Mrs. Feldman

It's Sunday today. I feel like it´s the first Sunday of autumn, and I am having a hard time with it. Last week it was twenty-six degrees. Today only thirteen... I'm a summer person, and at the end of summer my heart always has to break... for a few days anyway. What do we need then? Something that soothes the soul, don´t we? Yes! 

 Thinking of rainy Sunday afternoons from my childhood always comforts me on grey days like today. My grandmother would bake flan (the best for miles in the area), and my grandfather would tell stories. While enjoying a pousse cafe (Old cognac aged in French oak barrels). He would sit and contemplate the worldly issues in his life. His drink that started its journey years ago, came flavored with the culmination of all the finest flavors of an era gone by. This ancient 'water of life’ as he called it, always inspired him to tell a story about times gone by and the people who lived in them. Usually, they were stories about people he did not like or people who had done something to him. We all secretly agreed that his stories were greatly exaggerated, or perhaps sprang from the bottomless well of his imagination, but we did not mind - we always listened with pleasure and reckless abandon. We couldn't care less about the cold rainy weather outside. So today: to warm my broken heart, I am going to dive into one of his stories. Although I have heard several versions of this story, I will share the one I remember best. Usually, my grandfather also played a major part in his stories…

Feldman had bought the house, opposite my grandparents. It had stood empty for an eternity. The villagers had conducted their own investigations into the newcomer to town, especially since it had been in all the papers, that her husband had shot himself in front of her eyes within a month of their wedding. So, it goes without saying that an opinion about this woman had to be built to see if she had the right to live in the friendly village Mrs.Feldman was ten years older than her husband; a heartless gold-digger. He had never made a secret of the fact that he was not in love with her, and that the only thing he was genuinely interested in was her considerable fortune.

Shortly after they got married, the new husband developed a mysterious and inexplicable fear of her. Rumors circulated that on the morning of the day he ended his life, he had begged her for a divorce. But she had flatly refused to do so.

The night before, he'd dined at a club, leaving his one-month-old bride alone, and had returned by midnight in a disgusting state of intoxication, according to a live-in housekeeper. This man had made a statement to the police that he had heard Mr. Feldman yelling at his wife in her bedroom, and shortly afterward the sound of a gunshot was heard.

A note was found in his bedroom saying that he could no longer bear life because his soul was sick. A judge then decided that this was a suicide, that Mr. Feldman was temporarily insane, and expressed his condolences to poor Mrs. Feldman, who always treated her new husband with the utmost tenderness and affection during their short marriage.

After her husband's funeral, Mrs. Feldman traveled for six months to process her grief. When she returned, she had come to terms with the idea of life as a widow in a small country town. She shone on the sunny slope of the philosophy that life begins at forty and was exceedingly charming, always well-dressed and witty by nature.

Whatever the reason, my grandfather had a dislike for that woman from the start.

The house Mrs. Feldman bought had once belonged to two brothers. One had hanged himself from the front balcony, and the other had been arrested for nebulous and fanatical religious beliefs.

Was Mrs. Feldman under the influence of psychic phenomena or forces of an occult nature?

 One weekday evening my grandfather had to go to the post office to send a certified letter. Dusk had already fallen, but the red glow of the sunset was enough to enable him to recognize the marks of passers-by. In the opposite direction, a tall and finely built woman approached him, and as she did a tune started playing in his head that he could not get rid of a disturbing earwig. I made my grandfather nervous for days.

A few days later Charlie stopped by. A happy-go-lucky man, who never had any money and who just loved to pass by at dinner time.

Charlie had a great interest in reincarnation: the idea that people have lived before and after their death came back to earth for a new life. It was beyond my grandfather's comprehension why, if we had lived once, we could not remember anything about it. Well, that's material for another story.

My grandmother was fed up with the distaste my grandfather displayed for that poor widow and decided they should invite her to dinner sometime. Of course, Charlie was happy to invite himself for this occasion. He had seen Mrs. Feldman in passing and could not stop talking about how pretty she was. He thought she had Middle Eastern features. At least something southern.

When Mrs. Feldman entered, Mushroom, the dog stormed anxiously out of the room.

-"Oh, you have a dog." was the first thing Mrs. Feldman said with a frightened face.

-"Don't worry, Mushroom is very sweet." my grandmother had tried to assure her. But Mrs. Feldman claimed that all dogs hated her. In any case, Mushroom was anxiously hiding under my grandfather's bed for the rest of that evening.

During dinner, my grandfather's dislike for that woman became even more intense. She was graceful and charming, yet there was something undeniably terrible about her and he was unable to shake that feeling off. Charlie, on the other hand, was completely captivated by her, and she, for her part, showed a fascination for Charlie that went beyond the legitimate charm of a very pretty woman.

-"How are you enjoying your new home?" Charlie asked, "I hear it's haunted." My grandmother kicked his shin under the table:

-"That is ridiculous!" she tried to apologize on Charlie´s behalf.

When dinner was over, Charlie could not stop talking about how extremely interesting he found Mrs. Feldman. Her mind intrigued him.

"Mushroom was afraid of her," my grandfather growled, "so I don't trust her." He was convinced that the woman was surrounded by a plague of darkness.

