opened onto one of the underground levels of an adjacent multistory parking garage. It was the same garage in which she’d parked her 560 SL just a short while ago, though she’d left it a few levels above this one.
The gray concrete floor, the blank walls, and the thick pillars holding up the gray concrete ceiling made the subterranean garage seem like an immense, starkly modernistic, Western version of a pharaoh’s tomb. The sodium-vapor ceiling lights, widely spaced, provided a jaundice-yellow illumination that Rachael found fitting for a place that served as an antechamber to the hall of the dead.
The area around the morgue entrance was a no-parking zone. But a score of cars were scattered farther out in the vast room, half in the crepuscular bile-yellow light and half in purple-black shadows that had the velvet texture of a casket lining.
Looking at the cars, she had the extraordinary feeling that something was hiding among them, watching.
Watching her in particular.
Benny saw her shiver, and he put his arm around her shoulders.
Everett Kordell closed the heavy morgue door, then tried to open it, but the bar handle could not be depressed. “You see? It locks automatically. Ambulances, morgue wagons, and hearses drive down that ramp from the street and stop here. The only way to get in is to push this button.” He pushed a white button in the wall beside the door. “And speak into this intercom.” He brought his mouth close to a wire speaker set flush in the concrete. “Walt? This is Dr. Kordell at the outer door. Will you buzz us back in, please?”
Walt’s voice came from the speaker. “Right away, sir.”
A buzzer sounded, and Kordell was able to open the door again.
“I assume the attendant doesn’t just open for anyone who asks to be let in,” Benny said.
“Of course not,” Kordell said, standing in the open doorway. “If he’s sure he recognizes the voice and if he knows the person, he buzzes him through. If he doesn’t recognize the voice, or if it’s someone new from a private mortuary, or if there’s any reason to be suspicious, the attendant walks through the corridor that we just walked, all the way from the front desk, and he inspects whoever’s seeking admittance.”
Rachael had lost all interest in these details and was concerned only about the gloom-mantled garage around them, which provided a hundred excellent hiding places.
Benny said, “At that point the attendant, not expecting violence, could be overpowered, and the intruder could force his way inside.”
“Possibly,” Kordell said, his thin face drawing into a sharp scowl. “But that’s never happened.”
“The attendants on duty today swear that they logged in everyone who came and went—and allowed only authorized personnel to enter?”
“They swear,” Kordell said.
“And you trust them all?”
“Implicitly. Everyone who works here is aware that the bodies in our custody are the remains of other people’s loved ones, and we know we have a solemn—even sacred—responsibility to protect those remains while we’re in charge of them. I think that’s evident in the security arrangements I’ve just shown you.”
“Then,” Benny said, “someone either had to pick the lock—”
“It’s virtually unpickable.”
“Or someone slipped into the morgue while the outer door was open for legitimate visitors, hid out, waited until he was the only living person inside, then spirited Dr. Leben’s body away.”
“Evidently yes. But it’s so unlikely that—”
Rachael said, “Could we go back inside, please?”
“Certainly,” Kordell said at once, eager to please. He stepped out of her way.
She returned to the morgue corridor, where the cold air carried a faint foul smell beneath the heavy scent of pine disinfectant.
5
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS
In the holding room where the cadavers awaited autopsy, the air was even colder than in the morgue’s corridor. Glimmering strangely in all metal surfaces,
The gray concrete floor, the blank walls, and the thick pillars holding up the gray concrete ceiling made the subterranean garage seem like an immense, starkly modernistic, Western version of a pharaoh’s tomb. The sodium-vapor ceiling lights, widely spaced, provided a jaundice-yellow illumination that Rachael found fitting for a place that served as an antechamber to the hall of the dead.
The area around the morgue entrance was a no-parking zone. But a score of cars were scattered farther out in the vast room, half in the crepuscular bile-yellow light and half in purple-black shadows that had the velvet texture of a casket lining.
Looking at the cars, she had the extraordinary feeling that something was hiding among them, watching.
Watching her in particular.
Benny saw her shiver, and he put his arm around her shoulders.
Everett Kordell closed the heavy morgue door, then tried to open it, but the bar handle could not be depressed. “You see? It locks automatically. Ambulances, morgue wagons, and hearses drive down that ramp from the street and stop here. The only way to get in is to push this button.” He pushed a white button in the wall beside the door. “And speak into this intercom.” He brought his mouth close to a wire speaker set flush in the concrete. “Walt? This is Dr. Kordell at the outer door. Will you buzz us back in, please?”
Walt’s voice came from the speaker. “Right away, sir.”
A buzzer sounded, and Kordell was able to open the door again.
“I assume the attendant doesn’t just open for anyone who asks to be let in,” Benny said.
“Of course not,” Kordell said, standing in the open doorway. “If he’s sure he recognizes the voice and if he knows the person, he buzzes him through. If he doesn’t recognize the voice, or if it’s someone new from a private mortuary, or if there’s any reason to be suspicious, the attendant walks through the corridor that we just walked, all the way from the front desk, and he inspects whoever’s seeking admittance.”
Rachael had lost all interest in these details and was concerned only about the gloom-mantled garage around them, which provided a hundred excellent hiding places.
Benny said, “At that point the attendant, not expecting violence, could be overpowered, and the intruder could force his way inside.”
“Possibly,” Kordell said, his thin face drawing into a sharp scowl. “But that’s never happened.”
“The attendants on duty today swear that they logged in everyone who came and went—and allowed only authorized personnel to enter?”
“They swear,” Kordell said.
“And you trust them all?”
“Implicitly. Everyone who works here is aware that the bodies in our custody are the remains of other people’s loved ones, and we know we have a solemn—even sacred—responsibility to protect those remains while we’re in charge of them. I think that’s evident in the security arrangements I’ve just shown you.”
“Then,” Benny said, “someone either had to pick the lock—”
“It’s virtually unpickable.”
“Or someone slipped into the morgue while the outer door was open for legitimate visitors, hid out, waited until he was the only living person inside, then spirited Dr. Leben’s body away.”
“Evidently yes. But it’s so unlikely that—”
Rachael said, “Could we go back inside, please?”
“Certainly,” Kordell said at once, eager to please. He stepped out of her way.
She returned to the morgue corridor, where the cold air carried a faint foul smell beneath the heavy scent of pine disinfectant.
5
UNANSWERED QUESTIONS
In the holding room where the cadavers awaited autopsy, the air was even colder than in the morgue’s corridor. Glimmering strangely in all metal surfaces,
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