The Undertaker's Daughter (Ilka #1)(12)

“Just get this over with,” she muttered to herself. She froze when she stepped into the garage.

The space was as large as what she’d seen of the funeral home’s first floor. Right inside stood an open coffin. Glossy black, with large gilded handles. It looked to her like something for a head of state, or at least someone who didn’t want their final journey to go unnoticed. The coffin had a white satin lining, with a pillow featuring embroidered initials, and it was open in a way that gave Ilka the impression that a person had just sat up, climbed out, and walked off. A coffin that looked a bit less pretentious stood up against a wall, but what she couldn’t tear her eyes from was the refrigerator at the far end of the garage. Not exactly like what she’d seen in large restaurant kitchens and institutions, but something along those lines. Unburnished steel, about six feet wide and not as tall as a normal refrigerator, with three drawers. A few rugs and a box had been tossed on top. The whole garage seemed a bit messy.

Ilka knew she shouldn’t do it, but her feet were already on the way. When she opened the top drawer, the cold reached out and zapped her. But the tray was empty. She needed to open the next drawer only a crack to see the bluish foot on the steel tray inside. She shivered, closed the drawer, and looked out the window, checking the view—the same as from the room where she’d slept. In other words, her lodgings were above the funeral home’s morgue.

She was being silly; she understood that. And yet she was caught in a mood that made her stare momentarily at the drawers of rust-free steel. The boy’s grandmother lay inside. The smell— It was true, the air smelled like death. And cold. And like something that had been disinfected. Mostly it smelled cold to Ilka, even though she couldn’t put her finger on what that meant.

Thoughts roiled in her head, but she knew she was only stalling. She had an address and a body waiting for her, and she needed to figure out how to go about picking it up. She’d called Artie a few times, but he hadn’t answered. At last she pulled herself together and walked over to the hearse, which was parked just inside.

A wheeled stretcher, like the ones used in ambulances, stood against the opposite wall. Under the stretcher were blankets lined with thick plastic and straps to fasten down a corpse. There was also a low cart, something that looked like a forklift. She didn’t need anyone to explain it was for transporting coffins.

Ilka was unsure whether she was supposed to take along an unvarnished wooden coffin, or if she should just see if there were any left. To start with, she needed to find where the coffins were stored. She pressed the button to open the door to the funeral home’s spacious backyard.

An addition to the house stood next to the parking lot. An overhang under which a vehicle could be backed connected the garage and the addition. FLOWERS was written on the door beside the garage. Ilka walked by a large Dumpster with a biohazard sticker, and over by the next door she noticed a small sign: STORAGE.

Ilka walked in. The room seemed cramped. She turned the light on; she was right, the room was filled from floor to ceiling. In the back, two coffins had been stood up, one a light metallic blue, the other in imitation oak. She recognized the American coffins from films, yet these seemed to her even bigger and more pretentious. She also spotted one that was simple and unfinished—surely the one the nun had been talking about. It looked like a coffin from an old Western, rough wood, no carving or decoration whatsoever.

She ran into Sister Eileen on her way back to the garage.

“You haven’t left yet?” the nun asked. It sounded like an accusation.

“I need to talk to Artie before I leave.” She looked for plastic gloves and masks on the shelves. She’d called him several times now, but he hadn’t answered. She tried again, but no luck. “Unless,” she added, “you can come along and help me.”

Immediately the sister shook her head. “I can’t, and calling him will do you no good. He’s gone fishing; he always leaves his phone—”

“I’ve decided I’m going to help until we figure out what to do with the business.” She spoke sharply—too sharply, she thought. “And if I have to bring in a corpse, I will drive the hearse. But I’m not going alone.”

The nun handed her a note. “Pick him up on the way. Drive as far as you can down the last road. The last stretch before the lake is a bit steep.”

Ilka looked at the note and shook her head. Sister Eileen had planned on having her pick Artie up the entire time; she’d been testing her. Ilka was about to say something, but she realized it wasn’t the right time for a show of authority. In fact, right now she had little authority to show. How had it suddenly become her job to pick up a dead person? She hadn’t even eaten since her flight, apart from the chips she’d wolfed down during the night.

She took the note. “I’ll find him. Do I need documents or something to pick up the deceased?”

Suddenly memories from before her father had abandoned them popped up, of him saying, “I have a pickup.” She had misunderstood and asked if he’d forgotten something, but then he explained it was called a pickup when he had to go someplace—a nursing home, for example—to put a dead person in a coffin and drive them to the funeral home. He also explained to her that you didn’t call a dead person a corpse. You always called the dead person “the deceased.” It was all about respect for the person. She had even gone along on pickups, but she’d never been allowed to go inside. She’d sat out in the hearse and waited until he came out with the coffin and rolled it into the back. And by then, the lid of the coffin had been screwed down.