B Gill - Death Drop

THE MORTUARY WAS in the hospital grounds. Fleming had imagined a cement building lurking down one of Marristone's side streets. This place stood high on the Kent cliffs and had been weathered by salt winds. The smell – out here, at least – was the almond of gorse and the tang of seaweed. Gulls swooped in the breeze and the cold sun lay in splashes on his hands. He was perpetually cold as if he walked in heavy breakers through an icy sea. The coldness had started permeating him during the headmaster's longdistance phone call to the Bombay office. In the heat of an Indian afternoon it had crept through his pores with each word spoken.

"David has had an accident. A fall down the hold of a ship at the Maritime Museum."

"Dear sweet Christ! How badly hurt is he?"

A silence for a couple of minutes and then Brannigan's appalled voice had faltered on, "In all my time at Marnstone Grange I've never before had to tell a parent that his son…" He hadn't been able to get it out. The death of a twelve-year-old was an obscenity.

Fleming had caught the first flight to England. Brannigan had met him at Heathrow and he had spent last night at the school house. Through a miasma of anger rather than grief – as yet the wound was too anaesthetised by shock for him to feel – he had listened to Brannigan's explanation. The boys had been in the care of Hammond, one of the housemasters. They were working on a project on maritime history and were given separate assignments on board ship. David's assignment had been on the poop deck. For some reason best known to himself he had gone to the lower deck where the open hatch was. At this point Brannigan had looked away from him. "He had blindfolded himself-an imaginative twelve-year-old playing out an adventure film, perhaps. His hands were free. I have questioned everyone concerned very closely – there was no-one near him at the time."

Fleming, who had until then visualised a rubber-soled shoe slipping on a companionway, felt the new shock like a sword thrust in the gut. If negligence – or worse – could be proved, he had told Brannigan, he would take the school apart brick by brick.

Brannigan, grey-faced, had deferred argument. His tolerance and understanding coupled with Mrs. Brannigan's nervous and highly emotional hospitality were more than he could take. This morning, after one night at the school, he had arranged accommodation at The Lantern, one of the inns at Marristone Port. Brannigan's offer to accompany him to the mortuary he had crisply declined.

"Then let Dr. Preston go with you. It's too much of an ordeal to face on your own. I had arranged for the three of us to be there at eleven."

It was necessary to see the doctor. He had agreed to that.

It had already gone eleven. He began walking restlessly along the cliff path. The doctor was late. God damn them all in this place. And then he heard a car coming and retraced his steps.

There were two cars drawing up in the parking area by the mortuary. The first was a sleek, maroon Dolomite. The second a rusty black Morris Minor. Whoever was in it stayed in it. The owner of the Dolomite came to meet him – a big, balding man in a grey tweed suit.

He thrust out his hand. "Mr. Fleming? I'm sorry you had to wait. I assumed you'd be at the school house."

"Under the circumstances?"

"Both Brannigan and his wife are deeply distressed."

"Naturally… the reputation of the school…" It was vicious.

"That, too – but not just that. They're caring people. You malign them."

"Let's get on with it, shall we?"

Preston walked with him towards the mortuary. "There aren't any adequate phrases of sympathy. I'm sorry. We all are. The only consolation I can offer is that David died instantly and without pain. The fall broke his neck. I know that without a post-mortem, but the post-mortem will confirm it. I don't expect the pathologist to find anything else."

He pushed open the mortuary door and called out for Gamlin who was in the office off the main corridor. Gamlin, who had been smoking, stubbed his cigarette out on a tin lid that had once held adhesive tape.

Fleming smelt tobacco and formalin. The corridor was painted green and had a stone floor. Double doors with glass insets led off it into the main room. He had steeled himself to accept a clinical' filing system of bodies in metal drawers, but if they were there they were tactfully out of view. In an alcove at the end of the room and partly hidden by a white screen was a hospital trolley. The small form on it was covered by a sheet. For a moment he stood in the middle of the room and couldn't move forward.

Preston said quietly, "You'll see him as.you remember him – but take your time."

He began walking again. This time up to the trolley. The sheet was over David's face. He drew it back slowly. There were dark marks about the temples just below the springing fair hair. A small cut above the left eyebrow was a tiny line of mauve. Dark eyelashes lay thickly against the smooth freckled skin as if he slept. But this was no sleeping face.

This was nothing. Something loved. Something gone. David. Not here. Nowhere.

A shaft of sunlight came through the high window and lay across the trolley. It touched the skin with false colour as if nature tried to make amends.

Preston was at his side. "Did you want a priest? It didn't occur to me you might."

"No."

"Do you want to stay awhile? Gamlin will fetch you a chair."

"A few minutes – no chair -just leave me."

He stood emptily by the trolley. What words now, David? Your hand is a stiff ball of ice. I'm touching it. It's colder than mine.

I love you – wherever you are.

That goes on.

He turned at last and walked through what seemed a Siberian wilderness or non-reality towards the main door. There was a girl standing there – not looking at him – looking at David. She was carrying wild flowers – a rough posy of harebells and pinks. She was walking over to the trolley – standing there – putting the flowers on the white sheet – still standing there. Now walking away, her face awash with tears.

Outside he felt the bite of the wind and heard the distant roar of the sea. He went over to the sea-wall and tried to struggle back to some awareness of his own personal identity.

He turned and looked back at the mortuary. The doctor ' and the girl were standing by the door waiting for him – but giving him time. He went back to them. The girl, precariously calm, had stopped crying. Her lips were tight with tension and she avoided looking at him.

Preston introduced her. "This is Jenny Renshaw from the school. She's the matron and she knew David. She wants me to apologise for the way she walked in – intruded on your grief. But she cared about him. And she had the flowers." He remembered Gamlin's furious expression. Wild flowers in a mortuary – petals on a corpse. He had steered her out before Gamlin's annoyance could explode into words. He added, smiling at her, "Her function is to be around. To drive you wherever you want to go."

She found her voice at last and the words came out thickly, "Or to leave you alone. If you can't stand being with anyone – then say so."

Her perceptiveness touched him so that he could almost feel human. The rejection that had begun to form in his mind became a reluctant acceptance. He didn't know he needed human companionship, but he was beginning to know it. She had wept for David. She was the first who had shown any genuine emotion for David.

There was a bond.

He thanked her briefly.