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Viola snorted like an old horse and started up the hill

When we arrived, half a dozen elderly ht-iron fence around the huge ceht iron was a theme here; there were iron crosses and wreaths, and over soraves there were actual little iron houses, with roofs Through the ups and downs of Black Mountain’s s plant, Grace had been home to a lot of out-of-work metalworkers

Most families divided their tis on one set of graves and afternoons on the other Eos plot and set to work sweeping and straightening One of the graves, a great-uncle of JT’s naos, was co tequila bottles, buried nose down Mason and I spent half thetheht as teeth It was a reilancio, but the whole Soraves had shrines with niches peopled by saints; soardens of paper and silk; others had the initials of loved ones spelled out on theprinciple was that the sireatest care It was a comfort to see this attention lavished on the dead In these faold truck arrived at ten o’clock Wo aith arold There were many theories on the best way to put theo farthest Viola, who directed the Doos family operations, was of the deconstructionist school She had the boys tear the flowers up and lay the petals down over a grave, blanketing it like a monochrome mosaic

John Tucker stayed at his work but the tandered and Mason disappeared altogether E skills he learned on Halloween," she said, and was probably right Grandmothers everywhere, who at lunch had set out extra plates for the dead, were now indiscri out the sweet remains of their picnics

By mid-afternoon Emelina felt we should send out a search party, "before he eats so many cookies he busts" Viola volunteered, and I ith her, more or less as a tourist I wanted to see what else there was in the line of beautified graves We skirted Gonzalez and Castiliano and Jones, each family with its own style Some were devotees of color or forrave, a boy who’d died young, was decorated with the better part of a Chevrolet There were hundreds of holes drilled into the fishtail fenders, to hold flowers It was beautiful, like a float in a parade

The cemetery covered acres To the west of us were collections of slected mounds whose stones bore the names of fa toward the desert of the forgotten "Alice, Anna, Marcus Loel, Caret back to where people are," Viola cautioned, but I wandered on, as distracted in my way as Mason must have been, wherever he was

"Nolina," I shouted "Look, here’s -lost relatives"

Viola looked at raves

"I’," I said We came from Illinois, as she well knew "Here’s raves were illegible, or so crudelyto read Then I found one that stopped me dead

"Viola Here’s a Ho "Son of a gun"

I eyed her "Do you know so about this?"

"What do you want me to tell you?"

"Who were the Nolinas?"

"Come on back away froround

"Honey, come on, let’s leave these dead folks alone Nobody put any plates of food out for the so happy today"

"Okay, but you have to tell me"

She told me the Nolinas used to live up around Tortoise River, in the northern end of Gracela Canyon There was a little settlement there that dispersed when the area was covered byup what they could of the faraveyard and carried the bones a few o, she said Around 1950

"I don’t know any Nolinas in Grace now," I said

"No, they’re about gone They never did settle too good into Grace The ot tore up They weren’t" She stopped and took off her shoe, cocking her stockinged foot against her plump ankle while she examined the inside of it, then put it back on "The Nolinas weren’t real accepted They were kind of different all the way back There was one of the Gracela sisters had auburn hair and a bad temper, and she married Conrado Nolina They say that family went downhill"