Spillway Review
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A SIGN

by Elizabeth Tarver


When H. Durel Jumonville, III drowned in the pool of the Grand State Hotel in Zhengzhou, China, his wife authorized governmental officials in Henan Province to cremate his body in the Chinese fashion and ship him back to New Orleans in a cloisonne urn.  According to the official version of the facts, Durel had a muscle cramp while swimming, and the worker assigned to the pool was unable to pull such a great man from the water.  This story was intended to save Mrs. Jumonville face.  Funds wired in an amount insufficient to cover Durel's abundant minibar charges resulted in a phone call from Mr. Li, the hotel manager, and, at Mrs. Jumonville’s prompting, the truth emerged.

Durel had spent the evening in the hotel nightclub where he had propositioned a showgirl and been soundly rejected.  He then went to the pool (mineral water, very nice, best in China) and, bloated with Tsingtao beer, passed out and slovenly fell in.  It was true that the wisp of a boy, who sat behind the counter selling swimsuits to overweight Westerners, could not pull a man as fat as Durel from the water.  And by the time the boy returned with four other workers to assist him, Durel had drowned and was floating face down in the middle of the pool, a Tsingtao beer can floating next to his head, surely a sign, Mr. Li said, of a satisfying life in paradise.