Swimmer in the Secret Sea Read Online Free PDF Page B

cremated at a funeral home, and his ashes will be put in a little metal box and we can carry it around with us when we travel. And when we get to the middle of the ocean someday, we can throw his ashes there.
    That's exactly what we should do. I'll take him to the funeral home tomorrow and they can cremate him in the little coffin.
    A feeling of freedom came to Laski—freedom from land and houses and graves. And keeping this thought in his mind, he went upstairs to bed.
    When he entered the hospital room, it was into a new atmosphere—the other bed was now occupied. As he went toward Diane, out of the corner or his eye he saw a young girl lying in the bed he had lain in. Beside her was a young man, and two older women. They pulled a curtain around themselves and Laski sat down beside Diane.
    'She lost her baby,' whispered Diane.
    Laski glanced toward the closed curtain, behind which soft shadows were moving. 'I think we should have the baby cremated in town this afternoon.'
    'But why?'
    'If we bury him on the land, it will just be another tie for us, that this is the place where the baby is buried.'
    Her eyes filled with tears again. 'If you think i t's best ....'
    'I don't know what's best,' he said. 'Maybe there isn't any best. But the thought was very strong and I'm trying to flow with it.'
    'What will you do?'
    'I'll go over to the funeral home now and find out if they can do it right away.'
    He stood and went past the other visitors. Down the hall once more, and down the stairs, his thoughts were racing now—to get it over with, and set them free.
    He crossed the parking lot quickly and started the truck. Vaguely remembering the whereabouts of a funeral home, he drove through town. They'll deal with the whole thing, and we won't have to get involved.
    Snowplows were still working, clearing the streets, and here and there people were shoveling out their sidewalks and driveways. Laski turned a corner and saw the old colonial manor with the black and white nameplate on one of its large old pillars. It was an enormous place, with many windows, and he looked through the front window, down a long hallway lined with flowers and muted floor lamps. The parking lot was filled with cars. Three large limousines were heaped with flowers, and a crew of professionally somber men in black were standing beside a fourth limousine, hung with gray velvet curtains. The side door opened and the front end of a casket came out, made of dark wood polished to a high gloss and trimmed with silver and gold filigree. Clinging to its shining brass carrying-rails was a crew of professionals, waxed-faced and silent, bearing the huge gaudy coffin toward the hearse, where the back door was opened smoothly by a driver, who helped to slide the coffin into the richly curtained interior.
    Laski drove on, horrified. What in hell did I almost do?'
    His hands were trembling on the wheel. Tears in his eyes, he looked down at the little pine box on the seat beside him, and laid his hand upon its plain smooth surface.
    Circling back through town, he returned to the hospital; once again through the corridors, once again up the stairs, once again past the nurses, and past the people visiting in Diane's room.
    'Let's go,' he said softly, taking Diane's hand. 'We're going home together, and we'll bury him down by the stream.'
    'But what about the funeral home?'
    'Just something I dreamed up to protect myself from the truth of death.'
    She got up from the bed. 'I just have to get dressed,' she said, taking her clothes into the bathroom; he sat on the edge of the bed, and heard the voices of the visitors talking to the young girl behind the curtain.
    'You mustn't think about it anymore.'
    'Tomorrow's another day.'
    'Yes,' said the girl. And then again, ' Yes ,' softly.
    'That's right, dear. You should always look to the future.'
    'What a pretty nightgown.'
    'I got it at the K-Mart.'
    'They'll have the sales there now.'
    'Everything will be half-price. After New