Dead Body Language (30 page)

I grabbed at the stinging cloth, kicked—mostly at thin air—and tried to twist away. Cold, clammy hands held me tight at my head with a grip on my hair, holding the cloth against my face, suffocating me with the pungent odor.

Suddenly I was very, very dizzy.

I woke in darkness. Lying on my back, I couldn’t make out anything but blackness. I could feel my own breath come back at me, but felt little else, except the raw burn in my throat and lungs, and a throbbing pain in my right leg. I tried to lift my head, but it ached so badly I lay back down, the effort and pain too great. I tried to lift my arms; they were leaden; they wouldn’t move.

Oh, God, I was paralyzed!

I wiggled my fingers and toes. I bent my elbows slightly, and shrugged my shoulders. I moved my legs back and forth along a smooth velvety surface. No, not paralyzed. At least, not completely.

What then? I spread my fingers and felt the soft, velvety fabric once again. I followed the curve of the material slowly as it moved around to cover me. Completely.

Oh, my God. A casket.

I
tried to sit up and bumped my head.

Some people might have screamed. That was not my first thought. Making a loud noise simply did not occur to a person like me, used to soundlessness. My first thought was, I’m going to suffocate in here—and suddenly I found I couldn’t breathe.

Gasping for air, I tried to lift my arms and legs but they were immobilized between puffy pillows of softness. Feeling claustrophobic, I turned my head face up and was nearly smothered. With sweat dripping off my neck in rivulets, I turned my head sideways again. The back of my neck tickled and itched.

I tried kicking the top of my prison with both feet, but my legs didn’t have much power or leverage with only inches of space in which to maneuver. I struck weakly a few more times for the hell of it.

I was still having trouble breathing, beyond the burning sensation.

I remembered Celeste saying something about the coffins being airtight, to keep the bugs out. Some kind of
rubber gasket. It felt as if a weight were pressing on my chest. How long had I been here?

I wiggled my fingers on either side of the velvety smoothness, hoping to find some kind of inner latch. Ha! What was I thinking? A safety catch for those occasional premature burials?

Finally it occurred to me to scream. I’d seen it in the movies. It usually brought help. It was worth a try.

I screamed. At least it felt like I did. I screamed and kicked and pounded like hell, hoping someone might hear me. I screamed and kicked and pounded until I was hoarse, sore, and physically defeated.

Fuck, I thought. I’ve got to get out of here.

What were my chances of spending hours in this thing, undetected? I could suffocate in this airtight container in a matter of hours. Or maybe minutes. What was it my science teacher had said about the amount of air per cubic foot? I think I missed that question on the test.

I began to think about everything in life I still wanted to do: Make a proper go of the newspaper. Fix up the diner and maybe open it on weekends for cappuccino and croissants. Grow my hair long. Lose five pounds. Okay, ten pounds. See the home of my ancestors in Cornwall, England. Meet someone …

I thought about my old boyfriend. Suddenly I missed the bastard. He was better than nothing, wasn’t he? I thought about Jilda and French. Celeste and her bigamist husband. I thought about Mickey. And Jeremiah. I thought about Dan.

Goddammit! I had to come up with something or I’d really lose it.

I took a deep breath, hoping there was still enough left to last me a while. All right, assuming I’m in the mortuary, surely someone—the night watchman—would be around. I had to assume eventually he would hear me if I screamed. What choice did I have?

I screamed and kicked and pounded again, for what seemed an interminably long time. I gasped in air as it grew warmer and stuffier and more difficult to breathe in the man-made womb. Tomb.

I screamed “Fuck!” until my throat felt even rougher, and dry and scratchy. I could feel droplets of sweat sliding down the sides of my face and pooling at the back of my neck. My back was drenched. What little air there was was stifling.

I kicked again, more angry than anything else. Tears filled my eyes at the hopeless feeling that was beginning to overtake me.

