Casket Case

by Fran Rizer

  In South Carolina, we don’t have medical examiners. Our coroner here in Jade County is an elected official who sends bodies to MUSC—the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston—when a postmortem exam is needed.

  “Otis and Odell are due back this morning. I can drive Dr. Melvin myself and be home before I’m scheduled for work this afternoon.” I glanced at the Jacuzzi. Mrs. Dawkins had turned off the jets and was showing the coroner how to drain the tub. Levi Pinckney was helping them. The part of me who thinks I’m Kinsey Millhone instead of Callie Parrish wondered if they should save a sample of the water in case Melvin didn’t die of natural causes, but I had enough sense not to mention one of my wild ideas.

  “May I use your telephone again?” I asked Mrs. Dawkins.

  “Sure,” she answered. “I’m going in myself to get dressed. I know I won’t be able to sleep any more tonight, and it’s cooler out of the water than it was in the tub. I don’t want to catch ammonia.”

  I did a quick double take at the woman’s fear of catching “ammonia” in the June heat of the southern coast, then returned to the rooster kitchen of baked goods and vitamins to dial my friend Jane’s number.

  “What do you mean calling me before sunrise?” she demanded. “Roxanne’s on the other line.”

  “Dr. Melvin died. I’m taking him to Charleston. By the time I get there, deliver him, and have breakfast, I won’t have to wait too long for Victoria’s Secret to open. I’m going shopping.”

  “What about the funeral home?”

  “Otis and Odell are already scheduled to open this morning. We don’t have any clients right now, and the mortuary phone is forwarded to my cell. I’m not due in until four this afternoon.” Mental note: Go by my apartment and pick up the cell phone before leaving town.

  “Roxanne will speed up. Can I go?”

  “If you’ll behave.”

  “I’ll try.”

  Chapter Two

  Dalmation! I’d gone by my apartment, taken my Great Dane dog, Big Boy, out for his morning business, and showered. I changed from the black dress I’d worn to the Dawkins house into fresh jeans and a tank top with an inflated bra, then climbed in the hearse and headed toward my friend Jane’s. Why can’t I remember to call the hearse by its proper name—the funeral coach?

  Almost to Jane’s, I thought about the cell phone. After checking for any calls I’d missed while gone, I’d used my landline phone to call the mortuary number and leave a message for the Middletons. I’d explained about Dr. Melvin’s death and that I was taking him to Charleston for a postmortem exam. That had been efficient. Leaving the cell phone on the coffee table again hadn’t been. I needed the telephone with me until Otis and Odell opened the mortuary and transferred calls back to the business line. I was fortunate that another call hadn’t come in while I was at the Dawkins house, not even realizing the business calls were going to the cell phone in my apartment with nobody there to answer. The mortuary telephone was supposed to be answered immediately twenty-four/seven. That was one of Middleton’s rules.

  I finally reached Jane’s apartment after detouring back by my place for the cell phone and rubbing behind the ears of my joyful dog, who was happy to see me, but mad when I left again. No telling what Big Boy would do while I was gone. That dog throws temper tantrums like a five-year-old child.

  Jane was standing at the top of the steep stairway up to her garage apartment. Usually, she would have started down when I turned into the drive. Born blind, Jane recognizes the sounds of her friends’ cars, but since I was driving the funeral coach, she wasn’t sure it was me until I called out to her.

  “Hey, Jane, come on down,” I yelled.

  “Oh, that is you, Callie. I wasn’t sure since you’re not driving the Mustang,” Jane said as she walked toward me. I got out, stepped around, and opened the door for her. As usual, Jane wore vintage sixties clothing—a crinkly lavender dress with a low neckline. She’d inherited her mother’s hippie wardrobe after her mom’s death following our senior year of high school. Somehow, the clothes appeared current on her with her long, straight red hair hanging down to her waist. She wore a wide-brimmed hat with a clutch of purple violets at the band and new sunglasses with deep lavender lenses.

  When I was back in the driver’s seat and we were both buckled in, Jane asked, “Are we in the hearse?”

