The Interrogation of 'Phillip Gregg'

                                              The Interrogation of ‘Phillip Gregg’


3:15 a.m. 
Sheffield, England
         
         “You are well aware of my name, Detective Richter, but I will say it once more and only once more will I say it:  My name is Phillip Gregg, head mortician at Sykes Funeral Home, and yes—I am telling you that a corpse murdered my coworker.”
         Detective Lucas Richter sat down at the interrogation table, straightened his tie, and smoothed out his thin mustache with his thumb and forefinger.
        “I do apologise for not recalling your full name, Mr. Gregg.  I assure you that it will not happen again.  You’ve had a dreadful evening thus far and I do not intend to keep you beyond what is required.  I do, however, intend to ask more questions concerning Gerard Smith and Mr. Cradock.”
         “Firstly, Detective Richter, I cannot understand why you’ve brought me here or why you question me further. Why could we not have concluded this interrogation at the mortuary?  Why is it you intend on harassing me further?  And most of all, why have you shackled me? I’ve already told you what has happened to both Gerard Smith and that wretched corpse, Henry Cradock.  Now may I go, sir?  I’ve other matters to attend.”
         “There is no need to become hostile, Mr. Gregg.  Is that what you think this  is—an interrogation?  My good fellow, I am simply trying to put the pieces of your story together, which, truthfully, I am having a rather hard time doing.  Of course you’re being honest with me; I know.  Of course you’ve told what you perceive to be the truth.  But you must try and understand how your story appears to me: a corpse murdering your coworker?—interpreting this notion would strain anyone’s logic.  Do you actually believe that Henry Cradock, a cold and lifeless corpse, somehow came back to life and afterwards murdered your coworker, Gerard Smith; was that the way of it?”
        “Detective, it cannot be doubted that my account bears no resemblance to logic or rationale as we in this dimension understand it; however I would be dishonest if I were to augment my statement beyond what actually occurred.  I am confident you and your men will recover sufficient evidence that will verify my claim and extricate me from this matter.”
        “We’ve found no such evidence as of yet, Mr. Gregg.  As a matter of fact, your statement— while some of it appears to be true— has a few inconsistencies in terms of what appeared to have happened. Though I’m sure that in good time your memory will become more explicit.  But until that time comes, let us assume for a moment that you did in fact murder—“
        “Mr. Richter!  That is quite enough.  No more will I endure these implied accusations!”
        “Then tell me who murdered Gerard Smith, Mr. Gregg!  You said earlier that you and he were alone in the morgue except for the corpse, which—good God, man— was mutilated beyond recognition.”
        “I am no murderer, but I will not deny that I was overtaken by a compulsion to beat that devilish corpse until he was mutilated beyond classification; to this savage episode I verily admit.  But in so far as my fellow mortician, my good friend, Gerard Smith…”
        Pretending to soothe the suspect’s sorrow, Detective Richter engaged in an amiable technique that had worked for him in the past when trying to get answers.          
      “Perhaps you are right, Phillip—may I call you Phillip?”
        The question did not elicit a response from the interrogated man.  Instead he kept his shackled hands over his face, perhaps obscuring his remorse.  He was cold and weary.  Dried blood encrusted the cuticles of his unkempt fingernails. Strands of his long, grey hair were combed back over his head, while others hung and stuck to the sides of his aged face.  It was quite a pity to view this man, thought the Detective, whom then said, “I’ll interpret your indifference as yes. You’ve lost a good friend and you are visibly shaken.  Let us loosen the formalities some, eh? We need tea, of course, and lots of it.”          
           Detective Richter turned to the guard standing near the closed interrogation-room door and requested that he bring them tea.  The guard left and closed the door behind him; the questions continued. “Now then, I will only ask you once more and then I will let you be.  I cannot release you, but I can at least let you be for a while; we are after all dealing with a homicide.  So why don’t you start from the very beginning and tell me everything you recall about the event.  Start at the point when you and Gerard Smith were in commute to the mortuary earlier this evening.” 
         “Since we are now on a first name basis, Detective Lucas, and since you’ve agreed to ‘loosen the formalities’, then un-cuff me; un-cuff an innocent man, will you?—and I’ll tell you all that I know.”
