The World is a Wedding

by Wendy Jones

  Wilfred smoothed the pig bristles of the small brush he used for varnishing and said to Mr. Emlyn Jacobs, ‘Mind, your wife will give you a good send-off. “No life without a wife!” That’s what my apprentice-master said to me.’ Then Wilfred was reminded how that phrase had inspired his proposal, his impulsive and wrong-minded proposal to Grace at a picnic, how he had been drawn in by her yellow dress and what was underneath it. The memory sobered him, and he threw it from his mind. He turned to the hefty tarpaulin-covered mound in his middle of his workshop.

  ‘I’m varnishing the lid for you right now,’ he said. ‘It’s made of oak and fit for a king.’ He dipped the bristles in the golden liquid. Mr. Auden had said to Wilfred early on in his apprenticeship: ‘Don’t bury them until they’re dead. Wilfred, are you listening? This is important.’ It was good advice and he wouldn’t want to contradict it. A fair few of his customers, the Dead Ringers they were called, asked in their last will and testament to be buried in a British Safety Coffin with a periscope to see above ground and a bell which the poor bugger could ring. It was less common these days, but he had to agree with the old-fashioned folk who requested it. It would be terrifying to be buried alive and to come round from the sleep of the dead to find you were six feet under with nothing to do but claw fervently at the lid of a coffin. You’d have to die all over again, as it were. No, not a pleasant way to go. On occasion, a coffin had been exhumed and the skeleton found curled up at one end and scratch-marks etched into the underside of the lid. At least there was no fear of that with Mr. Jacobs.

  Wilfred varnished the smooth underside of the coffin lid carefully.

  ‘I’ve made your coffin slightly larger, so you should be comfy. I didn’t want you crammed in: you’d have no room to breathe, as it were. We’re getting you sorted, Emlyn—don’t you worry. You’ll soon be lying down. Better to be lying down for eternal rest, more comfortable. And your wife will be wanting her chair back.’

  He would forewarn the pallbearers of the weight they would be forced to carry at the—what was that? He listened. Ruddy hell. Was that what he thought it was? Was that the sound of dripping? He lifted the rim of the tarpaulin covering Mr. Emlyn Jacobs. A pool of gluey, dark red liquid was growing alongside the corpse’s black lace-up shoe.

  Wilfred pulled the tarpaulin off. Mr. Jacobs’s stomach was bloated with gas and his trousers were straining at the seam: his testicles were swelling by the looks of things. His lips were swollen, his tongue was beginning to poke out between his gums and there was froth on his lips. His brain was being eaten by germs and seeping out of his mouth. The brain was always first to decay. And his eyes had leeched away. As Mr. Auden said, ‘When you die, you eat yourself.’ Wilfred didn’t know about all this modern embalming, but it would have to be better than this.

  What to do? Mr. Auden had taught him: ‘A superior undertaker looks calmly at all the different and unexpected faces of death. And God only knows, Wilfred, boy bach, death has many faces. It isn’t just old ladies ascending to the celestial realms.’ Well, this must be one of the faces Mr. Auden meant. There was something rotten in the centre of his workshop. Right. Wilfred must act. A good undertaker was decisive in the face of death. A purveyor of superior funerals knew exactly what to do when faced with the great unknown. And even if he didn’t know what to do, he pretended he did.

  ‘Emlyn, you’re getting in that coffin now! This is enough. No more of you lounging around in my workshop as if you’re having a pint in the Conduit. Come on, in that coffin!’ He put his hand on Mr. Emlyn Jacobs’s rock-hard shoulder. ‘You’re going to have to help me here; you’re a portly chap. I’m not going to be able to do this on my own. Right. Wait here.’

  Wilfred stood on the steps of the workshop and bellowed, ‘Da, give me a hand with Emlyn. Bugger weighs a ton. And he’s not looking pretty. Hurry up, Da!’ he yelled. ‘Got to get him in that ruddy coffin now.’

  Hearing no answer he bounded down the four steps of the workshop, across the small yard and into the house.

  ‘Da, what are you—’ His da was speechless and sitting as if glued to the kitchen chair. Then Wilfred noticed that Flora was at the kitchen table, quietly sewing a button on the cuff of his cambric shirt.

  ‘Oh, Flora,’ said Wilfred. This was one of those instances when the way he used to talk and the way he spoke now that he was married was very different. ‘Da, would you be so kind as to assist me in the workshop?’

