Chapter 28
IF I EVER OPENED a funeral home,” said Chambers, “I’d sure as hell change my last name first.”
“Is there something wrong with the name?” Pendergast asked, as he eased the Spyder into one of the last free parking spaces in front of the funeral home né Victorian mansion.
“Kroker Brothers Funeral Home?” said Chambers, pointing at the sign with a laugh.
“Is croaker a term of the vernacular? I’m not familiar with it.”
Pendergast, Chambers mused, was a man out of time, strangely oblivious to the modern world of 1994.
They had driven straight from Penumbra, not wasting time by calling ahead and possibly being put off. Their week’s break was drawing to a close, and Chambers felt confident it would be nice to stride triumphantly into the office with a big, fat closed case—rather than simply slink back to his desk.
He led the way, Pendergast following. Entering the foyer, he could see there was a viewing in progress in an elegantly appointed room to one side.
Standing in the doorway was a short man in a black suit, hands clasped in front of a large, smooth belly, his glossy black hair slicked back.
A pencil mustache completed the picture.
He turned as they approached, holding out both hands as if preparing to clasp theirs in a sympathetic embrace. “I am so sorry for your loss.”
Instead of holding out his hand, Chambers grasped his lanyard and held it up. “Mr. Albert Kroker?”
Kroker stared at the ID. “FBI? What’s this about?”
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” said Chambers, in a low voice, “but we have some questions of an urgent nature. Is there a quiet place we can talk?”
“Can’t you see we’re in the middle of a funeral?” Kroker hissed, his face screwing up with annoyance, all signs of phony sympathy vanishing.
“I do apologize,” said Chambers in a low voice, “but this can’t wait.”
“It certainly can wait,” Kroker whispered. “You have no right to barge in here like this, with no notice whatsoever. Do you have a warrant?”
“We’re not here to search the place,” said Chambers. “Just looking for a little friendly cooperation.”
“And I will be glad to cooperate when my own schedule allows. Good day, gentlemen. The door is over there.”
Now Pendergast stepped forward. Chambers wondered how he was going to handle this one. He’d been astonished at the sugary ooze of charm in which Pendergast had smothered the sheriff; he wondered if the manager would get the same treatment.
“Special Agent A. X. L. Pendergast,” he said in a loud voice, holding out his hand.
“Federal Bureau of Investigation, New Orleans Field Office.” He seized Kroker’s hand before the man could move it away and gave it a vigorous, seemingly endless shake.
“We’re investigating an unfortunate—a very unfortunate—incident that occurred here five years ago, and we’d like to ask you a few questions. Voluntarily, of course.”
Pendergast’s curiously penetrating voice had reached every corner of the next room, and the entire audience of bereaved people had turned and were staring. Even those shuffling past the coffin had stopped in their tracks.
“For God’s sake, man, your voice—!” Kroker began, in a furious undertone.
“Now, Mr. Kroker,” Pendergast went on, speaking over him even more loudly, “I ask again: is there a private place where we can speak about this unhappy occurrence, or shall we talk here?”
Kroker moved swiftly from the doorway. “This way,” he said, walking fast on stubby legs. “Follow me, and for heaven’s sake keep your voice down!”
They followed him down a long hallway and into a small room.
Once they were all inside, Kroker shut the door and turned on them, face furiously red, practically spitting as he talked.
“What the devil do you mean by bursting in here and interrupting a funeral? I will register a complaint with your superior!”
At this, Pendergast turned to Chambers. “He would like to register a complaint with you, Agent Chambers.”
Chambers turned to the man. “Look, Mr. Kroker, I do apologize for the intrusion, but we’re investigating a serial killer who may have murdered scores of people over the last decade.
We need some questions answered. We will either get them answered here and now, or we’ll subpoena you and get those answers down in New Orleans. Your choice.”
“I’m outraged at this conduct!”
“So I can see,” said Chambers calmly, taking out his pocket tape recorder and placing it on a table. “Now, shall we sit?”
Kroker sat down and they did likewise.
