Author's Note: I dunno, my son and I were watching "Corpse Bride" for the 4,385th time (roughly) and we asked each other, "So where did that huge cake go?"
-PlayerPiano
Wedding Cake
Something had to be done about the cake.
The monstrous cake had been too big to fit through the church doors, so the dead had left it outside in the churchyard carefully balanced on a Merrimack sarcophagus. As the morning drew on and the sun got higher, the smell got worse. It wafted into the village on the cool breeze, making anyone who was up and out of doors gag. All of the tradesmen in town gathered in the square, hankies over their noses, to decide who should dispose of it.
Zegar, the skinny clockmaker, drew the first short straw. He was quickly followed by enormous Visser, from the cannery, and the stout, round-headed grocer, Lebensmittel.
Three of them should be enough. Three of them plus a handcart. And shovels? Two of the other men lent their shovels to the cause, tossing them into the cart.
They walked to the graveyard, Zegar pushing the handcart, the smell getting worse all the time. At last they stood before the sagging confection, staring up at it with faces curled in distaste.
"This is worse than a July fish delivery," remarked Visser, staring up at the cake. It was tilting ominously to one side. The decorative bride and groom had slid off and landed in the weeds around the sarcophagus. The icing was liquefying. Rivulets of it oozed and spattered onto the ground.
"What is it made of?" Zegar wondered, adjusting his spectacles. He did not want to investigate too closely. Particularly when he noticed that part of the second layer appeared to be moving. Zegar backed up. "What do the dead have to bake with?"
"I don't want to know," said Lebensmittel irritably as he tied a cloth around the lower half of his face. He was grouchy because he was sad that he'd had to say goodbye to his wife all over again last night. The first time had been bad enough. "It doesn't matter. Let's just get it out in the woods and bury it."
"Is it going to fit in the cart?" Visser asked, eyeing first the cake and then the cart, and then the cake again.
"How will we get it into the cart?" Zegar asked in return. All of them looked at the cake, then their hands. All three wished they had thought to bring gloves.
"We might have to split it in half," Visser said at last. He wished Mayhew were here. Mayhew was good at this kind of project, good-natured and hardworking and didn't mind awful odors. Plus he had permission to use Mr. Van Dort's horse. Had had. Visser sighed and took up a shovel.
"All right, top two layers first," agreed the clockmaker. He looked up at the towering cake, then at his companions.
Lebensmittel grunted from behind his handkerchief. "I'll go fetch a ladder," he said. He made for the shed at the back of the church, tossing back to no one in particular, "That shed better be unlocked."
It must have been unlocked, for soon he was back, lugging a tall wooden ladder and another shovel. Gingerly, grimacing, the three set the ladder against the cake. Their stomachs turned as the ladder sank into it. The insides squished out in places. The insides were bright green and dark gray, here slimy and there pointy. Zegar gagged and spat into the grass. As the thinnest, he went up the ladder while Visser held it for him. Lebensmittel passed up a shovel. After a moment's hesitation, he sank the blade of the shovel into the middle of the second layer, splitting a melted skeleton face in half.
The smell came first. It was so strong it had a physical presence. It punched Zegar directly in the face and he almost fainted. He clamped his hand over his mouth and nose and watched as the shovel slid out of the cake, taking most of the insides with it.
"Get the cart, get the cart, just scrape it in!" he shouted, muffled by his palm. He grabbed for the shovel with his free hand. The grocer heaved the cart over just in time to catch the globs cascading out of the cake. They spattered when they landed, all the colors of a ghastly rainbow and giving off a stench that would have burned Satan's nostrils.
"Jesus Christ on a penny farthing!" Lebenspittel exclaimed in horror as the cart filled with cake innards. "Oh my God! Is that a nose?"
"Ugh. Ugh," grunted Visser as the clockmaker slid down the ladder and ran to throw up in the weeds. "Remember that summer when the dead horse exploded? This is much worse than that."
It took surprisingly little time for the cake to disgorge itself, given how big it was. It deflated like a balloon as it spilled its insides into the cart. Mostly into the cart. At last all that was left was a pile of slimy, melting frosting. The skulls had stretched into ghastly faces and the bones were unrecognizable as such. Swallowing back vomit, Visser used his shovel to scrape the remains into the cart. Most of it fit. He tamped the whole mess down as best he could, but it started oozing out between the slats of the cart.
Zegar straightened up, gasping, and wiped at his mouth. "Oh! Catch it, catch it, it's tipping!" he cried, dashing forward. The three of them managed to keep the cart upright, to their great relief.
The cake was gone, but it had left a terrible slick of gore and frosting on the sarcophagus. The Merrimack name had flecks of green and gray all mottled through it. Luckily there weren't any living Merrimacks in the village to complain.
"We'll take care of that later," Visser said, gesturing at the mess. Zegar looked at him sideways.
"Someone else will take care of that later," he corrected. "I nominate Bellman."
