No Flesh Shall Be Spared

by Carnell, Thom

  So much to do…

  As he set about taking care of Mrs. Harvey’s internal organs, he silently considered his busy night so far. He’d already embalmed Mr. Lodene and now that he was almost finished with Mrs. Harvey he only had one more case to complete before calling it a night. After that, there was minimal cleanup that needed to be done and then it was all quiet on the Western front until his shift ended.

  Adamson enjoyed working the overnight shift at the Howard, Fine and Howard Funeral Home. The place was nice and had over the years developed a solid reputation. The late hours allowed him to work out from underneath the anally retentive eye of his boss, Mr. Marshall Howard, and let him care for the dead in the manner—and with the respect—he felt they deserved. In the past, he’d worked for too many firms that gave little to no care for the amount of consideration afforded to those who had passed on. For many people in this profession, the job was more about making money than any real sense of compassion; more about financial gain than offering any tangible psychological benefit to the bereaved. In some cases, the bodies themselves were tossed about like sides of beef in a slaughterhouse. In fact, many morgue workers often referred to the moving of bodies as "throwin’ meat." This was the kind of sentiment that Jeffrey neither understood nor condoned. It was crucial to Jeffrey that the dead be given their due. Working the late shift allowed him to see that quality care was given to each and every case that came under his watchful eye.

  "Jeez," he said aloud, his voice sounding alien in the silence of the room. He checked his watch and raised an eyebrow. "Four hours." He rubbed the back of his wrist across his forehead in an effort to relieve some of the tension there. "I’ve been at this shit for four hours."

  He absentmindedly let go of the trocar still inserted deep into the belly of Mrs. Harvey and pulled the latex gloves from his hands with a loud snap. The lance stuck up phallically from her midsection and pointed toward the ceiling.

  "Break time," he muttered, unstringing the stays at the back of his plastic apron. He stepped away from the table and pulled the cords from around his neck. The muscles in his back complained silently the moment his arms were raised over his head. As he took an appraising look at his handiwork, he draped the plastic apron across the foot of Mrs. Harvey’s table.

  Mrs. Harvey was a big woman with great rolls of flab cascading from her thick frame. Years of overeating with little or no thought ever being given to her health contributed to the stroke. A lifetime of Funyuns and root beer floats were not exactly conducive to longevity.

  A doctor had once told Jeffrey as he’d signed off on yet another death certificate, "You never hear the expression big old man or big old lady… It’s always little old man or little old lady." Most folks never seemed to get that.

  On the table before him, the woman’s hair laid slick with water against her skull, giving her face a "standing in a high wind" appearance. Her chubby cheeks hung like sacks of water from her face. All in all, it was a look that was not in the least bit flattering.

  Adamson turned to the small sink behind him and picked up a bottle of green antibacterial soap. The stuff looked as if it might have smelled of mint, but instead gave off an aroma of old socks and fungus. He washed his hands, first one and then the other, repeating the procedure until he was good and sure they were disinfected. With the amount of bugs and disease he worked with, sanitization was an important aspect of his job. Any embalmer who didn’t think that was so, usually ended up on a metal table himself. After shaking any excess water from his hands, he then dried them and unrolled his shirt’s sleeves. He walked to the door of the room and turned to look back at his workspace, feeling a genuine sense of pride at how well the night’s procedures had turned out.

  One more to do.

  He looked toward the last case which was a Mr. John J. Robinson, according to the toe-tag wrapped in one of the hospital’s plastic shrouds. The man’s arms crossed his chest, bound by a length of thin twine designed more to keep them in place than for any aesthetic purpose.

  Jeffrey figured that after he completed the necessary work on this last guy, he would be free to spend the last few hours at the end of his shift either reading or doing homework for the Business Administration class he was taking at the local city college.

  "I’ll be bawk," he said in a put-on Austrian accent as he opened the door and stepped through. As usual, he made sure to close it until he heard the click of the bolt mechanism falling into place.