  His da nodded his reply while Flora Myffanwy, seemingly thinking nothing and seeing little, continued to take the needle through the buttonholes. If she understood, and Wilfred suspected she did, she was contained enough to behave discreetly.

  ‘Good God Almighty,’ his da uttered once they were in the workshop and the door closed.

  ‘He’s dripping everywhere, Da. Got to put him in his coffin.’

  ‘How are we going to do that?’

  ‘We’ll drag him on the chair till he’s next to it, then lift him in.’

  Wilfred’s da looked at Wilfred with a lack of conviction but the two men started jerking the chair, which swerved indeterminately, its legs threatening to snap, across the floor. They shuffled slowly forward, Wilfred bending over and hugging Mr. Emlyn Jacobs around his bulging stomach so that the corpse didn’t topple over. Wilfred kicked a tin of Kingston Varnish out of the way. The accountant was eventually shunted, trailing rivulets of fluid, to beside the waiting coffin.

  ‘Right—you take his legs, I’ll take the top half.’ Wilfred got hold of Mr. Jacobs’s hand but felt a sheet of skin begin to peel away. Mr. Jacobs was gloving: the skin from his hand was falling off.

  ‘Wait a moment,’ Wilfred said, not explaining. He held Mr. Jacobs under the arms instead. ‘Don’t strain yourself, Da. On the count of three: one, two—three,’ and, with some grunting, they managed to raise the corpse and then near-drop him into the specially-widened coffin. Mr. Emlyn Jacobs sighed deeply with what sounded like satisfaction as the air left his lungs.

  Wilfred put his hands on his broad hips, his face dripping with sweat. He and his da looked down at Mr. Emlyn Jacobs, who still had one arm sticking out and his knees bent. Wilfred would have to break that arm and both legs with a mallet; he had hoped not to have to do it. He took the gold-rimmed spectacles from Mr. Emlyn Jacobs’s jacket pocket and put them on him.

  ‘I’ll get a cloth and wash this . . . this . . . off our shoes,’ he said.

  ‘Can’t you bury some lighter buggers next time, Wilfred bach?’

  5.

  WHAT HUSBANDS DO

  W ilfred ate his fried breakfast with a sense of satisfaction. The day was already bright and autumnal, and Mr. Emlyn Jacobs was finally in his grave. It had been a pleasant funeral yesterday, although it had not been entirely true when the Reverend Waldo Williams MA said that Mr. Emlyn Jacobs had been an honest Christian man who lived an upright Christian life—the reverend liked to say the word ‘Christian’.

  And tomorrow, Wilfred decided, taking a bite of some fried bread, he would empty the front room of furniture, sweep the floor, put up a shelf and start making a counter. Then he would order the paint and wallpaper.

  He noticed the tip of his necktie was resting in some egg yolk on his breakfast plate: he pushed the tie between the buttons on his shirt then looked down at the piece of bacon on his plate and said to his da and Flora Myffanwy, ‘Did you know “Baconian” doesn’t mean a man who likes bacon. It means “pertaining to Francis Bacon”.’

  ‘You’re not reading that ruddy dictionary again?’ his da asked.

  ‘Indeed I am.’ Wilfred put his knife and fork down. ‘Right!’ he announced, adjusting his necktie. Now he was a husband and going to be a father, he must sound confident.

  ‘Right,’ he repeated. Wilfred’s da and his wife looked at him, slightly puzzled. ‘It is a glorious Saturday morning. Flora Myffanwy and I will be making an early start in the hearse for a day at the s
easide.’ Flora Myffanwy smiled: Wilfred was delighted. This being confident was the right thing to be doing. He stood up and put on his Harris Tweed jacket.

  ‘Tenby it is,’ he declared. ‘We won’t be needing anything apart from a sunhat.’

  ‘A sunhat in Tenby?’ Wilfred’s da asked. ‘You’re optimistic.’

  ‘The sun always shines on the righteous.’ Wilfred smiled self-consciously at his weak joke. Lines from the Bible never made very good jokes. ‘Let us go. Dear.’

  ‘I shall fetch my camera,’ Flora replied.

  He waited to pull out Flora’s chair as she stood. That’s what husbands did, although quite how they knew the perfect moment to do it was a mystery to Wilfred. If a husband’s timing was wrong, his wife could end up on the floor—and that wouldn’t do, to have your beloved splayed on the kitchen flagstones, all crumpled and bruised. Yet somehow husbands knew how to do these things. But he had only been married for eight weeks and would have time to learn, to the end of his life—until death do us part. Hopefully, that was plenty of time.

