When the commercial publications begged off, I placed this one with a dusty literary magazine, which is a sign of shabby honor in certain circles. I think what makes this kind of story work is the wisdom behind proving motivation in court: In order for the jury to convict the defendant, it must on some level understand the reason behind the crime, and agree with it.
• • •
People who didn’t know that Umberto Fugurello was a great artist tended to mistake him for a comical old man. Outside his shop, his was a rheumatic figure smaller than the average in a tight black coat buttoned at the neck and a gray Homburg perched atop wild gray hair like an egg in a nest. Below that were gold-rimmed spectacles, a tight, lipless mouth, and a chin that usually wore a Band-Aid to remind him that one can get only so many shaves out of a razor before it becomes a lethal weapon.
In the shop, he was a professional in leather apron and shirtsleeves, the cuffs rolled up past corded forearms ending in large hands cracked and discolored by the many stains and acids with which he worked. The walls and benches twinkled with mallets, chisels, miters, and wood augers of spotless nickel steel, no two of which were designed for the same purpose. Their handles were worn to fit the contours of Umberto’s calloused fingers and no one else’s.
Umberto Fugurello made caskets. So had every previous male Fugurello back to Great-Great-Grandfather Filberto Gugliano, who, legend said, crafted the final resting place of Catherine de Medici. Since then, many another famous figure had gone to his reward in vessels fashioned by the Stradivari of caskets, and Umberto, had he been a boastful man, could point with pride to mausolea and family vaults throughout both hemispheres in which resided the evidence of his clan’s skill.
But it was generally agreed within the closed ranks of the world’s casket makers that Umberto was the best of his line. Who could forget the Egyptian-style sarcophagus he had designed for the eminent archaeologist Professor Simon Broderick, dead of a hitherto unknown Middle Eastern strain of venereal disease, or the gold inlays around the lid of the box in which Dirk Crandall, the motion picture star, was buried after his wife caught him rehearsing a love scene from his latest movie with a studio switchboard operator, or the lion motif Umberto had created for famed animal trainer Hugo von Rasmussen, following that tragic episode involving a young Siberian tiger the performer had mistaken for an aging Bengal? There was in addition the double-decked piece he had built on commission for a local Syndicate chief, but that was known only to Umberto himself, and he was not one to brag.
In any case, past triumphs meant nothing to him. He lived in the present. And why not, in view of the fact that he was working on his masterpiece?
It lay across two sawhorses in the back room of the shop, a lozenge-shaped construction of forbidden hardwood from the Brazilian rainforest without a nail or a corner or a sharp edge anywhere. The handles were solid gold, the lining deep blue satin. The crowning touch—the Fugurello family crest, a hammer in a mailed fist framed in a coffin—was assuming definition even now at the point of Umberto’s chisel. It surpassed all his earlier achievements, and certainly nothing would ever rival it in the future.
For this was to be his own casket.
The imminence of death hardly saddened him. He was seventy-eight, after all, and more aware than most that no one lived forever. His only regret was that he would be unable to observe the reaction to his last and greatest work when it was unveiled at his funeral. He was lamenting this necessary disappointment when the little bell mounted on the front door of the shop announced a visitor.
“Uncle Umberto?”
Bastardo.
The old man drew a tarpaulin over the casket just as his nephew, the mortician, entered through the curtain that separated the two rooms. The visitor was tall and thin—one was tempted to say “cadaverous”—and wore his dark hair fashionably long. Recent cosmetic surgery on his nose had left him with average features dominated by ice blue eyes that matched his suit.
“Good morning, Antonio.”
“Tony.” Something like annoyance edged the young man’s cool tone. “Tony Farrell. I had it changed, remember?”
“Who could forget?” The decision to forsake the honored family name had undoubtedly contributed to the early demise of Antonio’s father, brother of Umberto. “What brings you to my shop on a Saturday morning?”
“You mean my shop.”
His uncle said nothing. That had been a great mistake, his deeding the property over to his brother’s son on the occasion of his birth. Umberto had not touched wine since that night.
Antonio said, “A fellow has a right to inspect his possession from time to time. What’s this, another masterpiece?” Before Umberto could stop him he reached over and pulled off the tarpaulin.
For a moment the beauty of the thing struck even his nephew. But he recovered himself quickly.
