then.
[51] So was everybody. Nobodys got better or nicer since the mid-sixties. Wish Id been born thirty years sooner. So howd yours die?
Four guys thought hed cheated them out of some money, so they thumped him a little, taped his wrists behind his back, and submerged his head in a toilet long enough to cause brain damage.
Man, thats ugly.
Its not Agatha Christie, Ethan agreed.
But youre dealing with all this, it proves there mustve been something left between you and your buddy. Nobody has to be executor of an estate, they dont want to be.
Two meat haulers from the medical examiners office pushed open the double doors and entered the garden-room reception area.
The first guy was tall, in his fifties, and obviously proud about having kept all his hair. He wore it in a pompadour elaborate enough that it should have been finished with bows.
Ethan knew Pomps partner. Jose Ramirez was a stocky Mexican-American with myopic eyes and with the sweet dreamy smile of a koala bear.
Jose lived for his wife and four children. While Pomp dealt with the paperwork supplied by the attendant, Ethan asked Jose to see the latest wallet photographs of Maria and the kids.
Once formalities were completed, Toledano led them through an inner door, into the garden room. Instead of a vinyl-tile floor as in the reception area, this chamber featured white ceramic tile with only sixteenth-inch grout joints: an easy surface to sterilize in the event that it became contaminated with bodily fluids.
Although continually cycled through sophisticated filters, the cold air carried a faint but unpleasant scent. Most people didnt die smelling of shampoo, soap, and cologne.
Four standard stainless-steel morgue drawers might have held bodies, but two cadavers on gurneys made an immediate impression. Both were draped with sheets.
[52] A third gurney stood empty, trailing a tangled shroud, and to this one Toledano proceeded with a stupefied expression. This was him. Right here.
Frowning with confusion, Toledano peeled the sheets back from the heads of the other two cadavers. Neither was Dunny Whistler.
One at a time, he pulled open the four stainless-steel drawers. They were empty.
Because the hospital sent the vast majority of its patients home rather than to funeral services, this garden room was small by the standards of the city morgue. All possible hiding places had already been explored.
CHAPTER 7
IN THIS WINDOWLESS CHAMBER THREE STORIES underground, the four living and the two dead were for a moment so silent that Ethan imagined he could hear rain falling in the streets far above.
Then the meat hauler with the pompadour said, You mean you released Whistler to the wrong people?
The attendant, Toledano, shook his head adamantly. No way. Never did in fourteen years, not startin today.
A wide door allowed bodies on gurneys to be conveyed directly from the garden room into the ambulance garage. Two deadbolts should have secured it. Both were disengaged.
I left them locked, Toledano insisted. Theyre always locked, always , cept when Im overseeing a dispatch, and then Im always here, right here, watching.
Whod want to steal a stiff? Pomp asked.
Even some perv wanted to steal one, he couldnt, Vin Toledano said, pulling open the door to the garage to reveal that it lacked keyholes on the outside. Two blind locks. No keys ever made for it. Cant unlock this door unless youre already here in this room, then you use the thumb-turns.
[54] The attendants voice had been quickly worn thin by worry. Ethan figured that Toledano saw his job going down the drain as surely as blood was drawn by gravity down the gutters of an inclined autopsy table.
Jose
[51] So was everybody. Nobodys got better or nicer since the mid-sixties. Wish Id been born thirty years sooner. So howd yours die?
Four guys thought hed cheated them out of some money, so they thumped him a little, taped his wrists behind his back, and submerged his head in a toilet long enough to cause brain damage.
Man, thats ugly.
Its not Agatha Christie, Ethan agreed.
But youre dealing with all this, it proves there mustve been something left between you and your buddy. Nobody has to be executor of an estate, they dont want to be.
Two meat haulers from the medical examiners office pushed open the double doors and entered the garden-room reception area.
The first guy was tall, in his fifties, and obviously proud about having kept all his hair. He wore it in a pompadour elaborate enough that it should have been finished with bows.
Ethan knew Pomps partner. Jose Ramirez was a stocky Mexican-American with myopic eyes and with the sweet dreamy smile of a koala bear.
Jose lived for his wife and four children. While Pomp dealt with the paperwork supplied by the attendant, Ethan asked Jose to see the latest wallet photographs of Maria and the kids.
Once formalities were completed, Toledano led them through an inner door, into the garden room. Instead of a vinyl-tile floor as in the reception area, this chamber featured white ceramic tile with only sixteenth-inch grout joints: an easy surface to sterilize in the event that it became contaminated with bodily fluids.
Although continually cycled through sophisticated filters, the cold air carried a faint but unpleasant scent. Most people didnt die smelling of shampoo, soap, and cologne.
Four standard stainless-steel morgue drawers might have held bodies, but two cadavers on gurneys made an immediate impression. Both were draped with sheets.
[52] A third gurney stood empty, trailing a tangled shroud, and to this one Toledano proceeded with a stupefied expression. This was him. Right here.
Frowning with confusion, Toledano peeled the sheets back from the heads of the other two cadavers. Neither was Dunny Whistler.
One at a time, he pulled open the four stainless-steel drawers. They were empty.
Because the hospital sent the vast majority of its patients home rather than to funeral services, this garden room was small by the standards of the city morgue. All possible hiding places had already been explored.
CHAPTER 7
IN THIS WINDOWLESS CHAMBER THREE STORIES underground, the four living and the two dead were for a moment so silent that Ethan imagined he could hear rain falling in the streets far above.
Then the meat hauler with the pompadour said, You mean you released Whistler to the wrong people?
The attendant, Toledano, shook his head adamantly. No way. Never did in fourteen years, not startin today.
A wide door allowed bodies on gurneys to be conveyed directly from the garden room into the ambulance garage. Two deadbolts should have secured it. Both were disengaged.
I left them locked, Toledano insisted. Theyre always locked, always , cept when Im overseeing a dispatch, and then Im always here, right here, watching.
Whod want to steal a stiff? Pomp asked.
Even some perv wanted to steal one, he couldnt, Vin Toledano said, pulling open the door to the garage to reveal that it lacked keyholes on the outside. Two blind locks. No keys ever made for it. Cant unlock this door unless youre already here in this room, then you use the thumb-turns.
[54] The attendants voice had been quickly worn thin by worry. Ethan figured that Toledano saw his job going down the drain as surely as blood was drawn by gravity down the gutters of an inclined autopsy table.
Jose
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