Whispers. Part 41

"Yes. I cut him--" Goldfield stopped abruptly, thought for a second or two, then said, "No. It wasn't a complete autopsy in the sense you probably mean. Not a medical school dissection of every part of the body. It was an extremely busy day here. A lot of incoming. And we were short-handed. Anyway, there wasn't any need to open Frye all the way up. The stab wound in the lower abdomen was decisive. No reason to open his chest and have a look at his heart. Nothing to be gained by weighing a lot of organs and poking around in his cranium. I did a very thorough exterior examination, and then I opened the two wounds further, to establish the extent of the damage and to be certain that at least one of them had been the cause of death. If he hadn't been stabbed in your house, while attacking you ... if the circ.u.mstances of his death had been less clear, I might have done more with him. But it was clear there wasn't going to be any criminal charges brought in the case. Besides, I am absolutely positive that the abdominal wound killed him."

"Is it possible he was only in a very deep coma when you examined him?" Hilary asked.

"Coma? My G.o.d, no! Jesus, no!" Goldfield stood up and paced the length of the long narrow room. "Frye was checked for pulse, respiration, pupil activity, and even brainwaves. The man was indisputably dead, Miss Thomas." He returned to the table and looked down at them. "Dead as stone. When I saw him, there wasn't enough blood in his body to sustain even the barest threshold of life. There was advanced lividity, which means that the blood still in his tissues had settled to the lowest point of the body--the lowest corresponding, in this case, to the position in which he'd been when he'd died. At those places, the flesh was somewhat distended and purple. There's no mistaking that and no overlooking it."

Tony pushed his chair back and stood. "My apologies for wasting your time, Dr. Goldfield."

"And I'm sorry for suggesting you might not have done your job well enough," Hilary said as she got to her feet.

"Hold on now," Goldfield said. "You can't just leave me standing here in the dark. What's this all about?"

She looked at Tony. He seemed as reluctant as she was to discuss walking dead men with the doctor.

"Come on," Goldfield said. "Neither of you strikes me as stupid. You had your reasons for coming here."

Tony said, "Last night, another man broke into Hilary's house and attempted to kill her. He bore a striking resemblance to Bruno Frye."

"Are you serious?" Goldfield asked.

"Oh, yes," Hilary said. "Very serious."

"And you thought--"

"Yes."

"G.o.d, it must have been a shock to see him and think he'd come back!" Goldfield said. "But all I can tell you is that the resemblance must be coincidental. Because Frye is dead. I've never seen a man any deader than he was."

They thanked Goldfield for his time and patience, and he escorted them out to the reception area.

Tony stopped at the desk and asked Agnes, the secretary, for the name of the funeral home that had claimed Frye's body. She looked through the files and said, "It was Angels' Hill Mortuary."

Hilary wrote down the address.

Goldfield said, "You don't still think--"

"No," Tony said. "But on the other hand, we've got to pursue every lead. At least, that's what they taught me at the police academy."

Eyes hooded, frowning, Goldfield watched them as they walked away.

At Angels' Hill Mortuary, Hilary waited in the Jeep while Tony went inside to talk to the mortician who had handled the body of Bruno Frye. They had agreed that he would be able to obtain the information faster if he went in alone and used his LAPD identification.

Angels' Hill was a big operation with a fleet of hea.r.s.es, twelve roomy viewing chapels, and a large staff of morticians and technicians. Even in the business office, the lighting was indirect and relaxing, and the colors were somber yet rich, and the floor was covered with plush wall-to-wall carpet. The decor was meant to convey a hushed appreciation for the mystery of death; but to Tony, all it conveyed was a loud and clear statement about the profitability of the funeral business.

The receptionist was a cute blonde in a gray skirt and maroon blouse. Her voice was soft, smooth, whispery, but it did not contain even a slight hint of s.e.xual suggestiveness or invitation. It was a voice that had been carefully trained to project consolation, heartfelt solace, respect, and low-key but genuine concern. Tony wondered if she used the same cool funeral tone when she cried encouragement to her lover in bed, and that thought chilled him.

