"Lee Killough - The Existential Man" - читать интересную книгу автора (Killough Lee)

The Existential Man
by Lee Killough
This story copyright 1999 by Lee Killough. This copy was created for Jean Hardy's personal use. All
other rights are reserved. Thank you for honoring the copyright.

Published by Seattle Book Company, www.seattlebook.com.

* * *


The gun muzzle gaped like a cave before the condemned man's eyes. He screamed silently behind his
gag... furious, terrified, disbelieving. I can't really be about to die. He struggled to breathe through his
smashed nose. I can't end here, not like this! In the mud of a riverbank, trussed like an animal for
slaughter. Someone would see them. A full moon shone overhead, for god's sake! Help had to come in
time to save him!
He kicked at his executioner, but his legs, cramped from hours in the car trunk waiting for dark, jerked
without control. The killer cocked his gun.
Terror and fury blazed to incandescence. The condemned man glared over his gag at the shadowed
face. No! I refuse to die! And I sure as hell won't let you get away with what you've done, you
fucking bastard! Somehow, some way, I'll find a way to--
Ripping pain cut off the thought.
***


Sergeant David Amaro shaded his camera lens from the glare of July sunlight off the river. Sweat
trickled down his neck. What the hell had possessed him to volunteer for this floater call? Granted, it
could be worse. At least the sodden body sprawled on the riverbank did not smell.
David focused the lens for close-ups of the shattered, exposed bone where a face had been, then on
the large hole in the forehead. "Do you mind repeating your story once more, Mr. Ballard?"
The fisherman sighed. "My hook snagged off my hat and the current carried it into this backwater.
When I waded in after it I saw-- his face just under the water." The fisherman paused. "Why dump him
where the river's so shallow?"
David shrugged. "Intelligence isn't a prerequisite for crime. Thank you. We won't keep you any
longer."
This fisherman hesitated, glancing from David to the coroner and ambulance attendants, obviously
reluctant to give up the thrill of his part in a police investigation, before picking up his tackle box and
trudging away.
David watched him pass the uniformed officers securing the crime scene perimeter, then turned back
to the river. Had the killer dumped the body in shallow water? The woods marking the normal water
level stood five or six feet back from this year's shoreline.
"How long has he been dead, Doc?"
Dr. Miles Jacobs peeled open the shirt to expose the chest. "Hard to say. The fish have done a job on
all the exposed flesh so he's been in the water a while. Also notice he's mummified. I expect I'll find a lot
of him gone to adipocere. Until the autopsy, my best guess is one to five years."
The skin under the shirt looked dark and leathery. One to five years... but it could be even longer.
David remembered reading of adipocere, fatty tissues changed chemically to waxy material, preserving
bodies for decades. "Do you suppose we can get fingerprints?"
Jacobs examined the clenched fists, cut loose from the wire binding the wrists to a concrete block.
"Maybe. I'll see at the autopsy tomorrow." He stepped back. "If you'll finish we'll pack him up and be on
our way."