Shadowfires

soon as we realized theft was the
only remaining explanation. They're downstairs right now, in the morgue, and of course they want to speak with you, Mrs. Leben.”
    A soft rhythmic rasping noise was coming from Everett Kordell’s
direction. Rachael opened her eyes. The medical examiner was
nervously sliding his letter opener in and out of its protective
sheath. Rachael closed her eyes again.
    Benny said, “But are your security measures so inadequate that
someone could waltz right in off the street and steal a corpse?”
    “Certainly not,” Kordell said. “Nothing like this has happened
before. I tell you,
it's inexplicable. Oh, yes, a determined person might be clever enough to find a way through our security, but it wouldn't
be an easy job. Not easy at all.”
    “But not impossible,” Benny said.
    The rasping noise stopped. From the new sounds that followed,
Rachael figured that the medical examiner must be compulsively
rearranging the silver-framed photographs on his desk.
    She concentrated on that image to counteract the mad scenes that
her darkly cunning imagination had conjured up for her horrified
consideration.
    Everett Kordell said, “I'd like to suggest that both of you accompany me to the morgue downstairs, so you can see firsthand exactly how tight our security is and how very difficult it would be to breach it. Mrs. Leben? Do you feel strong enough to take a tour of the facility?”
    Rachael opened her eyes. Both Benny and Kordell were watching her
with concern. She nodded.
    “Are you sure?” Kordell asked, rising and coming out from behind
his desk. “Please understand that I'm not insisting on it. But it would make me feel ever so much better if you would let me show you how careful we are, how responsibly we fulfill our duties here.”
    “I'm okay,” she said.
    Picking at a tiny piece of dark lint that he had just spotted on
his sleeve, the medical examiner headed toward the door.
    As Rachael got up from her chair and turned to follow Kordell, she
was swept by a wave of dizziness. She swayed.
    Benny took her arm, steadied her. “This tour isn't necessary.”
    “Yes,” she said grimly. “Yes, it is. I've got to see. I've got to
know.”
    Benny looked at her strangely, and she
couldn't meet his eyes. He knew something was wrong, something more than Eric's
death and disappearance, but he didn't know what. He was unabashedly curious.
    Rachael had intended to conceal her anxiety and keep him out of
this hideous affair. But deceit was not one of her talents, and she
knew he had been aware of her fear from the moment
he'd stepped into her house. The dear man was both intrigued and concerned, staunchly determined to stay by her side, which was exactly what she didn't
want, but she couldn't help that now. Later, she would have to find a way to get rid of Benny because, much as she needed him, it was not fair to drag him into this mess, not fair to put his life in jeopardy the way hers was.
    Right now, however, she had to see where
Eric's battered corpse had lain, for she hoped a better understanding of the circumstances surrounding the body's
disappearance would allay her worst fears. She needed all her
strength for the tour of the morgue.
    They left the office and went down where the dead waited.
The broad, tile-floored, pale gray corridor
ended at a heavy metal door. A white-uniformed attendant sat at a
desk in an alcove to the right, this side of the door. When he saw
Kordell approaching with Rachael and Benny, he got up and fished a
set of bright jangling keys from the pocket of his uniform jacket.
    “This is the only interior entrance to the morgue,” Kordell said.
“The door is always locked. Isn't that right, Walt?”
    “Absolutely,” the attendant said. “You did want to go in, Dr.
Kordell?”
    “Yes.”
    When Walt slid the key into the lock, Rachael saw a tiny spark of
static electricity.
    Kordell said, “There's an attendant-Walt or someone else-on duty at this desk twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. No one can get in without his assistance. And he keeps a registry of all visitors.”
    The wide door was unlocked, and Walt was holding it open for them.
They went inside, where the cool air smelled of antiseptics and of
something unidentifiable that was less pungent and less clean. The
door closed behind them with a faint creak of hinges that seemed to
echo through Rachael's bones. The lock engaged automatically with a hollow thunk.
    Two sets of double doors, both