  I didn’t even bother to correct her that we call it a funeral coach. Just mumbled an affirmative, “Uh-huh.”

  “Is Dr. Melvin in the back?” she asked as I pulled onto the highway.

  “Yes,” I said.

  “I don’t smell anything.”

  “You shouldn’t. He’s fresh, clean, and enclosed.”

  “What kind of casket is he in?” Jane shows interest in my work, but the truth is that my job is as repugnant to Jane as hers is to me. She calls herself a “conversationalist,” but to call a spade a flipping shovel, Jane is a telephone sex operator. She works nights on a 900 line as Roxanne. I don’t criticize this because it pays well and keeps her self-sufficient without relying on anyone for transportation.

  Buh-leeve me, I know who would be driving her to and from work if she had to go out to a job. Being Roxanne at night works because Jane was always a late-night person anyway and frequently talks until dawn.

  “He’s not in a casket,” I said.

  Jane’s nose crumpled into a disgusted wrinkle. “He’s just lying back there?”

  “No, he’s in a zippered body bag. You can’t see him.”

  Jane howled with laughter. “I couldn’t see him anyway.”

  When Jane and I first became friends, I was very self-conscious about using words related to sight. After a while, I realized that it didn’t matter to her. Her standard good-bye is, “See ya later.”

  “Did you say Dr. Melvin drowned?” Jane asked.

  “We don’t know for sure. His wife found him dead in their new hot tub. The coroner wants an autopsy to see if he drowned or died from a heart attack or stroke.” I paused. “Betcha didn’t know he has a young new wife. She’s got red hair like you.”

  “I didn’t know she has red hair, but I knew he married a young woman he met over the Internet after he retired.” Jane just amazes me. She would let me think she stays in her apartment and sleeps except when she talks to me or is on the phone as Roxanne, but she’s always a day ahead of me on gossip.

  “The Internet?” I asked.

  “Yep, he met her in a chat room and decided she’s the perfect woman for him regardless of the almost fifty years between them. According to what I heard, she grew up in a poor rural part of Georgia and has never had much. When she came to visit, she thought the Dawkins house was like a mansion.”

  “Did you know Dr. Melvin liked to bake?” I said.

  “He doesn’t, guess I should say didn’t, really like to bake. He wanted to win the Southern Belle Flour Baking Contest. The grand prize is half a million dollars. I’ve thought about sending in one of my recipes.”

  “You should. You’re a great cook!” My mind shifted back to Dr. Melvin. “So he needed money?” I asked.

  “I think he was comfortable, but he wanted to be able to do more for his bride.”

  “Do you think she might have drowned him?”

  “Oh, Callie, why do you always think that way? Stick to reading your mysteries. His new wife probably killed him, but I doubt she drowned him.” Jane giggled. She didn’t have to say what she was thinking. We’ve been friends so long that a lot of the time we know each other’s thoughts. To be polite about it, she was insinuating that Roselle “loved” him to death.

  After riding silently for about fifteen minutes, Jane asked, “Can we have breakfast on the way? I didn’t have supper, and I’m starving.”

  “I don’t think it’s a good idea to eat before we deliver Dr. Melvin to MUSC.”

  “To what?”

  “The Medical University of South Carolina, where the autopsies for Jade County are performed.”

  “O
h, I should have remembered that, but why can’t we eat first?”

  “We need to get Dr. Melvin into refrigeration as soon as possible because he hasn’t been embalmed.” Besides, I thought, it seems disrespectful to leave Dr. Melvin in the parking lot while we eat. What if someone stole him out of the funeral coach?

  Jane didn’t answer. She was pouting. I could tell because she sat up straight and pressed her lips together. Her silence was probably because she hates to think about body preparation and the other aspects of the mortuary business just as much as I hate to think of her sitting up all night talking dirty to old men, though she swears not all her talk is obscene and not all of her clients are old. Jane considers her job a public service.

  When we pulled up at the MUSC morgue receiving area, Jane sat quietly while I got out and signed papers for the attendant, who transferred Dr. Melvin’s bag to a gurney and rolled him inside after signing my receipt for body delivery.

