by Robert Reed
like she wanted . Make yourself believe she’s really dead, and then
you can do whatever you want to the bitch’s grave . But come back
to me afterwards . All right, Noah? Will you do all that for me?”
* * * *
Clear-headed, full of purposeful rage, I hurry back to the mayor’s
house . My mind is made up . I’m ready to announce what I know,
or at least tell people what I think I know . Most won’t believe me .
Stubborn, unimaginative souls will dismiss my words, declaring
that I am misinformed or crazy or both . But even if the entire town
PALLBEARER, by Robert Reed | 64
laughs at my madness, the idea will start chewing at them: What if I
am right? What if the odd old lady bears some responsibility in the
murder of billions? And what if her family not only knows about it,
and by one route or another approves of what she did?
Yet coming through the front door, I discover May and her fa-
ther standing before a very happy audience . I expected them in the
adjacent room, the door closed . I didn’t imagine dozens of people
laughing about something outrageously funny, something said just
a moment ago . I’m standing at the back of a big loud happy party, a
handful of people glancing my way just long to determine that I am
immune to their deep joy .
May sees me . I feel her eyes, but when I try to meet them, she
shifts direction . A fond hand touches her father’s shoulder, and
whatever story she has been telling ends with the words, “And that’s
how we finally crossed the Mississippi River.”
Raucous laughter .
And I retreat outdoors .
My mind is still made up . Yes it is . I just need a better moment,
and maybe a smaller, more open-minded audience . And I might
have to lie . Winston gave a hypothetical confession . I’ll just change
his words a little, giving him even more arrogance than usual . But
even as I’m practicing this speech, Jack emerges to ask me, “What’s
wrong?”
I take a deep breath, wanting to answer . But my voice is missing .
“Did you catch Winston?”
I nod .
“You look sick, Noah .”
That’s only because I feel sick . I’ve got a rabbit’s heart in my
chest, and I can’t seem to breathe fast enough to make my chest
stop aching . I want to sit . I want that tall beer and a good chair and
silence . But mostly, I want to be in a different place than this, and
that’s why I ask Jack, “Did you ever get my elk unloaded?”
“Mostly, but then our guests showed up and my boys bolted,” he
says . “Why? You want to start home now?”
“Yes .”
PALLBEARER, by Robert Reed | 65
He nods. He says, “Let’s go finish then. I don’t know where my
boys got to, but there shouldn’t be much left to do .”
“No .”
He studies me, waiting .
I’m not sure what I want . But I hear myself saying, “Do me a
different favor . Would you?”
“Sure, what?”
“When you get a chance, tell May…tell her that I know .”
“You know what?”
“Tell her that her brother told me most of it. And I figured out the
rest for myself .”
“What did you figure out, Noah?”
I just shake my head .
Now Jack looks grim and serious . One of those strong hands
clamps down on my shoulder . “What’d that kid say to you?”
Through the door comes more laughter . Fourteen years of my
life was spent in this town, and I can’t remember ever hearing this
much joy .
“Noah?” he presses .
But I shake free, starting back to the butcher’s shop . “Point May
toward me, would you? And don’t wait long, Jack . As soon as the
meat’s off, I’m driving out of here .”
* * * *
Three years after my mom died, Lola and I took our last trip to
the city. Useful scrap was hard to find by then, what with fires and
rust and time . But we had some loot worth the trouble, and we also
realized we’d never come back to this place again . Which was a
very worthy accomplishment .
Half by mistake, half by planning, we ended up standing next
to one of the mass graves. A fleet of bulldozers had been parked
on the same ground for nearly two decades . The ground was still
rough, bits of bone and stubborn clothes poking out here and there .
Looking at that sorry scene, I thought about the last funeral that I
had attended, and when Lola asked what I was thinking, I told her .
PALLBEARER, by Robert Reed | 66
She was crying . I was crying .
Sniffling, she told me, “Somebody wanted this. Somebody
planned all of this .”
I couldn’t count the times we had wrestled with this subject .
“Know what I wish, Noah?”
“What?”
“That those responsible had come out and said so .” My sweet sad
shunned wife leaned into me, explaining, “As soon as the Shakes
began, they should have put out some official statement proving that
they were real and listing all of their wise good-hearted reasons for
doing the unthinkable .”
“We can guess their reasons,” I said .
“But if they went public, there wouldn’t have been any doubts .”
“And what would that have changed?”
“We would have somebody to blame today . A group with a name,
real people with a clear purpose .”