  As he stepped into the dark hallway, Jeffrey heard the phone ringing in the main office. The radio he kept playing during his shift to remind him that there was still a world of activity going on somewhere out there droned on despite no one being there to hear it.

  …due to the clear danger to countless people as a result of the situation that is occurring, this station as well as hundreds of others throughout this part of the country will remain on the air and pool their resources through the Emergency Broadcast System to keep you informed of all developments. At this hour, these are the facts as we know them…

  Jeffrey rushed across the loading area, which was an open space that had once been a garage. At the far end was set a large roll-up door. The space was used so that employees could have enough room in which to "casket" the prepared bodies for upcoming services. A "ship-out container," which was nothing more than a flat piece of wood covered by a cardboard box designed to protect coffins while shipping them via airline or train, sat with an occupied casket sealed inside.

  He quickly walked past and entered the office proper. He snatched up the handset of the phone just before the answering machine clicked on. As he lifted the receiver to his ear, he leaned over and twisted the volume button on the top of the radio to quiet it.

  There have been rampant reports of the de—

  As the radio fell silent, he subconsciously noted that the clock on the radio read 1:37 A.M.

  "Howard, Fine and Howard Funeral Home. This is Mr. Adamson speaking. May I be of assistance?"

  "Jeff!" said the voice from the other end. "This is Marshall…"

  "Heya Boss, what’s up?"

  "I’m home, buried up to my ears in taxes since I got here. I managed to lock myself in my study with no distractions: no TV, no kids, no wife, no nothin’. Just me and Uncle Sam, all alone with his finger up my ass," and the tinny voice laughed in Jeffrey’s ear. "I just wanted to call and make sure you were doing all right. How are the cases coming?"

  "Marshall, you’ve called me every night since I started here a year ago, no matter if there were cases or not. Are we sure there isn’t the word "micro" in front of your title of "manager," Buddy?"

  Again the voice on the phone laughed. "Ok… you’re right. I’m mothering you."

  "The cases are going great. Mr. Lodene and Mrs. Harvey are pretty much done and I only have Mr. Robinson to do," Jeffrey said, reaching over to switch the coffee on to start a fresh pot. "Now, providing we don’t get any new First Calls, you guys should be OK for the morning."

  "Ok, that’s just great. I have some death certificates to get filed in the morning and…"

  A loud metallic clatter interrupted the man’s next thought. The sound came from outside the office, somewhere deep inside the funeral home.

  "What the hell was that?" asked Marshall.

  "I have no idea," Jeff said, leaning back and looking toward the loading area. "I was working with the trocar, maybe it fell from the table. Let me call you back."

  "No, don’t. I’m heading to bed in a while. Me and the wife are gonna have some quality time, if you know what I mean. You check it out and leave a shift report on my desk."

  "Okay. You give my best to the Mrs."

  "I will… right after I give her my best," again he laughed. "Oh, by the way, before we hang up, I need you to look on the Case Board and give me Rabbi Feldman’s telephone number. I need to give him some information first thing in the morning about the Jacob service."

  Jeffrey strained, phone cord dragging, until he go
t to a point in the room where he could see the large, white board where all of the particulars of each case were posted. He scanned the board, found the rabbi’s number, and repeated it into the receiver. After a perfunctory good-bye, he hung up. Taking a quick look at the progress his pot of coffee was making, he made it a point to reach over and turn the radio back up. If there was one thing he hated, it was to feel like he was alone in the silent mortuary. It didn’t matter what the sound was—music, commercials, or even talk radio—but it was important for him to know he wasn’t by himself in this oftentimes creepy place. Given the tricks one’s mind could play on itself, a mortuary was not the place to let it run wild.

  Satisfied that everything was ok and going according to plan in the office, he walked back across the loading area to investigate the source of whatever that banging had been. The medicinal smell of bleach coming from the washing machines at one end of the concrete loading area burned his nostrils. Most of the laundry here was blood stained and soiled with all manner of bodily fluids, and everything that got washed was done so in a lot of hot water and chlorine bleach. There was always a basket or two of laundry going. The machines worked at their loads, continually making soft chug-chugging sounds as they swirled the bed linen in their scalding water.

