Ray Bradbury Stories Volume 1

‘That I wouldn’t know anything about,’ said a second man. ‘Please don’t block traffic, madam. This thing is heavy.’

‘Sir!’ she cried, wounded. ‘I’ll have you know I weigh only one hundred and ten pounds.’

He looked at her casually. ‘I’m not interested in your heft, lady. I’m due home for supper. My wife’ll kill me if I’m late.’

The four of them moved on, Aunt Tildy in pursuit, down a hall, into a preparations room.

A white-smocked man awaited the wicker’s arrival with a rather pleased smile on his long, eager-looking face. Aunt Tildy didn’t care for the avidity of that face, or the entire personality of the man. The basket was deposited, the four men wandered off.

The man in the white smock glanced at Auntie and said:

‘Madam, this is no fit place for a gentlewoman.’

‘Well,’ she said, gratified, ‘glad you feel that way. It’s exactly what I tried to tell that dark-clothed young man!’

The mortician puzzled. ‘What dark-clothed young man is that?’

‘The one that came puddlin’ around my house, that’s who.’

‘No one of that description works for us.’

‘No matter. As you just so intelligently stated, this is no place for a lady. I don’t want me here. I want me home cookin’ ham for Sunday visitors, it’s near Easter. I got Emily to feed, sweaters to knit, clocks to wind—’

‘You are quite philosophical, and philanthropical, no doubt of it, madam, but I have work. A body has arrived.’ This last, he said with apparent relish, and a winnowing of his knives, tubes, jars, and instruments.

Tildy bristled. ‘You put so much as a fingerprint on that body, and I’ll—’

He laid her aside like a little old moth. ‘George,’ he called with a suave gentleness, ‘escort this lady out, please.’

Aunt Tildy glared at the approaching George.

‘Show me your backside, goin’ the other way!’

George took her wrists. ‘This way, please.’

Tildy extricated herself. Easily. Her flesh sort of – slipped. It even amazed Tildy. Such an unexpected talent to develop at this late day.

‘See?’ she said, pleased with her ability. ‘You can’t budge me. I want my body back!’

The mortician opened the wicker lid casually. Then, in a recurrent series of scrutinies he realized the body inside was … it seemed … could it be? … maybe … yes … no … no … it just couldn’t be, but …‘Ah,’ he exhaled, abruptly. He turned. His eyes were wide, then they narrowed.

‘Madam,’ he said, cautiously. ‘This lady here is – a – relative – of yours?’

‘A very dear relation. Be careful of her.’

‘A sister, perhaps?’ He grasped at a straw of dwindling logic, hopefully.

‘No, you fool. Me, do you hear? Me!’

The mortician considered the idea. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Things like this don’t happen.’ He fumbled with his tools. ‘George, get help from the others. I can’t work with a crank present.’

The four men returned. Aunt Tildy crossed her arms in defiance. ‘Won’t budge!’ she cried, as she was moved like a pawn on a chessboard, from preparations room to slumber room, to hall, to waiting chamber, to funeral parlor, where she threw herself down on a chair in the very center of the vestibule. There were pews going back into gray silence, and a smell of flowers.

‘Please, ma’am,’ said one of the men. ‘That’s where the body rests for the service tomorrow.’

‘I’m sittin’ right plumb here until I get what I want.’

She sat, pale fingers fussing with the lace at her throat, jaw set, one high-buttoned shoe tapping with irritation. If a man got in whopping distance, she gave him a parasol whop. And when they touched her, now, she remembered to – slip away.

Mr Carrington, Mortuary President, heard the disturbance in his office and came toddling down the aisle to investigate. ‘Hear Hear,’ he whispered to everyone, finger to mouth. ‘More respect, more respect. What is this? Oh, madam, may I help you?’

She looked him up and down. ‘You may.’

‘How may I be of service, please?’

‘Go in that room back there,’ directed Aunt Tildy.

‘Yee-ess.’

‘And tell that eager young investigator to quit fiddlin’ with my body. I’m a maiden lady. My moles, birthmarks, scars, and other bric-a-brac, includin’ the turn of my ankle, are my own secret. I don’t want him pryin’ and probin’, cuttin’, or hurtin’ it any way.’

This was vague to Mr Carrington, who hadn’t correlated bodies yet. He looked at her in blank helplessness.

‘He’s got me in there on his table, like a pigeon ready to be drawn and stuffed!’ she told him.

Mr Carrington hustled off to check. After fifteen minutes of waiting silence and horrified arguing, comparing notes with the mortician behind closed doors. Carrington returned, three shades whiter.

Carrington dropped his glasses, picked them up. ‘You’re making it difficult for us.’

‘I am?’ raged Aunt Tildy. ‘Saint Vitus in the mornin’! Looky here. Mister Blood and Bones or whatever, you tell that—’

‘We’re already draining the blood from the—’

‘What!’

‘Yes, yes. I assure you, yes. So, you just go away, now; there’s nothing to be done.’ He laughed nervously. ‘Our mortician is also performing a brief autopsy to determine cause of death.’

Auntie jumped to her feet, burning.

‘He can’t do that! Only coroners are allowed to do that!’

‘Well, we sometimes allow a little—’

‘March straight in and tell that Cut-’em-up to pump all that fine New England blue blood right back into that fine-skinned body, and if he’s taken anything out, for him to attach it back in so it’ll function proper, and then turn that body, fresh as paint, into my keepin’. You hear!’

‘There’s nothing I can do. Nothing.’

‘Tell you what. I’m settin’ here for the next two hundred years. You listenin’? And every time any of your customers come by, I’ll spit ectoplasm right squirt up their nostrils!’