The Silent Dirge

Tax collectors, repo men, lawyers, used car swindlers, door-to-door insurance salesmen: the most hated professions in the history of the world. I pity the men in those fields who can't sleep at night, though most of them justify the means with the ends quite efficiently. I'm pretty sure I had a job like that once, until I gave it up for good in a small rural town in Upstate New York shortly after purchasing a standard marble composition book for three dollars and twenty-nine cents.

Traveling was part of my livelihood then, the business I was in required it. City to city, county to county, state to state; sometimes for an hour or two, other times for the better and worse parts of years. It was an exhilirating quality for a young man's world, but it also aged him fast. Some places appealed to me more than the rest and it broke my heart to leave them, to not be allowed to plant my roots there forever. But money made the world spin then as it does now and I didn't have the luxury of getting out of such a potentially lucrative industry for the sake of my own well-being. I'd tell you exactly what it was I did for a living during that period of my life, but I'm honestly not entirely sure what it was my employer had in mind for my role in his enterprise. There was some sort of commission involved, which is probably why I rarely received a substantial check and wound up having to give the nomadic lifestyle up when it came time to hang up my holsters.

I'd been working in that no-horse town for three months before I had the nerve to ask anyone his deal. Wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. I'm no storyteller, even less of an accountant. Let me start with the diner.

The diner was the central hub of the Catskill Mountain valley town with a population of less than three hundred that for our purposes here will be known as Lucretia. I don't recall if the church on Main Street, which should have been dubbed 'Only Street', was Presbyterian or Methodist, or whether the hotdog stand sold ice cream in the winter too, or if turning on red was permitted within the bounds of that locale's jurisdiction. One forgets those details quite quickly, moreso than one realizes until called upon to regurgitate the facts some twenty years later. But that diner-- no one who's ever spent more than three days in Lucretia could deny having a crystallized memory of that diner.

Its outer shell was not decked out in chrome and mirrors, flags and banners, like those I was accustomed to encountering. From the outside it looked like any other building on the strip, red bricks and a pitched roof with its peak in the middle. If the front was not primarily glass then you probably wouldn't even know that it was an eatery. Even that term's a bit generous. An oversized sign hung ominously over the sidewalk like a relic of the post-War age. "Steaks, Chops, Cutlets" it falsely advertised.

The inside was not much more impressive. One entered on the left side of the storefront and was immediately presented with a long countertop that spanned the entire length of the left wall right back to the kitchen. Booths lined the front and right side of the perimeter. A mass of tables and chairs that was constantly liable to slight alterations filled the center of the room. Patrons wiped their feet well on the tattered mat near the entrance, but it was too late; the tiles were already crumbling in their places. It didn't seem such a shame, though, since whoever had installed the black-and-white checkered pattern decades beforehand didn't bother to stick to the prescribed plan too faithfully. Some patches of the floor had clearly been laid after lunch on a Friday. Things on the high side of the room were no less inconsistent; the ceiling fans all spun at different speeds no matter how many times the chains were tugged. The kitchen, as I said earlier, was in the back left corner of the room. One restroom was located adjacent to the kitchen, and there was a glass door at the righthand corner in the back of the building that served as a rear entrance, though more often than not it was an escape route. Two booths were located in that remote corner of the diner, but no one voluntarily sat there. Well, almost no one.

School didn't seem to be an emphasis in Catskill life, at least not in Lucretia, but for the benefit of the metaphor let's pretend that everyone living there had gone to high school together. If that were indeed the case, then the Lucretia Diner picked up where the high school cafeteria's lunch table had left off. Everyone who was anyone ate at least one meal a day at that establishment religiously whether or not the daily specials had been changed once that week. The vegetables were overcooked mush, the soup tasted vaguely of potato dirt and rancid bacon grease, and the morning chef had somehow managed to burn every piece of toast that came out of the kitchen. Eggs. Eggs were the only safe bet on the menu, probably because they were guaranteed fresh by the hens that lived out back. An overhead view of the restaurant would prove that most natives agreed with my assessment; any plate belonging to a true-blue Lucretian would have yellow or white eggs on it, while the plates of vagabonds and passers-through would show faded greens and browns and various degrees of unappetizingly dull hues between the two. I must confess, it took me a full week of experimentation to join the first group, but I suppose that's not the worst track record in town.

