7

Gram’s was just the first death of the summer, important to our family, something to contemplate and sadden Sixth Street, of little notice to the town at large. Three weeks after Gram’s funeral, just as Josie and I had settled into a rhythm of life together, a death occurred that drew in the entire town. William Pete had been sheriff in Taylor for five years before Gram had shown up. The Copper King mining company had hired him out of a small farming town in Utah that seemed unusually glad to be rid of him. He was a bachelor and could trace his heritage back to one of Brigham Young’s forty wives, so the company thought it was getting a bargain. It didn’t have to pay him enough to feed a family, but he would be a clean-living Mormon. American, the managers at the smelter all nodded in agreement. They didn’t know that William Pete was a Jack Mormon. At an early age, he had fallen off the religious bandwagon. In truth, there wasn’t a vice that he didn’t savor, practice openly, and enthusiastically recommend to anyone who’d listen. The move from Utah to Nevada suited him as well as it suited the little town he was leaving. Nevada had possibilities. So did William Pete. He turned out to be a great sheriff. He kept the uneasy peace in a town where cultures, religions, and generations sought but refused to yield understanding. Sheriff Billy looked after the people in Taylor with a mixture of gentle diplomacy and whiskey, turned a blind eye to most of the shenanigans, and was genuinely sorry when he had to jail someone. Once you were in his cell, you became his personal drinking partner and the perfect opponent in endless, low-stakes games of blackjack and poker. He cheated with relish, and from behind his set of bars you were in no position to complain. If you were sent to the State Pen for your crime, he gallantly waved the gambling debt you had accrued. Should you be found innocent, you were sent home with a bill that could reach into the hundreds of dollars. Sheriff Billy always collected. Other than crimes of passion, Taylor became a law-abiding town. We couldn’t afford otherwise.

Gram and Sheriff Billy had been friends and business partners. When Gram came to town toting six children and one trunk of belongings she was dead broke. Migrating west after she’d buried her husband, Taylor was as far as the money went. She and the children sat in a line on their trunk at the one-window station while the dust rose in the northwest and then barreled over them. They huddled against it, each wondering, What is this place? Later, the sun set in jeweled tones in a pale, clean sky. Just before nightfall, a red-faced man with a paunch and the uneven gait of a man considerably inebriated approached. He wore a cowboy hat and a star on his Levi jacket. Gram and her children spent the night in a jail cell. He left the cell door wide open so she’d understand she wasn’t being arrested. There was a hot meal from somewhere, bacon, eggs scrambled with fried onions. While the children took turns swinging on the open cell door, Sheriff Billy slowly explained the basics of poker to my weary, uncomprehending grandmother. She gambled twenty dollars she didn’t have and with a shaking hand signed a note she couldn’t read. But by the time she and the children awoke the next morning, Sheriff Billy had arranged for a house down on Sixth Street, down where her people lived, and a few laundry jobs to keep her going. It took him three years to collect his twenty dollars. When it became obvious that laundry wasn’t going to feed Gram’s growing family, Sheriff Billy arranged for her to supplement her income by selling bootleg whiskey. He loaned Gram the money to buy Ball jars. Then, glowing like a furnace and gasping for every breath, he hiked up into the mountains behind town with my dad and my uncles Sam and Mike to introduce his very young business partners to his favorite distiller. Once a week, the boys were to carry down buckets of bootleg whiskey for their mom to bottle up and sell. Gram only handed out a second Ball jar when the first was returned. Customers paid for any breakage. She had the law behind her, so her business was brisk and well behaved. Sheriff Billy showed up at Gram’s front door on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays at 4:00 p.m., just after the dust had settled. In his quiet, reasonable way, he’d say he’d heard that she might be selling liquor without a state license.

Oh no, Sheriff Beefy, Gram would say. I no sell no booze. I have maybe just little bit here, give to my friends. You come in taste little bit. You see. This no good stuff. Nobody buy this booze. You come taste!

