhat’s your name?” he asked Brother.
    â€œPuddin-tame,” Brother said.
    â€œWould you like to come over and play with me?” the boy asked. “I’ll let you ride my bicycle if you will.”
    Brother and I climbed over the fence.
    â€œWhere’s the bicycle?” Brother asked him.
    â€œOn the porch.”
    We followed him up to the porch. The bicycle was a new one. And he had a new air rifle too.
    He brought the bicycle down the steps and rode it around in the yard. It was painted red and the sun shone on the spokes of the wheels. I wished Brother and I had one.
    In a little while the boy got off and gave the bicycle to Brother. But Brother couldn’t ride it, and it turned over with him. Then I got on it and it turned over with me. Mrs. Crandel came out on the porch and told the boy not to let us tear up his bicycle.

    When she went back inside Brother said, “Let me try it one more time.”
    The boy said, “No, you can’t. You might break it.”
    He caught the pet crow again and we went over to the corner of the yard and sat down under a locust tree.
    â€œThat’s a mighty fine crow you’ve got there,” Brother said. “Can I