The clientele may as well have had assigned seats with their names on them, or at least designated sections. Loggers sat with loggers at the end of the counter. Merchants and clerks huddled at the booths near the front windows, possibly in a subconscious effort to spot potential customers. The postman, the pastor, and the chief of police dined and lounged together at the central table section whenever their conflicting schedules would allow for it. Children congregated at the counter, though their mothers usually made them sit at as far away from the loggers as possible as if the temporary distance between them would save them from such a cruel and common fate. Felling trees was an honorable trade in the community, one that had sustained the local economy since its existence, but it was still hard for a mother to watch her son accept that yoke, or watch a daughter fall into the clutches of the burly, whiskey-ruined remnants of a lumberman who was once young and promising enough to escape Lucretia. The rest of the folks sat scattered here and there throughout the confines of the diner's walls, making sure not to trespass on another group's claim. When it did happen by accident there was never an exchange of words, only a few quick remarks and falsely smiling eyes to show that a foul had been committed. There was, however, the one time when Merle Windham had come back to society from a three-week bender after his wife had died of cancer, only to find some unfortunate soul sitting in his seat at the far end of the counter, but no one ever spoke of that incident or its victim ever again after it happened and I intend to follow suit here.

By this time you're probably wondering where I sat at the Lucretian Diner. I'll be honest: I was content to dine wherever the waitress suggested for that particular time, probably because my first experience there had been on that fateful night when good ol' Merle had stumbled through the front doors wanting some eggs to wash down his whiskey. I didn't mind the passive role I played on that particular stage, it led to some good angles and different perspectives that could've otherwise been missed. One day I was in a corner booth, the next at a table next to the who's who of town, sometimes I sat between the kids and the loggers like some distorted timeline in the form of a rare Rockwell painting. Dorothy, the head waitress, never steered me wrong. "Follow me?" she'd always ask when I walked in, as if I'd have the nerve to disobey after that first spectacle. "Scrambled or fried today, Mr. Thorpe?" was the next query in her service routine after that first week of dabbling in the menu's limited selections. Dorothy didn't bother handing them out to the regulars. I didn't notice that until after I'd been a patron for two months.

Exploring the territory had lost its novelty quickly. Most of the roads were named after founding families of the town where their decendants still resided. I learned the hard way that these funny-sounding streets with names like "Joneswright Way" and "Cockle Lane" were not public streets at all; they were long, winding, and imperatively private driveways which would be defended to the death until the last shotgun shell was fired. Perhaps if my strolls had taken place before the questionable motives implied by the setting of dusk, twilight, and beyond then I would have encountered friendly families sitting on porches instead of warning shots and guard dogs. Despite my less-than-amiable encounters it saddens me to think that those oddly named road names will probably be bought up and changed to things like "Birch Ridge Drive" and "Meadowbrook Road" by the urban sprawl of city slickers, if they haven't already. Lucretia was the kind of town where a communal gas-powered log splitter was left in a lot on the main drag year-round and no one had the audacity to steal it. I'm not so sure it's like that anymore, but I hope that it is.

As I'd bet you can imagine things tended to get a little boring in that lonesome mountain town once late-night walks were ruled out. Many a cup of coffee was consumed there just to kill time by both myself and most of the town's inhabitants. It was a place to be outside of the home or rented dwelling, aside from the daily grind. Again, to this day I'm not sure what my line of work even was back in those crazy years, but I knew it required me to live in Lucretia for a period of five-and-a-half months. Whenever I wasn't off doing whatever it was I was assigned to do, or jotting things down in a marble notebook in my rented room above the Rusty Axe Taproom, or getting lost both figuratively and otherwise in a book near some stream or precipice, I was sitting at the Creesh, as it was called, sipping burnt coffee and wondering when and where my next gig would take me.

Dorothy kept me company as best she could without seeming overly friendly and disturbing the delicate balance imposed by her fellow Lucretians. Standard waitress small-talk was permitted, the occasional laugh was tolerated, but nothing more. No one knew my identity or my purpose in their fine little town, and I wasn't in a position to change that. One day, about two months into my stay there, I left my notebook on the table by accident. Dorothy had always seen me scribbling in it in between coffee mug refills and must've assumed it was important, more important than it really was. She went over to where I'd been sitting to wipe the table and claim her tip when she noticed my blunder. "Mr. Thorpe!" she yelled in my direction as my hand reached for the front door of the diner just before closing time. "You forgot your book." The words sounded unusual coming out of her mouth. I suppose it was my book, though, in the same way that this will be part of it someday. "Thanks, Dorth," I said with a tired smile as I met her halfway to claim it. My hand brushed against hers as she handed me the notebook and one edge of her mouth curved upwards in a genuine show of friendship. From then on we were pals.