Sheriff Billy spent the next two hours at Gram’s kitchen table, having something to eat and making sure the whiskey was not worth selling. It was a lucrative business for both. Sheriff Billy obligingly took his profits in trade. When the favorite distiller died in a tragic but not unexpected explosion, Sheriff Billy decided that Gram needed a permanent solution to her financial woes. She needed a husband. It was Sheriff Billy who pointed Eli Milivich, a Serb miner living in the company’s bachelor quarters, in the direction of Gram and her Ball jars. Eli made wine, good wine. Sheriff Billy had sampled it quite often, had even won a gallon jug off of Eli once when Eli had spent a night in jail after a drunken brawl. Gram had empty Ball jars. Eli had wine. Eli had a steady job. Gram had eight kids. Eli presented his case. Gram shrugged and nodded consent. After a business-like civil service, Eli moved in. For the next twenty-five years, Gram fed him, did his laundry, put up with his nasty temper and, finally, missed him when he died. All during Eli’s tenure in Gram’s house, Sheriff Billy still came. After a big plate of something good, the two men sat in kitchen chairs on the front porch—weather permitting—comparing vintages, smoking cigars, swapping stories, and watching the town pass by.

Sheriff Billy’s town.

More than liquor, more than fat, evil-smelling cigars, more than eggs, bacon and fried onions, more even than gambling and always winning, Sheriff Billy loved the prostitutes over in Parker. His favorite spot was a joint called The Yum-Yum Tree. The faded sign on the front of the old wooden, two-storied shack showed a tree trunk sprouting female legs, splayed and naked except for spike-heeled shoes in assorted colors. Although he patronized all three whorehouses with equal cheer, it was the fruit of The Yum-Yum Tree that Sheriff Billy savored the most. The women there were athletic. They matched him in enthusiasm, but surpassed him in health and youth, a combination that was bound to catch up with Sheriff Billy one day. The day was a Tuesday, June 26th, 1:15 in the afternoon.

When the bouncer of the Yum-Yum Tree, Harold Deen, heard Dolores scream, he thought, What the hell are they getting up to now? He shrugged and went back to his sports page. When the second scream came, he dropped the paper and took the rickety stairs two at a time, shaking the entire building in his effort to reach Dolores’ room. He stopped short at the closed door. He knew Sheriff Billy was inside, and Harold was perplexed as to what to do. A small crowd of ladies gathered around him in the narrow hall. The door whipped open and Dolores screamed a third time right into Harold’s huge chest.

What the hell, Dolores? Harold bellowed down at her.

Dolores could only point. Through the door, the colossal mound of Sheriff Billy’s naked stomach could be seen on the bed. He wasn’t moving. Dolores, Harold, and the other ladies crowded into the tiny room. It was functional and stark; a sink and towel rack hung from one wall, a wooden chair and single metal cot pressed the opposite wall. The largest thing in the room was Sheriff Billy, a whale beached on the narrow white shelf of Dolores’ bed. His eyes were open and staring; a huge grin was solidifying on his face. There was no doubt about two things: Sheriff Billy was happy, and he was dead.

Jesus, Dolores. What did you do? Harold whispered in awe.

The usual! Dolores wailed.

The other prostitutes closed around her like a protective phalanx. Some discussion ensued. Should they try to dress Sheriff Billy, carry his huge bulk downstairs and prop him in a corner of the couch, maybe place a movie magazine in his lap? They tested the theory amongst themselves. He was sitting there looking at Betty Grable, officer. It was just too much for his heart. It didn’t ring true. It didn’t seem right. Staring down at the jubilant face of Sheriff Billy, Harold and the whores experienced Truth: this was just the way Sheriff Billy was meant to go, and he’d want everyone to know it, too. So they didn’t touch Sheriff Billy. Harold Deen went downstairs to call the Parker police and the women arranged themselves around their favorite customer like mourning angels marking the passing of a great man. When the police and the coroner arrived, they asked Dolores to be a bit more specific as to the particulars of ‘the usual.’ The men eyed the grinning Sheriff Billy, clearly impressed. Despite her misery over killing Sheriff Billy, she foresaw a time of increased prosperity ahead that allowed Dolores to smile tearfully up at the circle of uniforms and at the speculative coroner in his white smock.

Sheriff Billy seemed to have expanded since he entered Dolores’ room. He had gained at least a hundred pounds of satisfaction. It was an almost impossible task to heave his body from the cot. Inching him through Dolores’ narrow door was a feat of engineering that took Harold Deen, the whole police force, most of the prostitutes, and two unsuspecting customers who arrived just in time to see Sheriff Billy’s grinning face and naked body make a sideways entrance into the hall and then stop there, hopelessly wedged. The coroner waited in his station wagon out front, tapping the wheels and checking his watch. He wanted to have the postmortem over. He was making plans for the evening. Dolores, Dolores, he sighed.