One day Mrs. Feldman invited my grandparents to dinner, especially since she was going on another trip for a few months. On the evening of the invitation, my grandfather was overcome by a violent attack of shivers. so, my grandparents couldn't fulfill their obligation. My grandmother did not believe a word about my grandfather's sudden illness but called the doctor anyway. However, Dei could not find a physical cause, and my grandmother's suspicion of an excuse not to go to that dinner was confirmed.

As Spring began to stretch, she brought with her an unexpected nightmare. 

One morning shortly before Easter, Charlie burst into my grandparent's house with a newspaper in his hands. He pointed to an article reporting that Mrs. Feldman had died and had been buried at sea at her request—somewhere in the English Channel.

From that day on, something dim and gloomy seemed to obscure the sunshine Charlie had always been.

A few days later, there was great consternation in the village: The tide had left something along the coast: a bag.

A woman who was looking for beautiful shells that morning at low tide had found the shapeless bag. There was a tear in it, and to her horror, she saw the head of a woman. Her eyes were open.

There was no doubt about the identity of the body. Although it had been in the water for three days, no decay had occurred.

-"Even the sea wouldn't let her rest." my grandfather had responded with a certain sarcasm, "Isn't it strange that the waves spat her so close to her house?"

Feldman's remains were taken to the morgue, and although it was a public holiday the following day, a judicial inquiry was immediately initiated.

After the examination, the body was placed in a coffin, taken home, and set up in the drawing room awaiting burial two days later.

Spring had brought my grandparents' garden into bloom. My grandmother had made a wreath of flowers and brought it to Mrs. Feldman's house.

My grandmother thought it was strange that there had been no response from friends or family. She said that when she placed the flower garland on the coffin, she was overcome by a feeling of utter loneliness. No sooner the flowers were on the coffin than they withered. The daffodils were crumbling as she watched.

My grandparents and Charlie went to the funeral, where no relatives came. Even the servants did not come to pay their respects. They had been on the porch when the coffin was collected and had closed the door again before the casket was put in the hearse. 

My grandparents and Charlie were the only mourners in the cemetery. Though it wasn't raining, the sky was densely overcast, and a thick mist drifted between the tombstones.

When it was time to lower the coffin, it turned out that an erroneous measurement prevented it from fitting into the freshly dug grave.

-"Even the earth was not willing to receive her." my grandfather whispered behind his hand.

The diggers were brought in again. Meanwhile, it had started to rain heavily. When the resting place was finally ready my grandmother threw a handful of wet earth on the lid of the coffin, and then it was all over.

-"No!" my grandfather said in a loud voice, holding up his index finger. "I knew it was far from over when we left the cemetery."

The rain had stopped, and hazy sunlight penetrated the mist. A terrible conviction seized my grandfather: the sea did not tolerate her, the earth did not receive her, and besides, Charlie could not stop talking about reincarnation.

It had started to rain again, but my grandfather felt irresistibly compelled to go back to the grave once more. He had to make sure that Mrs. Feldman's body was truly at peace under the earth. It was raining sullenly, so he told Charlie to take my grandma home, and he made his way back to the grave. He slipped on the grass just in front of the freshly turned earth, but he was relieved that Mrs. Feldman was in the earth´s possession. He was about to leave when a noise in the heaped earth caught his ear. A stream of pebbles ran down the side of the mound above the grave.

With fear in his heart, my grandfather noticed that this was not loosening from the outside, but from within. Right and left the accumulated soil fell away, with pressure from below. At the head of the tomb, a mound of earth rose, pushed up from below. He could hear the sound of breaking wood, and the end of the coffin protruded through the earth: the lid was shattered. From a hollow, he saw the features of Mrs. Feldman's face and her wide-open eyes.

Fear held him motionless, but he tore himself free and stumbled between the graves back to the village and the house of the vicar who held the service that afternoon.

The next morning, he and Charlie went back to the cemetery, where the men of the funeral home had already arrived, and found the coffin completely dug out.

It was agreed not to attempt to bury Mrs. Feldman again and the Reverend decided that the body should be cremated as soon as possible.

For the sake of the credibility of his story, my grandfather had to recap the facts. He poured himself another glass of brandy and solemnly declared:

- "Mrs. Feldman died at sea, was entrusted in a canvas to the depths of the water. She washed up on the shore not far from her home. There was no earthquake under her grave and there was no scientific explanation whatsoever for those strange occurrences. “

A couple of weeks later, Charlie found an explanation that gave him some peace and explained why the sea had exhaled Mrs. Feldman's corpse.

An extract from a tract written in the Middle Ages gave him some comfort for his grief. He had always liked Mrs. Feldman very much. The piece he found was, of course, about reincarnation: a man's spirit was incarnated in the body of a beautiful woman who had died the day the man in question hanged himself. When that woman, in turn, was buried, the earth would not receive her and spat her out again. It was all extremely complicated what Charlie was saying there, but in a nutshell, the corporal flesh is the respectable of the spirit. And if that body had committed a capital sin, for example by suicide, it had to be purged by fire. Only then can that soul come into the mercy of the Almighty and must no longer wander. But that was only possible when the day of penance had come, and heaven could finally forgive the suicide.

"Well," my grandfather sighed, "that text was in Latin, and I don't think Charlie understood half of it. At least he had found comfort in it, and that was the most important thing."

Indeed!