Dorothy continued to warm up to me after that episode. The townspeople didn't seem to mind. I don't think she realized it, but Dorothy had more say in who was to be accepted by the population and who wasn't. She was the head waitress, the only waitress to be truthful, in Lucretia's main attraction. Her word was law, but she didn't abuse the power. If Daniel Thorpe was OK in Dorothy Sparker's book, then Dan and his silly book were to be welcomed with at least tentatively opened arms. I'm not sure how or when it happened, but it felt like a secret meeting had been held to address the issue of how I was to be treated. Almost overnight my status had improved. People greeted me more graciously and slowed their strides to make sure they'd be able to hold the door for me if I was approaching behind them. Whatever word Dorothy was spreading about my alleged sanctity was working wonders. I began to write more in that book of mine, and Dorothy fed me plenty of useful information to help my endeavor. When the Creesh wasn't busy, sometimes even when it was, she'd sit across from me for a quick piece of burnt toast and eggs washed down with coffee and tell me the latest gossip or an interesting piece of the town's history. It turned out there was more to Lucretia than one passing through on a weekend trek could ever imagine. My hand would cramp viciously at night from transcribing all of the tales I'd heard that day. Sometimes the specifics were jumbled a bit, but most great fiction is composed of two-thirds of the truth. The checks kept coming from my employer for some reason despite my lack of ambition in the vague work department, possibly due to some mistake in the payroll office. I felt like one of the famous American expatriate writers living in Paris in the 1920s: money for nothing, the cafe lifestyle, and a constant flow of priceless ink on the paper.

By the third month I was no longer limited to listening to what Dorothy chose to share with me. My questions were well received and answered to the best of her knowledge. My marble notebook had overflowed and I had purchased two more at Lucky's General Store. I had dossiers on a majority of the most interesting people in town, all except one fellow who always sat near the rear entrance of the diner by himself and never made eye contact with anyone. Something inside me knew that his was probably the most poignant tale. Maybe that's why I'd waited so long to ask Dorothy about him; I was saving the best for last.

"Who's that gentleman sitting back there all alone?" I asked during a lull in the action at the Creesh.

"That's no one, don't worry about him," came quickly from her mouth in a tone I'd never heard her use before. She avoided meeting my eyes as she said it just as the man in question always did. At first I thought that maybe she was being evasive because he was a past love of hers, but I took another look at his crumpled shirt, unkempt hair, and filthy face and came to the conclusion that no one had ever loved him in his life.

"Come on, Dorth. Don't hold out on me. I'm going to make this town famous someday, I need all the facts."

"This town don't want no fame, Mr. Thorpe. Finish your eggs before they get cold." A strange sense that she was trying to protect me from something swept over me so I let the issue go for the moment.

"Fine, but don't expect as generous a tip today." Her mouth formed that sincere half-smile and that was the end of it.

At least I thought it was the end of it. I found myself unable to sleep as a result of her instant change in attitude regarding the mysterious character who silently entered the diner and never had a soul to keep him company. Even Dorothy, one of the town's most friendly individuals, showed her distate for the man by bringing him a plate of eggs without bothering to ask how he wanted them prepared. Something wasn't right about the situation. All writing ceased for a few days while I wrestled with the enigma in the privacy of my mind until I gave in and decided to find out just who the man was by asking the most innocently honest source. Luckily, Dorothy sat me at the counter that day right between the loggers and the children getting milkshakes with their allowances.

"Hey there, Jimmy."

" D'aftanoon, Mista Thorpe." Jimmy was a fine boy of nine who was about to earn himself a second milkshake.

"Say, I seem to have ordered a milkshake by accident and don't think I can handle it. Would you be interested in helping me out?"

"O'course, sir. What's the catch?" Even country kids knew that everything had a price.

"Well, Jimmy, I was wondering if you happened to know who that man sitting back there is. I'm writing a book about your town, you see, and..."