When news of Sheriff Billy’s death reached Taylor, the reactions were mixed. Sheriff Billy’s rule had been a long and peaceful one, but it was not without critics. Above Main Street, the mostly chuvar population was relieved that this eyesore of a man, this lover of liquor and cigars, rich food and willing women, this reprobate behind a badge was finally gone. They didn’t pray for Sheriff Billy’s soul; contrary to doctrine, some things were beyond redemption. Farther up the hill still, in the offices of the smelter, a handful of men in suits worried. Layoffs had been scheduled in two weeks time. The price of copper was dropping, and production was moving to other, cheaper countries. Sheriff Billy would not be there to soothe the angry miners and smelter workers with cajoling words and free whiskey. The company could not have guessed all those years ago that the man they picked as sheriff for their little empire would dole out justice and manage the mixed populace in such a unique and fitting way. It had been happenstance, not likely to be repeated. There would never be another Sheriff Billy. The company quietly began a search for a man who could do the job—if not with gentle words, then with a strong arm.

On Sixth Street, we heard the news with a mixture of sadness and amusement. The old women shook their heads and crossed themselves. The Holy Wheel had rolled right over their Sheriff Billy. Without a word, dark, little eyes in wrinkled faces twinkled this shared message: Good way die! Sheriff Beely smiling in Heaven now maybe.

In the basement of the hospital, the coroner had finished his autopsy. Cutting through layers of what Sheriff Billy had happily called ‘hibernation insurance,’ the coroner had found signs of a massive coronary in a dangerously enlarged heart.

Taylor’s undertaker, Udiah Simple, had come to take the body away. An argument had ensued. The coroner wanted to leave the grin on Sheriff Billy’s face.

It’s an affront to God! hollered Undertaker Simple. It’s against the Book. Jesus and all the Latter Day Saints are watching!

I don’t care who the hell is watching, Udiah. Sheriff William Pete died smiling. With good reason, I might add. The coroner allowed himself a small sigh of appreciation. How often does a man die smiling? I say let him go to the grave with it!

The two men stared at each other for a time over the still mound of Sheriff Billy. Finally, the undertaker put on his hat, adjusted the peak and the brim, and left without either the body or another word. The coroner answered Sheriff Billy’s grin with a wide, satisfied one of his own.

Behind the wheel of his hearse, Udiah Simple was smiling, too, reminding himself that there was more that one battle in a holy war. Once he had Sheriff William Pete in the back room of his funeral parlor, he could do pretty much whatever he wanted.

News of the argument traveled through town at a brisk pace. At the Taylor Club, bets were taken. Would Sheriff Billy smile? The tallies were dead even. The light of heart and the optimistic showed the color of their money, nodding yes, absolutely; the sheriff would smile. The cynical shook their heads sadly at their benighted comrades. They punched a thumb over their shoulders, pointing across Main Street, at the orderly town that stretched up the hillside toward the smelter and the smokestack and the dark boundary of the cliffs. It would never happen. Sheriff Billy would be planted like any other corpse—stern, sour, and sad. On the hillside, in quiet houses on paved streets, pale-haired wives sipped mint tea, exchanging sainted smiles. They didn’t condone gambling, but they knew a thing or two. They knew Udiah Simple. They knew that the righteous prevail.

Perhaps Sheriff Billy may have started out a descendent of Brigham, but he had slipped from that lofty locale. A church service was out of the question. The question of sin aside, the Catholic priest and the Baptist minister from Parker felt uncomfortable burying a Mormon. The Mormons wouldn’t bury him at all. For a short time it seemed that there would be no clergy to preside over Sheriff Billy’s body, and he would be sent off by a curious throng of friends and foes without anybody to stand by the graveside and utter those few, carefully chosen words that applied to the dead man. Then, the Methodist-Minister-Without-A-Flock stepped forward. A free agent, the Methodist-Minister-Without-A-Flock was also a man to whom sin was not a stranger. He looked kindly on the foibles of other men. In fact, he and Sheriff Billy had spent many evenings at the jail, gambling until dawn. At the time of Sheriff Billy’s death, the Methodist-Minister-Without-A-Flock had owed him $4,262. Because the minister had no job, and thereby no means of paying, the sheriff obligingly extended unlimited credit. Sheriff Billy was patient; some day, he figured, Methodists were bound to move to Taylor. He died waiting for the payoff. On his side, the minister thought providing a rousing sermon and a heart-felt farewell would close the account nicely. Unaware, the residents of Sixth Street collected money to pay for his services.

Oh no, the Methodist-Minister-Without-A-Flock said in his most sonorous voice. This is a duty I would gladly do for nothing …

Well, he amended quickly. Maybe just a few dollars. Things are a bit tight at the moment. Somewhere in the back of his mind, slot machines jangled softly.