  ‘Let me help you. Dear,’ he offered.

  ‘Thank you, Wilfred,’ Flora replied politely.

  The chair squeaked awkwardly as the spindly legs dragged across the slate flagstones and Wilfred reached out a hand to help Flora regain her balance. Perhaps he should have been wearing bedroom slippers instead of socks, then he wouldn’t have stubbed his toe. Perhaps husbands wore bedroom slippers. They definitely wore dressing-gowns and pyjamas at breakfast, of that he was sure.

  ‘That’ll be a nice day out for you young people,’ Wilfred’s da commented.

  ‘Yes, Da. The weather looks clement.’ Wilfred still didn’t know how to talk naturally now that Flora was here. Usually on a Saturday he would have slouched at the table reading The Undertaker’s Journal and eating a hunk of soda bread without a plate. It wasn’t unheard of for Wilfred, on a sunny morning, to have his breakfast naked while doing a jigsaw of the Empire. That was unthinkable now. Life was different; Wilfred was married.

  ‘And tomorrow I shall begin turning the front room into a paint and wallpaper shop,’ he announced. His da and Flora looked at him in amazement. Last time he’d mentioned it to his da, his da had pointed out—correctly—that it was only seven years ago that he’d built the workshop in the yard, and that it was near-impossible to wallpaper the wattle and daub walls of Narberth houses. But this time Wilfred’s mind was set.

  ‘Right then, let’s go,’ he said quickly, before either of them could speak.

  Wilfred drove down the hill beyond Templeton, the hearse purring like a sleek black panther. The land was deep in peace and they were the first ones to motor through the day; as if the day was still a secret to the people sleeping in the cottages they passed.

  ‘We’re steaming along nicely,’ said Wilfred, turning to Flora, who was holding her straw hat with one hand and the dashboard with the other. Flora laughed as her hat almost blew away and Wilfred smiled because she was happy. His wife was happy. She said yes, Wilfred thought to himself with a rush of joy. She said yes to me, Wilfred Price. I am the husband of Flora Myffanwy, and Flora Myffanwy is my wife. And I vowed to worship her. Because if ever there was a woman to worship it was Flora. Flora Myffanwy Price.

  He accelerated with verve through the autumnal lanes towards the sea, the fresh air blustering through the hearse windows, and if his hair hadn’t been oiled it would have moved in the wind. It was a good day—a splendid day—and Wilfred in his optimism and joy could only imagine days of happiness amounting to years of joy for both of them. Please God, let us live, he thought, closing his eyes tightly, for years and years. Let us keep on living now that we have found each other. Especially now. He stopped praying—it was important to keep one’s eyes open while driving. He had read in The Undertaker’s Journal that there were fourteen fatal automobile accidents every day. One wouldn’t want an automobile accident, especially not one caused by praying for a long life. He opened his eyes, his heartfelt prayer having, he hoped, ascended to the heavens where it would be heard. He looked at his wife and wanted to tell her all this.

  ‘Mind the door doesn’t fling open,’ he said as an attempt to explain. ‘It’s a magnificent day,’ he added, ‘to go for a spin in the hearse to the seaside. And the weather is very clement.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Flora.

  ‘It is particularly temperate weather for autumn.’

  ‘Yes,’ Flora concurred.

  ‘It is very clement indeed,’ Wilfred repeated.

  ‘Yes, it’s clement,’ she acquiesced.

  Wilfred was reminded of the spring when he met Flora on Saturday afternoons in the empty cottage by the cove; when her presence had almost overwhelmed him, and the reality of her and her beauty left him floundering so that he didn’t know what to say. There were pauses then, like these pauses now. Wilfred turned and smiled at Flora and she smiled back. He reached out his hand and put it over hers. Both of their hands were warm.

  ‘Wilfred,’ Flora Myffanwy said, straightening her pearls, which had twizzled around in the breeze.

  ‘Yes, dear?’

  ‘Might it be possible not to call it a hearse?’

  ‘But it is a hearse,’ Wilfred announced pragmatically. ‘It’s a Super Ford hearse. I bought it from Mr. Ogmore Auden, my apprentice-master. It is most definitely a hearse.’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Flora, ‘though it sounds so much nicer if we say we’re going for a drive in a motor car.’

