Free Angel of Darkness by Katy Munger Page B

the horizon.
    Sunrise changes everything and it was no exception that day. As the first rays cleared the hill behind Holloway and sent fingers of sunlight creeping across the lawn, I saw a crumpled shape slumped beside the brick of the courtyard fountain. The shape had barely registered as a human being when Harold’s screaming began.
    â€˜Harold Babbitt sees a dead man!’ he cried as he dashed across the lawn, making a beeline for his unit. ‘Harold Babbitt sees a dead man!’
    I knew Harold had been out walking, as he often did at daybreak, hoping to spot some of the rabbits that lived among the bushes on the edges of the lawn. He must have seen the same shape that caught my eye and marched over to investigate. He had wasted no time sounding the alarm, but Harold was always announcing his discoveries. No one paid attention at first.
    Still shouting, ‘Harold Babbitt sees a dead man,’ he reached the long-term building, flung open its doors and began shouting bloody murder. Soon, a stream of nurses, aides and curious patients ran out to see if Harold had actually seen anything or was simply suffering another episode.
    I beat them to the fountain. Harold Babbitt had indeed seen a dead man. I did not know his name, but I recognized his face – it was the red-haired orderly who had fought with Otis Parker the day before. He was sprawled across the brick walkway in front of the fountain, his legs bent at unnatural angles. His body had been propped on its side and his broken legs folded into place to make it look as if the aide was trying to run backwards.
    Like an old-time cartoon. One someone my age or older would have seen.
    Since I have begun my wandering life, I have borne silent witness at many a crime scene. Murders almost always leave behind a mixture of the same feelings – surprise, betrayal, fear, rage, and shock – albeit in different proportions each time. These emotions hang in the air and entwine around me in my twilight world until, gradually, they fade away, I think because the victim has moved on, taking the last vestiges of life with them. But I had never felt a crime scene quite like this one. I could sense urgency, a trace of love and then . . . nothing. Nothing at all.
    I tried to put it all together. It was as if the orderly had gone from being here to not being here, all in a millisecond, with no time to struggle and no time to reflect on what he was leaving behind.
    Yes, that was it. The red-haired orderly had not known the attack was coming. He had never even heard his killer approach. He had been hit from behind, his neck broken in an instant before he dropped like a stone to the courtyard below. The killer had lingered long enough to break his legs after death and to arrange them in their strangely mocking position. That odd touch had been clinical and, to the killer at least, necessary. But the killing itself had not been a murder of passion. It had been one of expediency. Someone had needed him gone – and I was certain it was either Otis Parker or his partner.
    Then I wondered if the red-haired orderly had been Otis Parker’s partner. Had he killed Darcy Swan and been killed by Parker in turn to keep him from betraying their connection?
    No, I did not think so. There had been nothing between the orderly and Otis Parker but a mutual hatred. It had been pure and absolute. There were no secrets binding them. Besides, how could Parker have done it when he was locked up in the maximum security ward?
    I decided to make absolute sure that Otis Parker was still confined to his unit. I found him fast asleep in his bed, his face as serene as a child’s in innocent slumber. No nightmares tortured Otis Redman Parker. Quite the opposite. Otis Parker was the nightmare.
    But I did not think it was a coincidence that the red-haired orderly lay dead a day after hassling Parker. No way in hell. But if Otis Parker had not killed him, then who was roaming the