Down Among The Dead Men Part 2

At this point, Ed came back into the PM room and sniffed the air. 'Eau de peritonitis, I think,' he said cheerily. 'Hang on.' Having put on an ap.r.o.n, a cap, a mask, plastic sleeves and gloves, he came to stand beside me. 'Forget about removing the intestines first. Just take it all out in one.' Normally, we tie off and remove the intestines before taking out the rest of the organs, but delving around in that horrible mess would have been vile and probably done more damage than good.

Even so, it wasn't easy, what with having to reach down so far into the body that I was almost falling in, and with having to avoid splas.h.i.+ng. Eventually I got everything out of Mr Chandler and Ed helped me get it all across to the dissection bench. While he set to work, I scooped out the rest of the pus from the abdomen, trying hard not to fill my own mask with vomit, and then set about taking out the brain. Every so often Ed swore loudly (which I tried not to laugh at) as the intestines, made fragile by the inflammation, tore and spilled contents over the dissection table. Usually he could take all the organs out in ten minutes but this time it took him closer to thirty. As I was weighing the organs, he said suddenly, 'Ah!' and he beckoned me over, waving the brain knife in my direction.

'There,' he said, pointing with the scalpel at the underside of the liver. I couldn't see anything for a moment, then made out some st.i.tching that was embedded in pus. 'See how loose that is?' he asked. As he spoke, he gently pulled at one of the st.i.tches with forceps and it came away easily. 'Bile's leaked out into the abdomen from that and, hey presto, this is what happens.'

I asked, 'Does it happen often?'

Ed shook his head. 'No, not often, thank G.o.d.'

'Should it have happened?'

He hesitated, then said neutrally, 'That's for the Coroner to decide.'

TEN.

Easter was here before we knew it, and Mum wanted us all to do our normal bank holiday stuff. This consisted of a night in with a takeaway on the Sat.u.r.day at their house, then up early on the Sunday, and ready to catch the bus into town at eleven thirty for a pub crawl, in our Sunday best, with bank holiday Monday to recover. This was the whole family Mum and Dad, Michael and his girlfriend Sarah, myself and Luke. These Sundays nearly always turned into a long day, so my first task was usually to find a sitter for Harvey and Oscar; being German shepherd crosses, they can be a bit of a handful. I had happened to be having lunch with Maddie mid-week, on one of the rare occasions when we both managed to escape the pathology building at the same time. I was telling Maddie about the dogs needing a sitter, and she jumped at the chance. 'I'm not going home, as Mum's going away; anyway, I love your house, and it'd be nice to cosy up with the dogs. Better than being in the flat on my own all weekend.'

Maddie almost glowed as she was saying this. Luke and I really appreciate such offers, and take advantage of them when they come, which is all too rarely. We arranged that Maddie would arrive on Good Friday afternoon and stay over till bank holiday Monday.

On Thursday evening, Luke and I went out and bought Maddie all the goodies we could think off, including a supply of her favourite cider (not forgetting the blackcurrant to go with it), a bottle of vodka with a few cartons of orange juice, and treats and food for the dogs.

On Friday morning, Luke and I woke early, got Harvey and Oscar into the back of the wagon and drove them out to the local hills surrounding Gloucesters.h.i.+re. Luckily for us, the rain stayed away, and it was perfect dog-walking weather. It was a bit cold for us humans, but perfect for canines; for an hour and a half they ran about like animals possessed, so were pleasantly sleepy when Maddie arrived at one o'clock. Luke and I were then shoved out the door by Maddie at about two o'clock after I'd spent sixty minutes trying to organize her. 'Look at them both,' Maddie said, pointing at Harvey and Oscar fast asleep on the sofa. 'How difficult can it be to look after two sleeping angels?' she asked, followed by a wink.

We arrived at Mum and Dad's shortly after, kitted out with our overnight bags ready for our three-night stay. 'Your brother's not staying over, so you two can have the big room,' Mum informed us as we came through the back door.

'Good afternoon, Mrs Williams,' Luke replied in joking manner as he greeted Mum with a kiss on the cheek.

