Down Among the Dead Men: A Year in the Life of a Mortuary Technician

by Michelle Williams

  Something went terribly wrong, though, because the Gloucestershire ambulance service, which is normally fairly efficient, took over an hour to arrive, although no one knows quite why; possibly the message got lost, possibly the wrong address was noted down. Anyway, Mrs Cartwright-Jones didn’t dare leave her husband because he was bleeding so badly that she was afraid he would die while she was away from him. So, in the cold of the early morning, she comforted him and tried to help him and lay down beside him while he died. I don’t suppose we’ll ever know what they said to each other and I don’t think it would be right if we did know. They had been married for over fifty years and there must be a lot to be said after that long. Mr Cartwright-Jones died ten minutes before the ambulance arrived, apparently just slipping away from loss of blood and perhaps the cold.

  Mr Cartwright-Jones’ story ruined the day for me and, I think, for Maddie also. There wasn’t much banter the next day either as Peter Gillard did the PM with the radio turned low. The gunshot hadn’t severed any major arteries and he died from blood oozing out of a thousand tiny cut veins. Clive reckoned it must have been quite a small calibre weapon because, apart from making a hole in the front of the abdomen, the shot hadn’t penetrated deep inside. I couldn’t help wondering if he might have survived if the ambulance had got there in decent time and, when I asked Peter Gillard, he shrugged and said, ‘Maybe. He had quite bad emphysema and a bad heart, so they wouldn’t have helped. Anyway, there’ll be in internal investigation at the ambulance service, and the Coroner will want to know what happened as well.’

  I tried to take comfort from the fact that he didn’t die alone, and I sincerely hope that being with his beloved wife at the end helped him. I think it might have done.

  FORTY-SEVEN

  It was at this time that the C word passed Clive’s lips. ‘You ought to think about taking the certificate, Michelle,’ he said. We were sitting in the office tucking into a fish and chip lunch after a busy morning PMing. I thought, ought I? When I made a face he added, ‘Can’t get anywhere without qualifications, Michelle. Not these days.’

  The certificate is actually the Certificate in Anatomical Pathology Technology and it’s awarded by what was then called the Royal Institute of Public Health, but is now the Royal Public Health Society. To get it you have to travel to an examination centre – London is the nearest – and sit a two-hour written exam, and then take an oral examination afterwards. Once you’ve got this piece of paper, you can then go on to sit a harder exam for the Diploma in Anatomical Pathology Technology, and thereby progress to more senior positions, but I hadn’t sat any exams for nearly fifteen years and I hadn’t been too hot at them even then.

  ‘It’s a bit soon, isn’t it?’

  Clive shook his head. ‘Naw. You’ve made good progress. You’ll sail through. You’ll see.’

  Maddie asked, ‘What do you have to know?’

  Clive said airily, ‘Nothing you don’t know from doing the job every day. Procedures in the mortuary, some of the paperwork, health and safety, disinfection, that kind of thing.’ When he said this I relaxed a bit. It didn’t sound too hard. Then he added, ‘Oh, and anatomy and physiology.’

  I stared at him, all relaxation a thing of the past. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘You know . . . the structure of the circulatory system, the hormone system, how the eye works, that kind of thing.’

  ‘But I don’t know that!’ I protested. ‘All I do is what you taught me to do, which is take out the organs. I don’t know the names or anything, and I certainly don’t know how the eye works.’

  ‘You won’t have any trouble, Michelle. Not a smart girl like you. Seeing what you do every day will mean that the names and suchlike will come easily.’

  ‘But why do we have to know about that kind of stuff? I can do the job just as well without knowing what the spleen does or how the kidneys work.’

  ‘It’s background knowledge,’ Clive said, although he sounded a bit unsure of himself. ‘In any case, it’s very, very important that you’re up to speed about things like disinfection and all the paperwork we have to deal with. Absolutely vital, that is.’

  ‘I know most of that already.’

