by R E Swirsky
“Damn you, everyone!” Chris shouted.
His world was collapsing.
CHAPTER 82 Day Fifteen - Friday 11:59 PM
Jacob Mason looked at his watch. He was tired and frustrated. It was midnight, and he still had a few hours of work left before he could go home. He had been waiting for the blower to lower the temperature inside the chamber of the cremation furnace enough so for him to remove the tray with the remains. The timer indicated he still had another four minutes to go.
It wasn’t often that the funeral home received a request for a same day cremation. The circumstances surrounding this type of rush request was always the same: someone from out of town wanted to take the remains back with them when they left for home. The sign-off from the Chief Medical Examiner hadn’t come through until nearly four o’clock, so Jacob agreed to stay late. He hoped to be home by 9:00 PM.
But there was a problem. The cremation of one very large Armond Peterson he started at 3:30 PM was still incomplete.
“2260 degrees still!” he shouted into the phone at 4:45pm. He called the upstairs office and was speaking with his boss, Petraas Monahan,
“The main burner is off?” Petraas asked.
“Yes! And the temperature is still climbing.”
“Take it easy, Jacob. I told you to watch out for this. Peterson was severely obese. This happens sometimes. What’s the temperature in the second chamber?”
“It’s climbing too! 2120 degrees now! What do I do? You should come down here!”
“Don’t panic, Jacob. This is very normal. Now shut off the fuel to the afterburner. We need to wait this out. Keep both burners off.”
Jacob pressed the shutoff button for the afterburner and stepped back to watch the temperature readings for both chambers.
“I warned you about this,” Petraas said. “You can’t walk away from the furnace on obese cases. You need to sit your butt right there in front and watch those readings for the first half hour at least, especially that first chamber temperature.”
“I’m sorry,” Jacob replied. “It’s coming down now. 2220 in the main chamber and 2100 in the second.”
“That’s good. Now wait until the temperature falls well below 2000. Start up the afterburner at 1800 and then the main burner at 1600, in that order.”
“Uh huh,” he replied. “It’s working. They’re still coming down.”
“There’s so much fat on the body of an obese person. The fat ignites and combusts with intense heat sometimes. The temp can climb very rapidly.”
Jacob was relatively new to the job. He had only been running the furnace alone for three weeks. He knew how the cremation furnace worked: The main burner heats the first chamber where the body rests during the cremation process. The cremation temperature is usually about 1700 degrees. The second chamber is hotter, at 2000 degrees. The gases from the first chamber move to the second chamber where combustion of any remaining gases is completed. The remains of the body are brushed into a tray at the front of the chamber after a short cooling period.
“You are going to have to check on the remains as well. This one may need longer.”
“I know,” Jacob replied, but he didn’t sound confident. He saw one body before that hadn’t fully cremated. When he opened the chamber, instead of the usual grey clumps and ash, he stared into a blackened, gooey mass. It gave him nightmares for a week.
“Peterson’s going to take a lot longer than most.”
Jacob had to repeatedly monitor the chamber temperatures over the next half hour until the fats and liquids no longer combusted and spiked the temperature in the first chamber. Mr. Peterson was finally fully cremated three hours later. Then it took another hour for the furnace to cool down enough so he could remove the remains and another half hour of additional cooling before Jacob could begin his last cremation of the day: the rush request for one Jet Wu.
It was now after midnight and he waited for this final cremation to finish. The timer went off, and the temperature of the first chamber dropped below 700 degrees. Jacob slipped on his heavy, heat-retardant gloves and opened the door. He wasn’t about to wait any longer for the chamber to cool down another few hundred degrees. The heat blasted out at him and momentarily took his breath away. He reached inside with his long brush and brushed what remained of Officer Jet Wu into the tray at the front of the chamber. He removed the tray, shoved an empty, sterile tray back into the furnace, and closed the door.
After another hour, Jacob finished sifting through the remains with a magnet to pick out a few metal pieces. He ran the material through a processor to grind it down into uniform particles. He then sealed it all into a small plastic bag with an identification label, which he placed neatly into a small cardboard box.
It was nearly 1:30 in the morning when Jacob locked up and went home. He would be back at 8:00 AM, per his boss’ request, to meet the brother of the deceased.
CHAPTER 83 Day Sixteen - Saturday 10:03 AM
“Damn!” Dean shouted.
He cradled the phone, leaned back in his chair, and ran his hands through his hair. He was upset, but there was nothing he could do about it.
Brenda Tilley stared at him from Millie’s desk. Millie was off today. Brenda was a young, single mother who worked part time in the office. She always took over dispatch on Millie’s days off.
Dean forced a smile. “Sorry, Brenda.”
She smiled back. “It’s okay. Has something happened?”
“Nothing to concern yourself with,” he replied.
Brenda returned her attention to her computer.
But something did happen. After calling the funeral home repeatedly since arriving at the station two hours ago, Petraas Monahan finally picked up. He informed Dean that Jet Wu’s body was cremated last night.