Luke and my parents had got on like a house on fire right from the off. Mum was proud of the way he looked out for me, and also admired him for putting up with me. I think I have become less hectic with age, but I'm sure she would disagree. In my head, I am now reasonably sensible and not nearly so difficult I still cringe when Mum and Dad remind me of some of things I did and said when I was a teenager but sometimes Mum looks at me and I see in her eye the same look as she used to give me. It helps that Dad and Luke have a lot in common and, although this is mainly sport, they also get on well as people. Not only that but, as far as Dad is concerned, if Luke makes me happy, then he is happy.

'You've arrived just at the right time,' Dad said. As I looked around to see what was waiting for our perfect timing, I caught Dad grinning at Luke. 'The football's just kicked off on the TV.' With this unspoken decision made by the males of my family to sit and watch the whole ninety minutes, Mum and I decided to do a bit of internet shopping and bored the backsides off Dad and Luke as to how much cheaper things are online; I even managed to get Luke to part with his credit card, which was a victory indeed.

As the evening approached on Good Friday, the mood in the Williams household became very mellow and very, very relaxed. Mum cooked a huge pot of chilli served with home-made bread and, as Dad said, 'Real b.u.t.ter, not that spreading rubbish.'

Sat.u.r.day morning consisted of a hugely long lie-in and the usual Scottish fry-up after twelve o'clock, then more football for the men, and the town centre for Mum and me so that we could do some real shopping (again supported by Luke's credit card). You may think this is an unnecessary thing for me to do spend my well-paid boyfriend's salary but, for all its glamour, confidentiality, excitement and strangeness, an APT is pretty poorly paid. I have to cover the expenses of living Luke and I both have our own homes so my low salary leaves little for luxuries.

Sat.u.r.day evening was fairly quiet as well, and I could not help calling Maddie to see how she was doing with the dogs, and, of course, they were all fine.

'I don't know why you fuss so much about them,' Luke told me. But he knew deep down, as much as I did, that every now and then they could become a little excitable and start to chase each other around the house, up and down the stairs, through the kitchen, out the garden, back in the house, finis.h.i.+ng by throwing themselves against the front door, with a quick rest ready for the next lap.

Not long after this, the Indian meal that we had ordered arrived and we all sat down and ate to the point of bursting before collapsing on the sofa and watching TV for the remainder of the night.

Sunday arrived and the inevitable fight began over the bathroom. We all needed to be ready to go out the door at eleven thirty that morning, and no one wanted to be last one in the shower and therefore the last one that everyone was telling to get a move on. Anyway, with a bit of planning and bickering, we all managed to be ready to go out on time. We met Michael and Sarah in town and, as usual, Mum and Dad wanted to start the day off at the Social Club. Gramp would probably be in there with his friends and this was always good for some giggles. But the downside of the Social Club was that Sarah was going to be the youngest in there; after her in age terms would come my brother, then me and Luke, and then the age gap would jump twenty-five years to my parents; following that, the age range extended into the far distance.

There was compensation, though. It wasn't exactly rockin', but it was at least cheap and cheerful, as Mum has always said. As we walked into the bar, which, incidentally, women are are allowed into, but only on best behaviour, we saw that the place was full of retired people, elderly ladies dressed up in their best clothing with full make-up. All of them appeared to be wearing the same bright blue eye shadow and deep red lipstick. Gramp was sitting with his friends and we were encouraged to join them. We stayed for a couple of hours in the Social Club, which turned out to be very sociable indeed, and good fun. We left Gramp and his friends to continue the afternoon in the club, which I was sure they would do in the accustomed manner, and the six of us then headed over the road to a proper pub. Dad knows most of the landlords around town and we are always warmly welcomed by them. Since my parents gave up the pub trade, they do not see a lot of their old social circle, so in a way, days like these are very much a chance to catch up with their old friends and acquaintances. allowed into, but only on best behaviour, we saw that the place was full of retired people, elderly ladies dressed up in their best clothing with full make-up. All of them appeared to be wearing the same bright blue eye shadow and deep red lipstick. Gramp was sitting with his friends and we were encouraged to join them. We stayed for a couple of hours in the Social Club, which turned out to be very sociable indeed, and good fun. We left Gramp and his friends to continue the afternoon in the club, which I was sure they would do in the accustomed manner, and the six of us then headed over the road to a proper pub. Dad knows most of the landlords around town and we are always warmly welcomed by them. Since my parents gave up the pub trade, they do not see a lot of their old social circle, so in a way, days like these are very much a chance to catch up with their old friends and acquaintances.