  ‘This’ll prove it to everyone else.’

  I looked across at Maddie, who looked just as sceptical as I felt.

  I have to admit that I wasn’t keen on the idea of sitting another exam. When I had walked out of school for the last time I had been as high as a proverbial just thinking that I would never have to have study again, at least not in a school-type way. The idea of doing just that and then having to travel all the way to London not only for a written exam but then to be grilled across a desk made my heart sink. What did it matter if I didn’t have a piece of paper to show that I knew things? I wasn’t planning on moving to another mortuary.

  And there was Gramp. Since the news about his illness had come to light, I had seen him grow older, weaker, more delicate by the day. He was fading away before my eyes and I couldn’t stop worrying about him. How could I concentrate on anatomy and hygiene in the mortuary when my beloved Gramp was so ill?

  Dad had very different ideas, though. ‘You’ve got to do it, Michelle,’ he said firmly when I mentioned it. ‘You’d be a fool not to.’

  Dad is a real brain-box and I’ve always respected his opinion; if he says I ought to do something, then I listen. Yet I was still unconvinced that I wanted to ruin the next few weeks hitting the textbooks. I wasn’t going to be left alone, though. Mum joined in, and so did Luke.

  The final straw was when Clive mentioned it to Ed one morning. He was just finishing an autopsy on a drug addict who had been found in a cleaning cupboard on one of the campuses of the local university. He perked up immediately when Clive asked him loudly and well within my earshot if he agreed that I ought to sit the exam for the certificate. ‘Of course she should!’ he said at once. He turned to me and, waving the brain knife around as he is wont to do, told me, ‘I’ll get you through, no mistake.’

  I felt backed into a corner but for once, instead of being stubborn for the sake of it, I sighed and said, ‘OK.’ Deep down I knew I had no choice on this one.

  When he said he’d get me through it, I didn’t really appreciate what Ed had in mind. Over the next few weeks, he kept on at me remorselessly. The first thing he did was to go through the ‘red book’ – this is the mortuary technician’s bible, containing as it does all you need to know about the principles of running a mortuary, including the laws that govern us, the paperwork that has to be done, the special arrangements for different faiths and lots, lots more – and make me read a chapter every two or three days, then test me on what I had read. I didn’t do too badly on that, but then he moved on to the anatomy and physiology.

  He got hold of a simple anatomy book and went through each of the organ systems – respiratory, cardiovascular, nervous, urinary, genital, etc – making revision notes for me. At the same time, I got hold of old exam papers and at least twice a week I would do one of them under exam conditions and he would mark it. He and I then went through them and he tried to teach me on the questions that I got wrong. When we ran out of legitimate papers, he made them up. Because part of the paper is multiple choice and part of it is an essay-type question, he did both types.

  There were times when I think he got a bit annoyed with me. Although I know plenty enough anatomy to do my job, I found the more obscure bits and bobs about it – the stuff I figured I would never actually need to know in a million years – difficult to hang on to, but then that’s me all over; if I don’t see the reason for knowing something, then I don’t remember it. It’s as simple as that. Which, I suppose, was why I didn’t have too much trouble with the questions about the stuff that I actually do consider important, such as the paperwork and procedures you have to have in place so that there isn’t chaos in the mortuary.

  ‘But that’s not the point,’ said Ed, not quite banging his head against the wall, but close to it. ‘It’s
a game you have to play, Michelle.’

  ‘It’s a stupid game,’ I told him, and I meant it.

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed tiredly. ‘But in order to get that piece of paper and make your CV look good, you have to play.’

  So we went on and on. Sometimes I thought I was making good progress, but then I’d make a really dumb mistake and feel very dispirited about how it was going. A few weeks in was a particularly bad time when I answered a question Ed had set about the circulation of blood.

  ‘It’s a good answer,’ he said as he handed it back to me the next day. I was about to congratulate myself and be all modest about it when he added, ‘Unfortunately, it wasn’t the answer to the question I asked.’