         “I would be in violation of my duties if I were to unbind you.  But…I suppose that considering what’s happened to you and the merciless pressure the media will put on me if I delay solving this massacre…”
         The guard returned with steam-billowing mugs of tea and placed them on the table, never saying a word.  After being ordered by Detective Lucas Richter, the obeisant guard fetched a key ring from his belt, walked over to the suspect, and, after singling out a miniature silver key, unlocked the cuffs.
         “You’re a good man, Detective; you’ve treated me justly; however I’ve one more request to ask of you.”
         “And that is…?” the Detective asked, feeling a bit violated.
         “The guard must leave.  Have him wait outside.”
         “I may be a ‘good man’, Mr. Gregg, but I’m no fool: He stays.”
         “I’d prefer if you call me Phillip—the ‘loose formalities’, remember? 
         Detective Richter placed his elbows on the table and folded his arms, his eyelids narrowing with suspicion. He then let out a long-winded scoff, turned to the guard, and thrust his nose upward, motioning him to oblige the request.  The guard left the room and shut the door behind him.
         “Satisfied?  Now proceed with your account, unless, that is, you’ve any other requests,” the Detective demanded with a rather bloated sarcasm.
         “Very well then, to preserve my sanity as well as my freedom, I will give my statement yet again.  But I tell you now that I hardly think that restating my account will change your opinion of me or of what actually occurred, primarily because I hardly think it possible for you to fully conceive of the terrors that gripped me with wicked supremacy; it’s still beyond my range of understanding.

                                              --------
         “It was around 11:45 p.m. when we drove from the hospital to the morgue. The weather was much the same as it is now:  rain pelted the earth, thunder grumbled incessantly, lightning illuminated the clouds with silent pulses—but what else is new on this bleak island.  Neither I nor Gerard spoke to one another, for we both had been aroused from sleep and were less than eager to fulfill our on-call obligations with enthusiasm.  The corpse— Mr. Henry Cradock as the paperwork from the hospital identified— lay cold and lifeless on a folding stretcher at the hearse’s rear. 
         When we arrived at the mortuary—Sykes Funeral Home as you already know— I backed the hearse into the garage, disabled the engine, and flipped an automatic switch on a remote control clipped to the visor, closing the garage door.  Here the garage was lit by weak, incandescent lamps mounted on either side of the steal entrance door, through which lies the embalming room, into which Gerard and I rolled the listless corpse.             
         You must understand that over time my profession has diluted most—if not all— fear and apprehension associated with so grim an occupation.  I have seen and witnessed much within the artistic realm of embalming, so I was not, therefore, stimulated by feelings which most people would otherwise deem as being grotesque; but no longer do I maintain this view.  Nevertheless, all was ordinary up to this point, and I wished only to embalm Mr. Cradock and return home to resume sleep.
         The morgue’s fluorescent lighting cast a scrutinizing glow onto the cold, stainless-steel embalming tables, and reflected off of the various surgical instruments—scalpels, thin metal rods, clamps— methodically placed upon white linens. Designed to cut and probe, these instruments are.  After we laboured to position the body on a table, I engaged the latch on the door, while Gerard prepared water to make tea.  We both then shrouded ourselves with white medical gowns and primed our equipment to begin our undertaking.  I believe it was around this moment when the lights flickered, flickered yet again, and then after a brief moment of darkness, resumed its blinding white light.  We attributed this electrical flaw to the storm, which had been steadily growing in strength. I am sure you can attest to the storm that I’m referring to Detective, for no one, whether fully awake or paralysed with sleep, could have escaped its audible ferocity.  From here we continued with our routine and threw back the sheet from the body.
         It was upon revealing Mr. Cradock’s naked body that Gerard first spoke, as was characteristic of him.  At only twenty-two years of age and recently graduating from mortuary school, he had not yet learned to control his morbid curiosity.  He was a brisk lad, often allowing his surly behavior to dictate the course of his actions. 
         “I say, Phillip!—look at this poor soul.  Look how serene and peaceful his eyelids float atop his eyes.”  Gerard diligently scanned the pallid body up and down with an intrigued grin. “It still amazes me how still the dead lay.  Have you ever seen anything so remarkable?”
         I must tell you that Gerard was unusually inspired by the sight of the dead.  I had tried several times before to tame his strange interest, but to no avail.    Yet for the sake of friendship, as well as to pass the time, I decided to chat with him.