And then I had an idea. My first priority was an air hole. Not only would I be able to stay alive, but maybe someone would hear me if I could get the sound out. Could I make enough noise to raise the dead, so to speak?

Frustratingly slowly I worked the fingers of my right hand up my body, to my chest, up my neck, and around the side of my left shoulder like a contortionist, each movement increasingly painful as I maneuvered my arm into positions it did not naturally go. Near the top of the casket, just above my head, I felt the cool rectangle of metal I had been searching for.

I’d remembered from the tour that each casket had a bronze plaque with a name engraved on it, somehow secured to the puffy lining. Glue?

I grasped the metal name tag with my stubby fingernails and tugged awkwardly. After several minutes of clawing, the thing ripped away from the cushiony fabric. With the plaque in hand, I slowly inched my arm back down my body. The plate was small, about six inches by two inches. I hoped it would do.

I crept the fingers of my left hand along one side of the coffin, where I supposed the top and bottom met. After a few moments of prodding, poking, and pressing, I located the rubber gasket running along the juncture. Slipping the bronze plaque into the crevice, I pushed hard, attempting to use it as a wedge to create an opening.

The lid didn’t move. I tried again. And again. I couldn’t get any leverage. It was hopeless, and I was nearing true panic.

I took a slow, shallow breath, thought a moment, then tried another tack. Turning the plate on the diagonal, I jammed the sharp corner into the rubber lining where the
two parts of the casket came together, and started digging like a frenzied prospector at a newly discovered gold mine.

After a few minutes that seemed hours, I could feel the rubber begin to give and tear. I was breaking through. More digging, gouging, and grinding in the interminable darkness, and the soft wood of the casket also began to chip away. How long had it taken before I’d dug the plaque into the wood about a fingernail’s worth? It wasn’t much, but it was a start. I had nothing better to do.

I twisted and dug the corner of the plaque around until I felt more of the soft wood give. Back and forth, back and forth, I twisted the piercing corner until my fingers were raw and scraped from the friction and pressure.

Finally I pulled the plaque out of the tiny crevice I had created. A glimmer of light winked at me.

I tried to crook my neck toward the air hole but didn’t have much room to move. Still, I sucked in a few difficult breaths, then I let out a scream that I hoped was ear-piercingly loud. I screamed until I thought I might never be able to speak again. When I finally stopped screaming to take a breath, I felt the casket vibrate.

Someone had heard me! I felt the casket moving. Someone was opening it!

My elation was dampened with a sobering thought: Who was on the other side?

I broke out in another sweat, lying motionless as I waited for the lid to lift. After a few moments of unbearable stillness, I felt a rush of cool air sweep over me as the lid was lifted off.

I gulped down several deep breaths, then pushed myself up, dizzy and light-headed, and took in a few more deep breaths until my breathing became more regular. The lights although dim, hurt my eyes and it took a few moments to adjust.

Abruptly I jerked around to face whoever had come to my rescue.

Sluice Jackson stood there staring at me, wide-eyed, pale, and frozen with fear, as if he’d seen a ghost.

“Sluice! Thank God! I … I was trapped in there. Someone … if you hadn’t …”

I knew I was rambling. Sluice was looking more and more confused. He backed away from me as I spoke. The purple bruises on his face and hands were evidence of his recent fall into the open grave. I climbed unsteadily out of the coffin, and was surprised to see that the hand holding the bronze plate was bloody. There were droplets of crimson on the pale blue fabric where I had been digging.

“Sluice, listen carefully,” I said gently. “Someone shut me in there. Did you see anyone?” It hurt to talk from all the screaming I’d done.

Sluice shook his head. His mouth hung open, saliva lined his lower lip. He reeked of alcohol and cigar smoke.

“I din’t do it! I din’t do it! I heard the screamin’. I thought it was that damn cat. I din’t do nothin’.”

I looked at the terrified man, not knowing what to say. I hadn’t had a lot of experience dealing with old mentally challenged prospectors.