  I stared at him. ‘What do you mean? Yes, it was. You asked about the circulation and that’s what I’ve written about.’

  ‘The question asked you to describe the coronary circulation.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘You’ve talked about the circulation of blood in general.’ I still didn’t quite see, so he explained. ‘The coronary circulation is purely the blood supply of the heart. The three arteries and the venous system on the surface of the heart muscle.’

  At this, I felt about two inches high. He tried to cheer me up. ‘Never mind. At least you’ve done some revision on an important subject.’

  And all the while, I was aware that Gramp was ill. I tried to get to talk to him, if not see him, at least once a week, and every time he seemed just that little bit weaker, slightly more tired. I guess I knew what was coming, but didn’t want to think about it too much.

  As the day of the exam approached, Ed, who had been gradually increasing the pressure, relented. ‘If you don’t know it now, then you never will,’ he said, which just made me think, Then I certainly never will. ‘It’s important you relax now. Too much stress and it’ll only hinder your performance. Just a bit of light revision, and you’ll be fine.’

  Which was all very well, but I knew better than he did how much I didn’t know, and all the stupid mistakes I’d made kept coming back to me. It got so that I was waking in the small hours of the morning with all this going through my head, plus worries about Gramp’s illness mixed in.

  FORTY-EIGHT

  Gramp had been admitted to a hospice to die. It was a beautiful building, almost like an old stately home, surrounded by well-tended gardens. He was having trouble walking because of his breathlessness, so the staff had made sure he had a bed by the window. They were fantastic, even down to the cleaners who greeted you by name when you arrived. Gramp was happy to be there, and it was the right time for him, he had asked to go. He had become frail, and the robust, able man I had known had turned into a slow elderly gentleman. He had not lost his sense of humour though. My Gramp was still there inside the frail body he now owned.

  He had only been there a couple of days when Dad rang me at work. ‘Hi, love,’ he said in a soft voice.

  ‘What’s up, Pops?’ I asked.

  ‘I think you need to come down to the hospice. Gramp is not good and I don’t think it will be long now.’

  ‘OK,’ I replied, feeling suddenly afraid, like being kicked in the stomach, hard.

  Clive had told me that I could go, and that I should go, but I didn’t know what to do. I was surrounded by dead bodies, but deep down I was so afraid to go to the hospice because it was steeped in death. I rang Luke who offered to come and get me, but I had to do this on my own. Within half an hour I had left the mortuary and was slowly walking the short distance to the hospice. It was almost as if my legs didn’t want to take me there, even though my head and heart wanted to go. The twenty-minute walk from the hospital to the hospice this time took me forty-five minutes, a walk I knew well, but if you had asked me that evening, I couldn’t have told you how I got there. It was almost as if autopilot had kicked in good and proper.

  I entered the big wooden doors of the hospice just as it started to get dark about four o’clock. There was a huge spray of lilies in the vestibule and the smell was overpowering. One of the domestic assistants was polishing the wooden chest they stood on. I looked at her and smiled, asked her how she was, then mumbled something about the dark evenings. ‘I’m so sorry for your loss, Miss Williams,’ was her response.

  I was stunned. I was too late. My selfish dawdling and deciding what was best for me meant I had missed my last chance to see my Gramp breathing. Talk about being kicked in the stomach again, although I felt I deserved to be kicked a lot harder at that moment. I suddenly froze: was Dad going to be angry with me? He had rung two or so hours ago asking me to go. I sat down on the nearest chair and took a few deep breaths.

  After composing myself for a few minutes, I climbed the wooden stairs up to the area where Gramp’s bed was. The curtains were drawn around him, and I could see Mum and Dad’s feet behind the gap at the bottom. ‘Dad?’ I said quietly, not knowing what the reaction would be. I felt as though I had totally let him down. This was about his father; how on earth would I feel in this situation, especially when you knew that your daughter had a fantastic relationship with your dad. My head was doing somersaults. Dad came out from behind the curtain. As he did I glimpsed Gramp. He was sitting up, dressed in his pyjamas, pale and thin, eyes closed but jaw hanging down.