         “Hmm, very observant of you, Gerard.  Why don’t we—”
         “And look at this Phillip,” he interrupted, running his bare fingers through the man’s thin grey hair. “Look at how soft and life-like his hair feels.  Do you think—?”  Gerard looked up with a slight notion of concern and asked, “Is something troubling you, Phil?  You look depressed.  What—the misses been holdin’ ou’ on you again?  Pour it on me, Phil. You can talk to me abou’ it; I’m here for you, mate.”
         It warms me to think of his comedic face and his tall, slender frame; an amusing fellow, he was. He never did fail to elicit a grin, always trying to cheer me and the other morticians up.  Though I wanted dearly to burst out in laughter at him trying to counsel me, I tried instead to maintain professionalism, but not too sternly, of course.  He was a good lad—spontaneous and perhaps bipolar to a degree— but a good lad indeed.
         “Gerard, you know how I feel about you harassing the clients.  Put on your gloves and let’s begin shall we.”  But he didn’t listen, which was no surprise—I would just have to endure is enthusiasm, grinning inwardly the whole time.  Unlike his usual charades, which were quite bizarre nonetheless, Gerard engaged in an act that he’d never before displayed.
         Placing his ear closely above the corpse’s mouth, Gerard pretended to listen intently to the cold and sour voice of Mr. Cradock.  After nodding his head to affirm what the dead man had “apparently” said, Gerard whispered softly and secretly to deaf ears.
         “Yes, I agree”
         {‘…’}
         “Well, I’ve mentioned it to Phil, but he doesn’t listen”
         {‘…’}
         “Say again, ‘enry.”
          {‘…’}
         “Wait, speak up. I can barely hear you.”
          {‘…’}
         “Sure, I’ll tell ‘em.”
         
          And as if he’d actually had a genuine conversation with the corpse, Gerard looked at me with a discreet grin, which belied his otherwise solemn face.
          “Phillip.  Mr. ‘enry and I believe that it may be your lack of rigidity that places a strain upon your sex life, which explains your constant moodiness.  He says that he had the same problem with his willy at one point, but then sought medical treatment and now everything is lookin’ up.”  Gerard then rolled his eyes below the old geezer’s waist, leaned in to get a closer look, leaned a little closer still, squinting his eyes more and more.  Then, after abruptly withdrawing his face, he winced, turned his head away, and inhaled with a sharp hiss, as if he’d suffered the misfortune of watching Manchester United slip one in against Sheffield. All I have to say is piss on that lot; bunch of Red Devlin’ wankers, they are.  Anyway, Gerard points to the stiff’s unstiff pecker and say’s, “Oh, my dear Mr. Cradock…Really now, how you could ever be so concerned with such a small burden is beyond me?”
        We both laughed at this remark, which livened my melancholic state.  Although I’ve worked in the funeral business for quite some time, and though I have a notable responsibility as the head mortician, I did not feel guilty for partaking in this moment.  It is rather healthy to include this sort of ill-humour in our line of work, even if comes at the expense of the deceased’s dignity.  But this glorious moment was short lived, for following a monstrous burst of thunder, the lights cut off, filling the windowless room with immaculate darkness, thereby forcing us to search blindly for matches and candles or some source of illumination.  Eventually we found a couple of candles, lit them, and placed them on a wooden table where we’d often break from work to sip tea and play cards.  The orange glow of the candle flames painted a flickering portrait on the walls, filling the room with shadowy wisps, like images of untamed demons dancing crazily to some hideous and sacred rite in the pits of hell. Considering the acuity with which a mortician must apply to his work, we rejected the possibility of continuing under these darkened conditions; we knew that candlelight was far from sufficient to see us through our work.  And so in resigning to wait for the electricity’s return, we both sat at the table, drinking strong tea and playing cards underneath hellish illumination.
         The storm outside had hardly abated in the hour following the power outage; wind and thunder still hissed and hammered with singular violence, neither of us in favour of driving back home in such furious weather.  Meanwhile, we still both sat at the table, myself fully awake after several cups of tea.  I noticed, however, that Gerard Smith’s spirit had gradually declined to some extent.  It, too, seemed as if he’d lost interest in the game, though he should have been wide awake considering the amount of tea he’d consumed.  Despite this I noticed an unnerving look upon his face, and decided to observe him for a while, but he did nothing really, sitting there quietly, often taking intermittent glances in the direction of the corpse and asking me if ‘I heard something?’  And at one point particular, he turned suddenly in his chair, pushing himself away from the table, his handful of cards floating to the ground. 