She located the file on Bruno Frye and found the name of the technician who had worked on the body. "Sam Hardesty. I believe Sam is in one of the preparation rooms at the moment. We've had a couple of recent admissions," she said, as if she were working in a hospital rather than a mortuary. "I'll see if he can spare you a few minutes. I'm not sure how far along he is in the treatment. If he can get free, he'll meet you in the employees' lounge."

She took Tony to the lounge to wait. The room was small but pleasant. Comfortable chairs were pushed up against the walls. There were ashtrays and all kinds of magazines. A coffee machine. A soda machine. A bulletin board covered with notices about bowling leagues and garage sales and car pools.

Tony was leafing through a four-page mimeographed copy of the Angels' Hill Employee News when Sam Hardesty arrived from one of the preparation rooms. Hardesty looked unnervingly like an automobile mechanic. He was wearing a rumpled white jumpsuit that zipped up the front; there were several small tools (the purpose of which Tony did not want to know) clipped to Hardesty's breast pocket. He was a young man, in his late twenties, with long brown hair and sharp features.

"Detective Clemenza?"

"Yes."

Hardesty held out his hand, and Tony shook it with some reluctance, wondering what it had touched just moments ago.

"Suzy said you wanted to talk to me about one of the accounts." Hardesty had been trained by the same voice coach who had worked with Suzy, the blond receptionist.

Tony said, "I understand you were responsible for preparing Bruno Frye's body for s.h.i.+pment to Santa Rosa last Thursday."

"That's correct. We were cooperating with a mortuary up in St. Helena."

"Would you please tell me exactly what you did with the corpse after you picked it up at the morgue?"

Hardesty looked at him curiously. "Well, we brought the deceased here and treated him."

"You didn't stop anywhere between the morgue and here?"

"No."

"From the moment the body was consigned to you until you relinquished it at the airport, was there ever a time when it was alone?"

"Alone? Only for a minute or two. It was a rush job because we had to put the deceased aboard a Friday afternoon flight. Say, can you tell me what this is all about? What are you after?"

"I'm not sure," Tony said. "But maybe if I ask enough questions I'll find out. Did you embalm him?"

"Certainly," Hardesty said. "We had to because he was being s.h.i.+pped on a public conveyance. The law requires us to hook out the soft organs and embalm the deceased before putting him on a public conveyance."

"Hook out?" Tony asked.

"I'm afraid it's not very pleasant," Hardesty said. "But the intestines and stomach and certain other organs pose a real problem for us. Filled with decaying waste as they are, those parts of the body tend to deteriorate a great deal faster than other tissues. To prevent unpleasant odors and embarra.s.singly noisy gas acc.u.mulations at the viewing, and for ideal preservation of the deceased even after burial, it's necessary to remove as many of those organs as we can. We use a sort of telescoping instrument with a retractable hook on one end. We insert it in the a.n.a.l pa.s.sage and--"

Tony felt the blood drain out of his face, and he quickly raised one hand to halt Hardesty. "Thank you. I believe that's all I've got to hear. I get the picture."

"I warned you it wasn't particularly pleasant."

"Not particularly," Tony agreed. Something seemed to be stuck in his throat. He coughed into his hand. It was still down there. It would probably be down there until he got out of this place. "Well," he said to Hardesty, "I think you've told me everything I needed to know."

Frowning thoughtfully, Hardesty said, "I don't know what you're looking for, but there was one peculiar thing connected with the Frye a.s.signment."

"What's that?"

"It happened two days after we s.h.i.+pped the deceased to Santa Rosa," Hardesty said. "It was Sunday afternoon. The day before yesterday. Some guy called up and wanted to talk to the technician who handled Bruno Frye. I was here because my days off are Wednesday and Thursday, so I took the call. He was very, angry. He accused me of doing a quick and sloppy job on the deceased. That wasn't true. I did the best work I could under the circ.u.mstances. But the deceased had lain in the hot sun for a few hours, and then he'd been refrigerated. And there were those stab wounds and the coroner's incisions. Let me tell you, Mr. Clemenza, the flesh was not in very good condition when I received the deceased. I mean, you couldn't expect him to look lifelike. Besides, I wasn't responsible for cosmetic work. That was taken care of by the funeral director up there in St. Helena. I tried to tell this guy on the phone that it wasn't my fault, but he wouldn't let me get a word in edgewise."

