by Gideon, John
But I had to promise to buy her dinner if I ever spilled the beans that you were drinking alone at Liquid Larry’s on a Sunday night. And that’s the God’s truth, Officer.” He held up his right palm in solemn oath. “So how did things go today?”
Stu hung his head and shook it. “Not worth a damn. I was going to ask you the same thing.”
Carl wiped the foam from his mustache, seemingly at a loss for an answer. A question instead: “Do you believe in miracles, Stu?”
“I don’t know if I do or not. A year ago I would’ve said no. These days I’m not sure there’s anything I don’t believe in. Why?”
“Today I saw one, or at least the effects of one.”
“You mean Jeremy?”
Carl nodded. “Lorna had written about his progress with this Dr. Craslowe, and naturally I was anxious to see for myself. But honest to God, I wasn’t prepared for what I saw today.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean. His progress has been pretty mind-boggling, all right.”
“I’m still in a state of shock. I spent the whole afternoon with him,and I still can’t make my hands quit shaking. Look.” Carl held out his hand, and, sure enough, it trembled slightly.
“Don’t worry, it’s probably just exhaustion. All you need is a good night’s sleep. By the way, where’s Jeremy now?”
At home, Carl explained. With Aunt Lindsay and Gramma Nora. Sleeping the sleep of the innocent, while his father’s out getting drunk with an old buddy. Carl related how Hannie Hazelford had outfitted the whole house not only with furniture to replace that which had to be discarded but also with kitchenware and groceries. How a dozen of Lorna’s grieving friends had rolled up their sleeves and transformed the pigsty at 116 Second Avenue into a presentable home. How Lindsay Moreland had already made arrangements for Lorna’s cremation and memorial service, and how he himself felt thoroughly useless.
“Lindsay and Nora are staying at the house?” asked Stu. “They’re using the room that used to be Lorna’s studio,” said Carl. “Hannie sent over a big double bed to put in there.”
“How’s the kid taking all this?”
“Fine—and I mean really fine. He seems totally unaffected, almost serene, and in a way, I think that’s what’s been bothering me. Maybe I’d feel better if I saw a little pain in his face. Anyway, Lindsay had an appointment this afternoon with Craslowe, but he called and asked to postpone it until tomorrow. I plan to tag along and ask some questions.”
“So what happens after you’ve wrapped things up here—I mean, after the funeral and everything? What happens to Jeremy?”
Carl stared a moment at his old friend. Finally: “Stu, I’m moving back to Greely’s Cove. Jeremy’s going to live with me, and I plan to try my hand at practicing real law again.”
Stu’s mouth dropped open, and he nearly spilled his beer. “Are you serious? Tell me this is a joke.”
“I’ve never been more serious in my life,” answered Carl, smiling gently.
Stu took a long, deep breath and fixed his friend with a rebuking stare. “What in the hell do you want to do that for? You’ve got everything in the world going for you! You’ve gotten out of this fuck-stick town, you’ve succeeded—”
“That depends on how you define ‘success.’”
“You’re my definition, old stud. I mean, look at you: Rolex watch, two-hundred-dollar sweater, big job in Washington, D.C. Hell, you probably spend more on haircuts than I do on groceries.”
“Yeah, but I also run myself ragged. I babysit self-important assholes who call themselves congressmen or congressional candidates. I write things for them to say, because most of them have never had an original thought in their lives. And every three months or so, I change women, just like I change the oil in my Porsche, even though I rarely have time to drive it. On top of all that, I drink too damn much.”
“Sounds like heaven to me,” said Stu, incurring a sad chuckle from his friend. “You’ve done everything you said you’d do when you left this shit-heap town. You’ve gotten what you wanted. Why throw it away now?”
“For Christ’s sake, I became a lawyer because I wanted to help people. When the call from Washington came, I thought, ‘Wow! Here’s a chance to help people by the millions, not just in ones and twos.’ What a joke that was. I was a lot happier helping people in ones and twos right here in Greely’s Cove, and damn it, I want to do it again.”
