Beech Gratton

Beech Gratton is the son of Thomas Gratton, the butcher, and a friend of Gabe's.

Beech hands off the bucket to me and begins to indelicately butcher the corpse. It doesn’t seem like there should be an artful way to butcher a cow, but there is, and this is not it. For several long moments, I watch Beech carve jagged lines, grunting to himself all the while — I think he may be trying to hum. I am mesmerized by the utter unawareness of the entire process, the childlike pleasure Beech takes in a job ill done. Thomas Gratton and I catch each other’s eye. “He learned his butchering from his mother, not me,” Thomas Gratton tells me. I don’t quite smile, but he seems gratified by my response anyway. “If you don’t like how I do it,” Beech says, not looking up from his work, “I’d rather be at the pub, and this knife fits in your hand, too.” Thomas Gratton makes a mighty sound that comes from somewhere between his nostrils and the top of his mouth; it is a sound that, to me, effectively proves the etymology of Beech’s grunts.