[Hilarie is sitting on a couch with a book in hand and a large purple unicorn stuffed animal sitting next to her]
Hilarie Burton: Oh, hello Southern Gothic crew. It is time for the SoGoPro Book Club pick of the week, and some of you guys might know I am doing a movie called “Provinces of Night,” which is an amazing southern gothic tale written by William Gay who’s this amazing writer out of Tennessee. Currently, I am reading a different novel of his. It’s “Twilight.” No, it’s not about vampires. It’s about a creepy undertaker who is messing with bodies in this one town, and a teenage boy figures out what he’s up to and decides to track him. And so where we are currently in the book… This boy, Kenneth Tyler, has snuck onto the undertaker’s property, and is creeping around the house, when the undertaker pulls up. And so the boy is kind of hiding in the shadows, watching what this undertaker’s up too. So, the boys name, Kenneth Tyler… the undertaker, Fenton Breece. [puts on glasses and begins reading from book]
“Breece was standing behind the Lincoln, a tan leather briefcase by his side. He had a set of keys in his hand, unlocking the trunk lid. He raised it, and set the briefcase carefully inside and slammed the lid. He stood for a moment, as if abstracted by some new notion, then stred purposely to the back door of the house, and withdrew yet another set of keys, and unlocked the door of the house and went inside and pulled the door to after him. Tyler didn’t plan his next move, or even think about it. There was just something in the careful way Breece had stowed away the brief case. If Tyler had thought about it, he wouldn’t have done it, but the keys were in the trunk of the Lincoln, and in an instant he had darted across the carport and wretched up the trunk lid and seized the briefcase. He was already fleeing with it, when the door of the house opened and the undertaker came down the steps. Tyler was running full-tilt up the grassy slope, towards the line of trees, with the briefcase swinging choppily along, and his shirt blown out, cartoon-like behind him, like some half-crazed and ill-dressed commuter, chasing a fleeing train. He was holding his breath, expecting the crack of a gun and buck shots snarling about him like angry hornets. But all that came was the hoarse cry, like the cry of some wounded animal, hopelessly snared, a strangulated shriek, of outrage or despair. Once he reached the cover of the trees, he kept on going, crashing through the brush with saplings whipping past him, and his breath coming ragged, and when he thought how ludicrous the picture of portly Fenton Breece leaping brush and fallen trees, was he stopped and sat on a stump to catch his breath. He listened intently, but all was silent save the hammering of his heart against his ribcage. He sat for a time staring at the briefcase. He had to see what manner of beast he had here. There was a business-like lock on the strap, but he didn't even try forcing it, he just took out his pocketknife, ripped the strap, and looked inside. Papers. He leafed hurriedly through them, glancing occasionally at the woods. Invoices, bills of latent, receipts, copies of orders placed with various forms for chemicals, caskets, clothing, curious the tradesman follow. Beneath sheaf of papers lay a flat zippered pouch of the sort businesses use to carry deposits to the bank. His heart sank. A sack of god damn money, he thought. I take a chance on getting shot, and get chased through the woods by a fat undertaker, and all I’ve done is prove I’m a thief. He unzipped it with trepidation. The first thing he saw was a pair of lavender silk panties. They were discolored up one side, and hip with a faded rust brown stain that had long soaked into the very texture of the fabric and appeared very old. He didn’t even want to know what it was, or how it came to be there. He laid them aside and stared at them in a kind of appalled wonder. Here was more: a rubber-banded stack of glossy black and white photographs. He slipped off the rubber band to rifle hastily through them. He dropped them suddenly as if they seared his hand, or he had been handling one of those clever medieval boxes with their spring-loaded needles cunningly hidden and tipped with curare. He felt infected, poisoned, freezing his nerve and brain. The photographs had scattered some face up. He stared at them in fascinated revulsion. They were all of nude women, some young, some old, some pretty, some not. They were arranged in grotesque configurations they probably had not aspired to in life, and they were all, unmistakably, dead. Legs spread flagrantly, some grouped in mimicry of various acts of sexual congress, their faces painted in carmine smiles, their weary eyes, their sagging flesh. He’d used some kind of timer with the camera, for here was Breece himself, nude and gross and grinning, capering gleefully among the painted dead. He picked up the photographs carefully by the edges and replaced the rubber band, and just sat holding them. What to do with them? These trading cards from beyond the river sticks, picture post cards mailed from hell.” [closes book]
There you go guys. It is gross, gross, gross. [turns to unicorn stuffed animal] Right? Alright, pick it up. We’ll read it together. [waves] ‘Till next time. Bye.