Stu Bromton drained his glass and bowed his head a moment, looking almost prayerful as he thought. When he looked up again, his broad face was full of worry.
“I won’t fault you for wanting to make a new beginning. I worry, though, about whether you’ve given it enough thought.”
“Well, don’t. I’ve been thinking along these lines for a long time. Lorna’s death was just the catalyst that got me moving.”
“I hope you don’t think I’m off my knob, old stud, but is there any way I might convince you to make your new start somewhere else?”
“Somewhere else? You mean somewhere other than Greely’s Cove?”
Stu nodded.
“I really don’t think so,” said Carl. “I want Jeremy to be near Dr. Craslowe until his therapy’s finished. Besides, I’m known here. I used to practice here. People knew my family.” He cocked his head and raised his eyebrows. “Why would you want me to go somewhere else?”
Stu had trouble getting the words out. Several times he opened his mouth to speak, then shut it again. Carl watched with morbid fascination as his friend worked up the courage to answer.
“It’s just that things aren’t so good here anymore,” Stu said at length. “There’s something bad here, Carl. I haven’t figured out what it is, and maybe I never will.”
“You’re talking about the disappearances, right?”
“The disappearances are part of it. But there’s something else.”
“You’re losing me.”
“I don’t know how to put this, and I hope you won’t think I’m ready for the silly hatch—”
“I won’t. You know me better than that.”
“Okay, I’ll blurt it right out: There’s evil here. I can feel it. Sometimes I even think I can see it, sort of hanging in the air like it’s not quite invisible. It does things to people, throws the normal rhythm of life out of whack. There’s a kind of deadness in the atmosphere that wasn’t here before. If I were you, I’d take my kid and get out of town, honest to God I would.”
“I lied: You’re ready for the silly hatch.”
Despite himself, Stu laughed. “Get serious, would you?” he pleaded. “I’m worried about you moving back here, damn it. Greely’s Cove isn’t a healthy place these days.”
“I’m sorry, Hippo,” said Carl, clapping a hand on the big man’s shoulder. “I didn’t mean to laugh at you. But I think you’re starting to feel the stress of these damn disappearances, which is only natural. My God, it’s been happening for—what?—eight months. You’re entitled to get a little silly.” Carl’s tone became that of the amateur shrink—he considered himself a good one. “You want to solve the problem, but the problem isn’t cooperating. You’re frustrated, you’re tired. What you need to do is recognize that the problem won’t last forever, that it’ll go away someday. It really will, Stu. Whoever’s doing these terrible things will make a mistake, and you or some other cop will nail him. At the very least, the guy will get scared and move somewhere else. Maybe we’ll get lucky, and the bastard will suffer a fit of guilt and blow his own brains out.”
“But I told you, it’s not just the disappearances. There are other things.”
“What other things?”
Stu Bromton stared into space a moment, worrying that he was about to betray an incurable lunacy. He glanced around to make certain that Liquid Larry was out of earshot, that another patron had not worked his way toward this end of the bar. Then he started to talk, keeping his voice low, his eyes averted from Carl’s.
He talked about the other things, and Carl didn’t laugh.
>
Encircled in the silent aura of pedestal floor lamps, Mitch Nistler labored over the corpse of Lorna Trosper. Except it wasn’t really labor. His hands moved with a deftness he had never known before, as though he had spent his entire life mastering the skills of embalming. The smoothness of his motion, the certainty of his next move, and the precision with which he handled the instruments—all seemed beyond his normal capabilities.
This was not labor, or scarcely even work. This was love. Occasionally, while watching his hands dance through the process of injecting embalming solution into Lorna’s arteries, he would verge on asking himself Just what the hell am I doing? But the question never quite formed, because the hunger banished it before it could become a complete thought. Always the hunger: cresting and breaking whenever any part of his old self began to stir, surging forth from that dark well in his mind, consuming and controlling him.
From that dark mental well came not only skill and dexterity and hunger but also knowledge. He wondered how he knew that the sacred profession of embalming, for example, began with the Egyptians in 6000 B.C., and how it came to be that he—Mitch Nistler, of Greely’s Cove, Washington, twice-convicted petty drug pusher and menial servant of old Matt Kronmiller—could feel a kinship with the priests of the dog-headed god Anubis, the Divine Embalmer.
