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file:///E|/Funny%20&%20Weird%20Shit/75%20-%20Stephen%20King%20Books/Stephen%20King%20-%20Pet%20Sematary.htmDOG! the inscription amplified), who had died in 1958; and POLYNESIA (who would have been aparrot, if Louis remembered his Doctor Doolittle correctly), who had squawked her last “Polly want acracker” in the summer of 1953. There was nothing readable in the next two rows, and then, still a longway in from the center, chiseled roughly on a piece of sandstone, was HANNAH THE BEST DOGTHAT EVER LIVED 1929—1939. Although sandstone was relatively soft—as a result the inscriptionwas now little more than a ghost—Louis found it hard to conceive of the hours some child must havespent impressing those nine words on the stone. The commitment of love and grief seemed to himstaggering; this was something parents did not even do for their own parents or for their children if theydied young.“Boy, this does go back some,” he said to Jud, who had strolled over to join him.Jud nodded. “Come here, Louis. Want to show you something.”They walked to a row only three back from the center. Here the circular pattern, perceived as an almosthaphazardcoincidence in the outer rows, was very evident. Jud stopped before a small piece of slate that had fallenover. Kneeling carefully, the old man set it up again.“Used to be words here,” Jud said. “I chiseled em myself, but it’s worn away now. I buried my first doghere. Spot. He died of old age in 1914, the year the Great War begun.”Bemused by the thought that here was a graveyard that went farther back than many graveyards forpeople, Louis walked toward the center and examined several of the markers. None of them werereadable, and most had been almost reclaimed by the forest floor. The grass had almost entirelyovergrown one, and when he set it back up, there was a small tearing, protesting sound from the earth.Blind beetles scurried over the section he had exposed. He felt a small chill and thought, Boot Hill foranimals. I’m not sure I really like it.“How far do these go back?”“Gorry, I don’t know,” Jud said, putting his hands deep in his pockets. “Place was here when Spot died,of course. I had a whole gang of friends in those days. They helped me dig the hole for Spot. Digginghere ain’t that easy, either— ground’s awful stony, you know, hard to turn. And I helped themsometimes.” He pointed here and there with a horny finger. “That there was Pete LaVasseur’s dog, if Iremember right, and there’s three of Albion Groatley’s barncats buried right in a row there.“Old Man Fritchie kept racing pigeons. Me and Al Groatley and Carl Hannah buried one of them that adog got. He’s right there.” He paused thoughtfully. “I’m the last of that bunch left, you know. All deadnow, my gang. All gone.”file:///E|/Funny%20&%20Weird%20Shit/75%20-%20Ste...%20Books/Stephen%20King%20-%20Pet%20Sematary.htm (28 of 333)7/28/2005 9:21:49 PM