The Man in Black

The Man in Black

  It was one of Bob’s many irritating little habits and one that finally caused his wife to pack her bags. He accepted this finality with a shrug of his shoulders; not that he wanted a divorce, nor was he apathetic, it was only that he didn’t see the point in fighting the inevitable. 

  This particular habit was a daily occurrence. On getting dressed in the morning in his usual attire of black shirt, black trousers and black socks and shoes, he would sing a Johnny cash song, The Man in Black. Not softly to himself but at full volume. He knew he had a good voice, after all he sang solo in the church choir, but it grated on his wife’s nerves. She’d once asked him to turn down the volume, or at least change his repertoire. He thought about her request but decided it would be detrimental to his joie de vivre. Fair enough, he did explain his decision to his wife and subsequently filed it away as “matter closed”. 

  The first time he’d worn a full suit of black was at his father’s funeral, whose new family had requested all mourners to wear white. While the priest was reciting the funeral prayers, Bob whispered his own eulogy: ‘You egotistical, manipulative, unfriendly git. Thanks for nothing. I’m not going to pray that you rot in hell, as I doubt whether the devil is looking forward to your arrival. Please come back as a fly and I’ll have my swatter ready’. He then made a promise to himself never to let his children suffer the way his father had made him suffer. He kept his word by not having any children. And from that day on, he only wore black.

  On returning home from the funeral he felt the need to share what he had been through with his wife. She, instead of offering the wifely shoulder, berated him: ‘de mortuis nil nisi bonum’ – don’t speak ill about the dead! She’d studied Latin at sixth form college and was wont to occasionally drop these phrases to show off her intelligence. At these times, he would remember the quote he had once read from Pythagoras: ‘it is better to be silent than to dispute with the ignorant’.

  Let’s zoom in on Bob, or Robert as he was known in his work. He met his future wife at the aforementioned sixth form college and married her because she was the first girl to offer him more than a kiss. The experience hadn’t bowled him over but he did think it was kind of her. As her life was now sorted out, she gave up on the idea of further education and found a full-time job in a perfumery. Bob did a two-year management course and somehow rolled into the undertakers business. Within a few years he was owner of his own funeral parlour.

  He used to joke to his wife during dinner that they both worked with

-1-

smells. She wasn’t amused, as the thought of it put her off her dinner.

  Bob had two specialities. Whenever a body was discovered of whom no relatives could be traced, quite often the down and out or the homeless or the junkies, the police would inevitably phone him. With as little fuss as possible, the matter was dealt with. He’d handled so many police cases that, after a few years, he was on friendly terms with almost the whole force, which, it must be said, brought even more work his way.

  His second speciality, and he was the only undertaker in the whole country to offer this service, was a “two for, almost, the price of one funeral”. Should a couple pass away simultaneously due to, for example, a traffic accident or an illness picked up in a foreign country, he would arrange a double-decker casket, which he’d invented himself, and the couple could pass through into the next world united. To the next of kin, the romantic aspect helped them in their mourning process and the cut-rate price was an added bonus.

  When he first thought of the idea, he added another running gag at dinner time, saying that the couple would be happy for all eternity as he’d buried them in the missionary position. As usual, he was the only one who saw the funny side of it.

  Obviously, he had patented his invention and it wasn’t long before he was raking in the money when other funeral parlours also started to adopt his procedure. Yet, despite his wealth, Bob kept a low profile. He told his wife that gaudy trappings weren’t fit for his line of work and that their annual two-week holiday in Devon was satisfying enough. Her reaction to this was to furnish him with a new nickname: Scrooge McDuck.

  Three months after the departure of his wife, Bob was visited at the funeral parlour by one of his friends from the local constabulary. Once they were seated in Bob’s office, enjoying a small glass of Glenfiddich, the detective informed him that his ex-wife’s work had reported her missing when she hadn’t turned up for work after a week’s holiday. They had no reason to expect foul play as no body had been found, but they were obliged to make enquiries. Bob said that he was more than welcome to search his premises, where he assured him he would definitely find a couple of dead bodies. Once they were on to their second glass of whisky, Bob explained that the last time he had seen his ex-wife was two days before she flew out to Spain where, apparently, her new boyfriend was living. They had met at a local pub –it was probably on CCTV- and she’d asked him to finally sign the divorce papers, which he had done. In fact, she had also requested, actually demanded, a hefty divorce settlement. 

He had tried to make her see reason, but as he had no desire for a lengthy court battle. He finally acquiesced, aware that he still had sufficient funds to tide him over. His policeman friend listened with a sympathetic look on his face and, before leaving, explained that a missing person’s report would be filed but that she’d probably gone to live abroad. She had probably also changed her name to escape the clutches of H.M. Revenue and Customs. After all, such a huge divorce settlement was taxable. They had one more glass for the road and parted amicably.

  Bob went into his mortuary to prepare for tomorrow’s cremation of yet another homeless person whose relatives were untraceable. Before screwing down the lid he tilted the body to take a final glance at his wife’s corpse. ‘You shouldn’t have been so greedy, my love’, and while screwing down the lid he sang his favourite song, The Man in Black. Not too loudly, as he would have hated any passers-by to hear sounds of revelry emanating from his inner sanctum.