ELEVEN.

Clive had put me straight about mortuary security very early on. 'There is nothing, Mich.e.l.le, nothing at all, more important than the security of this place.' Graham nodded in silent agreement. 'You never let anyone in unless you know who they are and why they want to be here, understand?' Clive, laid back about so many things, was clearly telling me that on this subject he wanted me to listen and mark his words. He continued, 'There's a lot of funny people out there, and some of them think that the best way to spend a day out is drooling over dead people.'

I had known that people like that existed, but I didn't think that it would be a problem in a small mortuary in a rural county. My disbelief must have shown on my face because Graham added, 'You'd be surprised, Mich.e.l.le. We get all sorts around here. A few years ago, one of the porters was caught in the mortuary when he had no business being here. n.o.body could prove anything, but we all knew what he'd been up to, didn't we, boss?'

Clive nodded. 'Dirty b.u.g.g.e.r.'

'What happened to him?'

Clive said, matter of factly, 'The head porter had a chat with him. He got a job as a milkman shortly after, I believe.'

'And you have to be careful when it comes to viewings, too,' said Graham.

'What do you mean?'

Clive explained. 'We've had occasions when the "next of kin" weren't quite as closely related as they claimed. In fact, we've had one occasion when he wasn't related at all.'

'You're joking!'

Clive shook his head. 'Luckily, I didn't leave him alone, although he was b.l.o.o.d.y keen that I should. Turned out he wasn't the brother of the deceased lady but the bloke who had lived over the road from her. Always fancied her, apparently.'

All this was an aspect of the job that I hadn't really thought about before. It had seemed obvious that you have to keep a mortuary locked, but I hadn't realized that you had to regard the place as a high security vault.

Clive said, 'You've got to look on viewings as the weak point in our security; it's when we have to allow outsiders in and so when we're vulnerable.'

'We get all sorts in,' chuckled Graham, shaking his head. 'All sorts.'

Clive asked him, 'Do you remember that bloke who wanted to bring his cat in to pay his last respects?' They both laughed.

Graham added, 'And that old woman who wouldn't leave Dr Romney alone. Remember her?'

Clive became excited. 'Yes!' He turned to me. 'd.i.c.k Romney used to work here as a pathologist about ten years ago. Poor bloke. This widow kept after him for ages. It got so he was afraid to answer the telephone.'

Graham began to laugh so much that he caught his breath and went red in the face, stamping his foot and coughing up phlegm. I asked, 'Why? What had happened?'

'She and her husband had been a very devoted couple who'd lived together for years and years, and she'd gone a bit doolally, I suppose. Finally he died and she came in to view him. I had the body laid out really nicely so that he looked as if he'd just gone to sleep, and she came in, took one look at him, turned to me and said, "That's not my husband. That's an actor."'

'What did you do?'

'I argued, but it was no use. She knew that it wasn't her hubby, and she wasn't about to listen to me. She insisted that we had subst.i.tuted an actor who looked exactly like her husband. Didn't seem to think it odd that we happened to have had a dead actor identical to her hubby on hand, just when required.'

Graham added, 'She got really worked up, too.'

Clive nodded. 'Took me forty minutes to calm her down and get rid of her, but she didn't leave it there. A week later, d.i.c.k got a letter. It wasn't in green ink, but it could have been. She insisted that, as head of department, he was the one who had subst.i.tuted an actor for her husband, and she demanded to know what he had done with him.'

'What did he do?'