“Sluice, it’s okay,” I reassured him. “Someone locked me in there and you got me out. You saved my life.” I wiped the bloody hand on my pant leg and felt a new bruise on my thigh. My pants were missing a button and my top was disheveled and torn at the neck.

“I din’t do nothin’.” He turned away and shuffled quickly out of the Selection Room. I was left alone with a roomful of caskets.

And the memory of a lingering smell. Mints? Mouthwash? Or did chloroform smell like Tic Tacs?

I brushed myself off, and looked around for something to wrap my bleeding hand. The mortuary was dim, except for a few night-lights. Shadows seemed to dance in the empty room, and I shivered. Whoever it was that locked me in here could still be around. I headed for Celeste’s office, wondering how—and when—Sluice had gotten out of the hospital.

Celeste’s door was locked. I debated just leaving the damn place, but returned to the lobby where I located a pay phone in a far corner by the restrooms. I dialed a number using my credit card and waited a few seconds before speaking.

“This is Connor. If you can hear me, I need you to
come over to the mortuary as soon as possible. It’s urgent. I’ll be waiting outside. God, I hope you’re listening. Please hurry!” I repeated the message two more times, then I hung up the phone.

I left a similar message at the sheriff’s office, then hung up the phone again. I stumbled out the front door. My hands were shaking and I felt my heart still beating rapidly. Halfway down the mortuary driveway, I saw Dan Smith running up the slight incline. I guessed he was breathless by the way his chest heaved up and down rapidly.

“What’s going on? I got your phone call! What the hell’s up?”

I looked at him. “Dan, where have you been? What have you been doing the past—” I checked my watch—God, two hours “—the past two hours?”

“Your hands are shaking. You’re bleeding! Connor, what’s going on—”

“Please, Dan, just answer. Where were you?”

He shrugged his now familiar one-shouldered shrug. “I don’t know. I … let’s see. I cleaned up Boone’s office, switched on his little TV and watched some Hitchcock movie. They’ve been running them all week.
North by Northwest
. Had some microwave popcorn. Started to doze off. Then you called.”

I leaned into him, trying to smell his breath. But I must have given him the wrong impression, because he took my shoulders and pulled me closer. He kissed me.

The kiss lasted a little longer than strictly necessary for my scientific purposes. But you gotta do what you gotta do.

“Popcorn,” I said, and smacked my lips.

Dan frowned. “That’s all you can say?”

“You taste like popcorn. And you smell like popcorn.”

“You got a problem with popcorn? I could change to potato chips. Chew some Dentyne. Gargle a little Brut.”

I laughed. “No, you taste just fine. I mean—” I’m sure I blushed. I could feel the tingling on my chest and neck as heat fanned out like a spreading virus.

He tried to stifle a grin but couldn’t quite manage it. I
took his hands and lifted them up to my face, then took a big whiff. They smelled like popcorn, too. With butter. And salt. And a hint of pine-scented soap. He must have thought I had some kind of hand fetish. He might have been right. Hands are as expressive as faces to me.

“So what’s all this about?” he asked, not letting go of my hands when I tried to release him.

I explained my recent adventure, and the last thing I remembered before I awoke in the casket—the smell of mint and chemicals.

“God, Connor! So you thought I might have …” Dan let go of my hands as he trailed off.

“No, of course not,” I said a bit too quickly. “But I had to rule you out, you know, just to be sure.”

“Connor … don’t you know me yet?” He lifted my scraped and bloody hand and stroked the back of it gently.

I said nothing. I didn’t know him any better than I knew anyone else in this town. But he didn’t smell like Tic Tacs or chloroform, so I figured he must not have been the one who locked me into Edgar Allan Poe’s nightmare.

We stopped by the sheriff’s office to make a report, but only the dispatcher was in. For some reason she hadn’t received my message, so I left a note for the sheriff to call me at home. Dan and I walked back to the hotel. I washed off the blood in the hall bathroom while Dan waited in my office. When I returned, he was glancing around at my books and posters and comic books.