by Lillian Bell
If the Coffin Fits
A FUNERAL PARLOR MYSTERY
Lillian Bell
Chapter One
The Verbena Free Press
October 4
By Desiree Turner
Dangers of Drowsy Driving
On October 2, Verbena resident Violet Daugherty died in what police think was a drowsy driving accident. Ms. Daugherty lost control of her vehicle on County Road 202 at approximately 7:30 PM and collided with an embankment. Despite heroic efforts, doctors at the hospital were unable to bring her back to consciousness.
It’s difficult to establish exact numbers when it comes to how many accidents might be caused by people falling asleep at the wheel. There’s no test to be done like the ones that determine whether or not a driver has been driving under the influence. Still, estimates as to how many accidents are caused by drowsy driving go as high as 100,000 per year. Officer Carlotta Haynes of the Verbena Police Department said, “We don’t know what caused Ms. Daugherty to lose control of her car, but the lack of skid marks and the fact that no other cars were involved point to a case of drowsy driving.”
We should all take steps to make sure accidents like this don’t happen. If you find yourself blinking excessively, or don’t remember driving the last few miles, or drift from your lane, pull over. Take a nap. Get some coffee. Walk around a bit. Nothing’s important enough to risk your life and the lives of others on the road.
*
Generally, funeral directors don’t see the best version of families. Sometimes we do. Sometimes there are sisters holding each other up, or a son quietly supporting a father. Sometimes hands are held and hugs are given. The burden of sorrow and the good memories of the deceased are shared. More often than not, however, there’s squabbling.
Either there’s been some terrible illness that has eaten away at the family’s emotional, physical, spiritual, and financial resources—possibly for months or even years—or something cataclysmic has happened. A car accident. A tragic fall. An aneurysm no one knew about bursting like a malevolent Fourth of July firework in someone’s brain.
People are exhausted or in shock. Neither of those states brings out the best behaviors. Daisy and Iris Fiore, however, were one of those supportive exceptions when they came in to make arrangements for their father’s funeral. Daisy was the eldest by about two years. She was a little shorter and plumper with layered shoulder-length blonde hair and some well-applied makeup. Iris was one of those rail-thin women who started to look a little stringy after forty. She would be very low on the list of people to eat if our plane crashed in the Andes. Her dark hair with its gray streaks was cut in one of those sensible cuts. Sort of a reverse mullet with long bangs and short back. Neat, presentable, easy to take care of. If she was wearing makeup, it certainly didn’t show. They looked so different, but their care and respect for each other was the same. Iris pulled a tissue out of her purse and handed it to Daisy when Daisy’s eyes started to mist over while choosing music for the service. Daisy slipped Iris a cough drop and asked if Iris could have a glass of water when Iris got choked up picking which readings they’d like to have. They touched hands and held to each other. Which is why I was a little surprised when I heard Daisy hiss at Iris as I came back with the requested glass of water.
“What did you do?” she asked.
“Why do you always think I did something wrong?” Iris stage-whispered back.
I stopped on the other side of the door to the Lilac Room, not wanting to interrupt them. It was good to give people a little space.
“Well, did you do something wrong?” Daisy followed up. There was a tapping noise as if she was rapping something softly on the table.
There was a pause, then Iris said, “Define wrong.”
Daisy made a noise of disgust. “We’ll talk about this at home.”
Iris replied, “There’s nothing to talk about. What’s done is done.”
The room went silent, and I pushed through the door with the glasses of water I’d been getting from the kitchen. “Here you go,” I said, acting as if I hadn’t heard anything. I certainly wouldn’t have even known anything could be wrong if I hadn’t overheard them. They sat side by side on the plump coach, the coffee table with various brochures and forms and the ever-present box of tissues in front of them. It was a room designed to foment serenity. No bright colors. No hard edges. No bright lights.
Iris and Daisy resumed their supportive-sister act as if nothing had been said, although now it seemed kind of phony. Was this a performance they were putting on for people who were watching? Or had that moment of instant antagonism been the anomaly? I went along with the good-sister act, but I was uneasy. My role as assistant funeral director at Turner Family Funeral Home was not to stir up trouble. It was to make sure there was as little trouble as possible. My job was a lot easier if people weren’t squabbling. Daisy and Iris weren’t fighting, but if something was bubbling beneath the surface that could erupt at an inopportune time, I wanted to be aware of it. We went through the stack of paperwork required by law and made the other general arrangements. Nothing else tripped my sense of something being wrong.
“I doubt we’ll have a very big turnout at the funeral,” Daisy said, emitting a waft of honey and lemon. “Dad was sick for so long. People have forgotten they even knew him.”
“I barely remember what he was like when he was well.” Iris’s chin trembled.
“It takes time,” I said. Families often got so caught up in the care of their ill loved one that they forgot who the person was in the first place. It was part of the function of the funeral. It was a moment to go back and reflect. People dug out old photos and home movies and rediscovered who the person was, what they’d been like when they’d been healthy and whole. People shared stories that revealed who that person was and what they meant to everyone.
