Dangerous Undertaking by Mark de Castrique Read Free Book Online Page B

even call for the ambulance.”
    “Who, Connie?”
    “The mother and father. And a neighbor too. He was just a boy. An eight-year-old boy.”
    “You’d better go on in, Barry,” said Pace. “We’ll be there in a moment.”
    As I entered the foyer, I heard whispered voices coming from the viewing room on the left, the one more comfortably called the Slumber Room. I was surprised that Mom had not left the family across the hall in the living room where the homey, informal atmosphere could put the relatives more at ease as they discussed funeral arrangements. The Slumber Room was reserved for visitation when the family greeted friends and neighbors coming to extend sympathy.
    A young woman sat hunched in a straight-backed chair, her face buried in her hands. She wore a threadbare cotton dress and should have added at least a sweater or a jacket for the autumn chill. At her side stood a slender man whose face still bore the marks of adolescent acne. His jeans hung on his hipless body like rags on an understuffed scarecrow. His brown eyes were puffed with red circles, and though the tears no longer flowed, he had to clear his throat before he could speak.
    “You Mr. Clayton?” he asked, skeptical of my youthful appearance. “We were told to ask for Jack Clayton.” What little weight he had he shifted from foot to foot in nervous agitation. The woman looked up and stared through me, revealing a thin face with translucent skin. Her features could be taken as childlike from a distance, but the sunken eyes and flat cheekbones told of age beyond her years.
    “No, I’m his son, Barry.”
    “Then would you find him,” ordered a voice from the back of the room.
    Out of the shadows where the dark green drapes hung behind the casket viewing area stepped a man. Light first caught his brown hair, scraggly and dirty, dropping over his shoulders like twisted strands of Spanish moss. The face had a gray pallor, created by unshaven stubble. His pale blue eyes looked out of place beneath heavy dark-brown eyebrows that merged together over his sharp, hooked nose. He raised an oversized black Bible in one hand, letting the scuffed leather cover fall open as if he expected the words themselves to leap from the page.
    “The Lord has need of him,” he proclaimed. He swept the Bible in a wide arc toward the couple. “There is nothing more we can do but praise His Holy Name.”
    The woman shook with silent sobs.
    “My father is ill,” I said. “I’ll take care of things.”
    Beyond the path of the Bible, I saw the child lying on the low oak pedestal where a casket would rest. The small body was stretched out, hands across the chest, face slightly canted toward the wall as if a mischievous boy mocked the solemnity of the grown-ups. I pushed past the Bible-toting neighbor and stood over the child. Dull quarters rested on his eyes, opaque monocles closing out a world filled with new wonder. With my good arm, I lifted them from his face one at a time. There was no need for such nonsense. The child’s eyes were shut forever.
    “Those are mine,” said the belligerent man.
    The coins slipped from my fingers and scattered across the hardwood floor. The Bible slammed shut as the man chased after his money. Other footsteps sounded from the hall, and I heard Reverend Pace’s gentle voice introducing himself. The father responded “Luke and Harriet Coleman” and the other man said “Leroy Jackson.” Then the murmur of conversation blended into a background hum as I focused all my attention on the boy. The sneakers a size too big, yet worn enough to have belonged to someone before him. Jeans rolled up in double cuffs, patches at the knees. A brown belt with scratched silver buckle shaped like a cowboy’s six-shooter. A sweatshirt decorated with a montage of Saturday morning super-heroes, animals or aliens, I didn’t know which, but a new cast of characters that had become the coveted property of eight-year-olds.
    The boy’s face