        His behavior was often erratic, but at this point his demeanour was so urgent and genuine that it sent a brief tremor through me and put me ill at ease.  Gerard then stood, walked over to the embalming table with rising apprehension, merely staring at Mr. Cradock with such devotion that it required me shouting his name three times before he tentatively turned to me and sincerely asked, “You don’t hear that?”  Perhaps I dismissed his worry as being a prank.  Perhaps I dismissed it to suppress my own apprehension; but I simply suggested that we resume our game and that he refrain from ingesting any more tea, which, frankly,  often amplified his flamboyancy.  We sat back down and I dealt. Gerard seemed to care less about his cards, opting instead to stare into the waning candlelight.  I, however, decided to have a pipe, and sat there sipping and puffing for a while, letting my thoughts wonder.
         After becoming intensely aroused by too much caffeine and a full bladder, I rose from my chair and made a few mumbling remarks to Gerard, telling him that I needed to go and have a piss.  Adjacent to the morgue was set of security doors, which led into the mortuary’s back hallway, down which, on the left, was a restroom.  The length of this hall ran deep and dark and always smelled of flowers and ceremonial incense, for this hall flanked both a chapel and visitation rooms, where wakes and funerals were carried out.  I will not expand on the description of this any further—you’ve seen the hallway of which I speak, Detective.
I plunged through the door and into blackness, walking toward the bathroom in the distance, guided only by pulsating candlelight.  As I reached out to open the bathroom door, I looked to my left, back toward the amber glow of the embalming room in the distance, where I saw Gerard Smith silently leaning against the folding door, casually looking in my direction.  Beyond his dark outline, I could scarcely see the pallid face of Henry Cradock angled toward me, looking at me with the tops of his eyelids, though I remembered not placing him in that position earlier.  Thinking nothing of it at the time, I entered the bathroom and shut the door behind me. 
         With my eyes gently closed, warm relief giving me a slight chill, I urinated plentifully.  Zipping up, I returned to the hallway and looked to my right, where Gerard was pacing uneasily back and forth in the morgue, murmuring indistinct rubbish of a sort.  I shouted towards him, my voice labouring through the dense darkness; he looked up with a disconcerted smear upon his face.          
         “I believe there’re a few flashlights inside of the chapel’s storage closet.  I’ll only be a minute,” said I.
         “Very well,” he said, tremulously. “But don’t be long.  I…I keep hearing unusual sounds coming from Mr. ‘enry.”
          So saying, he turned and looked upon the body, whose head, I noticed, was now positioned so that the face was directed toward the ceiling.  Nevertheless, I tried to relieve Gerard’s somewhat vital concern by amusing him, by playing one of his ghoulish little games.
         “It’s probably just post-mortem gas bellowing from either his toothless mouth or his old wrinkled arse.  Either that or he’s pissed about the remarks you made toward his willy.”
         He smiled not. 
         “Just relax, Gerard.  Oh… and uh, stop playing with the body; it’s very unbecoming of you.”
         “But I’m not playing with—”
         “Just relax, mate.  I’ll be back straight away,” I assured him.  I then crossed the hallway and entered the chapel through a set of swinging doors.
         
         The inside of the chapel smelled of wood and antiquity; a quaint combination of old-age and cypress flooring.  Crossing the chancel— over which Jesus hung on a cross, dying— I opened the closet door, hopeful of finding a flashlight or two.  After placing the candle on a closet-shelf, I rummaged through dusty shelves, storage boxes, toolboxes... 
It wasn’t long into my search before I heard an indistinct sound emanating from some inner-place of the funeral home.  Standing motionless, I held my breath so that I could better hear beyond the closet’s dusty silence, beyond the soft sound of moths thrumming here and there.  Holding my breath did not clarify the sound; however it was clarified enough for me to determine that it originated from the direction of the embalming room; it was an insistent clatter that sounded wholly unusual.  And while focusing my ears on the apex of acuity, I heard further sounds, among these being a raspy scream that amplified my dismay.  I decide to return to the morgue to see what mischief Mr. Smith was up to, but was brought to a halt when the electricity suddenly came back  on, animating the building with industrious sounds, revving up the air conditioning units on the roof, flaring up the closet light, which had been left on. 