"No problem, Dan." We were on an equal plane by that point in the conversation apparently. "That there's Mr. Franklin Stevens."

"Now we're getting somewhere, Jim. Mr. Stevens is always by himself. What's his major malfunction?"

"You'd be shunned too if you'd gone and killed your brother."

So that was it. Lucretia had a dark underbelly that it didn't want an outsider to see. The Creesh's new resident loner was a renegade salesman-turned-writer, and the old one was a fratricide.

"Thanks."

"What about my ice cream?"

"Dorothy, see that li'l Jim here gets a milkshake on my tab."

I left the diner with an uncomfortable feeling that had never come over me before. A hundred sets of eyes were watching me from the safety of their homes and shadows formed by trees. I knew their secret now, their charade was up. It didn't help my insomnia any.

Sunrise could not come fast enough so I gave up trying to wait for its arrival. Dorothy, as embassador, had some explaining to do. It was so early in the morning that even the loggers wouldn't be there for breakfast yet, but I knew that she'd let me in. She did.

"What brings you here so early, Dan?"

"I know about Frank Stevens. I want answers. How could you leave out such an important character?"

"Look here, Mr. Thorpe," she said with an index finger itching to be raised as if scolding a schoolboy of Jimmy's age. "I don't want to have to ask you to leave."

Her threat was shallow and I knew it. I decided to take the other approach.

"Dorothy, all I want is to know the man's story. I promise I won't spread word of a murder here in Lucretia."

"Murder? There wasn't no murder."

"Did a jury decide that?"

"Wasn't no cover-up, either, Dan." I was Dan again, no longer Mr. Thorpe. I was making progress.

"Then what happened?"

"He was five years old and burnt his house down playing with matches. His kid brother was asleep inside and they couldn't get him out in time. The smoke choked him to death."

"So it was an accident, Frank wouldn't have been penalized. It was never reported?"

"The Stevens family was dirt poor, too poor to afford a lawyer. They could barely support themselves."

"That's no reason to let a death go undocumented, Dorth..."

"It wasn't undocumented. You can read all about it on Frank's face any day of the week. He crawled into some sort of shell after the accident, and no one ever treated him the same afterwards."

"Even so, his brother's accidental manslaughter should've been acknowledged by the law."

"It wasn't no manslaughter, Mr. Thorpe. Like I told you, the Stevens family didn't have a dime. It was a thinning of the herd."

I let it go at that. Dealing with my mother as a child had taught me when a woman was to have the final say in a matter. The case of Franklin Stevens was one of those scenarios. I left the diner, walked briskly back to my rented room above the Rusty Axe, and slept soundly for the first time in days.

A little over two months went by in an uneventful manner. My interaction with Dorothy and the other residents of Lucretia continued as usual, but the checks had been cut off. My employer must have found the error in the payroll department. My stay in town was about to be terminated since I'd have to go back to the real world in search of a real job. I didn't have the hands to be a lumberman, and there sure wasn't an opening in the local clergy for me. I wrote too much to be a holy man, the Good Book had already been written. Packing my things didn't take long. A brand new briefcase that had been issued arbitrarily by my former boss some years back revealed itself once again upon a final inspection of my closet. I tossed it into my car along with my suitcase and other belongings, thanked the barkeep downstairs for letting me occupy his room for so long, and headed for the Lucretia Diner for what would be my last serving of eggs for a long time.

In a lighthearted effort to appear prestigious during my last meal at the Creesh I brought that ridiculous pristine briefcase in with me as my stage prop instead of the customary notebook. The smallest inclinations tend to lead to the biggest discoveries. Just ask Eve.

The mood in the Creesh was uncharacteristically somber. There weren't many customers, but something was off about the general atmosphere. Dorothy barely noticed my arrival at first so I helped myself to a stool at the counter. She snapped out of her daze and pretended to be cheerful.

"You look nice today, Daniel." She must've been referring to my briefcase because my clothes and grooming habits had remained unaltered.

"Don't lie to me, I look like hell. What's with this place? It looks like someone died."

"Someone did, Mr. Thorpe." I really hated how she, Jimmy, and the rest of those Lucretians changed ones title to account for their current attitude towards him so effectively. "The funeral's being held right now."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Who was it?"