  As he stepped through the doorway leading to the funeral home’s main building, he noticed that the door to the Prep Room stood slightly ajar.

  I know I shut that…

  He reached out to push the door open, but as his fingers touched the painted wood, a sound of heavy movement came from deep within the funeral home. Jeffrey paused, closed his eyes, and bent his head slightly in an effort to concentrate on hearing from where the sound had come.

  At first, he thought he’d imagined it and after a minute of silence he was almost sure he had, but as he once again moved to push against the door, he heard it again. It sounded like there was someone slowly moving across the carpeting. It sure as hell wasn’t the sound of anyone moving with any sort of authority, but rather the hesitant steps of a person who was unsure of their surroundings, walking slowly and carefully, but not really caring whether too much noise was made.

  I don’t need this shit… not now… not tonight.

  Adamson turned from the Prep Room door, looking around for something with which to arm himself. You know… just in case. He’d been warned by the owners again and again that some of the funeral homes in the area had been vandalized and the local police were unable to find the people responsible for the destruction. The culprits, whoever they were, had spray-painted obscenities on the walls, kicked over pews and, in some cases, took out their mindless fury on the helpless dead who passively lay in state. Jeffrey would be damned if he’d allow someone to commit such acts in this mortuary… not on his watch.

  He quietly tip-toed back to the loading area and after a short search found a length of metal rebar leaning up against a wall; a left-over from the construction of the newly remodeled office which now stood where the garage and storage shed had once been. Feeling like he was something close to armed, Adamson bolstered his courage, drew a deep breath and walked past the Prep Room and on toward the doorway of the funeral home.

  They are so not paying me for this…

  The gray carpeted hallway stretched out before him like an empty airport runway with three visitation rooms: two on the left and one on the right. The hallway ended on the far side of the building at the foyer and jogged at an abrupt angle, bending sharply to the right, leading to the building’s entryway and on toward the chapel. Jeffrey stood silent for a moment and intently listened for any further sound of movement. Hearing none, he took three steps forward and, with his heart racing, gently pushed open the first door on his left.

  Inside the small room were several low platforms called biers on which caskets were laid during visitations and services, two sets of candles on ornate pedestals, and the wooden Aaron casket the funeral home received the previous day to replace the one in which Mrs. Jacob now lay. Heavy velvet drapery covered the window and the room sat cloaked in a darkness that was almost absolute. At the point where the two drapes met, a single shaft of light came through from the street lamps outside. Its beam fell coldly across the smoothly vacuumed carpet. The room held within it an air of sullen expectancy as if it were placidly waiting for the next group of mourners to come and pour out their grief like warm molasses.

  Nothing in here…

  Jeffrey closed the door, and as he lifted his foot to take his next step, he heard movement once again. The direction of the sound was still unclear, but that didn’t matter one bit to Jeffrey’s adrenal system. It kicked into overdrive the instant he’d heard that first clattering sound. His heart leapt up into his throat and took up a painful, throbbing residence. A light queasy feeling roiled deep in his bowels. His limbs burned with an almost electric feeling. Fight or flight clawed at the edges of his perception.

  He stepped forward, deciding to methodically check each room one by one before venturing deeper into the dark of the building, and reached out to nudge open the door on the right. He pushed against the wood slowly and let it swing open on its own.

  Leaning in, he inventoried the interior: couches sat patiently along one side of the room, tawdry landscape paintings littered the walls, as well as the dark oblong shape of a casket which dominated the front. He stepped a little deeper into the room, looking first to one side and then the other. With great care, he circled the room in an attempt to investigate every corner; reveal every nook and cranny. He soon reached the casket in the dark and peered into it, using the sparse light from the doorway to illuminate his vision.

