Excerpt of Sherlock Holmes and the Body Snatchers by Dean P. Turnbloom

Amos Witherspoon entered the “preparation” room at 4:00pm. He’d received his shipment of arsenic, just as he’d predicted, and after tending to some of the more mundane duties to which a mortician must attend, he made ready to prepare the body of Miss Drake for her return to England.

The sun had already disappeared behind the trees but it would be another fifteen minutes or so before it would set in the southwestern sky of Newfoundland. Amos was used to working after dark, as the sun set quite early in the winter months. In fact, he preferred the dark afternoons of the winter months, especially when he was to prepare a woman for burial.

The preparation room was a small room built into but insulated from the chill room. It communicated with the viewing room through a hidden double door in the wall. This allowed Amos to permit some heat into the room, for his comfort, while preparing the bodies for viewing and subsequent burial. It also had a large skylight. An amateur astronomer, Amos had it installed telling his wife that it would make it easier for him to star gaze on cold Canadian nights.

Amos worked unconcerned about being interrupted. The doors to the mortuary were always closed at 3:30pm sharp and he knew Mrs. Witherspoon, by this time in the afternoon, would be blissfully under the influence of several glasses of merlot, of which he kept her well stocked, leaving Amos quite sure he would be undisturbed. On evenings such as this, when he was graced with the company of a woman in the preparation room, Amos took an early dinner. The ritual consisted of his setting two places, one for himself and one for his ‘guest’, as he liked to term them. Most times he used the side table on which he would later place his instruments. The preparation room was brightly lit by gas jets at regular intervals on the walls. Amos also had candles both on and around the tables. Making himself more comfortable, Amos removed his jacket and placed it over the back of a chair in the corner of the room.

An excellent and thoughtful host, Amos always made polite conversation with his guests, often asking them why they were so quiet, or why they weren’t eating. It was a little game he played and he never ceased to be amused by it. Then, after having satisfied his gastronomic appetite, he made the necessary preparations to satisfy his carnal appetite. After cleaning up the remnants of his meal and removing the fine china to the kitchen, Amos flitted about the room turning down the gas jets and extinguishing candles as he removed his tie, all the while conversing with his guest, entreating her suggestively to prepare herself for what was to come. He had never been rebuffed in this request yet, and his present visitor was by far the loveliest guest to whom he’d yet appealed.

“A new moon makes the stars look all the brighter, don’t you think?” he whispered to his guest as he drew down the sheets, exposing her lovely body to the dim light of the single candle he’d allowed to remain shining. He was fascinated with how fresh the body appeared, surprisingly so considering the length of time since death. But he supposed it was not in small part due to his knowledge and skill as a mortician, not to mention the ameliorative influence of the light from the single candle.

With a genuine affection his thin fingers squeezed her right foot, feeling the cool but pliable flesh. Slowly, he ran them up the back of her smooth leg, wrapping them around her calf up to and behind her knee. He gently pulled it away from the other knee, caressing her inner thigh while his left hand unbuckled his belt, allowing his trousers to fall to his ankles. Leaving them in a bunch on the floor, he climbed up onto the table as he prepared to mount his conquest.

Suddenly he found it impossible to breathe. His first thought was that he was having a heart attack, his second how horrified his wife would be to find his dead, naked body on top of the deceased Miss Drake. The mind is a mysterious thing, for in the split second before he died he thought about these things and still had time to see the pair of white fangs framed within blood-red lips coming toward him, and then he felt the sting of their bite. As his life was sucked from him he experienced an ecstasy unlike anything he had ever known. He thought to himself, a final reward for my work ethic.