Short Story: "The Eulogist"
Dec. 6th, 2020 11:55 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
deemoyza(Originally written June 21, 2018)
When Charlotte Bixby was twenty-three years old, her grandfather passed away. Finding no solace in the company of her family and friends, she took pen to paper and composed a touching eulogy to the family patriarch.
She again dipped into the inkwell for her mother and her father, who passed only months apart, one to illness, the other to an unfortunate accident. And both times, as had happened after her grandfather’s funeral, townspeople would approach her and tell her how moved they were by her eulogy, what a talent she had in that mind of hers, and how proud the town was to count someone like her among their own. They told her many pleasant things, but never did a note of sympathy or a simple condolence pass their lips, never did a pair of arms collect her in a tender embrace.
But they sought her out, time and again, to lay their loved ones to rest with beautiful words, no matter how true those words were. And while she genuinely wept for children gone too soon, and spoke with admiration for devout and hardworking men and women, she also spoke well of Sadie Rockford’s cheating husband—who had died under most unusual circumstances—and helped Sadie to bury a saint.
When death came for her, hovering in the corners of her room, the ladies of the town requested she eulogize herself. "No one knows you better,“ they said. They were so insistent that Charlotte, drawing ragged breaths, grasped a pen in her quaking hands and scrawled out a short note. She folded the paper and sealed it with a dab of wax, instructing those present not to open it, but to deliver it to Reverend Adler, so that he may read it at her funeral.
When one woman asked why she had so little to say, Charlotte replied, barely above a whisper, “Humility is a virtue, my dear, and I am but a humble servant of God, no more, no less.” Before the sun rose again, death stepped from the shadows and carried her away in gentle arms, asking nothing of her but peaceful resignation.
⁂
When Charlotte Bixby was twenty-three years old, her grandfather passed away. Finding no solace in the company of her family and friends, she took pen to paper and composed a touching eulogy to the family patriarch.
She again dipped into the inkwell for her mother and her father, who passed only months apart, one to illness, the other to an unfortunate accident. And both times, as had happened after her grandfather’s funeral, townspeople would approach her and tell her how moved they were by her eulogy, what a talent she had in that mind of hers, and how proud the town was to count someone like her among their own. They told her many pleasant things, but never did a note of sympathy or a simple condolence pass their lips, never did a pair of arms collect her in a tender embrace.
But they sought her out, time and again, to lay their loved ones to rest with beautiful words, no matter how true those words were. And while she genuinely wept for children gone too soon, and spoke with admiration for devout and hardworking men and women, she also spoke well of Sadie Rockford’s cheating husband—who had died under most unusual circumstances—and helped Sadie to bury a saint.
When death came for her, hovering in the corners of her room, the ladies of the town requested she eulogize herself. "No one knows you better,“ they said. They were so insistent that Charlotte, drawing ragged breaths, grasped a pen in her quaking hands and scrawled out a short note. She folded the paper and sealed it with a dab of wax, instructing those present not to open it, but to deliver it to Reverend Adler, so that he may read it at her funeral.
When one woman asked why she had so little to say, Charlotte replied, barely above a whisper, “Humility is a virtue, my dear, and I am but a humble servant of God, no more, no less.” Before the sun rose again, death stepped from the shadows and carried her away in gentle arms, asking nothing of her but peaceful resignation.
From the Coriander County Press-Gazette:
A Note on the Passing of Charlotte Bixby
Last Friday night, our community lost a dear and gifted soul in Miss Charlotte Bixby. She is perhaps better known to less-frequent readers as the Eulogist of Coriander County. Miss Bixby used her way with words to soothe the hearts of many in our township and beyond for more than fifty years.
She embarked on this path at her grandfather’s funeral, where she delivered such an eloquent and heartfelt statement to leave few dry eyes among those in attendance. She did the same for her father and her mother, after which, other locals began to seek her services for their dearly departed loved ones.
She spoke tenderly of children lost to illness, and admiringly of old women who had devoted their lives to keeping God’s word. She had nothing but pleasant things to say about Sadie Rockford’s husband, who perished of a heart attack in a hotel room in Warington, in the company of a woman nobody else seemed to know. She even afforded her eloquence to the mayor’s hunting dog when he laid down beside the fire for the last time. Yes, Charlotte Bixby was indeed a town treasure.
When she was on her deathbed, Miss Bixby’s friends asked if she would consider eulogizing herself, the one person she knew best. According to those present, she scrawled a few lines on a scrap of paper, which she folded and sealed with wax, to remain so until her funeral service. When asked why she had so little to say, she reportedly replied, “Modesty is a virtue. I am but a humble servant of God, nothing more, nothing less.”
Miss Bixby’s funeral was held this Sunday past, whereupon the good Reverend Adler broke the seal on that mysterious note to share with the community our prized writer’s last words. To everyone’s surprise, the paper contained no proper eulogy. Instead, Miss Bixby had wanted to send a message to the residents of Coriander County who had come to rely on her compassionate service through the years.
However, when Rev. Adler came to that message, he appeared so overcome by emotion that he could not continue. The people clamored to know what had been written, so Tommy McCloud, the roughneck son of our gentle and well-spoken Amos, did the dubious honor. The message was quite short, but dear Reader, its contents are not fit to print. Suffice it to say, those in attendance were thoroughly shocked, to the point that the services of another eulogist are being sought posthaste to summarize the lengthy life of old Mrs. Paxton, whose poor heart finally gave out when she heard the words Tommy read.
None of us can ever know what went through Miss Bixby’s mind as she composed her final message, and one has to hope that it was merely a sign of a declining mental state. Her final words notwithstanding, Miss Charlotte Bixby truly was one of the most celebrated characters Coriander County has ever known.
— Chas. Braden, ed. May 26, 1908