'He put the letter in his desk drawer and tried to forget about it.'

Graham laughed again. 'He did the same with the next one . . . and the next.'

Clive joined in with the laughter. 'He was still getting them ten years later when he retired.'

TWELVE.

I had been working at the mortuary for a couple of months when I arrived in good time one Monday morning, feeling like an old hand now and thinking I knew what to expect; it had already become evident to me that Clive had a stable morning routine that rarely altered. I rang the doorbell and he greeted me with a smile. I could hear the usual Radio 2 blasting out in the background from the PM room and walked into the office just as the kettle had clicked off. Clive had all the cups ready for the hot drinks, but I couldn't help noticing that the smell was definitely not the usual disinfectant smell. This was different. This was rotten rotten; it reminded me vaguely of how Mr Patterson had smelt by the time he left us, only much worse. Clive didn't mention it, so neither did I, but I did begin to question if he could actually smell it; I wondered whether, after so many years in the business, he had become used to stenches like that, or even lost the ability to detect them altogether.

Graham arrived and instantly said with a grimace, 'How long has that been hanging around?'

So, I wasn't going nuts, and there really was a foul smell in the air. Clive said that he didn't know because he had not yet had the pleasure of opening the fridge. Graham turned around and went straight to the body store mumbling something about getting it over and done with and out the way. I followed him.

Four trays on the left-hand end of the twenty-eight-fridge bay were larger than the rest. These were for obese patients, which back then were very few and far between, so they were also used as an isolation bay for decomposed bodies. Because most of the time they were empty, we didn't have to open the door very often, so that the smell wasn't able to leak out and contaminate the whole department.

When Graham opened the fridge, the smell hit me like a ton of bricks, and then proceeded to do over and above its duty by further smacking into the back of my throat with an almost physical punch, and that was while the body was still concealed inside three body bags. I waited in dread-filled expectation for these to be opened, wondering just how it could get any more offensive. Graham approached the tray which the body lay on without thinking twice, and for the first time since I had started, I saw him wearing gloves.

If you can picture the goriest horror film you have ever seen and double it, then you're just beginning to have some idea of what he exposed when the final body bag was unzipped. When he did this, although the stench by now even more potent and eye-watering would normally have wiped everything else from my awareness, what lay in front of me vied for attention and won; it was a slimy, green, moving body. Layers of skin falling away, huge blisters waiting to spill their watery contents, lips and eyelids eaten away so that the teeth and eyeb.a.l.l.s were exposed in the most horrific manner. The reason it was moving was that it was infested with maggots that were having a huge feast on human flesh and were writhing like a Mexican wave at a Premiers.h.i.+p football match. Clive informed me airily that the human body was a perfect environment for maggots. Since I had not really had any idea of what was going to be revealed, I was slightly annoyed that I had been subjected to such a sight and smell without prior warning, while Clive and Graham obviously knew what lay ahead of us.

But I realized then that this was how it was going to be. No deliberate surprises, just things as nature intended them to be its own way of disposing of a body if the person was unlucky enough to die on their own and not be found. This did not put me off the job, but did make my skin crawl and the smell catching the back of my throat made me retch. Since I did not want to run from the mortuary screaming, I dealt with it and told myself again and again that it would get easier with experience.

Clive asked if I was OK and began to tell me how he had seen six-foot males brought to the floor by such sights. He did not elaborate on this, but I was beginning to learn that Clive liked to drip feed you only little bits of information at a time. So we left it at that and I stood back as Graham wheeled the trolley past me to take the body through to the post-mortem room. The body was transferred over to the PM table, left in its bags, door closed behind it and we all returned to the office for the coffee that we were going to have originally, while we waited for the pathologist to arrive. After a while, though, the smell of the rotting body seemed to be getting worse, so I asked Clive if it was all right to go out for some fresh air. Graham came with me and after ten minutes it was time to face it again. When we returned Dr Burberry was having a coffee with Clive in the office and merrily regaling him with the news that the stench of the decomposed body was wafting through the whole lab above us, and the staff were complaining once again. It was far, far worse than Mr Patterson and, at the time, I truly believed I would never have to experience worse.

