Peace Shall Destroy Many (22 page)

Old Franz Reimer was slowly reading the brief life-history. “Our sister, Elizabeth Anna Block, was born on the 15th of March, 1911 in Orenburg, Russia, the first child of Peter and Elizabeth Block. She was a quiet child, and at the age of eight she confessed her belief in Christ as her personal Saviour. She was baptized and accepted into the church at the age of fifteen. She was an obedient daughter, and her work in the church and in the home will ever be remembered as one of the finest examples of Christian living this community has known. She died unexpecte
dly on October 25th, 1944, aged thirty-three years, seven months and ten days. May her body rest in peace in the earth, and her spirit in the bosom of Him who died to save her. She is mourned by her parents, Peter and Elizabeth
Block, her brother Peter, and everyone who knew her in Wapiti district.”

The choir sang:

The book blurred before Thom’s eyes. He could barely sing.

Pastor Lepp said, when the song was concluded, “The family has requested that, for personal reasons, the coffin not be opened. We will honour that request, and proceed to the grave-yard. Let us stand to pray.” The stir of wonderment from the congregation was suppressed by the closing prayer.

They were pacing out then, between the standing row of grim men on one side and weeping women on the other. Thom looked straight before him, the coffin-handle smooth in his hand. The weight was nothing for six men. He was the last person she had talked to on earth, and that knowledge gave her words an eternal significance. She had said he must get away from Wapiti to learn other ways; he would be ruined otherwise. And that last impassioned outburst, as if torn from her being, “Can’t you see what’s happened to me!” Almost as if she knew she wa
s speaking her last word. Elizabeth, only vaguely pitied before, had that last day branded him forever with her personal being. In that moment when her eyes held his, the colourless woman had vanished and the human stood, naked, starved. He could not forget that. As he carried her body in the coffin down the church steps, that look reached after him and he knew himself eternally committed to something.
Stepping to the ground in the sullen afternoon, he did not know what.

Heads bowed, Block and his wife followed. She was weeping convulsively into her balled handkerchief. The Deacon, leading her, looked only down, but under the shadow of the balcony, as if drawn forcibly, he raised his head an instant towards the last pew. Herman Paetkau and his wife Madeleine stood there. Herman, head bowed, held in his arms their slumbering baby.

The people ebbed out, curious at the unopened coffin, but hushed. Old Franz Reimer lifted the dirge, and they sang, the women’s voices high and thin, as they followed across the yard to the corner enclosure where the mound of earth humped above the grey grass:

The song was never sung except when they followed a coffin. Though the words were to be a comfort, to Thom the sound fading in the dead-grey afternoon was harrowing.

The wind stirred as they stepped through the gate, lifting the hair on the bare heads of the men, swirling a twist of dead
leaves about their feet. The pallbearers placed the coffin carefully on the two planks across the grave. Looking past his feet, Thom saw the rough box in the bottom, the lid half-pushed between it and the wall of earth. He waited motionless as the people grouped about. Pete left his place to stand beside his mother at the grave-foot. Block stood solid on her other side, his cropped hair stirring, his eyes like a desert, staring at the black box.

Pastor Lepp read slowly over the coffin, his voice moving among the silent mourners: “Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them; while the sun, or the light, or the moon, or the stars, be not darkened, nor the clouds return after the rain: in the day when the keepers of the house shall tremble, and the strong men shall bow themselves, and the grinders cease because they are few, and those that look out of the windows be darkened, and the doors be shut in the streets, when the sound of grinding is low, and he shall rise up at the voice of the bird, and all the daughters of musick shall be brought low; also when they shall be afraid of that which is high, and fears shall be in the way, and the almond tree shall flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets: or
ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern.

“Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.”

There was only the sigh of the wind in the naked poplars.

The pastor turned the leaves of his Bible. “So when this corruptible shall have put on incorruption, and this mortal
shall have put on immortality, then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory. O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?

“Let us pray.” Thom stared down past his feet. He heard only the last words, “May she rest in peace—in the bosom of her Father.”

He leaned forward and reached his long arm under the coffin to take the rope Ernst passed to him. He and Ernst, with Franz and John, lifted the coffin on the two ropes; the planks were withdrawn, and they lowered the coffin into the earth. It settled in the box and, before another could move, Thom was down in the grave, his feet precise on the edge of the white box framing the black, pulling the ropes through carefully. Then, balancing on the edge, he levered the lid up and over the black coffin. As he looked up and caught the screw-driver, bending forward, he saw the elongated bodies and heads of the people dividing the slate sky and the grave’s rim, staring down at him. At a corner, beyond the granite form of Block, he glimpsed a woman’s face he had never seen before. It terrified him, somehow, to hunch in Elizabeth’s grave, feet on her coffin-box, and look up to see all Wapiti—and that sharp new face. Shuddering as before a premonition, he stooped to turn the
screws, two at each end and one on either side. The men threw in loose straw as he did so; he straightened up, and spread the straw evenly over the white-wood box. He paused a moment, looking unseeingly at the mound of straw under his feet, then, even as he grasped the hands stretched toward him, the falling earth thudded dully in his ears.

The pale straw vanished under the rain of earth and the thud died away to the rapid shovelling. Swiftly, men
exchanged spades. Thom stood there at the foot of the grave, the sound of Mrs. Block crying brokenly on her son’s chest mingling with that of the other women. He did not look at Pete. He saw his mother weeping while Margret held her close. Herb Unger was standing beyond them, away from the mound of earth and the shovelling men, looking steadily; Thom followed his glance. Herb was looking at the strange woman. Thom thought, in some remote portion of his mind, That must be the new teacher. Why did her narrow face look like a death’s-head from down there, beyond Block’s shoulder? He shook his head, gazing back at the grave, and saw it was nearly filled. Surrendered to dusty death.

