Russell Perry is in the parlor, in his coffin, open to view. It is from the parlor that the Perrys have always been buried. In the parlor they are christened, are betrothed, are married; dead, in the parlor they are laid out. It has always been so: the shades drawn, the casket on black-draped trestles looped with cords and tassels; sighing, whispery, shadowlike forms slipping in silently to mourn, to regret or—secretly, as some will—to savor, laying warm lips against cold unyielding flesh in last farewell. This is the Perrys’ way.