Chambers went through the preliminaries, then asked: “Mr. Kroker, five years ago you handled the funeral of a man named Bernard Montcalm, thirty-five years old, a construction worker who died in a fall. Do you recall it?”
Silence.
“There was an incident in the graveyard,” said Chambers, “that generated a criminal complaint against your funeral home for abuse of a corpse. Perhaps that will help jar your memory.”
“It was a ridiculous complaint, and it was immediately dropped. The family’s attempt to weasel their way out of paying—that’s what it was!”
Chambers nodded. “I can’t speak to that. But it appears the corpse was missing an arm, which was discovered when the coffin fell into the open grave and broke apart.”
“Dropped by the drunken trash I hired as pallbearers!”
“Let’s focus on the missing arm. It was never recovered, is that correct?”
“Never.”
“The body was embalmed and prepared in your mortuary, which is in the basement of this building—correct?”
“Yes.”
“But you can attest to the fact the body arrived with both arms, and somehow during the embalming process the right arm disappeared—correct?”
“Look here. If you’re trying to imply that my mortuary business—”
“Mr. Kroker,” said Chambers, “we’re not implying anything or casting aspersions on your business. We’re simply looking for answers. I can assure you, none of this will be used to revive the complaint against you.”
Kroker adjusted himself angrily in his chair. “I have no idea what happened to the arm.”
“But something did happen between the time the body arrived and the time it reappeared for burial.”
“I can’t say that for sure. No one can. All I can say for sure is that, when the body fell out of the casket, it was missing an arm.”
There was a brief silence. Then Pendergast began again. “At that time, how many people did you employ in the mortuary?”
“I fired them all after that. Cleaned house.”
“Very well. Who were they?”
“I had an embalmer, two mortuary science technicians, and a crematory technician. And the pallbearers, of course, who worked on a standby basis.”
“You fired them all?”
“The crematory technician wasn’t on the premises, so I kept him, fired the rest. It was outrageous—no one could tell me what happened to that arm. I was as shocked as everyone.”
“And may we have their personnel files? If you need a minute, we can wait.”
A brief silence.
“You can leave out the pallbearers for now, if your memory isn’t clear,” Pendergast went on.
“I remember their names. All of them. It was a horrific incident, and I’ll never forget it.
There was Marc Bloomquist, the embalmer, along with Parker Wickman and Carlos Medina Michelson, who were the mortuary science technicians.
Fired the whole lot of them. Pallbearers, too.
” He had risen and was pawing through a file cabinet in the rear of the small room.
“If asked, could you single out a potential suspect among the three who had possible access to the corpse?”
“No. They all came with good references, and I’d never had problems with their work before.
I had no idea one of them could have done something like this…
that is, if one of them did it. There’d been some grumbling about pay—that was the only thing I could think of.
I thought it might be a way to get back at me.
” He handed them a few battered files, then stared at them with tiny, hostile red eyes as they leafed through them. “Are we finished?”
Chambers looked at Pendergast.
“I’m finished,” said Pendergast cheerfully.
“Thank you. I will be making that complaint. You know where the door is—please leave without making any further disturbance. I will now rejoin the viewing you so grossly interrupted.” He got up and left.
In the room, Chambers turned to Pendergast—who had shown no inclination to rise from his chair. “Wickman… the name rings a bell.” The photo in the personnel file had shown a man with an unusually long face, like that of an Irish setter.
“According to this, he was only employed a few months at the funeral home before being let go.” Pendergast paused.
“If you recall, while looking at those antique maps of the Grand-Morte Swamp, you noted an old mansion labeled Wichman House. I believe it was roughly seven miles as the vulture flies from where the two women saw Drakos being recaptured.”
Chambers stared. “Jesus. You think Wickman’s the killer… and that old place in the swamp is his safe house?”
“I certainly do,” said Pendergast.
“Many of those maps are fifty years old. The hurricane wasted the nearby town, and it never recovered. Hell, I don’t think there’s even a road leading into that area.”
“Shall we find out?” Pendergast pulled out his pocket watch and glanced at it. “We have four hours of daylight left—just time enough for a lovely miasmic excursion.”