“The Shakes would have killed the same people,” I said . “Every
government would have failed in the same ways . And the two of us
would have ended up here or someplace like here, looking at dead
people and dirt .”
“Except,” she said . “If they offered their proof and their reasons,
then we’d know that people were responsible for everything . Just
ordinary idiot self-important people . And that means that those ordi-
nary idiot self-important people in Salvation couldn’t tell themselves
that this had to be God’s judgment, or that they’re all so special and
pure for surviving .”
I hadn’t thought of it that way .
Lola sniffed and said nothing more, wiping at her eyes with the
backs of both hands . And I stood very still, looking out over that
enormous graveyard, thinking, “This is how it feels . This is what it’s
like, serving as pallbearer to the world .”
* * * *
I watch for her, pulling a slab of smoky meat off the trailer,
and then I take a break, expecting May to rush into view . Only
PALLBEARER, by Robert Reed | 67
she doesn’t . I remove another two slabs and carry them into the
butcher’s shop, and when I come out I’m ready to see her . But the
street is empty . Nervous energy gives me enough juice to work hard
and fast . Warm enough to sweat, I open up my coat and sling more
meat onto a cart and wheel it inside, pausing in the doorway to look
back at nobody . She won’t show . I know this now . But when I come
outside again, May is standing in my truck, waiting for me . Except
that I don’t want to see her . A
moment ago I was comfortable with
the two of us never crossing paths again .
She says, “What?”
I push the cart past her, my head down .
“Your friend says you know something,” she says . “He told me
that I had to run over here and talk to you . That it was important .”
Bear meat is greasy and dark, and it demands an entirely different
approach to smoke properly . I start pulling the bear off the truck,
piling the roasts and haunches on the cart . May watches me until the
cart is full . Then she says, “You don’t know anything .”
“What was the old woman’s job?”
There . Somebody asks a question . And I guess it was me, since
nobody else is standing here .
“Job?”
“Before the Shakes came,” I say .
She stares at me, saying nothing .
“She was a scientist,” I guess .
May straightens her back before reminding me, “That was a long
time ago . And I’m sure you noticed, her mind is mostly gone .”
“She saved the world .”
The girl doesn’t react, not even to blink .
“Your brother’s pissed with her . But that’s only because she killed
the wrong people . He thinks . On the other hand, you know that she’s
a good person, an exceptional person, and always has been . You
love your grandmother, and you came all this way to see where she
and your dad lived before the world changed . Those notes in your
back pocket? They’re going to help you write a book about this great
woman who helped save the world .” I’m sweating hard, tired hands
PALLBEARER, by Robert Reed | 68
shaking . “The world needed saving . If Grandma and her friends
hadn’t acted, our species would have eventually pushed the climate
over the brink . And that would have been an even worse mess than
the nightmare I lived through .”
May says nothing . But her eyes drop, and with ten feet between
us, I can hear her breathing .
“The thing is, maybe I believe that’s all true . The climate was in
deep trouble . There were too many people and no time to spare . And
that one way or another, the Shakes saved the world .”
Her eyes lift .
“We’re still here,” I admit . “And I’m pretty much happy to be
alive .”
A smile starts, but then she thinks better of it .
“There’s just one problem, May . Maybe your grandma did what
she did for the best reasons . Maybe we didn’t have any choice left .
But why not come out and explain the situation? Why didn’t she
and her colleagues make their argument, even if it was horrible to
consider and there was no turning back?”
She looks off into the distance .
“One statement, and all the mystery would be gone . Nobody likes
dying, but at least there would have been a purpose to it . Mankind
was being chopped back like a weed, and the planet would be better
for it . That’s not nearly as hopeless as a pack of faceless murderers
with no goal but to be vicious .”
May stares at the sky until I look in the same direction . I see
nothing but the high blue, and she turns to me . “Maybe they should
have,” she says .
“Did any of them take the vaccine?” I ask .
Her eyes stay on me . She waits and then says, “No,” before risk-
ing a small step toward me .
I try to speak, but my voice breaks .
May waits impatiently .
I breathe, and talk . “Most voices would claim that if people want-
ed to kill billions, even for the good of the earth, then they should
take their own medicine . Me? I’d be happy if they ate their shotguns
PALLBEARER, by Robert Reed | 69
or drove off cliffs . But to think that one of them is fat and ancient
and rolling around the half-dead world in a palace…that doesn’t say
much about this group’s sense of sacrifice, or decency, or honor.”
