excerpt from the book..Sam Collins flashed the undertaker a healthy smile, hoping it wouldn'tdepress old Candle too much. He saluted. The skeletal figure in endlessblack nodded gravely, and took hold of Sam Collins' arm with a deathgrip."I'm going to bury you, Sam Collins," the undertaker said.The tall false fronts of Main Street spilled out a lake of shadow, acanal of liquid heat that soaked through the iron weave of Collins'jeans and turned into black ink stains. The old window of the hardwarestore showed its age in soft wrinkles, ripples that had caught on firein the sunset. Collins felt the twilight stealing under the arms of histee-shirt. The overdue hair on the back of his rangy neck stood up inattention. It was a joke, but the first one Collins had ever known DocCandle to make.