3
Sister Mary Sullivan was sympathetic but not very helpful. “The plain fact of the matter is, Mr. Brody, that I listed you in place of next of kin. We are permitted to do that when a friend instead of next of kin must claim the body. When the hearse arrived for the body, the driver must have presented burial papers signed by you. Otherwise the body could not be released to him. I must say that nothing like this has happened since I have been at the hospital.”
“Were the papers presented to you, Sister?” Millie asked.
“No, that would be done at the ambulance entrance, at the pathology office.”
“Could we speak to whoever received the papers?”
She hesitated a moment. “That’s off limits to visitors—but well, yes. We should clear this up.” She dialed a number on her desk phone and told the person at the other end that she was sending us down to pathology. “Are you sure you want to go with Mr. Brody?” she asked Millie. “It’s not a very pleasant place.”
“I have a strong stomach, Sister.”
“Then go straight back to the elevators and down one stop. Sister Plunkett will talk to you.”
Sister Plunkett, an elderly, stern-faced woman, received us coldly, giving the impression that no civilian came to pathology for honest reasons. Through the glass behind her I could see two operating tables, one with a sheet-covered corpse and the other with an uncovered corpse that a cheerful young man was expertly digging into. Behind those, shelves of uninviting jars with things floating in them. Millie hurriedly turned her gaze away to study the papers that Sister Plunkett had removed from her files.
“It’s not Mr. Brody’s signature,” she said. I looked at the paper and confirmed her observation.
“This is most unusual,” said Sister Plunkett.
“Sister, you deal with so many funeral parlors. Have you ever heard of the Hillrest Mortuary?”
“It’s on the order there.”
“But aside from this instance?”
“No, I can’t say that I ever have.”
“Sister,” I said, “in spite of the fact that my name is on that receipt, isn’t it possible that a mistake might have been made and that some other body was taken away?”
“Anything is possible. But It’s hardly probable.”
“Where is your morgue?”
“Directly behind the pathology room, but no unauthorized personnel are allowed there.”
The cheerful young man behind the glass paused in his explorations, wiped his hands and appeared with a bright smile. “Anything I can do?”
Sister Plunkett told him.
“Anyone close to you?”
“Just a friend.”
“Misplaced corpse. That’s cool, very cool. Sister Plunkett here is a demon for efficiency.”
“And also for courtesy, Doctor.”
“Right on. But I don’t see any harm in letting Mr. Brody take a gander at the corpses. They certainly won’t mind. Male or female, Mr. Brody?”
“Male.”
“We’re short on males. Only two of them. The choppers upstairs have been on their toes, and the fatality count has gone down.”
“That’s hardly a proper manner in which to talk, Doctor,” Sister Plunkett said sternly.
“Anyway, come on in and I’ll open the icebox for you.”
Sister Plunkett protested silently. Millie stood firmly where she was, averting her eyes from the pathology room, and I fought my heaving stomach and followed the doctor through pathology into the morgue. He opened doors and rolled out two bodies for me to look at. Neither bore any resemblance to Andrew Capestone.
I thanked the doctor and apologized to Sister Plunkett for the trouble I had caused. She asked me whether she should notify the police.
“I hardly think that will be necessary. I’m sure this will clear itself up as soon as I get to Hillrest Mortuary. Possibly the other funeral home has some sort of agreement with them—I mean the one I made my arrangements with.”
“It appears to me, young man, that you should have thought of that before you put us to all this trouble.”
“I’m terribly sorry.”
Outside, Millie filled her lungs with fresh, moderately smog-free California air and sighed with relief. “Poor Sister Plunkett. Can you image how wretched it is to sit there all day with that grinning hippie type cutting up corpses before your eyes?”
“I am too sorry for myself to worry about Sister Plunkett.”
“Oh, come on, Al, you put your finger right on it. We go to the Hillrest Mortuary and the puzzle is cleared up.”
“No.”
“Why?”
“It’s one o’clock. Let’s get some lunch. We don’t go to the Hillrest Mortuary because there is no Hillrest Mortuary.”
“There isn’t?”
“There isn’t.”
“Are you sure?” she asked desperately. “It’s such a proper name for a mortuary. There has to be one.”
“There isn’t.”
We got into the car, and for a while Millie sat in silence. Then she said softly, “My name is Millicent Patience Cooper, and I was born in Boston of proper Unitarian parents. I went to Wellesley College and majored in Lit. I married an impossible man and made it for just twelve months. I fled to California to escape him and my parents, and I took a job with a press agent because it was the only thing around. I worked for him six years and lived in a three-room apartment in West-wood. Because I was tall and skinny, because I wore a size thirty-two A bra and had brown hair and brown eyes, he never made a pass at me, and whenever he thought I was going to quit, he raised my salary. Then I had dinner with him and went to bed with him, and he decided to divorce his wife, and because he was fat and bald and had a low opinion of himself, he decided to make a dead man President of the United States.”
“What’s that for?” I asked her.
“I’m trying to make sense of it.”
“You really think I wanted to make a dead man President of the United States?”
“It’s been done.”
“You’re a real smartass broad, aren’t you?”
“I’m not smart, I’m just clever. Anyway, Hollywood dialect doesn’t become you.”
“Why do you always throw in that bit about my being fat and bald?”
“Because you’re nice and sweet-looking and kind-hearted, and I am trying to restrain myself.”
“You always can.”
“No, I can’t. Anyway, I’m scared. Are you, Al?”
“I’ve been scared since this started. Now I’m more scared.”