  “Where do you want to eat?” I asked as I wheeled out of the parking lot.

  “Are we anywhere near a Cracker Barrel? I’m starving. I want Uncle Herschel’s breakfast with grits and biscuits and gravy as well as country fried steak and eggs.”

  I’d planned to go through a take-out window at Bojangles’, but I’d asked Jane’s preference, and we weren’t that far away from where she wanted to go, so that’s where we went. When we got out, I was immediately reminded of work. We have rocking chairs on the wraparound veranda at the mortuary. Ever since a mourner said that the rocking chairs at Middleton’s made her think of the rockers on the porch at the Cracker Barrel, the restaurant brings the funeral home to my mind.

  All the tables were full, so I put my name on the waiting list.

  “Jane, do you want to sit in the chairs out front?” I asked.

  “No, let’s check out the gift shop.” Looking through any store with Jane means telling her what I see and letting her examine through touch whatever interests her.

  June. Not even summertime yet. Though the South Carolina coast feels like summer as early as April, sometimes even the end of March, I always remember that summertime sometimes starts officially on June twenty-first because my birthday is the next day.

  The Mother’s Day items were reduced forty percent. Not that Jane and I were interested. My mother died the day I was born. Jane’s passed away when she was eighteen. The Father’s Day special gifts were reduced twenty-five percent. I didn’t mention those to Jane either. I’d already given Daddy a nice gift on Father’s Day, and Jane’s dad abandoned his family right after he learned his baby girl was completely blind.

  “What’s new to look at?” Jane said.

  “There’s a lot of red, white, and blue for the Fourth of July,” I said, “but there’s also a lot of Halloween stuff.”

  “Oh, phooey,” Jane joked, “I was hoping to see Christmas trees.” I didn’t tell her that a young lady was setting up a display of ornaments right beside a turkey-shaped cookie jar.

  Jane can’t see a thing, not even a shadow. She was born with no optic nerves. Since, according to shows on television, the medical profession now transplants corneas, hearts, kidneys, livers, and lungs as well as grafting toes onto hands to replace fingers, I sometimes wonder if Jane could have optic nerve transplants and be able to see. Until then, I’ll just have to keep describing what she’s touching for her to “see” it.

  Chapter Three

  “Is that Jane Baker? Jane?” called a tiny older lady looking our way.

  The woman was hunched over one of those walkers with tennis balls on the back legs. She zeroed in on us, pushed through the crowd, and reached out to put her hand on Jane’s arm. The woman’s bright floral, matching skirt, blouse, and hat contrasted with her short, curly white hair. Her flip-flop shoes with bright cloth flowers attached didn’t quite seem appropriate with the walker she used.

  Jane doesn’t like to be touched by strangers, but she knew the speaker because she wrapped her arms around the lady in an embrace.

  “Mrs. White, you’re back! How was your trip?”

  “Wonderful, just wonderful!” the woman replied.

  “Callie,” Jane said, “you remember my landlady, Pearl White, don’t you?”

  How could I forget her? Names fascinate me because mine is so strange. I was named Calamine Lotion Parrish by my daddy, who happened to be drunk, very drunk, when my mother died giving birth to me. Daddy couldn’t think of anything feminine except the color pink. Thank goodness he thought of lotion instead of Pepto-Bismol. Most folks call me Callie now, but my dad still calls me Calamine, and I get a kick out of other strange names.

  What struck me as funny when I first met Pearl White was that her maiden name was Pearl Gray. I thought she could be a walking commercial for teeth-whitening ads. Especially since when Pearl gave up her own dental battle and got false teeth, she talked her dentist into giving her an unnaturally bright white.

  “Of course,” I replied and noticed the man standing right behind her. His hair was gray only at his temples, but his mustache was salt and pepper. He had cool blue eyes and a smile that said, “Hello, where have you been all my life?” I couldn’t call him a young man, because he looked about fifty, but if he was Mrs. White’s escort, he qualified as a boy toy in comparison to Jane’s landlady, who was at least seventy.

  “I’m really glad to run into you, Jane. I was planning to go by the apartment today to talk to you,” Pearl said.