Kinship he felt, as though his soul had once lived in the body of a great practitioner of Anubis’s art, as though he himself had launched countless human spirits on the 3,000-year “circle of necessity,” completion of which allowed those spirits to return to their mummified remains and ascend into the eternal realm of the gods. Could it be that he actually remembered such things, that he had been one of Anubis’s priests, that through some unknowable magic his own soul had broken out of the circle to survive an extra score of centuries?
Who owns Mitch Nistler?
He watched his hands as they finished the tasks of arterial injection, as they prepared the fluid for the next phase—cavity injection. The fluid must be an astringent, fast-acting preservative with a high formaldehyde content, augmented with phenyl, tanning agents, and odor suppressors. This he would inject into the body cavity to preserve the organs and give natural shape to the torso. After all, Lorna had given up so much—nearly a gallon of her blood to the flush receptor (virtually all of it), as well as the contents of all her major organs to the trocar and aspirator. The time had come to put something back .formaldehyde, the great preserver, the acridsmelling stuff of embalming fluid, pumped in with motorized force through a trocar hole in the tummy.
Oh, the beauty of it.
When that was done, Mitch Nistler snapped off the injector, and its whine descended into nothingness, leaving only the hushed whisper of the ventilation system in its place.
On to the surface applications. Cosmetic dyes like red ponceau and yellow eosin, to banish the grays and blues and chalky whites of death, at least for a while. Humectants and oils to combat postembalming dehydration—sorbitol, dulcitol, glycol, and lanolin. And to counter the horrific chemical smells, perfumes—sassafras, lavender, and the oils of cloves and orange and wintergreen.
Then the final touches. Having decided against sewing shut the eyelids and jaw, he removed the body to the dressing room, where he lovingly washed, combed, and brushed its hair. Filed and lacquered its nails, both hands and feet. Daubed on sealing compounds to hide blemishes and bruises and discolorations caused by pooling blood. Applied facial makeup, eyeliner, mascara, and peach-colored lipstick to complement Lorna Trosper’s radiant blond hair. All with love, with anticipation. And with hunger.
At last he stepped back from the gurney to behold the product of his labors in its wholeness. She lay on her back, naked, needing no clothing. Her skin was flushed and rosy, her face positively angelic. Mitch had taken great care in applying the makeup, lest he overdo it and fail to achieve the look that Lorna had had in life, of purity and wholesomeness. All flaccidity was gone, thanks to pressurized injection of embalming fluid, which had given her limbs and torso the firm, ripe look of a living woman. She seemed almost radiant.
Only touching her would dispel the illusion of life, for her flesh was dead-cold, but Mitch was prepared to live with this one small shortcoming. After all, never in his living memory had he touched a warm woman. You can’t miss what you’ve never had, he told himself.
After wrapping Lorna Trosper’s beautiful body in a clean sheet, he moved one of the massive black hearses out of the garage and drove his burbling, rust-cratered El Camino into its place. He then gently laid the body into the cargo bed of the half-car, half-pickup truck and covered it with a sheet of plastic to protect it from the rain. Back to its place went the hearse. The mortuary went dark as he shut off the last light. The garage door rattled closed, and Mitch Nistler, feeling both weary and exultant, drove away into the black night, bound for home with his woman.
8
That the sun shone on Greely’s Cove seemed a small miracle after two days of gloom and sleety rain. Lindsay Moreland rolled out of bed, heaved open the bedroom window, and drank deeply of the crisp, winter air. She savored the miracle, small though it was, with its pine-laden breeze and dazzling patches of blue sky. A good feeling washed over her, and the dark age since her sister’s death appeared to be on the verge of ending. Even so, she suffered a nibble of anxiety over being away from the brokerage on a Monday morning, and she thanked God for sympathetic associates who were willing to cover for her.