By the time of the burial, Udiah Simple had had Sheriff Billy’s body in his care for two days. During that time he had collected the sheriff’s tan uniform from the Yum-Yum Tree where it had been left on a chair in Dolores’ room and forgotten in the excitement of the sheriff’s departure. Udiah Simple stood three paces back from the front door and leaned way forward to knock. He leaned back and waited, his nose wrinkled. He was sure he could detect the whiff of sin, cheap perfume, booze and heated bodies oozing from the cracks around the loose-fitting door. He took an extra step back. From above, the prostitutes giggled down through the window at the black-clad undertaker. They considered dropping Sheriff Billy’s boots and uniform on Simple’s head, but they had lovingly washed and pressed the worn old uniform and polished the old boots and didn’t want to undo their labor. Dolores eventually delivered the uniform to the door, wearing a black lace bra of remarkably diminutive dimensions and gossamer half-slip with nothing on underneath, an outfit she had changed into for the undertaker’s particular benefit.

Be careful with these, Undertaker, Dolores said in her smokiest voice. Udiah Simple hissed and snatched at the clothes, sweat breaking out at his hairline.

Come back and see me again! Dolores yoo-hooed and waved from the open doorway as the hearse spit gravel and tore down the road.

Safely back in the prep room of the funeral home, Udiah Simple, still overheated from his encounter with the ripened peach of the Yum-Yum tree, set to work with shaking fingers. The first thing he did was to wipe the smile off Sheriff Billy’s face. This calmed Udiah enormously, and he continued with renewed professionalism. With cool efficiency, Sheriff Billy was embalmed, his toenails and fingernails cleaned and cut off in even square lines, his thin gray hair washed, trimmed, parted on the wrong side, and the curls combed out and held down with a shellac of Brillcream. Udiah Simple dressed Sheriff Billy’s body, rolled clean socks onto the cold feet, and pulled the gleaming old boots on. He added a few touches of powder and rouge to Sheriff Billy’s face, a hint of red to his lips, and then, cranking the gurney up with a foot pedal, he angled its metal surface down and slid the now ready body into its casket. As a final touch, he placed Sheriff Billy’s cowboy hat on his chest and crossed his hands up over the crown. Udiah Simple stood back to admire his work.

The undertaker was not completely satisfied. It seemed to him that a hint of smirk hovered around Sheriff Billy’s lips, the half-remembered tug of some stubborn muscle. Udiah Simple paced a few steps and looked from another angle.

Surely not, he thought to himself. He strode up close to the casket and thrust his face down toward Billy’s.

Surely not … he whispered to Sheriff Billy and traced the line of his lips with a light touch.

Sheriff Billy seemed to emit a chemical sigh. Powder found its way to Udiah Simple’s nose.

Surely Not, said Udiah with loud authority to the empty room. Rearing back, reaching up and then down, he closed the lid on Sheriff Billy’s coffin with a sharp finality.

On the widely anticipated morning of Sheriff Billy’s send off, it was hot by 8:00 a.m.. The sun sapped the blue from the sky, torched the streets of Taylor. Udiah Simple wheeled Sheriff Billy’s coffin from the back room in the funeral home and out into the middle of the front parlor. He opened the double doors, hoping to catch any slight breeze and clear the taint in the air. The sun from the windows caught the coffin lid and shot sparks of light off the lacquered oak. A long line of townspeople was forming at the front door. The clock inched forward. For a moment, Udiah Simple watched the crowd as it stood in the baking sun, enjoying its size and the building feeling of anticipation that begged admittance through his doors. Men stood fanning themselves with Fedoras, and women angled hands against the sun to shade their eyes or pulled black shawls protectively over gray heads. Udiah checked his watch. 9:00 a.m. exactly. He stepped forward, smiling.

The crowd surged. Udiah Simple led the flock in to the waiting coffin. The parlor was quickly filled, the line still spilling onto the porch, down the steps, and into the street. Udiah moved to the head of the coffin. With a flourish of utter confidence tingeing his usual black-clad dignity, Udiah Simple swung open the lid. A mixed gasp and cheer rose from the assemblage. The sound rippled out the double doors, gathered strength and volume on the porch, and then, rolled along the white-hot street. Money began changing hands.

The sun poured in, bathing Sheriff Billy’s face. Udiah Simple’s smile faltered, was eclipsed, by Billy’s, who lay in the powerful light of day, grinning his last laugh.