May considers what to say . Then as she opens her mouth, ready
to challenge me, I interrupt .
“But the worst thing? In my mind, without doubt, their silence
made these people possible .” I swipe my hand at the town, at faces
neither of us can see, at the years of embarrassment and hurt and
being excluded by people who in better times I wouldn’t need for
a single minute . “The good citizens of Salvation think they’re here
because God is benevolent . God is decent . And God preferred them
to the nameless bones in unmarked graves all around the world .
Dumb-shit lucky bastards, yet they’re free to think they’re nothing
but chosen .”
Again, she considers .
And when her mouth opens, I start to interrupt .
But May throws up a hand . I fall silent . I don’t remember what I
was going to say . A step apart, she looks younger than ever but not
as pretty, and she smiles with the bright intense expression that I
have never seen from a real person, only on saints in old religious
books—the consuming crazed gaze of an earthly soul bound to
eventually sit on the lap of God .
In a whisper but with considerable intensity, she tells me, “You
don’t understand .”
“Understand what?”
The hand covers my mouth .
“You think it’s finished,” she says. “You think once is enough
to save the world . But what you call the ‘noble’ thing would have
been foolish . My grandmother and the others…they had to survive
and remain in touch with one another . That was the plan from the
start .” She pauses, investing in a couple deep breaths . “How many
children are living in this one town, Noah? It’s like that everywhere .
A few old people, plenty of young parents, and too many children to
count . And you heard how people are crossing the sea, spreading out
to find new homes. Another crisis is coming. It won’t happen in my
PALLBEARER, by Robert Reed | 70
life, and maybe not for several centuries . But eventually these same
tricks will be necessary if we’re going to…”
Her voice falters .
I taste salt and May as I pull back the hand . “If you’re going to
what?”
Almost too softly to be heard, she says, “Another weeding .”
Then the saintly smile returns, self-assured and a million miles
above the concerns of the ignorant and innocent .
* * * *
Lola was right . Seeing my shrunken mother in the casket was
important . Even essential . Now I was certain that she was dead, no
doubts left, and helping carry her to the hole in the ground reminded
me that she was never half as large as she seemed in my head . She
was a shell already beginning to rot, and we nailed shut the lid and
lowered the box and started to shovel gouts of dirt and chunks of
rock on top of an object that was no more my mother than it was the
sky overhead .
Yet I was crying by the end .
And those who still happened to like me, or at least loved my
mother, put their own emotions on my tears . They came over and
hugged me and prayed for my soul . Then I went down to the Quilt
Shop and bought a very tall beer, drinking it too fast, my gait a little
sloppy as I headed back up the hill .
“Going to see your Mom again?” Ferris asked in passing .
“I need another minute with her,” I admitted .
The old man pulled up, hearing that . Then he turned and looked
at me until I returned the gaze . He was a small ageless sparkplug
with a bright smile and charming manner . Others had told me that he
had lost most of his family to the Shakes, but I could never remem-
ber him mentioning them, even in prayer .
“Son,” he said to me, like old men often do when referring to any
fellow younger than them .
I waited .
“A minute won’t be long enough, son .”
PALLBEARER, by Robert Reed | 71
“Maybe not,” I agreed .
“Don’t go,” he said .
But I’d already turned, pushing hard for that hill .
* * * *
The guests won’t stay the night in Salvation . I guess that much,
watching May walking quickly toward the RV . She will speak to her
brother, and he’ll make a show of his important anger, and leaving
him, she’ll return to the Mayor’s house to speak in private with her
father . In the meantime, I might tell somebody what I guessed and
everything I know . In the heat of the moment, May said too much .
But that moment has passed and she probably can’t believe that she
could do something so careless . So plainly stupid . Right now she’s
telling herself that I’m not part of this community, I’m just a crazy
hermit, and nobody will listen to my nonsense . But it’s going to
gnaw at her, this idea that maybe I will spread the word, and maybe
a few of these odd people will believe me, and May is certainly not
enough of a fool to trust the good will of Christians living in the
midst of this parched, unfamiliar wilderness .
The four of them will drive away, and it will happen sooner in-
stead of later . The best road is the highway . They can either head
back east or drive west to the next junction, then north to the old
Interstate—a route that gives them a straight shot at the promised
land of Canada .
What waits in Canada, and why should it matter?
Other people like Grandma, and a secret community of like-
minded zealots . At least that’s what I imagine . But I know almost