Free Apocalypse Island by Mark Edward Hall Page A

attention focused on the young officer. “What is it you think you saw, Myers?”
    “I’m not sure.”
    “Come on, this is important.”
    Again the officer licked his lips, his eyes darting to Cavanaugh, then back to Jennings. “This is gonna sound stupid.”
    “So what’s new, Myers?” Cavanaugh said.
    “Shut the fuck up, Frank!” Jennings snapped. “Let the officer speak. Tell me what you saw, Myers.”
    “I think it was a...ghost, sir.”
    “A ghost?” Cavanaugh said. “What are you, some kind of fucking fruit loop—?”
    “I said shut up, Frank!”
    Cavanaugh glared at Jennings.
    Myers stared down at his feet in embarrassment. “It was a woman,” he said. “She had on a white gown. Her hair was dark and it hung in her face. Don’t ask me to explain it, because I can’t.”
    “Jesus Christ!” Cavanaugh muttered.
    Jennings gave Cavanaugh a hard stare. “Where did you see this...apparition, Myers?” Jennings asked.
    “Over near the corpse. She had her hands out like she was trying to...” The officer seemed at a loss for words.
    “Convey something?” Jennings said.
    “Yeah, that’s the word. Convey something. And she looked afraid.”
    Jennings nodded thoughtfully.
    “What’s going on here?” Cavanaugh asked, the confusion evident in his tone. He was glancing appraisingly between Jennings and Myers.
    Neither Jennings nor the young officer answered him.
    Another of the uniformed officers had ventured over to the pool. He was standing beside Jennings staring dreamily down at the corpse trying not to breathe through his nose. “Oh...fuck,” he said, raising his hand to cover his mouth, fingers splayed. He did a mechanical-looking about face and vomited on the ground at his feet. His partner turned away, gagging.
    “What the hell’s wrong with you pussies?” Cavanaugh exploded. “Ain’t you ever seen a corpse before?”
    The sick patrolman, whose face was mime-white, said, “Not like that one. And I hope I never do again.”
    “Crime lab’s on the way,” Jennings said. He was still looking at Myers. “Don’t touch anything! They’ll want to scour the area immediately around the body. And if you guys are gonna puke, move back. I don’t want you messing up the scene.” The stench was so powerful that even he was having trouble keeping his breakfast down.
    He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket, clapped it over his face and stood examining the corpse. The body lay on its back, arms fanned out to the sides, legs splayed. The upper half lay partially submerged in the green pool. Nets of dark hair floated around the head like dirty cobwebs. The vacuous eye sockets were open and staring. There seemed to be an uncommon amount of greasy, dark makeup smeared around their orbits. The first victim had looked pretty much the same way and Jennings wondered if the killer had put the makeup there, and if so, then why. She looked like one of those blow-up sex dolls. The mouth was open in an O of surprise, frozen in a silent scream. Jennings’s eyes roamed up and down the body, left to right. A shiver of revulsion rippled through him. He was bothered most by the cross. He’d seen the exact same thing a week ago on a victim strapped to a cross-shaped tombstone at Oak Hill cemetery. And he’d seen a similar one five years ago on a walking trail in Falmouth that he was not supposed to talk about. Now this one, killed in exactly the same way.
    Jennings looked up and glanced around at his surroundings. He turned and did a slow but complete three-sixty. The four other officers watched him carefully. “I don’t think we’ve got ourselves a crime scene here, Frank,” he said finally.
    “No?”
    “No! I think the body was dumped. And I’d say by the look and smell of it that she’s been here a while. Perhaps as long as three or four days. You see that old telegraph pole?” He pointed to an old wooden pole not twenty feet from where they stood on the opposite side of Land Fill Road. There