Ill be damned. 1 think he expects me to go inside.
He looked at Lauffer, his eyebrows raised in question, and Lauffer smiled, nodded, and handed Clete a flashlight.
That was nice of him to think about that, but I won't need a flashlight in there. I can see well enough, and I don't intend to stay long.
He followed the monk into the tomb. He looked around. There was a large Christ on the cross either a statue or more likely a bronze castingon the wall of the tomb above the altar; a large, formal cross I wonder if that's gold? Probably not; if it was gold, somebody would climb the cemetery walls at night and steal itand several other goldor at least gold-platedobjects beside it on sort of a shelf against the wall. Two of them were filled with fresh flowers. Nice touch. Everything rested on a what do you call that, an altar cloth ? sheet of finely embroidered linen. That's fresh from the laundry. A similar but larger cloth covered a marble table, three feet wide and eight feet long, two feet from the altar against the wall. In a church, that's where the priest would have the wine and wafers for Holy Communion.
He turned to the monk, wondering if it would be appropriate to comment on the nice furnishings, or maybe to thank him he had the key to this place, he's probably responsible.
The monk was on his knees, not praying, but instead lifting a section of the tomb floor. The floor, Clete noticed for the first time, was of steel. Like in the center of a bridge, where they put a section of steel like that, with holes, to keep cars from skidding when there's ice.
What thehell is he doing?
With a grunt, the monk pulled a five-foot-square section of the floor loose, and with an effort pushed it to the side of the room, resting it against a wall.
Then he took a small flashlight from the folds of his robe, put it in his mouth, and backed into the hole in the floor. When only his chest was above floor level, he took the flashlight from his mouth.
"Be careful, Se?or. Sometimes the ladder is slippery."
Does he expect me to go down there? What the hell is down there, anyway?
When the monk disappeared from view, Clete went to the opening and stared down. A metal ladder, looking like something you'd find on a destroyer, went down as far as Clete could see.
At least three decks.
He shrugged what the hell?and backed carefully into the hole. Lauffer's flashlight was too large to put in his mouth, so he had to put it in his pocket. There was just enough light for him to find the round rungs of the ladder with his feet. He started to climb down.
He found himself in a room as large as the altar room above. There was no altar. Instead there were shelves on all four sides of the room, four high, each holding a wooden casket. Most of them were full-size, but he saw three smaller caskets, one tiny. Children's caskets, and a baby's casket. On the wall in front of him, where two shelves would ordinarily be. he saw another Christ on a cross.
The monk was descending farther into the ground. Clete followed him.
There's no smell of death in here. A musty smell, and the smell of wood, that's all.
The thought triggered a clear and distinctly unpleasant memory of the sweet smell of corrupting corpses.
Shit!
Clete climbed down after the monk through three more burial chambers, each full of caskets on shelves, and then to a fourth chamber. In this one, all but two of the casket shelves were empty.
I guess this is where el Coronel will go. How the hell are they going to get that casket down here?
The monk flashed his light on the two shelved caskets. Both were massive and polished like good furniture, Clete saw, but not identical.
I'll be damned! That's one of those cedar caskets Beatrice was raving about!
"We have moved your grandfather here, Se?or Frade," the monk said, laying his hand on one of the caskets. "Beside your grandmother."
"I see," Clete said.
"I will now leave you to your private prayers for the repose of the souls of the departed," the monk said, and started for the ladder. He stopped. "I suggest you be careful with your torch. If you drop it... very little light gets this far down."
He waited until Clete had taken his flashlight from his pocket and turned it on, then offered a final word of advice. "You might find it convenient to place the torch under your belt. And mind the ladder!"
"Thank you," Clete said.
The only thing I want out of this place is me! But, shit, I can't just follow him immediately.
You've been around dead people before. Stop acting like a child.
He flashed the light on the caskets, noticing for the first time that engraved bronze plates were on them.
MARY ELIZABETH CONNERS DE FRADE
1861-1916
"Mary Elizabeth Conners"? That doesn't sound Spanish. What did the monk say, "beside my grandmother"? Mary Elizabeth Conners is was my grandmother? She bore my father? Changed his diapers, for Christ's sake? Suckled him? An Englishwoman? Or an Irishwoman?He flashed the light on the other casket.
EL CORONEL
GUILLERMO ALEJANDRO FRADE
1857-1919
My grandfather, another el Coronel Frade.
Clete saw in his mind's eye el Coronel Alejandro Frade's pistol. His father had given it to him as a Christmas present reflecting his heritage. It was a Colt .44-40 single-action, often fired, most of the blue gone, a working gun, not a decoration. On one of its well-worn grips, inlaid in silver, was the crest of the Husares de Pueyrred?n, on the other the Frade family crest.
To judge by the gun, my grandfather was apparently a real soldier.
El Coronel why do I think of him that way, rather than "Dad"? told me his father died the rear beforeDad came to New Orleans and married my mother.
Did some monk bring my father down here when his father died, to show him where his grandfather had been moved? What the hell is that "moved" business, anyway? Moved from where, and why?
Sorry, Grandpa, Grandma, I'm an Episcopalian, and I don't know what kind of a prayer I'm supposed to offer for the repose of your souls. If I knew what to say, I would.
I've been down here long enough.
Curiosity got to him before he reached the next level, however, and instead of climbing higher, he stepped off the ladder and moved around the chamber, looking for one casket in particular. He didn't find it on that level, although he came across a surprising number of people whose names were non-Spanish-sounding. Even some Germans, which he found disturbing, but mostly English. Mawson. Miller. Evans.
He found the casket he was looking for on the next level.
JORGE GUILLERMO FRADE
1850-1915
Uncle Willy's in there. Horse breeder, swordsman of national disrepute, and collector of dirty pictures. Maybe I do have some of your genes in me, Uncle Willy. God knows, I like horses, whiskey, and wild, wild, women, and I looked at every one of your dirty pictures the night I found them.
The discovery of Uncle Willy's casket somehow pleased him, and when he realized that, he was uncomfortable. He returned to the ladder and climbed upward again.
In the chamber immediately below ground level, where there was enough light from above to see more clearly, an ornately carved casket caught his eye angels blowing trumpets; a hooded woman carrying a limp body, presumably to heavenand he stepped off the ladder and looked for the nameplate on it.