“What good will that do anyone when he’s in the ground? What did I tell you about throwing money away on materials we don’t need?”
“My money, not yours. The materials come out of my savings.”
“And whose time did you spend on it? I heard you were turning down business, but I didn’t believe it until now. That’s the family crest on the lid. What were you going to do, enter it in some fool exhibition put on by those graveworms you call your colleagues?”
Umberto made no reply. In a twinkling, Antonio’s manner went from hot to cold. “We’ll talk about this later. I came down here to tell you I’m selling the shop.”
“Selling!” The old man pronounced it as if it were an unfamiliar word.
“Lock, stock, and casket. I’m liquidating the inventory and putting the building and property on the open market. That includes your little project here. It should bring several thousand once we scrape off the engraving.”
“The Fugurellos have been in this business for—”
“Too long. It’s called moving with the times. No one does business with independents any more. They go to the big supply houses, where they can get machine-made models for a fraction of what you charge. This is a prime location for a parking garage. Of course, that means tearing down the building, but that shouldn’t cost too much. A swift kick will do it. I’ll make a killing.”
“And me, Antonio?”
“Tony.”
“Will you tear me down too, or sell me along with the inventory?”
His nephew smiled—a mortician’s smile, blandly obsequious.
“Certainly not, Uncle. You’ve worked hard all your life; you’ve earned a rest. I’ve made arrangements with the Waning Years Retirement Home. You move in next week.”
“But I don’t want to retire!”
“What you want or don’t want is not an issue. As your only living relative, I can have you declared incapable of caring for yourself and commit you to a state institution. Instead, I’ve elected to place you in private hands. You should be grateful.”
“I’ll fight you! I’ll hire a lawyer.”
“And what will you use to pay him? You don’t even own these tools—which, by the way, I have a buyer for, if you can provide a list of what you have here. If you can’t, I’ll just make one.” He produced a pad and pencil.
“I have rights.”
“Not if you’re senile, and that’s what I’ll prove in court if you insist upon making things difficult. This is a young man’s world, Uncle. If you hadn’t been so busy making your petty boxes you’d know that. Now, try to stay out of my way while I inventory this equipment.” He started counting the braces and bits on the wall behind the lathe, tallying them into his pad.
Umberto glared at his nephew’s back. Then his eyes fell to his masterpiece’s unfinished crest, and as always when he contemplated a project, all other cares receded. He picked up the No. 5 hammer he’d been using, thought better of it, exchanged it for a heavier No. 3 with a shiny neoprene grip, and brought it down with all his might, squarely into the center of Antonio’s fashionable hairstyle.
The Fugurello sanity hearing is in the records for anyone who cares to review it. Following conflicting testimonies by the psychiatrists who had examined the defendant, a harried judge ruled him legally insane and unfit for trial and committed him to the state mental institution for treatment. This failed to cheer Umberto, who was depressed by his inability to attend his nephew’s celebrated funeral.
The centerpiece was the talk of his profession for weeks. Under a rose-colored spot, the casket’s eggshell finish threw off a high gleam that put the flowers to shame. Everyone agreed that Antonio had never looked better, and when the service was over and the top half of the lid was lowered, exposing the ornate crest, the guests were moved in spite of the solemnity of the occasion to applaud.
After eighteen months, authorities at the institution agreed that Umberto could be trusted with tools once again, and he was granted permission to perform light work in the shop. These were happy days for Umberto, who had been cheered by his colleagues’ letters and telegrams of congratulation upon his masterpiece; doing work he loved, he no longer thought about death or its proximity. The doctors had, in fact, given him a clean bill of health, which he attributed to freedom from the responsibility of earning a living.
Then came the untimely passing of the institution’s director and a special request for Umberto to craft a vessel for the remains. Material posed a problem in the face of bureaucratic cutbacks, but with effort he managed to obtain some good cedar and recycled brass for the handles and fittings. Making something worthwhile out of such second-class stock was a challenge he welcomed.
He rubbed the last irregularity from the surface and stood back to survey his workmanship. The trimming glittered like gold against the deep red-brown of the wood. He frowned appreciably at his reflection in the finish. It wasn’t a masterpiece, but it was still good craftsmanship, and that was something money couldn’t buy.