Mercy Falls by William Kent Krueger Page A

with a big belly and a bald head, in his early sixties. He greeted Cork, then glanced at the other people on the porch.
    “These are the Jacobys, Sigurd. Family of the man Tom autopsied today. They’d like to see the body.”
    “That’s not a good idea,” Nelson said. “Tom’s finished the autopsy, but he hasn’t repaired the body yet.”
    “Is Tom downstairs?”
    “No. He went out for a bite to eat. He was going to finish up when he came back.”
    “We’ll come back,” Cork said.
    “We’re here,” Jacoby said. “We’ll see him now.”
    “Lou Jacoby,” Cork said by way of introduction. “Edward Jacoby’s father.”
    Sigurd Nelson addressed the man firmly but civilly. “With all due respect, you don’t want to see your son’s body right now.”
    “If you try telling me again what I want, I’ll shove one of your coffins up your ass. Take me to my boy.”
    It wasn’t so much that Nelson was cowed by Jacoby. Cork figured he probably decided a man with that attitude and those manners deserved to get exactly what he asked for. The mortician allowed them inside. Ben Jacoby signaled for Tony to accompany them, and the tall driver followed.
    Nelson led them down a hallway. He lived upstairs with his wife, Grace, but the first floor was all business and included a large room used for memorial services, several viewing rooms, and a display room for coffins. At the end of the hall, he opened a door and they followed down a flight of stairs to the basement, which was divided into a number of rooms, all with closed doors. Nelson went to the last room, swung the door wide, turned on the light.
    “Wait here just a minute,” he said and disappeared inside. Shortly, Cork heard the flap of a sheet snapped open and the rustle of linen being arranged, then Nelson reappeared at the door. “All right.”
    Cork had seen the room many times before. It always reminded him of a laboratory. The walls were sterile white, the floor shiny red tile. There were cabinets with glass fronts through which shelves of plastic jars and jugs and glass bottles were visible. In the middle of the room stood a white porcelain prep table. It was old. Cork knew most prep tables were stainless steel now. Near the table was a flush tank and a pump for the embalming fluids. Beneath the table, the red tile sloped to a large floor drain.
    The body lay on the table fully covered by the sheet the mortician had just positioned. Dark stains spread slowly across the white fabric.
    “It won’t be pleasant,” Nelson said.
    Jacoby paid him no heed. He walked forward stiffly, reached out, and drew the sheet back from Eddie’s head. His son’s face was bloodless, chalk white, but relaxed as if he were only sleeping. Which might have been a perfectly acceptable sight had Edward Jacoby still had a whole head. In his autopsy, Tom Conklin had slit the skin along the back of Jacoby’s head from ear to ear, pulled the scalp forward over the face, opened up the skull as neatly as a tin can, and removed the brain.
    “Oh God,” Ben Jacoby said, and looked away.
    Cork had been present at a lot of autopsies, and the sight didn’t bother him. He figured it would be plenty to turn Lou Jacoby away, but the man surprised him. He drew the sheet back completely, exposing the raw, open, empty body cavity.
    “Dad.” Ben reached to steady his father.
    “Leave me be.” Jacoby stepped back, faltering. A tremor passed through him like a quake along a fault line. His hands shook and his jaw quivered. He squinted as if a bright light had struck his eyes, but he uttered not a word as he walked from the room.
    The driver had not come in but had hung back, waiting in the corridor.
    “Stay with him, Tony,” Ben said. He turned to Cork and Sigurd Nelson. “I’m sorry. He’s a man who gets his way.”
    “We need to talk,” Cork said.
    “How about not here,” Nelson suggested, and ushered them out.
    In the hallway, Lou Jacoby stood staring down the basement corridor