He looked down between the first two rows of frozen corpses. Warily he took two steps to the right and looked down the middle row. He could see the bare light bulb in the rear of the compartment. Glancing back at the door, he took several more steps to the right so he could look down the last corridor.
Susan’s fingers were losing their grip around the overhead track in the back of the second row of corpses. She did not know D’Ambrosio’s position, not until he called the second time.
“Come on, sweetheart. Don’t make me search this place.”
Susan was sure that D’Ambrosio was at the head of the last row. She knew it was now or never. With all the force she could muster, she pushed with her legs against the back of the wizened female cadaver in front of her. By holding onto the track above, Susan had lifted her legs up and coiled them against the old woman’s back. Her own back was pressed against the rock-hard chest of the last cadaver in the row, a two-hundred-pound black male.
Almost imperceptibly at first, the entire second row of frozen corpses began to move forward. Once the initial inertia was overcome, Susan was able to lunge with her feet, imparting a terrific thrust. Like a row of dominoes the entire group of bodies slid forward on their ball bearings.
D’Ambrosio’s ears picked up the sound of the movement He held himself still for a fraction of a second, trying to locate the weird sound. With the swiftness of a cat, he whirled and retreated toward the door. Not fast enough. As he stepped past the third row, he saw the movement. Instinctively he raised his gun and fired. But his attacker was already dead.
Coming at D’Ambrosio with surprising speed was a ghostly white male whose lips were frozen in a horrid half-smile. Two hundred pounds of frozen human meat slammed into the hit man, sending him crashing into the side of the freezer. In rapid succession the other corpses tumbled after the first, several falling from their hooks, creating a huddle of corpses, a tangle of frozen extremities.
Susan let go of the track, dropping to the floor. Then she ran for the open door. D’Ambrosio was trying to pull the bodies off himself. But he was in pain and had little leverage. The reek of embalming fluid was choking him. As Susan passed he tried to grab her. He struggled to free his gun and aim but it caught in the gnarled hand of a corpse.
“Fuck!” shouted D’Ambrosio as he used all of his might against oppressive weight of dead flesh.
But Susan was through the door.
D’Ambrosio was upright now. Pushing the toppled bodies right and left, he flung himself at the closing door. But outside it Susan was pushing with all her might, and the momentum of the insulated door carried it home. The latch clicked. Susan fumbled with the stainless steel pin. Inside, D’Ambrosio was grabbing for the latch release. Susan beat him by a fraction of a second as the pin dropped home.
Susan backed up, her heart pounding. She heard a muffled cry. Then there was a thud. D’Ambrosio was shooting into the door. But it was twelve inches thick. There were several more ineffectual thuds.
Susan turned and ran. She finally understood the reality of the danger she had been in. Trembling uncontrollably, she fought back tears. She had to find help, real help.
Thursday, February 26, 2:11 A.M.
Beacon Hill was definitely asleep. As the cab turned off Charles Street onto Mount Vernon and drove up into the residential area, there were no people, no cars, not even any dogs. The lights in the windows were few; only the gas lamps suggested that the area was populated, not deserted. Susan paid the cab driver, then looked up and down the street to see if anyone was following her.
After escaping from D’Ambrosio in the freezer, Susan was terrified and decided not to return to her room. She had no idea if D’Ambrosio was working alone or with an accomplice, but she was in no mood to find out. She had run out of the Anatomy Building, crossed in front of the Administration Building and had reached Huntington Avenue by passing the School of Public Health. At that hour it had taken fifteen minutes to find a cab.