  Dad put his arm around me, and I asked him if he was all right. ‘Do you want to come in?’ Dad asked me, and again I froze. The NO that came out of my mouth shocked me. It was very stern and sure. The slight glimpse I had had of Gramp through the curtain was enough. ‘OK, that’s fine, love, whatever you want to do; Mum and I will be staying a little longer and Michael is on his way. Luke not with you?’

  ‘No,’ I answered, staring at the curtain. ‘I’ll wait downstairs for you both, Dad. I’m sorry.’ Dad tightened his grip on my shoulder then went back to Mum and Gramp.

  As I walked down the stairs to find the chair I had sat in earlier, I met Michael who had just arrived. ‘Am I too late?’ he asked. Heaven knows what happened next, but it was at this point that I began to cry. That uncontrollable sob, the sort I had witnessed so many families experience in my months at the mortuary. Michael got me to my seat, and said gently, ‘I guess that I am, then.’ He was smiling slightly, in the caring way that you only recognize from the people you most love, and on seeing his smile and his face, I did what people in those families also do; I apologized to him.

  I now understand the relief that this can give a person who is bereaved and in shock; the ability to grieve is helpful for most, although the guilt of not sitting with Gramp after his death ten minutes earlier had become a little overwhelming.

  I told Michael he should go and let Mum and Dad know he was there, and toyed with the idea of going back up myself, but I didn’t feel ready. Michael climbed the stairs, but came back down to me almost immediately. We stayed for a couple of hours while we waited for our parents, drinking far too much dodgy coffee from the vending machine, freezing while out in the cold smoking too much, as the smell of the lilies started to choke us both.

  We chatted about times past, mainly how we remembered Gramp when we were just youngsters and how, when we had visited Nan and Gramp, he would tell us that ‘a little bird’ told him stuff about our progress at school and our achievements. We were always amazed at how he knew this, not thinking for a minute that Mum and Dad would speak to them over the telephone of an evening while we were safely tucked up in bed.

  We ended up giggling at some points.

  Eventually, we all went on to my parents’ house and things were talked over. Luke met us there, but took a back seat and was there for support and to keep the kettle hot. This was the first time I had really been involved in the death of a family member. As I was older, and considering what I did for a living, my parents felt no need to hide me from death.

  The funeral arrangements were made the next day with a local undertaker, for a week later, and I knew they would treat Gramp to the level we expected, and with the respect he demanded. This was one of the bonuses
about my job. As I’ve said, I had come to know a lot of undertakers and found out what they think of the job they are doing. Some of them just want to pay the bills and, I suppose, to have a quiet life, because the one definite thing with the dead is that they will never answer back, but there are a few who genuinely care. When they arrive to collect a body, they are gentle, they talk to the deceased and the respect is there. Some of the others will just pull the body over from our trolley onto their stretcher as if it’s a lump of meat, strap it in then wheel it away. I was not having that, no way. Also, another thing I had learnt was that it was important for us that the funeral director was an independent trader; a lot of companies are owned by American chains, and they work by sales figures. I decided that I wanted us to use the same people that dealt with little Lizzie last year – Tony, from Phelps & Stayton. I told my family about his compassion and commitment, and all agreed.

  I arranged with Tony that they would collect Gramp as soon as possible, and spoke to the consultant at the hospice, using my position to lay it on thick, and he kindly pushed through the paperwork that accompanies a death. I also knew that it was important that I see Gramp at the funeral parlour – I don’t know why, maybe the guilt of not being able to look at him straight after his death, or maybe to see if they had got everything to my expected standards at the funeral parlour; not that I doubted Tony, but just needing reassurance, I suppose. Mum also wanted to check that Gramp was correctly dressed for his send-off, so we decided to go and see him together.