The next day, as Mr. Gilette called roll, everyone announced what he was going to make for his final wood-shop project. Mr. Gilette had been instructing us for weeks to come up with something “brilliant and useful,” but not until BeauBeau died was I inspired with the perfect idea.
“Allston,” hollered Mr. Gilette.
“Here,” Allston replied. “Gun rack.”
“Campbell?”
“Yo. Canoe.”
“Henry?”
“Present. Dog coffin.”
“Excuse me,” Mr. Gilette said, and peered up over his roll book. “Did I hear ‘dog coffin’?”
“Yes, sir,” I replied.
“A dog coffin is not an acceptable project,” he proclaimed. “Dogs don’t need coffins. They just need a hole and some dirt.” Behind me the class began to laugh.
But I stood my ground and said, “I think a dog deserves as much respect as a person.”
“Look,” Mr. Gilette explained, “from my point of view most humans don’t deserve coffins. And the whole idea of the final project is to make something that you could actually sell. Something that you could start a business with, like gun racks or shoeshine kits, or canoes. But not dog coffins.”
“Well, I think it’s an exceptional business idea,” I continued. “You can only use it once and then you have to buy a new one. It’s the American way.”
The class cracked up. I could sense they were shifting to my side and that encouraged me. Once I got it out of my mind that I was supposed to be dumb, I actually felt pretty smart.
And then Mr. Gilette did what teachers love to do when they find their power slipping. He polled the class. “Okay, wise guys,” he shouted. “How many of you think a dog coffin is about the most stupid business idea ever cooked up? Raise your hand.”
The hands went up as if he had pulled a machine gun on them.
I didn’t even bother to count.
“Bury that idea, Mr. Henry,” he concluded. “And come up with a new project tomorrow.”
But I didn’t. The next day he asked again, and again I replied, “Dog coffin.”
The class went wild.
“If you persist in making that coffin,” Mr. Gilette said, “I guarantee that you’ll fail this class.”
“But I’m making something worthwhile.”
“Worthless is more like it,” he cracked. “Why don’t you just make a nice bookshelf? A pair of crutches?”
“Dog coffin,” I said, standing firm.
“Then don’t be surprised when you have to repeat seventh grade,” he stated.
I didn’t take him seriously. Nobody was stupid enough to fail shop. Even me.
For three days Mr. Gilette encouraged me to work on a different project, and each day I worked on my coffin. For once, I enjoyed the work and thought Dad was right when he said that working with your hands was a useful skill.
I hadn’t measured BeauBeau, so when I drew out my plans I figured three feet was long enough. I made the coffin a foot high and made two handles, one for the front and one for the back. On the top I carved, To BEAUBEAU III, MY INSPIRATION. At the end of the week I carried it home on the bus.
On Saturday morning I went down to Kmart and bought two yards of red satin.
“Taffeta,” the sales lady said as she snipped it off the bolt. “Good for prom gowns. What are you going to do with it?”
“Line my dead dog’s coffin,” I replied.
She didn’t say another word, even though I paid her one nickel at a time, which took half an hour.
When I got home I glued the middle of the taffeta to the bottom of the coffin and let the rest of the fabric drape over the sides.
When I was ready Dad took me to the vet’s office to retrieve BeauBeau. We carried him out to the car in his plastic bag.
“You sure you want to go through with this?” Dad asked, as he closed the trunk.
“Of course,” I replied. “I think it’s about the smartest thing I’ve ever done.”
“Well, considering your IQ,” he said, “I guess this is pretty good for you. I only wish you would do this at night so the neighbors won’t watch.”
“Let ’em,” I said. “They might learn something about being nice.”
But I was glad Dad and the neighbors didn’t watch what awful thing I had to do in order to prepare BeauBeau for his final resting place. Once we returned home Dad helped me carry BeauBeau into the garage. Then he left. Pete was with me when I picked BeauBeau up and tried to place him into the coffin. He didn’t fit. BeauBeau had seized up solid, and frozen with his legs sticking straight out. When I put him sideways into the coffin his legs made him too wide, and when I turned him onto his back his legs stuck straight up and I couldn’t lower the top. I grabbed him by the paws and tried to bend his joints but they wouldn’t move. He was as stiff as an iron fence.