“Damn it all,” he whispered. He tapped his fingers on the desk. There was no longer any point in going to the coroner with his suspicion regarding Jet’s suicide. He had no evidence that a crime was even committed.
He brought up the file for Candace Youngman on his computer. He studied her many photos. Could this pitiful hooker from the east side of Vancouver really be Chris Pattison’s daughter?
Dean printed out the most recent photo on file.
CHAPTER 84 Day Sixteen - Saturday 10:17 AM
Chris remained in his study with the drapes pulled shut. The dark gloom of his dimly lit study matched his depressed mood.
Anita called him out. He had no idea that she knew all along about the horrible thing he did to their daughter. He was disgraced. He didn’t know if he could ever face her again.
Chris lit another cigarette and puffed away in darkness. He could hear the kettle whistling away as Anita shuffled about in the kitchen.
In all of their years together, Chris never once left Anita to sleep alone upstairs. He was wrought with worry.
What was Anita going to do?
The front doorbell chimed through the house.
He shuffled over to the door of his study, tilted his ear, and listened. He could hear Anita shuffle down the hall to the front door. He listened to Anita and the visitor converse for a number of minutes. He could only make out the odd word here and there. His heart raced. Who was calling, and why?
Minutes passed. Chris heard the front door shut, and Anita shuffle back into the kitchen.
He moved back to his desk and sat down. He buried his head in his hands. What the hell was he supposed to do now? Everything he lived for was at risk. It all depended on what Anita did next.
There was a soft knock on his door and the door handle jiggled. It was Anita.
“Chris?” she called out. She opened the door and slipped in with a cup of tea. She approached slowly.
She set the tea gently down on the desk and pushed it towards him.
“Is something wrong, Chris?”
He frowned and looked away. He didn’t want to look into her eyes.
“You never came to bed last night. I was terribly worried about you.”
<
br /> Chris’ mouth dropped open. He finally stared up at her with his mouth agape.
Anita looked around the small office. Her eyes paused on the leather couch that had a wool blanket sprawled across it.
“Chris?” She looked very worried. “Why did you sleep down here last night?”
“I uh…” He stared at the couch.
“Here’s your tea,” she said.
She moved to the window and pulled the drapes open. “It’s so dark in here, Chris.”
Chris was dumfounded. Had she really forgotten what happened last night? He watched her carefully as she straightened the drapes, moved to the couch, and folded the blanket.
“That officer came by again.”
“Who? Dean?” He felt a lump swell in his throat and swallowed hard.
“Yes, dear. It was so strange,” she said.
“What was?”
She looked at Chris and frowned. “I don’t know why, but he wanted a picture of Arlene.”
“What?”
“I didn’t see any harm, so I gave him one.”
Chris’s heart pounded away. He feigned a smile and nodded.
“No harm done,” he said. He was worried. “Thanks for the tea.”
Anita turned for the door. She paused. “If you slept down here because of me, I wish you would tell me what I did. You’ve never slept down here before.”
He stared at her. He stammered. “It’s… uh… It’s nothing you’ve done. I uh…”
“You would tell me, Chris, if I did something to offend you?”
She stared at him for what seemed like a full minute. He nodded slowly, and she smiled.
“You know how my brain is these days. Sometimes I don’t remember things so well,” she said. She slipped out of the room and closed the door behind her.
Chris sighed in disbelief. He wanted to feel relieved, but he was still incredibly uncomfortable.
Was it possible she remembered nothing from last night?
He chuckled and sipped his tea.
CHAPTER 85 Day Sixteen - Saturday 11:20 AM
“Mom, it’s me,” Vincent said. He trembled so hard that the phone shook in his hand.
Silence.
He pressed the phone tighter to his ear.
“Mom?” he asked.
He heard her clear her throat before answering.
“Vincent?”
She was clearly surprised to hear his voice.
“Yeah, mom.”
She giggled. “You called me,” she said.
“Yeah, mom. I called you.”
He could almost hear her smile.
He wept.
END OF BOOK ONE
BUMSTEAD'S WELL - BOOK TWO to be released early 2015
See next page for all books by R E Swirsky
Books by R E Swirsky
WISH ME FROM THE WATER
When a young teenage boy commits suicide, the town’s people believe it was because of bullying. Two brothers quickly uncover the horrible truth and take matters into their own hands.
EXTREME MALICE
The teenage boy living next door is charged with the crime of strangling Jack's wife. The boy's guitar string was found around her neck. Jack was hundreds of miles away on business.
IN THE MIDST OF A PREDATOR
A very short story.
Young Bobby finds himself alone at the fair and lured by a sexual predator. (This same Bobby, many years later, becomes one of the main characters in Wish Me From the Water).
THE BLUFFINGTON FOUR
A time travel mystery. Four students stumble upon a device hidden away in an attic and are sent through a portal back in time. Their attempts to find their way home takes them to many different dates, but all lead back to one point in time in which a crime was committed. They soon believe the four of them committed the crime and resolve to go take their place in history.