While Nolan did his part in the burial of Brandy Parker, I continued to do mine, which consisted of a handful of tasks that could be taken care of over the phone. Getting the obituary to the newspaper. Contacting the crematorium. Ordering flowers. Because the coffin wouldn’t be leaving the Home for a church service and as I would be bringing the remains directly to the crematorium, pallbearers wouldn’t be an issue. And there was also the issue of whether or not the body would be wearing any clothes.
Despite the fact that it would be a closed casket ceremony I had an obligation to ask Suzanne Worthington what her wishes were regarding the clothing issue. As with most aspects of the funeral and burial process, the typical person doesn’t consider certain areas until the situation arises.
The dressing of the corpse is always a touchy issue. Should a man be dressed in his underwear or not? Just a T-shirt or only his shorts or both? Socks and shoes or barefoot? Should a female wear a bra? Pantyhose? One would think that with closed casket viewings any clothing at all would be a moot point. Why bother dressing a corpse when no one would be seeing it? The same question could be asked about the logic of putting shoes on a corpse in an open coffin. Why? The body isn’t going anywhere. But considering the decomposed state of Brandy Parker’s remains, it would be natural to question the wisdom of dressing the corpse in conventional clothes. I decided to suggest a traditional burial shroud. I called the Worthington home. A man answered. I introduced myself and asked for Suzanne.
The man blurted an abrupt, “Hold on,” and roughly set down the receiver on a hard surface. What seemed like close to a minute later, Suzanne picked up. She had the same pre-occupied, disinterested attitude she displayed in our earlier meeting. I presented her with the choices. She opted for the shroud, but before committing to it said, “I’d better discuss this with my daughter. Let me call you back.”
Less than two minutes passed. It was Suzanne with the news that Quilla would chose the clothes that Brandy Parker would wear. We also discussed the matter of the photograph of Brandy which would be placed atop her coffin. They had a framed 9x12 color picture of her. I said I would stop by in an hour to pick it and the clothes up. When I got to their house, a basement-less, oversized ranch that looked larger than it really was because of an attached garage, I found that neither Quilla nor Suzanne were home.
Alan Worthington answered the door, a Blackberry to his right ear. As he talked he raised his left hand, palm up, which I took to mean that I should wait. I expected him to step back a few feet and continue talking, but he stood there in front me, as if I weren’t even there, separated only by the screen door.
He looked to be in his early Forties and had a thick black mustache that made him look like a Seventies porn star. He was about five feet five, a good eight inches shorter than I. He wore an expensive, but still noticeable hairpiece. I didn’t like his eyes. They seemed to be always moving, darting back and forth like a neurotic rat in a maze. After a minute or so he turned to me. “You here for the clothes and picture?” His voice had the same abrasive impatience he’d had on the phone earlier.
“Yes.”
“Wait here.”
He disappeared into the house for about thirty seconds, returning with a plastic bag from a grocery store.
“Here,” he said, handing the bag to me as if it contained garbage. “I’m supposed to tell you to hold it on the side so the stuff doesn’t get wrinkled… as if it matters, right?” He rolled his eyes. “The kid put a pair of shoes in there too. Why I don’t know. It’s not like Brandy’s going out dancing.” He laughed cruelly.
“The fact is,” I said firmly, in a tone carefully measured to make him feel stupid. “Most people put shoes on their loved ones. And most people also insist that underwear and socks are placed on the body.
He glared at me with a genuine sense of disgust.
“That’s sick,” he said. “When I die I want to be cremated and I want my ashes put in a bottle of Dom Perignon and dropped into the Caribbean. Look, between you and me, if you want to give these shoes to some charity, fine. We’re done, right, chief?”
“Yeah.”
As I headed back to my car I understood why Quilla couldn’t stand this guy. I wasn’t looking forward to seeing him later that night when, he, Suzanne and Quilla would arrive for the viewing. A part of me hoped he wouldn’t come.
Someone representing the Home has to be present when bodies are on view. Lew and I alternated. Sometimes Clint filled in.
We weren’t crazy about having Nolan greeting people at the door. All you had to do was have a kindly expression on your face — which Nolan possessed naturally — and be ready to direct people towards the Viewing Room in which the body of the person they were coming to see was laid out. The problem was that Nolan wanted to talk to people, oftentimes people in mourning or deep distress. If he engaged in minor chitchat it might’ve been acceptable, but Nolan would occasionally forget himself and reveal that he had done the work on the body.
*****
Because Brandy Parker would be the third body on view and since Lew was out of town, Clint would have to be on hand to help with the greeting. The Viewing was scheduled from 7:00-to-9:00 p.m. At my suggestion, the family arrives first, anywhere from fifteen to twenty minutes earlier, to have the first look at their loved one in private and to check over the appearance of the body. Sometimes there’s an inappropriate amount of make-up on a female. The plain Jane in life shouldn’t look like a Vegas showgirl in repose. Sometimes the hairstyle is all wrong, curls instead of straight hair, bangs instead of a bun. Sometimes the lips have been arranged in an uncharacteristic smirk or snarl.
