Arthur Holmquist, ninety-four years old, in a Legion cap that said Korea 1950, unwrapped the blanket at my fathers grave and revealed a gray granite headstone with a flag on it. Then he turned to Josh and said, When I called the monument company to order this, they told me someone had already been in asking about a refund, using your mother-in-laws name.
My father, Frank, carried a wounded man two miles through the snow at the Chosin Reservoir in 1950. For a year and a half his grave had only a temporary metal marker, because my mother Ingrid lent her three thousand two hundred dollar headstone fund to Josh, who said his supplement business needed it, and then asked why a rock was worth that much.
Arthur Holmquist was the man Frank carried. He had been looking for Frank for seventy years, found his obituary in March, and had a proper headstone made out of a debt of honor no amount of time could cancel.
And when the monument company told Arthur that a woman using Ingrids name had already been in trying to get a refund on a stone order, the last piece fell into place. Josh had not just taken the money. He had tried to cover it by canceling the headstone in my mothers name.
Josh said Frank is already gone, he does not know if he has a headstone. The man Frank saved carried a stone across seventy years to prove that the dead are owed what we promised them.
Using your mother-in-laws name to cancel a veterans headstone order is fraud, plain and ugly. Faced with a ninety-four year old witness and a monument company ready to talk, Josh repaid the three thousand two hundred dollars. The Rolex, I noticed, was not on his wrist the next time I saw him.
Frank has his headstone now, the one Arthur made, gray granite with a flag. Ingrids own saved money went to perpetual care of the plot.
Arthur comes to Mankato every Memorial Day now. He stands at Franks grave with his cane and his Legion cap, and he salutes the man who carried him out of the snow. My mother stands beside him. Neither of them says much. They do not have to.