"Did he give his name?" Tony asked.

"No. He just got angrier and angrier. He was screaming at me and crying, carrying on like a lunatic. He was in real agony. I thought he must be a relative of the deceased, someone half out of his mind with grief. That's why I was so patient with him. But then, when he got really hysterical, he told me that he was Bruno Frye."

"He did what?"

"Yeah. He said he was Bruno Frye and that some day he might just come back down here and tear me apart because of what I'd done to him."

"What else did he say?"

"That was it. As soon as he started with that kind of stuff, I knew he was a nut, so I hung up on him."

Tony felt as if he had just been given a transfusion of icewater; he was cold inside as well as out.

Sam Hardesty saw that he was shocked. "What's wrong?"

"I was just wondering if three people are enough to make it ma.s.s hysteria."

"Huh?"

"Was there anything peculiar about this caller's voice?"

"How'd you know that?"

"A very deep voice?"

"He rumbled," Hardesty said.

"And gravelly, coa.r.s.e?"

"That's right. You know him?"

"I'm afraid so."

"Who is he?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you."

"Try me," Hardesty said.

Tony shook his head. "Sorry. This is confidential police business."

Hardesty was disappointed; the tentative smile on his face slipped away.

"Well, Mr. Hardesty, you've been a great help. Thank you for your time and trouble."

Hardesty shrugged. "It wasn't anything."

It was something, Tony thought. Something indeed. But I sure as h.e.l.l don't know what it means.

In the short hall outside the employees' lounge, they went in different directions, but after a few steps Tony turned and said, "Mr. Hardesty?"

Hardesty stopped, looked back. "Yes?"

"Answer a personal question?"

"What is it?"

"What made you decide to do ... this kind of work?"

"My favorite uncle was a funeral director."

"I see."

"He was a lot of fun. Especially with kids. He loved kids. I wanted to be like him," Hardesty said. "You always had the feeling that Uncle Alex knew some enormous, terribly important secret. He did a lot of magic tricks for us kids, but it was more than that. I always thought that what he did for a living was very magical and mysterious, too, and that it was because of his work that he'd learned something n.o.body else knew."

"Have you found his secret yet?"

"Yes," Hardesty said. "I think maybe I have."

"Can you tell me?"

"Sure. What Uncle Alex knew, and what I've come to learn, is that you've got to treat the dead with every bit as much concern and respect as you do the living. You can't just put them out of mind, bury them and forget about them. The lessons they taught us when they were alive are still with us. All the things they did to us and for us are still in our minds, still shaping and changing us. And because of how they've affected us, we'll have certain influences on people who will be alive long after we're dead. So in a way, the dead never really die at all. They just go on and on. Uncle Alex's secret was just this: The dead are people, too."

Tony stared at him for a moment, not certain what he should say. But then the question came unbidden: "Are you a religious man, Mr. Hardesty?"

"I wasn't when I started doing this work," he said. "But I am now. I certainly am now."

"Yes, I suppose you are."

Outside, when Tony got behind the wheel of the Jeep and pulled the driver's door shut, Hilary said, "Well? Did he embalm Frye?"

"Worse than that."

"What's worse than that?"

"You don't want to know."

He told her about the telephone call that Hardesty had received from the man claiming to be Bruno Frye.

"Ahhh," she said softly. "Forget what I said about shared psychoses. This is proof!"

"Proof of what? That Frye's alive? He can't be alive. In addition to other things too disgusting to mention, he was embalmed. No one can sustain even a deep coma when his veins and arteries are full of embalming fluid instead of blood."

"But at least that phone call is proof that something out of the ordinary is happening."

"Not really," Tony said.

"Can you take this to your captain?"

"There's no point in doing that. To Harry Lubbock, it'll look like nothing more sinister than a crank call, a hoax."