The Lover's Children novel Chapter 70

KLEMPNER

“I’m here to see Borje. He’s expecting me. Larry Waterman.”

The receptionist purses lips. “Doctor Anderssen said to expect you, Mr Waterman. And to send you straight through to his office.” She angles an arm along the corridor. “To the end, then second on the right.”

My stomach rumbles as I follow her directions. I took Borje’s advice, but my breakfast wore off some time ago.

I’ve had many years of brushing shoulders with death, one way or another, but this is the first time I’ve been in a mortuary. My shoes, clipping on ceramic tiling, echo down the short passageway. It’s oddly unsettling.

Don’t be so fucking stupid…

The office is easy enough to find. I tap on the door but there’s no answer, so I try the handle and as it turns, enter.

No more than a small office, it’s unoccupied other than the squawk box spouting the receptionist’s tinny voice. “Doctor Anderssen? Your visitor is here. I’ve sent him on as you instructed… Doctor Anderssen?”

I call out… “Anyone around?” No one replies.

Raising my voice, “Hello?”

Crickets…

To my left, a door stands closed.

Viewing Area

Another door stands ajar at the end.

Mortuary

From beyond the door, comes a faint buzz. Trying the handle, it turns and I step through to be met by a mechanical whine…

A drill?

It’s a plain room: white walls and ceiling. White floor tiles too. The lighting too is very bright, almost too much so for comfort.

One wall is lined by a block of stainless-steel cabinets. Another by a series of matching steel tables. Double swing doors face me from the far end.

The drainer of a stainless-steel wash basin is stacked with handwash, antiseptics and a box of latex gloves. A notice board crowns it. Safety Instructions… Wash your Hands… Close by, a hose lies coiled by a bin… Biohazard… The smell of bleach and formaldehyde overlie a sweetly foul odour.

The raw lighting highlights stainless steel tables set out with metal trays of pliers, scalpels, toothed forceps, scissors and shears.

A be-gloved figure in green medic’s scrubs, mask and what looks like a plastic shower cap stoops over one of the tables: laid out with…

… as I approach…

… the source of the putrid odour: a corpse, grey-blue, male.

A sheet drapes over the feet, but the remainder is naked. The cadaver has already seen some work, its chest laid open, the cavity dark. The liver lies on a weighing scale, a clipboard of notes and a ballpoint alongside. A series of small bottles contains what I assume to be tissue samples.

At the end of the table, a wheeled trolley, slung with wires and feeds, carries a camera and a computer screen, currently displaying some output from the camera: a shot of what could be a knife wound. But judging by the surrounding bruises, the owner of the knife didn’t stop at a simple stabbing.

The stooped figure is the source of the whining sound, working on the skull of the cadaver with a circular bone cutter, the tool revving up to a screech as he applies pressure. Fascination wars with revulsion and I find myself moving close enough to see where the crown of the skull is being separated from the remainder like the top of some overgrown boiled egg. There’s less mess than I would expect, but nonetheless, dark fluids drip to the glazed floor tiles and away down a small drain.

My footsteps are drowned out by the sound of the saw. Certainly, intent on his work, the figure shows no sign of realising I am there. After half a minute or so, he switches off the saw, sets it to one side, then adjusting his position, reaches in toward the skull…

Taking out the brain…?

… I clear my throat. Quite loudly. “Doctor Anderssen?”

He looks up, but only with his eyes, then jerking upright, yanks the sheet back from the feet to cover the body. “What the hell are you doing in here?”

“Your receptionist sent me through.”

“The hell she did…” his voice is muffled by the mask. “…To my office, yes. Not…”

I keep my voice calm. “I knocked. No one answered. I entered. I called out. No one replied. I came through. I’ve been here for at least two minutes.”

“Oh.” Borje blows air. Glances at the body. “Sorry.” Then, returning the glance to me, assessing, he lifts his chin. “I take it you’ve seen corpses before?”

“One or two. I’ll not keel over on the mortuary floor if that’s what you’re asking.” I nod down to the draped cadaver. “What happened to him?”

Borje straightens up, slipping into professional mode, speaking as though delivering a report. “Attacked by an intruder as he was changing a flat tyre in his garage. Stabbed and beaten. His attacker got a pocketful of change and was driving the car as the police caught up with him, joyriding, two days later. He was three times over the alcohol limit.” He blows air. “This poor bastard hadn’t even been missed by then. The police came looking and found him on the garage floor when the neighbour let them in with a spare key.”

“May I?” I glance for permission, then as Borje nods, flick back the sheet. The corpse looks no better on second viewing. “What was the cause of death?”

“Blunt trauma to the cranium... Tyre iron.”