‘Colour-coding. It’s the only way to go. I’ve seen a file organizer with colour-coded compartments. The way I’m thinking is I can put my ante-mortem forms in the yellow tray, my PM forms in the pink tray. Looks like there aren’t going to be any evacuee forms so I’d keep the blue compartment for when I’ve matched my PMs and mispers.’
Me and George were inside the refrigeration truck. The doors were open behind us but the light was dim, so the photographer had given me a handheld halogen lamp for the viewing. I waited in silence, the lamp dangling in one hand, the other pinching my nose while George moved around in the semi-darkness at the far end of the truck, opening and rearranging two fibreglass coffins, dragging them into the middle of the floor.
‘What you said yesterday about them having no medicals, no dentals? Well, you were right. We’re looking but so far no biopsies, no X-rays, not even a print on file. It’ll be ninety per cent genetic IDing, because if we get a visual on ten per cent we’ll be lucky bastards indeed. I’m going to be up to my pointy little ears in paperwork.’
I switched on the lamp and ran it over two piles of plastic-wrapped shapes pushed up against the right side of the truck, all milky and opaque from the cold. Some of the bodies had burned in the fire after the explosion, and in places I could see blackened shapes pressing against the plastic. A pink notice hung above the furthest pile: ‘Incomplete 1–100’. I moved the light across the walls, the beam bouncing off the textured aluminium panelling. The sign above the second pile read: ‘Incomplete 101–200’. I switched off the lamp, my heart thudding loudly.
‘I’ve only got two for you today.’ George straightened and looked at me. The shadows on his face were etched and solid. In the gloom I could see he’d opened both coffins and folded the black rubber body-bag away to reveal the faces. ‘The only two who made it out of the chapel after the blast. Must’ve been in the corners behind the others–that’s how you get through an explosion. Someone else takes the force for you. Course, doesn’t mean you survive in the long run.’ He picked up his clipboard from the floor and showed me two yellow sheets. ‘I got these out earlier. Our chat yesterday? Remember? I think I know who our two are. Still, I’d like you to give me the thumbs-up.’
I knew who he meant. The missionary and Blake Frandenburg. There wouldn’t be anything of Sovereign left to identify. I switched on the light and approached, holding it down at an angle. In the first coffin lay the missionary, his face intact, eyes sunken. I looked at him in silence.
‘Okonole?’
I nodded. ‘Okonole.’
George wrote a neat three in a box at the top left-hand of the yellow form and tucked it with some satisfaction behind the other. We moved to the second coffin where Blake Frandenburg lay, his eyes like holes, his leathery face emaciated, like death had taken half his body weight. One of his hands poked stiffly out of the body-bag as if he was reaching for something–a light, or the sky maybe. I stared at that hand, thinking of him sitting in the cottage holding a fire poker, well ready to take me on at twice his size.
‘You OK there?’ asked George. ‘Want some time on your own?’
I turned stiffly to him. ‘Sorry?’
‘Do you want to be alone?’
‘Uh…’ I stared at him. It took a moment or two but then the question set off a cog somewhere in my head. ‘Uh, yeah,’ I said. ‘Yeah. Sure. Just a few minutes.’
He left the truck, going noisily down the aluminium steps. ‘Hey, Callum,’ I heard him say, ‘when you get back to Oban get the station officer to look in the stationery catalogue, will you? Tell her page three hundred, there’s a file organizer with colour-coded…’
I waited until the voices had moved round to the side of the truck. Working quickly, I fumbled out my camera. With the halogen light in my left hand, held up at arm’s length and angled down to minimize the shadows, I squeezed off five photos of Blake’s corpse. After each one I stopped, listening for the voices outside, wondering if the camera’s mechanism could be heard out there. Then I photographed Okonole, and swung round to do the two piles of body parts. I shoved my camera into my pocket and got to the doors as George was coming back up the steps.
‘How you getting on there? You feeling OK? We’ve got some bottled water here from the catering truck. If you want.’
‘It’s Frandenburg,’ I said. ‘Is that what you thought?’
He smiled and held up the yellow form on his clipboard. It read in capitals BLAKE FRANDENBURG. He took out his pen with a flourish and wrote a firm number ‘1’ in the box. He put the pen away and nodded at me.
‘See? That makes me happy. That’s two for my green compartment.’