  ‘I see what you mean,’ said Wilfred, understanding. He glanced at his wife’s fresh skin and the pink lipstick on her lips, then down at his own strong thighs, and his feet covering the pedals. ‘We don’t look dead,’ he replied.

  ‘No.’

  ‘And I certainly don’t feel dead—no disrespect to the deceased. Indeed, these days I feel very much alive.’ He winked at Flora, who smiled shyly. Wilfred felt emboldened by her response. ‘Right then—so it is. On every Saturday morning of our married life, Mr. Wilfred Price will take his wife, Mrs. Flora Myffanwy Price, for an outing in the motor car.’ He undid the belt on his jacket then slapped his knee. ‘I know!’ he said thinking out loud. ‘Let me take you to Fecci’s Ice Cream Parlour.’

  ‘And Wilfred?’

  ‘Yes, dear?’

  ‘I would like to learn to drive.’

  Flora dipped her long silver spoon into the spiral of cream. It was the first time she had eaten a Knickerbocker Glory. She looked around her. The walls of Fecci’s Ice Cream Parlour were decorated with hand-tinted photographs of ice cream concoctions which customers could order: Knickerbocker Glory, Black Cherry Supreme, Banana Boat, Banana Split, Peach Melba, Strawberry Melba and Fair Lady.

  ‘That’s a Cadbury’s Flake,’ remarked Wilfred, who had ordered a Banana Boat decorated with a stick of rippled chocolate. ‘Sometimes I eat them after a funeral, but if I’m not careful, they crumble all over the place. I get chocolate splotches on my morning suit and have to wipe them off with the dishcloth.’

  ‘The dishcloth?’

  ‘Is that not right?’

  ‘I should think so,’ said Flora diplomatically, picturing the slimy grey cloth slumped on the wooden draining-board. She ate the glacé cherry balancing on the tip of the cream and noticed her wedding ring on her finger. Flora remembered the delicate engagement ring Albert had given her. She thought back to Alfred, who had been killed in the war seven years ago, and her father, who had died in the spring. She had met and married Wilfred, perhaps too quickly—perhaps because he was devoted to her, perhaps because she had wanted to lay aside her mourning and live again. Flora looked into the glass at the whirls of fruit and strawberry syrup mixed together in no particular order. Sometimes she wondered if she had married Wilfred because she was so very shocked by the sudden death of her father.

  ‘It’s cold enough to make my teeth chop,’ Wilfred commented, putting a chunk
of vanilla ice cream in his mouth then a moment later pressing his hand across his forehead and closing his eyes. ‘The ice cream’s touched my brain,’ he groaned.

  I have married Wilfred, Flora Myffanwy thought to herself, watching him take his jacket off and place it over the back of the chair. I said yes when he proposed in the cottage by the cove, a plate of blackberries between us. I would have married Albert, had he lived, would have been a farmer’s wife in Pleasant Valley. And I would be carrying a different child. Instead I am an undertaker’s wife in a town. I have chosen my husband and I have chosen a life, she thought to herself. She could never have imagined the life she had now.

  ‘I was thinking that for our first wedding anniversary next year we could share a Black Cherry Surprise,’ Wilfred suggested, loosening his tie, ‘seeing that we are baccivorous.’

  She watched Wilfred lean back and rub his chest contentedly. Wilfred had been married before, to Grace. The marriage had been brief, lasting only weeks. It had been—Wilfred told her—unconsummated and she believed him. Certainly the Narberth courthouse had believed him. Although this surprised Flora in that Wilfred was eager to consummate their marriage—unable to hold back. Flora would rather not have been Wilfred’s second wife; some would consider it deeply shameful that he was divorced, and she would have preferred to have been his first wife, although in a way, she was.

  ‘You could have taken a photograph of the Knickerbocker Glory, my dear,’ Wilfred commented, eating his last slice of banana.

  ‘Yes,’ she agreed.

  She would like to take a photograph of the statuesque glass, the small helter-skelter of ice cream with the orange paper parasol sticking out of the top at a jaunty angle. Her camera felt like the only thread of constancy in her changed life: and the photographs she took of trees, shells and the jugs of flowers she arranged and snapped. Her Box Brownie was the way she framed the world and showed the world what she saw. She would like to work as a photographer, but she was a woman: it was almost impossible.