CHAPTER SIXTY
Polidori sliced the scalpel down the center of Master Aldridge’s belly from sternum to pubic bone. The body was sparse of hair, with softening muscle tone, grey in pallor. The stomach was plump with venison and vegetables. The arteries, veins, and heart were empty, as expected. By the third hour of the autopsy Polidori was sewing his incisions back together. Not with the thick needle and coarse twine of previous autopsies, but with a fine needle and cotton thread from his own sewing kit. The loops were close and tight, the interconnecting knots tenderly secured below the line of the flesh. The neck was harder to reconstruct, with torn musculature splayed out. However, the underlying muscle and sinew was intact. Polidori twisted it back into shape, molding it around the spine