  “Go by? Are you taking another trip?”

  “Not exactly,” Pearl said and then spoke over her shoulder to the man. “Georgie, would you change our request to a table for four? Jane and Callie can join us, and I’ll tell them my exciting news.”

  The man squeezed through the crowd and headed away from us toward the hostess area. I noticed that he moved with that confident, long stride that smooth, self-assured men use. His khakis looked like they’d been tailored to fit, and the polo shirt he wore was one of the top name brands.

  “I can’t wait until we’re seated to tell you.” Pearl laughed and gave a silly little shimmy. “George and I are going to be married. I’ll be moving to Orlando with him.”

  Jane opened her mouth, but before a word escaped, “Carter. Table for four for Carter” sounded over the speaker.

  “Come on, that’s us.” Pearl led Jane through the crowd, spreading the sea of people with her walker. I followed. We caught up with George and were seated together at a big round table. The restaurant was crowded and the table would have sat eight. I wondered if George had rubbed a little green across a palm at the hostess desk, but I must confess, I’ve never seen or heard of that happening at a Cracker Barrel.

  The landlady’s expression beamed with unabated joy. “Georgie, this is Jane Baker, my tenant in the garage apartment, and her friend, Callie Parrish. Ladies, this is George Carter, my fiancé.”

  “You’re getting married? How wonderful! Are you going to Orlando for your honeymoon? When will you be moving back to St. Mary?” I promise, I promise I didn’t mean to, but I babbled.

  “We won’t be,” George said as he patted the older woman’s veined and wrinkled hand. We’ll be living in Florida at my place. Pearl is selling her South Carolina property.”

  “And that’s what I needed to tell you, Jane. I’m afraid I have to give you thirty days’ notice to move unless you want to buy the house and apartment.”

  Jane’s eyes don’t demonstrate emotion, but her face does. Fear and dismay replaced her happy expression. “Thirty days? But what will I do? You worked for the Commission for the Blind, Pearl, and you know how hard it will be for me to find another place. I’ve been in the apartment for years. It’ll take more than thirty days to pack everything.”

  “Ridiculous! You’re one of the most independent visually handicapped people I know.” Pearl paused. “And I’ll help you pack.”

  We ordered and consumed breakfast foods, but Jane ate very little. Pearl described her love for Georgie and how the engagement might seem quick,
but they’d been communicating hours at a time on the Internet since meeting in a chat room for older singles.

  Having been interested in a younger man earlier in the spring, one I hadn’t heard from since he left St. Mary promising to be in touch, I felt a pang of identification with Pearl. I’d never thought of her as lonely, but she must have been. The change from drab brown and gray clothing to the brightly garbed peacock sitting with us was obviously a result of finding love.

  Picking at my breakfast cheese potato casserole and scrambled eggs, my mind wandered to this Internet phenomenon as Pearl and Jane talked. I caught occasional bits of their conversation. Pearl continued her joyful account of love at first sight, or was it first chat? Jane bemoaned the thought of moving.

  Both Dr. Melvin and Pearl had found their soul mates online. I wondered if I could find time to enter a dating profile in one of the chat rooms while at work. I’d been planning to buy a computer for my home, but other bills kept pushing that goal away. No one stared over my shoulder when I entered obituaries on the mortuary computer. I could check out a singles website there.

  Suddenly, my mind jumped back to Jane and her problem.

  “Next door!” I blurted.

  “What?” asked Jane and Pearl in unison.

  “You know I’m living in a duplex,” I said, “but no one lives next door. Jane, why don’t you rent the other side of my building?”

  “Is it just like yours?” Jane asked. She dipped her biscuit into white gravy.

  “It’s exactly like mine. It would be like living together, but still having our own privacy.” The server topped off everyone’s coffee. I added cream and two sugars to mine. I used to take three or four, but I’m trying to cut back on processed sugar.

  “And you wouldn’t be moving my things around like you did when you lived with me after your divorce.”

  “That’s right. No more garlic on your cinnamon toast, but we’d be close enough to visit anytime.”