         Better able to see in the closet, I located one working flashlight, pocketed it (just in case) and blew out the candle,  precisely at which time the power inconveniently relapsed, as if my breath were capable of extinguishing electricity.  Buried in black mystery once gain,  I retrieved the flashlight from my pocket and thumbed it on, spilling a funnel of yellow light that parted the darkness before me, and walked back over the chancel, intent on reaching the hallway and Gerard Smith, who— I dare to say it now—anxiously awaited my return.  But halfway across the chancel I heard something that was quite abrupt and startling; it sounded as though someone was moaning hideously.  So near was this sound that I stopped in place and traced it with the flashlight—someone was slowly opening the chapel door.
         I had never experienced such a warm and intense beating of my heart; so rapid and ominous, it was.  With haste and caution I directed the beam of light towards the partially open door, where I saw blurred movement.
         “Gerard” I cried. “Gerard, is that you?” Only a hideous moan replied.  I wasn’t sure whether to heed caution or reprimand my coworker for extending such a callow charade.  I nevertheless waited upon the chancel, my body shaking nervously and legs wobbling clumsily, I bathed in fear, as if I were next in line to be crucified next to the Son of God.  “Answer me, I say.”  There was no reply.
         Upon this plea, the obscure figure revealed himself, and I must say that never before had I seen such horror written upon any face:  There, amid the flashlights sallow glow, approaching me with eyes of terror and both hands wrapped tightly, wrapped desperately around his neck, Gerard Smith was anxiously trying to speak, but was obviously stifled.  His moans were barely audile yet were filled with a wet and sticky gurgling sound, a dismal sound, full of dire intent—and I could see why.  I rushed to the side of my companion and caught him just as his body collapsed.
         With one arm I held him; in my other hand I wielded the light.  The amount of blood spurting through his tightly pressed fingers and seeping down his already blood-soaked shirt was profoundly shocking.  His tenuous body convulsed with a species of panic that only the dying experience.  His tear-riddled eyes locked with mine, frantically beseeching my aid.  But an attempt to comfort him was absolute folly, for I could think of nothing to say.  As I went to pry his hands away from his neck to assess what tragedy had struck him, hoping to offer any help that I could, his arms gently fell away from his throat and dangled lifelessly at his sides; he exhaled the final breath of his short life with a wheezing sigh, and soiled himself.  I knew that the last of his heart had expired, for no longer was blood spurting from him.  I wiped away a slippery film of blood from his neck and noticed that an incision had been skillfully made directly through his jugular. 
         At this sight I gasped almost girlishly.  My hands were trembling with unwavering fear and were laced with red gore, which already was becoming sticky.  My entrails tightened and suffered unrelenting pangs. With the tips of my fingers, I gently closed his eyelids, staining them with a stamp of his own blood.  I then placed a sorrowful kiss upon his forehead—a bloody shame, the poor lad, his whole life in front of him.  Sentimentality is not an emotion to which I typically subscribe, but I’ll admit that a grieving tear descended along my cheek. The urgent cries of Gerard Smith’s desperation still lingered and reverberated throughout the chapel, like a fading memory being hushed by the passing of time.  But this silence was suddenly broken by that distant sound that I’d heard earlier while in the closet.  Now, however, the sound was more explicit, now it was mounting in volume.  It originated from the embalming room, this I was certain; a chaotic blend of metal objects crashing to the ground and what sounded like cabinets being open and closed with reckless intensity, as if some crazed fiend were in hysterical search of a quelling drug. Crazed and absolute upheaval, it was. I then gathered myself and warily exited the chapel, concentrating more so on myself, the living, rather than my young friend, whom I could no longer help. 

                                                      --------

        “Mr. Gregg, I find your account thus far unbelievable,” admitted the Detective with strong conviction.
         “Am I supposed to take that as a complement or as an accusation of deceit?”
        “You can perceive it as both, Mr. Gregg, for it is a wonderful ‘story. But rest assured there is nothing about you that I find worth complementing, frankly because I don’t believe everything you’re telling me.”
        “Oh? And what is it you don’t believe, Detective?”
        “Just so we are clear on this matter, I will revoke any claims that imply supernatural activity.  I rely on hard facts, Mr. Gregg. Furthermore, how could someone else have murdered Gerard Smith if you two were alone in the mortuary? This is what baffles me most.”
        “You must have omitted Henry Cradock from your pile of facts, Detective.”