By coming early the family can point out errors and Nolan can correct them.
I looked at my watch — 6:35. No one from the immediate family had arrived. I stepped outside the front entrance onto the veranda and looked at the parking lot. Nothing. Not even the other two bodies on view had callers yet. I glanced towards the entrance to the lot. No cars were visible. The warm October evening seemed more like June. I decided to stay outside until someone came. I gave the building a quick once-over. It could use a paint job and work on the roof. I would wait until Spring.
Our Home is small by traditional standards and quite normal-looking. Rather than a Victorian or Gothic design, ours is more Colonial, painted white with a cheery yellow trim, with abundant windows. I’ve been kidded it looks more like an International House of Pancakes than a Funeral Home. DiGregorio’s, on the other hand, is straight out of The House On Haunted Hill with arches and gables and turrets. Built with a dirty, reddish brown brick that hadn’t aged well and hadn’t been cleaned since I’d come to Dankworth, the structure was a sad, depressing reminder of death.
For Quilla’s sake I hoped she and her parents would pull in then and there. This part of the service is always the most painful for the family because it’s the first look they have at the deceased and they must acknowledge for the first time that their loved one is gone.
Even a closed casket is unsettling because of the knowledge that someone you love is inside. In some ways it’s more distressing because the survivors never get a last look at the deceased. I’ve always felt that this last look is crucial to the grieving process because the reality of death is the single truth that has to be faced.
Life is over. The person is gone and never coming back.
I was about to go back inside when I saw Clint’s station wagon pull into the lot. He was late. I expected him at 6:15. He waved at me then pulled around to the back. Within thirty seconds he was jogging towards me. He was 24 and a nice guy, personable, good with the bereaved and capable of squeezing a few extra dollars out of someone making arrangements. He had two drawbacks: pathological lateness and the woman to whom he was married.
“Sorry I’m late,” he blurted, out of breath.
I’d heard those words dozens of times. I gave him a non-threatening stare, as if he were a six-month old puppy who had just peed on the couch. “No one’s here yet anyway.”
“Cookie and I had a fight,” he said. “A big one.”
“The usual subject?”
He nodded yes.
Cookie was alone on a night Clint was supposed to be off.
For the entire time Clint had been working for me, she was alone most evenings and weekends. Her weekdays were occupied working as a substitute teacher for barely more than minimum wage at a Catholic elementary school forty-six miles away, a hellish commute that also drove her crazy, especially in winter. Part of Clint’s responsibility as our apprentice was to be at the Home most of the time so I could try to add some normalcy to my own life.
“She gave me an ultimatum,” said Clint. “I either get some guaranteed decent hours or she’s divorcing me.”
“We went through this last year, Clint. That’s how you got Sundays off.”
“I know. I know. But it’s not enough, Del. She’s not a social person. Cookie has a hard time making friends. We have this intense, co-dependant thing going on. She’s not good at finding ways to keep busy and there’s only so much TV to watch and so much to read and she hates housework. She’s starting to listen to Christian music and she’s joined a Bible study group at church. Sometimes she answers the phone with ‘Praise Jesus’ instead of ‘Hello.’ I don’t know what to do. Is there some way I can have one night a week off? If I told Cookie that we could have, say, Tuesday evenings to ourselves… it would be enough to calm her down for awhile.”
I was about to tell him that I’d need time to think about it when I heard the sound of a car pulling in the lot. It was a police cruiser. I could see Perry Cobb at the wheel. He punched the accelerator as if he were a seventeen-year-old out with his father’s rebuilt ’57 Chevy and headed for a parking spot a few feet from where Clint and I stood.
“Tell you what, Clint, I’ll think about it.”
“Del, I love working here with you and being a Funeral Director’s all I ever wanted since I was twelve years old. But I love Cookie too.” He seemed on the verge of tears.
“This is a business filled with broken marriages and bachelors,” I said. “The statistics are against you. Like cops. Listen, I need to talk to Perry. Why don’t you go inside?”
Clint nodded and went into the front entrance of the Home just as Perry was getting out of his vehicle. He slammed the car door and strutted towards me.
“What are you doing here, Perry?”
“I’m taking a guess that the killer might show up. I want to check out everybody who comes in.”
I nodded, then for Quilla’s benefit more than from my own curiosity, I said, “Have any leads?”
“The trail gets cold the second the killer walks away from the body. Girl’s been dead nine years. I got the Sheriff’s office to send me a criminalist and fingerprint person to dust the mausoleum and what was left of Brandy Parker’s clothes for prints and whatnot. Nothing. Apartment she lived in was rented three months after she disappeared and everything she owned went to Goodwill.”
“Who authorized that?”
“Her sister. I’m in the process of trying to track down her friends, people she hung out with, co-workers, neighbors, the usual. So far, not much. Broad who was her best friend back then is dead too. Relocated to Nevada. Vegas. Became a blackjack dealer. Got hit by a limo after walking out of the casino where she worked.” Perry shook his head. “Trying to track down a couple of people she worked with, but I don’t expect much. She was only nineteen when she disappeared. Had a couple of two-bit jobs. Waitress in a coffee shop. Barmaid. She lied about her age to get it. Owner of the coffee shop remembered who she was. One detail. She never picked up her last paycheck. As for the bar she worked at, it’s changed ownership three times. Same with her neighbors. It was a dump where mostly college age kids rented. No leases. Month-to-month. Everybody who was there when she was most likely has moved on. I have Wendell checking further.”
