C is for Corpse

Moza was dead white and she turned a stricken face to me. "This was your doing! What in heaven's name were you thinking of? The poor woman."

But I'd caught sight of Henry half a block away. Even at that distance, his face seemed blank with disbelief, his body tense. "I'll talk to you later, Moza," I said and headed toward him.

Chapter 25

By the time I reached my place, Henry was nowhere in sight. I pulled the envelope out of my waistband and knocked on his back door. He opened it. I held the envelope up and he took it, glancing at the contents. He gave me a searching look, but I didn't explain how I'd come by it and he didn't ask.

"Thank you."

"We'll talk later," I said, and he closed the door again, but not before I caught a glimpse of his kitchen counter. He had gotten out the sugar canister and a new blue-and-white sack of flour, turning to the activity he knew best while he worked through his pain. I felt awful for him but I had to let him sort it out for himself. God, it was all so unpleasant. In the meantime, I had to get back to work.

I let myself into my apartment and got out the telephone book, looking for Kelly Borden. If Bobby'd been searching for the gun out at the old county building, I wanted to have a crack at it too and I thought maybe Kelly could tell me where to start. No sign of him in the telephone book. I tried to find the number for the former medical facility, but there wasn't a listing for it and the information operator was being obtuse, pretending she had no idea what I was talking about. If he worked a seven-to-three shift, he'd be gone anyway. Shit. I looked up the number of Santa Teresa Hospital and put a call in to Dr. Fraker. His secretary, Marcy, told me he was "away from his desk" (meaning in the men's room), but would be back shortly. I told her I needed to talk to Kelly Borden and asked for his address and telephone number.

"Gee, I don't know," she said. "Dr. Fraker probably wouldn't mind my giving you the information, but I'm not really supposed to do it without his O.K."

"Look, I've got some errands to run anyway so why don't I stop by. It'll take me ten minutes," I said. "Just make sure he doesn't leave work before I get there."

I drove over to St. Terry's. Parking turned out to be a trick and I had to leave my car three blocks away, which was okay with me because I had to stop at a drugstore. I went in through the back entrance, following varicolored lines on the floor, as though on my way to Oz. Finally, I reached a set of elevators and took one down to the basement.

By the time I reached Pathology, Dr. Fraker was off again, but Marcy had told him I was coming and he'd instructed her to forward me, like a piece of mail. I trailed after her through the lab and finally came across him in surgical greens, standing at a stainless-steel counter with a sink, disposal, and hanging scales. He was apparently about to launch into some procedure and I was sorry I had to interrupt.

"I really didn't mean to disturb you," I said. "All I need is Kelly Borden's address and telephone number."

"Pull up a chair," he said, indicating a wooden stool at one end of the counter. And then to Marcy, "Why don't you look up the information for Kinsey and I'll keep her amused in the meantime."

As soon as she departed, I pulled the stool over and perched.

For the first time, I cued in to what Fraker was actually doing. He was wearing surgical gloves, scalpel in hand. There was a white plastic carton on the counter, a one-pint size, like the kind used for chicken livers in the meat section of the supermarket. As I watched, he dumped out a glistening blob of organs, which he began to sort through with a pair of long tweezers. Against my will, I feit my gaze fix on this small pile of human flesh. Our entire conversation was conducted while he trimmed off snippets from each of several organs.

I could feel my lips purse in distaste. "What are those?"

His expression was mild, impersonal, and amused. He used the tweezers to point, touching each of several hunks in turn. I half expected the little morsels to draw away from his probing, like live slugs, but none of them moved. "Well, let's see. That's a heart. Liver. Lung. Spleen. Gall bladder.

This fella died suddenly during surgery and nobody can figure out what his problem was."

"And you can? Just from doing that?"

"Well, not always, but I think we'll come up with something in this case," he said.

I didn't think I'd ever look at stew meat in quite the same way. I couldn't take my eyes away from his dicing process and I couldn't get it through my head that these had once been functioning parts of a human being. If he was aware of my fascination, he didn't give any indication of it and I tried to be as nonchalant about the whole deal as he was.

He glanced over at me. "How does Kelly Borden figure into this?"

"I'm not sure," I said. "Sometimes I have to look at things that end up having no co

"I suspect this is a lot more scientific than what you do," he remarked.

"Oh, no doubt about it," I said. "But I'll tell you one advantage I have."

He paused, looking over at me again, but with the first genuine interest I'd seen.

"I know the man whose death I'm dealing with and I have a personal stake in the outcome. I think he was murdered and it pisses me off Disease is neutral. Homicide's not."

"I think your feeling for Bobby is coloring your judgment His death was accidental."

"Maybe. Or maybe I can persuade Homicide that he died as a result of a murder attempt nine months ago."

"If you can prove that," he said. "So far I gather you don't have much to go on, which is where your work differs from mine. I can probably come up with something conclusive here and I won't have to leave the room."

"I do envy you that," I said. "I mean, I don't doubt Bobby was killed, but I don't have any idea who did it and I may never have any evidence."

"Then I have it all over you," he said. "For the most part, I deal in certainty. Once in a while, I'm stumped, but not often."

"You're lucky."

Marcy returned with Kelly's address and telephone number on a slip of paper, which she handed to me.

"I prefer to think I'm talented," he was saying wryly. "I better not keep you in any case. Let me know how it comes out."

"I'll do that. Thanks for this," I said, holding up the slip of paper.

It was now five o'clock. I found a pay phone in an offshoot of one of the hospital corridors and tried Kelly s number.

He picked up on the third ring. I identified myself, reminding him of Dr. Fraker's introduction.

"I know who you are."

"Listen," I said, "could I stop by and talk to you? There's something I need to check out."

He seemed to hesitate at first. "Sure, O.K. You know where I am?"

Kelly s apartment was on the west side of town, not far from St. Terry's. I trotted back to my car and drove over to an address on Castle. I parked in front of a frame duplex and walked down a long driveway to a small wooden outbuilding at the rear of the property. His place, like mine, had probably been a garage at one time.

As I rounded some shrubs, I spotted him sitting on his front step, smoking a joint. He wore jeans and a leather vest over a plaid shirt, feet bare. His hair was pulled back in the same neat braid, beard and mustache looking grayer somehow than I remembered. He seemed very mellow, except for his eyes, which were aquamarine and impossible to read. He held the joint out to me, but I declined with a shake of my head.

"Didn't I see you at Bobby's funeral?" I asked.

"Might have. I saw you." His eyes settled on me with a disconcerting gaze. Where had I seen that color before? In a swimming pool where a dead man was floating like a lily pad. That had been four years ago, one of the first investigations I ever did.