Blindsight

“Great!” Tony exclaimed. With obvious excitement he pulled out his Bantam and attached the silencer. It took him a moment because his hand trembled with pleasurable anticipation.

Angelo gave him a hard look, then shook his head in exasperation. “Try to stay calm. Let’s go!”

They got out of the car and ran across the street and between the two mortuary vans. They ran hunched over, trying to avoid the drizzle as much as possible. They entered the same way they had that afternoon, through the morgue loading dock. Angelo was in the lead. Tony followed with the black doctor’s bag in one hand and his gun in the other. In an attempt to conceal the gun, he had it partially under his jacket.

Angelo was almost past the open door to the security office when someone inside yelled, “Hey! You can’t go in there.”

Tony collided with Angelo when his partner stopped abruptly. A guard in a blue uniform was sitting at his desk. In front of him was a game of solitaire.

“Where you guys think you’re going?” he asked.

Before Angelo could respond, Tony raised his Bantam and aimed it at the surprised guard’s forehead. He pulled the trigger without a moment’s hesitation. The slug hit the guard in his head, just above his left eye, so that he fell over onto his desk, his head landing with a solid thump on his card game. Except for the pool of blood forming on the desk top, a passerby might have thought the man was simply asleep on the job.

“What the hell did you shoot him for?” Angelo snarled. “You could have given me a chance to talk with him.”

“He was going to give us trouble,” Tony said. “You said we had to be fast.”

“What if he has a partner?” Angelo said. “What if the partner comes back? Where will we be then?”

Tony frowned.

“Come on!” Angelo said.

They peered into the mortuary office. There was cigarette smoke in the air and a live butt in an ashtray by the desk, but no one was in sight. Leaving the office and advancing cautiously into the morgue proper, Angelo glanced into the small auxiliary autopsy room used for decomposed bodies. The dissecting table was barely visible in the half-light.

“This place gives me the creeps,” he admitted.

“Me too,” Tony said. “It’s nothing like the funeral home I worked at. Look at the floor. This place is disgusting.”

“Why are so many lights off?” Angelo asked.

“Saving money?” Tony suggested.

They came to the huge U-shaped mass of refrigerator compartments stacked four-high, each with its own heavily hinged door. “You think all the bodies are in here?” Angelo asked, pointing toward the bank of cooler doors.

“I guess so,” Tony said. “This is just like in those old movies when they have to identify somebody.”

“It doesn’t smell like this in the movies,” Angelo said. “What the hell are all those simple coffins for? They expecting the bubonic plague?”

“Beats me,” Tony said.

They wandered past the large walk-in cooler, heading for the light that was coming through the windows of the double doors that led into the main autopsy room. Just before they got there, the doors burst open and out walked Bruce Pomowski.

Everyone recoiled in surprise. Tony hid his gun behind his back.

“You guys scared me,” Bruce admitted with a nervous laugh.

“The feeling’s mutual,” Angelo said.

“You must be here for the Haberlin body,” Bruce said. “Well, I got good news and bad news. The good news is that it’s ready. The bad news is you have to wait until one of the doctors examines it.”

“That’s too bad,” Angelo said. “But as long as we’re waiting around, have you seen Dr. Laurie Montgomery?”

“Yeah,” Bruce said. “I just saw her a few minutes ago.”

“Can you tell us where she went?” Angelo asked.

“She went up to Toxicology,” Bruce said. He was becoming curious and even a little suspicious about these two men.

“And where might Toxicology be?” Angelo asked.

“Fourth floor.” Bruce tried to remember if he’d ever seen these two on a body pickup before.

“Thanks,” Angelo said. He turned, motioning for Tony to follow him.

“Hey, you can’t go up there,” said Bruce. “And what funeral home are you from?”

“Spoletto,” Angelo said.

“That’s not the one I’ve been expecting,” Bruce said. “I think I’d better make a call. What are your names?”

“We’re not looking for any trouble,” Angelo said. “We’d just like to talk with Laurie Montgomery.”

Bruce took a step backward and eyed Angelo and Tony. “I think I’ll give Security a call.”

Tony’s gun appeared and pointed at the mortuary tech. Bruce froze in place, looking cross-eyed at the barrel. Tony pulled the trigger before Angelo could say anything.

Similar to the security man, the slug hit Bruce in the forehead, and he swayed for a second, then crumbled to the floor.

“Damn!” Angelo said. “You can’t shoot everybody.”

“Hell!” Tony said. “He was about to call Security.”

“A lot of good that would have done him,” Angelo said. “You already took care of Security. You have to learn to restrain yourself.”

“So I overreacted,” Tony said. “At least we know the chick’s still here. We even know where to find her.”