The wagon creaked as it came to a halt by the small cemetery. Crickets chirped in the tall grass by the side of the road. Sunlight broke through a squall on the horizon, singeing the driver and the wagon with rust and amber. Across the field by the farmhouse, the last of the chickens skittered into their coop. The driver hopped down from the wagon and, with several others from the party waiting by the graveside, lifted a long pine box from the wagon bed. The widow, clothed in black, wimpered softly into a lacy kerchief when she saw the box. An old man snuffed out his pipe while an old dog lay in the grass beside him. Two blue soldiers stood by, stony-faced. The old farmer took off his hat and the farmer’s wife fanned the widow.
The men brought the box through the small wrought iron gate of the cemetery and up to the graveside. In the glowing field, the priest gave out the reading from his sunlit book. One of the soldiers stepped forward and draped a flag over the coffin. The other soldier began to play Taps on a horn and the men lowered the box into the Earth. The widow whispered between shudders, “God took you in the final hour. But you kept your promise nonetheless, my love: you came home to me.” Then she fled back toward the farmhouse in the arms of the farmer’s wife. The children shuffled after her and soon the priest and the soldiers followed suit. In the young night, the men filled the hole with soil.
After the men had gone, the old man and the dog stepped forward to the grave. Dad and dog grieved by its casket. Hold dearly, in eternal hope, our friend. The old man, shivering, placed his palm on the dog’s nape. After a time, they too departed for the farmhouse. Only the crickets remained.