"Barry, the barber over there on First Street." First Street was one of the few streets that was not named after a local family, and was therefore safe to travel at any hour of the day or night. I knew it well. Barry had even cut my hair once or twice during my five-month sabbatical in Lucretia.

"Maybe I should head over to the cemetery." It was the kind of place where you went to your barber's funeral, even if he'd only touched your head a few times.

"No, no...It's too late, it should be getting out soon. Eggs?"

"Of course. And a fresh pot of coffee if you don't mind. I'm leaving town today, you know."

"I know." Of course she did. News travels fast in small places.

The coffee was served too soon to be fresh. Dorothy gave no special treatment to a man just because he was leaving town, even though they were practically friends for a time. I respected her immensely for that. I sipped my stale coffee and felt the smooth auburn leather of the briefcase sitting on the floor brush up against the leg of my pants.

"Hey, Dorth. Why's Frank Stevens dressed up if he's the only one here? He can't care too much about Barry if he didn't bother going to the service."

Her cheeks paled as I'd seen them do twice before.

"He probably thought it best not to show his face there." She was dodging me and I knew it.

"Then why the suit? Why the tie?" Part of me already knew the answer.

"Barry was Franklin's father."

My foot jolted to the side when I heard that final piece of the puzzle, knocking over the briefcase.

"I thought you said their family had no money. Barry seemed to have a decent business."

"He did, once he opened his barber shop thirty years ago."

A gust of wind conjured itself within those walls and sent a draft up the leg of my pants. I glanced down at the briefcase my late employer had given me. The impact had caused it to open. Business cards and brochures were sprawled out on the dingy tile. I picked up one of the cards. "Booker's Insurance Agency," I read to myself. It rang a vague bell. Maybe I had worked for that firm at one time. That's when it hit me. I slammed the insurance company's card down on the counter and made my way for the rear of the building.

"Mr. Thorpe, what are you doing? Daniel!"

It was too late to stop me. Someone had to do it. I sat down across from Mr. Franklin Stevens, extended my hand, and attempted to introduce myself as best I could. He barely stirred from his initial position and continued to ruminate over his cold cup of coffee. My faked cordiality subsided once I saw that it wouldn't have an affect.

"It wasn't your fault. I know that you didn't start that fire. It was your father. He did it for the insurance money."

Franklin turned his head and stared at me blankly as if I'd just read the permanent Daily Specials from the menu and he wanted eggs again.

"And your brother, they couldn't afford to take care of both you and your brother so..."

Then, for the second time in two minutes, something struck me. This time, however, it was in quite the literal sense. Dorothy's hand had swooped down and slapped me firmly across my left cheek before I even had a chance to see her coming. My briefcase was shoved into my chest just as instantaneously as the palm had been delivered.

"Mr. Thorpe," she commanded as she stretched that motherly index finer in the direction of the front door, "I do believe you've finally outworn your welcome here in Lucretia."

I glanced at Frank for a word of support that I knew wasn't coming. Everyone, including him, knew what had really happened thirty years prior. He'd carried that cardboard cross for decades. It was a feat that people came to expect of him to maintain the stability of the town. That burden was too crucial to the balance of their world to give up now for the mere sake of the truth.

"Scrambled today, please, Miss Sparker," Franklin said with what were probably the first words uttered publically in years.

"Coming right up, Mr. Stevens," she said as she glared at me until I rose to my feet to leave.

The sun was shining too brightly through the front of the diner as I headed for the door. It was deceptive. Lucretia. It probably meant "Lie" in some foreign tongue.

"Mr. Thorpe," Dorothy Sparker yelled in the same sympathetic voice as she had once before regarding my notebook, "You forgot your briefcase."

"No, I didn't forget. Take care of them, Miss Sparker." I meant all of them, but I doubt she understood.

The funeral procession was walking its way down Main Street in the direction of the diner as I hopped into my car. Merle Windham staggered forward with a few stragglers in the rear, all of them visibly drunk. They broke off from the formation and made their way through the front door of the Rusty Axe to wet their palates in honor of Barry Stevens, a coward the whole town would pretend to miss.

My ride back to the city didn't take as long as it should've. It felt good to be back in civilization again. When the couch got uncomfortable I went out and found a more suitable job; the Lucretia notebooks were shoved into a dark corner for what would turn out to be years; and I vowed to never eat eggs again.