“What about some of the men she was involved with?”
“Best I’ve been able to piece together is that she wasn’t ‘involved’ with anyone so to speak. I’m hoping it wasn’t a one night stand that got out of hand.”
“Why?”
“Kind of hard to track down some quickie in a back seat from close to ten years ago,” he sneered. “Two of the bars she hung out in have changed ownership. One burned down. Another shut down.” He spit, aiming towards the grass, but hitting the pavement.
“You’ve found out an enormous amount of information for such a short period of time. I’m impressed.”
“Doesn’t matter,” he said grimly. “Part of me thinks I won’t find out much more than I have already. Nobody knows anything about this woman. Not even her sister. It might be a different story if I could find someone who knew the answers to some hard questions about who Brandy Parker was.”
“Did you talk to her niece? Quilla Worthington. I understand that you know her.”
Perry sneered. “Little bitch hangs with a bad crowd. If these kids can’t find grass or cocaine, they’ll settle for getting high on Robitussin.”
“The cold medication?”
“These assholes call it “Robo.” They like that heavy metal crap. Dress in black. Wear leather. Put rings in their noses and ears and lips. One girl has a spike in her tongue. I have Greg on special assignment to keep an eye on them.”
“Special assignment?” I said, feeling queasy in my stomach and more than a little sorry for Quilla. She liked Greg Hoxey, thought he was her friend. I wondered how she would feel upon learning that Greg was scamming them.
“Greg has made friends with them. They love his ass. You saying the niece knows something?”
“She was very close to her Aunt. If anybody could help you find out more about who Brandy Parker was, Quilla could. And I happen to know that she’d be willing to cooperate.”
“Oh yeah?” he said sarcastically. “How do you know that? And how do you know all this crap about her?”
“She rode out to the cemetery with me to pick out the grave site. We talked. The one thing uppermost in her mind is finding the person who killed her Aunt.”
“Talking to her can’t hurt, I guess.” He looked at me as if he were giving me an evaluation. “That’s twice now.”
“Twice what?”
“Only positive things I’ve had to work came from you. That cemetery buff stuff and now this info about the niece. I never would’ve even considered finding out if the kid knew anything. Christ, she was just a little shit when her Aunt disappeared. She taking the death hard?”
I nodded yes. “She seems to be the only one.”
“Meaning?”
“I didn’t see much grief coming from her mother.”
“Should I consider the mother a suspect?”
Perry let the question slip out so matter-of-factly, that I was speechless. You’re asking me? I thought to myself. I wasn’t used to receiving compliments from Perry Cobb. I felt like the child of an alcoholic getting a pat on the head from daddy on a sober day.
“Look, Perry, I don’t know anything about solving crimes and having feelings about who should or shouldn’t be a suspect. Based on years of doing business with grieving individuals, all I can tell you about Suzanne Worthington is that her behavior was typical of at least a third of those I’ve dealt with. Some are devastated and can barely get through the arrangements process. Others are so calm and collected you’d think that instead of picking a coffin they’re selecting drapes. Suzanne made no bones about her feelings for her sister. She’d dealt with her being gone years ago. Finding the body was anti-climactic. That’s not to say she won’t fall apart when she realizes her sister’s remains are in that locked coffin or that she won’t lose it at the burial. But if you want my gut feeling: Suzanne Worthington didn’t kill anybody.”
Perry bit down lightly on his upper lip. “I wonder why she didn’t tell me to talk to her daughter.”
“She probably doesn’t have any idea how much the kid knows. This is a mother and daughter who don’t communicate going on. Besides, Suzanne wants to get this over with. She’s not the kind who likes intrusions.”
“Who does?” said Perry and almost at the precise instant he uttered the words a car pulled into the lot. The headlights swathed Perry and myself, blinding us for a few seconds. By the time I could see the car, a BMW, it had pulled alongside Perry’s cruiser.
Three doors opened almost simultaneously and I watched Suzanne get out of the front passenger side, her husband slide out of the driver’s side and Quilla step from the right side of the back. As if she couldn’t stand to be near them, Quilla darted ahead of her mother and stepfather. I checked my watch. 6:50. I couldn’t take my eyes off of what Quilla was wearing.
A black dress. Down to mid-calf. Low cut. As she got closer I saw her shoes. Red high heels, spikes, actually, about four inches. As she got closer I could make out the fishnet stockings. Her hair was up in a sophisticated sweep and she wore make-up. Heavy. Too much mascara around the eyes that made her look older and a little glamorous. Earlier in the day she looked younger than her fifteen years and not very attractive.
But now she looked exquisite.
More like she were going out on a date, rather than to a Funeral Home to visit the dead body of the person she had loved more than anyone else in the world.