He turned to go, and saw Pete leading his mother slowly down the path towards the church. Block stood alone motionless, by the mounding grave. The tumbled glowering clouds told that harvest weather was past; winter was about to break. Thom followed the silent people.

T
he chores were done; late-autumn night had encumbered the world. Washing his hands at the wash-stand by the door, Thom let the soapy water drip from his finger-tips. Behind him the house-ki
tchen lay quiet in the kerosene light. His
mother came in from washing the cream-separator, and they were
all in the house: Margret rattling wood into the stove, Hal re
ading a gaudy-yellow book, Wiens leaning o
n his hands over the table. No one said a word.

Hal jumped up from the bench, “Aw shucks!” his high voice broke across their thoughts, “There’s no fun around here any more. Nobody says anythin’—everythin’ just quiet an’ quiet!—don’t play no games—”

Margret said, where the faint light moulded the gloom by the stove, “You were at the funeral today too, Hal. We can’t sing happy songs and laugh and play right after a friend has died, as if it didn’t happen.”

Hal pushed the reader over the worn oil-cloth. “Yah. It
sure was sad, eh? Mrs. Block was cryin’ the whole time—an’ even Pete. But Mr. Block didn’t a bit, even when the grave was filled up an’ only a few men an’ Mr. Lepp were left an’ Mr. Block still was standin’ there. Me an’ Johnny sneaked up close an’ looked, but he was just starin’ at it like nothin’—”

“Sonny,” Mrs. Wiens admonished gently, “You shouldn’t stare at people—especially in their sorrow.”

“Honest, he wasn’t cryin’. Doesn’t he care that she died?”

“Of course he cares.” Thom thought his mother answe
red quickly. “But some grown men cannot show it like others. In his heart he was probably crying more than anyone there.”

Margret said viciously, “Yah!” Mrs. Wiens looked quickly at her, but said nothing. She turned to Hal.

“It’s late, Sonny; time for bed. Pa will read first.”

Thom draped the towel over the spool nailed against the wall and moved over to drop to the bench as his father reached up for the heavy Bible on the shelf above the table. Margret sat on a chair in the gloom. Hal leaned against his mother. Wiens read slowly, voice rough and uninflected.

“And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people, and God Himself shall be with them, and be their God.

“And God shall wipe all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.”

After a moment, they all stood for his prayer.

“Our Father, we can only thank You for this blessed hope of being forever with You. In your mercy,
grant us grace, now and in the moment of our death. Let us sleep tonight under Your hand. In Jesus’ name. Amen.”

Thom had never heard his father pray so—he looked up at him, seated again at the table, staring into the hand-worn book—so—
personally
was the only concept that formed in his mind. Like the prayer of some new vision, almost.

Mrs. Wiens said, “Now to bed with you, Hal, come.” She took the boy’s arm and started him up the narrow stairs before her. She had not gone to put Hal to bed in over a year.

As they vanished in the dark of the stair-hole, Thom rose and went into the darkened living room. Fumbling, he pushed his fingers under the heavy radio-battery and slid out a fat envelope. When he returned to the kitchen light with it, Margret said, sitting now on the wood-box, “You going to read that letter again?”

“Sure.” Thom settled on the bench behind the table.

“I better write Joseph to send you another—before you wear this through.”

Thom said, without a smile, “This will keep me occupied for a while yet.”

Margret looked at him, past the silent figure of their father propped motionlessly against the table. Upstairs, Hal’s prayer murmur was indistinguishable. The whole day repelled teasing. She slipped from the box and walked across the living room. He read, as the rocker squeaked forlornly.

“Dear Thomas:

“You asked me why I wrote ‘Thomas’ to you when I never spoke so formally. Well, to tell you the truth I real
ly did not know how to write your name, since in Wapiti it’s spoken
‘Tom’ in English and ‘Thom’ in Low German and ‘Thomas’ in High German. You can assume, therefore, that I am writing in none of these languages but rather am using the correct Biblical form of the name as given in the King James Version; the name of the man whose eyes were open but could not see. I wonder sometimes if our parents, when they label us thus biblically, really understand what they are about. Surely mine didn’t. I’m convinced that anyone having glimpsed my face, even when a newborn infant, could have concluded on the spot that here was one male who would never be forced to leave his garments and flee away naked to preserve his unspotted character. There are other aspects of the Old Testament Joseph that might fit, but certainly that portion is, to me at least, a grim irony whenever I glance in the mirror.

“Enough of names.

“We are in the last week of basic training. We did a crosscountry race today—seven miles with full pack. We Restricteds carried our stretchers instead of rifles. Most of the men are accustomed to us. They cannot really understand us, but they try to be democratic about it. After all, if you actually have a democracy, you’re liable to end up with more oddballs than conventional people. It seems to me you should, anyway.

“I do get off on tangents! The incident I wanted to write about happened just now. After the race, we were lying in the barracks when a whiskery man came in and began talking to the man on the first bunk. He talked and waved a book and sheaf of papers when suddenly t
he half-naked recruit said, loudly, so that everyone looked up, ‘Go on—beat it!’

“Nothing daunted, he turned to the next. I told you about
O’Hannigan; the man said three words and O’Hannigan gagged him with a stream of filth. Then t
he man came to me, his face almost happy; I nearly fell off the bed at what he said.