‘Morning, Padraig, how’s tricks?’
The undertaker was in his back room dusting the head of the mannequin lying in an open coffin. As Ridpath tapped him on the shoulder, he jumped into the air.
‘Jesus, Mr Ridpath, don’t go sneaking up on a man, not in a funeral parlour. You’ll be after sending me to an early grave. I didn’t hear you come in and now my heart’s beating faster than a horse at the Curragh.’
Despite living and working in Manchester for the last twenty years, he still retained his Irish accent.
‘What can I do you for? I hope this isn’t a business visit? With the corona and all, I’ve been too busy to take a breath.’
‘No, I need to pick your brains, Padraig.’
‘Thank God, I thought you were here to pick my pocket. Now didn’t I have your bloody boss, the bald-headed fella—’
‘DCI Turnbull.’
‘Him as well. He was in here looking for donations to the Benevolent Fund last week. An ugly-looking man, hands that scraped the floor, if you know what I mean.’
‘How much money did you give him?’
‘Money? I never give those fellas money. Sure, I offered him the free use of a coffin when the need arose. He wasn’t a happy man when he left, but you have to have some craic with the eejits, don’t ye.’
‘Don’t cross him, Padraig.’
‘Ach, I’ve buried far better than him. Now, how can I help you?’
‘We’ve discovered some hands in a backpack. They were embalmed.’
‘I read about it in the papers and one of your young Johnnies rang me to ask if the hands were mine. As if they were. I wouldn’t last long in this profession if I didn’t look after my clients.’
‘The lab have given me the chemical composition of the embalming fluid.’
‘And you want me to tell you where it came from?’
‘You’re a sharp man, Padraig.’
‘I wasn’t born yesterday, Mr Ridpath. Let me check online for you.’ He walked across to the laptop on his desk. ‘What’s the chemical composition?’
Ridpath read from his notes. ‘Twenty-two per cent formaldehyde, forty-three per cent methanol and eight per cent glutaraldehyde.’
‘I can tell you straight away with the level of formaldehyde, this embalming fluid was used for preservation, not presentation.’
‘What’s the difference?’
‘Lots. As funeral directors, we’re looking to make the client as natural as possible, so we use our machines to inject the fluid into the arteries in a closed circulatory system. Afterwards, some embalmers drain the fluid and others, like me, leave it in the client. I think it gives a better, more natural look.’
‘So what happens when you are simply preserving the… object?’
‘You inject it in multiple sites to saturate the tissues. Generally used by researchers or medical professionals. It’s the old organs in jars from movies like Frankenstein. These days I don’t even use formaldehyde, too dangerous, there’s lots of new embalming fluids without formaldehyde. Ah, here it is. Twenty-two per cent formaldehyde, forty-three per cent methanol and eight per cent glutaraldehyde. Your embalming fluid is American, they’re always a little behind the times. A company in Virginia, sells mainly online.’ He frowned. ‘That’s strange.’
‘What?’
‘They closed down a long time ago.’
‘When?’
He scanned the web page. ‘It says here they ceased trading in 2009.’