FADE IN: INT. ST. OLAVE'S HOSPITAL, MORTUARY CORRIDOR, BERMONDSEY, LONDON, MORNING A corridor that was not built to be a waiting room. The walls are pale institutional green, the paint applied in a decade when optimism about public health was still a policy position. A clock on the wall reads 8:14. The date stamp on the admissions board reads: DECEMBER 9, 1952. PORTER WILLIAM HATCH (58) moves between two rooms at the end of the corridor. He is a deliberate man, big hands, soft-soled shoes, the economy of movement of someone who has been doing this job long enough that efficiency has become his natural posture. He carries a ledger. He carries it with the particular weight of something that has gotten heavier than expected. He pushes open the mortuary anteroom door with his shoulder. The room inside: two banks of filing drawers, a desk, a lamp already lit against the grey morning. DR. MORTUARY REGISTRAR HENSHAW (65) sits at the desk. He is writing. He has been writing for some time.