How wrong I was, though.

Having identified the body from the labels attached, Ed told Graham he could get on with the evisceration, and he went back upstairs to continue reporting surgical pathology specimens from living patients. Graham and I put on our scrubs, after which I stood in the background watching. From what Neville at the Coroner's office had said, it turned out that this person was female and had, in the prime of her life, been a GP. As she got older, the GP side came racing back to the surface and, thinking she knew better than other doctors and could self-diagnose, she refused any help from her own family doctor. Because she had no next of kin, and because she was a private woman with no friends, this had led to isolation and she had subsequently died a lonely death without being discovered for as I was eventually to learn a couple of weeks. Graham then went on to tell me how we were lucky it was late winter if it had been summer, he said with a wink, she would have been a lot worse. My initial reaction was to wonder just how how she could possibly get a lot worse. she could possibly get a lot worse.

As Graham rolled the lady out of the bag, it was evident that she was fully dressed and her legs were wrapped in a blanket. This blanket had stuck to her body due to decomposition and it, too, was gently moving. As Graham pulled it back, another writhing ocean of maggots was exposed, more than I could ever have imagined in one place. I was not able to stomach any more at that point and was excused from the room. I ventured back into the office, where Clive was sitting at the computer on his desk. 'Too much for you?' he asked with that half-smile I was starting to know so well. I guess the fact that I was ashen and holding my breath at intervals to stop myself heaving gave the game away.

I was embarra.s.sed, and thought this would be the end of my career as a Medical Technical Officer, but when, after ten minutes, I returned to the dissection room feeling slightly more in control of my breakfast, I was received by Graham and Dr Burberry with great compa.s.sion. This was not a job for the faint-hearted, and they both knew that. This was a job that, given a small amount of bravery and acceptance, becomes a day-to-day occurrence that you can can get used to. get used to.

I went home that evening, collapsed on the sofa after our evening dog walk, and drifted off to sleep. I was woken suddenly by a dream of the decomposed body getting up off the table and coming out of the PM room to get me, maggots and all. I spent an hour that night after I woke thinking about whether I was going to return to the morgue the next day, as this did freak me out. But, me being me, curiosity got the better of my misgivings and I was back there at seven forty the next morning ready for the kettle clicking to tell me that it had boiled.

THIRTEEN.

The smell had not died down the following day, but as I was let in I had a pleasant surprise: Clive presented me with a bunch of keys. After nine weeks or so I had earned the right to my very own set. Clive sat me down with a coffee and explained the importance of owning a set of keys to the hospital mortuary. This was big business to him, a sort of ceremony, and I finally felt part of the team. I also felt extremely chuffed that I had been given this responsibility so early into my new role, but scared at the same time. What, precisely, did this mean? I was about to be told.

I was aware that the mortuary had an on-call procedure, but that was all I did know; this state of ignorance was about to change, though, as I was going to be informed about everything you need to know to do on-call and be asked to partic.i.p.ate. I had been led to believe that it was usual practice for a technician to be given a three-month trial period to see if they and the managers were happy with their progress; only then, if everyone was satisfied, were they expected to join the on-call rota. In my case, two months or so down the line and I was already being given my own set of keys to the department (only three sets existed in total) and being asked to come on to the rota. I had obviously made progress without realizing it.

Clive went on tell me how he was impressed by my att.i.tude: the fact that I had returned after the retired GP episode apparently proved that I had what it takes. I could not say at the time that I agreed with this, but it meant a chance to prove myself so I was not about to argue. Clive went on to explain what my responsibilities would be when I was on call. After the mortuary was closed in the evening at four thirty, the switchboard would have my mobile number, and they would call me if I was needed. This would involve viewings of the deceased out of working hours if families requested it which, at that time, could be any time of the night. The policy has since changed (thank goodness) to a couple of hours added on to the end of the working day.

