Squelch by John Halkin

through her whole being, followed by a heartfelt cry of pity.
    ‘Oh, you poor thing!’ Ginny’s eyes filled with tears. ‘Oh, I hope you didn’t suffer too much! I should have listened to you.’
    ‘This is what we wanted to avoid.’ Jameela reappeared at her shoulder, reprimanding her sharply. ‘Come on now. Let’s go.’
    ‘It wasn’t deliberate!’ Ginny straightened up. There was an edge to her own voice too. ‘But now I’ve seen it, I want to know where else they attacked her.’
    ‘Then you must ask your brother-in-law.’
    ‘I’m asking you, Jameela. It’s not idle curiosity. These caterpillars will attack again. We’ve got to know what we’re fighting against.’
    Jameela softened her approach, as if humouring a fractious patient. ‘Please, Ginny, don’t make things awkward for me,’ she coaxed, taking her arm in an attempt to lead her away from the body. ‘I’ve got to get back. I’m on duty. Can’t we leave Mrs Kinley in peace now? You’ve paid your respects.’
    ‘Peace?’ A slight movement beneath the sheet caught her eye. She pointed to it. ‘Is that what you call peace?’
    It was no more than a faint ripple in one of me folds in the material. If Ginny had not turned to face the doctor she might not have noticed it at all.
    ‘Well,
doctor
?’
    Jameela took a step back and an expression of disgust crossed her face.
    ‘I shall report this to the registrar,’ she said, obviously upset. ‘They’ve had rats once before in this mortuary, but we were told they’d cleared it up. Apart from anything else, it’s a health hazard.’
    ‘Rats?’ There was another movement, as if the corpse were flexing its thumb under the blue shroud. ‘That’s too small for a rat.’
    Before Jameela was able to stop her, Ginny had peeled back the sheet. Naked on the slab, Mrs Kinley’s body was a pitiful object. The upper sections of her legs, her groin and abdomen were pitted with deep red craters of raw flesh where the caterpillars must have eaten into her. One was still there, emerging slowly from a wound an inch or two above her navel.
    Swallowing hard, Ginny somehow managed not to be sick. Jameela clung to her, exclaiming something in her own language which sounded like a prayer. Her eyes were wide with horror as she stared at it weaving malevolently this way and that.
    ‘That’s what they look like?’ The fear in her voice was undisguised.
    ‘They’ve been feeding on her!’ Ginny cried out harshly, breaking loose from her grip. ‘Don’t you see? Like so much carrion!’
    Her words echoed through the mortuary and the sound must have disturbed the porter who had opened up for them, because he put his head round the door.
    ‘Everything okay in there?’
    ‘No.’ Jameela spoke coldly, her emotions now tightly under control again. ‘Take a look at this.’
    ‘If anything’s wrong it’s not my responsibility,’ the man grumbled, ambling past the slabs towards them just the same. ‘Not the mortuary. That’s not one o’ myduties.’
    He reached them just as the caterpillar decided to make another effort to heave itself out. Under the hard strip lighting the bright green of its long hairs seemed exceptionally brilliant.
    ‘Jesus!’
the man swore, taken aback. ‘That’s not good, is it? Never seen anything like that before. Them rats was more’n I could stomach, but they only nibbled at the feet. What d’you think it is?’
    ‘It’s a caterpillar,’ Ginny told him. As if it wasn’t only too obvious!
    ‘Rum sort o’ caterpillar, doin’ that.’
    ‘Don’t touch it!’
    He had stretched out his hand, but he jerked it back rapidly at the note of panic in her voice.
    The caterpillar was moving again, bunching up its body, then pushing forward over the dead woman’s skin. It seemed oddly sluggish, Ginny thought as she remembered the one which had investigated her stomach – God, was it only yesterday? So alert, that one had seemed, but this was dopy in comparison.
    Or