touched. What rooms he was in,” Walker said.
“We’d better get him over here to show us. I’m assuming he has the key, so we won’t have to damage the door.”
Liddell gave Jack a questioning look. “You sure that’s a good idea?”
“It would be helpful,” Walker agreed. “And he’s already been inside once.”
Jack grinned. “Yeah. Why should we have all the fun?”
CHAPTER TEN
Dr. John Carmodi, known simply as Doc, or Dr. John, was a forensic pathologist by trade, but his hobby was collecting antique ambulances and lovingly restoring them. In his job he took bodies apart to see why they had quit working. He was proud of what he did, but it didn’t satisfy his creative spirit like taking apart an old ambulance and bringing it back to life. People thought it strange that a medical examiner would own a hearse, but it was no different from a cop owning a donut shop, as far as he was concerned.
That Sunday morning Dr. John had been looking forward to working on a recently purchased 1962 Pontiac hearse that was first off the line when limo builder Stageway merged with the Armbruster factory in Fort Smith, Arkansas, in 1962 to form Armbruster Stageway. Most people thought of hearses as Cadillacs, Lincolns, or Mercedeses, and all of those were built on a Pontiac body manufactured between 1960 and 1974, so he had a real collector’s item. Now he had to find parts, match the original paint and carpeting, a headlight, and it would be ready for the Frog Follies in the next year or so.
He owned two other hearses, and he was driving one of these, a 1963 Pontiac Superior Ambulance, almost identical to the one that transported John F. Kennedy’s body after the assassination in Dallas. He hardly noticed the stares he was getting from other traffic as he took the road to Illinois.
He knew he was close to his destination when he drove by a road sign that declared, “Welcome to Harrisburg,” and beneath that, “Home to 4,000 nice people and one old grouch.” Painted on the sign was a hillbilly with a straw hat, missing teeth, wife-beater shirt, and no shoes, holding a jug of whiskey. It made him think of something Jack Murphy would say: “He’s got summer teeth. Summer there, ’n’ some ain’t.”
Although his medical practice was based in Vanderburgh County, Dr. John’s job as a forensic pathologist took him to several adjoining counties. This time he was responding to a request from the coroner in Saline County, Illinois. He was just entering Harrisburg when he got the call from Lilly. A woman’s dismembered head and an arm, presumably from the same body, awaited him upon his return at the Evansville morgue.
He turned onto Main Street and looked for the coffee shop, which, according to Harrisburg detective Mike Jones, was the only thing in town that was open on Sunday. After the two-hour drive from Evansville, he needed a strong cup of coffee, and Jones had assured him it was strong enough to stand a spoon in.
He had never met Jones, but there was only one customer inside, a man in his forties sporting an old-fashioned brush cut, his hair graying on the sides. He was heavily muscled, as evidenced by his black knit shirt straining at the seams. He reminded Dr. John of the Hulk, only shorter.
“Dr. John,” Detective Jones said, extending a hand.
Dr. John took the offered hand and felt the heavy calluses and strength in it.
“Saline County ain’t big but it can boast two things, Doc. It’s home to the smallest post office and the biggest Kentucky Fried Chicken in the United States,” Jones said. “Backwater, USA. But having said that, I’ve got to show you something.”
They ordered their coffee and Jones led Dr. John outside. “We can walk from here,” he said, and they hoofed it half a block to a brick building with boarded-up windows and a sign over the door that read FRED’S. Jones had a key to the door and led him inside.
Dr. John checked out the tiny morgue and thought it looked like an old-fashioned meat market, evidenced by the scarred chopping-block table, steel counters and sinks, and the door to a walk-in freezer.
Jones said, “If you’re thinking this looks like an old meat market, you’d be right. The county bought it after Fred went out of business. It’s not state of the art, but it has what we need.”
Jones opened the freezer door and Dr. John’s eyes went wide as