Where Death Delights by Bernard Knight Page A

Doctor, welcome!’ greeted Christie effusively, holding out his hand. ‘Nice to have a pathologist up here again, since Doctor Saunders retired. All our cases have had to go down to Newport, costs a lot more in undertaker’s fees.’
    He led the way into the building, which consisted of two dismal rooms. The one just inside the doors held the body store, an eight-foot high metal cabinet which, from the three labels stuck on its door, was a triple-tier refrigerator of doubtful antiquity. The rest of the space contained a battered desk to hold the mortuary register and several trolleys for moving coffins and bodies.
    â€˜The “pee emm” room is through here, sir,’ said Christie, in a booming voice that suggested that he had been at least a warrant officer during the war. He pushed open another pair of doors into the other half of the building. Richard was half expecting to see a large slab of slate as the autopsy table, as he had once seen in Bridgend, but was relieved to find a porcelain version on a central pillar. There was very little else in there, just a large white sink with one cold-water tap, a sloping draining board and a gas water heater above it. A small table stood against one wall, with a glass cupboard above it containing bottles of formalin and disinfectants.
    â€˜Doctor Saunders always did his organ-cutting on this,’ explained John Christie, indicating a contraption standing on the autopsy table. It looked like the tray that invalids take their meals on in bed, a large board with four legs to stand across the lower half of the corpse.
    Pryor looked around the rest of the chamber which hopefully was to be his regular place of work. The usual paraphernalia of a morgue was there, mops and buckets standing in a corner, a butcher’s scales hanging over the draining board and several pairs of grubby Wellington boots under the table. A few red rubber aprons with chains around the neck and waist, hung from hooks on the wall.
    â€˜There’s no mortuary attendant, then?’ he asked tentatively.
    The officer shook his head. ‘Not enough work to warrant the expense, says the council. We’ve got one down in Chepstow, though. Here one of the chaps in the depot sees bodies in and out for the undertakers.’
    â€˜So I have to do all the donkey work myself?’ hazarded Richard. Maybe this wasn’t going to be such a windfall after all, he thought.
    The policeman’s rugged face cracked into a grin.
    â€˜Don’t worry, Doctor, I’ll give you a hand. I’ll sew up and clean down – and take off the skull when you need it.’
    He was as good as his word, too. While the pathologist put on boots and a rubber apron, then took his instruments from his black bag, the coroner’s officer had trundled a body in from the fridge, sliding it off the trolley on to the table and placing a wooden block under the head. He wore no apron and his green trilby stayed firmly on his head throughout the whole proceedings.
    Before Pryor began his examination, Christie produced some papers from his breast pocket and laid them on the table.
    â€˜This first gent is a sudden death, sir. Collapsed in the pub, probably just heard that the price of beer had gone up,’ he added heartily. ‘Seventy-one years old, history of chest pains, but hasn’t seen a doctor for a month, so had to be reported to us.’
    â€˜What’s the other one?’ asked Pryor.
    â€˜Probably an overdose, there’ll be an inquest on her. Lady of sixty-five, lives alone. History of depression, not seen for three days. Found dead in bed, empty bottle of Seconal on the floor, but we don’t know how many were left in it. I’m chasing the prescription date today.’
    â€˜Have to have an analysis on that one,’ said Richard. An extra fee and some work for Sian in the laboratory, he thought.
    Both autopsies went off smoothly and he took his samples for