He went on to say, and at the time it was news to me but I soon became fully aware of it, that the public perception of a mortuary is that it is manned 24/7. This is understandable as the main hospital is staffed twenty-four hours a day and you would not expect a ward to be left unstaffed. He went on to tell me about how he had often been called out at 'stupid o'clock' in the morning for the family of a deceased relative who arrived drunk and then decided that they had changed their minds when they arrived. When we meet a family, we take them into the relatives' waiting area, and when we are ready, they are invited into the viewing room to spend some time with the deceased. It is all done very smoothly (a.s.suming that the family allow this), but there is a lot to do beforehand. It means getting into the mortuary in plenty of time before the family, making sure we are dressed in suitable clothing to present ourselves to the family, then getting the deceased out of the fridge. It is essential that you ensure that you have the right person for the right family (understandably, they can get very angry if you show them a dead stranger) and then you have the task of making the deceased presentable. Death sometimes has a horrible way of leaving a person looking unpeaceful, as I remembered from my first week with the old gentleman whose mouth was gaping and eyes were staring.

I asked Clive about this, and he decided that there was no time like the present, so he took me through to the body store and got a random body out of the fridge. It just so happened that this person had died with their eyes and mouth open. Clive went on to complain about this becoming more regular when a person died on the ward. There was and is in place the Trust's 'Last Offices' policy that requires the ward to present the body to the mortuary in a suitable manner; this involves packing of cavities and, where possible, closing eyes. If this is done just after death then the eyelids will stay down but, if not, it becomes a problem. At least in this case, the fact that they hadn't followed the policy had done me a favour, as Clive would be able to show me exactly what to do, but I could tell he was upset that the body had been sent to the mortuary from the ward in this way. He had high standards when it came to how the deceased should be treated. He didn't seem to deal with the living too kindly, but at least he had great pride in his job.

He started to show me how to make things better. He got a pillow and placed it under the deceased's head; he then got a head block and placed that under the pillow; raising the head this way caused the mouth to close. Next he got a tiny piece of cotton wool and some forceps; he placed the smallest amount of cotton wool on the eye and lifted the eyelid over it. This simple act caused the eye to stay closed. Clive preferred this to gluing the eyelids together with superglue which some morticians do and, I have to admit, I was immediately sold, so that it is a practice I still follow today. He told me about how his predecessor preferred to put an invisible st.i.tch in the mouth, but that he considered such practices very invasive and preferred to see if he could solve the problems through other means. By the time Clive had finished, the deceased looked peaceful, as if he were sound asleep. To help with this, Clive had worked out the worry lines in the forehead by gently ma.s.saging them and straightened the mouth to a relaxed look. He made everything look so easy, and was rightly proud of his achievement.

It took Clive all of ten minutes to do this but what worried me was that, at least to begin with, I knew it would take me longer.

The switchboard was given my number and, as of the following week, I would be officially on call for the hospital. This went for the Coroner too, as I would also be working for him in a roundabout way; in turn, Clive added, that meant the possibility of having to do forensic post-mortems.

I had heard Clive and Graham mention forensic post-mortems before but didn't really understand what they were. When I asked, Clive said, matter of factly, 'You know, suspicious deaths, murders, that kind of thing.'

'Murders?' I began to panic.

Clive smiled. 'Every now and again, Mich.e.l.le, every now and again.'

FOURTEEN.

The next week flew by, being only four days, but without a lot of PM work although we had had several deaths through the doors, most of them had been expected and did not require autopsy so we spent much of the week cleaning and I got to know Graham a lot better. Like Clive, he had also worked for the hospital for a long time; first as a porter, and then he'd stumbled across the job in the mortuary, initially helping Clive out when he needed it, then ending up as a permanent fixture. He also loved his job, but was not interested in furthering his career. Now, what mortuary technicians do is a recognized profession and you are able to sit exams which, once you have pa.s.sed them, will allow you to climb the ladder in the technician world. It will also allow you to work with national disasters if you choose; Clive had taken these exams, but all Graham wanted out of life was to do his job to the best of his ability, go home in the evening, enjoy his whisky without being disturbed, and collect his wages at the end of the month.