"Let's get this to the woods, then," Lebenspittel said. He was red and sweating. Zegar was pale and a bit shivery. Visser wished again that he had brought a pair of gloves. Barehanded, he took up the handles of the cart and made for the woods with the other men behind him.
He had to go slowly along the dirt path. The last thing he wanted was to lose this ghastly load all over and have to scrape it up again. His stomach flopped at the thought. Ugh. Give him a crate of four-day-old smelts to deal with any day.
At last they made it to a suitable spot out in the woods. Far enough from the village and far enough from the river. Time to give the cake back to them as had made it. If that was how this worked. Hopefully whoever had baked it wouldn't be offended.
In silence but for a few gags and heaves, the three men dug as deep a hole as they could manage. By the time they'd finished it was past noon and they were covered in dirt, sweat, and dead man's cake. Visser and Zegar gave Lebenspittel a leg up and then clambered out themselves. The oozing, reeking cart was just as they'd left it. Only now did they see that they'd left a rather grisly trail behind them as they'd walked from the graveyard. Visser took up the handles again, with the other two holding onto the sides to be sure it didn't overturn.
As the handcart creaked and leaked its way to the hole, Lebenspittel said crossly, "This is a young man's job. We're too old for this."
Visser grunted. "Master Van Dort is the only young man in town. You'd think he'd show up to help. It's his wedding cake, innit?"
"Oh, I suspect he's busy," Zegar remarked, out of breath. He swiped at his forehead. Dirt speckled his glasses. "Honeymooning, isn't he?"
"What?" Visser asked, surprised, wondering if he'd missed something. "They didn't get married, did they?"
Zegar snorted, a bit priggish in his disapproval. "Well, Miss Everglot certainly didn't go back to her own house last night."
"Eh, you only live—er, you're only young once," Visser remarked philosophically. Both the grocer and the clockmaker snorted this time.
And his distraction meant the cart began to tip. They all cried out and tried to steady it. The cart did not overturn, but Lebenspittel's hand went directly into the warm gray-green pile of cake mush. They all gasped simultaneously. They froze. All of them were looking at Lebenspittel's hand.
Lebenspittel was overcome with shock and disgust. His mouth worked behind his handkerchief but his revulsion was beyond words. Slowly he removed his hand with a lot of squelching that made everyone wince. He scraped it off as best he could on the side of the cart. Then he took the cloth off his face and wiped it with that.
"That is foul. Ugh. That Van Dort boy. He's the one who should be wrist-deep in this mess, instead of nice and safe at home wrist-deep in Miss Everglot's-"
"That will do," interrupted Zegar loudly, even as Visser stifled slightly guilty snicker. "Honestly. That's too much. Let's just please get this done."
Lebenspittel frowned and they all made for the hole again, quickly and carefully. Once they reached the edge, they counted to three, and then heaved the lot into the earth. As soon as his hands were free the grocer found a pile of snow behind a tree and cleaned his hand as best he could.
"That's going to smell for months," he said morosely. He threw his cloth into the hole before picking up a shovel.
By the time the cake was well-buried, it was nearing sunset. A foul odor still hung in the air. And probably would for a long while, as the grocer had pointed out. Exhausted, filthy, and vaguely depressed, Visser, Zegar, and Lebenspittel started back toward the village.
"How'd it go?" Bellman asked as they approached the gatehouse. He wrinkled his nose when their odor hit him.
"Looking for the evening headline?" Lebenspittel asked in return, his bad temper even worse than it had been that morning.
"I'm taking the night off," Bellman replied, much to the other men's surprise.
"I thought news didn't take a holiday," Visser said, quoting one of the town crier's favorite defenses for the times he'd interrupted Christmas services or village meetings or church bazaars with an inane headline. Bellman just blinked and sniffed, and retreated into the gatehouse. With a round of shrugs the men moved on, and then paused when they got to the statue.
"I'll wash this down out behind the cannery before I return it," Visser told Lebenspittel, nodding at the cart. The grocer pulled a face.
"Better burn it, I'm never using it again," Lebenspittel said. He looked at his hand. "I might have to dip this in lye."
"You'll be fine," Zegar said mildly, wiping his spectacles off on his apron. Since his apron was also filthy he did not accomplish much except smearing dirt around. He sighed deeply. "What a day. What a few days, eh?"
Visser nodded. He'd just been thinking that he'd get Mayhew to help him with a burn pile tomorrow. But Mayhew wasn't here to ask anymore. Visser twitched his mustache and cleared his throat. Lebenspittel sighed deeply, his onion-shaped head hanging.
"I miss Winifred," he said in a low voice. "It would almost have been better not to have seen her."
The other men shifted uncomfortably, unsure of what to say to that. But Lebenspittel didn't seem to want a reply. Raising his clean hand in farewell, he turned and walked back to his house above his shop. With a nod to Visser, Zegar made for his own shop and his rooms.
In the gathering shadows, Visser turned and wheeled the cart toward the cannery.