The Cool Room by Clifford Beck - HTML preview

Chapter 12

As Jonathan was making the final sutures in the lower abdomen, he heard a knock at the door. Normally, he had very steady nerves, but its suddenness startled him into a slight jump. He knew it could only be one person.

“Yeah, Frank!” he yelled.

The door opened, and in walked Frank, who, looking at what lay on the table, reacted with wide eyes. In all his years, he had never seen anyone dismembered to such a degree.

“Jesus Christ,” he said. “You holding up okay?” Jonathan looked up with tired eyes. He had arrived early but was lacking in sleep, unable to sweep the image of evisceration from his mind. “Yeah,” he replied. “I’m okay, I guess.”

Frank handed him the picture of a young, beautiful girl.

“The family stopped by,” he said. “They wanted to give us this. I asked them for it earlier. Do you need any help? I know you’re really good at this, but this is a bit extreme, and it looks like you’re having trouble sleeping. To be honest, you look like a train wreck. Do you need me to take over for a while?” Jonathan was clearly feeling the effects of insomnia and stress but did not want to admit that he needed help. He took great pride in his work and wanted to complete this reconstruction on his own. “I think I’m okay,” he said. “But after this, I think I may need some time off.”

Frank agreed and promised that once the service was over, Jonathan could take a few days off. It was early fall, and it was suggested that he go up to the Adirondacks. Very few people went there except for hikers, and with sixteen million acres, he would have a great many choices of where he wanted to go. But both agreed that Jonathan needed to get away for a while. But there was one more thing. As Frank left the room, he turned back to make a last request.

“Oh, Jonathan,” he said. “Take a break. Get something to eat. Go outside and get some air.” Jonathan did as was requested.

The cool air of autumn brought Jonathan’s senses back to clarity, and upon returning, he entered the embalming room, donned his protective garb and gloves. Picking up the picture of the young woman, he studied her face and, comparing it to the shattered face in front of him, decided where to start with reconstruction. Placing an elbow on the steel table near her head, he spoke softly, telling her what he was about to do.

“I know you can’t hear me,” he began. “But there are some things I have to do. I promise it won’t hurt, and I’ll let you know what I’m going to do and when I’m going to do it. Don’t worry; I’m going to make you beautiful again – just like you were before.”

Anyone listening would have thought that Jonathan was insane – not only talking to a corpse but at length. On the contrary, it was how he maintained his sanity in a profession where he was almost always surrounded by death. Elderly clients were fairly easy to work with. It was simply their time. The bodies of the young, however, gnawed at him -- so much potential gone in the final flutter of a heartbeat. He did not so much feel grief for them as a loss of a different sort. He believed that everyone brings something to the table of the world, even if some never fully realize their potential. But for those who had been stolen away too soon, their chair would be left empty. No one would know what they could have accomplished had they been spared from the reaper’s scythe. With the picture as his guide, Jonathan continued his work. The only thing that saved her face from being completely torn off was the fact that she was wearing a helmet with a face shield. Unfortunately, the plane’s propeller shattered it upon impact, leaving her head and face exposed.

“This could have been a lot worse, you know,” he said. “Your head could have been lost. That would have sucked, wouldn’t it?”

As he prepared to suture her wounds, he glanced at the police report.

“A missing foot?” he asked. “That wasn’t you, was it?”

Fully exposing the bottom half of the body, Jonathan discovered that there was indeed a missing foot.

“Son of a bitch,” he said. “So it was you.” Reading further, he discovered that a coyote was seen running off with a dismembered foot in its mouth. The animal was never found. “I suppose we’re not going to be telling your family about this, huh?” he continued.

He brought the curved needle up for the first set of sutures and carefully looped it under the skin on both sides of the wound.

“Well,” he said. “I’ll tell you what. I won’t say anything if you don’t.”

The suture material was extremely thin and difficult to see, but it was what he preferred, as it left no indication of a wound once clay and makeup were applied over it. Snipping the last knot, Jonathan prepared for the next wound.

“It’s amazing what machinery can do to human flesh,” he said.

Although there was no response, the jaw began spontaneously chattering. He had seen bodies move before, but a chattering jaw sent chills up his spine. Putting one hand on the top of the head and one under the chin, Jonathan closed the mouth until the movement stopped.

“I think I’m going to sew your mouth shut,” he said. “I hope you don’t mind; I just can’t handle seeing that, and since you’re not being very talkative anyway, I might as well.”

