After the Fire Read Online Free Page B

I’m sort of torn up about it, you know?”
    “Of course you are,” Henrietta said, and she stood up. “It will be at noon at my house.”
    “Good excuse for a shave,” he said, a hand on his stubbly cheek, and he gave her a rueful grin.
    So many people these days, without a church to offer some structure for grief, wanted to let the dead go without public acknowledgement. But one of the points of a funeral was to make people take that first step, begin to pull themselves together. Riley would be the better for a shave and he knew it. And, once they were all gathered together, it would be easier for them to realize that, if they felt any responsibility for Dickie’s death, they all shared it, and it became a more honest weight, one with a meaning for the future. She knew. She had buried a son of her own.
    Miss James was sitting alone in the lounge, looking out at the somber morning. When Henrietta put a hand on her shoulder, she started.
    “Sorry,” Henrietta said.
    “I was riding the ferry from Oakland to San Francisco before the Bay Bridge was built,” Miss James confessed.
    “You still may want a lift into Vancouver,” Henrietta said loudly.
    “Thanks, Hen,” Miss James said. “That woman called me about the funeral.”
    “Oh, I hope you don’t think you have to bring anything.”
    “Of course I do. I’m past baking, but I can bring a pound of coffee.”
    “Worth its weight in gold,” Henrietta said apologetically.
    “Well, money’s to spend. Everyone who might have been waiting for me to die is dead themselves, long since.”
    “Where are you going today?”
    Miss James frowned at her.
    Henrietta repeated her question.
    “To my ear man,” Miss James answered wryly. “I’m going to ask him if an ear trumpet wouldn’t do better than this gadget.”
    “I’ll see you at the car then,” Henrietta said and moved on.
    Miss James was the only person on the island who was never called anything but Miss James. Only a few people, Henrietta among them, knew that she had been christened Lily Anne, which probably hadn’t had such a silly ring at the turn of the century in the South where Miss James had been born. There was hardly a trace of it in her voice, except when she pronounced names like Mary or Arthur. In Mary the “r” was pronounced and stretched. In Arthur, there was no “r” at all. It was a nomadic accent with traces of many dialects, its only true country great old age, a flat and windy plain. Miss James wouldn’t thank Henrietta for the stab of pity she felt at that deaf isolation.
    In the car Miss James chose, as most deaf people do, to talk since she could not listen, but she was attentive enough to fall silent at the moments when the traffic piled up or Henrietta had a difficult turn to negotiate. Miss James was for Henrietta an ideal passenger.
    “There’s something I’d like you to think about, Hen,” Miss James said as they were delivered from the Massey tunnel. “I want to do something for Red. I’ve been thinking about it for some time. She’s too young to have nobody in the world. Oh, she might marry, I suppose, but I wouldn’t like to see her marry for that reason. She can live alone. I was thinking of leaving her my house. It isn’t much of a place, but at least it’s got electricity and indoor plumbing, and I think it would suit her. But sometimes I’m afraid I’m going to live forever. When I think of that child dead in his bed …”
    For a moment Henrietta didn’t realize Miss James was referring to Dickie, but there was no distance between child and boy in Miss James’ long view.
    “If I knew I’d be dead in a year, that would suit me for her, but longer seems too long. I thought of telling her, but she might feel obligated, and I don’t want that.”
    “Why not?” asked Henrietta, for whom obligation had been a kind guide. But Miss James didn’t hear the question.
    “I give her a bonus at Christmas,” Miss James continued, “but that’s only