“You never know about attendance,” I said. “If you’ll fill out this form, I can get your father’s obituary and an announcement of the service into the paper right away.” I gestured toward that day’s copy of the Verbena Free Press that sat on the low coffee table next to the couch. “Your father was well-known. I’m sure people will come once they know when it is.”
“They sure didn’t visit him in the past few years,” Iris said with a sniff.
I winced. “People don’t always know what to say or do. They get worried about doing the wrong thing so they don’t do anything.” It was a lame explanation, but it was true. People don’t know how to act around death. We always want to shove it under the carpet or into a dark closet so we don’t have to look at it. Then it feels unfamiliar and scary when it inevitably makes its presence known in our lives. And its presence is indeed inevitable. I grew up with death all around me. I’d thought that was normal for a very long time. It still sometimes surprised me that it isn’t.
“I suppose,” Iris said on a sigh. “Do we have to have the funeral right away? Could we wait a little while? So people could make arrangements to get here?”
“Of course.” Since they’d already chosen to have their father embalmed, we could wait a week at least before the services.
We finished up the arrangements. As they were leaving, with Iris promising to bring by whatever clothing they wanted their father buried in and some photos for Donna to use to make the memorial video, Uncle Joey knocked on the door. Uncle Joey is my father’s younger brother. He and my dad ran Turner Family Funeral Home together since before I can remember. They were always together. Best friends. Brothers. Coworkers. They took over from their father who took over from his father before him. I think everyone assumed that my sister Donna and I would take over from them some day. They were half-right for a while and now were completely right, at least for the tim
e being. Donna did all the classes and training—she needed to do both what Uncle Joey did down in the basement and what Dad did upstairs—and took her place in the family business. I took off for Southern California when I turned eighteen without glancing in my rearview mirror, and I’d still be gone if I hadn’t managed to torpedo my own career as an on-air reporter with a hot mic incident that went viral. Instead, I was back in Verbena, working at the funeral home and wondering what was next in my life.
After extending his condolences to Iris and Daisy, Uncle Joey asked, “Are you available to help me with a pick up today?”
“Sure. We’re just finishing up here.” I turned away from my Iris and Daisy and mouthed “who?” at Uncle Joey.
He nodded to the newspaper on the coffee table. It took me a second to get it. Violet Daugherty whose single-car accident I’d written about for the Verbena Free Press. I turned back toward Iris and Daisy who were exchanging their own glances between each other and also surreptitiously trying to check the time on their phones. It only took a few more minutes to finish everything up and they looked relieved to be done.
I watched them go, arm in arm, Daisy’s hand tucked through Iris’s elbow. When we’d had to plan the memorial service for our father, Donna and I had spent a lot of time like that. Shoulders pressed against each other as we sat on the couch. A hand placed gently on the other’s hand or arm. You’d think we would have had it easier than most people. We knew the business. We knew what Dad would have wanted. We’d had months to get used to the idea that he was gone. It was entirely different when it was your own family.
Getting used to the idea that he might not actually be gone was taking even more getting used to.
I sat looking at the paperwork in front of me. Mr. Fiore had been on hospice care. His death had been expected, even, perhaps, welcomed as it released him from pain. What was it that Iris could have possibly done that would have made her sister that angry? That might or might not be wrong? And why wait until they were here at the funeral home to ask about it?
I headed downstairs to Uncle Joey’s office in the basement. Mr. Fiore was already there. Uncle Joey had picked him up that morning.
“Everything okay, Desiree?” he asked as I came down the steps.
“I think so.” I put the paper work I’d filled out with the sisters down on his desk. “There wasn’t anything weird about Mr. Fiore, was there?”
He put his reading glasses on and started going over the paperwork. He was a big man. He filled his desk chair and then some. All bulk when my dad—his brother—had been long and lean. Uncle Joey had gone gray young, which had always made him seem older than he was, but his hair was still thick. If I met him on the street, I might not be able to guess his age. “What kind of weird do you mean?”
I pulled up a chair to his desk. “I don’t know. Something out of the ordinary, something not right.”
He set the papers down and peered over the top of his glasses at me. “Why do you think there might be something wrong?”
I explained about what I’d overheard. “It sounded like Daisy was accusing Iris of something. Something bad. And Iris didn’t exactly deny it.”
“Did they say it had to do with their father?” Joey asked.
I thought. “No, but what else would they have been talking about? They were here making arrangements for their father who just died.”
“After a long and painful illness,” Joey pointed out. “His passing wasn’t unexpected.”
“I know.” I kicked at the floor with my toe. “It felt wrong, though. Maybe not wrong. Just weird. They were all sweet and supportive with each other until I left the room. Then they had this whisper-fight that made it sound like Daisy always thought Iris did things that were wrong. Then they both acted like nothing had happened the second I walked in. Like they were covering something up.”
“Or maybe it was something they didn’t want to talk to someone outside of the family about.” Joey turned back to the paperwork. “You did a good job with these. Very thorough.”
“Thanks.” I gave him a half smile. Doing good work at a job I didn’t want was a step up from failing at a job that I didn’t want, but only one step.“When do you want to do the pick up?”
Joey tapped all the papers into place and set them in a file folder, which he then stashed in his desk. He took off the reading glasses and set them on a little tray. He was a very precise man. “Now if you have the time.”