Annoyed, the Detective coldly asked, “Do you purposefully mean to mislead me?”
        “Perhaps so, but I have not yet completed my ‘story’ as you so mockingly say.  Now then, as I was saying—
                                                          --------

        Terror brewed strongly within me, yet I was intent on returning to the morgue to ascertain the source of my friend’s demise.  I exited the chapel and silently negotiated the same hallway that I had walked earlier, but now I sidled with my back pressed upon the wall, unable to look down onto the carpeted floor, which surely was pocked with a trail of Gerard Smith’s blood. 
      The flashlight’s meager intensity was incapable of fully penetrating through the darkness and into the morgue, which stood several yards before me, where now the candles—having been extinguished— burned no more, making it a haven for unseen horrors.  Moving cautiously against the wall, I could here subdued clatter emanating from the room and covertly slowing in purpose, as if some nocturnal predator were preparing the final touches to his malicious ambush.  Among these harrowing sounds was one particular that interrupted the growing silence: it resembled a large metal bowl crashing upon the hard ground and wobbling faster and faster and faster still, rising to a crescendo, before finally coming to a rest, but still I pressed on, and with great vigilance.
         It was strange, but halfway down the hall the darkness seemed to drown the flashlight’s ray, seemed to crush it with its empty unknown.  I realised that the batteries were dying, and before long they died altogether, abandoning me in darkness that was thick and suffocating, like drowning in an oily ocean of black ink.  Although the tempest still raged outside, the silence had become stale, still, and completely unbearable upon the flashlight’s failure.  From my pocket I pulled the pack of matches that I had used earlier to light the candles as well as and my pipe.  Lighting one after the other, I noticed that I was nearing the door faster than I had intended.  I wasn’t so ready to confront the murderer of Gerard Smith.
          At merely an arm’s-length away from the threshold, positioned an angle that was off-and-to-the-side of the opening, my back still clutching the wall of the hall, I waited like a vigilant policeman does before delving into peril.  At the height of my reluctance to blindly encounter whatever foe was waiting for me, my heart jumped when an intense wave of fluorescent light spilled from the room and out into the hall, instantly dissolving the darkness in my vicinity—the electricity had once again been restored.
         One thing that should be noted is that I am not a fancier of the supernatural, but standing there in that hallway, I could not refrain from letting my thoughts wonder upon several uncanny possibilities—I could not stop thinking about Henry Cradock.  Anticipating the worse but arming myself with fear, apprehension, and fierce uncontrollable anger, I gritted my teeth, and clenched the handle of my only weapon—the flashlight— and sprang around the threshold into the morgue where…All was still, all was unexpectedly quiet; Mr. Cradock lay there as he had earlier, naked and sickly pale, but—. There were crimson streaks and splashes everywhere, liberally painting the floor and the counters and even Henry Cradock.  This was undoubtedly the blood spewed from the veins of Gerard Smith. 
         I struggle with finding the words, but I suppose hopeless would best represent the emotion seizing me at this point, for before me, affirming the raucous that I’d heard earlier while in the closet and then again in the hallway, there were metal instruments and implements and several other items scattered amid the room: broken chairs and various materials, some coated with blood; the wooden table had been overturned and viciously reduced to a pile of splintered timber; the deck of playing cards littered the floor, some sticking to bloody patches here and there.
         I should point out that the door leading to the garage still remained barred, which would have forbid my unseen foe the possibility of exit.  And unless my assailant lay hidden away in any of the several cupboards in the morgue, there was no other place possible he might conceal himself.  But I need not even mention this, for as I slowly scanned the room, I noticed something from the corner of my eye that was quite bizarre.  I could easily describe the fright consuming at this moment, but instead I will now tell you what you most desire to hear.  I will tell you what possessed me, what provoked me to repeatedly strike that stiff and cold brute with fiendish brutality—and this is why, Detective:
         Through sterile white light, with eyes that burned terribly from fear and sweat, I noticed that Mr. Cradock, though naked and deathly motionless, had a hideous amount of blood caked on his hands.  But far worse than this was the sight of the object in his grip: Secretly placed at his side, I glimpsed the gleaming edge of a scalpel, where light refracted off its razor-sharp edge as he inconspicuously stirred it in his hand.  At this sight, with a primal instinct to live swelling within me, I picked up a length of the splintered table and with both hands drove its jagged edge into the chest of the body, removed it, drove it in again, and again, and again, whereupon I replaced my grip and struck his face with copious ferocity, screaming with unrelenting rage, and for how long this savage episode endured I do not know, but when I regained myself, a tangled pulp of flesh and exposed bone lay before me that, believe me, moved no longer, and the scalpel, which he’d long since released, lay motionless on the floor beside the embalming table.