“There’s only one thing to do,” I said to Pete. I could feel the little hairs sticking up all over my body.
Pete read my mind. “No,” he shouted.
“Yes!” I insisted. “Get me the three-pound hammer.”
“You’ll burn in you-know-where for this,” he said with his face all twisted up.
“The hammer,” I ordered. “Or I’ll fit you in here with him.”
He dragged the hammer over, then looked away and covered his eyes.
“You’d be better off plugging your ears,” I advised him, took aim, and lowered the hammer with both hands. There was an awful crunching noise as I smashed BeauBeau’s left front knee. Pete moaned, then started to jump up and down like a pogo stick. I folded that limb over, then hauled off and splintered the right front knee.
“Jack has lost it!” he yelled, and ran off. “He’s killing BeauBeau again!”
I knew I had to hurry. If Betsy saw what I was doing she’d turn me in to the Society Against Cruelty to Animals. Who knew what Dad would say? Probably tell me I’d be better off using a band saw.
“Forgive me, BeauBeau,” I muttered. I raised the hammer up over my head and brought it down again, and again, until I had busted up all his joints. Then I twisted and snapped his legs back, and tucked them up against his chest. When I finished all the gruesome work I fit him sideways into the coffin and covered him with the taffeta. Sorry, sorry, sorry, I said to BeauBeau. I didn’t mean it to be this way.
Hurry, hurry, hurry, I said to myself. I set the coffin top in place and was pounding the nails in when Mom, Dad, Betsy, and Pete scrambled into the garage. They stared down on me as if I were some serial killer chopping up another victim.
“You’re just in time for the funeral,” I announced as cheerfully as I could, and drove in the last nail.
“Pete,” I ordered, taking control of the situation, “help me pick up the coffin.” He grabbed the rear pallbearer handle with both hands. I grabbed the front and we lifted the coffin, then marched solemnly around the side of the house.
“Pick up the pace,” Dad said. “The Teeters are looking out their window and I’m sure they think we’re burying the baby.”
“God forbid,” Mom said.
“They probably think we’re Satanists,” Betsy speculated, and she waved to Mrs. Teeter, who had pulled the picture-window curtain to one side.
Mom made a big sign of the cross so we’d look legitimate. It probably just made us look more ghoulish.
When we arrived at the grave site Pete and I set the casket on the ground.
“Would anyone like to say a few words on BeauBeau’s behalf?” I asked, and bowed my head.
Dad began to laugh. “Look,” he said dryly, “I liked the dog. But keep in mind that he was so dumb he dug his own grave. What more needs to be said?”
“He barked in French,” Betsy added. “So I hope he ends up on the French side of dog heaven.”
“With a bunch of French poodles,” Pete said.
Mom declined.
“Amen,” I croaked, wrapping it up.
Pete and I bent down and lowered the coffin into BeauBeau’s double-wide hole. Then I grabbed my shovel and sprinkled a load of dirt on the lid. This is the final hole he dug, I thought, and one of the last holes of his I’ll ever fill in. From now on I’m going to be a writer. Not a gravedigger.
Then I made the sign of the cross and said a little prayer.
Betsy was watching me closely. “You should be institutionalized,” she proclaimed. “This whole ceremony is the workings of a sick mind.”
“I’ve already been tested,” I said proudly. “And I’m not mentally ill.”
“He’s just really stupid,” Pete said. “Leave him alone.”
She left in a huff.
I gave Pete a dirty look and pointed to an open hole. “You’re next,” I said coldly. “You know what I did to BeauBeau. What makes you think I won’t do it to you, too?”
He ran.
“Don’t turn your back on me,” I shouted. “I’ve already got you sized up for my next wood project. I’m goin’ for extra credit!”