Graham also had a habit of sometimes using the wrong words. He would say 'defiantly' when he meant 'definitely', and 'poignant' when he meant 'pertinent', both of which I could understand, but not when he swapped 'skellington' for 'skeleton'. Still, it just made him all the more human as far as I was concerned.

He was divorced, and had been for a long time. He told me about the many times he had had to climb out of the window at the nurses' residence at some silly time in the morning, because the Sister was doing the rounds and he had been spending the evening with whichever nurse he was seeing at the time. It appeared that he had had liaisons with a large number of nurses certainly lots of them spoke to him when we were out having a cigarette. He came across as a simple man, uncomplicated, who said exactly what he thought and knew what he liked and what he didn't like, and nothing was ever going to change that. He would have his breakfast at the same time every morning two rashers of bacon, fried eggs and toast (always the same) and revelled in talking about what he was having for tea each evening, proud of the fact that he cooked it himself. Every morning Clive and I would have a running commentary on how good it had been and how he had cooked it. I found this both boring and intriguing: boring because I know how to cook, but intriguing because of the pa.s.sion he displayed when telling me about it and the type of food he ate. No animal organ was safe from the frying pan in Graham's kitchen. You name it, he had tried it, right down to sheep brains, which are very nice (or so he a.s.sured me). He offered to get me some next time he went to see his old mates at the abattoir, but I refused politely.

Graham also told me about his love of shooting, and I tried my best not to look shocked. I don't think I did this very well, though.

'I never shoot anything I don't eat,' he said quickly when he saw the reaction on my face. 'Apart from when the farmer asks me to sort out any "mixies" I see when I walk his land; I don't eat those b.u.g.g.e.rs.' I knew from this he was talking about rabbits with myxomatosis. 'I just put the poor bleeders out of their misery; the foxes have those.'

I warmed to Graham; not because I agreed with some of the stuff he enjoyed doing I didn't at all but because he was so straightforward and you knew where you stood with him. He also taught me a lot. Clive was a knowledgeable man, but his patience with me could be pushed sometimes. I am a very inquisitive person and have an annoying tendency to ask 'Why?' a lot. I like to have things explained to me, reasons given and what the end result is expected to be. I also like to know why I am asked to do something, but I am quite aware that this can really annoy people; I know this because people like me can annoy me me! Graham, though, was always ready and willing to give me an answer or a reason. He was never fl.u.s.tered or agitated, but always gave a reply that was straight to the point, given in the language we both spoke, and without trying to impress or baffle me with long medical words that he knew I wouldn't understand. We worked well together and appeared to complement each other, and I could see that Graham was like me in that he wanted to get the job done. Whatever task was given to him, he would jump on board.

By Friday I felt as though I was definitely part of the team and had been accepted. We started to relax fully with each other. And I loved the fact that the atmosphere was nothing like I imagined it would be. There was a strong sense of companions.h.i.+p, lots of helping each other out, lunches together in the office, jokes and gossip shared and plenty of laughing and high spirits. Working in a mortuary can be unpleasant; the sights that are brought through the doors are sometimes enough to make you want to turn around, walk out and never return. An att.i.tude of extreme levelheadedness is important, and the att.i.tude that Graham and Clive had was healthy as far as I was concerned. Although dealing with the deceased every day, they had never forgotten the fact that they were very much alive and lived each day to the full. The proper respect for the bereaved family and the dead was always there, but sometimes, given the normal everyday conversations and laughter that would come from the office over coffee, you would never have believed that we were completely surrounded by the dead and all their finery.

So, this week had been my first week on call, and the working week evenings had gone by without an emergency. I had actually turned my mobile phone on and off a few times and asked Luke to ring it to make sure it was working properly, which of course it was. From the stories relayed by Clive and Graham, I had thought it was going to be non-stop. This was about to change when Sat.u.r.day morning arrived, however. The first phone call came around eight in the morning. It was the A&E department to say they had an elderly gentleman who had died in the ambulance on the way to be admitted. OK, I thought to myself, that is not a problem.