Jesse Ball - The Curfew

— I have a theory, the young man said, that a person should prepare his or her tombstone at the happiest moment of life. I am right now, for no reason at all, as happy as a person could possibly be, and so I decided, yesterday, to prepare my tombstone. I want nothing of sadness in it. Just rejoicing, you see?

— There is one danger, said William.

— What’s that?

— Well, although you feel now that this is the happiest you can be, what would happen if, in the years to come, you became happier still?

— I would simply make another gravestone! I have done it three times already.

— What did the others say?

— Oh, I can’t tell you that. I don’t want them to influence this one.

— Understood. All right, well, what sort of epitaph are you interested in? Do you want it to be a general address, a private message, a warning, what do you think?

— A warning?

— Well, some people favor something like, Watch Out. Or, Hell Rears Its Head.

The young man burst out in peals of laughter.

— Certainly nothing like that. Perhaps something about my shack. I’ve just gotten it, you know.

William took out his pencil and sharpened it. He opened his notebook. So, your name?

— Stan Milgram.

He wrote:

Stan Milgram

Dweller in shacks

— That’s not quite right, said Stan. It’s just one shack. And anyway, maybe the shack isn’t that important. I just, well, the whole thing came from Death Poems — where some people would prepare a death poem, so that they would know for sure it would turn out well. But then I want it to reflect these brilliant days I have come to now.

— What do you do?

— Fishing, and I sit around there in the shack and read.

— What if it gave a catalog of your day? Tell me about your day, what happened?

Stan told him in detail about the day’s events.

— All right, then.

William turned to a new page.

STAN MILGRAM

4 AM, rose, already dressed, and set out for the boat.

5 AM, out on the water to the shoals.

6 AM, net after net of powerfully squirming fish.

& 7, 8, the same.

9 AM, returned to the docks.

10, 11, read Moore’s Urn Burial; ate an onion, cheese, brown bread.

12, closed eyes for a moment.

4, woke and met with the epitaphorist, and set down this record.

— I would like to see a gravestone like that, said Stan proudly.

— I also, said William.

— The writing will have to be rather small.

— Not in itself a large obstacle.

— It isn’t, is it?

— Nope.

— Let’s settle it, then. Thank you. How did you come by this work, anyway?

— I was always good with puzzles, and I have memorized the complete works of five poets which I can recite on command. Four years ago, when I could no longer do the work that I did before, I saw an advertisement in the paper. It read, Position requiring: ingenuity, restraint, quiet manner, odd hours, impeccable judgment, and eloquence. Unworthy candidates unwelcome . I was the only one to apply.

— That sort of thing, said the young man. That sort of thing I understand effortlessly. It seems the way things should work.

William smiled and shook his hand, broke the pencil in half, tucked away his notebook, and set out back towards the gates.

THE STONEMASON

had a few small houses by the cemetery, with a yard around and between them. The whole thing was walled in, as you can imagine, with a high stone wall. The grass was short and yellow and patchy. The trees were old and august.

Smoke rose from the chimney of one of the houses. To that one William went.

— Mercer, he said, a good day’s work done.

— I’d expect no less.

Mercer, a man of about fifty years with a ruddy face and thick clever hands, was grinding a piece of granite. He stopped his work and went with William into the next room, where the fireplace was. They sat.

— Let’s see it.

William handed him the notebook.

He read slowly through it, nodding sometimes, sniffing, narrowing his eyes.

— I see, he said.

He set the notebook in his lap.

— Can the girl be trusted? This could be trouble, and for nothing.

— Not for nothing.

— No, not for nothing. But can she?

— I believe so.

— Good work, then. These will be attended to. And how is Molly today?

— Seemed happy.

— You know, the rhyme she made me, I say it every day. The paper she wrote it on is gone. But I remember it.

— When was that?

— Last winter. She was here the whole day while you went around.

— I remember.

— She came to me, and I was chiseling away, in the midst of it, you know, and she had a scrap of paper. It said Mercer on it, and underneath, to be said on mornings, and under that the thing.

— I asked you what it was and you wouldn’t say, and I asked her, and she wouldn’t either.

Mercer grinned.

— It’s a thing like that. Not to be bandied about.

He set to coughing again. Finally he settled.

— On the way here this morning, I saw a woman killed.

One of the gnarled hands was gripping the other.

William waited.

— I was under the walking bridge on Seventh. There was a shout and then she came down, hit not twenty feet in front of me. Then right there where she fell from, a face looking down.

— Did she look like a cop?

— What does a cop look like, these days?

— So, the body was there, and you walked past it.

— Looked to see if she was dead, and she was. Twice over. People don’t fall like cats, you know. Even cats don’t always fall like cats. Have you ever seen it? When a cat does something it knows a cat shouldn’t have done? There’s nothing like the embarrassment of cats.

He laughed.

There was a little stove, and William made a pot of tea. The two men sat there while the water boiled, and then Mercer made the tea.

— I do prefer good tea leaves, he said. In a fine tin.

— If I saw any, I’d bring it. These days it can’t be bought.

There was a book there, of old tombstone designs. William leafed through it.

There were many there he liked, and he showed them to Mercer. These were also ones that Mercer liked. They sat there, then, together, liking them.

The mason picked up his chisel. It was a splendid tool, an old tool, extremely heavy. William was very fond of Mercer and of all the things that Mercer owned. There are a few people one meets whom one can approve of entirely, and such was he.

— You keep that chisel sharp.

— I like to think I could cut the heart out of a sheep without it knowing. Just the tap of a hammer, and a slight twist.

— But you’ve always been fond of sheep.

— And am, and am. I’m speaking of the chisel, you understand.

There was the humming of an airplane overhead, but neither man looked up or made as if to notice.

— Tomorrow’s list is by the door, said Mercer finally.

He handed William the notebook. William tore the pages out of it and set them down. White marble for the last, he said. And leave room, she says.