The Nitrogen Murder by Camille Minichino

story-building and had learned to follow the plotline in spite of the extraneous threads.
    “They’re saying Sandy’s in the wrong suit.” Rose’s voice registered extreme stress and incredulity “Sandy’s wife says he’d never wear a yellow shirt and the jacket is way too small and not his.”
    “The body’s in the wrong clothes? How did that happen?”
    I’d made a clothing run for the Galiganis more than once, picking up an outfit from a dry cleaners or from the family of the deceased. I’d mark the bag or valise carefully before stepping out of my car with it and, holding my nose against the odors of death, would deliver it to the Galigani prep room.
    In fact, I knew more than the ordinary layperson about the process of prepping a client for presentation in a casket. Rose and Frank and I had been friends from grade school, never losing touch, even when I moved to California after college and didn’t return home, as Rose called it, for thirty years. Frank had been in the funeral service business forever, starting as an informal security guard for a Boston mortuary when he was a chemistry major at Boston College.
    “I wish you and Matt were here to do a little investigating, Gloria.” No matter that I wasn’t a real detective, private or public, and that the rest of Matt’s Revere Police Department was still on duty in her city.
    I didn’t bother to suggest that two clothing deliveries might
have been switched accidentally by a Galigani employee. Frank and Rose, and their son Robert, ran a very tight ship.
    “It wouldn’t be the first time a grieving family got a little confused,” I offered. “Or tried to take their anger out on the mortuary staff.”
    Frank and Robert had told me stories of spouses and parents who turned their anger on the funeral directors, as if the person arranging for the burial of their loved one was responsible for his death. It usually happened, I learned, when the deceased met an especially tragic end or was “too young to die,” as we say. As if anyone were old enough to die.
    “Want to know what I really think?” Rose asked, bringing me to the problem at hand. “I have an idea how it happened, but I can’t prove it. I think it was Bodner and Polk.”
    “The mortuary chain in Boston?”
    “Not just in Boston anymore. They’re branching out, literally, to take over all the independents they can. I told you they made an offer to O’Neal’s last month. They’re working their way to Revere.”
    “How could they get into your prep room? Also, it’s hard to imagine a big business like that stooping to a childish prank like switching clothing.”
    “They’ll do anything, Gloria. Ralphie over at O’Neal’s told me they had a similar screw-up a couple of weeks ago, right after they refused to sell.” She took a breath. I knew the extent of Rose’s agitation when she didn’t bother to apologize for using an expression that her grandson and everyone else in Revere might use, but not her. “Screw-up” was not in Rose’s normal working vocabulary. “O’Neal’s van went to the wrong hospital for the Myers girl’s removal, and now this? All of a sudden we’re all getting sloppy? I don’t think so.”
    I knew Rose’s worries were real, and well founded. Like most other small businesses, family mortuaries were fast becoming a thing of the past. Chains were able to get bigger discounts on
caskets, flower stands, votive lights, and all the fragrant chemicals that were necessary for business. Thus, they could offer better prices to clients. However, I decided to give Rose the upside of the issue.
    “Cost isn’t everything, Rose. Galigani’s has a reputation for the kind of attention people want in a time of trial. The personal touch, run by a family, using local businesses for supporting services like florists and printers and—”
    Rose’s laughter came over the lines, as clear as if we’d been eating biscotti on her front porch. “You sound like our