we walked into the morgue they led us into a large sub basement room completely bare without even a window with gray walls lit by long neon tubes and that’s where we started to smell that smell and there we sat my brother in law and I waiting for them to bring out Peppinotto after half an hour we heard the squeaking of wheels coming down the hallway that leads to the freezer cells an attendant brought him to us pushing this creaking gurney Peppinotto was completely naked perfectly shaved hair beard body hair all of his skin was startlingly pale an ivory white color against a grayish background and where he had been shot the face was stitched back together it was almost unrecognizable because there was quite a spread in the blast pattern when the pellets hit his face he had this stitching just about everywhere because they hit him in the stomach in his legs everywhere

when I was asked to go with my brother in law Antonio to the morgue in Caserta to dress the poor murdered Peppinotto I accepted almost without question because it was clear to me that in that house there was no one else who could do it because the others were all either women or old men and so I understood no matter what I had to do it along with my brother-in-law even though the thought of it scared me but then once I was there in Caserta in the morgue partly because of the stench and partly because I saw Peppinotto lying there like that naked unrecognizable stretched out on the gurney I just couldn’t move I froze while my brother in law Antonio as calm and unruffled as could be just as if this was the kind of work that he had always done began to dress him methodically from head to foot socks undershirt underpants trousers shoes white dress shirt black tie blazer and all

I couldn’t take it any longer couldn’t stand looking at the corpse because it made me feel ill I had to turn my face away I stood there practically motionless but then I tried to move toward Antonio to help him to do something but luckily he said no there’s no need stay put because if you come over here you’ll feel sick you’ll certainly vomit but the fact that I couldn’t help him made me feel even worse and then Antonio realized how I was feeling and he said you’d better go outside and wait for me just outside the door of the morgue so I went outside and a little time went by and I started to feel better as soon as we both got out of the morgue my brother in law Antonio who had dressed the corpse and made it as neat as could be and all the rest the first thing he did was to duck into a café and order an espresso with two pastries as if nothing had happened just as calm and familiar with death as could be and where the fuck did that come from I wondered to myself