We didn’t drive the hearse to the hospital. It was a little too conspicuous. We kept that for actual drives to the cemeteries. The van was set up a lot like an ambulance. The back was largely open, but with places where we could secure a gurney so it didn’t bounce around in the back as we drove.
We pulled out of the long driveway that led to Turner Family Funeral Home and headed west toward town. Taylor’s Pumpkin Patch was open for business. It wasn’t crowded on a weekday, but the dirt parking lot would be full come the weekend. People came from all over for Taylor’s Pumpkin Patch and the Verbena Corn Maze. They stayed for the Haunted House and the Ghost Tour.
The Ghost Tour had always been a sore spot with Dad. He’d absolutely refused to be part of it despite being begged to be a stop on the tour. He’d said most spirit sightings were the products of grief. People didn’t want to believe someone they loved was dead so they found a way to keep part of them alive. He’d felt his job was to help people deal with grief and let go. The whole idea of manufacturing something that would keep someone from processing through their sorrow had been an anathema to him. One year, Tamera Utley, who ran the tour, had brought a group to the foot of our driveway. It was probably the only time that I’d ever heard my father raise his voice in public, with the exception of my volleyball games in high school. Tamera had stood her ground at first, pointing out that she wasn’t on Turner property and she could stand wherever she wanted with a group to talk about ghosts. Eventually she’d given up, though. She’d said Dad was putting out negative vibes that were scaring the ghosts away.
Gray clouds gathered west of us in the sky and there was a slight scent of damp in the air. “Do you think it’ll rain?” I asked Uncle Joey as he drove at exactly the speed limit through town, hands on the wheel at ten and two.
“I hope not. The corn maze always smells funny if it gets rained on.” He wrinkled his nose at the thought. The maze had just gone up. Right now, it gave off a smell an awful lot like freshly mown grass. That could turn fast with much more than a light sprinkle. It was close enough to Turner’s to have the smell waft over us if the wind was right.
We pulled into the alley at the back of the hospital. Uncle Joey parked and we slid the gurney out of the back, up the wheelchair ramp, and through the double doors into the back entrance of the hospital to go to the morgue. The squeak in the wheel I’d already greased echoed in the tiled hallway, only partially masked by the buzz of the fluorescent lights overhead. We traveled the short distance to the morgue.
“We’re here to pick up Violet Daugherty.” I handed the clipboard to the woman behind the desk. Violet had been the office manager at the insurance office where my brother-in-law, Greg, worked and I’d written about her accident for the Verbena Free Press. Otherwise, I didn’t really know her. She must have moved to Verbena after I left and before I moved back.
The woman looked at the paperwork, nodded, and handed the clipboard back. Then she consulted her computer. “Come on in.” She got up from her desk and motioned to us to follow. She found the appropriate drawer for Violet Daugherty and pulled it out. Uncle Joey and I positioned our gurney next to it and made sure the black body bag was in the right spot.
Uncle Joey and I took our places at either end of Ms. Daugherty and shifted her onto our gurney on the count of three. We weren’t exactly the most evenly matched transfer team around. Uncle Joey was several inches over six foot. I was quite a few more inches beneath it. We made it work, though. Practice and perfection and all that.
Uncle Joey frowned at Ms. D
augherty’s paperwork. “Who’s her next of kin that’s making the arrangements?”
“A cousin back in Maine,” the woman said. “We had a heck of time tracking down who her next of kin was. I guess Ms. Daugherty was kind of on her own. I’m not sure the cousin ever even met her.”
“Really?” I couldn’t quite imagine that. Then again, my family was kind of tightly wound.
“Yeah. You’ll have to call her to make arrangements. Oh, yeah. Dr. Nate Johar will be by tomorrow to sign off on the death certificate,” she said. “Wasn’t he just at your place last week?”
Uncle Joey made a noise in his throat. “Seems like he’s always at Turner’s these days.”
The woman scratched at her head with her pen. “What’s up with that?”
Uncle Joey opened his mouth, but I rammed him with the gurney. “I have a service to prepare for back home. We should get moving,” I reminded him.
He shot me a look, but he started walking.
The truth was that the ME had been spending a lot of time at Turner Family Funeral Home for the last few months and I was pretty sure it wasn’t because we had the best lighting or the newest facilities. I was pretty sure it was because of me. Maybe I’d ask him a favor when he stopped by. Maybe Iris had hurried her father along to his inevitable and imminent demise. I’m sure she wouldn’t be the first person to feel it was a mercy to put someone out of their misery, especially if it eased their own suffering as well. Maybe Nate could take a quick look at Mr. Fiore and see if anything looked hinky because something certainly felt hinky.
*
Back at Turner, I opened the packet of Ms. Daugherty’s paperwork, found the cousin’s phone number, and dialed. “May I speak to Lizette Pinkston?”
“This is—” Before the person on the other end could finish her sentence, I heard the voice of a child chanting, “Mom mom mom mom mom mom.”
“In a minute, Clayton. Mommy’s on the phone.” There was some rustling. “Hi, sorry. This is Lizette. Who is this?”