         You may deem me mad.  You may deem me insane.  But I ask you, Detective, what would you have done in my position?  A little while later, following this mania, I heard a frenzy of sirens gathering outside, which later proved to be the police.  But what confuses me most is how the police were contacted—I did not call them.  Nevertheless, they questioned me for some time and then you, sir, arrived.  And here I am…that is my account, or, if you still don’t believe me—my story.”

                                                              ****
        “Well, Mr. Gregg, I must say that you are a good storyteller, indeed.  For this I applaud you.”  Sitting lazily in his chair the Detective clapped his hands sarcastically, pausing several seconds between each languid repetition.  “Bravo, my good man…Bra-vo.”
        His suspect only smiled with self-assurance. “Why do you mock me, sir?”
        Standing with sudden urgency, knocking over his chair in the process, Detective Richter leaned over the table, pointing an accusing finger into the suspects face. “We have records showing that you…you placed the call.  You do own a cell phone—don’t you, Mr. Gregg?”
        At this the suspect squinted his eyes, as if trying to recollect whether or not he actually did own a phone.  But his response indicated that his thoughts were pondering something else.
        “Sooo, is that how the police were contacted?  I say, he must have phoned them while in the chapel…or while in the hallway.” His vigilant eyes widened.  His face suddenly lit up with understanding. “Yes, the hallway, I’m sure that is where it occurred.  And to think I nearly accounted for it perfectly.”
        Stunned would scarcely describe the look on the Detective’s face. “I’m not quite sure what in bloody hell you’re referring to, Mr. Gregg.”
        “Your instincts are quite pale and weak for a Detective.  Are you always so oblivious?”
        “Excuse me, sir?  I am asking you—you devious fiend—what exactly took place?!”  The Detective was quite vehement with his query, yet received no response.  “Answer me, my patience grows fragile!”
        After a tentative delay of silence, the two of them probing deeply, probing intensely into each other’s eyes, the suspect began snickering in some casual yet sinister tone. 
        “Heh, heh, heh… you’re quite amusing, almost charming, when your temper is inflamed, Detective.”
        “What is this madness, this impish grin upon your face?  What’ve you gone on about?”
        “Will you excuse me? — I must stretch my legs, for they are quite stiff.”
        “You sit back down, Mr. Gregg!!  I assure you I’ve not yet shown how inflamed my temper can become.  Now I will give you one minute and not a moment longer: tell me the truth of things.”
        “I’ve told you as best I recall, or at least, as best I could recall from my position. You see, I’m not a brilliant liar, though I have managed to regale you with both lies and stories at this late hour, Detective Richter.  Some of it is truth.  Some of it is pure conjuration—I will leave it up to you to decide what is what, for after all—you are the Detective.  But… I can solemnly swear on the Queen’s life that Phillip Gregg is innocent of bloodshed.”
    “Regarding yourself in the third-person disturbs me.  Furthermore it secures my belief that you are guilty. GUARD!” demanded the Detective, but his voice penetrated through the interrogation-room door only to travel into an empty hall.  The guard had busied himself with some other work, perhaps off and about getting tea. 
No longer in fear—if ever he was—of retribution, the suspect rose from his chair, and with unstopping haste uttered this:
         “But Detective, before you leave I have one last thing to say regarding the murders that took place this past evening.  It may very well incriminate me, though of what you’ll charge me for and where you’ll detain me, I’m unsure; however it will give you a sense of closure in terms of what really occurred in the morgue between Phillip Gregg, Gerard Smith, and that stiffened fiend.”
         Though he wanted the interrogation to be over, Detective Richter couldn’t end it quite yet.  He was a prostitute for information, even if the prospect of its truth seemed unlikely. 
         “Make it quick, Mr. Gregg.” 
         “Ah, but that is precisely it.  You’ve matched the body of Gerard Smith with his identification, but you’ve not asked to see mine.  So I ask you, Detective Richter: 
Without being able to identify that blood-mangled and disfigured corpse— how do you know the person standing before you is Phillip Gregg?”