  Mrs. Devon lay in her rosewood casket patiently awaiting her service which was scheduled for late the following day. The smell coming from the large number of flower arrangements surrounding her casket bordered on overwhelming. It was an odor so sweet that it threatened to sour Jeffrey’s already turbulent stomach. He turned from the casket and made his way back toward the door and walked through it into the hallway, absentmindedly leaving the door partly ajar.

  Ok… two down.

  His heart continued to race like an unbridled pony and his belly still felt all tight and oily as he stepped back into the dim hall. The last visitation room in the building lay just ahead and to the left. He lifted up onto his toes like a small child sneaking down the stairs on Christmas morning and tiptoed toward the final door. Jeffrey turned the knob and pushed the door open with his shoulder, just enough so he could stick his head through. The inside of the room lay much like the others: silent, still and quite empty.

  Ok, only the chapel left…

  He slid his body back between the door and the doorjamb, but as he did so the sound of rustling once again reached his ears. Only this time, he was able to pinpoint exactly where it was coming from—the chapel. He was sure of it now. Since the intruder was not in any of the visitation rooms, the chapel was the only logical answer. With one more quick backward glance into the visitation room to verify its vacancy, he closed the door, gripped the metal rod tighter with both hands, and proceeded across the foyer toward the chapel’s doors.

  Jeffrey stepped through the double doors of the chapel, pushing them all the way open with the side of his foot so that they would be held in place by the stops in their hinges. The room was bathed in darkness and lay cloaked in an almost deafening silence. Along one wall, a small garden of fake ferns and foliage sat under a row of softly colored lights recessed beneath an overhang. The pews, quiet and alone, stood in two columns with an aisle running down the middle. His shadow extended long and thin down the aisle, cast as it was by the single lamp’s light which dimly illuminated the foyer.

  At the front of the room sat Mrs. Jacob’s Aaron which had been placed upon a bier. It looked quite austere in its simple but elegant setting. All had been prepared and was ready for her morning service which would be presided over by the good Rabbi Feldman. The woman’s body arrived earlier in the afternoon and had gone straight into t
he casket as prescribed by Jewish tradition: no embalming, no metal to touch the body, casket made without nails to join the pieces of wood together. Once she was tucked inside, the lid was closed and held tight by an intricate mortise and tenon system. Jeffrey quickly scanned the room and to his great relief saw nothing out of the ordinary. He was about to turn and leave when he noticed that the head panel of the casket was slightly ajar, lifted just barely, almost imperceptibly.

  Wait a second…

  Jeffrey moved up the aisle with a cautious hesitation, scanning the shadows for any sign of either burglar or vandal. He surveyed the room, moving his head from side to side, taking in the most minute of details as an excited mind often does. Someone had left the Catholic hymnals in the pockets in the back of the pews. This would need to be addressed after he’d finished checking for this intruder. It wouldn’t do for a Jewish service to come in and find them left behind. He also noticed that there were several empty Kleenex boxes littering the pews and they would need to be replaced with fresh ones. It was being attentive to small things like this which gave a funeral home its reputation.

  So much to remember…

  When he finally arrived at the side of the casket, he took a nervous look back over his shoulder. The chapel lay as it had before, quiet and empty. Turning back, he carefully slid his fingers under the lip of the lid and gently, but with constant pressure, pulled upwards. What little light there was in the room pushed back the shadows within the casket.

  Mrs. Jacob’s face slowly slid into full view. Her skin looked blanched of any color, her lips bleached of any shade. He used both of his hands to push the lid to its full upright position and surveyed her body. She lay in quiet repose, wrapped in a white, linen sheet with only her sallow face exposed. She looked in good shape, all things considered. Her complexion was a little drawn, but structurally she was sound as a pound. He looked down the length of her body, and it was at that moment he noticed several circles of dark blood soaking into the linen midway down her chest. He gently pulled back the cloth, hating that he had no gloves for his hands, and exposed the area. What he found was beyond any fevered imagination. Three large pockets of flesh had been torn from the woman’s bound arm; large semi-circular chunks were ripped from the flesh leaving a massive amount of destruction to the tissues behind.