Retrieving a large curved needle and a length of string, Jonathan opened the mouth, inserted it through the base under the tongue. Aiming it upwards, he pushed it through the hard palate and looping it back through, tied both ends together. The mouth closed as the knot tightened. “There,” he continued. He wagged a punitive finger at the lifeless face.

“Now, no more chattering, got it?” Later, he would insert dark-colored cotton into the nasal cavity to avoid any fluid leaking out onto the face. The pressure of gas bubbles can push fluids out of any opening of the body, and specially designed plugs would also be used for the same purpose.

Shaping the face was tedious. The sutures had to be and to be close together, tight and lie beneath the skin, but once finished Jonathan covered them with a lightly colored mortuary clay. This made them undetectable, and covered by makeup. In the end, the entire process took three days and required daily embalming fluid. As the artist he was, Jonathan kept his promise and brought her mangled face back to life. To be certain, he asked Frank for his opinion. Having seen the body before moving it into the refrigeration unit, he stood back and marveled at Jonathan’s work.

“Jesus Christ,” he said. “Jon, how the hell do you do this?”

Frank was not one to give compliments often, but when he did so they carried a great deal of weight. “Do you need some help dressing her?” he asked. Jonathan took a great deal of pride in his work knowing that the final judge was always the family, but he was not so proud that he couldn’t accept some help once in a while.

“Yeah,” he replied. “I guess I could use a little help.”

Aside from the picture, the family brought in the clothes they wanted the young girl wearing at the service. The parents described her as having been a down-to-earth girl who had spent a lot of time hiking. True to her short life, she was dressed in blue jeans and a flannel button-front shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the middle of her forearms. In order to hide the heavy suturing used to piece her body back together, the shirt was buttoned up to the top. However, before the shirt was buttoned up completely, Frank noticed a bit of abdominal bloating.

“How long have you been working on her?” Frank asked.

Jonathan hesitated, wondering why Frank would ask and what, if anything, he saw that required his attention.

“About three and half days,” he answered. “Why?” Putting his hand on the young woman’s stomach, he pushed just enough to make the bloating visible. “There’s a bit of bloating here,” he said. “You might want to run a trocar through and then again on the morning of the service. Just let the air bleed out. Throw a few sutures in on the morning of the service.”

Jonathan grinned as he reached for the trocar. “You always manage to see the smallest things, don’t you?” he asked.

Frank stood back as Jonathan placed the instrument above the right collarbone and pushing it through the skin slid it through the chest cavity and further into the abdomen. Any remaining gases would leach out through the track created by the length of the instrument.

“Hey,” Frank replied. “I’ve been doing this for a long time.”

Sliding the trocar out of the body, Jonathan placed it in a nearby sink. Anything that touched the deceased was cleaned and sterilized as was required by state law. All instruments were to be free of contaminants for the protection of the public as well as those who came into contact with the body. As the end of the trocar was removed, a soft hiss of gas could be heard. It went on for only a few seconds but served as an indicator of how much bloating was present.

“Hmm,” Frank began. “That’s more than I thought.” They finished dressing the girl’s body. Having done his part, Frank excused himself, but on his way out turned and comically offered a bit of advice. “Gotta watch that bloat, Jonathan.” Jonathan shook his head with a slight grin while retrieving a jar of makeup – the color was the same as what he had applied to the face. He prepared and applied the makeup to the arms – up to the middle of the bicep. After three and a half days, Jonathan stood back and marveled at yet another post-mortem masterpiece. This had truly been a challenge and having required no assistance he, for a fleeting moment, swore he saw her breathe. But there was one thing he had forgotten. The muscles around the eyes had relaxed to the point of allowing them to open. The solution was simple. Opening a drawer he removed a short cardboard cylinder, pulling off its top took out two eye caps. These were placed between the eye and the eyelid and were lined on both sides with small spikes that gripped the tissue and hold the eyes closed. Now, he was finished, and the young girl was ready to be seen by her grieving family and friends. Tomorrow, she would be carefully placed in a bronze-colored casket. Foam blocks would be placed under her elbows, hidden by a white liner. These allowed the hands to be laid on her abdomen without falling to the side. Due to a lack of funds, her body was to be cremated and buried the following day. Although he understood why the family wanted this, he couldn’t help feel somewhat discouraged. He had spent so much time recreating such a beautiful young woman that it almost pained him to have to slide her body into the furnace. But the work was done, and the family always had the last say. And Jonathan always respected their wishes.