While her mother puttered over breakfast in the kitchen, Lindsay showered and dressed in a red cotton sweater and fitted oatmeal slacks. She topped off the outfit with a black linen jacket, simple brass bracelet, and earrings. Not in the mood for contacts this morning, she wore her horn-rims with the thin bows and larger-than-usual lenses, which her friends said made her look “bookish.”
Nora presented her with a plate of French toast and a welcome cup of black coffee when she came into the kitchen. “Mmmhh,” she said after the first bite. “No one does French toast like you, Mom.”
“You can thank that Miss Hazelford person,” said Nora, sipping from a coffee cup. “The woman must have spent a small fortune in groceries for this household. We could’ve had Tillamook cheese omelets or smoked salmon or even eggs Benedict, for that matter. But I know how much you love my French toast, so French toast it is. By the way, are the others stirring yet?”
“Not according to the sound of the rumbling snores coming from Carl’s room,” answered Lindsay. “Or the silence that seeped through Jeremy’s closed door.
“It wouldn’t surprise me,” she offered, “if Carl’s feeling a little under the weather this morning. He didn’t come in until two o’clock.”
“I know,” said Nora. “I was awake myself.”
“I hope it wasn’t because of my tossing and turning.”
“Not at all. My head was just so full of thoughts and memories, so many”—her voice cracked ever so slightly, and her eyes fluttered, but she kept control—“so many questions. Even though most of her old things are gone, this house is still so full of Lorna. I don’t think I could ever sleep well under this roof.”
“I know what you mean. I’m glad that tonight’s our last night here. There’s no reason we can’t go back home after the memorial service tomorrow.”
After breakfast Lindsay placed a telephone call to her lawyer in Seattle, Denver Moreen, a trusted old friend who had handled the Moreland family’s affairs for a quarter-century. All she wanted was some “quick and dirty” legal advice, she told him, on her chances of winning a court battle against Carl Trosper for custody of Jeremy. But like all lawyers, Moreen was wary of giving quick advice over the phone. He posed a dozen questions about Carl’s moral and emotional fitness, finances, ability to earn a living, and the answers were hardly encouraging to Lindsay, the prospective litigant. Moral turpitude, Moreen explained, is difficult to prove in a custody case, even on the basis of expert testimony and documentary evidence, and nigh impossible with only hearsay and suspi
cion. After forty minutes of jawing, he offered the tentative conclusion that she would be crazy to challenge Carl over custody of the boy. Absent some unknown factor that would override all else that was known about him, Carl would win.
Lindsay thanked him, told him good-bye, and wandered back into the small kitchen to refill her coffee cup. Her mother had settled at the dinette table with the morning newspaper.
“I couldn’t help but overhear,” said Nora. “Denver wasn’t very encouraging, was he?”
“No, he wasn’t. In fact, he was downright discouraging, which makes you happy, I’m sure.”
“Lindsay, would you please keep your voice down? I think Carl is awake.”
“He’s in the shower, and I don’t care if he hears. There’s no way I’ll ever believe that he’s fit to raise Jeremy.”
“That’s not for you to decide, is it?”
“Mother, there’s nothing to decide. Look at his behavior last night: Lorna hasn’t been gone two days, and he’s out on the town, getting blotto with that police chief friend of his. You and Denver can say what you want, but that’s not my idea of responsible fatherhood.”
“Maybe I’m becoming weak in the head as I get old,” said Nora, “but I’m not so sure I disapprove of it. I was tempted to do the same thing when your father died.”
“You can’t even handle one martini, Mother.”
“That is hardly the point, dear. Now listen to me, because I’m about to give you some good advice—”
“I don’t need any more advice.”
“Well, listen anyway. As the contributor of half your genetic makeup, I’m entitled to give it. Let this drop, Lindsay. You can’t accomplish anything by going to war with Carl. Oh, you can throw away hard-earned money on legal fees, and you can create lots of heartache and ill feeling, and you can probably alienate your nephew forever—which could very well happen if you pursue this insane notion of yours. Instead of fighting Carl, you should be trying to help him. Why not become an ally instead of an enemy? Do you really think Lorna would have given her blessing to a war between you and Carl over Jeremy?”
