Read Beautiful to the Bone (The Enuis Trilogy #1) for Free Online Page B

me. A job like that in Bemidji, doubtful, although . . .
    I thought out loud, “How about old man Carver?”
    “He gives me the willies. The whole thing does, so it’d be right up your alley.” Lyle took another sip, went back to strumming his guitar.
    ***
    “I don’t want anyone seeing you. You stay in the back room,” said Mr. Carver after explaining the tools and chemicals I would use to assist him. “Not that you should be ashamed of what you’re doing. It’s an art. That’s why,” he sniffed, “you aren’t doing any of the skinning.”
    He adjusted his coke-bottle glasses. Anyone could see Mr. Carver’s eyes were going fast. He needed an assistant. He couldn’t seem to keep them though, whether it was the chemicals, the dusky physical space, or the gloomy space in Mr. Carver’s head. The large dark sign outside said it all, supported by two thick timbers and Mr. Carver’s eyes looming over “Carver’s Taxidermy.” Under that: “Preserve beauty forever.”
    “You’re not squeamish, are you?”
    “No.” I meant it. Who had the luxury of being squeamish? But I did feel uncomfortable turning beautiful living things into trophies.
    “Good.” Mr. Carver pushed the coke-bottles back in place. “There’s a whole history to this.” He stretched a shaking hand over his domain of wings, paws, fins, skins and skulls. He did a brisk business. His tools lay neatly in rows or hung on the pegboard, ready for cutting, pulling and scraping; the same kind the dentist used, though I hadn’t seen a dentist in a while. He even had a crochet needle for tugging the skin back or over.
    A hanging spotlight illuminated each workbench, making the rest of the sprawling building a series of black holes. My comfort zone.
    “The English Victorian Era,” he said launching into his homily. “That was the golden age of taxidermy.” I was attentive, though he barely laid eyes on me. One-by-one he rested his attention on each body part in the room, all but mine. “The well-educated, or those who wanted to be, placed birds and animals and fish all over their homes. Things of beauty, if the man, the taxidermist, was an artist and not some ‘stuffer.’”
    Only men were taxidermists? Women could understand beauty too. But back then it probably was a male profession. I didn’t ask Mr. Carver. I already felt his agitation.
    He sniffed again, as if he had been inside my head, heard my thoughts, and already dismissed them as trivial. “Anyway, I’ll not accept rogue taxidermy assignments. You don’t need to worry.”
    I shook my head. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand.”
    “When some jackass creates a Frankenstein, like a jackalope or a skvader , that’s rogue, not sticking to nature.” Momma had talked of the skvader , a fictional hybrid, front half and head, hare; the second half —torso, wings and tail— grouse. A flying rabbit.
    “I’m no Dr. Frankenstein. I don’t care if it’s their favorite mystical creature, I won’t do it. I won’t be part of their sick ideas.” This time he filled both nostrils, a hillside of open pores inflating his already sizeable nose.
    “Dragons, water fairies, sirens of the deep, chimeras: a bunch of myths and bad luck. I don’t like mixing body parts. It brings bad luck.” He stared off to a darkened corner of the shop, but still not at me. “If I ever ask you — assuming I want to keep you— to help with that superstitious crap —excuse my language— then tell me to ‘just remember,’ and that’ll do the trick.”
    “I wouldn’t tell you no.”
    “You tell me ‘just remember.’ Part of your job, assuming you do your job.”
    “Why ‘just remember?’”
    “End of lesson. Be here six o’clock tomorrow morning.” Again he swept his hand over the multitude of half-completed projects. “Plan a long day.”
    And they were long days. The more Mr. Carver disintegrated and decayed before my eyes, the more taxidermy prep and finishing I took on, though he